Ijoma Mangold on his way into the rabbit hole

He is a ZEIT literary critic, Proust fan, esthete and for quite some time also – Bitcoiner? While pruning apple trees in the Uckermark, Ijoma Mangold discovered the transformative power of digital gold with the help of relevant Bitcoin podcasts. His book “The Orange Pill” impressively tells of his tortuous and long-lasting path down the rabbit hole and back to the ZEIT editorial office. We met him in March in our studio in Berlin. And were able to learn some fascinating things themselves – about the educated middle class, Bitcoin and how it helps us to think differently about money and the world.

BTC-ECHO: How long did it actually take until you had the self-confidence to go public with the controversial topic of Bitcoin or to talk about it with your colleagues at ZEIT?

Ijoma Mangold: That was probably in 2021 in an episode of our ZEIT podcast “The So-Called Present”, together with my colleague Lars Weißbrod. We dealt with Bitcoin there. These were the first searching and touching movements. That’s what we said to our listeners, too: “We’re fascinated by the topic and don’t quite understand it yet, but we want to share it with you.” We’ve explored digital scarcity and decentralization, and even tried to explain how Proof of Work works. Presumably three out of fifty sentences are correct. I got these
Episode not replayed yet. My hair would probably stand on end today.

But in my job as a journalist and intellectual, I’m always concerned with risk. I’ll defend anyone who throws out a bold thesis and falls flat on his face. I much prefer that to someone who just reproduces the safe position of the juste milieu, because then he never has to take a beating. Curiosity and joy are part of a journalist’s DNA. He should make what moves him public and share it with others. Even if he misses it at first and makes a fool of himself.

Have you ever had the pleasure of meeting some maxis?

Yes, a lot. Luckily I must say. I benefited immensely from the exchange with them. I’m eternally grateful to any maximalist for hammering the basic beliefs into our heads over and over again until they sometimes blared out in our ears.