Sometimes we loose the plot. When things happen that we don't like the response is sometimes not very thought out. Bitcoin was just created for use by our friends. When people are buying or mining Bitcoin that we don't agree with..what does that mean?
Bitcoin Price at Time of Recording
November 14th, 2024: 88,145 USD; 83,750 EUR
Block Height at Time of Recording
870,342
Software Updates
Zeus 0.9.2
BTCPay v2.0.0
Robosats 0.7.1-alpha
JAM v0.3.0
0xChat v1.4.0
Hodl Hodl Discontinues Support for Most Altcoins as Payment Method
Music Credits
Protofunk by Kevin MacLeod
Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/4247-protofunk
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Ethernight Club by Kevin MacLeod
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/7612-ethernight-club
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Website
https://satoshis-plebs.com
Podcasting 2.0 Apps available at http://podcastapps.com and Value4Value information page available here: https://value4value.info
McIntosh can be reached by email at [email protected] and on Twitter at @McIntoshFinTech. His mastodon handle is @[email protected] and his Nostr. Kenshin can be reached on Twitter at @kenshin_ninja or on Nostr. Kenshin’s email is [email protected]. You can also follow the Satoshi’s Plebs podcast account on Nostr. We are looking forward to hearing from you!
We are looking forward to hearing from you!
[00:00:01]
McIntosh:
What is up, Pleb Nation? Today is November 15th, and this is episode 184 of Satoshi's Plebs. I'm Macintosh.
[00:00:10] Kenshin:
And I am Kenshin. And today's episode is bitcoin is for everyone.
[00:00:46] McIntosh:
Alright. So we'll jump right on into our price information. I need to look this up, Kenshin. Last week, we were lower. I do not remember exactly. I actually meant to make a note of it. Oh, well. It was 70 something. As we record, we are at 88,000 let me actually double check. It's supposed to have that up. Sorry. $88,145. We will look up do you have the European price there, the EU price? It's 83,000
[00:01:28] Kenshin:
€750.
[00:01:29] McIntosh:
Doctor. Darrell Bock Okay. We had an all time high November 13th UTC time at approximately $93,200 I don't have an exact figure for that, but it was right around there. So we had a nice kinda little top, and we've settled back down. We're I don't know if we're consolidating or what. We'll see, but we have definitely gone up in the last week. So it's been kind of nice, for the miners out there. The hash price, basically how much they're earning for their hash power has gone up, And, we we we're getting a little break because it's been tough for, frankly, for a few months. So, that is good to see.
[00:02:19] Kenshin:
Yep. And we are at block height 800 700,342. The transaction fees are a low priority, 10 such per v byte, and we have around 258,000, unconfirmed transactions. Okay.
[00:02:43] McIntosh:
So we've gone up in our transactions unconfirmed. We've gone up in our mempool fees. There I don't know exactly what's going on. I don't know if they're minting a new thing or what. I I don't, or if this is just general traffic build up, but it's definitely picked up. But even at 10 sets per vbyte, it only ends up being a couple of dollars. Right? Yeah. It's a dollar 23, maybe? Am I reading that right? I think I am.
[00:03:11] Kenshin:
Yeah. I can see a lot of OP return, transactions which indicate some form of data and images.
[00:03:24] McIntosh:
So that would you're right. That would typically be how they would do, I don't know, a rune or or whatever. I don't keep Yeah. The ruins. I don't even keep an ear to the ground for that stuff. So I don't know what they're doing, but every once in a while, it just kinda bumps up. Traffic picks up, and then you'll notice it'll die off, again. So alright. So tonight's topic is Bitcoin is for everyone. And, I'll be honest, you guys, some of you have been with me for a long time. You know, I get a little a little irritated sometimes. And I was reading, x, which maybe I should not be doing so much. But I was reading x a couple of days ago, and I came across this post. And I I just I'm gonna read this and I'm not the person I don't think the person is being malicious or or anything.
I'm not gonna tell you who it was. They're reasonably well known. It's somebody that I follow on Twitter and they give a lot of good information. So I don't wanna dismiss them. But I do wanna talk specifically about this post, because I actually think this is really important. So I want to read the post first, and then Ken Chen and I will talk about it. The kind of volume required to make Bitcoin go up this high. So he posted this, on 10th. So actually it wasn't even as high as it is now. Coinciding with a Trump victory and a lack of retail cinema is very alarming to me. Who is buying right now? We can only guess and that unknown is what is keeping me up at night. So with all respect, first of all, you need to get some more sleep.
But we're we're gonna talk about this and and and here's my angle. One of my precepts, one of my foundational pieces of Bitcoin is that Bitcoin is for everyone. It is not for the elite. It is not for the bankers. It's not for the governments. It's not for the poor people out in the jungle. Not to categorize people, but, you know, it is literally for everyone. It always has been. The the idea certainly early on is that Bitcoin was going to be this sound money, this medium of exchange, this uncontrollable, medium of exchange. Right? I'm going to go to you directly and say, oh, I want that. You want some Bitcoin. I pay for it directly to you. We don't have any intermediaries, and we're done.
But at the same time, I think a lot of people have trouble wrapping their head around the idea that Bitcoin is for everyone. Bitcoin, as a US citizen, and I've brought this up, I've even brought this up recently. Russia is probably our number one, you know, enemy. Certainly was in my childhood back in the eighties as we were growing up, in the middle of the cold war. And I distinctly remember Ronald Reagan, for example, with his famous speech saying, Gorbachev, tear that wall down. Right? I lived through all of that. And prior to kind of the Soviet Union crumbling, Russia was very much or the Soviet Union was very much on our minds as Americans. We were worried about nuclear war. Okay?
But I am sitting right here tonight telling you that Bitcoin is just as much for Russia as it is for the United States. It is just as much for the citizens of Russia as it is for the citizens of the United States. What are your thoughts, Kinshan?
[00:07:20] Kenshin:
Yeah. I agree. I mean and we see that, here in Europe with the European Central Bank Mhmm. That we see now that they are freaking out, that they say that the Bitcoiners are early to Bitcoin and Right. They will have an advantage if and when the price goes up. So now they stop saying that Bitcoin is a scam. Right. And they they start to admit that in case it really keeps going up, then those early Bitcoiners will have an advantage. And and they can see that they have no control over it. And they are freaking out. They are. And the funny thing about that is
[00:08:01] McIntosh:
they have made a 180 on that. They have completely turned around in a very short period of time from saying that Bitcoin was a joke. Bitcoin is worthless, Bitcoin is never gonna go anywhere to, oh my god, what have those Bitcoin people done? We gotta stop this. And, you know, especially those early people who, man, they're gonna be like really, really rich. It's like, yes. And they had the most risk and the most vision, frankly.
[00:08:35] Kenshin:
Yeah. And anyone who had could have the chance to buy Bitcoin early on. So it was literally for everyone and anyone could benefit. And honestly,
[00:08:46] McIntosh:
very few people from early on kept their Bitcoin. I've told my story here a number of times. I bought my first Bitcoin at $300 a coin back in 2013, and I I do not have that Bitcoin anymore, unfortunately. And I did not put all of my net worth into Bitcoin as soon as I figured out that Bitcoin was, you know, a really good thing. Because if I did, my net worth would be a lot more than what it is today. So I we are really not talking about that many people, and I think it's just, man. Well, I don't wanna get off on that rabbit trail. Honestly, we should maybe do a separate episode about that whole thing with the with the European Central Bank.
But the federal bank here in the United States, our Fed Reserve, did something very similar and suspiciously very much at the same time. It's almost like they coordinated it, and it's very, very similar talk. These institutions are waking up realizing that Bitcoin is actually a threat. But the problem is the cat's out of the bag. There's no way they're going to be able to shut Bitcoin down. There's no way they're going to be able to make it illegal and they cannot come and take my Bitcoin. They cannot because it's just words that are in my head. Plain and simple.
Right? So anyways, I just, I don't know. This thing, I don't, I truly don't even quite understand where this person is coming from, what they're worried. He's worried about this lack of retail sentiment. First of all, he mean he says that. And first of all, actually, on November 11th, I checked Coinbase is actually the 21st most popular app on the in the app store. So retail actually is kind of FOMO ing in right on time. We see this every cycle. This is nothing different. I believe when we pass $100,000 that retail is really going to be FOMO ing in late as always. Right?
So I really wouldn't worry about FOMO. I think I actually, I don't wanna read into this too much because it's very unclear what they're actually thinking. But whether Bitcoin volume comes from, you know, MicroStrategy or maybe Jeff Bezos dumps a bunch of his Amazon stock, which he has been, and starts buying Bitcoin. I don't know. Is that fair? Well, I don't know. I I guess it is because he has money and he wants Bitcoin, so go buy Bitcoin. I'm not gonna judge that. Is it governments? There are people on Twitter who talk about, well, the US government or any government, although I well, I'm not gonna say that. I think it's, I was gonna say, I think it's people they talk about the US government more often than not, and and that's fine. But I think they mean any government shouldn't have Bitcoin.
And again, how do you do that? Okay. You keep your USD over here, your US dollars that are backed by nothing and we'll keep the sound money to ourselves. That that's just not realistic. No. That's not how it works.
