As Bitcoin finds its way into the news in increasingly negative ways, punctuated by the collapse of the Mt Gox exchange where $600 million in Bitcoin “disappeared” in a bankruptcy, Conan O’Brien humorously welcomed the “COO of Bitcoin” to explain how it works.
Mythical “COO of Bitcoin” guest on the show
“Marcus Ortman,” an actor for the mythical “Bicoin” entity, was welcomed to the late night talk show looking like a nerd refugee from the 1980s wearing a peach collared shirt buttoned to the top, tan sport jacket and sporting bushy salt and pepper hair.
“Glad you are here,” Conan says. “I’ve asked a lot of people and no one is able to explain what Bitcoin is all about.”
“Conan, its quite simple. Bitcoin is a decentralized digital currency exchanged in the interactive metaverse,” he says as the crowd laughs and he sheepishly smiles, stammering back and forth. “Yeah… that didn’t help me at all,” Conan replies. “Is it like PayPal?”
Layman’s terms: Bitcoin is an open source synergistic flow matrix
“No… no…,” the actor says with a condescending chuckle. “Let me put it in layman’s terms. Bitcoin is an open source synergistic flow matrix facilitating e-transference of digital assets,” he said, opening his arms as if he was a cult leader welcoming people who just discovered “truth.”
“No! Those are not layman’s terms”
“No! Those are not layman’s terms,” Conan fires back. “Can you just explain how I might use Bitcoin?”
“Conan, imagine that you are in a snow globe where every snowflake is a unique and beautiful ‘coinpertunity.’”
“No! No!” an increasingly frustrated Conan says. “Can you tell me what Bitcoin is or not?”
“Bitcoin is a flat circle and everything we do or have ever done we will do again,” the actor said, softly raising and lowering his voice intonation like a religious profit.
“No, that is a line from True Detective!”
“No, that is a line from True Detective!” Conan says, to uproarious laughter.
To this the actor, opening his arms in a wide circular embrace, introduces a more than nebulous promotional video “explaining” Bitcoin. The video resembles a music video without much point, mixing in quick images of freemasons and reputed illuminati symbology with pictures of an elderly woman and a baby crying, along with text such as “The when of why” and “The newness of now.”
“Ok, that was bullshit,” Conan says to even more uproarious laughter. “I’m going to ask you one last time. Do you know what Bitcoin is?”
To this the actor says, “Bitcoin is this,” as he throws down an incendiary device that triggers a smoke plume, turning and attempting to vanish like a magician. As the smoke clears, the actor is confused and can’t find the exit behind him, which elicits laughter from Conan. Mt Gox, it should be noted, was an exchange for magic trading cards before it was a Bitcoin exchange. Mt Gox is an acronym for “Magic: the Gathering Online Xchange.”
The faulty “magic” being a metaphor for Bitcoin, Conan ends the interaction by saying “He needed more smoke.”
