Citadel Dispatch

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EPISODE: 43
BLOCK: 708970
PRICE: 1501 sats per dollar
TOPICS: bitcoin for beginners, acquiring bitcoin, tradeoffs, dangers of KYC, holding your own keys, using your own node, transaction fees, utxo management and labeling, coinjoin, lightning, multisig, common mistakes and questions

@BitcoinQ_A: https://twitter.com/BitcoinQ_A

 I. Buying Bitcoin with KYC [5:19] 
 II. Buying Bitcoin with No-KYC [13:39] 
 III. Self-Custody your Bitcoin [26:16] 
 IV. Software Wallets [29:31] 
 V. Hardware Wallets [37:15] 
 VI. Full Nodes [45:56] 
 VII. Transaction Fees [59:06] 
 VIII. UTXO Management [1:07:31] 
 IX. CoinJoins [1:16:02] 
 X. Lightning Network Wallets [1:19:39] 
 XI. Multisig [1:28:02] 
 XII. Common Mistakes [1:44:12] 
 XIII. Common Questions [2:07:56]  
Full Transcript: https://chowcollection.medium.com/matt-odell-citadel-dispatch-e43-bitcoin-for-beginners-with-bitcoinq-a-f6e628b1ac5b

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[00:00:00] Unknown:

And crypto apples. Tim Cook sat down with our Andrew Ross Sorkin this morning at deal book, and Andrew asked him if he is looking at accepting Bitcoin on Apple Pay. Here's what he said.  

[00:00:13] Unknown:

It's something that we're looking at. It's not something we have,   immediate plans to do.   For   I would sort of characterize it as there are things that I wouldn't do,   like,   our our cash balance.   I wouldn't go invest it in crypto,   not because I wouldn't invest my own money in crypto, but because I don't think people buy an Apple stock   to get exposure to crypto.   And so if they wanna do that, they can they can,   you know, invest directly in crypto or through other means.   And so I wouldn't do that,   and I'm I'm not planning to, in the immediate future, to take crypto for our products   as a as a mean of tender.  

But there are other things that we're definitely looking at. Like what?   Like, I wouldn't wanna   have anything to announce today.  

[00:01:09] Unknown:

Well, let me ask you a different question because you you just said that you might not do it personally.  

[00:01:14] Unknown:

Do do you own crypto and any Bitcoin or Ethereum? Would you play around with this? I I do. Yeah. I think it's reasonable to own it as a as a part of a diversified portfolio, and I'm not giving anybody,   investment advice, by the way.  

[00:02:01] Unknown:

Happy Bitcoin Tuesday, freaks. It's your boy, Matt O'Dell, here for another   Citadel Dispatch,   the interactive live show about Bitcoin distributed systems privacy and open source software.   To our audio freaks listening in on the podcast feeds, that clip was Apple CEO, Tim Apple,   giving   financial advice,   to the whole world on TV.   Shout out to the ride or dies   who support this show. You keep it ad free, sponsor free. Just actionable Bitcoin discussion   that is supported by our audience. It's really powerful, and I do appreciate all the support I get.   And another shout out to the ride or dies that join us in the live chat.  

Today is a very special episode. I will get into that in a second, but, you guys are more important than ever for this episode.   If you wanna support the show, you can do it through podcasting 2.0 apps.   If you go to new podcast apps.com, you could pick an app there that supports podcasting 2.0.   Then you search CITLD dispatch, load it up with sats, and you can stream sats directly to my lightning wallet.   Or you can go to sitoldispatch.com   where I have a tipping.me link,   or you can donate,   via   my pay name is Odell. It's very easy to remember.   So with all that said,   we got a repeat guest here, Bitcoin q and a, good friend.  

And our plan is   to try and do an episode,   have a conversation here   where it's all encompassing   from start to finish,   new new bit Bitcoin are coming into the space, trying to do things, you know, the right way, trying to do things in a secure way,   and and just have it all in a single episode, have it all in a single conversation.   So as I was saying earlier, the rider dies that are in the live chat.   If you have questions, put your questions in. If   if you're not a beginner and you're listening in and you think we missed something,   feel free to put that in the live chat as well. And just a reminder, the live chat is accessible through the Twitter, Twitch,   and YouTube streams, and they all get   fed into, the main chat. So with all that said, I'd like to introduce Bitcoin q and a. How's it going, Bitcoin q and a?  



[00:04:14] Unknown:

Hey, Matt. It's going good. Thank you for having me back on. It's been a while, I think,   episode number 2, wasn't I, with with Ergo? So, yeah, looking forward to to getting back to it and, running through some some of the beginner focused, stuff that seems to be missing from some of the podcasts,   floating around. We tend tend to get jump into the weeds pretty quickly sometimes, don't we?  

[00:04:34] Unknown:

Yeah. I mean, I have a feeling we are gonna also be jumping into the weeds, but we're gonna try and do it in a nice constructive path into the weeds.  

[00:04:41] Unknown:

Yeah. And it just keep me, keep me in check on that one.  

[00:04:44] Unknown:

But, yeah, you are a dispatch OG. It has been it's been a minute, and,   we've we've both been through a lot.   I like to see like to think that we've been through it together, and,   yeah, just,   love that you're back joining us. You know, I hope it's, you know, not just the second time. It'll be many more times in the future.   So with all that said, freaks, we have a bit of a structure that we set up for this episode, which is unusual for dispatch, but I think it'll keep us,   more focused.   And so we're gonna start with   actually   getting Bitcoin for the first time.  

So do you wanna do you wanna start with that Bitcoin q and a?  

[00:05:25] Unknown:

Yeah. So, it's buying Bitcoin's   never been easier than it is today. There's, exchanges popping up all over the place. Every every man and his dog seems to be,   giving you the opportunity to to be able to buy Bitcoin from within their their ecosystem or their app.   The the kind of elephant in the room, unfortunately, and,   is is the,   know your customer or KYC as it's, it's lovingly called within the space.   KYC is a regulation that essentially any sort of, business, entity that has a banking relationship, has to abide by, that kind of dictates,   that they must collect certain pieces of information from anybody that they give a service to. Obviously,   in the context of Bitcoin, that's, an exchange that sells you Bitcoin for dollars, pounds, yen, whatever   your jurisdiction is.  



[00:06:19] Unknown:

So in practice, that looks like if you, like, go on to Cash App and you try and sign up to Cash App to buy Bitcoin,   they require you to upload your ID, your address.   I'm not sure. I some some services require, like, a selfie.   That's what we're talking about right here, which is this identification   information that's required when you sign up to one of these regulated services.  

[00:06:41] Unknown:

Right. And some of these some of these exchanges now are even doing, videos where they take, like, a 3 d scan of your face, which is kinda scary, really.  

[00:06:50] Unknown:

Just a little bit.  

[00:06:52] Unknown:

So with all that said, why why is that kind of, why is that sort of a bad thing that that people like Matt and myself sort of try and   warm people away from or or at least paint the dangers, clearly for everybody.   So when you supply this information to to be able to buy Bitcoin in a, you know, a really sort of easy and stress free way, you know, Cash App's a good example where you can just, in a couple of clicks, get some Bitcoin into a wallet that you control.   But, one of the main problems is that, you know, all of this information gets, rounded up into a a centralized database that's controlled by the entity that you're doing business with.   Unfortunately,   these entities or some of these entities, I won't tell everybody with the same brush,   don't have a great track record of, securing it, effectively.  

Talk about perfect timing. We we heard about, a hack with, Robinhood  

[00:07:47] Unknown:

yesterday, was it? It was 7,000,000 users.  

[00:07:51] Unknown:

7,000,000 users.   Information has been leaked.   Now there's varying degrees of the severity of the leak. Some of it's just email addresses.   Some of it's more personal information like banking details, etcetera.   You know, to name a few others, Equifax, Facebook, T Mobile, Clubhouse, LinkedIn,   Coinbase,   Ledger,   all of those companies,   require,   some form of,   of your personal information to to do business with them.   And they've all had hacks where, again, with varying degrees of severity that,   somebody that shouldn't have got their hands   on your information did so. And, you know, what's we're not talking small fry here. Some of these, hacks were in to the tune of millions and millions of of people.  

Now, you know, if that's something like Facebook and your, email address gets leaked, you know, it's not really the end of the world. It's you know, it might piss you off a little bit.   When you tie that into,   something like Bitcoin where,   hopefully, especially after you've listened to this podcast,   you're sort of securing your own wealth. That might be, in your house. That might be in a loved one's house or a combination of those.   If, if if, the wrong person was to get hold of, this information, you know, your selfie, your home address,   in the in the case of Coinbase, how much Bitcoin you've actually bought,   that is,   essentially painting a a very large cross on your front door that,   might make it inviting to to the wrong type of people to come and pay you a visit to, see if they can relieve you of of those sats.  

So that's one of the main,   you know,   reasons that that that I personally try and sort of make people aware that, yes, going on to Cash App or Coinbase or whatever is is you know, they make it really, really simple. They've got really nice polished UIs to to be able to go and,   get some get your hands on some stats within a within a couple of clicks.   It's,   you know, one of the big, big risks is that this information   is leaked on a regular basis.   And there are companies in space that, to to their credit,   have you know, they've never,   been fallen prey to one of these attacks.  

Well, unfortunately, they do seem to be coming,   more and more, frequent.   So, yeah,  

[00:10:14] Unknown:

the that's one of the main risks with KYC. So Yeah. I mean, I would add a couple of things here.   First of all, even if, you know, a company hasn't been compromised yet, we should basically operate under the assumption that they will be compromised in the future.   This information,   once it is taken, is often sold,   to other people as well.   It can be combined with other information   that was leaked from other databases. So for instance,   if, you know, you you have the Facebook leak, and the Facebook leak has your mailing address in it, and then you have the ledger leak, and your ledger leak has your email address in it, but the Facebook leak also had your email address in it, they can combine those 2,   leaks to get your full email address and your actual in person address.  

Second of all, we've seen,   we've seen physical attacks happen to people who were known Bitcoiners and how much Bitcoin they had.   Sometimes it was because of these leaks. It's hard to tell for sure. Sometimes it's because people just talk about their Bitcoin and how much Bitcoin they own, which you also shouldn't do.   3rd of all,   this information can obviously be used against you by your own government. It can also be used against you by foreign governments in the future. Obviously, it is painting a target as you are someone who owns Bitcoin and uses Bitcoin and exactly how much Bitcoin you have.   And then fourth of all, in the Coinbase leak specifically,   all of your withdrawal history was also leaked.  

So,   it can be used to track your future Bitcoin transactions,   based on that information, and we will go further in on   on Bitcoin privacy and trade offs with Bitcoin when using Bitcoin, trying to use it privately, how to go about that in later on in this episode. But these are just things to keep in mind.  

[00:12:07] Unknown:

Right. So, you know, all of which is is sort of incredibly scary.   And the other thing final thing I'll add to that before we sort of look onto the alternatives is that, you know,   something that I like to sort of keep in mind and remind people is, you know, being here for for number go up is great. You know? I'm not gonna sit here and say that, I don't like to to see us hit all time highs all the time.   But Bitcoin is also   created to be able to make the transactions that they don't want you to make.   Now   if you're sort of, tying all of your Bitcoin to your personal identity,   you're you're kind of, putting a a chink in your armor before you've even started that, you know, if you do wanna make those purchases that,   Bitcoin allows you to make,   due to its pseudonymity,   then   you're sort of starting 2 steps back by tying your your Bitcoin holdings to your personal identity,   which is where sort of buying from a no KYC source,   comes in so that you can have,   some or hopefully, you know, in a perfect situation, all of the Bitcoin that you own.  



[00:13:10] Unknown:

And so before we get there before we get there, just one more thing.   KYC,   these records are forever. Once once you do these records, you have to assume they're forever.   Is it best practice to delete an account?   At you know, if you're no longer using it, yes, but you should assume that actual database record hasn't been deleted,   and it might be used against you in the future.   So these are things to keep in mind.   Now let's move to okay. So if you're trying to avoid KYC, you don't wanna use one of these regulated services. What are your options?  

[00:13:45] Unknown:

Right. So the the sort of, 2 most common ones that kinda get banded around in terms of actually purchasing Bitcoin,   is BISK,   which is a   peer to peer,   decentralized exchange where you essentially it's a make or take a model where somebody will want to,   sell some Bitcoin, and they will go on to Bisk. And they'll say, you know, I wanna sell, x amount of Bitcoin   for this much,   you know, $500, whatever.   And then you, as a buyer, can go on to that sort of, pit to bear marketplace,   and look for these offers to see one that sort of fits your bill that, you know, was is within your price range and, you know, the amount that you want to buy.   You can go on completely anonymous anonymously,   and sort of take their their sell offer, so that you can buy that amount of Bitcoin from them.  

That's spelled b I s q, Bish. Yep. So it's an application that you just download onto your computer. Basically, you run it all locally.   You know, there's no personal information. You don't need to show any IDs to sign up. The only person, again, depending on the payment method that you use, you know, there's many, many payment methods.   Some are better from a privacy perspective,   than others.   But let's say, you know,   most people are gonna go on,   and if they want to sort of be able to take a wider range of offers from, you know, more people across the world, they're gonna wanna use the banking system,   which, you know, might ring some alarm bells to some of the people listening. But   what what also I say is what's worse is sharing your banking information with 1 person who is very likely to want very likely to be a privacy preserving individual because they, you know, they probably wouldn't be using Bisc otherwise,   versus,   the regulated entities that throw all of your information into a centralized honeypot that we've just, explained.  

