Bitcoin Billionaires: Book review

Today, I am doing a special session. It&#8217;s a review of a book called Bitcoin Billionaires by Ben Mezrich.&#160;<br/><br/>Accessibility: A<br/><br/>Learning: A<br/><br/>Enjoyment: A&#160;<br/><br/>Overview<br/><br/>Bitcoin Billionaires is one of those books you could see being made into a movie. It&#8217;s not that far fetched given that the author, Ben Mezrich, also wrote the award winning &#8220;Social Network&#8221;, the movie about Facebook. In some ways, it feels like Bitcoin Billionaires continues that story except the focus is now shifted to the Winklevoss Twins.&#160;<br/><br/>Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss became famous as the tall, Harvard-educated, Olympic rowers who alleged that Mark Zuckerburg ripped them off while founding Facebook. The author weaves the bold story of how the twins became among the first bitcoin billionaires along with a colorful dose of bitcoin history. The Winklevoss twins founded Gemini, one of the largest US based crypto-exchanges and Nifty Gateway, a leading NFT marketplace. The book lays bare the tension between ideologues like Ronald Ver and businessmen like Tyler and Cameron. Additionally, key developments like the Mt Gox hack and the Cyprus banking crisis also feature in the story. Mezrich does a great job making bitcoin history fun to learn.&#160;<br/><br/>Key stories<br/><br/>Storing bitcoin in banks: The twins have taken extreme measures to safeguard the private keys to their mountain of bitcoin. The private keys - a long alphanumeric code - are split up and stored in bank safety deposit boxes across the country. Funny how banks are keeping crypto safe probably without them even knowing it.&#160;<br/><br/>2013 Cyprus banking crisis: What would you do if you woke one morning and 10+% of your life savings were gone? This was the reality for bank account holders in Cyprus in 2013. The banks were too big to fail but the government didn&#8217;t have the funds to bail them out. As a last resort, the government dipped into all bank accounts while everyone slept. This set off