1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:07,600 One of the things that I really like about Bitcoin, and I think is perhaps its most, its strongest attribute of all, 2 00:00:07,600 --> 00:00:12,880 is the confidence that we have that the monetary system is not going to change. 3 00:00:12,880 --> 00:00:18,400 Now, if you're talking about a fork which would change to proof of stake, which would inflate the supply, 4 00:00:18,400 --> 00:00:26,280 which would do all kinds of other things, then you have removed what I believe to be one of its major selling points 5 00:00:26,280 --> 00:00:32,000 that I think a lot of people, even if they don't appreciate it when they first get in, 6 00:00:32,000 --> 00:00:35,520 certainly come to appreciate over time. 7 00:00:35,520 --> 00:00:39,160 The Bitcoin hardware wallet space can be a little confusing, 8 00:00:39,160 --> 00:00:46,800 but I'm here to tell you that the most important part of your decision needs to be the ethos of the team 9 00:00:46,800 --> 00:00:51,600 that's developing the hardware wallet. 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RoninDojo.io. 43 00:03:48,240 --> 00:03:51,240 Craig Ross Sparrowalk today. 44 00:03:51,240 --> 00:03:56,240 I'm very grateful to him. Craig, do you have a Ronin Dojo? 45 00:03:56,240 --> 00:04:07,240 I don't, Chris. I actually tend to need to tinker around myself. So I need to compile things and try different versions. 46 00:04:07,240 --> 00:04:13,240 So for me, it actually makes more sense to have a kind of a bare bones device that I can adjust as I need. 47 00:04:13,240 --> 00:04:21,240 Do you think that it's like a sacrifice of... 48 00:04:21,240 --> 00:04:28,240 In what ways do you think we're making a trade off by getting a Ronin Dojo as opposed to building my own node? 49 00:04:28,240 --> 00:04:32,240 I don't think you're making much of a trade off at all, to be honest. I think I'm just... 50 00:04:32,240 --> 00:04:36,240 There's trade off. No, man. No, no, no, no, no, no. 51 00:04:36,240 --> 00:04:43,240 I want to know the hardcore view because I know I have to trust the software they put on it. 52 00:04:43,240 --> 00:04:51,240 When I receive it, it has software. I could check it myself, which I should, but I haven't yet. I just plugged it in and it's gone. 53 00:04:51,240 --> 00:05:00,240 I mean, I just received the device and I plugged it in. I didn't check it. I trust the guy that sent it to me. 54 00:05:00,240 --> 00:05:04,240 But I should have checked it because it could be anything. It could be doing anything. 55 00:05:04,240 --> 00:05:08,240 Somebody wanted to attack that thing and replace the software. 56 00:05:08,240 --> 00:05:16,240 And then once I connect my Sparrow wallet to it, by then I should know that it's okay. I didn't build it myself. 57 00:05:16,240 --> 00:05:23,240 I should be on top of things and I'm falling behind on a few things when I trust the developer. 58 00:05:23,240 --> 00:05:30,240 This goes for like closed source stuff too, especially, but with open source stuff, at least we can check it ourselves. 59 00:05:30,240 --> 00:05:39,240 Yeah, sure. I mean, I guess in an ideal sense, you want to have compiled everything yourself all the way down to your kernel. 60 00:05:39,240 --> 00:05:43,240 There's obviously levels to which people can practically address these things. 61 00:05:43,240 --> 00:05:49,240 Practically, we do the best we can and there is a certain amount of trust. We just try to minimize that trust. 62 00:05:49,240 --> 00:05:59,240 So when it comes to the likes of one of these kind of pre-built note packages, you do kind of look at, well, who's building it? 63 00:05:59,240 --> 00:06:07,240 What is the team behind it? What is their sort of ethics? And you do place a certain amount of trust in that, for sure. 64 00:06:07,240 --> 00:06:13,240 If you build it yourself, you obviously place less trust, but it's certainly not a binary thing. 65 00:06:13,240 --> 00:06:21,240 There's always some degree of trust involved because you just are never going to be able to read every line of code going all the way down. 66 00:06:21,240 --> 00:06:26,240 So you just have to choose where you want to jump off the boat, if you will. 67 00:06:26,240 --> 00:06:33,240 And I think it's always good to aspire to get further down the stack and to do more of the things yourself and to minimize your trust further. 68 00:06:33,240 --> 00:06:37,240 But the most important thing is obviously to get you a node in the first place. 69 00:06:37,240 --> 00:06:45,240 So it should not be a case of, well, I want to wait until I can compile everything myself before I'm going to get a node at all. 70 00:06:45,240 --> 00:06:50,240 You need to kind of start on that journey, as this kind of would be my message. 71 00:06:50,240 --> 00:06:56,240 Yeah, like they say, don't let perfect be the enemy of good, right? 72 00:06:56,240 --> 00:06:57,240 That's it. Yeah. 73 00:06:57,240 --> 00:07:03,240 So it's like if you're getting a node, it's a step in the right direction. 74 00:07:03,240 --> 00:07:11,240 But people use the same argument with regard to self-custody, and I have a problem with that. 75 00:07:11,240 --> 00:07:26,240 You know, as far as like people saying it's OK to use custody as a first step, as long as you're buying Bitcoin, it's OK to use custody and then go to self-custody later when you when you feel better about it, when you're more confident about it. 76 00:07:26,240 --> 00:07:32,240 But actually, before we even get into that, I should reference who you are and what you do. 77 00:07:32,240 --> 00:07:40,240 We just jumped in. But you created Sparrow Wallet and Sparrow Wallet for anybody who doesn't know is probably my pick. 78 00:07:40,240 --> 00:07:48,240 In my opinion, the best Bitcoin wallet for you to use on your on your computer. 79 00:07:48,240 --> 00:07:51,240 It's available. It's available PC, Mac, Linux. 80 00:07:51,240 --> 00:07:53,240 That's right. Yes. Yeah. 81 00:07:53,240 --> 00:07:57,240 So, I mean, it's it's the most versatile tool that I've used. 82 00:07:57,240 --> 00:08:17,240 And it's it's, you know, probably the strongest competitor to Electrum, right? And Electrum has been around for years and it's the one we've used to, you know, sync up with our hardware wallets and our our mobile wallets and stuff like that and use it as a node as a 83 00:08:17,240 --> 00:08:33,240 Electrum. I don't even know all the right terminology all the time. All I know is that I can use Sparrow Wallet with my hardware wallets, with my Samurai wallet, you know, my Android phone, and I can use it standalone on my computer to do some amazing stuff. 84 00:08:33,240 --> 00:08:40,240 But what inspired you to jump into this? And when did you jump into this project? 85 00:08:40,240 --> 00:08:50,240 I was really, you know, coming to a point in my life where I'd been doing a lot of managing of people and businesses for a long period of time. 86 00:08:50,240 --> 00:09:01,240 And I just, you know, I'm at heart a creator, somebody who likes to build things. And I really just had this very deep seated need to get back into that. 87 00:09:01,240 --> 00:09:14,240 So I was at a point in my life where that became possible that I could take some time out from purely commercial activities and kind of really focus on just building again. 88 00:09:14,240 --> 00:09:27,240 And then sort of alongside of that, I had this this kind of long period of researching and understanding and diving down the Bitcoin rabbit hole, which had been going on since around 2013. 89 00:09:27,240 --> 00:09:36,240 And just eventually got to the point where I just really had to build something in it. And Sparrow was really what came out of all of that. 90 00:09:36,240 --> 00:09:44,240 It didn't actually begin as a kind of a goal. Well, I'm going to go and create a wallet. It actually began as a more sort of modest intent. 91 00:09:44,240 --> 00:09:49,240 I began it initially as a transaction editor, which is a rather strange thing to build. 92 00:09:49,240 --> 00:09:57,240 But I just kind of wanted to start off with something which was, in my view, at that time, relatively achievable. 93 00:09:57,240 --> 00:10:02,240 And it was only really later on that I realized, well, you have to have some way to create a transaction. 94 00:10:02,240 --> 00:10:12,240 And of course, then the wallet kind of came out to that. So, you know, it was really just wanting to build something which was better than what was out there. 95 00:10:12,240 --> 00:10:20,240 You know, I was trying to create a multi-vendor multi-signature wallet in Electrum at the time. 96 00:10:20,240 --> 00:10:27,240 And I was getting down to actually editing the JSON wallet file to try and create the setup that I wanted. 97 00:10:27,240 --> 00:10:37,240 And it was just really didn't feel good. It didn't feel like a good self-custody, long term sort of cold storage solution. 98 00:10:37,240 --> 00:10:46,240 So I really felt that there was a need for it. And I built it really for myself as the kind of primary user. 99 00:10:46,240 --> 00:10:51,240 And it's kind of I think that that still is largely true. 100 00:10:51,240 --> 00:10:59,240 There are obviously features in Sparrow that, you know, I don't myself need today, but who knows? Perhaps someday I might. 101 00:10:59,240 --> 00:11:09,240 So it's really just been a journey of understanding what it is that I'm building, understanding who I'm building it for. 102 00:11:09,240 --> 00:11:21,240 And as my own needs have sort of evolved, so I have been able to use that input into what I've tried to create. 103 00:11:21,240 --> 00:11:35,240 And was the idea initially wasn't to build an open source project that would be used by many, it was just to build for yourself and then sort of at some point evolved into something that became useful other people? 104 00:11:35,240 --> 00:11:39,240 Yes, I think that's true, to be fair, for many open source projects. 105 00:11:39,240 --> 00:11:49,240 You know, I think it's difficult when you are just sitting there and, you know, dreaming up some idea that it will become as large as it is today. 106 00:11:49,240 --> 00:11:54,240 And I think there's probably many open source developers who have a similar story to relate. 107 00:11:54,240 --> 00:11:56,240 But no, it certainly didn't begin there. 108 00:11:56,240 --> 00:12:03,240 I'm very grateful that today I get to work on something which has the impact that Sparrow wallet has. 109 00:12:03,240 --> 00:12:12,240 And, you know, that really wakes me, you know, gets me out of bed every day and makes my life certainly more meaningful than it would otherwise be. 110 00:12:12,240 --> 00:12:20,240 So I'm happy to be doing what I'm doing, but I didn't foresee it at the start, for sure. 111 00:12:20,240 --> 00:12:22,240 That's what I was wondering, like, what inspires you? 112 00:12:22,240 --> 00:12:25,240 Because you're like kind of a low-key dude, right? 113 00:12:25,240 --> 00:12:27,240 And there's a lot of people using the product now. 114 00:12:27,240 --> 00:12:29,240 It's grown into something bigger. 115 00:12:29,240 --> 00:12:32,240 Is the project like, are you the only developer? 116 00:12:32,240 --> 00:12:35,240 There's contributors too, right? 117 00:12:35,240 --> 00:12:37,240 No, I'm the only dev. 118 00:12:37,240 --> 00:12:40,240 There are certainly contributors in terms of ideas. 