So that's one way. You know, some of the more private options that are available on Bisk   are sort of, postal money orders, which are you know, I don't really know a great deal about, because it's a US centric thing.   But you've also got cash in the mail,   and then there's very other various other, options that are kind of   relevant to their sort of jurisdictions.   Another option as well is Huddl Huddl, which works   quite similarly to to the way I've just described with Bisk.   The the difference being is that Huddl Huddl is kind of a a centralized company   that hosts,   the sort of buy and sell,   locations for you. You know, it it it's a a website, huddlhuddl.com,   where you can go and sort of make offers or you can take offers, again, in the same fashion.  

So so there may be some, other alarm bells ringing where thinking where, well, what happens if I go on to Biscuit or to Huddl Huddle,   and I, you know, take this buy offer, and I send somebody some some, you know, US dollars?   What's to stop them from just never sending me the Bitcoin?   So both of these services,   work on what's called an escrow system,   where the seller will have to deposit the Bitcoin first into a a multisig wallet that is controlled by   by the buyer, the seller, and the sort of centralized entity.   So that, basically, they they,   can't sort of run off, once they've, you know, got hold of your dollars because they have to deposit the Bitcoin first.  

And you'll be notified to wait until you send any of the payments so that they've proved that they've sort of deposited,  

[00:17:15] Unknown:

the Bitcoin into that. There is still some risk there, but it's a reduced risk.  

[00:17:22] Unknown:

Yeah. Absolutely. You know, the   it's kind of I would say it's more of a a grief and attack than a you you're not really at risk of losing funds. You it's more of a, going through the arbitration process to prove that you've sent the dollar so that you get the bitcoin back in the end. So it's gonna be more of a headache more than a risk to to actually   lose any,   any cash, would you say?  

[00:17:44] Unknown:

Yeah. More or less.   So So some of it. Yeah. Continue.  

[00:17:51] Unknown:

So some of the other options,   if you,   you can buy from, Bitcoin ATMs.   There's a really great website called, coinatmradar.com,   where you can go on,   punch in your,   physical location. I would recommend doing so   using a VPN.   And it will tell you all of the Bitcoin ATMs that   are in your local area. The the general premise of these is that you, woke up, you can deposit some cash,   give it a   Bitcoin address, hopefully from a wallet that you control, which we're gonna come on to later.   And the Bitcoin will be deposited directly into that wallet that you control.   There are, again, as is always the case with Bitcoin, some caveats.  

Just because you're depositing cash doesn't immediately make Bitcoin ATM super private.   Depending on the   the brand of ATM machine that you use, some of them do still ask for ID,   but that is,   distinguished on the the website I've just said, which is coin ATM radar dot com. Right. Some ask for ID, and then  

[00:18:59] Unknown:

and then some ask for just a phone number. Some ask for both.  

[00:19:03] Unknown:

Yeah. Which and and, obviously, the the just the ones that just ask for the phone number are the better ones because you can spoof that with services like textverify.com,   where you can just get kind of a burner number,   to satisfy the ATM's,   you know, phone number requirements. But, obviously, that's not tied to to your personal identity.  

[00:19:24] Unknown:

And then Before we continue before we continue, since we're still, like, early in the episode and I should have mentioned in the beginning,   Bitcoin q and a has,   my favorite guides in the space. So if you wanna look up something specifically   or if you prefer reading,   if you go to bitcoiner.guide,   he has all of his guides listed there. So just keep that in mind. Okay. Continue.  

[00:19:47] Unknown:

Yeah. Pretty much everything that we're talking about, I've got some,   some form of information on it. Yeah, moving on to other no COIC opportunities.   So we've covered, peer to basic peer to peer exchanges.   We've covered ATMs.   The the next sort of option is to, is to earn it,   which might sound a bit outlandish to some people that are new and entering the space. But also we'll say is that,   everybody has some form of a unique skill,   and there's always gonna be somebody who needs   what you can offer them. It's just about sort of, trying to build up a a bit of a reputation, whether that's in your local area or online,   so that you can,   you know, sell your time or your skills and knowledge,   and receive SATs   in in, in repayment for them.  

And the other option, again, probably not as much of a beginner   option,   as I would like it to be, but the other option is to mine it.   Although, home mining does seem to be, going through somewhat of a renaissance, which is really, really great to see.   So the the general premise of that is that you can,   buy a Bitcoin miner. You can plug that into your   outlet at home, plug in an ethernet port,   connect up to to a mining pool, and stream yourself some,   secret sats or some private no KYC sats,   directly again into your wallet that you control.   There there there's been, you know, a a fair bit of foot banded around that home mining is is kind of   too difficult or it's too expensive.  

The the thing I would say is that, yeah, it's very much dependent on your electricity   prices. But, again, you know, this this show is fairly US centric, and there's a lot a lot of places in the US where, you know and if if you're   earning   anywhere less than you know, Neil's in the chat there. Probably correct me on this, but I think you're a profitable mind at the moment. Anywhere   below 30 sats 30 sats.  

[00:21:46] Unknown:

Yeah. So I mean, with with all of these techniques,   you might be spending a little bit more money than you would be,   if you went through one of these regulated services.   You're   the way I justify it is, I mean, you're you're paying a little bit of a premium for privacy,   and you're paying that for privacy going forward too. So it it keeps paying dividends.   With mining specifically, mining home mining is a fantastic way,   in my opinion, of   accumulating KYC free sets.   It's really nice because once you have it plugged in, it's just constantly going. You don't even have to really think about it. It's just constantly   bringing in more sats.  

We already have 2 whole mining,   Citadel dispatches. So if you go back if you go to sidildispatch.com   or if you go through the podcast feed or if you go to bitcoin tv.com and our playlist over there, you can find those episodes, and we're about to have a third one too.   I think November 30th, there's gonna be a 3rd home mining episode. So if that's something that interests you, you should go check those out,   starting with the first one, because we literally spent, like, 3 hours on all the different trade offs there.  

[00:22:55] Unknown:

Yeah. Just to come back on on something that you said about,   generally speaking, you're absolutely right that you're gonna pay   a little bit more for, no KYC SATs, you know, especially if you go to the peer to peer exchanges.   But I just I like to try and reframe it, and, you know, it's not a a no KYC premium.   The the,   price that you see on a KYC exchange, I like to call it the,   the discount that you get given,   for giving up your personal information and and putting yourself,   a little bit more at risk than versus, getting some stats that are not tied to your identity. So I think that's a I like that for me. Framing. Yeah. The real price is the private way, and then Exactly. You get a discount if you sacrifice your privacy.  

[00:23:42] Unknown:

And then one method that you didn't mention, which is   probably the most,   accessible   to New Coiners,   is if you have a friend or a couple friends that are interested in Bitcoin and they've been in Bitcoin for a while,   obviously, if you can if you can pay them cash for some of their Bitcoin,   that is the most private.   I I wouldn't say the most private, but it's definitely the most accessible private way,   for a new coiner.   And if they if they don't wanna sell you any, they might know someone who wants to sell some. So,   that's always something to keep in mind. Cash   in person is,   extremely gives you very good privacy guarantees, period.  

What else? Also, like, if you know,   to the to the big corners out there listening to this, show,   you know, guide your New Corner friends   in through   that kind of method. Right? And whether or not you wanna actually explicitly sell it to them, that's one thing. But, you know, if you if you go out to dinner, have them pay for dinner with their with their cash or their credit card, and then pay them back in Bitcoin, or   give them, you know, birthday gifts in Bitcoin. And, like, get them started   in a peer to peer fashion rather than just throwing them to the wolves and sending them to a regulated exchange.  

[00:25:05] Unknown:

Yeah. There's, a couple of people in the chat that have just, rightfully shouted out, Azteco Vouchers as well,   which is essentially,   you'll get sort of stores,   that sort of sign up to become a an Azteco,   sort of vendor. And you can go in, hand over some cash, and you'll get sort of a voucher where you can go and claim the the equivalent amount of sats from that, again, directly into a wallet that you control.   The the the other caveat the sorry. The only caveat with Azteco is that the   the sort of, KYC responsibility,   if any, is put onto the specific vendor.  

So it won't just be you know, don't just presume that because there's an Azteco,   vendor near you, that it won't be no KYC.   Each one is sort of, left to kind of   come up with their own interpretation of whether they need to do it or not, basically.  

[00:25:57] Unknown:

And you have that major chain in u in the UK that's an Azteco vendor. Right? What's the name of that?  

[00:26:02] Unknown:

It was Poundland, but, they it stopped a couple of months ago, and it's showing no signs of coming back, unfortunately.  

[00:26:08] Unknown:

Okay. So it was they realized what was going on, and they're like, ah, we can't. Too much liability.  

[00:26:13] Unknown:

Which which was a shame because they they have a store in literally every town. There was 100 of them, and it was massive for the UK. But, yeah, unfortunately, to no more. Okay. Well, that's a shame. If you wanna  

[00:26:24] Unknown:

read more about   the dangers of KYC, you can go to Bitcoin q and a's website, no k y c only dot com.   However you decide to proceed with obtaining Bitcoin and accumulating Bitcoin,   the next step is   trying to secure it   secure it well, and secure it in a way that you don't have to trust a third party,   who can seize your funds.   So how should   how should Bitcoiners how should Newcoiners   go about that Bitcoin q and a?   What are their options?  

[00:26:57] Unknown:

The the the natural,   first step for most people, unfortunately, like we just said, is is,   a a centralized exchange, again, like Coinbase, Cash App, or someone something like that, where you will go on deposit dollars or your local currency.   They will, sort of, credit your account with, you know, the equivalent amount of stats.   What you have there is, an IOU,   where you've got an account with them, where they say that you've got this much Bitcoin.   Essentially, what you actually have in real terms is,   well, it's an IOU, and you don't actually hold any Bitcoin.   The the sort of,   very essence of Bitcoin is the, the you know, that goes to say, not your keys, not your coins, which is banded around a hell of a lot, and for good reason. And it essentially means that if you're not holding the keys for your Bitcoin,   you don't actually have any Bitcoin.  

So you've bought someone in exchange.   The the next step would be to get yourself,   a a mobile wallet   where you can, generate the keys,   within that wallet,   so that your you and only you are in control of, any of the Bitcoin that you send to that wallet.  

[00:28:07] Unknown:

So before we before we move on and I'm sorry that I keep cutting you off. I hope I hope it's, fine with you.   Of course. Before we move on,   so so the risk is if you're holding it if if you're holding it in one of these custodial wallets, which is what the exchanges default to,   and there's some other services that also are custodial wallets,   basically, the telltale sign of that is the way you access it is through a username and password.   You don't have any backup yourself.   What happens there is there's a high likelihood that your account could get frozen. We've seen that with PayPal in the past with Fiat, with just US dollars where PayPal will freeze your account and you're not able to get your money.   It could be stolen if the exchange gets compromised or the custodial wallet gets compromised.  

And, obviously, you're trusting your privacy completely with the custodian because they know all of your transactions   and your current balances.   So it's not ideal,   and you want to learn how to hold Bitcoin yourself because   one of the revolutionary things about Bitcoin is that you can hold it yourself in a way that   someone has to physically compromise you,   to to take your Bitcoin.   So   I guess you're about to start with mobile wallets. I think mobile wallets are the most accessible way getting a a wallet on your phone, basically,   to hold your Bitcoin for you. Right?  



[00:29:36] Unknown:

Yeah. Just before I get down to the the mobile wallet, it it comes back to the the point I made earlier about censorship resistant or being able to make the payments that,   you know, you want to make, not that they give you permission to to make.   If you've got to,   ask for permission from an exchange to be able to send Bitcoin to your desired destination,   you know, you're you're asking for permission, and, you know, that's not why we're here. We wanna be able to spend our money to whoever we want, whenever we want. So   first step and the easiest step is to get a phone wallet. You know, they're free. They're easy to access. You know, you can   download from any popular app store, or quite a lot of them offer   direct downloads so that you can,   download from the the tick you know, the chosen team's   website or or GitHub.  

The a lot of people tend to rush in and try and buy,   you know, the next best hardware wallet straight away when they've just bought sort of $100 of Bitcoin to dip their toes in a little bit.   Well, if you, you know, if you're just dipping your toes in to see if this thing's, working for you, then it doesn't make any sense to, you know, go out and buy a hardware wallet. And this is coming for somebody who works for a hardware wallet company.   It doesn't make any sense to go out, rush out, and buy a a couple $100 on a hardware wallet when you own less than that in Bitcoin. So that's why no problem. Perfectly good phone that you carry around with you. It's very easy to spend and receive from.  

[00:31:03] Unknown:

But the important thing here is that you use a reputable   mobile wallet. There's a lot of scammy mobile wallets. Don't just open up the app store and search for Bitcoin Wallet. You will get a lot of bad options there.  