[00:12:38] Kenshin:
And that's the beauty of Bitcoin. That's why it exists in the first place. So no one can dictate who gets it. Exactly. No one can really control it. So Exactly. That's the whole purpose behind it. So anyone can have it, any government, any country, any individual. Kids can have Bitcoin that cannot have a normal bank account. Poor people that cannot, again, open a bank account and Right. For the cards can have Bitcoin, get paid in Bitcoin and use it. So it's for everyone. I heard a,
[00:13:13] McIntosh:
a great story earlier this week and I it was on a podcast. I don't remember which. They were talking about being down in El Salvador, at a conference, that that goes on down there, and I can't remember if it was this year or last year. But they were talking to, like, a taxi driver or someone like that, kind of a common person. And they were talking about Bitcoin. And of course, El Salvador is a country that's made Bitcoin legal tender. It's now been a couple of years since that happened. So it's kind of had some time to percolate. And this person was talking about how they'd never been able to save before.
And now because of Bitcoin, because of a essentially because of a digital wallet that they didn't have to go to the bank and this and that and the other, they could save and they were, and they were saving in something that's a sound money, that's a solid asset. Something that, certainly seems like for the near future is going to be going one direction, which is up, You know? So I love stories like that. I don't care if BlackRock makes a bunch of money off Bitcoin. Those are the people that I want to win because BlackRock is gonna make money whether it's off of a Bitcoin ETF or something else.
That cab driver down in El Salvador, they have one shot. They have one shot, and that's it. And is that person going to become rich off of Bitcoin? Probably not. But the reality is if they actually do save their money, and they're wise about it, their lives will be better down the road and their children's lives will be better down the road. And as someone who has children, that's something that I want. I want to hand them a world that's better off than what I'm, than the one that I'm in. Does that I think that made sense. Did that make sense, Kishan? Yeah. Of course. Okay. Right? And, of course, we try to pass value to our next generations. It's,
[00:15:33] Kenshin:
it's what Bitcoin is about. Hard money, store of value, generational wealth, eventually.
[00:15:41] McIntosh:
So to people who are worried about where Bitcoin is going and these governments that are using Bitcoin, look, the United States, first of all, I don't think they're the first one. Well, they're definitely not. El Salvador and Bhutan have certainly been involved long before this. But even aside from that, I don't think they're the first country, if they build this strategic Bitcoin reserve to stack sats, right? So to speak to stacks and Bitcoin. They won't be the last. You will see countries all over Europe, all over Asia, and I hope down in South America and Africa as well, building their own version of the strategic Bitcoin reserve. There are people on Twitter now who are calling in the United States. They're calling on the states to do Bitcoin reserves. And I think that's a great idea because we have a financial system here.
Well, it's not just here in the United States. We have a financial system that's crumbling, and it needs to be replaced. And I'm looking around going, is there anything better to replace it? Well, no. I guess we'll do Bitcoin. Right?
[00:16:57] Kenshin:
Yeah. And I have another answer to this person who is worried about who is buying Bitcoin right now. What was the previous all time high? It was back in 2021. It was 69 k. Right. Adjusted to inflation, in today's money, it would be 70 8, right? Somewhere around this. It's somewhere around there, certainly, yes. So we have passed that now. But if we think about it mathematically speaking, we have half the Bitcoin supply right now and if we would have kept the same demand as back then 3 years ago, but we didn't have any of the US stocks talking about reserves, we didn't have so much micro strategy, they were just starting up Right. Stacking.
I mean, every month that passes, more and more people get into Bitcoin. I mean, just by natural speaking, Bitcoin needs to go up if the demand is at least the same as before.
[00:18:04] McIntosh:
If you have more people using it, then you you will see the price go up. If you have less, if you have less Bitcoin being mined, the price is going to go up, and and that is what we are seeing. We had the halvening back in April of this year. We're only mining 450 blocks, which on a good day, not 400 I'm sorry, 450 Bitcoin a day, roughly. And that is roughly on a good day, what the ETFs alone here in the United States are buying. So if you start stacking ETFs. Yeah. If you start stacking other things on top of that, the demand is far going to outstrip the supply, and the natural reaction to that, the logical reaction to that is the price is going to go up. So I'm not into price predictions, but this cycle, well, I do think this cycle will be a lot better than the last cycle. The last cycle got
[00:19:12] Kenshin:
And had the China ban. Right. It had the STX.
[00:19:15] McIntosh:
Right. It was FTX and and a number of these other shenanigans going on that that really handicap. We call it kneecapped. The the, the price. I don't think 69,000 or whatever exactly it got to was should have been the high. I think it should have been higher than that, And we would not even be at the all time high at this point, in my opinion. Now I have no way of proving that, but if you look at the craziness that was going on with FTX and these other companies, It was it was just pure insanity. So they were definitely affecting the market, and that won't be happening this time around. And what we will see is things going in the right direction, positive things.
More companies coming on board buying Bitcoin for their treasury. If the United States gets involved, that's a huge deal. If they do get involved, probably before this cycle is over, there will be other nations who will publicly announce it, that they are doing so, and so on and so forth. So it could be a very fun ride. There are people who talk about this is now gonna be the super cycle. We're not gonna pull back after this, right, and all that. And my take on that is very simple. It's like, well, when it happens, it happens. Until that happens, I'm going to assume it's going to do the same thing that it's done every cycle in the past. Now maybe it doesn't drop down 70 or 80% like it's done in the past. Maybe it's a little less volatile. Maybe it's 50. Maybe it's 40. I don't know, but I still think we're gonna see a significant drop. It's just the way that the markets work, and until we get to the point where Bitcoin is well integrated into the systems and whatever, I just don't I don't see that kind of leveling off. It will one day in in the future, but I think it may be a little further off than than we would like.
[00:21:30] Kenshin:
Once everybody adopts it, of course, then it's gonna be much more stable. Once we have prices set in Bitcoin and most of products, then it's gonna be less volatile. But that's we're a long way from that point, so it's gonna be still volatile until then. Alright. Well, I think and because of time
[00:21:52] McIntosh:
time, I think we should go ahead and move on. I think we've probably also covered that pretty well. I wanna make sure we give enough attention to these other things that we, may have kinda skimmed over last week. We did have some support this week. Our old friend, Gulag Bound, boosted in, while he was listening to the last episode, and said, missed you comrade, buy the dip. And short and sweet as he typically is, and sent a a row sticks, 1111, so 1,111 sat, and I certainly appreciate that. I'm glad, glad to see you back around, and, you know, we're gonna, I think Kenshin and I'll be doing this every week.
I don't see a reason why we would not be at this point. We're still kinda getting to know each other and all that, but I think overall, I think Kenshin, not to put you on the spot, but I feel like we've we've been doing pretty good. So
[00:22:57] Kenshin:
Yeah. It's a good start. Yep. So,
[00:23:00] McIntosh:
we did have a total of 2,000 boosted and streamed, in addition well, including that boost. So I appreciate that again, Gulag bound, and I hope you enjoy, the additional commentary that we'll be having. Alright. We're gonna move on to news and notes. There's actually a fair amount this week, and I wanna take some time to unpack this. Alright. And, Kenshin, I'm sorry I do not have these all listed in the hedge doc, but we're gonna get through this. Then one of the things that just actually came up today, I was telling, Kenshin about this just a few minutes ago.
I actually just came across this about 2 hours ago. Twitter has gotten so busy with everybody all at Twitter about Bitcoin. It's getting hard to keep up with the feed, and maybe I just need to kinda dump the whole thing, but I don't know. We do find out stuff from it. It's one of those things, but I think there's some fairly reputable information that's come out. Now I will say that I am not 100% sure about this, but this smells right, if that makes sense. So for those of you who think I just love Trump and everything, you're about to find out that I I don't. I can certainly say that he does wrong things. And if this is true, I'm going to say flat out, this is a really bad idea. I'm just gonna read this, and and then we'll talk about it for just a minute. President Trump and the upcoming Department of Government Efficiency, which I just just right there. That's just funny. But, yeah. They are exploring a federal blockchain based election voting and identity verification system.
According to sources familiar with the matter, the system will be built in partnership between X, Cardano, which is kind of the that would be the blockchain part of it, Hyperledger and Hedera. Ouch. Legislation will federally require all states to implement the e vote platform to ensure election integrity across all the United States. According to the sources, President Trump insists on implementing a system to eliminate voter fraud as he fears foul play in 2020 8. I'm sure he does. You can agree or disagree. I believe that he thought that the 2020 election was stolen. I think that's a fair statement. You may disagree with that and think that that did not happen.
I do believe that there is some level of voter fraud that goes on in the United States. Now I'm sure that the country that you're listening to, listening in is perfect and y'all don't have voter fraud. I'm not suggesting that it's half the votes or I don't know, and I don't know what level, but I certainly know with our current systems that it's possible. And because of that, given the fact that, say in the last election, roughly a 140,000,000 people voted, or there were a 140,000,000 votes, I'm sure some of those were fraudulent.