119 00:12:40,240 --> 00:12:49,240 So, you know, a lot of the features in Sparrow, a lot of the tweaking and the tuning that you see is just the community coming forward and saying, what about this? 120 00:12:49,240 --> 00:12:51,240 It would be great if it could do that. 121 00:12:51,240 --> 00:12:54,240 There's a huge amount of that in there. 122 00:12:54,240 --> 00:13:05,240 So I'm very grateful to all of those ideas that I've had over the years, which have just come out of other users, other Bitcoiners really just coming forward and asking for certain things. 123 00:13:05,240 --> 00:13:08,240 But there are no other, you know, devs. 124 00:13:08,240 --> 00:13:14,240 There is, I've got a Telegram group which handles the support needs. 125 00:13:14,240 --> 00:13:26,240 And there's a few great admins on there who, you know, I really am very grateful for who put in a huge amount of time to answer questions at all times of the day and night, all days. 126 00:13:26,240 --> 00:13:33,240 So, you know, it's really just, you know, I would like to think, you know, what an open source project can be. 127 00:13:33,240 --> 00:13:36,240 Just people coming to get together. 128 00:13:36,240 --> 00:13:41,240 But from a purely development point of view, it is just me. 129 00:13:41,240 --> 00:13:45,240 And that's kind of how I want it to be. 130 00:13:45,240 --> 00:13:51,240 And there's many different ways of, many different pros and cons, should I say, of going at it. 131 00:13:51,240 --> 00:13:53,240 You can build a team, you can do various things. 132 00:13:53,240 --> 00:13:56,240 But this is the way that I wanted to do it. 133 00:13:56,240 --> 00:14:00,240 And so far it seems to be working out. 134 00:14:00,240 --> 00:14:03,240 What kind of licenses on the software? 135 00:14:03,240 --> 00:14:12,240 So it is the Apache software license, which is very similar in sort of intent to the MIT license that Bitcoin Core uses. 136 00:14:12,240 --> 00:14:14,240 So it's kind of the same license. 137 00:14:14,240 --> 00:14:25,240 The Apache is a little bit more verbose, which I like, I guess, kind of spells it out a little bit more that what the sort of warranty limits are. 138 00:14:25,240 --> 00:14:29,240 But other than that, it's pretty similar to the MIT. 139 00:14:29,240 --> 00:14:37,240 So it can be utilized, it can be forked for nonprofit uses. 140 00:14:37,240 --> 00:14:38,240 Is that how that works? 141 00:14:38,240 --> 00:14:42,240 But if it's for profit, it's against the license? 142 00:14:42,240 --> 00:14:44,240 No, that would be the GPL. 143 00:14:44,240 --> 00:14:51,240 So it's not that kind of far left licensing that some open source projects have. 144 00:14:51,240 --> 00:14:53,240 No, this is a very permissive license. 145 00:14:53,240 --> 00:14:57,240 You can kind of take the code and do most things with it. 146 00:14:57,240 --> 00:15:04,240 It's not specifically trying to limit you to stay in an open source world. 147 00:15:04,240 --> 00:15:05,240 OK. 148 00:15:05,240 --> 00:15:15,240 Yeah, I'm always curious how people come to those decisions, you know, as far as like should, you know, if somebody comes along and decides to take your code. 149 00:15:15,240 --> 00:15:20,240 And you've been so generous with the license, you know, you're putting it out there for the world to see, for the world to use. 150 00:15:20,240 --> 00:15:22,240 You're not trying to make money off of it. 151 00:15:22,240 --> 00:15:34,240 Although I have questions about how Whirlpool works in a sec. But, you know, you're not trying to create this glossy package software that you're going to sell. 152 00:15:34,240 --> 00:15:36,240 You put it out there, your hard work. 153 00:15:36,240 --> 00:15:40,240 I'm sure you're, you know, you're putting more work into it than you're getting paid for. 154 00:15:40,240 --> 00:15:49,240 But then somebody else come along and sort of borrow it, take it and then sell it or find a way to monetize it. 155 00:15:49,240 --> 00:15:54,240 How do you decide? Because for me, like right off the bat, I would be like, I want to I want to prevent that from happening. 156 00:15:54,240 --> 00:15:57,240 But you made a decision to let that happen. 157 00:15:57,240 --> 00:15:59,240 So how do you reconcile that in your head? 158 00:15:59,240 --> 00:16:02,240 And would you feel OK if somebody did that? 159 00:16:02,240 --> 00:16:04,240 Well, it has actually happened. 160 00:16:04,240 --> 00:16:11,240 There is a some other coin who has taken it and has used the code. 161 00:16:11,240 --> 00:16:14,240 You know, obviously, sort of a Bitcoin clone. 162 00:16:14,240 --> 00:16:23,240 Yeah, you know, for for me, it's it's about let's create a true open source project and see where it goes. 163 00:16:23,240 --> 00:16:29,240 You know, that is that's the mission that I'm here to to achieve. 164 00:16:29,240 --> 00:16:32,240 You know, it's it who knows where it ends up. 165 00:16:32,240 --> 00:16:36,240 You know, to be honest, Chris, I'm just on a journey like we all are. 166 00:16:36,240 --> 00:16:39,240 But I'm on a journey with this and I don't know where it's going to end up. 167 00:16:39,240 --> 00:16:45,240 I'm not sure. All that I know is that, you know, I think it's providing value in the world today. 168 00:16:45,240 --> 00:16:53,240 I think that that it it's it's acts in small some small part to move Bitcoin forward. 169 00:16:53,240 --> 00:16:55,240 And that's enough for me today. 170 00:16:55,240 --> 00:17:01,240 If somebody takes the code, folks it and tries to do something else with it, it depends who it is. 171 00:17:01,240 --> 00:17:07,240 But I suspect there would be a community reaction to it because, you know, 172 00:17:07,240 --> 00:17:16,240 you know, today, at least I think the principles of open source are well defended within the Bitcoin community. 173 00:17:16,240 --> 00:17:20,240 Now, of course, somebody might try and take it to do something other than Bitcoin. 174 00:17:20,240 --> 00:17:26,240 But, you know, how much I really care about that, not a huge amount. 175 00:17:26,240 --> 00:17:33,240 So it's for me, you know, if somebody else tries to take it and kind of rebrand it, 176 00:17:33,240 --> 00:17:37,240 I suspect the Bitcoin community would react to that. 177 00:17:37,240 --> 00:17:43,240 How much we'd have to have to see that. That's that's what I I would guess would happen. 178 00:17:43,240 --> 00:17:46,240 Yeah. Yeah. It's a tricky world. 179 00:17:46,240 --> 00:17:49,240 There's so many disputes in the space. 180 00:17:49,240 --> 00:18:01,240 Some of them are petty and some of them are real, you know, over open source and like what is open source ledger just claim to open source their their hardware. 181 00:18:01,240 --> 00:18:04,240 And then it turned out it wasn't really open source. 182 00:18:04,240 --> 00:18:08,240 You know, it's it's just visible, I guess, or whatever they call it. 183 00:18:08,240 --> 00:18:13,240 You could see it, but you can't really do anything with it. 184 00:18:13,240 --> 00:18:16,240 So it's interesting to get different people's takes on it. 185 00:18:16,240 --> 00:18:23,240 I think that's but it sounds like you've been very generous and it sounds like I mean, that's the vibe I get from you is that. 186 00:18:23,240 --> 00:18:29,240 You're very genuine in the space and that you want to do the work you want to contribute. 187 00:18:29,240 --> 00:18:44,240 And you you haven't shown any signs of being somebody who's out to find a way to just grift or try to make money off other people's backs or rent seek or anything like that, which is admirable, I think. 188 00:18:44,240 --> 00:18:53,240 But one of the things that makes that makes Sparrow stand out against Electrum are the privacy features. 189 00:18:53,240 --> 00:18:58,240 So what inspired you to go in that direction? Like, what's your history with privacy? 190 00:18:58,240 --> 00:19:12,240 Yeah, I mean, it's it's it's really I think, you know, I was lucky enough to kind of be, I guess, listening to the right people at the right time. 191 00:19:12,240 --> 00:19:22,240 You know, so many years ago, almost before Sparrow began, you know, I sort of tuned into the right kind of people who were talking about these these things. 192 00:19:22,240 --> 00:19:33,240 And that just kind of gave me an appreciation for what privacy was, you know, because as I'm sure you're aware, Chris, most people don't even think of it. 193 00:19:33,240 --> 00:19:36,240 And I think that that's kind of to go back to the early days. That's where it starts. Right. 194 00:19:36,240 --> 00:19:43,240 You have to actually be listening to somebody and kind of hearing what they're saying about it. Why should we care? 195 00:19:43,240 --> 00:19:58,240 And then, you know, as you sort of get further down, you realize that to to actually have privacy on Bitcoin is really just seeking the default that we're all used to today by and by and large. 196 00:19:58,240 --> 00:20:03,240 You know, we're sort of used to having bank accounts where people can't just see what's going on. 197 00:20:03,240 --> 00:20:08,240 They can't just see what you spend your money on, how much you receive every month. 198 00:20:08,240 --> 00:20:15,240 You know, that's not normal. That's not a normal societal thing. And yet with Bitcoin and an open, transparent block chain, it obviously is. 199 00:20:15,240 --> 00:20:23,240 So it just comes back to saying, well, we just want to get to at least the default of what we have and what we're used to. 200 00:20:23,240 --> 00:20:37,240 So I don't see it at all as something unusual or something, you know, that we are reaching beyond to be, you know, secret or somehow nefarious. 201 00:20:37,240 --> 00:20:43,240 We're just seeking what we're used to, what we've grown up with, what, you know, what is the default in our lives. 202 00:20:43,240 --> 00:20:49,240 And these privacy tools are helping you achieve that on an open block chain. 203 00:20:49,240 --> 00:20:57,240 So that's that's the kind of backstory of kind of why I got into it and what I think about it today. 204 00:20:57,240 --> 00:21:02,240 Who were those people that were inspiring you back then when you started? 205 00:21:02,240 --> 00:21:10,240 So certainly Madadal, you know, has been a strong campaigner in the space for a long, long time. 206 00:21:10,240 --> 00:21:22,240 There's also Max Tannahill, who's been a longtime supporter of the project and one of the admins that I mentioned earlier. 207 00:21:22,240 --> 00:21:25,240 You know, the list goes on. I mean, there's there's many others. 208 00:21:25,240 --> 00:21:40,240 But certainly, you know, those those two names are definitely ones that come come to mind as sort of reasoned arguers for why we need to be concerned about these things. 209 00:21:40,240 --> 00:21:47,240 Yeah, I mean, you were saying it's about it's I mean, I say the same thing and I believe it's about dignity, right? 210 00:21:47,240 --> 00:21:57,240 Like privacy is just we just want to be able to transact in private, not have everybody know what we're doing all the time. 211 00:21:57,240 --> 00:22:00,240 That's not like it's not like we're breaking any law. 212 00:22:00,240 --> 00:22:13,240 Like if I'm buying a can of soup or if I'm buying a magazine, there's no reason that 20,000 people need to be able to know that I did that or see that transaction. 