????2013年，比特幣不僅價(jià)值一飛沖天，基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施、配套服務(wù)、用戶(hù)接受程度也同樣突飛猛進(jìn)。而最近隨著主流電商O(píng)verstock.com和美職籃（NBA）的薩克拉門(mén)托國(guó)王隊(duì)（Sacramento Kings）公開(kāi)宣布將接受數(shù)字貨幣作為支付方式，比特幣熱潮更是達(dá)到了頂點(diǎn)。

????有些人還在質(zhì)疑比特幣的有用性和耐用性，但2014年這些抱懷疑態(tài)度的人可能會(huì)進(jìn)一步跟不上形勢(shì)的發(fā)展——開(kāi)發(fā)者和企業(yè)家們已開(kāi)始在比特幣協(xié)議的基礎(chǔ)上努力開(kāi)發(fā)各種功能。它們將使各種金融服務(wù)實(shí)現(xiàn)分散操作，從貨幣對(duì)沖到貸款，從股票發(fā)行到租賃及購(gòu)買(mǎi)合同，都會(huì)如此。這些新服務(wù)都要靠同一個(gè)分布式安全和記錄的工作量證明（proof-of-work）模型來(lái)實(shí)現(xiàn)，正是這個(gè)模型讓比特幣的總值超過(guò)100億美元后仍能保持安全。長(zhǎng)期來(lái)看，點(diǎn)對(duì)點(diǎn)融資將會(huì)弱化銀行和其他金融機(jī)構(gòu)，對(duì)它們的生存造成威脅，正如當(dāng)年點(diǎn)對(duì)點(diǎn)文件傳輸讓音樂(lè)產(chǎn)業(yè)如臨大敵一樣——而這個(gè)金融納普斯特（Napster，當(dāng)年著名的點(diǎn)對(duì)點(diǎn)MP3下載分享軟件——譯注）的一些建構(gòu)師似乎很樂(lè)于看到這種前景變成現(xiàn)實(shí)。

????比特幣協(xié)議（它與比特幣根本不同，是比特幣建立的基礎(chǔ)）是為了支持更復(fù)雜的交易和金融關(guān)系而從頭至尾一點(diǎn)點(diǎn)構(gòu)建起來(lái)的，簡(jiǎn)單的轉(zhuǎn)賬不是它服務(wù)的對(duì)象（比如什么“轉(zhuǎn)五個(gè)比特幣給斯蒂夫”這類(lèi)業(yè)務(wù)）。比特幣支持的幾種交易方式中有一種所謂“N的M”（M of N）交易。它要求一群人中的特定子群之間簽有協(xié)議，并能用于第三方支付、仲裁或財(cái)務(wù)管理共享；鎖時(shí)交易，即比特幣按照嚴(yán)格的時(shí)間進(jìn)程分發(fā)，用于信托或遺囑；甚至還包括基于數(shù)據(jù)的交易，即腳本利用谷歌（Google）的定期搜索信息這類(lèi)數(shù)據(jù)監(jiān)控現(xiàn)實(shí)中可能會(huì)自動(dòng)觸發(fā)支付或其他交易行為的各種事件。更依賴(lài)基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施開(kāi)發(fā)的是可能出現(xiàn)的“智能財(cái)產(chǎn)”（smart property），即通過(guò)和比特幣數(shù)據(jù)區(qū)塊鏈（blockchain，數(shù)據(jù)區(qū)塊記錄了整個(gè)比特幣網(wǎng)絡(luò)上的交易記錄數(shù)據(jù)，并且這些數(shù)據(jù)是被所有比特幣節(jié)點(diǎn)共享的。通過(guò)數(shù)據(jù)區(qū)塊，可以查詢(xún)到每一筆比特幣交易的歷史——譯注）相互作用的數(shù)碼鎖執(zhí)行的合同來(lái)管理現(xiàn)實(shí)世界的合同、抵押貸款和采購(gòu)合同。

????這些交易的所有環(huán)節(jié)都是經(jīng)過(guò)編程并自動(dòng)完成的，交易可靠性由比特幣數(shù)據(jù)區(qū)塊鏈來(lái)保障。這個(gè)數(shù)據(jù)區(qū)塊會(huì)經(jīng)常接受大批“礦工”的審核，而他們主要靠維護(hù)連串比特幣的工作而獲酬。實(shí)際上，拿納普斯特來(lái)打比方并不十分確切，因?yàn)榧{普斯特是用中央服務(wù)器來(lái)追蹤音樂(lè)分享的，而比特幣交易則是完全分散的。這就意味著，貸款不需要通過(guò)銀行，簽合同無(wú)需律師幫忙，炒股也不用假手經(jīng)紀(jì)人。所有這些交易都通過(guò)分散在全球各地的成千上萬(wàn)臺(tái)服務(wù)器來(lái)完成并記錄在案。

