Australian Bitcoin Podcast

Discount link (get 6 months of bitcoin Auto-Send withdrawals for free): https://www.hardblock.com.au/join/ozbitcoinpod

GLOBAL

CPI Updates

ECB CBDC: https://twitter.com/Lagarde/status/1547247694170800129 

Russia bans domestic crypto paments: https://sozd.duma.gov.ru/bill/138674-8#bh_histras 

Paraguay’s crypto framework: https://cointelegraph.com/news/paraguay-s-crypto-framework-one-step-away-from-becoming-law 

Andorra's Digita Assets Act: https://cointelegraph.com/news/andorra-green-lights-bitcoin-and-blockchain-with-digital-assets-act 

Central African Republic launches shitcoin and holds bitcoin as reserve asset: https://sango.org/ 

Chinese citizens likely unable to have deposits returned from Henan branch banks: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/are-chinese-tanks-defending-banks-from-customers-viral-video-sparks-rumors/ar-AAZPlhs 

Tesla sells 75% of its bitcoin (~US$930 million): https://bitcoinmagazine.com/business/breaking-elon-musks-tesla-sold-75-of-its-bitcoin

Celsius has initiated Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220713005911/en/Celsius-Network-Initiates-Financial-Restructuring-to-Stabilize-Business-and-Maximize-Value-for-All-Stakeholders 

3 Arrows Capital declares bankruptcy; founders Su Zhu and Kyle Davis detained at Dubai airport: https://www.investing.com/news/cryptocurrency-news/the-race-three-arrows-capital-3ac-founders-detained-in-dubai-airport-2849780 

Zu Shu files US$5 million claim against 3AC: https://watcher.guru/news/3ac-co-founder-zhu-su-among-creditors-files-5m-claim-against-own-company 

New York Yankees to pay staff in bitcoin: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/business/new-york-yankees-pay-employees-in-bitcoin 

Amazon surveillance devices 'shockingly' used in warrantless & permissionless surveillance: https://theintercept.com/2022/07/13/amazon-ring-camera-footage-police-ed-markey/  

AUSTRALIAN

Digital-X CEO (formerly NAB Head of Innovation) takes 5% of her salary in bitcoin: https://www.smh.com.au/business/entrepreneurship/meet-the-asx-chief-executive-who-receives-5-percent-of-her-salary-in-bitcoin-20220714-p5b1jt.html 

TECHNICAL / OTHER

Discussion about increasing bitcoin supply to extend block reward subsidy was continued in Bitcoin Optech Newsletter #209: https://bitcoinops.org/en/newsletters/2022/07/20/  

Level39 (of Bitcoin Magazine) releases comprehensive thread on the ways bitcoin can stabilise energy grids and bootstrap new infrastructure: https://twitter.com/level39/status/1548550264218583040 

Crypto Fear & Greed Index has spent 72 days in "Extreme Fear" (as of July 18th) - the longest period ever: https://alternative.me/crypto/fear-and-greed-index/ 

Bitcoin Lightning Network reaches ATH capacity of ~4,300 BTC: https://bitcoinvisuals.com/ln-capacity 

Discount link (get 6 months of free bitcoin Auto-Send withdrawals): https://www.hardblock.com.au/join/ozbitcoinpod

- Celsius debacle, shitcoin scams (eg LUNA and UST), and shitcoin casinos

- Living on a bitcoin standard can be tough in bear markets

- Increasing financial freedom with a Self-managed Superannuation Fund

- Rusty's bitcoin journey, including working with Tone Vays and Michael Saylor and joining the meme factory (PS: fuck you Greg)

- The power of memes in conveying messages and shifting narratives

- Max Keiser is the final form of all bitcoiners

- Having a spiritual connection with bitcoin

- Appreciating the incentives model of the whole bitcoin ecosystem

- Money is always hierarchical, but bitcoin provides equality in rules

- Threats to bitcoin: changing the code (or not being able to change the code when issues like the block header overflow bug arise)

- Toxic bitcoin maximalism as a cultural immune system for bitcoin (and it comes from a place of love not vitriol)

- Bear markets are when the productive stuff gets done - stay focused on the fundamentals, get involved and contribute, and stay humble and stack sats

We apologise for the low audio volume in this episode - that'll be fixed for next time!