213 00:22:13,240 --> 00:22:18,240 But I guess the problems begin and I think most of the time that's fine. 214 00:22:18,240 --> 00:22:22,240 And with bank accounts, you get that level of privacy at least. 215 00:22:22,240 --> 00:22:30,240 But the problems start when the government or a government has trouble seeing what you're doing. 216 00:22:30,240 --> 00:22:37,240 And for the past 20 plus years, that's become a bigger issue, right? 217 00:22:37,240 --> 00:22:45,240 So a lot of the tech we're talking about does give you privacy on that level. 218 00:22:45,240 --> 00:22:57,240 You know, so what do you think about the sort of the differences between the two levels of privacy and how do you think about that when you're doing your work? 219 00:22:57,240 --> 00:23:05,240 Chris, do you mean privacy from the government when you talk about the two two levels? 220 00:23:05,240 --> 00:23:13,240 Well, I guess what I'm talking about, the two levels are privacy, like period, right? 221 00:23:13,240 --> 00:23:28,240 And then privacy from everyone except the government, which is sort of becoming the acceptable legal standard. 222 00:23:28,240 --> 00:23:42,240 You know, I think more and more as time goes on, we're seeing it with a lot of the stuff that's going on on Ethereum and in some other places where it gets to that point where, okay, and tornado cash, that whole thing. 223 00:23:42,240 --> 00:23:44,240 I'm not sure how much of that you followed. 224 00:23:44,240 --> 00:24:02,240 But the whole idea is privacy is okay until you're private from the government, at which point it becomes not okay because then the government can't see whether or not you're a criminal and they presume you're guilty until they can prove that you're innocent. 225 00:24:02,240 --> 00:24:10,240 So those are the two levels that I'm talking about. Does that enter your mind at any point with the work you're doing? 226 00:24:10,240 --> 00:24:24,240 Yes. So, you know, I think that, you know, whether you are how concerned or how worried you are about this is often a function of where in the world you live. 227 00:24:24,240 --> 00:24:34,240 You know, I live in a country which doesn't have a government with the greatest track record, at least not the government, in place today. 228 00:24:34,240 --> 00:24:54,240 And certainly the default view of the citizens around where I live is that they would be very against having the government having a view of their funds, you know, by just by default, if you will, without a certainly without a court warrant or what have you. 229 00:24:54,240 --> 00:25:09,240 So, you know, I think it's it's, you know, one shouldn't expect. I know that the US view is a bit different. I know the US view is is, you know, by default, you know, kind of more trusting of the government. 230 00:25:09,240 --> 00:25:26,240 And obviously, I'm not referring to Bitcoiners here, but rather kind of the sort of broad, broad view. But, you know, I don't think one should assume that the entire world is is kind of OK with the government having view of everything that you receive and spend. 231 00:25:26,240 --> 00:25:49,240 That's not, I think, something which is which is true. So, you know, I kind of I'm building for a global world and one where there are plenty of governments around the world who even the most left US citizen would consider, you know, privacy from that particular government to be a good thing. 232 00:25:49,240 --> 00:26:18,240 That's that's what I think. Ultimately, you know, the ideal is you're trying to create a tool which allows individuals, no matter where they live, to be able to save in a currency which has the potential of holding value over time and which allows them to effectively hide their funds, not only from people around them who might try to steal, steal it, but from the government itself who might. 233 00:26:18,240 --> 00:26:35,240 Do the same. So it's it's it's an empowering technology for the individual. And that's kind of how I think about it in terms of my my work. I think that it's it's absolutely reasonable for such a technology to exist in this world. 234 00:26:35,240 --> 00:26:51,240 In fact, you know, I would argue that in the struggle between, you know, totalitarian control versus anarchy, it's definitely pulling towards the anarchy side. But it's not it's not trying to be an anarchist. 235 00:26:51,240 --> 00:27:06,240 It's just trying to give individuals the tools to be able to save, to be able to transact in a world where those things are getting harder and harder to do. And for many people, you know, they've had very little ability to do it at all. 236 00:27:06,240 --> 00:27:12,240 Yeah, it's it's interesting because it's. 237 00:27:12,240 --> 00:27:25,240 I hear what you're saying. You're saying because you're living and developing in a country that's not the US. Do you say what country it is or do you rather rather not? Yeah, yeah, I live in South Africa. 238 00:27:25,240 --> 00:27:31,240 OK, I was going to guess based on the accent. I'm pretty good with accents. 239 00:27:31,240 --> 00:27:44,240 But the idea is that you live and work and build in South Africa. You distribute a product globally, but you know, you're basically under the jurisdiction of South Africa. 240 00:27:44,240 --> 00:27:52,240 So the US or the EU or Australia or whoever else wouldn't have any jurisdiction over the work you're doing. 241 00:27:52,240 --> 00:27:55,240 And it's interesting. 242 00:27:55,240 --> 00:27:59,240 That because you're developing. 243 00:27:59,240 --> 00:28:04,240 The way you're developing open source and organically and. 244 00:28:04,240 --> 00:28:14,240 Not sure if you're generating a profit or if you have a company or anything like that, but there's other there's other developers in this space. 245 00:28:14,240 --> 00:28:19,240 Mostly outside the Bitcoin ecosystem, I guess, like Ethereum, especially and others. 246 00:28:19,240 --> 00:28:32,240 That are doing the same thing, but they are super conscious of the way that they're going to be viewed by the US and the EU, you know, with regard to banking and with with regard to. 247 00:28:32,240 --> 00:28:51,240 Regulators and stuff like that to the point where they're blocking like US citizens from accessing their website and they're there. Even some of them are even blocking VPN's now to block US citizens from using VPN's to access their tools, because they're afraid of. 248 00:28:51,240 --> 00:29:06,240 You know what kind of crackdown could come or what effect it could have on their business if they're attacked by, you know, the Department of Treasury or opac or whatever it might be, but it sounds like this kind of stuff. 249 00:29:06,240 --> 00:29:18,240 Like, are you even aware of this kind of stuff and you've chosen to not really think about it or it doesn't even enter your radar as as a open source developer in South Africa? 250 00:29:18,240 --> 00:29:27,240 So the first thing is Sparrow is, as I said before, very much an open source project. It's not a business. I did not set it up that way. 251 00:29:27,240 --> 00:29:47,240 And I do not intend it for it to become a business. So I'm not motivated by commercial concerns. And I understand very much the effect of commercial concerns having run businesses before, you know, I am still involved in certain businesses and that I have founded in the past. 252 00:29:47,240 --> 00:30:06,240 And, you know, I can, I can, you know, attest with a great deal of experience, you know, how it can just have a chilling effect, if you will, on what you do, because you are concerned about how it might be perceived in future, let alone how it is perceived today. 253 00:30:06,240 --> 00:30:21,240 So I very much do understand that, but I'm just here creating a some some code which I put out there and is used by others. I don't run any servers that people use to transact with. 254 00:30:21,240 --> 00:30:31,240 In fact, the only server that I run is the documentation website for sparrowwallet.com and a BTC pay server instance to accept donations. 255 00:30:31,240 --> 00:30:41,240 So those that is the only service that I run. So if somebody downloads sparrow, which is a static piece of code or even compiles it them themselves. 256 00:30:41,240 --> 00:30:58,240 I have no further contact with them in terms of the transactions that they create. And that's a very important distinction, I believe, because, you know, from a legal perspective, I'm not involved in any kind of doings beyond that point. 257 00:30:58,240 --> 00:31:14,240 It is simply a tool which is put out there into the world. And, you know, if somebody uses it for whatever use, certainly I could have had no ability to detect that use, to block it, to do anything with it, because I'm simply not involved. 258 00:31:14,240 --> 00:31:29,240 So that's kind of how I think about it. It's not that these concerns don't occur to me, but I've spent time understanding the legal frameworks around how these things are determined. 259 00:31:29,240 --> 00:31:46,240 And, you know, I'm sort of backing our banking, if you will, on the ability for developers to still create code. And I think, you know, if we take that away, well, then we really have very little indeed. 260 00:31:46,240 --> 00:31:56,240 Then we have effectively lost in the US the First Amendment, you could argue, and the ability to develop on Bitcoin in any reasonable way. 261 00:31:56,240 --> 00:32:16,240 So it's a very kind of broad and I think basic legal principle on which I work. I'm not, as I say, kind of involved on a transactional level, on any of the activities that Sparrow might be used for. 262 00:32:16,240 --> 00:32:36,240 And that's deliberate. Like, it sounds like it's deliberate. It sounds like you have thought it through. And like, have the laws and the attitudes towards privacy throughout the world legally, has that stuff affected the way you develop and the decisions you made, or it just sort of worked out this way? 263 00:32:36,240 --> 00:32:52,240 No, look, to be honest, I began thinking that way simply because I spent my entire career maintaining servers, and I simply had enough. I'm done. I'm not going to maintain any servers anymore. So that's certainly where it began. 264 00:32:52,240 --> 00:33:11,240 But then as things progressed, I realized the benefit of doing so. Now, I want to say that, you know, I'm very grateful for those who do run servers, you know, the public servers that Sparrow connects to and the Whirlpool coordinator run by the Summer, Summer, Wallet are invaluable tools. 265 00:33:11,240 --> 00:33:28,240 So it's not that I don't see the value in it. I'm simply not taking on that burden myself. I kind of see the contribution that I make is in building this tool and putting it out there. 