Thanks for the invite. Interesting to see some of these.
Questions and answers:
1. When and why did you become interested in cryptocurrencies?
Sunday, July 11, 2010 in the evening. I read the white paper and realized that (despite what people who either hadn’t read the paper or hadn’t understood it said) bitcoin was an important step and was useful as it related to the Byzantine Generals Problem. There were a bunch of idiots around (and still are) making ridiculous arguments like “I’ll just duplicate my hard drive and have double the coins.” “Bitcoin will fail.”
The biggest interest is that bitcoin takes power from the statist authoritarians and keep people free. Bitcoin gives people the power over the products of their own lives. You make money by spending the hours of your life to earn it and you should control it. You aren’t at the mercy of someone who wants power over you. Did you live in Cyprus when there are capital controls and have bitcoin? Screw the politicians, and leave. Live in Venezuela and need to flee the authoritarians? With bitcoins, no problem. With everything else, they’ll probably steal/confiscate it at the border. Stuck in Hong Kong with the communists restricting freedom? Use bitcoin to get your assets out before they are stolen. Or at least convert some assets into bitcoin so they aren’t locked down like other assets in China. Tools like bitcoin protect liberty from people who are willing to sacrifice you to their own “needs.” Protect yourself from nonsense like that: buy some bitcoin. South Korea has capital controls, lots of places do. Protect yourself.
Anyone who will vote their own liberty away is bad enough, but voting everyone else’s away for their own greed is worse. What does it say about their character and their lack of caring for their family, let alone other people, to do that? Not much, but there are a surprising number of people who want someone else to pay for their choices. Bitcoin can help now, but as adoption increases, more so.
Bailouts for banks mean bailouts for people - depositors, shareholders, employees etc. Do you want to be forced into bailing out someone else's bad choices or should you have the freedom to decide for yourself who you help? Bitcoin gives you the power and responsibility to decide how you want to respond. Someone can't just come in and give your "account" a "haircut" or inflate the value away (a hidden tax on everyone). Follow the money, who is helped by the polices.
The article on slashdot on July 11, 2010 exposed a lot of people to bitcoin, lots of people had the chance to be involved. Lots of people missed it. I ran the 0.3.x version for a very long time.
2. When and why did you buy your first bitcoin?
I didn’t. I just started mining around July 2010. Actually, I take that back, I think I bought a few hundred dollars worth in 2019 to pay someone since it was easier than accessing cold storage.
3. How did you get on the forum?
I found it on google in July/August 2010 and I had been reading the forum for more than a year before finally registering. I was getting 3 more new GPU cards going and thought I might have some questions about it. Turns out, I got things set and it took a while until I actually joined in the conversation.
4.1. What prevents mass adoption of cryptocurrencies?
- Ease of use.
- Lack of US ETF to enable more investment directly from a brokerage account.
- Lack of full anonymity.
- Security of computer and mobile operating systems. When you have OSs that are insecure, will people be willing to trust that their coins are secure? Everything - backup included - needs to be end-to-end encrypted using on device keys so that a hack somewhere doesn’t open everyone’s devices up. Have a private key on your device? At least there is another layer of encryption if it is encrypted on-device. Of course, that messes up the plans of those who want to control everyone and everything in the world since they can’t crack them (yet). If your bitcoins are on your computer and you get a virus, you may be screwed. Ditto on your mobile device. In many ways the irreversibility of bitcoin is a great thing except if your computer is insecure. All the CPU manufacturers have had serious bugs, all the OS venders have too. Device security is critical.
Remember that any politician or bureaucrat who is trying to sell you on a backdoor, does not have your interests at heart. They have one goal: power. Don’t buy the siren song of backdoors being necessary. Backdoors in hardware or software are evil. They may be put their with good intentions, but they will be compromised, it is a just a question of when and then anyone who relies on them for security (bitcoin or otherwise) will be screwed.
- Uncensorability. Do you want Facebook, Twitter, Google, PayPal or anyone else to be able to freeze your assets because you don’t toe the politically correct, authoritarian line? Do you want to be “cancel cultured” if you don’t bow down to the mob? Bitcoin helps you keep your freedom. Do you want them to control your money?
4.2. How do you think mass advertising of gambling projects has a positive effect on the development of the forum or harms the community?
I just ignore the ads, and don’t gamble since I know the odds are always in the house’s favor - unless you are counting cards and there is no CSM. Unless you *are* the house, gambling is a fools errand. Does it harm the forum? In the sense of getting a lot of nonsense, low content, high noise posts, yes it does harm it. If people get involved for the ads and then truly get involved after seeing the benefits, then it is a positive. I don’t know the ratio of the number of people who just spam post and then leave vs the ones who stay for real reasons.
4.3. How do you consider whether 2-3 years of experience in cryptocurrency is enough to successfully invest or does an investor need to receive special education?
Five minutes, maybe 60 minutes, experience is enough time to invest. Go to someplace (coinbase, square, many other places) and buy some. Don’t sell. Anyone who has done that at any point with the exception of a few weeks at the end of 2017 has done quite well. If you are trading, well, there is a huge amount of luck there and you are just trying to out smart hundreds of other people to sell before a drop and know when the bottom is in. Trading isn’t investing. Some people will do well, a lot won’t. One needs to not be afraid to cut losses (if any). This isn't rocket science that requires a lot of education or experience.
I also love (sarcasm) how some people term buying and holding “hoarding”. That is a nonsense term that people use to add a negative connotation to people who believe in bitcoin and were/are willing to take a risk. What is the real agenda of people who say it is “hoarding”? Probably to weaken bitcoin. Ditto for bitcoin “expiring after X years of not moving” and then being “redistributed.” A bunch of nonsense by statist toadies who want to weaken bitcoin to increase their own power.
A nice thing about an ETF or private wealth coming in is that it isn't traders, but investors so they are in for the long haul, not minutes, hours, days, or weeks. It provides more stability to the fiat price, less volatility and better price discovery. And more demand, obviously.
5. What do you think of the current Merit system and signature campaigns? Do they harm the forum?
Signature campaigns are fine. Do they add much? Not really. Does anyone pay attention to them? With all the scams that have happened in the past, I am skeptical of anything that is sig advertised. The Merit system is okay, I don’t pay much attention to it.
6. The most useful forum topic? Most helpful users?
I always like the technical and development sections and read those, but don’t do much replying in there recently (e.g. the last 3-4 years) - too much other stuff going on. Kids and the like.
7. 3 things you would implement on the forum?
On the forum? Not much. I haven’t given it much thought. Perhaps a way to be truly anonymous given the hacks of the database over the years - e.g. no email address needed. Of course, that cat is out of the bag now.
8. Do you trade on exchanges or invest in projects?
No. I’ll invest time in projects. I invest in my own projects.
9. Tell a story about your big profit or big loss?
Start mining in 2010. Don’t sell. Cool story bro. There isn’t much to tell though. If I’d had a crystal ball, I would’ve sold everything in December 2017 and repurchased in March 2020. Or just delivered a pizza. (Funny story there, but that's for another time). Of course, no one knows the future.
10. What do you think about the DEFI ecosystem?
The more legitimate projects and the more use cases, the better. This is a nice use.
11. Is your anonymity a vital necessity or precaution?
Anonymity is always a good thing. It protects freedom of speech, it protects people from bad actors, and it is critical to the future success of the world. Not just bitcoin, or cryptocurrency, but the freedom of the world.
Just ask Thomas Paine, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, Patrick Henry and others about the importance of free, anonymous speech. Anyone who believes that anonymity is unimportant or shouldn’t be permitted wants to stop people from speaking freely in order to stop criticism of things. Anyone who believes that people should not be able to fund others who are speaking anonymous, also wants to stop criticism of themselves and stop freedom of speech in the world. Anyone who thinks that “hate speech” is real intends to stop all speech they don’t like. Subjective definitions like that are useful for totalitarians to control people.
Anonymity for money is just as important. Anonymous speech is useless without an audience or without the ability to get the message out. Consequently one of the most important areas in bitcoin is true anonymity of transactions. The powerful governments and entities (like Facebook, Google and others) won’t like it because of “think of the children”, “terrorism”, and other tropes.
Anyone who is against anonymity wants control. Control of you and everyone else. Control over what you say, to whom you say it, and everyone else who sees it. They want you to self-censor. Just ask anyone who won’t toe the line on Twitter how that works. Do you want to have your money banned, shadow-banned, or censored so no one else can get it/see it?
Without the freedom to be anonymous and uncensored, you can't be free.
12. The last cryptocurrency book you read?
I haven’t unless you count things like Snow Crash which isn’t technically cryptocurrency related. Much of the stuff is just so basic that it isn't worth the time.
I’ll read very technical stuff on the engineering and programming side of things, but cryptocurrencies in general? Not a lot. Projects built on top of bitcoin are important for their uncensorability and decentralization. Both built on top of the bitcoin coin, and using forks of the bitcoin codebase. e.g. things like Twister. So I’ll look at them and their code and documentation.
13. Advise 3 cryptocurrencies/tokens for investment in the next 1-2 years?
Bitcoin. Everything else is quite derivative. Ethereum is about the only interesting one, but it is very centralized in many ways, is (from what I’ve seen) much more difficult to get a node up and synched, and consequently not in the same league as bitcoin.
The huge value of the bitcoin ecosystem helps to provide the security of the network. It is a virtuous circle. None of the alts have that.
14. How much will Bitcoin cost at the end of 2020?
Perhaps a better question is what will be the cost to you and your family if you DO NOT have some bitcoin as an inflation hedge, insurance against bad governments and the like. What will the opportunity cost be for not having some even in relatively normal circumstances. What would the opportunity cost be of being in a Cyprus, Venezuela, or Hong Kong-like situation wishing you had owned some to protect yourself? So what will not owning bitcoin cost you at the end of 2020 and onwards?
