[qertoip]

> The much less important part of crypto is exactly how the shared ledger is assembled

No! It is of *critical* importance how the shared ledger is assembled, because Bitcoin's threat model assumes the World's governments descending upon the shit, eventually!

[ralusek]

The part of critical importance is ECDSA (or any public/private key DSA), and p2p networks. With that technology alone, you have the basis for a functional decentralized currency.

The blockchain assembly with proof of work, while an interesting and very creative solution, is just one of a multitude of ways you can arrive at a consensus.