266 00:33:28,240 --> 00:33:46,240 And there are very valuable contributions made by others who simply run service servers who pay for those hosting costs. And they get perhaps a lot less of the limelight. But, you know, it's all part of this ecosystem, and we're all adding to it. 267 00:33:46,240 --> 00:34:05,240 So there is, I think, so long as there are people out there who are prepared to take these steps, steps, and there's always some degree of risk. But I think so long as we spread that risk out as broadly as we can, then it effectively becomes a lot harder to take any one part of it down. 268 00:34:05,240 --> 00:34:31,240 Yeah, that's a concern that I have with Whirlpool and with Samurai Wallet. And I did a chat like this a couple weeks ago with Samurai Wallet. And we talked about that. You know, I think that he's not especially concerned about it, you know, as far as at least that's what he voiced to me as far as the stuff that happened with Tornado Cash and the developers there and the way they were treated. 269 00:34:31,240 --> 00:34:48,240 And obviously, it's a different situation. Like, you know, there was a token involved with Tornado Cash and a DAO and a bunch of other stupid things that Samurai doesn't have to worry about. But at the same time, it is a point of centralization for their product and for your product. 270 00:34:48,240 --> 00:35:06,240 Not centralization in that, you know, you could really lose money, but in that, if it goes down, it's down, you know, and then it's gone. And same goes for other CoinJoin implementations too, for the most part, I think, the ones that use sequencers like that, right? 271 00:35:06,240 --> 00:35:35,240 So, but it sounds like you feel comfy, right? And that you're not necessarily in that position like you. But the reason for I may have been asking these questions is because I'm always curious about what kind of sort of side effects the government doing stuff like that has, you know, and it's like even if you've never had a direct interaction legally or whatever, you know, over this, it's still in your head. 272 00:35:35,240 --> 00:35:52,240 And it's still like limiting what you might do, like on a grander scale, right? It's still, there's that chilling effect that sort of hampers a little bit, maybe some of the innovation in some places or something like that. And that's something I get concerned about because it's a real issue. 273 00:35:52,240 --> 00:36:00,240 Like it could set us back decades as far as where we could really be. Do you think that's a fair take? 274 00:36:00,240 --> 00:36:14,240 Yeah, I mean, sure. I think that, you know, it is there definitely is a chilling effect as a result of the various actions that governments around the world take. 275 00:36:14,240 --> 00:36:27,240 The way I see it is, as I was saying before, there's kind of always a struggle between the kind of far poles of are we heading towards anarchy or are we heading towards a totalitarian state? 276 00:36:27,240 --> 00:36:39,240 And, you know, you can, for the most part, you know, people are kind of just kind of live their lives in the middle and they don't really think about it too much. 277 00:36:39,240 --> 00:36:51,240 But then there are those who will pull things towards either side. And I think on the long arc of history, we are always aware that there is this struggle going on. 278 00:36:51,240 --> 00:37:03,240 So, you know, being part of it, I think, is, you know, is for whatever reason, giving a lot of people in this world meaning and they see value in what they are they are doing. 279 00:37:03,240 --> 00:37:15,240 And I don't think we ever see an end to it. I don't think one side wins. I just think that, you know, you choose where you want to be and where you want to place yourself and your kind of efforts and how much risk you want to take. 280 00:37:15,240 --> 00:37:24,240 And then you act according to that. You know, I'm sort of doing what I believe in what I think is worthwhile. And so are others. 281 00:37:24,240 --> 00:37:31,240 And, yeah, sure. I mean, there's, you know, governments take actions based on what they believe to be the right thing. 282 00:37:31,240 --> 00:37:39,240 And we don't necessarily agree with it. And we all use the tools that we have to counter them. And that's kind of the way that it goes. 283 00:37:39,240 --> 00:37:48,240 And we'll probably go on like that for for sort of ever. You know, that's that's in broad strokes how I think think about it. 284 00:37:48,240 --> 00:38:08,240 I try to understand the risks that I'm getting myself into. But also, you know, be aware that it's better to to have lived with some degree of integrity, of fighting for what you believe in the world that you would like to see and then let others do the same. 285 00:38:08,240 --> 00:38:24,240 Yeah, I think that you're a little more optimistic than me because you said before you feel like we're heading more towards anarchy than totalitarianism. Right. But it's no, no, I believe we'll kind of end up some somewhere in the middle. 286 00:38:24,240 --> 00:38:29,240 I'm not I'm not saying we're going to hit out. We're not going to end up in one or the other. 287 00:38:29,240 --> 00:38:34,240 I believe we will probably keep on some somewhere in the middle because that's what history shows us. Right. 288 00:38:34,240 --> 00:38:41,240 We have we've had certainly had more totalitarianism in the world than we do today. 289 00:38:41,240 --> 00:38:47,240 So maybe you could argue that the long term trend is towards freedom. 290 00:38:47,240 --> 00:38:51,240 You know, I think that there is an argument there, but I don't ever think that the battle is one. 291 00:38:51,240 --> 00:38:56,240 You know, you you have to fight for what you believe in in the world you want to be in every day. 292 00:38:56,240 --> 00:39:04,240 That's important to you. And some some some some people will fight and some will just be happy to live their lives until it affects them. 293 00:39:04,240 --> 00:39:09,240 And then they might choose to to take some action as well. Yeah. 294 00:39:09,240 --> 00:39:22,240 It's so interesting to think about because it's debatable, I think, whether we've seen more totalitarianism in the past than we do today that we're better off today. 295 00:39:22,240 --> 00:39:30,240 When it really depends on what your definition is, if your definition of totalitarianism. 296 00:39:30,240 --> 00:39:39,240 Is the government through the tyranny of the majority, because that's how governments are formed, basically. 297 00:39:39,240 --> 00:39:50,240 Excuse me. If the government can decide whether or not on any given day you can get health care or the government can decide on any given day 298 00:39:50,240 --> 00:39:56,240 whether or not you can buy food. We're kind of almost there, right? 299 00:39:56,240 --> 00:40:08,240 We're kind of heading into that world where the government controls the money, the government controls the supply, the government controls your access to your own money, 300 00:40:08,240 --> 00:40:11,240 which is where we're going with the CBDC concept. 301 00:40:11,240 --> 00:40:18,240 And that's where they want to get to. And that's kind of what we're building the rails for inadvertently with a lot of crypto. 302 00:40:18,240 --> 00:40:30,240 So it's like, how much more totalitarian can you get than having a government that decides whether or not today you're allowed to go and buy a loaf of bread? 303 00:40:30,240 --> 00:40:44,240 I think that even if that's not exercised right away, just them having that ability seems like far more totalitarian to me, like total control over your life 304 00:40:44,240 --> 00:40:49,240 than anything they were able to do in the past. Right? 305 00:40:49,240 --> 00:41:02,240 So it's like, it depends on, I feel like we have to shift a little bit what our idea is of what it really means to live under totalitarian rule. 306 00:41:02,240 --> 00:41:04,240 Do you think I'm off the rails on this? 307 00:41:04,240 --> 00:41:21,240 Well, if you go back far enough in history, you will find a different form of totalitarianism. So if you are one of the poorer classes living in ancient Egypt or the Middle Ages or so forth, 308 00:41:21,240 --> 00:41:30,240 yes, the government might not have direct visibility on your actions, but your ability to change your life is extremely limited. 309 00:41:30,240 --> 00:41:42,240 I mean, there was very, very, basically no chance. We usually had an extremely strict class system, which has existed in almost all societies until quite recently. 310 00:41:42,240 --> 00:41:51,240 And your ability in your life, no matter how hard you try of raising yourself above or into a different class, was almost non-existent. 311 00:41:51,240 --> 00:42:05,240 So you could argue that you were living, in a sense, in a totalitarian system because you had no ability to change your living conditions from day to day to day. 312 00:42:05,240 --> 00:42:26,240 And if you weren't happy with where you were at, which I presume that most people weren't, given the fact that they were probably living in conditions which were unhygienic, difficult to find food, all of those things, 313 00:42:26,240 --> 00:42:32,240 then you could argue that we are in a different place today and we are in a better place. 314 00:42:32,240 --> 00:42:39,240 But I think that, as you said, it really depends on how you define these things. 315 00:42:39,240 --> 00:42:52,240 That's the thing. I feel like we're getting lulled into this new form of totalitarianism, which with the eradication of privacy from the government is sort of facilitating, I guess. 316 00:42:52,240 --> 00:43:14,240 I'm just looking up the definition of totalitarian, and I'm not even sure if it's changed over time, but what I'm looking at says it's a system of government where the people have virtually no authority and the state wields absolute control over every aspect of the country socially, financially, and politically. 317 00:43:14,240 --> 00:43:33,240 So when you think about where we're at today, and sort of just going by the definition and maybe not so much even historically what we've seen, but socially, we already know, at least more in the US, I'm not sure how it is in South Africa these days with the woke nonsense. 318 00:43:33,240 --> 00:43:45,240 But as far as you have to think certain things, or you could be punished socially, you could be canceled, you could eventually have your money restricted. So socially, financially, duh, we all know that. 319 00:43:45,240 --> 00:43:54,240 And politically, obviously, the president of the United States is saying that people on the right are terrorists. 320 00:43:54,240 --> 00:44:06,240 So it's like, I hear what you're saying. It's like, yeah, I'd rather live my life today than be a slave in ancient Egypt. Yeah, I get it. 321 00:44:06,240 --> 00:44:27,240 But at the same time, total control over one's life can still exist, even if you don't, even if you feel happy, even if your belly's full, even if you can do your day to day and not really feel like it's that frog in boiling water effect, right? 322 00:44:27,240 --> 00:44:38,240 It's like, slowly, you lose control. And I'm a firm believer, too, that you can have privacy without having control over your life. 323 00:44:38,240 --> 00:44:49,240 You know, I think that the government could give you say, we're giving you more privacy by doing this or, you know, by giving you decentralized identification or something like that. 324 00:44:49,240 --> 00:44:55,240 But at the same time, you don't have control over your own decisions over the things you do every day. 325 00:44:55,240 --> 00:45:03,240 So it's an interesting conversation, you know, as far as where we are, where we're heading and what it's ultimately going to mean. 326 00:45:03,240 --> 00:45:12,240 It's like a new form of slavery almost, you know? I think maybe I go a little more tinfoil hat with some of this stuff. 