[00:31:15] Unknown:

Yeah. The the unfortunately, the the top ten,   results for for that sort of search in most of the app stores are quite abysmal.   My personal recommendations would be samurai wallet if you're an Android user,   or blue wallet or if you're an iOS user.   Moonwallets  

[00:31:32] Unknown:

is also another one that I know you're, pretty bullish on that as well. Yeah. Both blue wallet and Moon Wallet, that's with 2 u's, m u u n, are available on both Android and iOS.   They're   they're very easy to use for beginners.   I I would say they're not very intimidating,   So don't be intimidated. You should download 1. Just try it.  

[00:31:57] Unknown:

So the the the kind of general premise of these, and, unfortunately, I mentioned Moonwalder there, it's gonna,   it's gonna book the trend of what I'm about to say. But the general premise is you'll download the app from your chosen location.   The the app when you set up a new wallet, the app will show you a list of 12 or 24 words, which is your master secret,   you know, which is the the master backup to your to your Bitcoin wallet. Anybody that gets their hands on that,   be that physically or digitally,   is gonna be able to take all of your funds.  

So make sure that you write that down, and secure it somewhere,   safe.  

[00:32:34] Unknown:

And then your fees so Moon Wallet has a different backup method.   It'll prompt you and explain how to back up that, but we will focus on this standard, which is something we call seed words, which is they're basically these words.   It's a phrase,   and the wallet generates it for you, and you need to keep them secret. You absolutely need to keep them secret. So you don't wanna put them on an Internet connected device. You put them on an you don't wanna, like, save them in your Icloud notes folder. You don't wanna take a screenshot and upload it to Icloud.   What you wanna do is, at the bare minimum, you wanna write it down on a piece of paper, double check that you wrote it down correctly,   store it somewhere securely because if someone gets access to it, they have access to your funds. But as long as you have those words,   your phone you could drop your phone in the toilet. It could fall, you know, it could fall and crack and break or just completely just   you know, some phones just, like, stop working sometimes.  

As long as you have those seed words, you can reinstall the app on a new device and just put in those words, put in that phrase words,   and you will have access to your funds.  

[00:33:42] Unknown:

Yeah. And the beauty of that is, like you said, most of the, you know, 99% of the wallets,   in the space all all sort of work to that same standard. So, you know, you you wouldn't necessarily have to even   download the exact same mobile wallet as long as the mobile wallet that you choose,   abides by the rules, which, again, most of them do, then you can sort of, put that seed phrase into into any other wallet.   And there's a quick question in the chat, which I think is probably good to touch on before we move on to hardware wallets. And,   somebody asked, how much would you need to own to get a hardware wallet?  

Now, obviously, I'm not gonna be able to answer that for the for everybody that that's, watching. You know, it's quite an individual question.   Also I'd say is, you know,   if it's   your the only mobile wallet you've got and it's on your daily phone, I would use the equivalent of how much cash would you physical cash would you carry around with you.   You know, and what's your limit at which it's gonna start   affecting your life if you used to lose that balance?  

[00:34:43] Unknown:

The quick caveat The mobile wallet the mobile wallet should be, like, almost considered   is is like your spending wallet, what you would have Right.   In in in your back pocket. But,   going further when we go into more methods of storing your Bitcoin, that would be more like a savings account.   Except   I you were about to say a caveat.   I mean, I have my own caveat. I would say,   I think,   especially if you're using a reputable one,   I think people can be feel a little bit more comfortable than the kind of amount of cash that they would carry in their pocket.   I know, like, I wouldn't feel more comfortable I wouldn't feel that comfortable carrying more than, like, $400 in my pocket.  

But, like, a mobile wallet, especially if it's your first wallet, you're just getting started, you're getting comfortable, you have your seed words backed up,   your phone's up to date.   You know, we don't see   hacks are theoretically possible.   Obviously, phones get compromised all the time.   But I I would probably if I had to pick a number, I like being, like, the 5,000 to $10,000   range.   Like, that's where you start having to really   consider securing it more.   And you should also operate under the assumption because Bitcoin tends   to go up fast.  

You should be prepared ahead of time because it could be,   you know, it could be a $1,000 in there, and then in 6 months, it could be worth $8,000.  

[00:36:08] Unknown:

Yeah. The the other thing I would say as well is that this   almost everybody   has got, a spare phone lying around at at their house that, you know, you could use that as your sort of dedicated Bitcoin phone,   where you could be, slightly more comfortable storing, you know, maybe larger amounts   relative to the individual.   And then you could kind of, decant off into your sort of daily phone what you might wanna spend on a day to day basis. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that approach as well if you didn't wanna,   shell out quickly for for   for a hardware wallet, which we can we can come on to now.  



[00:36:46] Unknown:

So hardware wallet is But before we get to hardware wallets, you also have   there's also software wallets on on the computer that you can have.   Right? So you have mobile wallets, you have software wallets on your computer, which, like, you install an app on your computer.   I I mean, I would say,   like, unless you're an advanced user and you're you have, like, a dedicated computer and this episode isn't for advanced users,   they should probably shy away from that in the beginning. I I think the mobile security model is a stronger security model as, you know, as long as you're not worried about, like, the NSA or something,   or, like, the Chinese intelligence services   or the Israeli intelligence services.  



[00:37:28] Unknown:

Most most of the population,   are not great at securing their their computer.   Most people's computers are, unless you're sort of,   a bit of a hackamond. This this, you know, a a far more vulnerable device than your mobile phone is,   which is why, like you said, you know, I completely agree that I don't recommend them, especially for larger amounts.   And I tend to sort of skip straight to the hardware wallet after the mobile wallet stage.   So   hardware wallets,   are essentially a dedicated,   physical device,   designed to manage the the keys that control your Bitcoin.   So with them being a a physical,   dedicated device, you know, their one purpose is to secure your Bitcoin, whereas your phone has you know, it's it's essentially a computer in your pocket.  

With all of that extra functionality that that your phone has compared to a hardware wallet,   increases the theoretical,   attack factors   where hackers or   the NSA, whoever   can,   sort of try and attempt to get their hands on your Bitcoin.   So these devices are very focused.   They're focused at securing your Bitcoin from physical attack,   and also, from   digital attack, I. E, you know, somebody stealing your keys over the Internet if you were to connect one of these devices to your   very likely highly insecure computer.   So they a lot of them most of the the good ones,   work,   you know, their their primary   way of of sort of keeping things secure is that they operate with, what's known as an air gap, where they they can operate without being connected physically   to to any other device,   because,   it's that physical   connection that sometimes can introduce,   intro   extra   threat factors.  



[00:39:24] Unknown:

So the the idea, just to distill it here, like, the idea of a hardware wallet is that you have a   a device that's built   to securely hold your Bitcoin.   Well, technically, it's holding the keys to your Bitcoin.   But for all intents and purposes, it's it's you can think of it as holding your Bitcoin, and and it interacts with either your computer or your phone in a way that those keys   all the keys are what protect your Bitcoin, gives you access to Bitcoin, and you don't want someone else to have access to those keys. It keeps those keys   off that computer or off that phone. So it stays on the device,   and that device is never connected to the Internet. So   the the basic concept behind securing   your stash with a hardware wallet is that,   for someone to compromise you, they need to physically have access to you and the device, or if they can compromise the device, just the device. But they, like, have to come into your home or come into your office and get that device rather than hacking you through the Internet.  



[00:40:30] Unknown:

Right. And and, you know, the even,   if a   a sort of generic attacker was to,   gain physical access to to most of these devices,   they're still gonna need, a fair bit of time and a hell of a lot of equipment   to be able to,   you know, crack the   protections on the device to be able to access the keys,   and to be able to steal your Bitcoin. So it's not just a case of   protecting you from a malware infested computer.   If somebody was to break in, there's there's still PIM protection on the device.   And so it's not just a case of you lose the device, and you lose that because of your Bitcoin. Again, the the premise that Matt spoke about before about writing down your seed words,   is exactly the same with the hardware wallet.  

The differences here is that,   the the when you sort of, generate those c those 24 or 12 words,   it's done in an offline environment   that's, never been connected to the Internet. So that's, again, it just removes   that extra,   threat vector where,   you're not connected to any sort of, Internet connected devices.   So it's just that extra layer,   or wrapper of security.  

[00:41:44] Unknown:

Perfect.   Should we   what is your favorite hardware wallet?  

[00:41:55] Unknown:

I saw that. We're coming a mile off.   So full disclosure,   I work for a   hardware wallet manufacturer called Foundation Devices.   And obvious biases aside, I genuinely believe that we make the,   the best option for a beginner entering the space.   It's incredibly secure, but also very easy to operate. So I should have named the device. It's called Passport.   And another great device is the call card,   which is probably looks a little bit scarier to to the newcomer, I would say,   but has some extra features,   that might   be more beneficial for, more advanced users that they could sort of leverage. So those would be my 2 favorites.  



[00:42:39] Unknown:

Yeah. I would say my favorite is,   cold card.   I've used multiple versions of cold cards. I highly recommend them.   And then   if   we're not really gonna go into shit coins here, but if you   absolutely   need to gamble on   other coins in the space rather than just Bitcoin.   Both foundation and cold card are Bitcoin only.   I mean so I I would say either use a ledger or a Trezor   hardware wallet if if you want shitcoin support.   But even in that situation, you probably should go with a Bitcoin only hardware wallet for your Bitcoin and then use the other ones for your shitcoins.   And just like the mobile wallets, there are lots of really bad hardware wallets out there.  

So don't just Google   best hardware wallet because a lot of influencers are paid, to   promote them. So you'll see YouTube videos with 500,000   views saying to use a horrible hardware wallet. So   consider that.  

[00:43:48] Unknown:

Yeah. What I would say, just to back that up again, is that, you know, likelihood is if you're listening to this that you're at least aware,   of,   you know, Bitcoin, Twitter and the the people that are,   around and popular on there.   Most of those people have been around for a good number of years, and they've probably tried all of these devices. So look to what most most of that most of those people are using or at least recommended,   when you're sort of doing your own research to see which device is gonna be best for you.  

[00:44:19] Unknown:

Perfect.   When they're using their hardware wallet, they need to use it with a   with software. They need to use it with an app.   So what are your recommendations   for which apps they should use with their hardware wallet?  

[00:44:37] Unknown:

The best 2 for me, if you want to stay on desktop, which generally gives you sort of a little bit more extra functionality,   would be, number 1, be Spiral Wallet, hands down my favorite.   Or if you like a little bit of a sort of, easier to to operate interface with kind of less,   advanced features,   Spectre Desktop is also a great one.  

[00:45:01] Unknown:

Two great recommendations.   Spectre used to be my favorite. Now Sparrow is my favorite.  

[00:45:07] Unknown:

Yep.   Which   might, be a good segue for what we've got coming up next. Well, before we get there,  

[00:45:14] Unknown:

you can also use   you can also use both the cold card and the foundation passport with BlueWallet on mobile. So if you are going through the steps and you got comfortable with BlueWallet already,   because you started with the mobile wallet,   you can then use BlueWallet with both of those hardware wallets, which is nice. Especially, I mean, I I think some people listening to this probably don't have a computer that's   so a lot of people don't have computers. They just have the computer in their pocket.  

[00:45:44] Unknown:

Yeah. We're you know, we're we're heading towards a mobile first world, aren't we, if not if we're not already there. And BlueWallet does,   offer a great interface,   especially,   with with the with the passport, with the QR interfaces,   very basic and very easy to to wrap your head around as a beginner.  

[00:46:00] Unknown:

Awesome. Okay. So you wanna go to the next topic?  

[00:46:04] Unknown:

You said there's Yeah. Let's let's hit nodes. Yeah. So I I talked about,   Spector Desktop.   One of the great features about Spector Desktop is it actually has a built in Bitcoin node.   So,   the the next step along your journey,   hopefully, will be to look to run your own Bitcoin node.   A Bitcoin node is you can look at it as your,   sort of interface   into your into the Bitcoin world.   It's gonna be that next step along the sovereignty journey so that you can,   again, one of the the buzz phrases that you're in the space is verify your own transactions.   So when you receive,   any Bitcoin transaction,   that will be, being passed to you via,   a whole network of nodes,   and the wallet that you choose to use will be connected to a node. Now that node could be   a centralized node or operated by an exchange. It could be,   a node that you don't know who exists, that might actually be a chain surveillance company, or hopefully, it could be your own node that you can run,   in your house relatively cheaply.  

Now the benefits of of running your own node, like I said, is you can verify your own transactions   so that you can be sure,   when somebody's sending you a transaction,   that the transaction abides by,   the this sort of rule set,   that the the network that you've chosen to join,   that we all agree on.   To put that a little bit simple   a little bit simpler is that you can, be sure that sort of nobody's trying to cheat you and send you some fake Bitcoin or a transaction that's not valid.   So that, you know, you might be selling goods or services, and they might be paying you in Bitcoin for that.   And and if you weren't verifying your own transactions, they might be able to  

[00:47:52] Unknown:

send you, the I like to frame it is it's using your own node to to interact with the Bitcoin network, you have to use a node. And if you don't use your own node,   you don't have counterfeit detection   is is, like, kind of how I like to view it. Someone can kind of trick you,   into into thinking you have Bitcoin when you don't have Bitcoin. So you wanna use your own node for that purpose,   and then second of all, which I think is almost more tangible to people, because to be honest,   we haven't seen that's more of a theoretical attack, and we haven't really seen it play out.   It could still play out in the future. You should assume it it will, so you wanna use your own node for counterfeit detection.  

But second of all, it also   if you don't use your own node,   you're trusting your privacy with whoever's node you're using.   So you wanna use your own node so that you don't have to trust   a potentially   potentially a stranger or a company   with that that private transaction information and balance information?  

[00:48:53] Unknown:

Yeah. It's about removing trust, essentially.   And and by running your own node, you're you're you're putting the trust in the hardware and or the the software that you are choosing to run,   not the one that's kind of being given to you if you're operating with an exchange or or a centralized node runner.   So there's,   a massive awash of choice,   with varying degrees of   technical ability.   The the easiest way to get running with your own node   is to download a piece of software called Bitcoin Core.   This is kind of the the sort of, de facto software   built by the the Bitcoin Core developers,   that is essentially a piece of software that you can, in a couple of clicks,   download onto your laptop or desktop.  

And it will start to, download the your own copy of the blockchain   so that you can,   transact with the built in wallet   to just to get started and verify your own transaction that way. That's absolutely the easiest way. And as I touched on earlier, Spector desktop actually has,   essentially that built in as well, just packaged in a slightly different way for you.   So they're they're absolutely free.   And within a couple of clicks, you'll be on the way to downloading your own copy of the blockchain and having your own node setup.   The problem with a setup like that is that,   you I can't really,   generally speaking, connect any mobile wallets to it. So if you were to want to transact when you're out and about and you run Bitcoin Core on your laptop,   and you wanted to send the transaction,   the likelihood is you're not gonna have your laptop with you. So you you, you know, you won't be able to to spend as easily as some of the the node options that we're gonna come at come on to,   in a second. I'll just pause to see if Matt's got anything to add there.  



[00:50:42] Unknown:

Yeah. So, I mean, if you're using Bitcoin Core or if you're using the built in Bitcoin Core inspector,   yeah. Correct. You you can't the main negative is you can't use it with a mobile wallet. The, also, the other negative is,   your transaction and balance info will be on your computer. So if it's   a computer you use for work or a computer you use   to play games or look at porn or something like that, your social media habit,   it might be easily compromised and that becomes a it becomes, mostly, it becomes a privacy issue,   because all your transaction history will be there and all of your balance history will be there.  

But, also, you can't use with mobile wallets, which is a key component as well.  

[00:51:30] Unknown:

Yeah. So so the next best option,   and, unfortunately, the most expensive option is what's known as a plug and play node.   So this is where, you'll buy, essentially a small box from, one of the various teams.   To name a few, we've got, Ronin Dojo.   We've got Raspberry Blitz. We've got Start9,   Umbrell.   There's loads of different companies or or Mino   Mino. Mino. Yeah. There's loads popping up,   all with different feature sets. But, essentially, they sell you a box,   that you plug in at home. You plug it into your router. You plug it into the power outlet.   And then within a couple of clicks, you're off, and running again to to get your own copy of the blockchain and have your note your own note up and running. And before we move on,  

[00:52:17] Unknown:

civil dispatch,   civil dispatch 26.   I had all the major node teams on for a conversation   on   their node projects.   So if you're interested in having one of these purpose built boxes or you a lot of the those projects that were just named allow you to actually buy the hardware separately   and then install their software on it,   consider listening to that till dispatch.  

[00:52:46] Unknown:

Right. So and the the the kind of final option is the deep DIY approach like Matt just touched on where all of the projects that we just said,   will have a a parts list. You can go away and buy,   spend a couple $100 buying a hard drive and a single board computer and a couple of other cables,   and build your own node and put your own software well, put the software that these teams provide   onto that hardware.   The the end result is that you get,   the same node with all the same features.   Obviously, the caveat is that you've gotta go through the process of buying the hardware yourself,   flashing the software,   onto a micro SD card,   which might cause you some, you know, if you're a less technical user, you're less comfortable with taking that approach.  



[00:53:31] Unknown:

That's why but it seems to offer the the plug and play note. It does sound more intimidating than it actually is. And I would Absolutely.   So, like, I encourage new users to get their feet wet.   Also, just on the   just to go back a little bit about Bitcoin Core, I mean, if you're using you can use you can also use Bitcoin Core if you're running Bitcoin Core on the same computer you're running Specter on or Sparrow, they both can connect to it.   If you do that process, you really should be using it on a dedicated computer.   I know I, like, kind of touched on that earlier when I said, you know, if you're using it for playing games or social media,   it could get compromised   easier because you're using it for all these other general purposes. You're downloading software on it that maybe you haven't verified you definitely haven't verified and have no idea what's really running there.  

So if you are gonna go that approach,   you should have a dedicated device.   You should consider a dedicated computer or dedicated phone that you are using with it.   And,   yeah. In general, dedicated devices   are are gonna be more secure and more private. You're   when we when we talk about security in Bitcoin land where   you don't   don't let perfect be the enemy of good. Don't get overwhelmed because your setup's not perfect.   But at the same time, you're just trying to   reduce your threats so that you're not the lowest hanging fruit. Most of the time when we see these hacks, it's targeted at at the people that are most vulnerable.  

[00:55:02] Unknown:

Yeah. And the just to go back to the DIY approach that I was outlining,   all of these, different projects that we've spoken about have got really, really good documentation   and and quite vibrant, communities as well,   on Twitter, Telegram,   or their own dedicated forum.   So don't be afraid to, you know, go and have a browse through the documentation. Like Matt said, it's not actually as scary as I might I made it sound.   And also, you know, go and ask some questions in the in the Telegram chat or in the Slack or whatever, you know,   chat room that the the the project has got.  

You'll probably find or you'll definitely find that   all of these the people that are in these communities are really welcoming. They they've definitely been in your position before now.   And, you know, they they found,   the thought of this really scary a couple of years ago, and, you know, they might now they might be running several DIY nodes. So they'll be they'll be off put by it.  

[00:55:57] Unknown:

100%.   I will echo that sentiment. I would just add a slight caveat   that there are scammers in these Telegram groups and these chat rooms.   They will often try and impersonate   people that are involved with the project or other notable figures to try and get you to feel comfortable. Never never give anybody,   your seed words, those secret backup words. Never give them their secret backup words,   and, you know, always be skeptical if someone in one of those groups tries to DM you separately and tries to go into a private chat. You know? Sometimes it it is legit, but you need to be extra cautious in that in that type of situation.  

[00:56:37] Unknown:

Yeah. And and and if somebody does, don't be afraid to ask in in the sort of main room. You know, tag the person who you think might DM'd you and said, is that is this you, DM me? Exactly. But always, just act on the the on on the side of caution,   and and keep that sort of adversarial mindset to think, you know, why is this person reaching out to me completely out of the blue after I just asked my first question entering the room.  

[00:57:00] Unknown:

A 100%.   So all those node projects   support something called Electrum server,   and Electrum server is a standard.   It's it's a standard way to interact with your own node.   You can use those Electrum server details, and then you can put them into Sparrow.   You can put them into   many of the mobile wallets,   that we mentioned earlier. You can put them into BlueWallet.   With Samurais, specifically,   they don't use Electrum server. They use something called, Dojo.   And with that, pairing is as simple as there's a QR code, and you just scan the QR code with your Samurais wallet on your phone, and it'll pair up with your node.  

[00:57:48] Unknown:

Yeah. The good thing is with Dojo as well is it's,   implemented in the vast majority of the the node packages now. There's there's more that have Dojo that than don't, which is, really great to see.   Indeed.   Should we hit on the coin join?  

[00:58:04] Unknown:

Okay. So   I just want you know, we're we're an hour in.   If you're a newcomer, you just listened to this hour and you're intimidated as fuck.   Don't be intimidated. You know? Start with step 1 where we talked about acquiring your Bitcoin.   Then, you know, learn how to hold your own keys and slowly move through the process. Don't, you know, freak yourself out that, you know, now now I gotta run a node too.   Like, I'm now I'm really intimidated. You know, step by step, get your feet wet, get comfortable, send transactions,   receive transactions,   back up your wallet, restore your wallet. Just get comfortable with it. Get used to it. Don't it's not something to be scared of. It's something that you learn by doing.  



[00:58:47] Unknown:

Yeah. I, I put out a tweet a couple of weeks ago actually that kind of echoes that that, you know, if sending a transaction,   makes you feel a little bit uneasy, then you haven't sent enough transactions.   You can see on screen there that the mempool is, you know, it's a little bit busier than what it was, but a couple of sats per byte is gonna get your transaction confirmed very quickly, and that's gonna cost you, you know, less than a dollar to send a transaction. So We don't have we don't have that on the list. But before we move on to CoinJoin on chain privacy  

[00:59:17] Unknown:

UTXO   management, we should probably   how does how does a newcomer   choose what fee to pay? They open up their wallet. They go to send a transaction.   What like, how do Bitcoin transaction fees work? I feel like that is something we tend to gloss over. Yeah. We overlooked that one.  

[00:59:37] Unknown:

Well, fortunately, most of the the good mobile wallets, especially the ones that we've, mentioned,   on tonight's stream,   will give you a couple of options,   where you can,   you know, they'll either have, you know, 3 options, sort of low priority, medium priority, and high priority, like, again, like we can see on screen. Or there might be a slider where you can manually adjust the fee.   And, essentially, the the higher that the fee you pay, the more likely   that,   your transaction is gonna be, confirmed or processed quicker.   Again, a caveat with that one, we've got a lot of caveats tonight, is that,   the, some of the estimation the fee estimations,   these wallets all use different sort of algorithms as to how they,   calculate or estimate   the fee that would be required to get you confirmed in the,   displayed priority.  

So Matt's got on screen here a really great, website called mempooldot space,   which can it shows you, again, the the priority,   fee selections,   or what it would advise,   based on, correct me if I'm wrong here, Matt, but based on what's currently in the mempool,   as well as sort of historical data as well. So it's kind of a a a always a really good sort of accurate look at, you know, if you wanna get, your transaction processed within the next block.   Right now, it would take an estimate of 13 sats per byte.   But, again, there's a little caveat here that there's still   transactions with much lower   transaction fees   than 13 sats per byte that will also get   get confirmed. So it's kind of   it's not an exact science, I will say that. Right. But   multiple sources is is always a good one if you wanna try and,   get it sort of nailed.  



[01:01:26] Unknown:

So, I mean, Bitcoin is run by a company.   Bitcoin   is a   distributed network.   And so as a result,   how Bitcoin transactions work   is   we have this chain of transactions,   and the transactions are within blocks. We call them blocks.   Roughly every 10 minutes, there'll be a new Bitcoin block, and it will have finalized transactions   included in that block.   Until you get into a block,   you sit in a waiting list. That waiting list   is we call that the mempool. We call it a mempool. Technically, every node has their own mempool,   but if your Internet connection is solid,   in most   situations, those mempools should all look the same. So when you go to mempool.space,   you're looking at their mempool.  

That will look very similar to if you looked at the same thing on your own node, which a lot of these node projects, by the way, allow you to run mempool dot space natively with your own node.   So the   basically, you have this, like, free market that's constantly going on where you're decide where people are choosing which fee they're willing to spend,   and miners are going to   usually   include you in a block based on your order in that waiting list, based on how much you wanna spend.   So if it's a transaction   between someone you trust,   and you're willing to wait a longer period of time, you can pay a lower fee. If you're sending just to yourself, you can pay the lowest fee. We call it that's one sat per byte, is the lowest fee because you're just sending it to yourself.  

You know, if if in some crazy situation where a one SAP provider never gets confirmed ever, which we've never been through, you can always resend that transaction.   So you're gonna want to,   choose your transaction fee based on the urgency you want that transaction finalized   on the network,   and most good wallets will basically give you a low, medium, and high,   you know,   this   low being I can wait. Medium being, like, I'm in the middle ground because it's medium. And high being I don't wanna wait. I want it finalized as soon as possible.  

[01:03:44] Unknown:

Yeah. And,   it's   it's a a very much a dynamic thing. It's like a a queue that's always evolving every single second because there's more and more transactions being sent, you know, every second. And,   it's not within, you know, outside the realms of possibility that what the the fee that you put up right this second,   might not be enough to get you immediately,   processed into the next block in sort of 5 minutes time.   So it's it's very, very dynamic and,   you know, that's why I said it's not sort of an exact science. So generally speaking, for most people, the wallet estimate is pretty good, especially if it's an urgent transaction that you need to be processed   immediately.  



[01:04:23] Unknown:

100%. I'm glad we covered that topic.   Also,   just to before we move on to the next topic, just to jump back, with hardware wallets,   you know, the backup to that hardware wallet are those words you wrote down.   You have the option of putting them into steel. These steel plates are available. Many different vendors offer the steel plates.   And the idea there is if you put it into steel, obviously, it's gonna be water resistant and fire resistant. It's gonna be more sturdy than paper.   You might also consider making duplicates of those seed words   and having them in different places. So, like, if your office burns down or your house burns down, it's still in the other location   with the caveat that it means   it's could be more likely that someone else finds it because it's in more locations, so you need to think about that very carefully.  

And then 3rd of all, with hardware wallets, which I forgot to mention,   one thing I like to tell Newcoiners   is it's a good idea to have to buy 2 of whatever you decide to buy.   Because if you have a second one,   you can   you can have the same backup words initialized on both devices.   So then if something happens to your device, not only do you have the seed words available, those those secret backup words available to restore your device, you also have the second device that still has access to your funds. So you're not in a panic situation.   So I always I I tend to recommend to people that they should buy 2 of the same device, whichever they choose,   so that they they can have 2 initialized. And you can keep those in separate locations as well   if you  

[01:06:03] Unknown:

want.   Okay. Yeah. I think that's good advice.  

