Chances are that you have already heard about Bitcoin, yet don’t really understand what it actually is. While this is a common observation, many people seem to have strong opinions on the digital currency: while some believe that Bitcoin is the cure to most of the world’s problems, others are convinced that it’s little more than a get-rich-quick scam and an environmental disaster. In this talk, researcher and consultant Michel Rauchs explores why Bitcoin, the “magic Internet money”, provokes such strong reaction and emotions so that people either love it or hate it. Michel Rauchs is a Luxembourgian born cryptocurrency researcher. Having been interested in the intricacies of monetary and financial systems for a long time, Michel went down the proverbial rabbit hole after discovering the cryptocurrency Bitcoin in early 2014, and has yet to find his way out. For the last two years, he has been leading the Cryptocurrency and Blockchain research programme at the Centre for Alternative Finance at the University of Cambridge, where he co-authored six research studies and co-created the Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index (CBECI), a real-time model estimating Bitcoin’s annual electricity consumption. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx