Bitcoin, the distributed open source cryptocurrency went live in 2009. Since 2009, for about 3-4 years it was still an obscure token which only a handful of tech publications showed interest in. However, it all changed when this obscure ‘game currency’ was found to be a major currency in the deep web economy. The emergence of the deep web online marketplace – Silk Road and the use of bitcoin to but drugs and other contraband on that site garnered some attention from mainstream media.
As time progressed, the Silk Road investigation and the sudden surge and fall of bitcoin price due to Mt Gox incidence were all picked up religiously by the mainstream news outlets. Almost all newspapers, magazines and online publications covered these incidents. By then, the digital currency had definitely gained the world’s attention, but in a negative way. Even though media took its own time to even feature bitcoin in their publications, when they did, it garnered a lot of curiosity among people. The angle for coverage opted by news outlets were predominantly negative. Not many magazines spoke about the intended usage of bitcoin as envisioned by Satoshi Nakamoto. This made bitcoin more notorious than popular.
About 8 years down the line, things have changed a lot since then. the digital currency has gained its fair share of media coverage and everyone seems to be excited about this new digital currency and its underlying technology. The adoption of blockchain technology in other industries stands proof of this. Now, with the mainstream industries taking notice of bitcoin and adopting bitcoin technology has given a shroud of legitimacy to the digital currency (at least that’s what conventional media believes). Why is media trying to stay away from the cryptocurrency?
Every business has stakeholders and it is the same for media […]