[01:06:07] Unknown:

So when you're opening up a Bitcoin wallet, it shows a balance.   A common misconception   is   that   that, you know, you just it shows your Bitcoin balance, that's what's in your wallet. But in reality,   what's in your wallet is basically a bunch of different Bitcoin transactions that all add up to that balance.   We call those UTXOs.   Those those are unspent transaction outputs, UTXO's is what we call them. You can think of them like bills in your wallet, like, maybe your wallet, you know, your your cash wallet has   $50 in it, but in reality, it has 2 twenties and a 10. And that's how Bitcoin wallets work. So you have all these   small UTXOs   in there that add up to your balance,   and that has privacy implications.  

Because if   if 2 of those UTXOs   come together,   in a single transaction,   they're obviously linked on this chain,   forever. Right? We call it the blockchain. It's this ledger of transactions. They'll be linked together because they were both spent in the same transaction.   So that brings us to this idea of UTXO   management   and coin control. The idea of   trying to   manage those   Bitcoin transactions   in a privacy and cost effective way. Should you wanna go into that a little bit?  

[01:07:37] Unknown:

Yeah. Definitely.   And quick I will start with the the 2 wallets that we keep mentioning, BlueWallet and Samurais,   offer all the features that I'm just about to cover that sort of help when it when it comes to to UTXO management.  

[01:07:50] Unknown:

And Zowro and Spectre?  

[01:07:52] Unknown:

Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. I keep referring to mobile wallet, but, yeah, the the all of the desktop,   the the good desktop wallets that we've spoken about have all got UTXO management features as well.   So there's a couple of facets to it. The first one is the ability to,   label   the the UTXOs   or the pieces of Bitcoin that you've got in your wallet. So what would be an example of a label might be that if Matt was to pay me for dinner,   or pay me back for dinner,   when I receive that transaction into my wallet, I could put a label on that to say that that's come from Matt and it was for dinner.   I could then, receive my wages from my employer.  

And I could put the the relevant label on that just to know that where the origin,   of that UTXO is from.   So the once I've labeled them,   when I'm making future transactions,   and I'm,   there's 2 ways you can make a transaction. You can let the wallet to construct it for you automatically, which   they might choose any random UTXOs and merge them together, again, like Matt said, to which will show common ownership. That might not be a problem. However, if you're, want to preserve your privacy, and I might not want my employer to know that I'm friends with Matt because he's a bad person.  

[01:09:08] Unknown:

Because I've labeled those I'm not a bad person, though.  

[01:09:12] Unknown:

You're being theoretical.   Because I've labeled those UTXOs when I receive them at the time,   in you know, 2 weeks down the line when I go in to make a transaction,   I can then, you know, consider,   the person that I'm paying. You know, do I want them to know that I know Matt, or do I want them to know that I work for the company that paid me, with this UTXO?   I can make that informed decision then to say, well, actually, I'm just gonna spend for one of those pieces of Bitcoin.   Or, actually, it's not a bad thing. Matt's not really a bad person. I'm gonna combine the 2, because the value that I want to send, I need to combine the 2.   So those are the 22 sort of main facets to it.  

And but, obviously, you can't   make   a a an informed decision when you come to spend,   if you don't know the origins of all of the details that you've got.   So they kind of go hand in hand, really.   You need to label so that when you go to spend,   you can make, the informed decision as to whether you should merge or not. Yeah. So a key aspect of Bitcoin is  

[01:10:17] Unknown:

if someone sends you Bitcoin,   they can see where that Bitcoin goes in the future.   And if you receive Bitcoin, you can see where that Bitcoin came from in the past.   So   this is why labeling is important because you wanna know   where that transaction came from   or it goes to   because   that's who you're exposing your privacy to in that situation.   Is that a good Yeah. We distillation? Yeah. Which, you know,  

[01:10:49] Unknown:

might not be a a problem for, you know so the person that I'm paying might not,   be able to   or be clever enough to to to use blockchain analysis.   But the other sort of, adversary that we need to consider here is chain analysis firms   that might be trying to   cluster   or monitor your on chain activity, who you're spending to, who you're getting change back from,   to to monitor your habits, to try and,   piece together,   you know, the the identity because the the blockchain, doesn't have any identities at the at the blockchain layer.   But these companies work to kind of,   tie all the pieces together so that they can   deanonymize people. So it's not just a case of,   you know, hiding how much you earn from your friend.  

It's also, you know, these more sophisticated actors that have got more a lot more resources to throw at this,  

[01:11:47] Unknown:

that you've also got to bear in mind as well, unfortunately. Yeah. You both you both don't want you don't want your employer to know   what you're spending things on,   and you don't want the guy who sells you a sandwich to know how much money you make.   But on top of that, we also have these professional surveillance mercenaries that work for governments, dictators, and companies,   and they are just out there constantly trying to   track Bitcoin transactions. So you also have that as a concern.  

[01:12:19] Unknown:

Which leads us nicely onto CoinJoin, I think, if there's unless there's anything else you wanna touch on? No. Let's yep. We can talk about CoinJoin now.   So CoinJoin,   is,   a   coordinated or collaborative transaction   where, you and at least one other person,   will, collaborate to construct the transaction   that casts some   doubt,   as to the,   origin and the output of the transaction   to,   to make sure that   am I still can you still hear me?   I can still hear you. Yes. Oh, sorry. I thought I dropped out. Yes. It it's a coinjoin is a collaborative transaction   where,   the the idea is that the,   somebody watching the blockchain, again, chain surveillance firm, your employer, your friend, whoever,   they can't,   deterministically   or,   with good probability be able to track the   people on the input side of the transaction to the output side of the transaction.  

So it effectively attempts to put up sort of,   a brick wall in your, you know, the the the UTXO's,   history   so that,   anybody looking on chain can't be sure 100%.   You know, is there one person involved in this transaction? Is there 10 people involved in this transaction?   It just casts doubt on the the the,   path that the Bitcoin has taken and and who sort of,   you know, has the Bitcoin changed hands, hasn't it? We we're not really sure. So so tracking Bitcoin is a probability game.  

[01:14:00] Unknown:

These surveillance companies and their tools will basically or just someone who's curious and trying to spy on you,   will basically assign a probability   to every transaction if ownership has changed. Because one of the things about Bitcoin is, you know, we I could send Bitcoin to myself   or I could send it to Bitcoin q and a, and,   the chain doesn't delineate between that. So a key aspect of tracking Bitcoin transactions   is,   determining   some kind of probability that Bitcoin actually changed hands, and then from there trying to see   which hands it went from, from who to who.  

So CoinJoin is this idea of a collaborative transaction, and you can think of it like,   just for an example, if you have 5 people that are doing a coin join together,   instead of,   having a simple path that you're following on chain and deciding if ownership has changed,   all of a sudden there's 5 different potential paths it could go down.   You don't know which of the 5 people that participated,   which of their 5 outputs are them.   So it it breaks that probability chain,   and it's a useful tool in terms of trying to   rec you have forward privacy, have this idea of someone who sent you Bitcoin   doesn't necessarily know which path your Bitcoin took going forward.  



[01:15:28] Unknown:

Yeah. And specifically with   implementation of coin joint like Whirlpool, which are known as equal output coin joints,   the the the sort of notion is that everybody,   on the output side, all of the Etech curves on the output side of the transaction,   look absolutely identical.   So it's kind of, I always like to use the analogy of v for Vendetta where you've got the 1,000,000 mask march.   It's essentially the same thing, but on the blockchain where all of these UTXOs   are indistinguishable   from one another. And so like Matt said, you've got some forward privacy.   And Very quick.  



[01:16:06] Unknown:

And so   I the the 3 major coin joint projects   are Samurai Whirlpool, JoinMarket, and Wasabi.   Citadel dispatch 15 was with the Wasabi team. Citadel dispatch 16   was with the join market team.   And Citadel dispatch   I don't know where he is. I also did a samurai one.   Is Citadel dispatch?   It's there in your feed somewhere. You know,   Stefan can just rattle them off. He knows exactly which one this bridge. Always amazes me that.   I don't know which one it is. I'll come back to it and tell you, but it's there's there's another serial dispatch with the samurai team, so if you're interested in this,   consider going back and listening to those 3.  

Me and Bitcoin q and a,   like samurai Whirlpool the best. You can also you you don't have to use samurai wallet with it. You can use Sparrow wallet with it as well.  

[01:17:15] Unknown:

Yeah. Yep. Co signing that. Samura or Sparrow, hands down, winners for me.   Especially   from a from a beginner's perspective.   Definitely the easiest ones to get started with, in my opinion.  

[01:17:28] Unknown:

You can continue on. I'm trying to figure out which fucking dispatch.  

[01:17:32] Unknown:

I'll I'll cover off one quick question that's,   quite on topic. Somebody asked, what's the difference between,   CoinJoin that we've just spoken about and a CoinTumbler?   So the unfortunately, the words,   or the the meanings have been kind of,   whitewashed somewhat over the years. But,   generally speaking, a CoinTumbler   is, a centralized service   where you will have to   send in   your Bitcoin and give up, custody of it to whoever's running the Tumblr,   and they will send you somebody else's Bitcoin back.   I absolutely wouldn't, recommend anybody use these, because you're putting yourself,   completely in the hands of whoever's running the Tumblr,   that you know, whether they're gonna send you your Bitcoin back or not.  



[01:18:21] Unknown:

And so And you also not only are you trusting them with your Bitcoin if you use a custodial mixer, it's the same idea as as custody,   custodial   risk with wallets.   You're also you're trusting them with your privacy and your funds.   So the key aspect of CoinJoin is is the idea that you are reducing trust in any kind of centralized third party.   Wasabi   and   Samurai   have a centralized server that they do   that they'd use to coordinate the Coin Joins to make them easier better UX,   and more reliable.   Those coordinators are blinded.   With Samurais specifically,   you can use it without your own node, and then you're trusting Samurais node. So that goes back to our earlier conversation about using your own node. You should use your own node when you use Samurais.  

Otherwise, you are trusting them with your transaction and balance information as as is the case with all light wallets.   I found it. So so it's serial dispatch 15 is Wasabi, serial dispatch 16 is joint market, and serial dispatch 30 is samurai. So consider listening to those.  

[01:19:33] Unknown:

Okay. I think we're are we done on Koji? Should we move on to the next topic?  

[01:19:37] Unknown:

I have multisig as the next topic, but should we do lightning real quick first?  

[01:19:41] Unknown:

Sure thing. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's apt.   So quick high level on what the the Lightning Network is.   It is a scaling solution for Bitcoin that,   allows you to,   transact with   actual real Bitcoin,   but you don't do so with, what's known as a non chain footprint.   So it allows you to sort of, lock up a small amount of, well, as much Bitcoin as you want onto this 2nd layer solution known as the Lightning Network   so that you can,   you've had essentially just defer the the overall settlement,   of any number of transactions from going on chain to to reduce fees and also to allow you to transact,   much quicker.  

So whereas,   one on chain transaction, you know, might cost you a couple 100 sats depending on the fees,   you you might be able to send, you know, 10 or even a 100, Lightning Network,   transactions for the same,   for the same amount of fees.   Now there is,   unfortunately, lots of caveats with the Lightning Network again in terms of being able to do it properly,   with, the best way to do so will be with one of the,   node packages that we've spoken about before,   which will dictate that you need to   manage your own sort of, your own channels, which is essentially where you lock up this Bitcoin to be able to to transact on this second layer.   So it's a little bit more of a hurdle to to get on board with.  

But you you sort of can save yourself a fair bit on fees, especially   if we ever see a fee spike again,   which I think is inevitable.   The I don't know if I'm doing a good job again. Inevitable.  

[01:21:28] Unknown:

So   so first of all, there's been a lot of dispatches on lightning.   If you go through the feed,   consider listening to those. There's, like, a lot of different caveats and nuances when using lightning.   Specifically with privacy,   I did a full privacy episode,   with Openknobs and Anthony. That's still dispatch 21. That's on lightning privacy.   So consider checking that out. But the main differentiation   that you as a new user should think about with lightning   is going back to our transaction free conversation earlier,   which is when you use a regular Bitcoin transaction,   your transaction fee is not based on the amount you send. It could be kind of weird for you.  

It's it's actually based on the amount of UTXOs   that you use,   for the transaction. It's based on the data size, not the amount of money that is sent.   So you could end up sending a $5 transaction   with Bitcoin   on chain, a regular Bitcoin transaction, and it could cost the same as sending   a $5,000,000   transaction.   Now with Lightning,   it's different. The way fees are calculated on Lightning is based on the amount you're sending. So that'll be more comparable to something that you're used to in traditional finance world, where if you send more money, you're gonna pay a higher fee. You send less money, you're gonna pay a lower fee.   Now,   Moon Wallet with 2 u's, as we talked about earlier, Mobile Wallet supports Lightning,   and blue wallet supports Lightning. Now if you use blue wallet in its default state with Lightning, it's gonna be a custodial wallet,   which I don't love.  