As far as the fiat price in US dollars will be between 0 and 1,000,000. :-) Everything else is just a guess, there are so many variables. Given the uses of bitcoin to protect one’s assets from statist authoritarians (fascist, socialist, communist, totalitarian etc), given the uses of bitcoin to facilitate commerce (e.g. cross border, or gambling - as I said, I don’t do it, but lots of people exercise their freedom to do so), given the smart contract features, given the inflation protection, and given all the other proposed uses, the future looks bright. Will an ETF happen before then? Probably not. (Will one happen in the next 4 years (given the potential now much more statist president), probably not - but who knows.)
With the resurgence of statist authoritarians around the world, more people will realize the advantages of owning bitcoin. Will many more realize the need in the next 2 months? Some, but who knows how many. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, and it just takes a step at a time to get there. Voting away freedom one step at a time isn't any worse than doing it all at once. It is merely a slower trip. Everyone should protect some of their assets. Be on the right side of history and protect yourself, your family, and your freedom. Bitcoin is an off ramp on the road to hell where you can protect yourself from the arbitrary whims of the statists.
Remember that “free" bread for one means slavery for someone else. All the people wanting the "free" bread don't realize that they're going to be the ones providing the bread for someone large number of others - at the point of a gun while the politicians in the centralized capitals take their vig. They think they're only going to be receiving it. And that is bad enough that they believe their needs entitle them to use the force of government to take it from someone else, but voting everyone else into that immoral view is worse. Disposing of the hours and minutes of someone else's life merely because they "need" something (a cell phone or whatever) is evil. What's worse is that the people who don't (or aren't able to) think about it trumpet a socialist/communist type platform as something virtuous, not something evil and immoral. It isn't charity if it's at the point of a gun and it isn't moral or charitable if it's somebody else's money. Bitcoin stops people from taking your money. Obviously you pay taxes, but a Marx, Lenin, Stalin, Chavez, Castro, Mao, Xi, Hitler, won’t be able to come in and take your assets if you leave the country. And with anonymity, won’t know you have them.
So the value of bitcoin depends on the value that many individuals put on the hours and minutes of their lives and the degree to which they intend to protect themselves from people who want to take the products of their lives. Long answer: no one knows the price, but over longer periods - years - the trend is very likely much higher.
15. P.S. (Optional) - since there was no question, I wrote what I wanted10 years ago, I would’ve been quite clear that bitcoin was an experiment and could fail. That is still true today, but it has a decade under its belt and is much less likely to fail. The future for bitcoin in particular, and even crypto in general, is bright. Not the scam coins and others that offer little value. Concentrated mining right now is one worry, particularly in a communist regime. Just ask Hong Kong how being under the thumb of a communist regime is working out. Just ask the people of Taiwan how it is to live in fear of China. How many time over the last 10+ years now have people said things like “Bitcoin will never hit $1. Bitcoin will never maintain dollar parity. Bitcoin will never hit $10 or $100 or $1000 or $20000.” Too many to count. The doubters have been proven wrong for more than a decade. The people who understood the import of the project and were willing to wait have been greatly rewarded.
My main concerns and areas that are critical right now are:
- Concentration - mining concentration is a fear.
- Hash rate decrease - unlikely to happen, but you never know if miners are concentrated and a government tries to take them down.
- Freedom - bitcoin and similar decentralized, pseudonymous projects are critical to protect everyone from statists. This is why bitcoin and its ilk are so important.
- Responsibility: How many people keep their phones or computers updated? Lots do not and you end up with infections on your PC and mobile device. Then you end up with people saying “bitcoin is not secure” when the device itself is hacked. Ditto for when exchanges get hacked or when there are exit scams. People always look to blame someone else. Bitcoin requires responsibility since there isn’t a credit card company to call and say “my card is stolen.”
Bitcoin isn’t perfect, but is reasonably uncensorable (mining concentration is the worry there). Anonymity isn’t great, but great strides are being made in that direction. Lightning and similar projects, all are helping.
p.p.s. Just from personal curiosity, I’d like to hear from two people although it seems very unlikely they are around:
Atlas - from a long time ago, long ago banned for a lot of reasons - I think all discussed here and elsewhere online. Hopefully he matured, got his act together, and didn’t sell his bitcoin. (Started this thread:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=12156.4620 ).
Zeroday - hasn’t been on in years. I’d be interested in hearing how he has recovered from the Cyprus fiasco (
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=83045 ). He protected himself and got himself away from the control freaks.
A quote worth remembering: “There is only an up or down. Up to man's age-old dream-the maximum of individual freedom consistent with order or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. Regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would sacrifice freedom for security have embarked on this downward path. Plutarch warned, "The real destroyer of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits."
Bitcoin puts you in charge of who you give "bounties, donations and benefits" to.
Cheers.
* Slashdot article:
https://news.slashdot.org/story/10/07/11/1747245/bitcoin-releases-version-03