- Macroeconomic market review, including: currencies, Government bonds, energy, and food prices

References

- A report on the likelihood of a Fed pivot (back to quantitative easing and away from increasing interest rates): https://www.myrmikan.com/pub/Myrmikan_Research_2022_06_14.pdf

Discount link: https://www.hardblock.com.au/join/ozbitcoinpod

The Australian Bitcoin Podcast is focused on Australian bitcoin and privacy content, including educational episodes, recent news, and guest interviews.  

- Setting up www.mineracks.com and making the facility acessible for visits from customers

- Attempting to solve the three common problems for bitcoin mining in Australia: 1) understanding if it's profitable, 2) buying a miner, and 3) dealing with the heat and noise (especially if it's in your home)!

- Learning about bitcoin mining keeps you humble as you're always learning and meeting people who are motivated by the right values

- Compass Mining and BitRiver US-Russia sanctions fiasco - a risk / trade-off many didn't consider when looking at the cheaper energy prices

- Piers' bitcoin journey

- Receiving a cheque from the FBI from the eGold rug-pull and being unable to cash it due to high fees (peak fiat!)

- Trying to find the "next bitcoin" and realising there isn't and won't be one

- Setting up bitcoin and lightning nodes, using the technology, and realising the utility it has

- Discovering bitcoin mining initially through GPU mining of shitcoins

- Realising stacking hash is as addictive as stacking Sats

- Taking on the personal mission to help non-miners get access to the mining industry if they choose to

- Running one's own node and using the network may be the tipping point for becoming a bitcoin maximalist

- Understanding the benefits of proof-of-work over proof-of-stake through lived experience and experimentation

- Consensus versus democratic or authoritarian systems

- Libertarian and Austrian ideals in regards to free markets in the context of other cryptocurrencies and bitcoin

- Experiencing five difference currencies, hyperinflation, and sovereign confiscation of private assets in South America

- Financial privilege gets in the way of Westerners understanding the global benefits of bitcoin adoption

- Family and friends reactions to transitioning to a bitcoin-focused vocation

- Working on containerized mining solutions for flare gas mining sites

- Most people working in the bitcoin industry needs to be a polymath

- Tips for people starting their bitcoin mining journey (eg, adopting the right mindset and understanding the risks)

- Building the Australian bitcoin mining industry to further decentralize the overall bitcoin mining ecosystem

- Mining is a collaborative competitive industry - a non-zero sum game unlike anything else!

- Orange pill stories and tips: shitcoin miners transitioning to mine bitcoin, 1) establish yourself as a knowledgeable and trustworthy source of information; 2) expose the person to the network; 3) be helpful, and let them come to you

- Things to be bullish about: motivated, innovative, and intelligent bitcoinrs!

- Bitcoin is an energy buyer of last resort; an energy sink which stabilizes demand and lowers the price for everyone; an efficient way to utilise our otherwise wasted energy resources

- Threats to bitcoin: the energy debate and a global push towards less reliable energy and discussion over the morality and utility of proof-of-work protocols (similar to the net neutrality debate)

Discount link: https://hardblock.com.au/join/ozbitcoinpod

Thanks to our guest: https://twitter.com/talej (of https://voltpay.app)

- Michael's bitcoin journey and becoming a developer

- Being counter-culture and mistrusting the media helped to discover and learn about bitcoin

- Understanding Austrian economics and Libertarian perspectives helped to grok bitcoin

- The importance of building an economy (especially a circular economy) that people can't be excluded from

- The reaction of colleagues, friends, and family when moving into bitcoin development work

- Build the tools and the circular economy will come!

- VoltPay current features: customisable inventory (including set prices for products, along with custom categories and units/groupings of products), customisable amounts if no product has been set up yet, multiple currency options, deposit and withdrawal features, dark mode, Wallet of Satoshi for liquidity

- VoltPay future features: LNURL function so users can setup their own name@VoltPay address, ability to plug into own LDN or C-Lightning node, semi-offline mode, ability to have static QR codes for individual products, NFC functionality for contactless payments

- Running a community market garden to establish shorter supply chains and make better quality food available to neighbours (versus them relying on inefficient global supply chains and fiat farming practices which are generally unhealthy for the land and the food consumer)

- Collaborative competition in community farming, similar to an open source project / network (or bitcoin mining)

- Australan Tax Law "Personal Use" exemption - brief discussion and strategies, including the "spend and replace" model

- Bitcoin needs a "Fiverr" equivalent, maybe a SatsSer?