If you insist on using it, use it with a small amount because they can take your funds. You are trusting them with your privacy.   If,   you can also use BlueWallet with something called LND Hub, which some of these node projects offer.   I think Umbrel and my node offered. I don't know who else offers it. But if you use it with LND hub or your friend's LND hub, then it's not custodial with BlueWallet. It's custodial with who's ever running the LND hub. So if you run the LND hub yourself,   then it's not custodial.   Other   other Lightning specific wallets on mobile,   that you can use, so Moon does both.  

Blue Wallet does both.   Then there's Lightning specific mobile wallets that are very good. There's Phoenix   Wallet. There's Breeze Wallet.   Breeze, b r e e z,   continuing the Bitcoin naming scheme of using words and spelling them differently.   Is there another Lightning Wallet that I'm missing? Lightning You've got a Clari as well, haven't you? Well, Clari is Phoenix.  

[01:24:16] Unknown:

Phoenix is better. Yeah. That's 2 separate wallets. Yeah. Why do they have 2 okay. But, yeah, both of those are good. Yeah. One allows you to manage your own channels, and the other one does it for you.  

[01:24:27] Unknown:

Okay. Phoenix does it for you. Yep.   Okay. So forget eclair. You're a new corner. You have Phoenix, and you have Breeze Wallet, or you can use Moon or Blue Wallet. And that's   rather than for savings, you should think of that more as,   okay. This is, like, my spending wallet. My transaction fees are based on the amount I send. I'm gonna be sending smaller amounts.   So I I might use Lightning. Right?  

[01:24:54] Unknown:

Yeah. Agree. I'm I'm quite a big fan of Phoenix,   in especially from a perspective of, you know, one that's man a wallet that manages the channels for you.   I might get a lot of shit for this in the chat, but I'm I'm a firm believer that most new users don't shouldn't strive to dive headfirst into lightning with their own channels because it's it's it's not easy. It's not approachable. And everything that we've already discussed,   in terms of holding your own keys,   using CoinJoin,   and not using KYC are far more important than, striving to get your own channels up and running   quickly. I don't know what you think about that, Matt. I'm I'm I'm waiting for the shit in the chat. No. I mean, I think I I I think  

[01:25:38] Unknown:

lightning on mobile,   with the wallets we just mentioned,   Moon, Blue,   Breeze,   Phoenix   for smaller spending amounts,   is very accessible.   Actually,   if if you if you if you actually wanna do lightning in a proper sovereign way,   that I would say is a more advanced thing. Don't get intimidated by it. But I it's I think it's important for our all encompassing   getting started guide that we do mention it it exists   and what are the, you know, different trade offs. Basically, the trade off there is a little bit you're getting less security,   you're getting less reliability with lightning,   but you're getting lower fees,   faster transactions,   all else equal.  

And it could be very useful in a mobile spending type of situation.  

[01:26:37] Unknown:

Yeah. Agree.   Phoenix and Breeze are really great ways to to get started with lightning that have sort of their own unique,   trade offs, that kinda give the the best of both worlds from a from a new user perspective   when you compare them with   custodial solutions like, the default blue wallet or running your own channels. I think they  

[01:26:58] Unknown:

Yeah. I mean, that's one of the reasons why I like Moon so much. Like, Moon with 2Us has, like, different trade offs.   It doesn't have a standardized backup process.   It's you know, if   if you're   a lot of big corners will say it's, you know, not a lightning wallet, but at the end of the day,   it's not a lightning wallet because you store all your funds on chain. You're not storing it in a proper lightning wallet.   But what's cool about Moon is   if you scan a QR code, it could be a lightning QR code or it could be a regular Bitcoin QR code, and it just automatically   figures that out for you   and and vice versa. Yeah. So so you can just have you can have some spending cash in your Moon Wallet, m u u n,   and whatever whatever Bitcoin QR code you scan, it will send. But it doesn't have power user features.  

It doesn't have that coin selection that we were talking about with UTXO management. It doesn't have labeling.   It doesn't have a standard backup process.   So these are all things to keep in mind.  

[01:28:04] Unknown:

Right. Multisig.  

[01:28:06] Unknown:

Multisig. Let's let's go. Here's where we get into the weeds a little bit. Right. We've been in the weeds for a while, brother.  

[01:28:13] Unknown:

All of the, wallets that we've spoken about,   the desktop wallets, mobile wallets, all operate,   on what we colloquially call a single SIC setup,   where they have,   a single secret or backup,   which is required   when you want to spend your Bitcoin.   A multisig wallet is where you combine 2 or more of these   separate wallets together to create a brand new wallet.   When you set up this multisig wallet, you can dictate   the minimum,   amount of keys required to be able to make a to to sign or authorize a send transaction.   So that could be,   2 from a possible 3 keys is a popular one, all the way up to something elaborate like 11 or 15, you know, which might be,   used in sort of a a business setting perhaps.  

But 2 or 3 where you need 2 signers from a possible 3 that were created to to that were used to create the wallet to sign off any transactions   from that wallet. So why would you wanna do that? Well,   with a single sync wallet,   some of the 3 theoretical,   attack factors,   if someone was to someone somebody was to steal your device,   and and,   while it you know, they snatch your phone while it's out of your hand, and you've got your wallet unlocked,   they can steal your Bitcoin.   If that was one of the keys in a multisig wallet where you needed 2 to spend from, then they can't steal anything from you.   Another one of the attacks that multisig protect from is known as a retirement attack, where   there might be a malicious hardware wallet vendor   that,   doesn't publish their source code,   and they   have some   malware baked into into the the into the device,   that is actually,   has the ability to steal,   your Bitcoin. I will say, again, correct me if I'm wrong here, Matt, but that has never happened. Again, it's a theoretical attack. But if you were to use,   a multisix setup   where you've got different hardware wallet manufacturers,   If one of those is is malicious,   they can't get access to your funds because they don't have you know, if it's just one key out of 2 that are required, they don't have the,   the minimum, number of keys required to steal anything. Right. So that's another little effect of that. So  

[01:30:40] Unknown:

all all the good   all the good wallets all the good hardware wallets are open source. So,   theoretically,   open source means   that the code is available for you to verify,   and you can read the code line by line. Now if you're a new corner, you're probably up to this point. You're already really intimidated. You're like, Matt, I can't read code.   I'm aware. Okay? So   at the end of the day,   it is very good that you're able to technically verify the code, but most people will be updating their hardware wallets and they will not be verifying the code. So there is some trust that you're you're trusting that hardware wallet manufacturer to not ship,   malicious code to you, and you're also trusting them,   that that the actual device wasn't compromised when it was first sent to you. Right?  

So with Multisig,   the idea is   you can have multiple   but specifically in a hardware wallet I d a hardware wallet Multisig,   the idea is you can have multiple vendors,   that are   multiple different hardware wallets that come together to form your wallet,   and   you need   a combination of them as Bitcoin q and a was saying. A common one is 2 of 3. You need 2 of them to spend the funds.   This reduces trust in any specific hardware wallet manufacturer.   You also have the added benefit,   that those backup words instead of those backup words being a   one and done situation. If someone finds those secret backup words, we call them seed words. If someone finds those words, they have access to your funds. In a multisig setup, you have   multiple sets of backup words, and they have to find the required threshold of backup words   in order to   spend your funds. So if you're using a 2 of 3, you're gonna have 3 sets of backup words. You're gonna have 3 hardware wallets.  

Those backup words obviously can be on steel as we said earlier,   and you can have them in different locations. So Bitcoin gives you Bitcoin with multisig   gives you this unique situation   where you can have a geographically   distributed,   security setup where you're holding your own coin,   but   the   the the keys to access it can be located in different places. They can be duplicated.   You can keep copies of them in different places.   And for someone to actually compromise you and take your funds, they're gonna need to have access   to a combination of those secrets,   not just one secret.  

We lost Bitcoin q and a about 2 minutes ago or a minute and a half ago, and I'm just gonna keep talking until he reconnects.   So   that is the main benefit of multisig.   Do not once again, do not get intimidated here.   Plenty of people store Bitcoin in single sig setups. It is the normal way of setting it up.   This is something you might graduate to.   Multisig UX, Multisig.   I guess UX can be kind of a complicated word. Like, the way you interface with the Multisig wallet   is a relatively   new thing in Bitcoin,   So it it has a little bit more of a learning curve. It is a little bit more rough around the edges.   So   you wanna get really comfortable with it. As I said earlier, you wanna be backing up, restoring, spending, receiving, getting comfortable with it separately   of your single sig setup.  

Now one cool aspect of Multisig   is that you can   actually have a single sig wallet.   So you can be using a hardware wallet that is single sig, and then you can take that single sig, and you can actually also use it in a multisig environment.   And   it can be one signer of, for instance, the 2 of 3 in the multisig, but also   it could also be a separate wallet.   And   I guess the main advantage there,   I guess there's 2 main advantages there. First of all, if someone finds   your single sig   backup, your your secret words,   it might have some small amount of funds on it, and they think that's all your funds. They'd they can't tell that it's in a multisig setup.  

So they might just take that funds and think they took all your Bitcoin.   The the   secondary   benefit is   that, you know, you can repurpose   these these hardware wallets and use them for multiple wallets.   Now one other caveat here is with multisig, you do wanna back up additional information besides just your seed words.   Bitcoin q and a came in and then left again, so I will continue.   The popular multisig software,   Sparrow,   Specter supports it, BlueWallet supports it.   They will tell you what you need to back up and make sure you save all that information. Now that information,   that additional information that's not your seed words,   they will have terms like derivation path,   descriptor,   the list of something called XPUBs.  

You don't necessarily have to know what all of that means. You just have to save it, and you just have to realize that   while   seed words are   a security risk, if someone gets your seed words,   the that information, that separate information that you have to back up with a multisig wallet is a privacy risk. So if someone finds that, they can see how much you're holding in the multisig, but they can't necessarily spend it. But you need that information plus your backup words in order to,   to spend your funds. Bitcoin q and a, are you back?  

[01:36:48] Unknown:

I am. Apologies for that. Mine's a little open. I think it's my network.  

[01:36:53] Unknown:

No worries at all.   I just continued on, and I just kept talking about multisig.  

[01:36:59] Unknown:

I know you'd be holding it down.  

[01:37:04] Unknown:

I   I get I mean, I think we are   I I think I sufficiently   explained multisig trade offs and and benefits.   Should we move on to mistakes, common mistakes?  

[01:37:19] Unknown:

Yeah. Did you cover sort of the alternatives to doing it yourself, the multi sig approach? No. I didn't. That's great. Why don't you go into that?   Yeah. So, obviously, Matt just outlined some of the the potential pitfalls with doing it yourself.   So one of the other options is known as kind of, collaborative custody,   alternatives   where,   there will be a centralized service.   Some examples are Unchain Capital and, Casa,   where they will help you coordinate a multisit quorum,   where they hold one of the keys,   so that in the event that you were to   so I'll give you an example. You'd have a key on your mobile phone.  

You'd have a key on a hardware wallet,   and one of these   services will hold the key as well. So they only have one key, so they can't steal from you, which is great.   But if you were to lose, say, your phone, what key or the key on your hardware wallet and you didn't have it backed up, they will be able to step in, as a third party to help you move your Bitcoin. So that in a doomsday scenario,   you,   you don't lose your life savings, which is really great.   You will pay for this service.   Again, I'm not sure on how much each charge. The the bottom tier, I think, is just over $100   last time that I checked, per year.  

One of the the trade offs with this is that,   unless you sign up, without your personal information, which I believe is quite difficult to do,   The   these,   centralized,   entities that hold the key in part of your multicore,   they know who you are. They know how much Bitcoin you hold in that wallet because they hold one of the keys, and they also,   hold the sort of,   the wallet file if you like, to put it simply,   so that they can just as a KYC exchange can,   be able to tie you to your Bitcoin identity.   So it's worth picking up the trade offs.  

[01:39:19] Unknown:

Yeah. And you're using their node. So   the assumption is if you do this, if you use one of these providers,   you're trusting them with your privacy, but they will hold your hand, and they will have a spare key for you as well,   and they will help you onboard into the process. They will help you get hardware wallets. They will go through that whole process, but you are trusting them with your privacy. They know your transactions. They know your balances.   And   in 99% of situations,   they know who you are as well.   They'll know the IP address of your of your devices that you connect from. This is all kinda getting a little bit too much into the weeds, but the key is that you're trusting them with your privacy.  

I was explaining earlier just basically doing it yourself so you could use your own note and you aren't trusting someone. In that situation, you can still have,   other people hold keys for you. So   Bitcoin q and a started with a 2 of 3 setup because that's a very common setup, but another common setup is a 3 of 5 setup. And if you do a 3 of 5 setup, you have 5 total keys and you need 3 to spend.   So   if you need 3 to spend,   you can hold 3 keys yourself so that you know you have and you put them in different locations, and you know you have enough to spend it yourself. But then you can also have, you know, a a family member, a friend,   a lawyer   hold   hold a key. You can have different combinations of people hold the key, so it can be very useful in,   specifically   in in situations   where you're trying like, inheritance situations where you're if if if you pass away, you have large Bitcoin savings,   you know, maybe a lawyer is holding 1 in a trust,   maybe a couple family members are holding individual ones, and they basically all need to collaborate together in order to spend your funds if you have 3 keys with other people.  

