What is a Soul Bound Token?

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

Today: What is an SBT, which is short for Sould Bound Token?

The idea of the soul bound token is relatively new, and was proposed by three authors: Glen Weyl, Puja Ohlhaver, and none other than Ethereum co-founder Vitalki Buterin.

In short, it describes a record of your accomplishments on the blockchain.

You’ll remember that blockchains are really nothing more than databases, with the twist that anyone can verify a record's correctness. And the idea here is to record your achievements on it, and record them in a way that only your wallet can hold them. They can never be transferred, hence the name soul bound - bound to you.

Sounds abstract? It is, but think about it this way: If you play a video game online and earn a badge, or do a workout with your AppleWatch and get a virtual medal - those are all digital recognitions of something you accomplished, they are just not recorded on a blockchain.

But the blockchain does make sense if you take the concept further: Your university could issue you an SBT that undeniably verifies your degrees. A former employer could do the same for a reference. And whoever you show it to, can trust them instantly.

We’ll see where this goes. But we think it’s one of the few practical applications where the idea of a blockchain provides extra value.

What do you think?

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

Cryptohunt is going live!

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

Today is a special day for us. Today, we are launching cryptohunt to the public after working very hard on it for the last 6 months.

It may sound a little cheesy, but cryptohunt is a product that is trying to give you the same joy as we have when learning about crypto.

What you don’t know: Every day, my co-founder Arndt writes one of these podcast episodes during the day, And after dinner, excited like a child on Christmas morning, I sneak into the garage and learn something new while recording it.

That’s what cryptohunt aspires to do, but as a product. If you go to www.cryptohunt.it, you’ll find dozens of little classes that’ll teach you crypto from the ground up. Our goal is to make you giggle and laugh, and have fun. This stuff is technical sometimes, so we made it light and enjoyable - earn badges, and share lessons with friends.

So, that is cryptohunt. Check it out at cryptohunt.it! We hope you have as much fun using it as we have building it for you.

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

What’s the best way to learn about crypto?

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

Today, let’s talk about the best way to learn all about crypto and blockchains. And stay tuned for the end of the episode, where we have exciting news: This podcast is getting a big upgrade!

Crypto can be complicated. It’s a very technical topic, and we are still in the beginning stages. That means most people you’ll hear from are early adopters and builders who tend to talk in complex terms or assume you know the basics.

But here’s the secret: We were beginners too, 6 months and 180 episodes ago. And our biggest insight was: Crypto is like a new language. You can learn it one step at a time, by understanding the core concepts.

So here’s the big reveal: We are launching cryptohunt tomorrow, and with it a fun, and entertaining learning experience where we have engaging classes for all of those fundamentals. It’s like Duolingo, but for crypto.

By the time you hear this, we are probably already live, so give it a try at www.cryptohunt.it! And don’t worry, this podcast isn’t going anywhere!

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

Elon Musk’s history of hyping crypto - can you trust him?

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

Today, let’s take a look at one of the most popular crypto influencers ever - none other than Tesla-founder Elon Musk. And the question is: Should you listen to him?

Musk has a long history of hyping crypto, in particular Bitcoin and Dogecoin. He tweeted about Bitcoin first in 2014 and has since raved about Dogecoin quite often as well. He’s also made some big moves with Tesla: The company bought $1.5bn dollars worth of Bitcoin in 2019 and even said customers would soon be able to buy cars with crypto.

But here is the strange thing about Musk: What he claims and what is actually happening are often two different things. Tesla ditched their Bitcoin holdings quickly thereafter, and the only thing Dogecoin buys to date are Tesla T-shirts.

You see, Musk has one of the most followed Twitter accounts on earth and seems to rarely filter his tweets. That’s why we wouldn’t give them too much weight; we would rather suggest you do your own research. Bitcoin and Dogecoin for example are both bad for the planet - strange for an electric car guru to promote.

Best to ignore the opinions of influencers, and develop your own! Stay tuned for our launch on Wednesday, because we’ll help you do exactly that!

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

What does DYOR mean?

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

“DYOR”, you might sometimes hear it in the context of investment forums and the like. It stands for “Do Your Own Research” and simply reminds you that you should always understand what you invest in.

If you think about it, that’s really solid advice. First, you are less likely to get scammed by someone if you independently research and verify their claims.

Second, it helps you figure out which things are something you want to invest in instead of just blindly following market trends. Warren Buffet famously follows this approach: He and his investment partners at Berkshire Heathaway only take long term bets in companies that they think have a fundamentally solid business model and leadership team.

And lastly, it is easy to get lured by the promises of making a quick and easy return. We’ve all told about the friend who got a Ferrari after she made a lucky investment in some crypto coin. But what they made, someone else lost because they bought into the same buzz, just later. Do your research to understand the risks.

With cryptohunt, we are building a learning platform that will teach you the fundamental building blocks of how crypto works. So you can make your own decisions and don’t need to follow someone else’s advice. Whether you are interested in personal finance or simply want to understand this new technology that is lurking around the corner.

We hope you enjoy this content - and next time we’ll talk about one of those people who’ve fueled a lot of uninformed crypto purchases: Elon Musk.

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

What is a public ledger? And why may you not want to send money via crypto if you care about your privacy?

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

Here’s a thing most people won’t tell you about crypto: Every blockchain is really nothing other than a giant notebook, stored in the cloud.

That notebook is often referred to as the public ledger. So let’s explain what the ledger is, and then look into the implications of it being public.

Think of your own bank account: Money goes in, money goes out. The result is your account balance. Your bank keeps track of your transactions, and everyone else’s.

A blockchain ledger is the same: It’s one big history of all the transactions. Nothing more, it’s really that simple. But instead of being saved on your bank’s server, an identical copy is saved on many computers that are connected peer-to-peer.

Why many computers? The point here is to eliminate the middle man, your bank. But trusting a single random person to keep this important history of transactions is problematic. They could alter it and steal your money. So many copies exist, and they are publicly accessible. If someone cheats, anyone with a separate copy can quickly find out by doing some simple math.

But that has downsides for consumers like you. By design nothing is private on a public ledger. So when you send money, anyone can see how much and where. And of course, anyone can see how much you have in your wallet as well.

So think about that as one of the downsides of using crypto. Everything is always a tradeoff.

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

How to avoid problems with those stupid wallet addresses that most blockchains use

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

Last time we showed you how to send money via stablecoins. But in the process we noticed something super annoying: These wallet addresses.

They are a frustratingly cryptic string of numbers and letters… and easy to get wrong. Uppercase and lower case matter, they are seemingly randomly mixed, and are pretty long. In other words: They are user hostile and unfortunately you have to deal with it.

But there are a few ways to avoid trouble.

First, make sure everyone handling them always just copy-paste them through their computers or phones, By avoiding to manually write them down, lots of those potential errors can be eliminated.

Second, make sure you know the difference between your wallet address - which is also called public address and your private key. Both look the same, but you never want to share the private key with others. It unlocks full access to your wallet and anyone asking is likely trying to scam you. What you can share is usually called wallet address, or public address.

Lastly, if you are sending larger amounts, make sure to do a small test transaction and confirm the amount with the recipient before you send the rest.

And yes, we are sorry we have no better news for you. One day we’ll laugh about how stupid this all is, but for now we are stuck with it. But hope is on the horizon: There are blockchains, like Celo, that allow you to use email addresses or phone numbers instead, making it more like Paypal.

And next time, we’ll talk about the public ledger and why you may not want to send money via crypto if you care about privacy.

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

How to send money to friends and family with stablecoins

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

Today, we explain how to use crypto to send money to friends and family, regardless of where they are.

To be precise, we are going to talk about using stable coins. So before we dive in here, let’s clarify a few things as always!

First: Why bother? Because sending money across borders and between currencies can be hard to do, cost ridiculous amounts of fees, and is very slow. Crypto is instant and in many cases much cheaper.

Second, for those of you just tuning in, stable coins are closely following a government-backed currency in value. For example, 1 USD Coin should always be worth very close to 1 real US Dollar. Unlike Bitcoin, for example, this makes stable coins great for sending money to others because their value doesn’t change while you are transferring.

But, third, the word stable coin is a bit misleading. Not all stable coins are really stable, do you research before you choose one, and listen to episode 111 of this podcast.

Ok, let’s get to it then. Here is what’s required: You need a crypto account that allows you to buy that stable coin, and your friend needs one that allows them to receive and sell it, and both of you will likely have to go through some required checks while opening those.

Once you are sure your stable coin of choice is accepted by both wallets, it’s as simple as using Paypal: You exchange your own currency for the stable coin, and send it to the recipient, who can exchange it back into their local currency.

And there you have it. You just sent money, possibly across the entire planet, without paying your bank a single cent in fees. Neat, isn’t it?

And next time, we’ll talk about those annoying wallet addresses you still have to deal with.

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

What does KYC stand for and why is it so hard to create a crypto account?

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

If you’ve ever signed up for a crypto account with one of the big exchanges you will have noticed: The process was really hard – all kinds of questions asked, some you probably didn’t even know the answer to. Maybe you even gave up and said: “Too complicated, what do they want from me!”

We are here to tell you, those companies don’t actually WANT you to do this. They HAVE to make you do it. But why?

The requirements are different in different countries, but at the core of it is a requirement known as KYC - short for “know your customer”. Governments actually require that companies make sure to verify who you are.

There are a few reasons, but governments want to make it harder for bad players to use crypto for bad things. Because once your money is in an anonymous wallet, it’ll be hard for them to tie it back to someone. Money laundry, tax evasion, financing terrorism - you name it. There are some really bad things money can do, and of course governments try to make them as hard as possible, rightfully so.

But now you know: Because a few bad people do a lot of very bad things, you have to suffer through a long signup process.

And next episode, we show how stablecoins can help you send money to friends and family in even the most remote of places.

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

What are on-ramps and off-ramps?

Welcome to the cryptohunt jam where we spend one minute a day to explain crypto. In plain english.

You’ve likely heard the terms on-ramp and off-ramp in the crypto context before. And of course you figured out that we are not talking about actual ramps leading on and off freeways.

But those on- and off-ramps serve a similar purpose in the crypto world: They describe the process of buying into crypto and selling out of crypto for real-world money.

How does it work? Very simple.

To on-ramp, you use a provider, for example a crypto exchange like Coinbase or Binance, that will connect with your bank account or credit card. Then they charge you real-world money, such as Dollars or Euros, and give you crypto in exchange.

Off-ramp is exactly the opposite. Sell crypto for money, send the money back to your account.

And you can see why both are essential. Without people on-ramping into crypto, blockchains would have no value. And if you couldn’t sell again, there wouldn’t be many reasons to buy into it in the first place, given that paying for everyday purchases with crypto is still not really a thing at all.

And if you’ve ever gone through the process yourself, you will know that these providers ask for a ton of personal information: They don’t exactly make it easy to buy in and out. In the next episode we’ll talk about why: A little acronym called KYC is at fault.

Stay tuned until then! We are thrilled you are listening to this podcast!

Disclaimer: This podcast references our opinion and is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Do your own research and seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.