Okay? So I wanna be very Were there dead people voting? I suppose. Is that something that So far, I've not heard evidence of that in this election. I have seen heard people say that that has happened. And I don't wanna go down too deep into this because we start sounding like conspiracy theorists and all this kind of stuff. I do think it's important that we have validity of our vote. And I do think that to keep votes from being tampered with, or anything like that, I think that's important. But this is probably really not a good idea for multiple reasons. And by the way, this Charles Hoskinson, I always butcher his name. I apologize on a continual basis, but the guy who created Cardano, okay, he's been kind of parading around for the last few days acting all like everything was great. And I think this is why.
Now, understand that Cardano is headed up by him. If he were not there, there would not be a card a Cardano. And so you're accepting essentially a centralized source with, Blockchain. But I would even argue Genshin, that it shouldn't be done with a blockchain. There are other technologies that we can use to verify ourselves. We don't need to do this necessarily.
[00:28:19] Kenshin:
And it should not be based on a centralized company, essentially. Right. But it can be corrupted.
[00:28:25] McIntosh:
Exactly. Exactly. Now I'm sure he's going to do very well, but if you waive a a decent amount of money under somebody's nose, there are a lot of people in this world who will frankly crumble under that, who'll do whatever you want. So there's that aspect of it. I also think it's going to end up being very complex. And I I don't know. I just I'm not saying, by the way, just to be really clear, we should not be replacing this with Bitcoin or the Bitcoin blockchain or something like that. That's not what I'm saying at all. I just think the there's this mentality in the alt coin world, in the casino coin world, that blockchains will go into every aspect of life. I just as a software engineer, I don't see the use case.
I mean, I guess it's a permanent record, maybe until it's not. I don't know. I don't know all the ins and outs of Cardano. So I don't I don't know what that implications are of that. But I guess that's kind of the general idea, but I just don't I I think this is a really bad idea. So president Trump does have people around him who, you know, they're not Bitcoin only, and there there are people who are gonna promote stuff like this. Apparently, Charles has the ear of the president for some reason. And so, you know, he's he's promoting this.
I think that's gonna be rather unfortunate. Anyways. Oh, just to offend everyone in the UK, I'll go ahead and say this. I saw this saying apparently now in the UK, if you just view what amounts to right wing propaganda, or at least what they call that, you can go to jail. That's just great. I don't know. If you do what? Like view like I'm on Twitter, and I'm, you know, scrolling, and I click on somebody's right wing feed, whatever that means. I could go to jail in the if I live in the UK. Have you I actually reached that point. I'm curious your thoughts on this specifically because I assume that you've been able to follow this a little better than I can. I get Sky News and I watch it, but it's filtered.
They don't really talk about stuff like this ironically enough.
[00:31:16] Kenshin:
I I don't think anyone's talking about this outside the UK. I mean, it sounds too crazy to to even mention.
[00:31:24] McIntosh:
I do know that people are going to jail just for for posting stuff that they say right wing. I mean, that is that's been going on for a while, and there have been a number of people who are doing that, which is, as an American, that's just like four levels of crazy to me. I mean, I don't understand it, but they seem to be accepting it. I don't know. Maybe we're not being told about how they're not accepting it. I don't know, but this is just like making that worse. So, I do wanna put this out there. This is sad if this is true. I don't, again, this is Twitter, and I haven't seen verification of this, but this does look official.
Swan Bitcoin, who's one of the major Bitcoin companies here in the United States for custody of Bitcoin with their different products, put out something today saying, which is today is November 14th, and that runs into this in just a second. They're saying, our international banking partner relationship is ending soon. Unfortunately, this means Swan will no longer be able to support clients outside the United States. Please withdraw all Bitcoin from your Swan account by December 1, 2024. So literally
[00:32:49] Kenshin:
2 weeks and just a couple of days from now. And if you have I'm curious if that has something to do with the mic that we talked last time, this
[00:32:59] McIntosh:
European law that's come in effect in December 1st. That's a good question. I'm not sure. It very likely may, actually. I'm glad you brought that up. Swan's had some troubles, and frankly, Swan as a company is not a place I would recommend. I don't normally recommend solutions like theirs, but if I were, it would not be Swan. I'll just say that and move on. Okay. In news that I know is true, 18 states in the United States. So that is almost half of our states, by the way. We've got 50, so that's just under 25. 18 states in the United States are suing the SEC, our securities and exchange commission headed by our old friend, Kenshin, Gary Gensler. I know you love him.
He's a great guy. They're suing the SEC for unconstitutional overreach of the Bitcoin and crypto industry under Gary Gensler. That's awesome. I love it. Yeah. Alright.
[00:34:12] Kenshin:
Yeah. They get some, courage now that Trump is elected, maybe. They can go Funny how that works.
[00:34:19] McIntosh:
Yeah. Do you have any, news items yourself? I actually don't think I have anymore. No. Some software news, but Yeah. We do have software updates. Yes. Let me look at one other thing real quick. I'll just cut some dead space out. Alright. Kenshin, why don't you go through the first couple of these software updates?
[00:34:41] Kenshin:
Yeah. So we have, Zeus Wallet, version 0.9.2.
[00:34:48] McIntosh:
So that would make it not production ready, maybe? Normally?
[00:34:56] Kenshin:
Yeah. It's not version 1 yet. Is that what you mean? But it's been around for a while. True. It's been a very
[00:35:04] McIntosh:
good wallet overall. Have you used it?
[00:35:07] Kenshin:
I've used it with my own, Lightning
[00:35:11] McIntosh:
node. Okay.
[00:35:13] Kenshin:
And I used it at the same time with an Albi Okay. Lightning account as well. So they worked in tandem, in parallel, very good together. It's it's a really good wallet, especially for lightning. Great.
[00:35:29] McIntosh:
I have loaded it at one point or the other, and then I never really used it. So they used to have features in it to, like, control your own node. Right? Yeah. But I would say if you run your own nodes and have lightning in your own node, then that's a must have, I would say. Okay. I think that's actually why I did it because I did have a node. I'm not running lightning right now, although I'm looking at setting up another one. But I'm pretty sure that's actually why I was using it. And yeah. Yeah. So they marched along. And a a good new feature they launched,
[00:36:06] Kenshin:
it's exporting transaction history to spreadsheets.
[00:36:09] McIntosh:
Oh, that's good.
[00:36:11] Kenshin:
Yeah. That's quite good. So if you use it a lot, that's good to keep your records
[00:36:16] McIntosh:
in, Excel file or CSV format. I am holding out hope that Trump just eliminates the IRS, but I don't think that's gonna happen. So maybe I should use that. Oh, man. Alright. Next one.
[00:36:34] Kenshin:
Next one, we have a BTC pay version 2.
[00:36:38] McIntosh:
Okay. So that's a major range. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:36:44] Kenshin:
And, let's see. What's the highlight is Yeah. It's not actually, it doesn't sound like a version 2 when we see the features. It's mostly about, localization, interface adjustments, new sidebar navigation, new onboarding for new users.
[00:37:10] McIntosh:
I wonder why they made it a major release like that. That's interesting.
[00:37:16] Kenshin:
Maybe they decide to change their their version. I mean, some software they they like to go yeah. Major release every year or Yeah. It could be. Absolutely.
[00:37:27] McIntosh:
Yeah. It is solid software. I know I've not used it personally, and it's Java based if I'm understanding correctly or remembering correctly, which I am not a Java fan. But to be honest, it's been around for a long time. It's providing a very solid set of services for, like, a small business, this kind of thing.
[00:37:48] Kenshin:
Yeah. It's very good for this.
[00:37:50] McIntosh:
Good stuff if you're out there using BTCPay. Let me go ahead and take Robosats here. Again, this is alpha software. In fact, they even label it as such, v0.7.1 alpha. It's a fixes and performance improvements release. This is one of the tools that you can use to, buy, crypt not crypto, bitcoin off not off of an exchange, like peer to peer. And I've done episodes in the past. I don't I think I included Robosats in that roundup. I did a roundup of different, peer to peer, tools like this at one point in the past year or so. Maybe it's time we go back and kinda take a look at those, actually, because things have changed a good bit, I'm sure, as I always do. And I love getting people off of the exchanges.
And one of the important I mean, if you're buying bitcoin, if you're not mining it, you have to buy it. Right? How do you buy it? That gets a little more difficult. So, this is one of the solutions for that.
[00:39:07] Kenshin:
Alright? Yeah. And if you don't want to to deal with, KYC, know your customer Right. With some companies, then that's a good solution. Then you deal with but, of course, dealing with another human that you don't know can also be risky in some ways. So
[00:39:25] McIntosh:
Now, looking at I don't know about Robosats offhand, but some of these, peer to peer products have implemented some pretty sophisticated tools in order to protect the users. So, that technology is continuing to evolve. I hope it's not frozen out by the EU. Sorry. They they were help me out. Were they not doing some legislation? I think it got pushed down or whatever, but trying to block peer to peer, Bitcoin exchange like that. Does it does that ring a bell with you?
[00:40:10] Kenshin:
I'd had to look it up. I remember they closed down the local Bitcoin, but was that in US?
[00:40:17] McIntosh:
No. I don't think so.
[00:40:21] Kenshin:
Well They've been fighting, of course, all those Anyways.