But you can also do it in a way where you don't   you you don't they never have the threshold. They need to compromise you plus combined together.  

[01:41:21] Unknown:

Yeah. I think,   just one final thing before we move on to the next topic. Inheritance is a big one for me that,   I I sort of like to drive over people who who seem to seem keen to kinda jump into the DIY approaches that,   you know, you might spend some time listening to podcasts, watching some, tutorials or reading some guides and feel comfortable in setting up a multi sig   setup.   But   what happens   if you're not around tomorrow unexpectedly?   Is your spouse, your next weekend, are they gonna be able to coordinate a spend from a 2 or 3 or a 3 or 5? Do they know where to find the keys? Do they know how to recover it? And if the answer's no to any of those questions, then,   all of your life savings disappears when you disappear. So,   something to bear in mind, especially if you're gonna take the the DIY approach.  



[01:42:12] Unknown:

100%.   I'd also add that there's a middle ground here,   specifically supported by cold card called seed XOR,   and basically in that situation instead of having one seed, it's not multisig, but instead of having 1 seed, you have 2 seeds and you need both of them in order to spend your funds.   So it's a little bit different than multisig.   It can be more accessible to people,   because you don't have these additional   complications that we were just discussing with multisig,   but it gives you that benefit of not having a single seed,   backup words,   that can be compromised by someone. There's also something that's supported by pretty much every wallet out there called a passphrase,   and in that situation,   you have these backup words are usually 12 word phrases or 24 word phrases.  

The passphrase is the 13th word or the 25th word, and you pick that yourself.   So if you do that method,   then you can keep the passphrase separate from your backup words. If someone wants to compromise you, they need access to both.   And, I mean, if it's a weak passphrase, they might just take your backup words and keep trying passphrases,   but it it adds an additional   burden on them to try and compromise you without going through a multisig setup.   Another   interesting thing about pass raises   is you can store money on the bare backup words, and then you cannot when you use a pass raise, it's a separate wallet. So in that situation,   you can actually keep funds on your   your basic backup words,   and then if someone finds that, they'll just steal those that money, and they might not know you have a passphrase with the majority of your savings in it.  

So that's just something to keep in mind.  

[01:44:08] Unknown:

Awesome. Do you wanna cover off, some some common mistakes? I think that was the next on the list. Yeah. I think common mistakes is a good spot to go next.   So I've got quite a lengthy list in.   The the first one of which, unfortunately, I,   fell fell prey to a little bit.   And that is,   a couple of topics on ratio   of k y k I KYC,   multiple exchanges   without any real need to really.   So I've just,   sort of exposed myself to you know, I put my name on loads of different databases.   So it's an unfortunate one that you can't really undo, like we spoke about before.   If you, were to, you know, listen to this podcast and decide that you   still wanna   go for a KYC exchange because you think you're you're down to the task of of going, no KYC.  

Try and limit your,   your exposure to this by just signing up with one reputable exchange.   I think that's a good one to start.  

[01:45:19] Unknown:

Did you   I think that's very good advice. Like, if you are gonna use a KYC service where you're providing your identity information,   you should choose it carefully.   You should choose someone you trust the most,   and you should   not sign up for a lot of people just sign up for a ton of different services. You should only you should sign up for the bare minimum. Ideally, if you're gonna do it, you sign up for 1.   You use it solely just to buy Bitcoin and then send it to your own wallets,   and and you don't you you don't use any other additional KYC services. You wanna limit that as much as possible.   Second thing is, did you change your mic setup at all? Because it's way worse now than it was before.  



[01:46:02] Unknown:

Change   it. Hello? I changed my computer.   I'll do I'll have a play around while you're talking. I'll turn up. Is it is it quiet?  

[01:46:09] Unknown:

No. We can hear you, but it's just, like, breaking up a little bit. It's, like, cutting in and out.  

[01:46:14] Unknown:

Alright. I'll let I'll I'll play around.  

[01:46:21] Unknown:

Another common mistake,   that I see people make is,   I I mean, gambling on shitcoins.   So a lot of people will think that,   Bitcoin is too expensive, and I've missed the boat, and I I'm too late to Bitcoin.   Literally, every single person who has entered Bitcoin at any time in Bitcoin history has thought they were too late. There's, like, a famous screenshot of someone on one of the Bitcoin forums,   lamenting that they didn't get in at 5¢, and instead they got in at a dollar and they were too late and they missed the bus.   So everyone feels that way.  

You're not alone in that. It's important to realize that you can   transact in   smaller units of account. We call them SATs.   So   you can you don't have to have a full Bitcoin. You don't you don't you don't need like, right now, Bitcoin's at almost $70,000.   You don't need to put $70,000   in to use Bitcoin.   Sats are the smallest unit of Bitcoin. There's a 100,000,000 of them   per Bitcoin.   And   right now, Sats, you can get 1500 for a dollar. So you can send any amount of Sats you wanna send. You can send $2 worth.   You can send 25¢   worth.  

It doesn't matter. Don't get caught up in   in in thinking that Bitcoin is too expensive.   What a common thing that these other coins will do   is they make it so they have so many units   that it seems like it's cheaper than it is just to try and get you in the door. It's a it's a marketing tactic, so just keep that in mind.   Q and a, you there?   Yeah. How's my mic now? Oh, so much better. I'm glad I brought it up. Perfect. Okay. Do you have more common mistakes?  

[01:48:15] Unknown:

Yeah. Common one,   is just not practicing   enough with transacting,   testing my backups for my hardware wallets,   testing different wallets, even using test net. Just practice, practice, practice in getting comfortable   using the the various tools that we've spoken about.   Getting comfortable with it, either using Testnet, which is basically a a copy a carbon copy of Bitcoin that's has that holds no value. You can get it for free, on   websites called Faucets,   where you can go on, and just mimic the normal behavior of a wallet,   without the fear of,   losing any real value. So you can   send some test net bit Bitcoin to to your hardware wallet.  

You can wipe it, recover it,   just to get really, really comfortable with with that process so that   if,   the worst was to happen and you something was to happen to your house,   where you store a Bitcoin or wherever you store Bitcoin.   You're when you're in that pike state,   it's not like the first time that you search your hardware wallet for 5 years because you, you know, you've done that, you know, periodical practice.   You've practiced lots of time. You send real value in there that did   second to you. Because,   you know, if you're in a panic and you need   to move your Bitcoin quickly, the last thing you want to be doing, is doing it sort of   in unfamiliar   situation or in a familiar   in a situation where you're not really comfortable   and and familiar because that's when mistakes happen and you could, mock something up.  



[01:49:57] Unknown:

Yeah. So we see that happen a lot where, you know, people,   so I actually don't   especially for newcomers, I don't know if you need to use test net.   It adds just another   complication to your process.   But but what happens a lot is, like, people will buy Bitcoin. They'll send it to a hardware wallet. They never really,   get comfortable with it.   Then Bitcoin goes up in value significantly,   and, like, 4 years later,   they're trying to spend it and they're just not comfortable at all.   So you really wanna get comfortable with it. You wanna practice sending, receiving,   backing up, and restoring,   And just, you know, I don't think testnet's necessary in that situation because you should just do it with the small amounts. You know, use you know, send $5 back and forth,   erase the wallet, restore it from your backup, see that your $5 are still there.  

One nice thing about my earlier approach that I mentioned, if having 2 of the same hardware wallet,   is without putting funds at risk at all, you can load up 1 hardware wallet with some Bitcoin,   and then you can restore it   on your 2nd hardware wallet. You can load up those secret words onto that hardware wallet, and if your funds are there and you can spend them, then you know you did the backup and restore process correctly without actually wiping the original wallet. So that's another   benefit. You're basically verifying your backup and restore process.   You don't want to be in the situation   where you have a lot of money   and   you have a lot of money on the line, and you've never done a backup, you've never have you never done a restore process, and you're just freaking out, and maybe you wrote down the words wrong. I've had that happen to friends where we've had to guess the word that they that they wrote down wrong or wrote down in bad handwriting.  

So you don't you don't wanna be in that situation. You wanna practice, practice, practice.  

[01:51:58] Unknown:

I think just to add to that, back up process   as well is that   most of the,   or or the hardware wallets that we've spoken about this evening   have multiple different types of backups as well. So I think it's worth noting that practice using both of them as well. So we've we've got the the the seed words.   Both call Coldcard and Passport also offering   the backups as well where you can store a back   onto a micro SD card,   which is a a little bit easier to store.   So I would urge people to practice   restoring from both methods as well because   at the end of the day, if again, if in a doomsday scenario, you don't know which method of backup you're actually gonna have access to or which has survived whatever,   you know, doomsday scenario,   has actually happened.  



[01:52:46] Unknown:

100%.   Before we move on to more common mistakes, we have Alex McCluskey in the chat asking about 401 k IRA funds.   If you're trying to hold Bitcoin in a   in a in a tax beneficial way in your retirement account.   I would just keep this very simple.   If you do have,   a 401 k or an IRA where you already have funds in it and you wanna move them into Bitcoin,   just consider using,   the service offered by Unchained Capital, that's unchained.com.   Disclosure, they are a sponsor of of   my other show, rabbit hole recap. This show does not have sponsors,   but they're a sponsor because they're a good team. It's a good product.  

I have friends there that are working there. My buddy, Jeff Andrew runs their   their retirement division, and they will hold your hand.   They will help you through it. Obviously, as we said earlier, the caveat is you're trusting them with your privacy,   but pretty much in all situations with retirement funds, if you're using a tax beneficial retirement,   method,   you're gonna have to trust someone because it's all getting reported to the government as well.   The nice thing about what Unchained does is you hold your own keys. So you get that tax benefit,   but you're holding your own keys. They can't spend your funds.  

A lot of the other programs that are out there,   can can spend your funds at will, and you have to trust them completely with the security of your funds and your privacy.   So just something to keep in mind.  

[01:54:23] Unknown:

Yeah. The next one,   for for me is kind of a little bit more outside of the box.   I lurked around on on Bitcoin, Twitter, and in some of the communities,   for a lot longer than I really should have.   When I started to,   interact with with people in the, you know,   wallet chat rooms or the no chat rooms,   to use a few examples,   my knowledge grew exponentially from then onwards from having those interactions   versus me just sitting on the sidelines and kind of, you know, liking a few tweets every now and then. So if I was to go back and kinda have my time again, I'd I'd absolutely   start getting involved and start contributing,   to the conversation   much, much earlier because,   personally speaking anyway,   my my knowledge just, you know, skyrocketed compared to where I was just a couple of years ago.  

So big one for me, that one.  

[01:55:20] Unknown:

Yeah. That's,   and,   I just I think, like, learn by doing. Right? Practice with small amounts,   and get your feet wet rather than feel intimidated and feel like you have to read everything and listen to everything and watch everything,   before you even get your feet wet.  

[01:55:39] Unknown:

Yeah. Another one as well is and and Matt might, roll his eyes at this one is is kinda going public.   There there's a lot of value in in,   staying in the proverbial shadow, so to speak.   I would urge people, you know, not to,   sort of start shouting from the rooftops,   that they own Bitcoin again because, you know, we talked earlier about   KYC and how it kind of, can paint a a sort of, red cross on your back a little bit. Well, shout from the rooftops,   when Bitcoin hits an all time high to all your friends,   might, inadvertently do the same thing one day. You know, you're not gonna get a little bit jealous. You never know who's gonna get jealous and tell somebody else. You tell somebody else who's, an individual that might wanna try and get their hands on it. So,   I would be be candid about who you who you speak to Bitcoin about.  

It's a bit of a a   double edged sword, that one, because,   I think we've all got a a little bit of a personal responsibility to try and help on onboard others as well. So,   also say just kinda be selective,   about who you speak to and and what you say.  

[01:56:48] Unknown:

Yeah. It is,   it might sound a little hypocritical coming from me,   as a   as as a as a public Bitcoin figure.   But   definitely in the beginning, you should not you should you should not be talking you should try and reduce how much you talk about Bitcoin. Don't make it obvious that you own Bitcoin.   Don't post on social media.   Consider using a name like Bitcoin q and a does. I mean, it might surprise you, but he wasn't born with that name.   He decided on that name himself, for the Internet for his Bitcoin work.   In the future, if you do wanna become   more public about it,   you can do so in a more   responsible way,   rather than doing it right in the beginning. You can never come back from it once you do it.  

So it's something to keep in mind. You should never talk about your own Bitcoin. You should never talk about your own how much Bitcoin you have.   These are best practices.   You don't you don't   even if it's a friend or a family member, it might seem like small amount today, but in the future,   it could be a large amount and they will not forget it. They tend to remember one of the first questions most friends and family will ask you is how much Bitcoin you own. They love asking that question.   Do not answer it. Explain why you don't wanna answer it for them.   If people do know you own Bitcoin,   this is where that multisig setup really shines because you can have it geographically distributed. You can have your keys in different locations,   that are far away from each other that make   you getting compromised more difficult   even in a physical attack situation.  

And, obviously, it is more ideal to live in a place where you have   proper gun rights and you can defend yourself.   So these are things to consider.   If I was to do it again,   I probably would not be,   you know, as public as I am about Bitcoin.   I made a judgment call later on in my Bitcoin journey   that I felt we needed more public Bitcoin figures that were talking about real issues and   specifically privacy.   So I made that judgment call, but there are some mornings that I wake up and regret it.   But there are precautions you can take. And there are benefits though to being semi public about your Bitcoin usage,   meeting people. I've met some of the best people,   you know, I've I have I have basically, I have family now that wouldn't exist otherwise,   But these are all things that you should consider,   as part of your Bitcoin journey. But in the beginning,   very, very, very strongly   would say,   you know, keep keep it as discreet as possible.  

