EP81 Bitcoin podcast with @kryptokidz_

Bitcoin is close to becoming worthless.

Let's go!

Now what's the Bitcoin? Bitcoin's like rat poison. Yeah! Oh. The greatest scam in history. Let's get it! Bitcoin will go to fucking zero.

Yeah! Yeah!

Yeah!

Alright, you ungovernable misfits. I'm your host, Max. Everybody knows that Bitcoin is useless, worthless, and doomed to fail. But what if everyone's wrong? What if it's the system that is doomed to fail?

Join me as I speak to some of the brightest people in the space, and deliver to the deepest, darkest depths of the Bitcoin rabbit hole.

Welcome back, everyone. Today's guest is Crypto Kids. You might recognize him from Twitter. We spoke about a year ago, and we've kept in touch. Since then, he's been very busy. He's been building hardware.

He's been running meetups. And generally helping all sorts of people who just need a little bit of guidance. In fact, after we jumped off the call, he helped me restart one of my nodes I was having issues with.

And I thought it was a really good opportunity to get him on. He is a proper Bitcoiner who is helping people in the space. As you all know, there are a lot of people who talk the talk. There are very few who walk the walk, and are actually there to help.

So, you know, I'm here to celebrate those people, and Crypto Kids is definitely one of them. I had a great time chatting to him, and I hope you enjoy listening. I want to say thank you to Coin Floor UK for sponsoring the show.

They are based in the UK. They do dollar cost averaging. And if you use my link that's in the show notes, you will get a discount on your fees. I think it's about 30% off. You can check that out in the show notes, but 30% off your fees.

And it gives me a little bit of a sat back to me as well, which helps me support the show. And finally, before we dive in, I would like to say thank you also to my new sponsor, Crypto Clokes.

You will definitely know these guys from Twitter, CryptoClokes.com, who are making some of the coolest stuff out there, 3D printed lightning shells, the Triton case, the Bloc Mirror, all of these different things that are about the only products that I will pass that's for.

And I'm really, really proud to have these guys on board. They are Bitcoin only, they have a fucking awesome team. We've had them on 21ism recently, so if you haven't gone and checked that one out, go and check it out, see some of the products they're making.

And yeah, I'm really made up. I'm very, very proud to have them as a sponsor. And if you haven't already listened to the podcast I did with Rick last episode, go and check that one out, see what they're about.

And if you haven't already, go on the website, CryptoClokes.com, enjoy the show. (upbeat music) - That sounds so much better. I'm looking for doing that. It was, yeah, it was really throwing me off.

And I was thinking, oh, this is some good stuff here. I really hope, so I've had it before where I've done like a two-hour interview and it was like a really fucking good one. And then I couldn't use any of it.

And I was just thinking, oh, I hope that doesn't happen now. But yeah, you're coming through loud and clear now. That's so much better. - Okay, good, no problem. I could tell you couldn't get over it.

That's okay, we need to be ready. - Exactly. We can go through some of those bits again. But yeah, now that I'm not distracted, yeah, it's been some time. I was trying to think, when was it we first spoke?

Was it as long as a year ago? - I wanna say like last fall sometime. - Yeah, it feels like maybe that sort of time. And it was good. We had a long conversation all off air. And it was like very...

I think maybe I just started the show possibly. But I can't look at any of our old messages 'cause I got banned from Twitter. It's with my mind, but yeah. I can't see exactly what it was.

But I remember thinking like this is really cool to be able to speak to someone who was on my level and had similar interests because at the time, no one was about to speak to. Nobody gave a shit about anything that I was talking about.

And I remember sort of coming away from the conversation like, ah, there are proper people in this world. So yeah, welcome to the show. And really nice to speak to you again, mate. - Likewise, man, I feel the same way.

And that's how I feel when I listen to your podcast. It's like, okay, good. There's someone like me out there that have a similar understanding to all this stuff. 'Cause yeah, you can get the fear of missing out on a lot of things.

So it's nice listening to and realizing like, okay, maybe it's okay to be at this level. 'Cause like sometimes when you start paying attention to all this stuff that happens on Twitter and Telegram, you can kind of get discouraged, especially like if you're not a, especially if you're not a developer, so.

- Yeah, there's a big leap there, isn't there, from becoming interested in the technology and what it can do, and then actually working out how to use it is not an easy thing, you know, or certainly not for me.

And we chatted obviously when we were recording before and you did a bit of an introduction and explaining what you'd done before. So for anyone who's listening and missed that, previously you were a professional footballer, is that right?

- Yeah, yeah, where's that? So very non-techy. - Super non-techy, so like that was all I wanted to, that was all pretty much what I was focusing on growing up, but luckily, like fortunately, I still had a sense of curiosity about me, so even though, you know, whenever I was training to try and become better,

there were still certain things I was interested in that I was doing that helps me now today. Like for example, I mean, a lot of this has to do with my parents, but they forced me to read growing up.

So like before I used to do a lot of reading and now you'll never see me pick up a book, but like it helps me today with what I'm doing. So I wasn't all sports, but yeah, I mean, that's what I spent most of my time training to do.

And so, but when I got injured from that about 10 years ago, I found out about Bitcoin very soon after luckily. So I had something to sink my teeth into. And because I grew up using peer-to-peer technologies like Torrance and it stood that decentralized, the network effects of that.

And so I immediately got hooked on Bitcoin and been paying attention since. And I've been fortunate enough to work for a couple of Bitcoin wallet companies, Samurai and Wasabi. And then I've also been running Bitcoin meetups locally, just trying to get connected, like with the local community and connect with other Bitcoiners.

That's where Samurai is my core. I can hear myself in the background now. I didn't know. No, it's gone. It's gone. Samurai is my favorite wallet. So what was that experience like working with them?

Oh, it was once in a lifetime. I mean, like the stuff I learned there, I would have never learned doing anything else. And, you know, everything that I learned there, I just like soaked it up and I'm trying to apply it to what I'm doing now.

So I mean, yeah, being able to work remotely, getting paid in Bitcoin, if I didn't take that step, I wouldn't be where I am today doing what I'm doing now. And, you know, yeah, I mean, the free time I have now, like I wouldn't have it if I didn't take that step.

Like it was a leap, you know, not just looking for them, but like their mentality and the way they think about things, like it really forces you to, yeah, it really forces you to take chances, I guess, but also be stern with your beliefs.

So, you know, if you don't like the government watching all your stuff, like, what are you gonna do about it? You know, so you just, I tried in find ways to do things in a more private manner and where I don't have to rely on third parties so much or work for other people, for example.

So yeah, I mean, their ethos is great. It helped me get to where I am today, that's for sure. There's a lot of them, oh shit, I can hear myself again. If you've got, oh no, it's fine, it's gone.

I don't know why it was doing that. Yeah, there's a lot of people who talk the talk on Bitcoin Twitter and then there's Samurai and they are unyielding in the way that they approach things.

And I really respect that. I like that it is a complete, it's just like, no, there is no room for compromise with this. And the more I think about it and the more time I spend trying to play with this technology and like wrap my head around it, it's the only logical way to be giving all your information

out all the time to not be looking forward and thinking about this stuff is crazy. You know, you have to be forward thinking to even consider Bitcoin as an asset. You know, that's why we all come in generally is because of the money.

You have to be ahead of the game in that sense and then to not think, well, where are we going to be in 10 years and do I want to be on every government list? Yeah. The answer is no. And so I have huge respect for the team and it's great to hear you were working with them.

Is it something that you still contribute to or like are you still using Samurai or are you using something else now? I don't contribute in any way because I'm not definitely not a developer.

I was just doing it was like a customer facing position, but I definitely, definitely still recommend it because like you said, it seems like your best bet. It seems like the best option nowadays to have that forward privacy and sovereignty and in a user friendly way as well.

Like, you know, Bitcoin is quite complicated to get into but they make it, they make it very, I want to say very user friendly, but I want to say I guess as user friendly as it can get nowadays and the community is very helpful.

So it is like the best bet for any average user getting into Bitcoin because then also you get your BIP 39 seed and pass raise, which is compatible with other wallets. So, and yeah, now you have Dojo.

So you don't have to rely on their servers anymore. And I mean with Ronan Dojo with my node, it's very easy to get a Dojo running and set up these days to get your Samurai wallet and your Whirlpool connected to it.

So, yeah, I definitely, definitely still recommend it 'cause you know, it's very, it's very good. It's very useful. And like their mobile option as well is such a good option for like a noob trying to get into the space.

It's definitely obviously much better than an exchange but even I'd say much better than the desktop wallets you have out there. 'Cause most people, like I just had someone asking the other day with one of my meetup groups, like I have a paper wallet, you know, why is it bad to use a paper wallet and what else should I use?

'Cause I'm on desktop. So, you know, there's not many options for desktop and you wanna try and get people away from that, I'd say. I don't know. I just think there's not too many desktop options out there.

Like I think Electrum is probably the best desktop only Bitcoin wallet option out there. Other people were recommending it's an Exodus but like it has other shit coins in it. So I don't wanna recommend that.

- Yeah, I've used both but the Exodus is very, very shit coiny but it's very slick. Like the user interface is very, very slick or it was when I'd used it. But yeah, it wouldn't be something that I would recommend to people.

What's your thoughts on the other wallet software, for example, like Spectre or something like that and using with a hardware wallet? Do you have any views on these sort of watch-only wallets and things?

- So Spectre, I've, that project I've contributed to in this sense, I hope that they're FAQ in the beginning earlier on. And I really do like that project and what they're doing and how they're handling it.

It's all top notch but whether or not I think it's useful for the average user is another thing. I've always been publicly clear that I don't think. Even if you're not an average user, like even if you're an experienced Bitcoiner and you've used a single SIG all this time and you want to start experimenting with multi SIG,

you have to be careful. It's not, it's kind of complicated and it's getting better in terms of how you can back it up and things like that. But I just think it's too many steps. Like you're adding too many steps for someone getting involved in Bitcoin.

I mean, there's so many people that still haven't got involved in Bitcoin yet. We are talking, well, not everybody, but there's lots of people talking about lightning network and how this can be used.

But I mean, I think we need to slow down and just help onboard other people first before kind of pushing this technology or that technology. Like don't get me wrong, lightning has its use cases, multi SIG has its use cases.

I just don't think it's user friendly and ready for that everyday person. - Yeah, it's definitely something that I'm too concerned to try at the moment. It seems like it's a sort of thing.

I would shoot myself in the foot with the hands. - Exactly. - I'd, yeah, not for me. - I'm not gonna lie, I did have a scare experimenting with multi SIG stuff. So after that, I forget it.

I'm not trying this stuff again. (laughing) - Was this some sort of like backup or derivation path issue or what was it that caught you out or nearly caught you out? - Well, I was, you know, like luckily I have, I have everything like backed up.

So I was able to kind of retrace my steps and everything. But I was just experimenting with different setups and like it was very stupid because I was doing things that I wasn't, like I was experimenting, but I wasn't 100% sure with what I was doing, so basically I had joined market set up on a laptop and I had it connected

to a remote node and then I tried started using, and then I tried using Spectre wallet at the time, which was, it was a multi SIG. And so just like with the way the backups were with in the configuration files with joined market and Spectre, I just confused myself when I tried, basically what happened with join market,

like something happened with my node. So when that happens with join market, you need to rescan the full blockchain again, otherwise your balance is not displayed, it's displayed zero. So that's what happened eventually I figured out, okay, I have to rescan the whole blockchain again in order to see my UTXOs again in join market.

So that's a scary time when things up that happen. - Oh yeah, shit my pants. (laughing) - I think that's happened to me maybe four times now with Ronan Dojo and messing around with Whirlpool and stuff and then it will break, just sort of like monthly, I don't know why, I have magnet hands or something, but they're just breaking break.

Everything starts working, we flash it, go in, and then I search for my balances in Samurai and it's all gone. I don't know if you've had this experience and then you have to go in and a Bitcoin Q&A kindly taught me through it and you'd like go and rescan and then eventually they'll come up and you have to search for all,

in all the different address types as well 'cause you're like, oh, hold on, now I've got some of it but not all of it 'cause that was in a different address type and my heart was just like pounding out my chest and thinking, oh my God, what have I done here?

I've lost everything and it is just the worst feeling that you can think of. Those sort of experiences I just don't want to have if I can avoid it. - I'm sorry to you, but I do know what you're talking about and it's interesting, you mentioned that actually 'cause when I was working for them, that was something that I did regularly,

it was having to help customers rescan their ex-puffs but now it's cool that you can do that yourself with Dojo on your end but yeah, it can certainly be scary but once you learn though, like once you have that experience, you know, it's kind of like learning the hard way, you're never gonna forget it

and you're not gonna let it happen again. You know, like now you know, okay, if my balance is missing, like I guess, I seems I just need to rescan something like my node needs to be done so.

- Yeah, absolutely. And so do you enjoy the process of building and playing around with this stuff? Is it something that you'll just, you'll look forward to sitting down and like taking on a task and go, right?

I want to work out how this works and you put us aside some time and get cracking with it or is it something that you don't really enjoy but you're doing because you know it's important? - I'd say a bit of both but more so, more so because I really enjoy it.

I mean, when Inspector Wallet offered their Inspector DIY, that kind of started me down the rabbit hole because you know, like it took me a while to order the parts to and wrap my head around it because I didn't want to order the wrong part and waste my money and maybe put it together wrong but I mean, once I got the confidence

and ordered all the parts and I got that set up, like I was addicted because I learned a lot by doing it that way and then you can also start looking into the code a bit more like all of these projects, most of them, I want to say all of them are based off of MicroPython, which is basically Python but a condensed version

so it can fit onto smaller embedded devices and so I got what I'm not a programmer at all but like I'm aspiring to learn this stuff better so I can just understand it. So by doing that, it's like forcing me to learn things and it's giving me the motivation to learn things as well 'cause it's hard to stay motivated constantly

and about something that's useful for yourself. So I know this stuff is gonna be useful in the future so I figured kind of like Bitcoin early on like, okay, if I start learning this stuff now before other people do, I can help them when it becomes more popular.

That's like another reason why I'm doing it is for fun but also because I know I'll be able to help people down the line and like that's why I created the Telegram group, DIY Bitcoin just so it can kind of like so I could share the projects that I was doing but also connect with other people that are doing similar things and then yeah,

I just kind of have it as a place for anyone else that wants to take on these projects to get help because I know like all of the projects do, they do require like a little bit of command line skills so have a Linux operating system and then and it is user friendly.

Like for me, it wasn't complicated because I was following guides like Specter DIY had guides or the team was giving me information on how to set it up. And then the next one I did after that was the Jade hardware wallet which uses the M5 stack device but the Bowser wallet just from like a regular guy, Ben Ark.

He built that one and all I had to do was like follow his steps, install this, download this and then you use this, it's what's called an Arduino IDE so it's this graphical user interface that you load the files onto and then you connect your device to your computer and then you flash the firmware

onto your device and then you can start having fun with your device. So Ben had good information as well to get set up and then yeah, then actually no I did leave the kit after that which is from the blockchain commons.

I think that's what they're called from the blockchain commons. That one is very complicated. It had soldering involved and yeah, there's many many steps but very thorough documentation with that so that helped me as well.

And yeah, the Jade hardware wallet from Blockstream, that you could use a very cheap, any ESP32 chip based device. So I think I used the version of an M5 stack and they had some good documentations as well where you can just follow the commands and flash the firmware onto your device.

So it's not, like that's what's fun for me. You know, I was like, okay, I learned a little bit of Linux, like, okay, now I can apply it here and build this and have fun with that. So yeah, it's a lot of fun for me.

- Yeah, yeah, all the different ones that you're used. - Oh, hold on, one sec. Well, cut it here. Are you sure there's no, 'cause every time that I start speaking, it's like properly coming through like as loud as I've ever heard in my ears of myself which I think it just throws me off.

I don't know whether it's, I don't know, I've never had it before. - You've got earphones in, have you? - Well, I took the earphones out when you said it started sounding a little bit better.

- Yeah, okay. - Yeah, it sounds. - Let's try with the earphones in again one more time.

We're back. (laughs) - You'll be a little bit about the meet-ups because I remember last time we spoke, you had done a couple and you'd said that you'd really enjoyed them and that it was something you were passionate about continuing.

So how has that gone? I mean, obviously lockdowns and things are probably fucked a lot of that up for you, I'm sure, but have you done a few before then? - Yeah, it is something I was passionate about and I still am, but I say it was because it got harder to host events myself because I was having to go somewhere

physically, I don't want to say waste my time, but I was going to say waste my time because most of the people ended up being interested in price. I mean, when I first started hosting the meet-ups, this was before that big bull run and I think 2017 went up to around $20,000.

There weren't too many people attending, but I was fortunate enough to have a partnership with a local library. So the local library was giving me space to host for free, so it was great.

So I didn't have to pay anything and I had a nice place to host them at and yeah, they even helped me advertise a bit, so it was good. And then when that bull run happened, price went up to around $20,000.

There was lots of people in the room. But ever since then, like 2018, when the price was just, you know, it corrected itself and then it just started being steady, I was getting gradually less and less people.

And at that time, it was also a couple of years that I was running meet-ups, so I had even started hosting some in Toronto. Like I actually, if you see the Bitcoin Toronto Twitter page, we actually hosted Peter Todd one event, but it's just really hard finding spaces in Toronto, like not only are they expensive,

but it's just hard to find consistent good spaces. And then it was hard getting there. So we were also for other people trying to get there on time and stuff like that. So I kind of stopped for a while, but I still had the meet-up groups.

And so I was just kind of waiting for a better time. And, you know, like funny, funny enough, even though, yeah, COVID didn't mess up this, is what I'm trying to say. So it actually helped in this regard because I figured, well, why don't I try and start hosting online events again?

Because, you know, no one has to go anywhere. They can do things at their leisure. They don't have to be on video or just talk on audio. And so I started using Jitsi, a video conferencing software.

And yeah, this year I started hosting them again, and it's been pretty good. Yeah, most people are, I don't want to say, yeah, okay, most people are still interested in price, but it's not as bad, I guess, as it was before.

And I have this one, it's neat too, because you don't have to be from Toronto. I have this one gentleman who's also from the UK, and he keeps crashing our meetups, but it's phenomenal because I have someone else that knows what they're talking a little bit.

So it's two people with different opinions, and that's good for new people. Like, it's important to hear different opinions. So yeah, it's going really good right now. That's really cool.

And like you say, yeah, there were a lot of positives to the online stuff. I mean, you don't get the same feeling that you have in person. You know, there is something nice about the in-person meetups, but equally, privacy-wise, being able to just do something with voice-only is pretty good.

And like you say, it's just convenience-wise. I think a lot of people, you know, you get close to a meetup, you get close to the time, and then you're overloaded with work, and you know, it's going to take me all this time to travel across and everything.

And then you're like, oh, I just can't do it. Whereas if you can just flick on your laptop, it's much, much easier. Yeah, you're right. But it's funny you mentioned that. So a lot of people still do RSVP.

That they'll come. But then, like you said, you know, things change and then they end up not coming. But it's way less than it was before. A lot of people would RSVP and then never change it.

So I would expect a certain amount of people and it ends up being this amount of people. So yeah, that sucks when that happens. But it is a lot less now, thankfully, because of, you know, what you mentioned.

It makes it easier. As much as I do enjoy the face-to-face conversations, because you can just communicate easier that way with a group of people and you can, you know, get a better feel for who that person is and what kind of information or what kind of answers they need.

You know, the positives and negatives with it. So just trying to take the positives. And you were saying, obviously, a lot of these people who come in at the beginning, they only care about the price.

And I mean, I think most people are in that camp and then some sort of transition and become a bit more passionate about some of the other reasons why this technology is here and really start to dig into the privacy side and care about how it works and all the rest of it.

But have you found a way to help explain to people why this is important? If you're doing it on a regular basis, have you found something that really clicks for people? Or is it just, you know, some people are going to and some people aren't?

And you just kind of accept that. Yeah, it's definitely at this point. I'm definitely, definitely have the mentality where it's kind of, you know, they are who they are and they'll learn at the rate that they learn at.

Because I think something drastic, drastic needs to happen in order for it to click for them, you know, because they just look at it as an investment because that's all they know. Like they don't maybe, maybe they like the government still, you know, maybe they still want to pay taxes

and think the government's going to have a positive effect on the future. And so I think that's another thing, you know, because, like we mentioned earlier with the samurai guys, like that's one of the things they talk about and anyone in the community is getting involved in an OKYC manner.

And so there's just, you know, it's tough because, like, you want people to get involved for the right reasons, but then you just realize you can't change them. Like no matter, so I said the impressing meetups are good because you can get a better feel for the person and, you know, maybe try and give them better information

based on who they are. But even then, I've never found it to be one thing. It's almost as if they have to experience it on their own. It's like, OK, yeah, they listened to you. They took in what you said and, you know, maybe they even liked it, but they don't know you.

Like they don't know who you are. You know, a lot of people also look for certificates and stuff. And I've been asked that at one of my meetups before, like, when some lawyer guy in Toronto was like, oh, what are your certificates and blah, blah, blah.

So, like, that's not what it's about, you know? So, yeah, I totally just now. It's just, here's the information. I try and not waste my time and energy. I just try and make it as simple as possible.

And that's that, like, just try and educate as many people as possible and then on to the next one. And then, eventually, you hope they'll come around. So, like, that's why I have a telegram group for the meetup as well.

So, eventually, like, people are coming around and starting to ask better questions and stuff like that. So, yeah, I think it's not one thing. I think they just have to experience it themselves.

And, yeah, another thing is, like, who they are, right? If they still think the government is going to do a good thing moving forward, it's never really going to click for them, because there's so many people that are, you know, getting involved in Bitcoin

but they're tying their identities to that Bitcoin and, frankly, that's just not Bitcoin. Yeah, it's not a good idea. And it's something I struggle with quite a lot in terms of sponsorship for the show.

And I've armed an ad often, does this fit with the message that I'm giving because the message that I'm giving to people is, do not use KYC. Do not use it. But I always come back to the same conclusion, which I think is right, or it certainly feels right for me, which is a lot of people, like you said, just will not,

or certainly at the start, will not come into this thinking government are bad. You know, I don't want them to have my information. They're not going to view things through that lens. It's often just going to be speculative.

They're going to want to use something that is in their eyes reputable and that they feel comfortable with. And in my opinion, it's better to get somebody on-boarded to buy some Bitcoin and hold some Bitcoin than just saying, oh, well, it's KYC free or nothing.

Like, if you don't do KYC free, then fuck off. Because what you're doing is just like having, you know, probably 90%, 95% of people who won't buy. And of those ones that will buy on a KYC service, if they start learning more about Bitcoin, which you do once you hold it, because you care more, once you see, like, oh, I own this,

like, you start to research more. If you research at all, you're going to work out that the government is not your friend. You're going to work out that it's a really fucking stupid idea to give all your information away.

And you're going to rethink things. And then for those people, they can say, okay, we're going forward. I'm going to actually use this. I'm going to use HODL HODL. I'm going to mine. I'm going to, you know, whatever decision they make.

And I'm going to use something like Whirlpool to get forward looking privacy. But I think it's really hard to out the gate, get someone to go. I'm going to buy this thing that I don't really understand on a KYC free service that is really not as easy to use and then work out how to hold my keys as well,

because I can't just have them look after it for me. And I have to learn all this information all at one time. And all I want to do is buy 50 quads worth of Bitcoin. So, like, what's your thoughts on that?

Like, do you have any views on how you approach these things with people? Are you just saying to them, well, buy KYC free or don't at all? It's good. I agree with you. By the way, like, I would rather just, I would rather someone get involved and start learning than not get involved at all because, you know, they're scared.

It's like, okay, these people said it shouldn't be KYC. So, now I need to figure out how to do it and then they end up getting discouraged. So, I think as long as they're willing to do the research after taking the easy steps, so say, you know, they go on an exchange and they take the easy option.

And so they've had to give up some of their personal information, their banking information. But now they have Bitcoin and now they understand how it works a little. As long as they continue to educate themselves and like do everything like you mentioned, then I think it's okay.

But I think the problem with those people is they don't do that education. They don't do that research unless something bad happens. So, the exchange gets hacked or they get social engineered and to give in a way they're in for the seed or whatever or sent to a wrong Bitcoin address.

So, yeah, I think like if you take that step and you're willing to do the research, then that's fine. But I think most people that take that step, they just take it and then they leave it because they think of it like a bank account.

They treat it like online banking where it's like, okay, I have Bitcoin that's similar to my online banking where I created an account and I just take my password in every now and then and now I have access to that account.

It is a tricky one, it's one I don't think there's an easy way to solve it certainly for now. And sometimes I do honestly like I flip between I sometimes go this is not congruent with my message.

I'm telling everyone this and then I have sponsorship from this and it is a very fine line. But I just think that you could make the argument, well, you don't want anyone to buy through KYC because if there is some kind of effectively like bifurcation of the network in terms of you have,

you know, they put up these crazy regulations and people stay within it and you have the blacklist as coins and you have all this sort of nonsense that they're probably going to try. I think without normies coming in and then being able to convert a small percentage of them to realize, okay, no, I'm going to change and go, okay, I see.

This is all just going to go into the hands of massive corporations. We have more chance of normal people who buy a little bit of Bitcoin to convert them than you do with big companies putting it on their balance sheet because they can't do the no KYC stuff, you know, certainly not through the businesses.

If we're to believe we do have this SAT squeeze, over time it becomes more and more difficult to get your hands on proper Bitcoin, not an IOU for it. Yeah, I'd rather it be more decentralized rather than more people have it than less people.

So I don't know how to solve it. It is really difficult as well with you go on and you pay the real price on Bisk or HODL HODL and people look on there and they go, certainly in England, a lot of time it's like, oh, well, it's like six or 10% more and you try and convince someone who's just coming in to go,

Oh, no, trust me, it's worth paying 10% more. And they're like, is it fuck? I'm not paying 10% on top. I'm just not doing that. Like, why would I do that? They can't wrap their head around it.

So do you think we'll sort of, if we get more people involved in the no KYC services that we can bring down that percentage? If there's more and more people using it transactionally and they're jumping in and out when they need to, that we can bring these percentages down more in line?

Because I see that as quite a big barrier. It definitely puts people off. Yeah, it is certainly a barrier. But, you know, just so you know, for your show, when I listen and I hear that sponsor, there's a lot of other shows that have sponsors that don't necessarily align with what they say.

So even though you have that, I know because of what you talk about in the show that that's not how you feel. It's just your sponsor. I get it. And I like them. Listen, like as KYC services go, they've got a really fucking good team. I really like them.

You know, they have to operate within certain regulations so that they can carry on as a business in the UK. And for my friends and family, I send them there. So I'm like, well, I'm sending them there anyway.

So if they're going to use a KYC service, it might as well be one that I trust more than the others. No, I say don't beat yourself up. Don't beat yourself. It's yeah, it's a fun lot. But in terms of this.

What do I say? We talk about it pretty much every meetup now because we try and explain to people why you might not want to buy it with the exchange and why you might want to do no KYC. So what we say is, I think it's similar to what I've heard from you from Bitcoin Q&A on the show.

But basically, you tell them, and see, this is hard. Like if this is someone that pays taxes and they want to keep paying taxes moving forward, it's going to be tough to say this to them.

But we just say it in general. And you can think of it like this. Like, yes, you're paying roughly 10% for no KYC Bitcoin. But by getting that no KYC Bitcoin, there's no chance that the government is going to tax you in the future on that.

And so if you think of it that way, taxing is a lot larger than 10%. So there's that. But also, there's been instances in the past where governments have confiscated gold.

And I don't see that being any different with Bitcoin if you buy through an exchange and you have large amounts and they want it for whatever reason. So yeah, I think when we try and explain that, I guess it gets them thinking.

But still in the end, they're going to do whatever is easier for them. But that's just what we say to try and get them thinking like, okay, if I pay that premium now, I'm paying that premium.

So I'm paying for sovereign Bitcoin, Bitcoin that's mine and that can get taxed or confiscated in the future. And so that's also how I think about all the Bitcoin that we have to talk about this as well, because people get worried like, oh, all this Bitcoin is being bought up by these institutions right now

and kind of getting fear of missing out. But the way I think of it is they're buying up all the KYC Bitcoin. So it's all of the Bitcoin that people aren't going to want it. Well, not people, but you're not going to want to use. Like, that's not the Bitcoin that was created in the beginning. That's not why it was created.

It was created to not rely on third parties and not for governments to have all your information. So I think I'm okay with those institutions buying up that Bitcoin because I'm not going to use that Bitcoin anyway.

Like, I think there's going to be like a private Bitcoin network, so to speak, and then more public Bitcoin network, just because those are the people that bought their exchanges and are getting trapped because like, another thing I'm noticing this year is

there are a plethora of blockchain investigation companies. So many. So many pop up and they are using. I don't know if it's software from a chain analysis or if they're using their own home brew version, but I mean,

I just came across an open source one the other day, which allows you to search transactions within the blockchain, but you need a ridiculous amount of hardware. So I'm not sure how that all works yet.

But yeah, I'm noticing that which just goes to show you how profitable it is right now because law enforcement have no clue what they're doing. So they need help searching the blockchain.

And so you get these companies, you know, say, okay, I have this tool and I can help you search for this, this and that, but it just goes to show you know, like, why are they popping up? Why do they exist because there's a demand for it?

And there's only a demand for it's because of all the KYC Bitcoin, but if people make it harder on them by not using KYC and then using tools to break those heuristics, because that's what they that's what they look for, right?

They try and connect your UTXOs in a way. So as long as people start using tools to break those heuristics, then they'll be out of business in the future. But, you know, they exist right now because that's what's popular. That's what's happening right now.

Yeah. And do you have any thoughts with, you know, we talked a little bit about lightning earlier. I'm kind of with you in terms of it's not really quite there yet for mainstream use, but I'm also really actually very interested in a lot of the applications for it.

And one that I'm considering more and more is using it to help with your privacy post mix. I wondered if you have any thoughts on that or if you've played around with it or used it in any way to gain more privacy or to make things more difficult for these fuckers who are tracking everyone.

Honestly, I haven't, I haven't experimented, experimented with it at all in terms of privacy or just for fun in general because, because I haven't heard, like I always keep coming across information where it's like, oh, there's this bug or that bug and, but also just trying it myself.

It's very hard to back up and it's different node implement implementations are different like there's LND and then there's C lightning and I mean, it can get confusing like when I first set up when I was experimenting with umbrella and I set up umbrella.

I didn't know that it was going to be an LND node and that I would have to back up and A Z seed and crap like that. So I just went back to my Bitcoin D full node and with my node and back to what I was comfortable with because, yeah, it's just, I just think it's too complicated.

Like, don't get me wrong, there are, there are applications that are exciting and enticing to me like, I think through the things, through the Sphinx chat, there's an application where you can, you know, like, like I could host the meetups and people can tip me through jit, through the JITC app.

Sphinx has that coin. So there are like cool use cases for it, but I just don't, I just haven't taken the leap yet I'm to, I don't want to mess around with it.

But, you know, I have heard some things about it helping with privacy, but I haven't heard enough for me to want to experiment with it. Like, I've heard you can get enough good privacy just from using Bitcoin on chain.

So that's what I'm trying to focus on and, yeah, trying to get, trying to get better at that.

Yeah, I think you definitely can, you can get enough privacy on chain, but it does seem as though you can do some pretty interesting things and it's, it's like a bit of a layered approach, you can gain privacy and then do a couple of extra hops and make things even more difficult.

Yeah. But I'm with you. I've, I've set up my Raspberry Blitz. I opened a channel with help from Bitcoin Q&A and then had issues with it, ended up having to close it and lost a load of SATs, which really fucking annoyed me.

It wasn't, I mean, it wasn't actually masses, but it was enough that I was like, okay, that's pissed me off.

And then, yeah, the backup stuff is a little bit worrying. So I had to set, I had to set it up where I had like it backs up to a Dropbox drive, and then also like I have another backup where it's going on to a little USB drive all the time.

And it's just, it was like learning Bitcoin again, it felt like, like, do you know what I mean? Like, you know, when you're first sending those transactions and you're like, oh, fuck, you know, what if I mess this up and I lose my money and it's all new and confusing.

And then you become more comfortable with it. And now like sending a transaction on chain, I'll still check and double check and triple check to make sure that I've got the right address and all that kind of stuff.

But I feel pretty comfortable with it. Lightning. No, not yet. That's, that's it. You know, like, I'm still getting to grips with Bitcoin and now you're doing lightning network at me, but come on.

Yeah. So what else has caught your eye recently? You know, we've talked about you doing the multi-six stuff. Obviously, you're still doing meetups, but they're online. You've been, you're building your own hardware wallet, which is pretty fucking cool and doing all the soldering yourself and all this kind of stuff.

Learning Linux. You've been busy. You've learned a lot. Is there, is there anything that's on the horizon that you're looking to jump into? I'm all of that is just me trying to, trying to learn more about Bitcoin under the hood so I can help, help educate others, however that may be when the time comes.

I haven't figured out how that's going to happen, whether it be, you know, running an online help desk of some sort or even starting like a local business here and running consultations. You know, I haven't figured out exactly what I want to do yet that way, but I know, like, in the meantime, I'm just learning as much as I can.

And by doing, doing those things, like slowly learning Linux and slowly tinkering with this hardware stuff, it's helping me, it's helping me learn more.

So right now on the hardware side of things, I'm slowly trying to learn MicroPython, which I don't even want to say it because it just seems so abstract for me and so difficult for me because I guess maybe it's so new and so foreign to me.

But it's something I want to do because if I start learning MicroPython, then I can start messing around with different Bitcoin applications on these devices.

