Just a few years ago, the word ?Bitcoin? was only well known in technological circles. Ask the average person what it was, and they would give you a worried look. But at the end of 2017, as the value of a single Bitcoin approached $20,000 from under $1,000 at the beginning of the year, everyone was taking notice. Mainstream news sites were leading on the headline, and stories proliferated everywhere. Bitcoin was a mainstream story.