You never know,   you know,   you you don't wanna expose yourself to a malicious actor. Your government could turn on Bitcoin.   A foreign government can use that information against you, if you're traveling across a border or something like that.   So you you'll wanna keep this in mind.  

[02:00:05] Unknown:

Yeah. The final,   sign off one for me   would be   it just completely got out of my brain.   Was another 2 FA is another one. A good one to touch on, I think.   Yes. Would be,   if if you and it's just come back into me now. So I've got 2 to finish off.   If you, again, listen to this podcast, decide that no KOC is not for you and you wanna sign up for an exchange,   a lot of these exchanges will prompt you to use,   SMS based 2 factor authentication   to,   I'm using Echo to to secure your account.   This is where you'll get a a text message to when you try and log in to the to the Exchange, they'll send you a text message to authorize that login.   There have been multiple   instances where this has been,   exploited.  

People have had their information   and their accounts hacked on these exchanges,   which if you   unfortunately, you've got funds on that account, can be withdrawn to whoever's, got access to your account. They can withdraw it to their own wallet.   A better alternative,   would be to use, an app based   two factor authentication.   So an example would be,   there's one called AndOTP.   There's one called a Aegis.   There's another one called,   help me out here, Matt. I've drawn a blank.  

[02:01:39] Unknown:

Did you say Aegis?  

[02:01:41] Unknown:

Yeah. I said Aegis. Yep. Aegis is my favorite.   Any app based one, far more secure, and there's been far well Aegis is the open source. Aegis is open sourced.  

[02:01:53] Unknown:

That's aegis,   and the backup process is very easy. You gotta remember when you're when you use these authenticator apps,   if your phone dies, you you wanna make sure you have a backup of them.   So Yeah. The most popular one is Google Authenticator and it's not last I mean, I haven't used it in   maybe 6 years or something like that, but previously it wasn't easy to backup. So make sure you're using one that is easy to backup,   and back it up and keep multiple copies.  

[02:02:26] Unknown:

Yeah. All the other alternative is you can get,   like, a physical device that access your the second factor authentication. Looks like a bit of a USB key that provides the the, additional authorization,   but less services tend to,   offer compatibility with those.  

[02:02:44] Unknown:

100%.   I I would say, I think for most people, the physical device is overkill.   Can a sophisticated   attacker compromise a phone based 2 factor?   Yes.   Have we seen any widespread cases of that? No. Do they still need your email and your password? Yes.   On that note, you shouldn't be using the same emails and the same passwords in different places.   If you go to have I been pwned.com, you can put your email address in and it'll tell you whenever,   database gets leaked with your email or your password or your personal information.   So that's a very important resource, but but what we see a lot of times is, like, there'll be, like, a leak,   like, maybe Facebook will get hacked, and those emails and passwords will then be used at all the other services to try and get into your account.  

So that two factor code gives you an additional protection on top of that, but you really should,   be trying to limit reuse of email addresses   and never reuse passwords.   Yeah.  

[02:03:54] Unknown:

Yeah. There's one in the chat. Scooby Snacks is asking, is a password manager a good idea? Yes. Definitely. Would recommend it to anybody.   My personal favorite is,   is Bitwarden.   Again, another free and open source, software. They do offer a paid version as well, but the the freemium   option is per is perfectly good enough for for,   99% of users, I would say. Yeah. Bitwarden's great.  

[02:04:18] Unknown:

You just gotta   if you're using a password manager,   there's some nuance there. Because if you're not self hosting your password manager, you're you're using a   I what what's the main one?   LastPass.   People love LastPass.   It's closed source. You're kinda putting all your eggs in one basket.   So there's some concern there. You know, if you if you have all your passwords   in this password manager   and that password manager gets compromised, then all of your accounts are compromised.   What I think is, like, a very,   easy accessible   thing for,   new users or people that are concerned is is your really important passwords. You can just write them in a notebook.  

You write them in a notebook.   Someone's gonna need to get access to that notebook physically in order to compromise you.   You might not wanna write it out completely clear. You know? Maybe some things you remember versus some things are on the paper.   You can develop your own, like, kind of code system. Don't over complicate it. You'll probably forget the password.   But,   paper and pen paper and pen is a tried and true method.   Yeah. Absolutely. And, just But don't put it on a Post it note on, like, your computer either.  

[02:05:44] Unknown:

The, the the final one that went out my head before, was we've spoken about you know, there's a lot of information in the past couple of hours.   Don't try and,   do everything in the space of a week, especially if you are literally at step 1.   I would sort of pick one of these topics. You know, we spoke about them in a in a   in a specific order for a reason. I would urge people to sort of start from step 1 and try and master each step before they move to the net before they move on. Or at least not try to do too many of them at the same time.   Yes. Depending on the depending on the the approach that you take for the different tools that we've we've spoken.  

You know, to do it properly and to do it justice and to understand it and practice it like we've been like we've been sort of,   reiterating,   it's gonna take you, you know,   a good bit of time. You're gonna have to dedicate some time to do this and to master some of these tools. So trying to do too much too soon, is setting yourself up to to fail. So take your time, be be, deliberate about it, and and sort of master something, then move on.  

[02:06:48] Unknown:

Yeah. And our I that's great advice. And as Bitcoin q and a said, our order in this episode was intentional.   So don't feel like you have to go through all the steps at once, but   go through   that order was how we we we we chose that order   specifically because   we think it's a very,   efficient, effective,   managing trade offs and stuff balance of what order you should kinda be coming into this.   We also have some person in the chat,   who uses the name some person. So every time I call him out in the chat, I sound like I'm just don't care about his name.   Asking for the best,   two factor app for iOS. I really like Authenticator Plus,   for iOS users.  

I think it's available on Android as well, but if you're on Android, I really just like Aegis.   So, yeah, there there you go for that answer.   I have on this list Bitcoin q and a. I have common questions. Do you have common questions that you have in mind? Or  

[02:07:55] Unknown:

I've got nothing noted down, but kind of,   off the top of my head,   a common one that I get is sort of,   is,   is this setup good for me, or is this wallet the one I should use,   You know, insert service or or tool here, you know, is this good?   It's the thing with Bitcoin and and using the tools properly that we've been speaking about is   that what Matt or I might recommend from our own personal experiences   might not be perfectly applicable to your own personal,   threat metal threat models or skill set.   So, again, we we have kinda covered this ground a little bit earlier, but it's   just try things out.  

You know, by all I'm not saying don't come to to people like Matt or myself and ask for advice. You know, we're always,   more than happy to to to help out.   But the the best thing to do is to sort of get your hands dirty and try these tools. You know, you can do it for for free or for very low fees at the moment, just testing out wallets   or or different devices,   or multi 6 setups if you wanna go that far, coin joint implementations.   Best thing to do is get your hands dirty, get in get amongst the communities, and, you know, what's perfect for one person might not be perfect for another. So,   it's a bit of   a a DYOR. Do your own research and get comfortable with what's, gonna work for you, really.  



[02:09:24] Unknown:

A 100%.   Just to reiterate,   Bitcoin q and a has all of its guides at bitcoiner.guide.   I have a list of resources and tools at sidldispatch.com/   help. At the top of sidledispatch.com/help,   I have, also, I have links to   both Bitcoin q and a,   myself,   and our buddy, Catan, from Australia who runs Ministry of Nodes offers,   we offer private one on ones, and there's links to all of that at the top of civil dispatch.com/help.   So if you do   feel that you you have the need for a a one on one, a specific time to jump on a call,   that is available to you as well. I highly recommend both Bitcoin q and a and   and Catan,   for that, and that's why they are at the top of that page.  

I think,   Narwhal Tacos has an interesting point. I I kind of touched on it, but I felt like it was a little bit too early in the episode, so I didn't go heavy into it.   He's asking, have you explained that no one actually holds their sats in a wallet, just the key? It took me a while to wrap my head around that.   That is absolutely correct.   You're not actually storing your Bitcoin. You're storing the key that allows you to access and spend your Bitcoin.   So when we talk about all these wallets, when we talk about hardware wallets and mobile wallets,   it's really, either a piece of software or a piece of hardware that is that is storing that secret key for you and allowing you to easily access that so you can access your Bitcoin.  

I think that's an important point, but I I do I would say that   that's almost more of a   I don't know. I I feel like it's more of an advanced thing.   For all intents and purposes, you can kind of operate under the assumption that you're holding your Bitcoin in the wallet. But,   it is a good it is a good point. Thank you, Norwall Tacos.   I think with all that said, it doesn't seem like we have,   any any additional questions in the live chat. I would add that, obviously, this is still dispatch 43. There's been 42 other episodes   filled with content.  

That's a lot more advanced than this. So if you want to dive into that after listening to this,   obviously, feel free to do that. It's all available for free without ads or sponsors.   Q and a, you have any any additional thoughts here before we wrap up?  

[02:11:56] Unknown:

I just wanna reiterate, just get amongst the communities,   use the tools, get your hands dirty. Don't be afraid to try things out.   Come to my cell phone, Matt, for for any help and advice.   And just one of the you know, we've we've mentioned Catan,   one of the prominent educator in the space is BTC Sessions. He's got a fantastic YouTube page   that's got guide video guides on using literally everything to do with Bitcoin. So, if you're more of a visual learner,   check out his YouTube channel. It's a fantastic resource as well. A 100%. That is also linked at sill dispatch.com/help,  

[02:12:30] Unknown:

or you can just search BTC Sessions on YouTube.   I made him a channel on bitcoin tv.com. I don't think he has uploaded anything there,   but there's also a ton of great content at bitcoin tv.com   that is curated. One of the issues and the pitfalls you should keep in mind when you're on YouTube,   especially the high view count videos are filled with   scams and bad advice,   so you need to be very careful.   You know, if you're watching a BT Sessions video, it might recommend another video that looks like it's reputable and that a lot of people have watched and recommended it.   You need to be very careful.  

At the end of the day, Bitcoin's about personal responsibility,   so no one's gonna be there. If if you lose your Bitcoin, there's no getting it back.   And there's just a there's a lot of money to be made giving bad advice and chilling bad product.   So you really, really need to be skeptical all the time.   Think for yourself, make your own decisions, and constantly keep learning.   And I want to be very clear here   that I'm not asking you to trust me either   or Bitcoin q and a or Catan or anything else we've mentioned in this video in this video or any of the other Citadel dispatch episodes.   You need to constantly   figure out things for yourself and make your own judgment calls. If anyone's asking you to trust them,   be very, very careful and just be very careful in general.  

BTC Pins wants everyone, all the newcomers to know that they could buy they could buy merch from him atbtcpins.com.   So there you go, BTC Pins. I love you, bro.   Q and a, you got any final thoughts before we wrap it up, or are we good?  

[02:14:18] Unknown:

No. I think it was a great episode, and and one I'll be bookmarking on on my home page as well. Just wanna say thanks for having me back on, and, look forward to doing it again sometime.  

[02:14:27] Unknown:

Thank you, dude. I appreciate you. Everyone can follow Bitcoin Q and A on Twitter.   It's it's Bitcoin q under dash a.   I hope to have you back on again. Thank you for coming on.   I appreciate you tremendously, and thank you to all the rider dive freaks that joined us in the live chat   and joined us and and continue to support the show and keep it ad free and sponsor free. I really do appreciate you, and,   cheers to you all. Thank you, Bitcoin q and a.  

[02:14:58] Unknown:

Thanks, Mark.  

[02:15:06] Unknown:

The new number is  

[02:15:23] Unknown:

Last night I let the party get the best of me. Waking up in the morning, 2 of us land next to me. Plus I heard an officer arrested me. Cool weed and cold   So tonight everything is on me. The drinks is on me. The bitches, the hotel, the weed is all free. Get high means so high we don't see the whole suite. Then fly to a level where you gonna need your own key.   T g o t. No   party all night,   say you wanna party, let's party all right, ah. Party all day, party all night, say you wanna party, let's party all right now. Party all day, party all night. Say you wanna party, let's party all right now. Party all day, party all night. Say you wanna party, let's party all night.  

[02:18:24] Unknown:

Love you, freaks. Thanks for joining for another Ciel dispatch.   I'll be with you on Thursday for rabbit hole recap.   And next Tuesday, for another Bitcoin Tuesday, we'll be doing Ciel dispatch,   with raw avocado and waxwing jumping back into technical things.   I hope you appreciate this episode. To all the new freaks, welcome.   I hope you enjoy all the content going forward, and welcome to Bitcoin.   To all the old freaks,   I got in trouble for my Bitcoin 2021,   code because I don't take a cut, so it's higher than everyone else. So if you wanna join us at Bitcoin 2022. If you wanna join us at Bitcoin 2022, April 6 6th 9th in Miami, it's gonna be the biggest Bitcoin only event.   You can use code open source for 21% off, but do not share it on Twitter. Otherwise, I'm gonna they're gonna remove my code.  

So cheers to that, and I'll see you on Thursday. Love you all. Stay humble. Stack stats.