327 00:45:12,240 --> 00:45:23,240 Yeah, I mean, you know, the frog in boiling water is an interesting idea because what eventually happens to the frog, he dies, right? 328 00:45:23,240 --> 00:45:29,240 So that kind of analogy breaks down a little bit there because, presumably, the government's not looking to kill everyone. 329 00:45:29,240 --> 00:45:34,240 There's conflicting theories on that, actually, but yeah, go on. 330 00:45:34,240 --> 00:45:48,240 But, you know, so we would assume then at some point, if we carry this thought experiment out to its logical conclusion, that people will eventually get to a point where they'll say, wait a minute, what has happened here? 331 00:45:48,240 --> 00:45:55,240 Presumably, assuming that they still have the power of independent thought, right, that hasn't been taken away. 332 00:45:55,240 --> 00:46:01,240 But at some point, it gets to that stage where they say, whoa, you know, we need to rethink this. 333 00:46:01,240 --> 00:46:10,240 And then hopefully we have the tools in place that people can start to use them, even if they are not as easy as the tools that they are used to. 334 00:46:10,240 --> 00:46:23,240 It will then become more important. And I guess that that's really the kind of balance between the two sides that I've mentioned, kind of, you know, you have this convenient world that everyone's happy in until it doesn't work for you. 335 00:46:23,240 --> 00:46:38,240 And I guess the question is, are we going to reach that point or is there some other end goal where, as I say, you don't even have the power of independent thought anymore to kind of say, well, my life is not what I thought it should be or wanted it to be. 336 00:46:38,240 --> 00:46:47,240 I need to make a change. So that's that's kind of, you know, I guess an open question as to where we're heading with this. 337 00:46:47,240 --> 00:46:57,240 But, you know, I tend to think as Bitcoiners, we're kind of operating on the fringes of society looking into the future. 338 00:46:57,240 --> 00:47:01,240 We tend to be people who think about the future more than others. 339 00:47:01,240 --> 00:47:09,240 And, you know, that gives us a certain it's a bit of a curse in a way because you're less in the present. 340 00:47:09,240 --> 00:47:17,240 But it's also gives us this ability to to guess what might be and then to try and prepare for it. 341 00:47:17,240 --> 00:47:32,240 So I think that that's what we're doing here is trying to create a tool which, you know, is at least available in the future should the mass require it. 342 00:47:32,240 --> 00:47:36,240 Yeah. Did you follow the tornado cash situation as it was happening? 343 00:47:36,240 --> 00:47:38,240 It's still happening. Yes, I did. 344 00:47:38,240 --> 00:47:40,240 Yeah, yeah, absolutely. 345 00:47:40,240 --> 00:47:54,240 And like what implications do you think that that could have or has had or will have for the work that you're doing and that Samurai is doing and that wasabi is doing and stuff on Bitcoin? 346 00:47:54,240 --> 00:47:57,240 Yeah, I mean, it's it obviously does have impact. 347 00:47:57,240 --> 00:48:01,240 And there's there's no no doubt that that case does have impact. 348 00:48:01,240 --> 00:48:12,240 I think that, you know, really what we are seeing here is, you know, the testing of how the in particular the U.S. 349 00:48:12,240 --> 00:48:24,240 government perceives the kind of, you know, non custodial, on my own tools, you know, we have on the one hand, the FinCEN gardens, which is very clear. 350 00:48:24,240 --> 00:48:35,240 And FinCEN is a body with a lot of swing, you know, so it's quite reasonable to argue that we should read their guidance and act according to it. 351 00:48:35,240 --> 00:48:42,240 I tend to think that the OFAC decision was was made in a rushed way. 352 00:48:42,240 --> 00:48:58,240 I don't think it was necessarily thought through on all of the legal and kind of, you know, the sort of regulatory frameworks were thought through before that was put in. 353 00:48:58,240 --> 00:49:03,240 So we'll have to see whether the courts, you know, which version they go to. 354 00:49:03,240 --> 00:49:06,240 And, you know, it obviously is a bit more complex than that. 355 00:49:06,240 --> 00:49:09,240 There's detail, which you've mentioned. 356 00:49:09,240 --> 00:49:18,240 But I think by and large, you know, people, many people have looked at the indictment and said, you know, there's a lot in here that simply doesn't make a lot of sense. 357 00:49:18,240 --> 00:49:23,240 And hopefully, you know, that's kind of the broad theme of what we're seeing. 358 00:49:23,240 --> 00:49:30,240 We're seeing a lot of, you know, legal action being brought. 359 00:49:30,240 --> 00:49:38,240 And then that legal action kind of once the courts eventually get around to it, you know, some some degree of sanity returning to the world. 360 00:49:38,240 --> 00:49:47,240 And I think that that's, I believe, a trend we're going to keep on seeing, which might to many U.S. citizens seem overly optimistic. 361 00:49:47,240 --> 00:49:53,240 But that is never, nevertheless, the trend that I see. 362 00:49:53,240 --> 00:50:03,240 So, you know, that's what, you know, I do believe that there is still largely a rule of law in the places that matter. 363 00:50:03,240 --> 00:50:06,240 And the U.S. is certainly one of the places that matter. 364 00:50:06,240 --> 00:50:15,240 I believe that rule of law will be applied and what, you know, we should not fall into the trap of thinking the government is the law. 365 00:50:15,240 --> 00:50:18,240 They are not the law. They do set some laws. That's true. 366 00:50:18,240 --> 00:50:22,240 They do create that, or at least the current government does create certain laws. 367 00:50:22,240 --> 00:50:26,240 But laws have been created over a long period of time. 368 00:50:26,240 --> 00:50:30,240 There's a very long legal history that can be drawn upon. 369 00:50:30,240 --> 00:50:40,240 I think it's I think we kind of need to have the patience to see where that journey goes and what outcomes there are. 370 00:50:40,240 --> 00:50:47,240 Yeah. If we learned anything over the past three years, I think what we learned a lot of things, you know, throughout the past three years. 371 00:50:47,240 --> 00:50:57,240 But one of the most important is that the tyranny of the majority of the people is actually stronger than the government. 372 00:50:57,240 --> 00:51:10,240 You know, and the government can want to do things, but they can't get a lot of things done without the majority of the people creating that social pressure. 373 00:51:10,240 --> 00:51:25,240 You know, and a lot. So a lot of the impacts of the of the pandemic throughout the world were the result of, you know, I guess the weak minded majority that was sort of led in a certain direction. 374 00:51:25,240 --> 00:51:34,240 And then exercise social pressure, you know, to make things happen, you know, and then they were assisted by the government and the media and things like that. 375 00:51:34,240 --> 00:51:39,240 And I guess that's part of my sort of pessimism. 376 00:51:39,240 --> 00:51:51,240 I don't want to say total pessimism, but a little bit pessimistic about the future of privacy is that it seems like already the the weak minded majority. 377 00:51:51,240 --> 00:51:57,240 Sort of like the, you know, just. 378 00:51:57,240 --> 00:52:07,240 I say this a lot and I'm not really apologetic for it because I really do believe that most people just don't think these issues through and are led by the nose by whoever they think is in power. 379 00:52:07,240 --> 00:52:13,240 You know, so if it's they think the government's in power, they think the media is in power, then fine. 380 00:52:13,240 --> 00:52:21,240 And they're being led towards a conclusion that says that if you try to hide what you're doing, then you're criminal. 381 00:52:21,240 --> 00:52:26,240 You know, if you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to worry about. 382 00:52:26,240 --> 00:52:32,240 How often do we hear that? Right. You hear that like a million times a day. If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to worry about. 383 00:52:32,240 --> 00:52:42,240 You know, and it's like it seems like the weak minded majority that caused the lockdowns that caused the mandates, caused all the social pressure over masking. 384 00:52:42,240 --> 00:52:47,240 They're in the same place on this issue, too, as far as restricting freedoms and and stuff like that. 385 00:52:47,240 --> 00:52:57,240 So that's why I sort of get like, yeah, governments we could, you know, our point of view could maybe take over a government. 386 00:52:57,240 --> 00:53:07,240 And start to push things in a right direction. But when you look long term, you look over the past like 100, 150 years, we're clearly trending long term. 387 00:53:07,240 --> 00:53:15,240 It's like we take, you know, two steps towards that sort of totalitarian way of thinking with regard to privacy. 388 00:53:15,240 --> 00:53:19,240 And then we take one step back in our direction, but then two steps closer to that. 389 00:53:19,240 --> 00:53:29,240 So it's like we just keep on sort of inching closer to a world where there is no more whirlpool because everybody's too afraid to do it. 390 00:53:29,240 --> 00:53:33,240 And there is no more tornado cash attempts because everybody's too afraid. 391 00:53:33,240 --> 00:53:42,240 Nobody wants to go to jail or they're already in jail, you know, and there is no more privacy from the government because everybody's forced to use the CBDC. 392 00:53:42,240 --> 00:53:49,240 And if you don't use it and you have to you have to go to jail, you know, if you don't use it because you have to use it. 393 00:53:49,240 --> 00:53:57,240 And then you've got maybe you've got this little island in the South Pacific where Bitcoiners like have gone to like, you know, create their own little economy. 394 00:53:57,240 --> 00:54:00,240 But they're looked at as criminals. They're looked at as the enemy. 395 00:54:00,240 --> 00:54:06,240 And eventually they're just going to get nuked. Right. Because at the end of the day, if somebody kills you, none of this matters anymore. 396 00:54:06,240 --> 00:54:09,240 Right. So that's where my head goes. 397 00:54:09,240 --> 00:54:16,240 And by the way, people that listen to this podcast always say, well, you shouldn't go on so many rants. 