The Hubs
The cities that hosted the movement — Bay Area, Prague, Tokyo, Zug, Berlin, Amsterdam, Toronto, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, Buenos Aires, Reykjavík. Crypto as a sociology of place.
Part of Cypherpunk
14 moments in this segment.
- — Amsterdam is where pre-Bitcoin digital cash was invented and where its most consequential developer was imprisoned. Video: How Did Crypto Begin? Crypto Currency History From 1983 To Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start The Fire" Amsterdam is where pre-Bitcoin digital cash was invented and where its most consequential developer was imprisoned David Chaum founded DigiCash here in 1989; Alexey Pertsev was arrested here in 2022. The Dutch arc is the longest in the archive. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — San Francisco is where the cypherpunks were named and where their mailing list ran. Video: Phil Zimmerman, 'father' of online privacy and winner of the cryptowars against the US - Newsnight San Francisco is where the cypherpunks were named and where their mailing list ran The term was coined at a meeting in Oakland in late 1992; the list was hosted on John Gilmore's personal server at toad.com. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — Toronto is where Vitalik grew up and where Ethereum was written. Video: [3] Vitalik Buterin: Before He Founded One of the World's Largest Cryptocurrency--Ethereum Toronto is where Vitalik grew up and where Ethereum was written The whitepaper was drafted in a city that barely noticed — a quieter origin than the protocol deserved, or perhaps exactly the right one. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — Tokyo is where Bitcoin first traded at scale, first collapsed at scale, and first got a legal name. Video: Tokyo Whale Caused Bitcoin Crash 📉 Mt Gox Is Back! He Has More $BTC Too! Another Crash Soon? Tokyo is where Bitcoin first traded at scale, first collapsed at scale, and first got a legal name By early 2014, Mt. Gox in Shibuya was handling over 70% of all bitcoin transactions worldwide — and then it wasn't handling anything. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — Hong Kong held Asian crypto's center of gravity for a decade, then lost it to its own geopolitics. Video: Asia's First Bitcoin ATM: How Does It Work? Hong Kong held Asian crypto's center of gravity for a decade, then lost it to its own geopolitics Tether registered in Hong Kong on September 8 2014 — the most consequential financial instrument in crypto history, born in a city it has since mostly left. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — Zug became the legal capital of the protocol era by being first and being copied. Video: Inside Switzerland's Crypto Valley Zug became the legal capital of the protocol era by being first and being copied Stiftung Ethereum was incorporated July 14 2014 at Zeughausgasse 7a, CH-6300 Zug — and every major L1 governance structure since has followed the template. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — Iceland's mining era was the cleanest illustration of cypherpunk ideology meeting raw thermodynamics. Video: [Cypherpunks & Bitcoin] Ep4 - Bitcoin and the End of History Type: hub · Hub: reykjavik · Tags: reykjavik, iceland, mining, geothermal, proof-of-work, genesis-mining, banking-collapse-2008, immi By 2017, Icelandic mining operations were estimated to draw more electricity than all of the country's homes combined — and then the Merge ended it. Iceland's place in this archive is simultaneously economic substrate and ideological resonance chamber. The October 2008 Icelandic banking collapse — Glitnir, Landsbanki, and Kaupthing all nationalized within ten days, the largest banking-system failure relative to GDP in history — was the immediate macro background against which Bitcoin's October 31 2008 whitepaper arrived. The Pots-and-Pans Revolution (Búsáhaldabyltingin, the 2008–09 protests) and the Icesave dispute created a small but real population that had personally watched a sovereign banking system fail. The Icelandic Modern Media Initiative, advanced by parliamentarian Birgitta Jónsdóttir and Smári McCarthy and adopted as Icelandic policy in 2010, briefly positioned Iceland as a free-information sanctuary; WikiLeaks routed significant operational presence through Iceland in that period. The mining era began around 2013 and peaked 2017–18. Cheap geothermal baseload (the Hellisheiði plant alone supplies roughly 300 MW), cool ambient temperatures that make cooling close to free, and a small post-crisis country willing to host data centers as an export industry — these conditions made Iceland globally competitive. Genesis Mining, founded in 2013 by Marco Streng, Jakov Dolić, and Marco Krohn, ran some of the largest mining facilities near Keflavík. Verne Global and Auðlind built out additional infrastructure. By 2017 the mining draw was estimated to exceed total national residential consumption — an extraordinary statistic that illustrated, in the most literal possible terms, what proof-of-work actually costs and where it was cheapest to pay. The decline came in three waves. The 