I noticed that some of the most brilliant minds in their respective professions are often relatively unacquainted with cryptotechnologies and their revolutionary potential.
I had a recent correspondence with legendary futures trader, psychologist, and historian Ed Seykota who wrote a brilliant book called "Govopoly in the 39th Day." Duckweed doubles every day then once it doubles again on the 39th day, all pond life is suffocated by the 40th day. Duckweed, like the size of governments, goes unnoticed in the beginning even though it's always doubling with each day. But by the 30th day, it becomes more noticeable, but nothing can be done by that point.
Govopoly makes great points. That said, cryptotech is the first technology in the history of humanity that can decentralize power structures, ie, governments and corporations. Governments printing currency to fund their wars will be a thing of the past within a generation as cryptotechnologies are viral, decentralized entities with exponential growth. For example, ethereum stands to decentralize corporations... in time.
At no other time in history have so many smart minds joined the cryptotechnology frontier - luminaries such as the Google guys, Netscape creator and pioneer Marc Andreessen, the Winklevoss twins, and a significant portion of Silicon Valley.
Here are a few articles of note to those who wish to well-acquaint themselves with cryptotechnologies such as blockchain:
http://www.deepdotweb.com/2014/07/06/crypto-markets-will-undermine-government-control-money/ though they should say "cryptotechnologies" since bitcoin is just the ice cube on the iceberg.
Here's one about how decentralization of power structures via cryptotechnologies will move us closer to the efficiencies of ants, the most successful species on the planet where cooperation, not competition, is key: http://www.coindesk.com/maidsafe-ceo-david-irvine-talks-nature-ants-decentralization/
And already, DAOs are being launched into cyberspace that are self-evolving: http://www.coindesk.com/succeed-as-decentralized-autonomous-organization/
A friend of mine who is monitored closely by the UK (and probably other) governments (police states are everywhere when it comes to this stuff) has Richard Branson courting him for a share in his technology. My friend hopes to do for cryptotechnology what Bill Gates did for the personal computer. The decentralized, viral nature of cryptotech will potentially spur a revolution across most all industries that will make the internet look like "one small step for man" compared to cryptotech which will be "one giant step for mankind".
Governments are ambivalent about cryptotechnologies, bitcoin being the most recognized. Some see its massive evolutionary potential. Others see it as a total threat. But it's decentralized, viral technology so will be hard for governments to stand in its way, short of blocking the whole internet. As one of many examples, even though file sharing site Napster lost the battle, for every equivalent file sharing site shut down, ten others spring up like mushrooms across the cyberlandscape., thus peer-to-peer file sharing has completely won the war.
Indeed, the dark economy is now valued at over $12 trillion, just a few trillion shy of the US GDP. "Dark" simply means non-regulated, of which much of what is transacted is actually legal, thus growing at a faster rate than any country's GDP growth rate. http://www.forbes.com/sites/benzingainsights/2011/11/07/rise-of-the-shadow-economy-second-largest-economy-in-the-world/
The third world implications of cryptotech are vast. For example, while 50% of the world does not yet have a bank account, cryptotechnologies such as bitcoin are enabling the world's unbanked to be able to transact without a bank account and send money back to their relatives in the third world at less than 1/100 the normal wire fees (typically 8 cents) because so much of the world now owns a mobile phone.
And LBRY.io will do for publishing of music/art/books what bitcoin is doing for banks via its blockchain technology to which institutions are finally waking up.