Ripple Cto’s ‘50-year Bitcoin’ Joke Has A Point: ’s The Deeper...

The “50-year Bitcoin” joke reveals crypto’s split tempo, where the base layer ossifies while L2s and edge systems innovate rapidly.

Bitcoin evolves on two clocks: slow, consensus-driven changes at the base layer and fast experimentation at the edges.

Major upgrades (such as Taproot) arrive through cautious soft forks after long review.

Rapid shifts such as Lightning payments and Ordinals happen without changing Bitcoin’s core rules, which is why headlines move faster than the L1.

The “50-year” line is a cue to look at where change occurs, whether in the core protocol or at the edge, before judging whether Bitcoin has truly changed.

On November 10, 2025, Ripple chief technology officer David Schwartz posted a deadpan line on X: “Bitcoin is not the same now as it was 50 years ago.”

The gag works because Bitcoin (BTC) launched in 2009, so the “50 years” is obviously tongue-in-cheek, but it landed because it pointed to a bigger truth about how people talk about Bitcoin’s evolution.

Schwartz’s quip came in a thread arguing that “1 BTC = 1 BTC” and that volatility exists in fiat terms, not in Bitcoin’s own unit of account. This framing often fuels absolutist takes about whether Bitcoin changes at all.

Did you know? Rajat Soni, a critic of XRP (XRP), is a CFA charterholder and a Bitcoin-focused finance commentator active on X.

Schwartz’s line works because it highlights a mismatch in how people think about time in crypto.

Source: CoinTelegraph