Bitcoin is not only a digital currency. It is a protocol, a network, a currency and a transaction language.
Anyone can participate in the Bitcoin network. Bitcoin threatens the financial status quo. It promises to put the power of finance in the hands of each and every individual on Earth.
Bitcoin shifts the financial model from "trust by exclusion" to "trust by computation". Trust is distributed across a large and growing network of collaborators continually checking one another to make it increasingly difficult for a bad actor to undermine the network. As a result there is no need for exclusion or access controls.