[00:40:25] McIntosh:
Websites. Yeah. I we should probably go back, take a look at those at some point, maybe spend an episode reviewing them. Jam, version 0.3.0, I do want to highlight this. So they've got a new version. It is a web interface for JoinMarket. So JoinMarket is a man, I hope I don't mess this up. Boost in if I am or not, and let me know. But JoinMarket is a CoinJoin implementation. It's a way to, anonymize your Bitcoin. Okay? If I go and buy my Bitcoin off of Coinbase, for example, that's all tracked. And not everyone really wants that for whatever reason. And, you can you can use something like join market to, to anonymize your Bitcoin to kinda swap it out with a bunch of other people, and you end up with anonymous Bitcoin.
[00:41:28] Kenshin:
Yeah. You essentially combine the bit your Bitcoin with 10 other people, for example, and share it back in equal amounts Right. Between you, and then they don't know if someone is very harsh. To be tracked. Now,
[00:41:43] McIntosh:
from what I'm understanding, the chain analysis tools that are out there are proving to not really be that correct. Like, statistically, they're not actually getting the right answers a significant portion of the time. So I I'm actually not even really convinced that this is even necessary, but it would certainly if if I were concerned about my privacy, it'd be something I'd be looking at. Let me put it that way. And it's one of the best tools out there, and it's actually a way for you to make some money. You can run, part of this network.
This is something that I've looked at and basically participate. And you can earn, yield. You can earn sats on that. So I'm not quite willing to risk my Bitcoin, but I don't know.
[00:42:40] Kenshin:
I'm trying to figure out. I used it, with some of my KYC Okay. Bitcoin.
[00:42:47] McIntosh:
I used it does with that type of Did you, like, install it on, like, an Umbrel or something like that? Start starts 9. Start 9. Very similar. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I wanna set it up Very easy to use. On a VPS, like, instance, not not on like a start 9 or an umbrella because maybe it's because just my internet here at the house just isn't that great, but to me, it makes a lot more sense to actually do that on a VPS. There's a project, Citadel. One of their goals is actually to build that kind of framework for a for a virtual private server is what a VPS means. And as like a AWS instance or something like that.
And that is an area of the these virtual servers that I have a great deal of, experience in, so I'm very comfortable in there. Not necessarily something for the kinda the average person. Start 9, Umbrel. These tools, they do great with their little web interfaces. They run on a little computer right there in your house. Sorry. I don't know why I got off on that track, but that's free. Alright. I'm gonna go ahead and do this next one, and then you can talk about the last one. I don't know how they say this. It sounds like a great project. I'm gonna say it's 0xchat, and it is, the idea is they're building kind of a chat based like like a Telegram.
A lot of people have used Telegram. Telegram is a centralized service who very recently, the CEO was actually arrested, for I don't know. He was in custody for a day or 2 at least. I think he was released. He made some kind of deal with the French government,
[00:44:39] Kenshin:
which Jamaica arrested when he landed in Paris.
[00:44:42] McIntosh:
His private jet landed in Paris and he got arrested on the tarmac, which that should give you great pause about if you're using Telegram for private things. This is a secure chat that's built on the Nostra protocol. So Nostra, of course, is this open source peer to peer protocol that's being developed. It's got a lot of Bitcoin integrations, so we end up talking about it a decent amount. It's primarily being used as kind of a Twitter alternative, but this is basically an app that's targeting more of the group chat kind of thing. So I am interested to see where this goes.
I think it could be very interesting. Of course it's open source, all of that kind of stuff. This is version 1.4.0. So, they are adding support for this is not initial so Cashew wallet is like an e cash service. This is not initial support, but they're adding some other things, some other functionality there. They've updated the UX. They've added compatibility with Android 9, which forgive me, I that seems old, prison. That's quite old, it is. Okay. So they're going backwards there, not forwards. And, support for kind 15 encrypted file messages, which you'll just have to I don't know what that means. It's some type of file encryption. I know that, but I have never heard of kind 15.
So, anyways, overall, if you're interested in that or already using it, you should definitely, upgrade to it. My problem with all this stuff, Kenshin, is frankly, there's just there's so many different things going on now. I try to use different things, and then people aren't on it, and they're not here, they're not there. I need a single dashboard that I do something and it just blast it out to to all these things.
[00:46:53] Kenshin:
Yeah. And this actually this, 0 x chat or as I call it, OX chat Mhmm. Is, is quite good.
[00:47:03] McIntosh:
Have you you've used this? Redundant. Yeah. I
[00:47:07] Kenshin:
I did, but it's, with some friends I experimented a bit. But if you have another Nostr app that supports encrypted messages, like Amethyst, for example, that I also use, then you don't need this. You get the same messages from the same people, and
[00:47:27] McIntosh:
it's just a better interface for transfer chats. Right. They're trying to build a better interface, which there's nothing wrong with that, but I didn't realize that this okay. That makes a lot of sense. Thanks for that.
[00:47:40] Kenshin:
Yeah. So for example, as you say, you want everything in 1, then you could have amethyst or something similar.
[00:47:47] McIntosh:
You don't need the extra ups. We're we're running over and I don't wanna take too much time on this. But this is actually a real problem for me. At least I perceive it as so. And to be honest, I got on chat GPT the other night, and I basically said, okay chat GPT, I wanna write a Python program that when I post to either Twitter or, Nostra, that it would post the alternative. Right? It turns out in Twitter, for free, you can't it goes one way, but not the other, the free. I don't remember offhand. But like, I I it actually looks doable, and it doesn't even look like crazy code. Now, it would not be something that I'd be like packaging up and selling or giving away or anything like that. But like, I'm on Twitter all the time because let's be honest, that's where people are.
And I don't have time to cross post between Twitter and Noster, and which that sounds like I'm trying to be, I don't know, whatever, but it's, it's the truth. I don't get on Noster because it's off to the left and I'm over here on Twitter. Oh, and I retweet this or I quote tweet this or whatever, or I just put up a post and then it never gets to Nostra. And then I go over to Nostra occasionally and I scroll through it and I'm like, oh, that's good. Oh, that's good. It really is a different experience. And I love the lack of algorithms. I love the lack of manipulation that goes on in the background, whether we like it or not, you know?
Anyways, I may actually take some time and do that because the code is only a couple hundred lines long. Mhmm. Chat GPT is actually, with Python especially, gotten pretty good at that kind of stuff. But yeah. Anyways, that's enough about that. Do you wanna go ahead and do HODL HODL?
[00:49:50] Kenshin:
Yeah. So HODL HODL is similar to Robosat. It's a peer to peer platform, and, they stopped supporting a lot of the shitcoins.
[00:50:03] McIntosh:
Okay.
[00:50:05] Kenshin:
So I don't know how many they supported before, but from now on, they will only support Bitcoin and Stablecoins.
[00:50:14] McIntosh:
Oh, okay.
[00:50:16] Kenshin:
So I guess they supported more before and
[00:50:19] McIntosh:
Stablecoins are something we probably need to be discussing. We need to add that to our list. But there's a lot going on there. You can now do stable coins essentially on Bitcoin or on lightning really. And the it's kinda like this Twitter message I posted earlier or talked about earlier. People are getting their underwear in a twist, about that because God forbid we do something that's not pure Bitcoin. And there are actually and maybe they're reasonable arguments, but there are people who are arguing that using Tether, for example, is promoting, the dollar hegemony.
Probably not saying that word quite right, but the the US dollar, the federal, the global reserve currency. Right? It literally is promoting that because of what they do in the back end and all that kind of stuff. And I I don't know. I do know, to be honest, there are people who their local currency is just like crazy. Like, what's the place, Nigeria. Nigeria? Right. Nigeria with the with their silly e naira or whatever. I mean, that is insanity. And if I lived in Nigeria and and I could not handle the volatility of Bitcoin, we love Bitcoin, and Bitcoin goes up over the long term, but Bitcoin is volatile.
You think I wanna stack my money in in Tether rather than the e naira? Well, you I would. So I don't know how to kinda separate all that out. Maybe that's a discussion we can have, whatever. Anyway, sorry. Sorry. All right. Well, I'm glad to see they're pulling everything out. That's that's good. I look, these are attack surfaces, if nothing else. Just aside from the fact that they're promoting these other things that that are not really good in the long term. These are attack surfaces that can be you compromise the app through that, and then, you know, you could lose your Bitcoin. So Yeah. And then you have a big,
[00:52:50] Kenshin:
target audience that that they see that you support so many coins. Right. And for example, if I if I see how to hold and support 10 different coins, I will say no. I'll go to another platform that support Bitcoin or or a couple of them at least, and it will feel more safe, more secure, and more focused on on what it needs to do.
[00:53:13] McIntosh:
Alright, Kenshin. Let's wrap this up. Why don't you, chat for just a second about, about how people can support the show?
[00:53:22] Kenshin:
Yeah. So if you want to support the show, of course, you can, share this podcast with your friends and family members. You can help us by posting a question to to us on the podcasting 2.0 platform. Okay. For example, on fountain, you can leave a comment and boost the show, and that will help us a lot because, we don't run any ads here. And running ads would not also be good for the podcast because we want to stay impartial. Mhmm. And how do you say we want to stay? Neutral. Neutral. Exactly. So we we need to criticize the companies that come out, in the news every week. And if it's a company that they have asked us to support them, we might be yeah.