And the only way I can do that is because there's these MicroPython based Bitcoin libraries that already exist. So you basically are like taking from another library and building off of it. So a lot of these devices that I built, like, I think it's based off of one of Trezor's crypto libraries, for example.

So I'm trying to kind of learn a lot that way because I just see that's going to be, it's going to get more, it's going to get more popular and kind of, I don't want to say DIY, but certainly cheaper Bitcoin hardware wallets, like blockchains, Jade hardware wallet is very cheap, but it was very popular.

So just watching both of the projects, like Spectre Wallet, or Spectre DIY was very popular, but there was a lot more expensive, so not that many people could play around with it and experiment with it, whereas with the Jade, yeah, okay, it's not as good, it's not as secure, but it's cheap.

And so a lot of people bought them and a lot of people played around with them. So that's kind of the road I'm going down is just messing around with different Bitcoin hardware projects.

I don't know, it's just what's fun, it's just what's fun to me, and it does help me learn more about Bitcoin wallets as well and how they operate because you start looking at the code and how seeds are generated and stuff like that.

Yeah, it's really, really interesting thing to learn because the whole culture and ethos is, oh, don't trust verify, it's like, well, okay, but there are certain things that you just cannot verify yourself unless you learn, you know, you can get down to a certain point, but like, you know,

so I'll use a coal card and then there's a point where I'm like, well, I'm just trusting other people to tell me that this is secure because I can't fucking review the code, I've got no idea. I'm just trusting that there's a few people around me who I respect and trust, who trust it and use it.

And therefore, I'm like, okay, well, that's probably the best thing, but I can't look at the code. So if you could do that, if you could learn MicroPython and you could have a deeper understanding, that'd be incredible.

And, you know, just when you said, just when you said that, it made me think of another reason why I'm actually interested in it is because of that verification point you made. So right now with Bitcoin, you know, it's open source software.

A lot of people have reviewed reviewed the code, looked it over. And so now when you download different applications, a lot of these projects have documentation for verifying the software you download.

So, for example, Sparrow, Sparrow Wallet, which is one of my favorite wallets right now in terms of user-friendliness, usefulness, you can hook up your electron personal server remotely to it.

It's great, but one of my favorite things is their documentation. They have the best documentation. One of the best documentation that I've seen from any project, and they focus on verifying the software.

So you're starting to see that more and more so anyone can verify the software, but like you said, you know, what happens if I'm using this hardware wallet and not hardware wallet, I'm having to trust that hardware.

So another reason why all this stuff is interesting to me is because of that aspect. I think the project or the company is called Bunny Studios and this guy, he already has the device for on crowd supply and he already went past his goal, but it's for this precursor device, which basically it's a device that allows you to verify it.

So it's openly verifiable hardware, and I don't think that's ever been done before, so after listening to his talks and reading his blogs, this guy is really on another level, and he's actually trying to create a device which is fully verifiable in a way that anyone can do it.

If you look over the blog, a lot of this is high tech stuff, but he's going down a road that no one has been going down yet, and so that would be interesting to see how that can be applied to different Bitcoin hardware wallets or different hardware that's used for different Bitcoin applications,

because I think Bitcoiners would really like that. They're already big on verifying their own software, but now how cool would that be if they could get a device and verify their own hardware before setting it up.

All this stuff is incredible, I'm very excited about the things that I'm seeing, I like this whole building your own hardware at home from components that you wouldn't otherwise know, or you wouldn't know are going to be made into a hardware wallet, I think that that takes

things to a new level because of the sort of man-in-the-middle attacks, and people knowing, if someone sees a treasure or a ledger or a cold card, they know what it's going to be used for, so I like those kind of ideas, and it's just good to see that things are

pushing forward all the time, and it's cool to know that you're digging in and taking things to the next level where you can actually start learning MicroPython and digging deeper, so I'm very interested to see how you get on over the coming months with it.

Don't keep me accountable for everything, I'm just going to reach out next week and say, "Right, have you worked it out now? Are you fluent?"

I'm slowly trying to learn, you know, like now that we're forced to be at home more and more, why not, right?

Absolutely. All right, mate, well, look, I think we'll wrap it up there, but before you go, can you let people know where they can find you for these meetups, who's welcome to come and any other things that people should be aware of so that they can find you?

Yeah, so for the meetups, I'm just, I typed it out to you there, @BitcoinTO meetup is the Twitter handle for our meetup group, and then I have a telegram chat group with the same, I think with the same lettering, t.m.e/BitcoinTO meetup, and yeah, I've had people that aren't from Toronto join, so I'll share the event.

I think it's every couple of weeks now, we're doing it Saturday morning, yes, T time. Yeah, I'll just share it on the Twitter account and on the meetup page, I'll make an event and put it out there.

It's been really, really cool to catch up with you, it's been some time, we have to not leave it as long next time, and yeah, thanks for coming on and everything that you're doing in the space, it's great to see the hustle.

It was a pleasure chatting with you and yeah, we shouldn't leave it as long next time and we'll catch up soon. Alright mate, speak soon, take care. Take care man, have a good day.