A brief history of money
From barter to gold, from the gold standard to fiat money. The moment Nixon suspended dollar convertibility in 1971 and its consequences.
Bitcoin: Cryptography, Consensus & Distributed Computing
Where money becomes mathematics
27 slidesMarch 19, 2026Alejandro Fernández Camello
A journey from the history of money to the cryptographic and consensus mechanisms that make Bitcoin possible.
Bitcoin is the first practical solution to the Byzantine Generals Problem in an open, permissionless system.
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Blockchain
Each block references the previous one, forming an immutable chain of transactions.
nonce:0
hash:0xffffffff
target:< 0x000fffff
Mining...
Proof of Work
Miners compete to find a hash lower than the target. Hard to solve, easy to verify.
Talk contents
Four blocks connecting classical economics with modern distributed computing.
The emergence of Bitcoin
Satoshi Nakamoto, the 2008 whitepaper, the genesis block, the 21-million cap, and how the blockchain solves the double-spending problem.
The Byzantine Generals Problem
How to reach consensus in a network with potentially malicious nodes. Mining, proof of work, and the algorithmic hash lottery.
Public-key cryptography
Addresses, public and private keys, digital signatures, and how the network verifies ownership without revealing secrets.
Download the slides
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