We might not be honest with you, so we want to stay impartial. So, yeah, don't hesitate to to tell your friends about the podcast, and don't hesitate to get in contact with us. We also want to improve and find new ways to interact with the audience. And, yes, you can contact us through, by email. We we have the email, makintosh@satoshis plebs.com.
[00:54:50] McIntosh:
Yeah. I need to set you up an email on there, by the way. We need to get that taken care of. So we'll actually, I'll go ahead and do that. So you can send Kenshin an email at Kenshin@satoshis dash plebs.com as well, and I'll go ahead and get that set up.
[00:55:10] Kenshin:
Right. And, of course, you can find us on, on Twitter. You can find me as Kenshin_, what is it? Ninja.
[00:55:23] McIntosh:
Ninja. Right. Yeah. And I'm, Macintosh Fintech on Twitter. We both have Nostra as well, but the the keys for Nostr are not really human readable. I pinned mine to the top of my Twitter post, and I'm also going to add this is all in our show notes as well so that you can go there to, if you need to to to see this.
[00:55:53] Kenshin:
Yep. And I have done the same. So and I check from time to time, for sure, a couple of times a week.
[00:56:02] McIntosh:
Awesome. Yeah. I need to get more diligent about that. I actually probably do check a couple times a week, but it's just not not part of my cycle. And like I was talking about, I need to be able to do kind of both at the same time because I personally have a feeling that, you know, Twitter may be around for years, and I just I don't know. I don't wanna lose that audience. But, anyways, I appreciate it. As always, Kenshin, I I want everybody to stay humble. Go out, make it a great week, and we will talk to you all soon. Goodbye.
What is up, Pleb Nation? Today is November 15th, and this is episode 184 of Satoshi's Plebs. I'm Macintosh.
[00:00:10] Kenshin:
And I am Kenshin. And today's episode is bitcoin is for everyone.
[00:00:46] McIntosh:
Alright. So we'll jump right on into our price information. I need to look this up, Kenshin. Last week, we were lower. I do not remember exactly. I actually meant to make a note of it. Oh, well. It was 70 something. As we record, we are at 88,000 let me actually double check. It's supposed to have that up. Sorry. $88,145. We will look up do you have the European price there, the EU price? It's 83,000
[00:01:28] Kenshin:
€750.
[00:01:29] McIntosh:
Doctor. Darrell Bock Okay. We had an all time high November 13th UTC time at approximately $93,200 I don't have an exact figure for that, but it was right around there. So we had a nice kinda little top, and we've settled back down. We're I don't know if we're consolidating or what. We'll see, but we have definitely gone up in the last week. So it's been kind of nice, for the miners out there. The hash price, basically how much they're earning for their hash power has gone up, And, we we we're getting a little break because it's been tough for, frankly, for a few months. So, that is good to see.
[00:02:19] Kenshin:
Yep. And we are at block height 800 700,342. The transaction fees are a low priority, 10 such per v byte, and we have around 258,000, unconfirmed transactions. Okay.
[00:02:43] McIntosh:
So we've gone up in our transactions unconfirmed. We've gone up in our mempool fees. There I don't know exactly what's going on. I don't know if they're minting a new thing or what. I I don't, or if this is just general traffic build up, but it's definitely picked up. But even at 10 sets per vbyte, it only ends up being a couple of dollars. Right? Yeah. It's a dollar 23, maybe? Am I reading that right? I think I am.
[00:03:11] Kenshin:
Yeah. I can see a lot of OP return, transactions which indicate some form of data and images.
[00:03:24] McIntosh:
So that would you're right. That would typically be how they would do, I don't know, a rune or or whatever. I don't keep Yeah. The ruins. I don't even keep an ear to the ground for that stuff. So I don't know what they're doing, but every once in a while, it just kinda bumps up. Traffic picks up, and then you'll notice it'll die off, again. So alright. So tonight's topic is Bitcoin is for everyone. And, I'll be honest, you guys, some of you have been with me for a long time. You know, I get a little a little irritated sometimes. And I was reading, x, which maybe I should not be doing so much. But I was reading x a couple of days ago, and I came across this post. And I I just I'm gonna read this and I'm not the person I don't think the person is being malicious or or anything.
I'm not gonna tell you who it was. They're reasonably well known. It's somebody that I follow on Twitter and they give a lot of good information. So I don't wanna dismiss them. But I do wanna talk specifically about this post, because I actually think this is really important. So I want to read the post first, and then Ken Chen and I will talk about it. The kind of volume required to make Bitcoin go up this high. So he posted this, on 10th. So actually it wasn't even as high as it is now. Coinciding with a Trump victory and a lack of retail cinema is very alarming to me. Who is buying right now? We can only guess and that unknown is what is keeping me up at night. So with all respect, first of all, you need to get some more sleep.
But we're we're gonna talk about this and and and here's my angle. One of my precepts, one of my foundational pieces of Bitcoin is that Bitcoin is for everyone. It is not for the elite. It is not for the bankers. It's not for the governments. It's not for the poor people out in the jungle. Not to categorize people, but, you know, it is literally for everyone. It always has been. The the idea certainly early on is that Bitcoin was going to be this sound money, this medium of exchange, this uncontrollable, medium of exchange. Right? I'm going to go to you directly and say, oh, I want that. You want some Bitcoin. I pay for it directly to you. We don't have any intermediaries, and we're done.
But at the same time, I think a lot of people have trouble wrapping their head around the idea that Bitcoin is for everyone. Bitcoin, as a US citizen, and I've brought this up, I've even brought this up recently. Russia is probably our number one, you know, enemy. Certainly was in my childhood back in the eighties as we were growing up, in the middle of the cold war. And I distinctly remember Ronald Reagan, for example, with his famous speech saying, Gorbachev, tear that wall down. Right? I lived through all of that. And prior to kind of the Soviet Union crumbling, Russia was very much or the Soviet Union was very much on our minds as Americans. We were worried about nuclear war. Okay?
But I am sitting right here tonight telling you that Bitcoin is just as much for Russia as it is for the United States. It is just as much for the citizens of Russia as it is for the citizens of the United States. What are your thoughts, Kinshan?
[00:07:20] Kenshin:
Yeah. I agree. I mean and we see that, here in Europe with the European Central Bank Mhmm. That we see now that they are freaking out, that they say that the Bitcoiners are early to Bitcoin and Right. They will have an advantage if and when the price goes up. So now they stop saying that Bitcoin is a scam. Right. And they they start to admit that in case it really keeps going up, then those early Bitcoiners will have an advantage. And and they can see that they have no control over it. And they are freaking out. They are. And the funny thing about that is
[00:08:01] McIntosh:
they have made a 180 on that. They have completely turned around in a very short period of time from saying that Bitcoin was a joke. Bitcoin is worthless, Bitcoin is never gonna go anywhere to, oh my god, what have those Bitcoin people done? We gotta stop this. And, you know, especially those early people who, man, they're gonna be like really, really rich. It's like, yes. And they had the most risk and the most vision, frankly.
[00:08:35] Kenshin:
Yeah. And anyone who had could have the chance to buy Bitcoin early on. So it was literally for everyone and anyone could benefit. And honestly,
[00:08:46] McIntosh:
very few people from early on kept their Bitcoin. I've told my story here a number of times. I bought my first Bitcoin at $300 a coin back in 2013, and I I do not have that Bitcoin anymore, unfortunately. And I did not put all of my net worth into Bitcoin as soon as I figured out that Bitcoin was, you know, a really good thing. Because if I did, my net worth would be a lot more than what it is today. So I we are really not talking about that many people, and I think it's just, man. Well, I don't wanna get off on that rabbit trail. Honestly, we should maybe do a separate episode about that whole thing with the with the European Central Bank.
But the federal bank here in the United States, our Fed Reserve, did something very similar and suspiciously very much at the same time. It's almost like they coordinated it, and it's very, very similar talk. These institutions are waking up realizing that Bitcoin is actually a threat. But the problem is the cat's out of the bag. There's no way they're going to be able to shut Bitcoin down. There's no way they're going to be able to make it illegal and they cannot come and take my Bitcoin. They cannot because it's just words that are in my head. Plain and simple.
Right? So anyways, I just, I don't know. This thing, I don't, I truly don't even quite understand where this person is coming from, what they're worried. He's worried about this lack of retail sentiment. First of all, he mean he says that. And first of all, actually, on November 11th, I checked Coinbase is actually the 21st most popular app on the in the app store. So retail actually is kind of FOMO ing in right on time. We see this every cycle. This is nothing different. I believe when we pass $100,000 that retail is really going to be FOMO ing in late as always. Right?