2018 bear market thinned operators. Rising European energy export prices through 2021–22 made Icelandic kWh less competitive against Texas and Kazakhstan. And the Ethereum Merge on September 15 2022 eliminated GPU mining demand entirely — overnight, the second-largest mining use case for the infrastructure ceased to exist. By 2024 most of the marquee Icelandic operations had shut or downsized significantly. The Iceland mining chapter is a closed parenthesis, but a clean one: a post-banking-collapse country with cheap geothermal power and a tradition of free-information politics hosting the cryptographic infrastructure of a trustless monetary system. The cypherpunk logic was coherent. The thermodynamics were favorable. The era ended when the protocol changed. Facts • Icelandic banking collapse October 2008 — Glitnir, Landsbanki, Kaupthing nationalized within ten days • Largest banking-system failure relative to GDP in history • Icelandic Modern Media Initiative passed parliament 2010 • Genesis Mining founded 2013 by Marco Streng, Jakov Dolić, Marco Krohn — facilities near Keflavík • Hellisheiði geothermal plant: ~300 MW baseload supply • By 2017 Iceland mining estimated to exceed total national residential electricity consumption • Ethereum Merge September 15 2022 eliminated GPU mining demand • Most major Icelandic mining operations shut or downsized by 2024 Primary Documents • International Modern Media Institute (IMMI) — https://en.immi.is/ • Verne Global — Keflavík data center — https://verneglobal.com/
- — Prague inherits its crypto-anarchism from a living dissident tradition. Video: Hackers Congress Paralelní Polis 2015 trailer Type: hub · Hub: prague · Tags: prague, paralelni-polis, charter-77, plastic-people, benda, havel, ztohoven, trezor The name Paralelní Polis is not borrowed metaphor — it is a direct citation of a 1978 samizdat essay by a man who was arrested for writing it. Prague is the only city in this archive where the modern crypto-anarchist scene can be drawn in an unbroken line back to a literal underground samizdat lineage. Most cypherpunk hubs have to manufacture their political seriousness. Prague inherited it, across two or three degrees of personal connection, from people who had been imprisoned for typing essays. The pre-history begins in September 1968, when The Plastic People of the Universe formed in the immediate aftermath of the Soviet invasion. Their long-haired refusal of 'normalization' was treated as a political affront, and a 1976 trial that jailed four members of the broader underground scene became the catalyst for Charter 77 — signed January 6 1977 by 242 initial signatories and circulated in samizdat. Václav Havel's October 1978 essay 'The Power of the Powerless,' distributed through the Edice Petlice and Edice Expedice samizdat networks, is the foundational text of living in truth: the idea that an ordinary citizen's refusal to repeat ideological lies is itself a political act. In the same circle and the same year, Václav Benda wrote a shorter samizdat essay simply titled 'Paralelní polis.' Where Havel diagnosed the rot of the official sphere, Benda proposed the positive program: don't reform the regime's institutions, build parallel ones — parallel education, parallel literature, parallel economy, parallel law — until the official polis becomes vestigial. VONS, the Committee for the Defense of the Unjustly Persecuted, founded April 27 1978 by Havel, Benda, and Petr Uhl, was the first of those institutions. Benda was arrested in May 1979 and imprisoned until 1983. Then November 1989, and Havel into the Castle. This is the inherited grammar. The modern braid begins around 2003 with the artist collective ztohoven — core members Roman Týc, Pavel Hampl, Martin Tibitanzl — whose actions subjected state symbolic infrastructure to precisely the kind of irreverent exposure the pre-1989 underground had applied to the party apparatus. Their 2007 mushroom-cloud hack of Czech Television's Panorama weather feed, acquitted in March 2008 on grounds of producing amusement rather than panic, is the closest the post-Velvet generation got to a political trial. Their 2013 'Občan K' action swapped passport photos among a hundred volunteers to stress-test the state's identity infrastructure. In October 2014, ztohoven opened Paralelní Polis at Dělnická 43, Praha 7 — three floors: ground-floor Bitcoin Coffee (cash not accepted, by design, for a decade), coworking in the middle, the Institute of Cryptoanarchy at the top. The name was an explicit citation of Benda, and the founders knew exactly whose tradition they were placing themselves in. The annual Hackers Congress Paralelní Polis ran from 2014 through October 4–6 2024, when the Hardcore edition closed the run. The Czech commercial spine grew alongside: Marek 'Slush' Palatinus and Pavol 'Stick' Rusnak met at the brmlab hackerspace in Holešovice in 2011, prototyped a hardware wallet in 2012, and with Alena Vránová founded SatoshiLabs and the Trezor brand in 2013 — Slush had already invented the first Bitcoin mining pool in late 2010. The Trezor One, shipped 2014, was the first hardware wallet ever