398 00:54:16,240 --> 00:54:20,240 You should let people talk more. But I can't just can't help us. 399 00:54:20,240 --> 00:54:34,240 Yeah.IS what do you think? I kind of if you look back at the advertising that was around in the 1950s, let's say. 400 00:54:34,240 --> 00:54:40,600 at how, I don't know what, there's a good English word for it, but it's sort of how 401 00:54:40,600 --> 00:54:47,920 obvious it is, how effectively how gullible the audience must have been in order for them 402 00:54:47,920 --> 00:54:53,240 to simply read those messages and take them in. And you look at the kind of advertising 403 00:54:53,240 --> 00:54:59,840 that we have had today, and you see that gives us for me a sort of an ability to see things 404 00:54:59,840 --> 00:55:06,200 over a slightly longer period of time. I think that we are all suffering from recency bias, 405 00:55:06,200 --> 00:55:15,000 and I think that it colours our thoughts a huge amount. It's like we are really not rational 406 00:55:15,000 --> 00:55:21,880 creatures at all. So you have to try and think outside of your own lifetime. For me, the 407 00:55:21,880 --> 00:55:29,400 trend of advertising has been one where it is getting increasingly hard to convince and 408 00:55:29,400 --> 00:55:37,240 increasingly sceptical public of whatever message you are trying to get across. And 409 00:55:37,240 --> 00:55:43,340 you've had to be cleverer and cleverer about it, and that trend seems likely to go on. 410 00:55:43,340 --> 00:55:54,760 So I see there a clear sign that, I would argue an optimistic sign that people in general 411 00:55:54,760 --> 00:56:01,800 have gone from a position of, I trust what is being said to me, to I'm going to filter 412 00:56:01,800 --> 00:56:06,720 this and I'm going to consider it before I just simply take it in and believe it. Now, 413 00:56:06,720 --> 00:56:10,880 obviously there's a huge number of people who are still taking things in. I'm not trying 414 00:56:10,880 --> 00:56:15,760 to argue that isn't the case. I'm just trying to say it's got harder. And I think that that 415 00:56:15,760 --> 00:56:23,600 is important when we consider privacy, because yes, sure, today the majority of people are 416 00:56:23,600 --> 00:56:29,440 simply used to being private. It is, yes, perhaps not private from your government if 417 00:56:29,440 --> 00:56:34,040 you are doing nefarious things. And that's kind of the default of why people have got 418 00:56:34,040 --> 00:56:43,200 to the conclusion that so many have. But really, it's likely that if we are living in a world 419 00:56:43,200 --> 00:56:48,280 where we are being surveilled constantly, which is probably the world that we could 420 00:56:48,280 --> 00:56:53,280 be headed towards, then it is likely that privacy will be more center of mind. And I 421 00:56:53,280 --> 00:56:59,600 think you're seeing that. Apple has built their marketing on this idea of I can help 422 00:56:59,600 --> 00:57:05,400 you be more private. And I'm sure they didn't take that decision without a lot of careful 423 00:57:05,400 --> 00:57:12,760 thought to what do people value and what will they value in future. So there is reason to 424 00:57:12,760 --> 00:57:18,080 believe that privacy is going to become a more important thing. I completely agree. 425 00:57:18,080 --> 00:57:24,320 I'm not trying to make the argument that it's an important thing today on a sort of a global 426 00:57:24,320 --> 00:57:30,000 level. But I do think that there is a reason to be hopeful that over time, over enough 427 00:57:30,000 --> 00:57:36,160 period of time, people will see the benefits of it as they realize that the capabilities 428 00:57:36,160 --> 00:57:39,600 of surveillance against them are increasing dramatically. 429 00:57:39,600 --> 00:57:49,240 Yeah, it's an interesting point about Apple, in that they found a way to add more privacy 430 00:57:49,240 --> 00:57:57,800 features for people like us while not affecting the usability of the device, which is really 431 00:57:57,800 --> 00:58:03,240 a problem with a lot of the other solutions out there. Like, God forbid you want to use 432 00:58:03,240 --> 00:58:11,440 graphene or something like that, and you just totally sacrifice usability. But on iOS, it's 433 00:58:11,440 --> 00:58:17,240 optional for the most part. Except, you know, the encryption on the iMessages and stuff, 434 00:58:17,240 --> 00:58:24,640 I don't think is optional. But the end to end encryption, I would I would guess that, 435 00:58:24,640 --> 00:58:32,480 like the amount of iPhone users that are using the advanced security, the encryption on their 436 00:58:32,480 --> 00:58:37,320 backups and stuff like that, I bet you it's really low, though. I bet you it's like 5%. 437 00:58:37,320 --> 00:58:42,080 Right. I think it's like, you because of the steps you have to take, you have to create 438 00:58:42,080 --> 00:58:47,280 that private key or C phrase or something like that. And you have to go through all 439 00:58:47,280 --> 00:58:52,880 these steps. And you have to basically take responsibility and give up the conveniences 440 00:58:52,880 --> 00:59:00,040 of iCloud. I'm the only person I know outside of crypto that's that's using it. How about 441 00:59:00,040 --> 00:59:01,040 you? 442 00:59:01,040 --> 00:59:05,640 I mean, it's it's I think that you mentioned the one point that, you know, taking personal 443 00:59:05,640 --> 00:59:10,680 responsibility is this very foreign thing for most people in the world. And certainly, 444 00:59:10,680 --> 00:59:16,800 I come up against that, as you can imagine, all the time, you know, people, if I was to 445 00:59:16,800 --> 00:59:23,640 onboard somebody to sparrow for the first time, who's only ever held on an exchange, 446 00:59:23,640 --> 00:59:28,000 you know, there is obviously this point where, you know, you'd say to them, listen, you can't 447 00:59:28,000 --> 00:59:34,280 lose these 12 words if you lose these 12 words and your cold card, for example, sample, you 448 00:59:34,280 --> 00:59:39,600 know, your funds are gone, you know, that to most people is quite foreign. And I think 449 00:59:39,600 --> 00:59:46,360 we've got a long way to go to kind of return people to an idea that they are actually responsible 450 00:59:46,360 --> 00:59:51,920 for their own lives, whether we'll get get there or not, again, who knows. But I do think 451 00:59:51,920 --> 00:59:58,240 it's it's it's worthwhile to try, because the alternative is a world where we place 452 00:59:58,240 --> 01:00:03,760 all of our trust in a very small set of people who may or may not. I mean, it's it's it's 453 01:00:03,760 --> 01:00:09,560 really not really even relevant whether they have our best interests at heart. The point 454 01:00:09,560 --> 01:00:14,840 is they will never be able to cater towards the specific needs of every person on this 455 01:00:14,840 --> 01:00:21,760 planet. It's just it doesn't scale. So, you know, I do think it's it's a worthwhile fight 456 01:00:21,760 --> 01:00:28,600 to try and convince people to take some responsibility in their lives. And there will be various 457 01:00:28,600 --> 01:00:33,680 tools that will allow you to take, you know, everything from complete responsibility to 458 01:00:33,680 --> 01:00:41,400 shared responsibility. And that's great. You know, we need people to go on a journey. It's 459 01:00:41,400 --> 01:00:46,280 kind of a little like the different kinds of servers you can connect to in the Sparrow 460 01:00:46,280 --> 01:00:52,000 wallet. You can connect to your own private Electrum server, which is about as private 461 01:00:52,000 --> 01:00:59,280 as you can get. You can connect directly to your Bitcoin core node, which is pretty similar. 462 01:00:59,280 --> 01:01:03,280 And then you can connect to a public server, which is obviously then you're sharing your 463 01:01:03,280 --> 01:01:09,600 transaction information with that server. And, you know, when I first began the Sparrow 464 01:01:09,600 --> 01:01:15,240 journey, I was convinced that this was going to be a tool that you could only connect to 465 01:01:15,240 --> 01:01:20,440 your own node. There was going to be no other way to do it. And then I realized that what 466 01:01:20,440 --> 01:01:25,600 you actually need to do is to take people on a journey. So people, you know, if you 467 01:01:25,600 --> 01:01:29,840 were to try and introduce, for example, your neighbor and you said, well, before you can 468 01:01:29,840 --> 01:01:33,920 even hold this currency, you need to have this whole you need to go and order yourself 469 01:01:33,920 --> 01:01:38,320 a Ronin Dojo. You need to set it up. All of these different things. You just wouldn't 470 01:01:38,320 --> 01:01:44,120 have any success in trying to convince the majority of people. And if you can instead 471 01:01:44,120 --> 01:01:49,840 provide them with a gradual path with certain, you know, wins along the way, then you have 472 01:01:49,840 --> 01:01:54,160 a much better hope of success of getting them to that end goal. And that really is the point, 473 01:01:54,160 --> 01:02:00,000 right? We're trying to onboard people. We're trying to get them to take personal responsibility 474 01:02:00,000 --> 01:02:06,320 over their money and in a more general sense over the privacy in their lives. So, you know, 475 01:02:06,320 --> 01:02:12,600 that for me is I think, you know, there is room for different levels of solutions in 476 01:02:12,600 --> 01:02:17,160 it. You know, we can we can argue whether some solutions should be there at all. But 477 01:02:17,160 --> 01:02:23,200 the reality is that they are and people will use them. And, you know, we can advise them 478 01:02:23,200 --> 01:02:28,280 not to we can say, well, take your funds off an exchange, as I will always say. But the 479 01:02:28,280 --> 01:02:33,360 reality is the the exchanges there, it is the first port of call for many people as 480 01:02:33,360 --> 01:02:39,180 they enter this space. And frankly, without them, they might not have entered it at all. 481 01:02:39,180 --> 01:02:42,720 So at least now I have the opportunity to come in and say, well, maybe you need to take 482 01:02:42,720 --> 01:02:47,480 your funds off. Maybe you should be using them in a more self custodial way. And these 483 01:02:47,480 --> 01:02:52,880 are the benefits that you will get. And they are already primed to understanding at least 484 01:02:52,880 --> 01:03:00,080 the basics of what Bitcoin is, you know, having bought some. So, you know, I think that it's 485 01:03:00,080 --> 01:03:06,320 not a black and white thing. It's it's a it's a journey. And you need to be open to people 486 01:03:06,320 --> 01:03:10,920 taking that journey in different ways and over different periods of time, but ultimately 487 01:03:10,920 --> 01:03:17,920 having empathy for it and for their own kind of personal experiences and how they impact 488 01:03:17,920 --> 01:03:19,680 on the decisions that they take. 489 01:03:19,680 --> 01:03:26,680 Yeah, I get that. I agree with you. I think, though, that the journey, I guess my big thing 490 01:03:26,680 --> 01:03:34,280 is the journey has to start with some level of respect for self custody. Like it has to 491 01:03:34,280 --> 01:03:40,000 start with some appreciation for what Bitcoin actually is and what makes it unique and what 492 01:03:40,000 --> 01:03:47,000 makes it more than just a speculative investment. Right. So it's like you have to if you're 493 01:03:47,000 --> 01:03:53,760 not there. And with that being said, even me, you know, in 2015, I was messing around 494 01:03:53,760 --> 01:03:58,960 with Bitcoin. Just I didn't understand it. Right. I was using it on Coinbase. I was basically 495 01:03:58,960 --> 01:04:04,160 buying it to spend it on a trip to Asia, you know, spending on guest houses and stuff like 496 01:04:04,160 --> 01:04:08,740 that and food. So I didn't hold it, by the way. I was buying it at two hundred dollars 497 01:04:08,740 --> 01:04:15,140 and selling it probably at one ninety nine. So no, I didn't get rich. But that was my 498 01:04:15,140 --> 01:04:22,960 first step. It wasn't until 2017 that I