- Regenerative farming with goats, cattle, and other livestock - focus on building the soil and the great vegetables will be a natural byproduct

- Issues with traditional ("classical") farming through monocropping and excessive (and escalating) fertilizer use

- Sled dogging in Australia

- Huskies and Malamutes can be hard dogs to train

- How does someone get started in bitcoin app development or development more generally?

- Things to be bullish about with bitcoin: there's so much educational tangent topics from bitcoin, e.g., psychology, philosophy, economics

- Bitcoiners are abnormally exceptional

- Bitcoin risks: regulatory capture and general regulatory risks

- Cypherpunks Write Code documentary - encryption and anti-encryption regulation has been and will continue to be a cat-and-mouse game

- Orange pill techniques: focus on the money, especially the problems with it (including the fractional reserve banking and inflation)

- A tangent into psychology: living a life of meaning and value is hard work, but it's important to find that meaning to remain on track; your mind is like a garden, so be sure to prioritise the plants that you want - don't always focus on the weeds; the mind is naturally more negative too, so get used to rolling with that; and once you find your meaning - get started, and don't get paralysed by analysis!

Resources

Discount link: https://www.hardblock.com.au/join/ozbitcoinpod

US annual CPI rose to 8.6% in May: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-10/us-inflation-unexpectedly-accelerates-to-40-year-high-of-8-6

Federal Reserve raised interest rates to a new level of 1.5%: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/to-fight-sky-high-inflation-the-federal-reserve-just-raised-interest-rates-three-times-faster-than-usual-e2-80-94-and-the-most-since-since-1994/ar-AAYvisU

Cynthia Lummis has introduced a bitcoin and crypto bill that includes recognising bitcoin as a commodity: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/business/heres-whats-in-senator-lummis-bitcoin-bill

Alex Gladstein and human rights advocates from 20 countries across send letter to US Congress: https://www.financialinclusion.tech/

China bank protest (due to deposit ‘bail in’) stopped by COVID ‘health app’ turning red:

https://www.reuters.com/world/china/china-bank-protest-stopped-by-health-codes-turning-red-depositors-say-2022-06-14/

http://lifeweek.com.cn/article/165940

Bank of Canada (ie, the Canadian central bank) reported that the number of Canadians holding bitcoin doubled from 2020 to 2021: https://finbold.com/bank-of-canada-number-of-canadians-holding-bitcoin-doubled-in-2021/

Gazprom (third-largest oil producer in Russia) is partnering with BitRiver (a bitcoin mining company) to mine bitcoin with its excess oil resources: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/business/gazpromneft-partners-with-bitriver-to-mine-bitcoin

Majid Al Futtaim Group (a retail giant) will soon accept bitcoin payments in 29 of their shopping malls and 13 hotels in Dubai: https://twitter.com/BTC_Archive/status/1533744002083717120?s=20&t=uX2R0sTg3ZELVdmFKDjz1A

Octagon Networks (an American cybersecurity firm) has converted its entire balance sheet into bitcoin: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/business/octagon-networks-converts-full-balance-sheet-into-bitcoin

Reserve Bank of Australia has raised interest rates for the second month in a row, increasing by 50 basis points to 0.85% https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/rba-hikes-interest-rates-for-second-month-in-a-row/ar-AAY9IEG

2022 Lightning Network Summit summary: https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/lightning-dev/2022-June/003600.html

Hacker claims to have extracted Telegram data including incriminating messages from prominent crypto influencers involved in pump and dump schemes: https://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1ss24a6

Jack Dorsey (Block, Inc) released further detail about TBD, a bitcoin-based decentralized exchange: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/business/jack-dorseys-tbd-presents-bitcoin-based-decentralized-web5

SethForPrivacy releases a technical summary of bitcoin privacy-related improvements: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/technical/list-of-bitcoin-privacy-proposals

OXT Research updates their chain analytics visualiser to include better wallet fingerprinting information: https://medium.com/oxt-research/oxt-update-38591f4050d9

Bitcoin hash rate reached a new all-time-high of around ~241 exahash per second: https://insights.braiins.com/en/

Lightning Network capacity reaches an all-time-high of 4000 BTC: https://btx.com.au/bitcoin-lightning-network-capacity-charges-through-4000-btc/

Discount link: https://www.hardblock.com.au/join/ozbitcoinpod

- Reflecting on the 2022 Lightning Summit (including discussing the Oakland protocol for improving LN privacy in the context of channel probing, as well as agreeing on zero confirmation channel opens): https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/lightning-dev/2022-June/003600.html

- How are LN improvement proposals implemented (through a collaborative yet adversarial process)?