produced. Devcon 4 — Prague Congress Centre, October 30 to November 2 2018 — was the moment Prague was anointed as a node in the Ethereum imaginary; the Ethereum Foundation chose the city precisely because the cryptoanarchist lineage made it a credible cultural home. ETHPrague followed in 2022, founded by Czech Ethereum builders adjacent to the Paralelní Polis circle, and runs annually. ETHPrague 2026 — May 8–10 at Obecní dům, the Art Nouveau ceremonial hall where Czechoslovakia was declared independent on October 28 1918 — is the fifth edition and the one being held, for the first time, after the building is gone. On March 2 2026, Second Culture — the successor entity operating Dělnická 43 — permanently closed. Financial pressure, landlord decisions, the same forces that kill any beloved unprofitable institution. The eleven-year arc is closed. What remains is the lineage and the diaspora: ETHPrague, Trezor, brmlab, the people scattered across the Holešovice neighborhood and beyond. A working test of Benda's thesis — parallel institutions are temporary by design; what carries is the habit of building them. Tim May's 1988 specter is haunting the modern world; in Prague, unlike elsewhere, you can trace the haunting all the way back through the walls of the building where people once typed forbidden texts under the neon light of a regime they intended to outlast. Facts • Plastic People of the Universe formed September 1968, immediately after the Soviet invasion • Charter 77 signed January 6 1977; ~242 initial signatories; circulated as samizdat • Václav Benda's 'Paralelní polis' essay written 1978; Benda imprisoned 1979–1983 • Havel's 'The Power of the Powerless' written October 1978; distributed via Edice Petlice • VONS (Committee for Defense of Unjustly Persecuted) founded April 27 1978 • Velvet Revolution: November 17 – December 29 1989 • ztohoven founded ~2003; TV mushroom-cloud hack June 2007, acquitted March 2008 • Marek Palatinus launched first Bitcoin mining pool (Slush Pool) late 2010 • SatoshiLabs / Trezor founded Prague 2013; Trezor One shipped 2014 — first hardware wallet • Paralelní Polis opened at Dělnická 43, Praha 7, October 2014 • HCPP ran annually 2014–2024; final edition 'Hardcore' October 4–6 2024 • Devcon 4 at Prague Congress Centre, October 30 – November 2 2018 • ETHPrague founded 2022; fifth edition May 8–10 2026 at Obecní dům • Dělnická 43 permanently closed March 2 2026 Primary Documents • Václav Benda, 'Paralelní polis' (1978) — English translation via cryptoanarchy.wiki — https://www.cryptoanarchy.wiki/getting-started/parallel-polis • HCPP 2024 Hardcore — final edition site — https://hardcore.hcpp.cz/ • ETHPrague 2026 — https://ethprague.com/
- — Berlin gave Ethereum its genesis venue and its most consistent core-developer city. Video: Why Is a Cypherpunk in Davos? Berlin gave Ethereum its genesis venue and its most consistent core-developer city Devcon 0 was held at c-base in November 2014 — a crashed-spaceship-themed hackerspace on the Spree that predates the modern hackerspace movement by half a decade. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — China was the physical substrate of Bitcoin for seven years, then banned itself out of the picture. Video: China's Bitcoin Ban Was Good - Here's Why! China was the physical substrate of Bitcoin for seven years, then banned itself out of the picture At peak, Chinese mining pools controlled over 65% of global Bitcoin hashrate — and then, in a matter of months in 2021, most of it moved to Texas. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — Singapore became the structured alternative to Hong Kong's geopolitical risk. Video: The Great Crypto Hub War: Hong Kong vs. Dubai vs. US & Singapore | Animoca Brands Group President Singapore became the structured alternative to Hong Kong's geopolitical risk Token2049 drew roughly 20,000 attendees in 2024 — making it the largest Asian crypto conference and the closest thing to a regional Devcon. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — Buenos Aires is where the cypherpunk thesis is being tested under real conditions. Video: 🔥 Argentina’s Hyperinflation Meets Bitcoin Revolution | The Blockchain Report Buenos Aires is where the cypherpunk thesis is being tested under real conditions When annual inflation crossed 200% in 2023, holding USDT stopped being speculation and became infrastructure. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — Dělnická 43 closes permanently — eleven years of parallel polis, ended. Video: HCPP24 | Matthias Tarasiewicz - Hardcore Cypherpunk Values Dělnická 43 closes permanently — eleven years of parallel polis, ended The building is closed. The lineage is not the building. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
- — ETHPrague 2026 opens at Obecní dům — the lineage continues, the building changed. Video: Kartik Talwar I Welcome & Introduction I Pragma Prague 2025 ETHPrague 2026 opens at Obecní dům — the lineage continues, the building changed This archive is being written from the floor of this conference. The fifth anniversary. Two months after Dělnická 43 closed. [Source: cyberpunkoracle.com]