So I really wouldn't worry about FOMO. I think I actually, I don't wanna read into this too much because it's very unclear what they're actually thinking. But whether Bitcoin volume comes from, you know, MicroStrategy or maybe Jeff Bezos dumps a bunch of his Amazon stock, which he has been, and starts buying Bitcoin. I don't know. Is that fair? Well, I don't know. I I guess it is because he has money and he wants Bitcoin, so go buy Bitcoin. I'm not gonna judge that. Is it governments? There are people on Twitter who talk about, well, the US government or any government, although I well, I'm not gonna say that. I think it's, I was gonna say, I think it's people they talk about the US government more often than not, and and that's fine. But I think they mean any government shouldn't have Bitcoin.
And again, how do you do that? Okay. You keep your USD over here, your US dollars that are backed by nothing and we'll keep the sound money to ourselves. That that's just not realistic. No. That's not how it works.
[00:12:38] Kenshin:
And that's the beauty of Bitcoin. That's why it exists in the first place. So no one can dictate who gets it. Exactly. No one can really control it. So Exactly. That's the whole purpose behind it. So anyone can have it, any government, any country, any individual. Kids can have Bitcoin that cannot have a normal bank account. Poor people that cannot, again, open a bank account and Right. For the cards can have Bitcoin, get paid in Bitcoin and use it. So it's for everyone. I heard a,
[00:13:13] McIntosh:
a great story earlier this week and I it was on a podcast. I don't remember which. They were talking about being down in El Salvador, at a conference, that that goes on down there, and I can't remember if it was this year or last year. But they were talking to, like, a taxi driver or someone like that, kind of a common person. And they were talking about Bitcoin. And of course, El Salvador is a country that's made Bitcoin legal tender. It's now been a couple of years since that happened. So it's kind of had some time to percolate. And this person was talking about how they'd never been able to save before.
And now because of Bitcoin, because of a essentially because of a digital wallet that they didn't have to go to the bank and this and that and the other, they could save and they were, and they were saving in something that's a sound money, that's a solid asset. Something that, certainly seems like for the near future is going to be going one direction, which is up, You know? So I love stories like that. I don't care if BlackRock makes a bunch of money off Bitcoin. Those are the people that I want to win because BlackRock is gonna make money whether it's off of a Bitcoin ETF or something else.
That cab driver down in El Salvador, they have one shot. They have one shot, and that's it. And is that person going to become rich off of Bitcoin? Probably not. But the reality is if they actually do save their money, and they're wise about it, their lives will be better down the road and their children's lives will be better down the road. And as someone who has children, that's something that I want. I want to hand them a world that's better off than what I'm, than the one that I'm in. Does that I think that made sense. Did that make sense, Kishan? Yeah. Of course. Okay. Right? And, of course, we try to pass value to our next generations. It's,
[00:15:33] Kenshin:
it's what Bitcoin is about. Hard money, store of value, generational wealth, eventually.
[00:15:41] McIntosh:
So to people who are worried about where Bitcoin is going and these governments that are using Bitcoin, look, the United States, first of all, I don't think they're the first one. Well, they're definitely not. El Salvador and Bhutan have certainly been involved long before this. But even aside from that, I don't think they're the first country, if they build this strategic Bitcoin reserve to stack sats, right? So to speak to stacks and Bitcoin. They won't be the last. You will see countries all over Europe, all over Asia, and I hope down in South America and Africa as well, building their own version of the strategic Bitcoin reserve. There are people on Twitter now who are calling in the United States. They're calling on the states to do Bitcoin reserves. And I think that's a great idea because we have a financial system here.
Well, it's not just here in the United States. We have a financial system that's crumbling, and it needs to be replaced. And I'm looking around going, is there anything better to replace it? Well, no. I guess we'll do Bitcoin. Right?
[00:16:57] Kenshin:
Yeah. And I have another answer to this person who is worried about who is buying Bitcoin right now. What was the previous all time high? It was back in 2021. It was 69 k. Right. Adjusted to inflation, in today's money, it would be 70 8, right? Somewhere around this. It's somewhere around there, certainly, yes. So we have passed that now. But if we think about it mathematically speaking, we have half the Bitcoin supply right now and if we would have kept the same demand as back then 3 years ago, but we didn't have any of the US stocks talking about reserves, we didn't have so much micro strategy, they were just starting up Right. Stacking.
I mean, every month that passes, more and more people get into Bitcoin. I mean, just by natural speaking, Bitcoin needs to go up if the demand is at least the same as before.
[00:18:04] McIntosh:
If you have more people using it, then you you will see the price go up. If you have less, if you have less Bitcoin being mined, the price is going to go up, and and that is what we are seeing. We had the halvening back in April of this year. We're only mining 450 blocks, which on a good day, not 400 I'm sorry, 450 Bitcoin a day, roughly. And that is roughly on a good day, what the ETFs alone here in the United States are buying. So if you start stacking ETFs. Yeah. If you start stacking other things on top of that, the demand is far going to outstrip the supply, and the natural reaction to that, the logical reaction to that is the price is going to go up. So I'm not into price predictions, but this cycle, well, I do think this cycle will be a lot better than the last cycle. The last cycle got
[00:19:12] Kenshin:
And had the China ban. Right. It had the STX.
[00:19:15] McIntosh:
Right. It was FTX and and a number of these other shenanigans going on that that really handicap. We call it kneecapped. The the, the price. I don't think 69,000 or whatever exactly it got to was should have been the high. I think it should have been higher than that, And we would not even be at the all time high at this point, in my opinion. Now I have no way of proving that, but if you look at the craziness that was going on with FTX and these other companies, It was it was just pure insanity. So they were definitely affecting the market, and that won't be happening this time around. And what we will see is things going in the right direction, positive things.
More companies coming on board buying Bitcoin for their treasury. If the United States gets involved, that's a huge deal. If they do get involved, probably before this cycle is over, there will be other nations who will publicly announce it, that they are doing so, and so on and so forth. So it could be a very fun ride. There are people who talk about this is now gonna be the super cycle. We're not gonna pull back after this, right, and all that. And my take on that is very simple. It's like, well, when it happens, it happens. Until that happens, I'm going to assume it's going to do the same thing that it's done every cycle in the past. Now maybe it doesn't drop down 70 or 80% like it's done in the past. Maybe it's a little less volatile. Maybe it's 50. Maybe it's 40. I don't know, but I still think we're gonna see a significant drop. It's just the way that the markets work, and until we get to the point where Bitcoin is well integrated into the systems and whatever, I just don't I don't see that kind of leveling off. It will one day in in the future, but I think it may be a little further off than than we would like.
[00:21:30] Kenshin:
Once everybody adopts it, of course, then it's gonna be much more stable. Once we have prices set in Bitcoin and most of products, then it's gonna be less volatile. But that's we're a long way from that point, so it's gonna be still volatile until then. Alright. Well, I think and because of time
[00:21:52] McIntosh:
time, I think we should go ahead and move on. I think we've probably also covered that pretty well. I wanna make sure we give enough attention to these other things that we, may have kinda skimmed over last week. We did have some support this week. Our old friend, Gulag Bound, boosted in, while he was listening to the last episode, and said, missed you comrade, buy the dip. And short and sweet as he typically is, and sent a a row sticks, 1111, so 1,111 sat, and I certainly appreciate that. I'm glad, glad to see you back around, and, you know, we're gonna, I think Kenshin and I'll be doing this every week.
I don't see a reason why we would not be at this point. We're still kinda getting to know each other and all that, but I think overall, I think Kenshin, not to put you on the spot, but I feel like we've we've been doing pretty good. So
[00:22:57] Kenshin:
Yeah. It's a good start. Yep. So,
[00:23:00] McIntosh:
we did have a total of 2,000 boosted and streamed, in addition well, including that boost. So I appreciate that again, Gulag bound, and I hope you enjoy, the additional commentary that we'll be having. Alright. We're gonna move on to news and notes. There's actually a fair amount this week, and I wanna take some time to unpack this. Alright. And, Kenshin, I'm sorry I do not have these all listed in the hedge doc, but we're gonna get through this. Then one of the things that just actually came up today, I was telling, Kenshin about this just a few minutes ago.
I actually just came across this about 2 hours ago. Twitter has gotten so busy with everybody all at Twitter about Bitcoin. It's getting hard to keep up with the feed, and maybe I just need to kinda dump the whole thing, but I don't know. We do find out stuff from it. It's one of those things, but I think there's some fairly reputable information that's come out. Now I will say that I am not 100% sure about this, but this smells right, if that makes sense. So for those of you who think I just love Trump and everything, you're about to find out that I I don't. I can certainly say that he does wrong things. And if this is true, I'm going to say flat out, this is a really bad idea. I'm just gonna read this, and and then we'll talk about it for just a minute. President Trump and the upcoming Department of Government Efficiency, which I just just right there. That's just funny. But, yeah. They are exploring a federal blockchain based election voting and identity verification system.
According to sources familiar with the matter, the system will be built in partnership between X, Cardano, which is kind of the that would be the blockchain part of it, Hyperledger and Hedera. Ouch. Legislation will federally require all states to implement the e vote platform to ensure election integrity across all the United States. According to the sources, President Trump insists on implementing a system to eliminate voter fraud as he fears foul play in 2020 8. I'm sure he does. You can agree or disagree. I believe that he thought that the 2020 election was stolen. I think that's a fair statement. You may disagree with that and think that that did not happen.