really appreciated Bitcoin for what it was, you know, 499 01:04:22,960 --> 01:04:30,480 as an unconfiscated form of money. You know, that's, you know, basically the only way in 500 01:04:30,480 --> 01:04:34,160 the world that you could pay somebody anywhere in the world without needing permission of 501 01:04:34,160 --> 01:04:44,440 a government. And my concern, I'll tell you my concern. My concern right now is that most 502 01:04:44,440 --> 01:04:50,120 people I think that hold Bitcoin. Well, we know this. Most people that hold Bitcoin are 503 01:04:50,120 --> 01:04:59,320 holding it on an exchange and they don't seem to have any desire or reason to take it off 504 01:04:59,320 --> 01:05:04,440 the exchange. Now, a certain percentage of them will over time. Maybe, you know, they'll 505 01:05:04,440 --> 01:05:10,000 fall down the rabbit hole slowly. But I think that the percentage of people who are just 506 01:05:10,000 --> 01:05:16,280 holding Bitcoin as an investment is growing. And that's in no small part thanks to the 507 01:05:16,280 --> 01:05:20,160 way Bitcoin has been promoted, like, you know, in the sort of community sentiment around 508 01:05:20,160 --> 01:05:25,160 store value. But here's the bigger issue. The bigger issue is that now we're entering a 509 01:05:25,160 --> 01:05:31,660 time where we're going to have ETFs. We've already got GBTC holding tons of Bitcoin out. 510 01:05:31,660 --> 01:05:36,440 So it's not just the exchanges, but it's these other investment vehicles. BlackRock is trying 511 01:05:36,440 --> 01:05:40,000 to launch this ETF right where it's going to hold potentially billions of dollars worth 512 01:05:40,000 --> 01:05:48,080 of Bitcoin. And ultimately, at some point, Bitcoin is going to just become what people, 513 01:05:48,080 --> 01:05:54,560 what the majority wants it to be, right? What they think it should be. And, you know, I've 514 01:05:54,560 --> 01:06:00,400 tweeted about this. It's got some attention, but I do see a future where BlackRock becomes 515 01:06:00,400 --> 01:06:05,760 this massive holder of Bitcoin in this ETF. And maybe it's other companies too. It could 516 01:06:05,760 --> 01:06:13,160 be not just BlackRock, it could be 10 different ETF companies that decide, you know what, none 517 01:06:13,160 --> 01:06:17,080 of the people holding this ETF care about decentralization because if they did, they 518 01:06:17,080 --> 01:06:22,480 wouldn't be holding the ETF in the first place, right? They'd be holding, they'd be self-custodying. 519 01:06:22,480 --> 01:06:29,000 So let's centralize Bitcoin. Let's move it to a proof of stake system that we control. 520 01:06:29,000 --> 01:06:35,740 You know, let's call that Bitcoin. Most people that hold the ETF will be fine with that because 521 01:06:35,740 --> 01:06:40,920 they can make the case that it's better for them and it's more regulatory friendly. They 522 01:06:40,920 --> 01:06:45,280 can get the media behind them. They can get the government behind them. They can get the 523 01:06:45,280 --> 01:06:49,440 majority behind them. And when you have all those things combined, all of a sudden you 524 01:06:49,440 --> 01:06:54,000 have the name. You can take the name with you to your new system. And yeah, me and you 525 01:06:54,000 --> 01:06:59,920 will still be out there like Roger Ver basically like, no, this is Bitcoin over here. You know, 526 01:06:59,920 --> 01:07:03,360 this thing that was supposed to be 21 million, this thing was supposed to be proof of work, 527 01:07:03,360 --> 01:07:07,840 this thing is supposed to be, we're still doing that over here. But the world will sort 528 01:07:07,840 --> 01:07:13,280 of shift off in a different direction because ultimately this whole thing is just about 529 01:07:13,280 --> 01:07:18,720 social consensus, right? It is a social contract to a certain extent. So that's a real concern 530 01:07:18,720 --> 01:07:24,760 of mine. I think that the majority not respecting self-custody and not understanding it, if 531 01:07:24,760 --> 01:07:30,120 we don't make that the first thing that they digest about Bitcoin, it's like we've already 532 01:07:30,120 --> 01:07:37,480 lost in my opinion. Yeah. I mean, I think that there is certainly 533 01:07:37,480 --> 01:07:46,080 an argument that that might happen. We could argue that the block size wars were similar 534 01:07:46,080 --> 01:07:54,560 to that and provide some example of the way it could go. My view is that if it happens, 535 01:07:54,560 --> 01:08:01,080 there will just be one more fork. And I was listening to your interview with Lynn Eldon 536 01:08:01,080 --> 01:08:09,880 and I think her reply on this was very to the point. The pros and cons of that fork 537 01:08:09,880 --> 01:08:20,780 versus the sort of original kind of proof of work will then stand in the free market 538 01:08:20,780 --> 01:08:29,960 and we'll see what people actually want. And that will be what it will be. The reality 539 01:08:29,960 --> 01:08:36,120 is that the majority of the time you have these centralized systems who think they know 540 01:08:36,120 --> 01:08:41,560 better from the majority of people doesn't often end up turning out to be the better 541 01:08:41,560 --> 01:08:49,200 system because it is so very hard to plan and to determine what is the better system. 542 01:08:49,200 --> 01:08:55,640 One of the things that I really like about Bitcoin and I think is perhaps its strongest 543 01:08:55,640 --> 01:09:00,760 attribute of all is the confidence that we have that the monetary system is not going 544 01:09:00,760 --> 01:09:05,640 to change. Now, if you're talking about a fork which would change to proof of stake, 545 01:09:05,640 --> 01:09:10,160 which would inflate the supply, which would do all kinds of other things, then you have 546 01:09:10,160 --> 01:09:18,360 removed what I believe to be one of its major selling points that I think a lot of people, 547 01:09:18,360 --> 01:09:22,600 even if they don't appreciate it when they first get in, certainly come to appreciate 548 01:09:22,600 --> 01:09:29,920 over time, is just that simple ability to plan and predict what is going to happen into 549 01:09:29,920 --> 01:09:38,520 the future, regardless of whether you custody the funds yourself. And of course, those kind 550 01:09:38,520 --> 01:09:45,600 of selling points will apply to the likes of BlackRock as well. They will see the benefit 551 01:09:45,600 --> 01:09:52,240 of simply holding on to the current system because they can plan into the future, which 552 01:09:52,240 --> 01:09:57,360 all businesses want. They very much want as much certainty into the future as they can. 553 01:09:57,360 --> 01:10:04,480 And it is ultimately the death of all business is because of change, all successful kind 554 01:10:04,480 --> 01:10:10,800 of business anyway. So the less change they have, the better. And they want the stability, 555 01:10:10,800 --> 01:10:17,080 particularly when it comes to the kind of money that they are using. Any instability, 556 01:10:17,080 --> 01:10:23,880 any kind of instability that we have in the field world today creates a great deal of 557 01:10:23,880 --> 01:10:30,760 cost for every business in the world and certainly one where they can't maybe conceive of a world 558 01:10:30,760 --> 01:10:34,840 being different. But I'm sure that many of them would prefer not to be spending lots 559 01:10:34,840 --> 01:10:40,320 of money in Forex and have difficulty sending their funds overseas. I know I certainly would 560 01:10:40,320 --> 01:10:47,480 running a business. So I think that there are arguments to say that they might change 561 01:10:47,480 --> 01:10:51,920 it, but there are also arguments to say that it's in their best interest not to change 562 01:10:51,920 --> 01:10:56,880 it. Yeah, but we have to look at what's possible. We have to think adversarially, right? We 563 01:10:56,880 --> 01:11:03,760 have to look at here's how it might go. How could we possibly defend against BlackRock, 564 01:11:03,760 --> 01:11:09,680 the government, the media, the majority hijacking the Bitcoin name and even potentially saying 565 01:11:09,680 --> 01:11:13,800 if you hold the old Bitcoin, you're now breaking the law. It's like there's all these different 566 01:11:13,800 --> 01:11:20,960 outcomes. I think that too many people stop thinking about Bitcoin at the edges of the 567 01:11:20,960 --> 01:11:25,520 actual Bitcoin ecosystem. They think about, okay, we have the blockchain, we have the 568 01:11:25,520 --> 01:11:30,200 code, we have the miners, we have the nodes, we have, this is our little world. But they 569 01:11:30,200 --> 01:11:36,320 don't think about the fact that it's basically Bitcoin is like a planet and you could have 570 01:11:36,320 --> 01:11:41,200 a comet coming straight at it that could just completely blow it up. It's like there's a 571 01:11:41,200 --> 01:11:45,200 lot of things that could potentially blow up Bitcoin that wouldn't come from within, 572 01:11:45,200 --> 01:11:52,000 that would come from the outside. The most obvious being it just gets outlawed one day 573 01:11:52,000 --> 01:11:58,040 and you go to jail if you hold it. That's the most obvious thing that could potentially 574 01:11:58,040 --> 01:12:05,080 impact it. Now, yeah, people would argue against that too. But my point of view comes from 575 01:12:05,080 --> 01:12:10,920 not the side that's optimistic like, yeah, even if that happens, we'll find a way. That's 576 01:12:10,920 --> 01:12:17,600 not how I think. How I think is this could happen, how can we make sure that we can be 577 01:12:17,600 --> 01:12:23,680 bulletproof enough? How can we strengthen what we have today enough to the point where 578 01:12:23,680 --> 01:12:28,800 we can defend against these kinds of attacks so it doesn't shatter us into a million different 579 01:12:28,800 --> 01:12:33,200 pieces? When I think about this kind of stuff, I see the way the world is going, I see the 580 01:12:33,200 --> 01:12:38,360 way people think, I see how stupid most people are when it comes to privacy, when it comes 581 01:12:38,360 --> 01:12:46,100 to self sovereignty. Most people, 90% of the world doesn't have any concept of what it 582 01:12:46,100 --> 01:12:52,720 means to be a free human being as far as thinking for yourself, not relying on third parties, 583 01:12:52,720 --> 01:12:57,760 not relying on governments, not relying on banks. Most people don't even know central 584 01:12:57,760 --> 01:13:04,440 banks exist. They just go out, buy the McDonald's, go to the park, sit there, go watch some TV, 585 01:13:04,440 --> 01:13:08,760 go home. It's like they use their cell phone, they forget how they pay for it. They turn 586 01:13:08,760 --> 01:13:15,760 on Netflix, they get mad when their show's not there, go to bed, wake up, do it again. 