- Collaborative work with Blockstream (Core Lightning), Lightning Labs (LND), Lightning Development Kit (Block, Inc), ACINQ (Phoenix Wallet), Eclair, VLS, Breez Wallet, Anthony Towns, René Pickhardt, Matt Corallo

- LN engineers are focused on improving privacy and interoperability while expanding utility of the network (eg, making subscription/streaming micro-payments easier, as well as developing solutions for refund scenarios)

- Understanding the discrepancy in priorities and methods between Core Lightning and LND

- Remembering to celebrate the wins, appreciate how far bitcoin and lightning has come, but to remain focused on solving current and future problems

- Rusty's journey as a developer (including Linux kernel development), how he got into bitcoin, getting Mt Gox'd, and ending up in lightning development

- Recent and current work on the lightning network (including dual-funded channel opens, and building the Core Lightning community and user-base)

- HardBlock implementing lightning deposits and withdrawals - considering Core Lightning versus the competition for an institutional implementation (eg, Core Lightning focuses on stability / reliability and modular add-ons for additional features and experimentation)

- Blockstream's Greenlight project - providing a non-custodial yet third-party hosted Core Lightning solution for institutions

- Discussion of sender versus receiver privacy on lightning network, including potential solutions (eg, Trampoline Routing; Zero-conf channel opens with short channel aliases; and Blinded Routing)

- Basis of Lightning Technology (BOLT) 12 versus BOLT 11 - improvements and new features

- Lightning network improvement procedure in comparison to the Bitcoin Improvement Proposal (BIP) process

- Improvements to lightning network privacy by changing the way public channels are announced on the Gossip network

- How the bitcoin block header overflow bug will need to be fixed with a hard fork

- Does fixing the block header overflow bug with a hard fork open up the discussion for other changes to be worked into that hard fork? Is this a risk for bitcoin?

- Could there be a bitcoin civil war coming, especially about the blocksize or block subsidy? Will the 21 million supply cap ever change? What circumstances would make people consider it?

- Threats to bitcoin: privacy is lagging

- Things to be excited about: lightning network (near-instant, near-free, more private, and eventually-infinitely-scalable transactions)

https://lightning.readthedocs.io

https://github.com/ElementsProject/lightning

Thanks to our guest: https://twitter.com/dazbea1 (of https://lookingglasseducation.com)

- Society's gradual erosion of trust towards authorities and media institutions

- DazBea's bitcoin journey - transitioning from wage slavery to self-employment to investing in the future

- Understanding "fair value" of businesses before investing (and realising that almost everything on the stock exchange is overvalued)

- We're all incentivised to improve and benefit ourselves, which is often incongruous with being a wage slave

- People are forced to move far out on the risk curve just to protect their wealth (and bitcoin fixes this)

- Inflation is destroying savings (whether it meets the 'hyperinflation' criteria or not)

- Everyone's "basket of goods" in regards to inflation is different

- There are incentives to keep the CPI number down through manipulation of the basket of goods (including hedonic adjustments)

- Broken incentives in various industries and academia (e.g., agriculture, nutrition, health)

- How to lie with statistics

- Starting and working on www.lookingglasseducation.com

- Preparing a 3-hour course focused on answering the question "what is money?" for no-coiners and wage-earners without focusing too much on bitcoin

- Future courses and plans for Looking Glass Education

- Financial education at a young age disrupts the cycle of poverty

- Bitcoin mining at home (eg, with an S9)

- Is it still profitable? How much energy is used for what hash rate output? How much do they cost to buy?

- Bitcoin mining at home is more viable with solar source of energy to offset grid energy costs

- Running miners non-stop or turning them on/off intermittently - pros and cons?

- How loud and hot do they get?

- Running standard versus customised firmware (e.g., BraiinsOS)

- What maintenance do they need?

- Can you run miners on the same circuit, or is it best to separate them?

- Ethernet vs WiFi connection?

- How to reduce the noise (e.g., building a sound-proofed 'black box')?

- Immersion cooling systems - pros and cons?

- Heating water or your house with the heat from a bitcoin miner

- Speed reading and mind mapping - useful tips and tools (e.g., Voice Dream and Obsidian) to consider

- Econoalchemist's DIY UpstreamData BlackBox Guide

- Obsidian Mind-mapping Tutorial for Beginners