I do believe that there is some level of voter fraud that goes on in the United States. Now I'm sure that the country that you're listening to, listening in is perfect and y'all don't have voter fraud. I'm not suggesting that it's half the votes or I don't know, and I don't know what level, but I certainly know with our current systems that it's possible. And because of that, given the fact that, say in the last election, roughly a 140,000,000 people voted, or there were a 140,000,000 votes, I'm sure some of those were fraudulent.
Okay? So I wanna be very Were there dead people voting? I suppose. Is that something that So far, I've not heard evidence of that in this election. I have seen heard people say that that has happened. And I don't wanna go down too deep into this because we start sounding like conspiracy theorists and all this kind of stuff. I do think it's important that we have validity of our vote. And I do think that to keep votes from being tampered with, or anything like that, I think that's important. But this is probably really not a good idea for multiple reasons. And by the way, this Charles Hoskinson, I always butcher his name. I apologize on a continual basis, but the guy who created Cardano, okay, he's been kind of parading around for the last few days acting all like everything was great. And I think this is why.
Now, understand that Cardano is headed up by him. If he were not there, there would not be a card a Cardano. And so you're accepting essentially a centralized source with, Blockchain. But I would even argue Genshin, that it shouldn't be done with a blockchain. There are other technologies that we can use to verify ourselves. We don't need to do this necessarily.
[00:28:19] Kenshin:
And it should not be based on a centralized company, essentially. Right. But it can be corrupted.
[00:28:25] McIntosh:
Exactly. Exactly. Now I'm sure he's going to do very well, but if you waive a a decent amount of money under somebody's nose, there are a lot of people in this world who will frankly crumble under that, who'll do whatever you want. So there's that aspect of it. I also think it's going to end up being very complex. And I I don't know. I just I'm not saying, by the way, just to be really clear, we should not be replacing this with Bitcoin or the Bitcoin blockchain or something like that. That's not what I'm saying at all. I just think the there's this mentality in the alt coin world, in the casino coin world, that blockchains will go into every aspect of life. I just as a software engineer, I don't see the use case.
I mean, I guess it's a permanent record, maybe until it's not. I don't know. I don't know all the ins and outs of Cardano. So I don't I don't know what that implications are of that. But I guess that's kind of the general idea, but I just don't I I think this is a really bad idea. So president Trump does have people around him who, you know, they're not Bitcoin only, and there there are people who are gonna promote stuff like this. Apparently, Charles has the ear of the president for some reason. And so, you know, he's he's promoting this.
I think that's gonna be rather unfortunate. Anyways. Oh, just to offend everyone in the UK, I'll go ahead and say this. I saw this saying apparently now in the UK, if you just view what amounts to right wing propaganda, or at least what they call that, you can go to jail. That's just great. I don't know. If you do what? Like view like I'm on Twitter, and I'm, you know, scrolling, and I click on somebody's right wing feed, whatever that means. I could go to jail in the if I live in the UK. Have you I actually reached that point. I'm curious your thoughts on this specifically because I assume that you've been able to follow this a little better than I can. I get Sky News and I watch it, but it's filtered.
They don't really talk about stuff like this ironically enough.
[00:31:16] Kenshin:
I I don't think anyone's talking about this outside the UK. I mean, it sounds too crazy to to even mention.
[00:31:24] McIntosh:
I do know that people are going to jail just for for posting stuff that they say right wing. I mean, that is that's been going on for a while, and there have been a number of people who are doing that, which is, as an American, that's just like four levels of crazy to me. I mean, I don't understand it, but they seem to be accepting it. I don't know. Maybe we're not being told about how they're not accepting it. I don't know, but this is just like making that worse. So, I do wanna put this out there. This is sad if this is true. I don't, again, this is Twitter, and I haven't seen verification of this, but this does look official.
Swan Bitcoin, who's one of the major Bitcoin companies here in the United States for custody of Bitcoin with their different products, put out something today saying, which is today is November 14th, and that runs into this in just a second. They're saying, our international banking partner relationship is ending soon. Unfortunately, this means Swan will no longer be able to support clients outside the United States. Please withdraw all Bitcoin from your Swan account by December 1, 2024. So literally
[00:32:49] Kenshin:
2 weeks and just a couple of days from now. And if you have I'm curious if that has something to do with the mic that we talked last time, this
[00:32:59] McIntosh:
European law that's come in effect in December 1st. That's a good question. I'm not sure. It very likely may, actually. I'm glad you brought that up. Swan's had some troubles, and frankly, Swan as a company is not a place I would recommend. I don't normally recommend solutions like theirs, but if I were, it would not be Swan. I'll just say that and move on. Okay. In news that I know is true, 18 states in the United States. So that is almost half of our states, by the way. We've got 50, so that's just under 25. 18 states in the United States are suing the SEC, our securities and exchange commission headed by our old friend, Kenshin, Gary Gensler. I know you love him.
He's a great guy. They're suing the SEC for unconstitutional overreach of the Bitcoin and crypto industry under Gary Gensler. That's awesome. I love it. Yeah. Alright.
[00:34:12] Kenshin:
Yeah. They get some, courage now that Trump is elected, maybe. They can go Funny how that works.
[00:34:19] McIntosh:
Yeah. Do you have any, news items yourself? I actually don't think I have anymore. No. Some software news, but Yeah. We do have software updates. Yes. Let me look at one other thing real quick. I'll just cut some dead space out. Alright. Kenshin, why don't you go through the first couple of these software updates?
[00:34:41] Kenshin:
Yeah. So we have, Zeus Wallet, version 0.9.2.
[00:34:48] McIntosh:
So that would make it not production ready, maybe? Normally?
[00:34:56] Kenshin:
Yeah. It's not version 1 yet. Is that what you mean? But it's been around for a while. True. It's been a very
[00:35:04] McIntosh:
good wallet overall. Have you used it?
[00:35:07] Kenshin:
I've used it with my own, Lightning
[00:35:11] McIntosh:
node. Okay.
[00:35:13] Kenshin:
And I used it at the same time with an Albi Okay. Lightning account as well. So they worked in tandem, in parallel, very good together. It's it's a really good wallet, especially for lightning. Great.
[00:35:29] McIntosh:
I have loaded it at one point or the other, and then I never really used it. So they used to have features in it to, like, control your own node. Right? Yeah. But I would say if you run your own nodes and have lightning in your own node, then that's a must have, I would say. Okay. I think that's actually why I did it because I did have a node. I'm not running lightning right now, although I'm looking at setting up another one. But I'm pretty sure that's actually why I was using it. And yeah. Yeah. So they marched along. And a a good new feature they launched,
[00:36:06] Kenshin:
it's exporting transaction history to spreadsheets.
[00:36:09] McIntosh:
Oh, that's good.
[00:36:11] Kenshin:
Yeah. That's quite good. So if you use it a lot, that's good to keep your records
[00:36:16] McIntosh:
in, Excel file or CSV format. I am holding out hope that Trump just eliminates the IRS, but I don't think that's gonna happen. So maybe I should use that. Oh, man. Alright. Next one.
[00:36:34] Kenshin:
Next one, we have a BTC pay version 2.
[00:36:38] McIntosh:
Okay. So that's a major range. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:36:44] Kenshin:
And, let's see. What's the highlight is Yeah. It's not actually, it doesn't sound like a version 2 when we see the features. It's mostly about, localization, interface adjustments, new sidebar navigation, new onboarding for new users.
[00:37:10] McIntosh:
I wonder why they made it a major release like that. That's interesting.
[00:37:16] Kenshin:
Maybe they decide to change their their version. I mean, some software they they like to go yeah. Major release every year or Yeah. It could be. Absolutely.
[00:37:27] McIntosh:
Yeah. It is solid software. I know I've not used it personally, and it's Java based if I'm understanding correctly or remembering correctly, which I am not a Java fan. But to be honest, it's been around for a long time. It's providing a very solid set of services for, like, a small business, this kind of thing.
[00:37:48] Kenshin:
Yeah. It's very good for this.
[00:37:50] McIntosh:
Good stuff if you're out there using BTCPay. Let me go ahead and take Robosats here. Again, this is alpha software. In fact, they even label it as such, v0.7.1 alpha. It's a fixes and performance improvements release. This is one of the tools that you can use to, buy, crypt not crypto, bitcoin off not off of an exchange, like peer to peer. And I've done episodes in the past. I don't I think I included Robosats in that roundup. I did a roundup of different, peer to peer, tools like this at one point in the past year or so. Maybe it's time we go back and kinda take a look at those, actually, because things have changed a good bit, I'm sure, as I always do. And I love getting people off of the exchanges.
And one of the important I mean, if you're buying bitcoin, if you're not mining it, you have to buy it. Right? How do you buy it? That gets a little more difficult. So, this is one of the solutions for that.
[00:39:07] Kenshin:
Alright? Yeah. And if you don't want to to deal with, KYC, know your customer Right. With some companies, then that's a good solution. Then you deal with but, of course, dealing with another human that you don't know can also be risky in some ways. So
[00:39:25] McIntosh:
Now, looking at I don't know about Robosats offhand, but some of these, peer to peer products have implemented some pretty sophisticated tools in order to protect the users. So, that technology is continuing to evolve. I hope it's not frozen out by the EU. Sorry. They they were help me out. Were they not doing some legislation? I think it got pushed down or whatever, but trying to block peer to peer, Bitcoin exchange like that. Does it does that ring a bell with you?