????咨詢(xún)師安德里亞斯?M. 安托諾坡羅斯回應(yīng)軟件開(kāi)發(fā)者J.R.威利特所寫(xiě)的一份2012年白皮書(shū)時(shí)稱(chēng)，比特幣協(xié)議對(duì)于分散式金融正像當(dāng)年的互聯(lián)網(wǎng)協(xié)議對(duì)于分布式信息的意義一樣：“數(shù)據(jù)區(qū)塊鏈就是IP地址。控制好這個(gè)就能打造一個(gè)完全不同的系統(tǒng)?！闭鏘P和組成互聯(lián)網(wǎng)的網(wǎng)絡(luò)節(jié)點(diǎn)基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施現(xiàn)在支持從電子郵件到流媒體視頻這些功能一樣，比特幣協(xié)議及其礦工也能為眾多金融功能提供支持。不過(guò)，安托諾坡羅斯建議應(yīng)把“比特幣數(shù)據(jù)區(qū)塊鏈”看成“擁有一種API（應(yīng)用程序接口）”。它能讓其數(shù)據(jù)為第三方所用，就像Buffer公司或Hootsuite公司這類(lèi)第二層服務(wù)供應(yīng)商使用Twitter的API用稍作調(diào)整或重新組織的形式呈現(xiàn)Twitter數(shù)據(jù)或與之互動(dòng)一樣。

????In 2013, bitcoin's valuation didn't just skyrocket, but its infrastructure, services, and adoption exploded as well, culminating in recent announcements that major online retailer Overstock.com and NBA team the Sacramento Kings would accept the digital currency as payment.

????Some still doubt bitcoin's usefulness and durability, but 2014 may leave skeptics even further behind -- developers and entrepreneurs are already hard at work building features on top of the Bitcoin protocol that will allow for the decentralized execution of financial services, from currency hedging to loans to stock issuance to rental and purchase contracts. These new services rely on the same innovative proof-of-work model of distributed security and record-keeping that has kept the bitcoin currency secure as its value ballooned well past $10 billion. In the long term, peer-to-peer finance threatens to weaken banks and other financial agents just as peer-to-peer file sharing did the music industry -- and some of the architects of this financial Napster seem gleeful about the possibility.

????The Bitcoin protocol (crucially distinct from bitcoin, the currency it underlies) was built from the ground up to support far more complex transactions and relationships than simple value transfers. (Example: "Send five bitcoins to Steve.") Some of the kinds of transactions that Bitcoin can support include so-called M of N transactions, which require agreement between a certain subset of a group, and can be used for escrow, mediation, or shared financial management; time-locked transactions, in which bitcoins are distributed on a strict schedule, useful for trusts or wills; and even data-conditional transactions, in which a script uses a data input such as a regular Google search to monitor real-world events that would automatically trigger disbursements or other actions. More conditional on infrastructure development is the possibility of "smart property," with contracts enforced by digital locks interacting with the Bitcoin blockchain to manage real-world leases, mortgages, and purchase contracts.

????All aspects of these transactions would be programmed and automatic, with their transactional integrity guaranteed by the Bitcoin blockchain, constantly vetted by the vast network of "miners" rewarded for their maintenance work with a stream of bitcoin. In fact, the comparison to Napster is somewhat inaccurate, since Napster used centralized servers to track music sharing, while Bitcoin is entirely distributed. That means loans without banks, contracts without lawyers, and stocks without brokers, executed and recorded across hundreds of servers at all corners of the earth.

????Consultant Andreas M. Antonopoulos, echoing a 2012 white paper by software developer J.R. Willett, says that the Bitcoin protocol is to distributed finance what Internet Protocol has been to distributed information. "The blockchain is IP. And through manipulation of that we can build a whole other system." In the same way that IP and the infrastructure of network nodes that make up the Internet now support functions from e-mail to video streaming, the Bitcoin protocol and its miners can support a variety of financial functions. Alternately, Antonopoulos suggests thinking of the "Bitcoin blockchain as having an API" (application programming interface) that makes its data usable by third parties, in the same way that second-layer services like Buffer or Hootsuite use the Twitter API to present and interact with Twitter data in slightly modified or reorganized forms.