587 01:13:15,760 --> 01:13:20,960 Or they work for the government and they go to work and they expect something, they expect 588 01:13:20,960 --> 01:13:26,200 this, they expect that. I mean, people freaking, we're in a world where people download an 589 01:13:26,200 --> 01:13:30,600 app on their phone, they have no job, right? They're sitting there, they got no job. They 590 01:13:30,600 --> 01:13:36,960 download an app on their phone that lets them drive their car and connects them with people 591 01:13:36,960 --> 01:13:43,240 to get in the backseat of their car, drive them from their house to Burger King. And 592 01:13:43,240 --> 01:13:50,960 then those people who just downloaded an app go on strike and demand higher wages. It's 593 01:13:50,960 --> 01:14:00,560 like we live in this crazy world where people have no concept of reality. So I do not expect 594 01:14:00,560 --> 01:14:06,480 most people to value the stuff we value. So it's like what I want to think more about 595 01:14:06,480 --> 01:14:13,000 is how do we put up this force field around this planet Bitcoin that'll deflect all this 596 01:14:13,000 --> 01:14:18,400 stuff that's definitely going to come our way, all these asteroids and comets and meteorites. 597 01:14:18,400 --> 01:14:22,960 Because Bitcoin is the best chance we have, I think right now for a free financial future. 598 01:14:22,960 --> 01:14:27,600 And it's like if one of those things hits, even if we shield against 100 of them, one 599 01:14:27,600 --> 01:14:32,720 of them gets through, whether it's BlackRock or something else, it could just impact that 600 01:14:32,720 --> 01:14:38,920 level of freedom that we want to offer for a very long time. So just long story short, 601 01:14:38,920 --> 01:14:45,840 that's why I'm so against people that are out there saying, oh, it's fine to start with 602 01:14:45,840 --> 01:14:51,360 custody. It's fine to just let people buy Bitcoin on exchange. We'll eventually get 603 01:14:51,360 --> 01:14:55,680 them off. Yeah, you'll get 5% of them off, but the other 95% are going to turn into your 604 01:14:55,680 --> 01:15:03,440 worst nightmare in 5, 10, 20 years when they're trying to fork away or nobody cares about 605 01:15:03,440 --> 01:15:09,480 decentralization and they're just trying to number go up. Let's go proof of stake. So 606 01:15:09,480 --> 01:15:14,040 yeah, I get a little tinfoil hatty and conspiracy theorists, but that's just who, that's how 607 01:15:14,040 --> 01:15:19,240 I do it. I think one of the mistakes we can make when 608 01:15:19,240 --> 01:15:23,080 trying to predict into the future is taking our current world and saying, well, only one 609 01:15:23,080 --> 01:15:27,600 aspect of it is going to change, but it's likely that actually much more than that will 610 01:15:27,600 --> 01:15:34,000 change. So what people believe is important in the future isn't likely not to be the case 611 01:15:34,000 --> 01:15:41,240 of what they think is important now. And the other thing is, I think that we can all see 612 01:15:41,240 --> 01:15:48,400 as Bitcoin is that this grand fiat experiment that the world has embarked upon is not doing 613 01:15:48,400 --> 01:15:56,800 so well and is likely to come to some kind of conclusion probably sooner rather than 614 01:15:56,800 --> 01:16:03,520 later. So what does the world look like and what do people value on the back of that? 615 01:16:03,520 --> 01:16:13,520 Because if that is truly as dire as some would, you know, as if we are in such a debt laden 616 01:16:13,520 --> 01:16:19,240 world and that debt can never be paid back and the only way to deal with that fact is 617 01:16:19,240 --> 01:16:26,960 to inflate the money away. And what effect does that have on the world? What kind of 618 01:16:26,960 --> 01:16:32,360 chaos does that bring? How does that change people's views on what is money? And will 619 01:16:32,360 --> 01:16:38,880 they care about what a central bank is if the inflation is 20, 30, 40 percent? I can 620 01:16:38,880 --> 01:16:46,940 assure you that Argentinians know what a central bank is. You know, that's why this presidential 621 01:16:46,940 --> 01:16:54,920 candidate has received the votes that he has. So it's just a matter of what is important. 622 01:16:54,920 --> 01:17:00,280 And currently in the US right now, it's simply not that important. That is just the truth 623 01:17:00,280 --> 01:17:04,720 of it. And that's why, Chris, you are seeing what you're seeing and feeling the way that 624 01:17:04,720 --> 01:17:09,880 you are is because, you know, it's simply the honest truth is it's just not that important. 625 01:17:09,880 --> 01:17:17,240 You have a fairly good financial system and it will likely be the last to fail. So, you 626 01:17:17,240 --> 01:17:20,840 know, but there are plenty of other places in the world who, you know, I'm not saying 627 01:17:20,840 --> 01:17:25,720 that they know what Bitcoin is. It's still very small, but certainly they feel the need 628 01:17:25,720 --> 01:17:30,440 for something better. They're looking for something better than what they have access 629 01:17:30,440 --> 01:17:37,360 to today. And I think that we're in very early Bitcoin days here. That's in fact a general 630 01:17:37,360 --> 01:17:45,720 thing. Most of the takes I see on Bitcoin are, in my view, just far too early to know. 631 01:17:45,720 --> 01:17:49,880 But I think that, you know, when we try and predict into the future, A, it's very hard 632 01:17:49,880 --> 01:17:56,640 to know really where we're going on sort of a medium to long term basis. It's extremely 633 01:17:56,640 --> 01:18:04,200 hard to be able to predict that far out. And secondly, you know, we just we're really beginning 634 01:18:04,200 --> 01:18:11,080 this journey now and there's a lot of education that is required. So, you know, you were saying, 635 01:18:11,080 --> 01:18:15,800 well, what can we do to protect against this asteroid? Well, I think the best thing we 636 01:18:15,800 --> 01:18:22,200 can do is to educate. I really do. And, you know, there are Bitcoin educators around this 637 01:18:22,200 --> 01:18:26,520 world who are doing great work, who are not necessarily all that well known even within 638 01:18:26,520 --> 01:18:34,280 the Bitcoin community. But they are educating thousands of people around what is Bitcoin? 639 01:18:34,280 --> 01:18:41,920 Why is it important? What makes it different? Those that's, in my view, the work that really 640 01:18:41,920 --> 01:18:46,880 needs to happen in order for us to have a chance of this being the freedom money that 641 01:18:46,880 --> 01:18:48,880 we hope it will be. 642 01:18:48,880 --> 01:18:54,800 Yeah. And I think having these conversations too, I think is really important. You know, 643 01:18:54,800 --> 01:19:00,320 I think my philosophy on that is, yeah, I mean, obviously, the educators in the space 644 01:19:00,320 --> 01:19:07,720 are critical. And it's the way I learned. And I think it's all very, very important. 645 01:19:07,720 --> 01:19:14,600 And what I try to do with this and with other stuff is have the uncomfortable conversations 646 01:19:14,600 --> 01:19:20,680 about the grander sort of world that we live in, you know, how it could affect us and to 647 01:19:20,680 --> 01:19:25,200 look at Bitcoin as a planet with asteroids and comets coming at it and think about it 648 01:19:25,200 --> 01:19:29,840 from that more philosophical point of view, because I feel like in the long term, that's 649 01:19:29,840 --> 01:19:36,000 the way like Bitcoin is always going to exist in a real world with real guns and real jails 650 01:19:36,000 --> 01:19:41,920 and real tyrants, right? It's like it's always going to exist in that world. So in the longer 651 01:19:41,920 --> 01:19:46,920 term, as Bitcoin gets more important and gets more powerful, it's going to have to fend 652 01:19:46,920 --> 01:19:53,480 off more of those attacks, the real world attacks from the outside. So I'm hoping that 653 01:19:53,480 --> 01:19:58,040 by having conversations like this with people like you, who really understand this stuff 654 01:19:58,040 --> 01:20:04,840 and who really have thought it through, that it'll give people, people need to think about 655 01:20:04,840 --> 01:20:10,880 it just more holistically, you know, more in a grander context, I think, for us to really 656 01:20:10,880 --> 01:20:15,440 have the survival that we want. You know, I think, yeah, it's one thing to really understand 657 01:20:15,440 --> 01:20:21,120 Bitcoin within that ecosystem. But then it's almost like the it's like the graduate program, 658 01:20:21,120 --> 01:20:25,880 right? It's like first you understand Bitcoin, that's, that's undergrad. And then, you know, 659 01:20:25,880 --> 01:20:29,600 the graduate, the master's degree is like understanding how Bitcoin can survive in the 660 01:20:29,600 --> 01:20:33,900 real world. Yeah, it's like that's, that's sort of where we have to go with it, I think, 661 01:20:33,900 --> 01:20:37,800 because if we don't, we're just gonna get caught off guard one day and just kind of 662 01:20:37,800 --> 01:20:43,960 that comments gonna come, we're just not going to be ready. But well, listen, man, I've kept 663 01:20:43,960 --> 01:20:47,440 you over time. But I really appreciate you being here. How do you by the way, how do 664 01:20:47,440 --> 01:20:51,360 you make money? Do you do you get donations? Or what is it? Money wise? 665 01:20:51,360 --> 01:20:59,120 Yeah, yeah, there's certainly you can donate sparrow wallet.com. There are some fees from 666 01:20:59,120 --> 01:21:05,800 Whirlpool that help. But as I say, it really is an open source project. It's not a business. 667 01:21:05,800 --> 01:21:11,680 I'm not trying to make it into one. I'm grateful for every donation that I get. For me, it's 668 01:21:11,680 --> 01:21:16,920 a sign that people value the tool and value what it brings to their lives and are prepared 669 01:21:16,920 --> 01:21:25,120 to part with their hard earned sets to show their appreciation for what I do. So I certainly 670 01:21:25,120 --> 01:21:32,280 value it more than perhaps most. Yeah, okay. So every Bitcoin is listening to this. If 671 01:21:32,280 --> 01:21:39,040 you've never used sparrow, go download it and use it. And it replaces ledger live, it 672 01:21:39,040 --> 01:21:43,160 replaces tools that you're using with your hardware wallets. For the most part, you still 673 01:21:43,160 --> 01:21:49,500 need ledger live to like do firmware updates and stuff like that. But as far as your transactions, 674 01:21:49,500 --> 01:21:54,320 it's a way better way to use those kind of tools. You can obviously have software hot 675 01:21:54,320 --> 01:22:00,560 wallets as well. So I recommend just downloading it playing with it, trying it out. If you've 676 01:22:00,560 --> 01:22:06,440 never Whirlpooled, get into that world. Run your own node. Obviously Ronin dojo is one 677 01:22:06,440 --> 01:22:13,160 way to go. There's others out there or you could build your own. And if you go to sparrow 678 01:22:13,160 --> 01:22:17,680 wallets website, you can also jump into their telegram and just keep that open in your app 679 01:22:17,680 --> 01:22:22,960 and ask questions there. I know Craig's there a lot. There's others in there too, who answer 680 01:22:22,960 --> 01:22:29,800 questions and it's just a really good community, good ecosystem, which is rare in this space 681 01:22:29,800 --> 01:22:34,120 these days, but it just, it just feels good. You know, it's, it's one of those, uh, everybody's 682 01:22:34,120 --> 01:22:38,240 there for the right reasons. So that's why I appreciate it. But Craig, thanks for joining 683 01:22:38,240 --> 01:22:40,280 me today. And maybe we should do this again sometime. 684 01:22:40,280 --> 01:22:53,800 Awesome Chris. It's been great to chat.