Hey @crypto.piotr, hope you had a good holiday break :)

I think the point on "monetary independence" is more on the decoupling of the monetary system from governments. Government needs their source of power to remain in control. In the old days, a few centuries back, the government dictates and control religion. In 17th/18th century, there was a movement of separating church from state. Thereby bringing free religion. However, that meant government lost a source of power. Because religion was huge back then and controlling religions meant control over people.

Hence, a new source of power is required. Coincidentally, paper currency became popular across Europe and America in the early 1800s. Back then those currencies were still backed by gold. But later on, fiat currencies that are only backed by the government became the standard. Circling back to Bitcoin, if the 17th/18th century we had a speration of church from state, then in this era, Bitcoin is leading a separation of money from state.

As for altcoin, I read somewhere that the earliest altcoin is Namecoin. Didn't do a fact check though. Haha.. but you can view coinmarketcap earlier snapshots. Based on a snapshot in 2013, those are probably the earlier altcoins. Ethereum came later in 2014.

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