[00:40:10] Kenshin:
I'd had to look it up. I remember they closed down the local Bitcoin, but was that in US?
[00:40:17] McIntosh:
No. I don't think so.
[00:40:21] Kenshin:
Well They've been fighting, of course, all those Anyways.
[00:40:25] McIntosh:
Websites. Yeah. I we should probably go back, take a look at those at some point, maybe spend an episode reviewing them. Jam, version 0.3.0, I do want to highlight this. So they've got a new version. It is a web interface for JoinMarket. So JoinMarket is a man, I hope I don't mess this up. Boost in if I am or not, and let me know. But JoinMarket is a CoinJoin implementation. It's a way to, anonymize your Bitcoin. Okay? If I go and buy my Bitcoin off of Coinbase, for example, that's all tracked. And not everyone really wants that for whatever reason. And, you can you can use something like join market to, to anonymize your Bitcoin to kinda swap it out with a bunch of other people, and you end up with anonymous Bitcoin.
[00:41:28] Kenshin:
Yeah. You essentially combine the bit your Bitcoin with 10 other people, for example, and share it back in equal amounts Right. Between you, and then they don't know if someone is very harsh. To be tracked. Now,
[00:41:43] McIntosh:
from what I'm understanding, the chain analysis tools that are out there are proving to not really be that correct. Like, statistically, they're not actually getting the right answers a significant portion of the time. So I I'm actually not even really convinced that this is even necessary, but it would certainly if if I were concerned about my privacy, it'd be something I'd be looking at. Let me put it that way. And it's one of the best tools out there, and it's actually a way for you to make some money. You can run, part of this network.
This is something that I've looked at and basically participate. And you can earn, yield. You can earn sats on that. So I'm not quite willing to risk my Bitcoin, but I don't know.
[00:42:40] Kenshin:
I'm trying to figure out. I used it, with some of my KYC Okay. Bitcoin.
[00:42:47] McIntosh:
I used it does with that type of Did you, like, install it on, like, an Umbrel or something like that? Start starts 9. Start 9. Very similar. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I wanna set it up Very easy to use. On a VPS, like, instance, not not on like a start 9 or an umbrella because maybe it's because just my internet here at the house just isn't that great, but to me, it makes a lot more sense to actually do that on a VPS. There's a project, Citadel. One of their goals is actually to build that kind of framework for a for a virtual private server is what a VPS means. And as like a AWS instance or something like that.
And that is an area of the these virtual servers that I have a great deal of, experience in, so I'm very comfortable in there. Not necessarily something for the kinda the average person. Start 9, Umbrel. These tools, they do great with their little web interfaces. They run on a little computer right there in your house. Sorry. I don't know why I got off on that track, but that's free. Alright. I'm gonna go ahead and do this next one, and then you can talk about the last one. I don't know how they say this. It sounds like a great project. I'm gonna say it's 0xchat, and it is, the idea is they're building kind of a chat based like like a Telegram.
A lot of people have used Telegram. Telegram is a centralized service who very recently, the CEO was actually arrested, for I don't know. He was in custody for a day or 2 at least. I think he was released. He made some kind of deal with the French government,
[00:44:39] Kenshin:
which Jamaica arrested when he landed in Paris.
[00:44:42] McIntosh:
His private jet landed in Paris and he got arrested on the tarmac, which that should give you great pause about if you're using Telegram for private things. This is a secure chat that's built on the Nostra protocol. So Nostra, of course, is this open source peer to peer protocol that's being developed. It's got a lot of Bitcoin integrations, so we end up talking about it a decent amount. It's primarily being used as kind of a Twitter alternative, but this is basically an app that's targeting more of the group chat kind of thing. So I am interested to see where this goes.
I think it could be very interesting. Of course it's open source, all of that kind of stuff. This is version 1.4.0. So, they are adding support for this is not initial so Cashew wallet is like an e cash service. This is not initial support, but they're adding some other things, some other functionality there. They've updated the UX. They've added compatibility with Android 9, which forgive me, I that seems old, prison. That's quite old, it is. Okay. So they're going backwards there, not forwards. And, support for kind 15 encrypted file messages, which you'll just have to I don't know what that means. It's some type of file encryption. I know that, but I have never heard of kind 15.
So, anyways, overall, if you're interested in that or already using it, you should definitely, upgrade to it. My problem with all this stuff, Kenshin, is frankly, there's just there's so many different things going on now. I try to use different things, and then people aren't on it, and they're not here, they're not there. I need a single dashboard that I do something and it just blast it out to to all these things.
[00:46:53] Kenshin:
Yeah. And this actually this, 0 x chat or as I call it, OX chat Mhmm. Is, is quite good.
[00:47:03] McIntosh:
Have you you've used this? Redundant. Yeah. I
[00:47:07] Kenshin:
I did, but it's, with some friends I experimented a bit. But if you have another Nostr app that supports encrypted messages, like Amethyst, for example, that I also use, then you don't need this. You get the same messages from the same people, and
[00:47:27] McIntosh:
it's just a better interface for transfer chats. Right. They're trying to build a better interface, which there's nothing wrong with that, but I didn't realize that this okay. That makes a lot of sense. Thanks for that.
[00:47:40] Kenshin:
Yeah. So for example, as you say, you want everything in 1, then you could have amethyst or something similar.
[00:47:47] McIntosh:
You don't need the extra ups. We're we're running over and I don't wanna take too much time on this. But this is actually a real problem for me. At least I perceive it as so. And to be honest, I got on chat GPT the other night, and I basically said, okay chat GPT, I wanna write a Python program that when I post to either Twitter or, Nostra, that it would post the alternative. Right? It turns out in Twitter, for free, you can't it goes one way, but not the other, the free. I don't remember offhand. But like, I I it actually looks doable, and it doesn't even look like crazy code. Now, it would not be something that I'd be like packaging up and selling or giving away or anything like that. But like, I'm on Twitter all the time because let's be honest, that's where people are.
And I don't have time to cross post between Twitter and Noster, and which that sounds like I'm trying to be, I don't know, whatever, but it's, it's the truth. I don't get on Noster because it's off to the left and I'm over here on Twitter. Oh, and I retweet this or I quote tweet this or whatever, or I just put up a post and then it never gets to Nostra. And then I go over to Nostra occasionally and I scroll through it and I'm like, oh, that's good. Oh, that's good. It really is a different experience. And I love the lack of algorithms. I love the lack of manipulation that goes on in the background, whether we like it or not, you know?
Anyways, I may actually take some time and do that because the code is only a couple hundred lines long. Mhmm. Chat GPT is actually, with Python especially, gotten pretty good at that kind of stuff. But yeah. Anyways, that's enough about that. Do you wanna go ahead and do HODL HODL?
[00:49:50] Kenshin:
Yeah. So HODL HODL is similar to Robosat. It's a peer to peer platform, and, they stopped supporting a lot of the shitcoins.
[00:50:03] McIntosh:
Okay.
[00:50:05] Kenshin:
So I don't know how many they supported before, but from now on, they will only support Bitcoin and Stablecoins.
[00:50:14] McIntosh:
Oh, okay.
[00:50:16] Kenshin:
So I guess they supported more before and
[00:50:19] McIntosh:
Stablecoins are something we probably need to be discussing. We need to add that to our list. But there's a lot going on there. You can now do stable coins essentially on Bitcoin or on lightning really. And the it's kinda like this Twitter message I posted earlier or talked about earlier. People are getting their underwear in a twist, about that because God forbid we do something that's not pure Bitcoin. And there are actually and maybe they're reasonable arguments, but there are people who are arguing that using Tether, for example, is promoting, the dollar hegemony.
Probably not saying that word quite right, but the the US dollar, the federal, the global reserve currency. Right? It literally is promoting that because of what they do in the back end and all that kind of stuff. And I I don't know. I do know, to be honest, there are people who their local currency is just like crazy. Like, what's the place, Nigeria. Nigeria? Right. Nigeria with the with their silly e naira or whatever. I mean, that is insanity. And if I lived in Nigeria and and I could not handle the volatility of Bitcoin, we love Bitcoin, and Bitcoin goes up over the long term, but Bitcoin is volatile.
You think I wanna stack my money in in Tether rather than the e naira? Well, you I would. So I don't know how to kinda separate all that out. Maybe that's a discussion we can have, whatever. Anyway, sorry. Sorry. All right. Well, I'm glad to see they're pulling everything out. That's that's good. I look, these are attack surfaces, if nothing else. Just aside from the fact that they're promoting these other things that that are not really good in the long term. These are attack surfaces that can be you compromise the app through that, and then, you know, you could lose your Bitcoin. So Yeah. And then you have a big,
[00:52:50] Kenshin:
target audience that that they see that you support so many coins. Right. And for example, if I if I see how to hold and support 10 different coins, I will say no. I'll go to another platform that support Bitcoin or or a couple of them at least, and it will feel more safe, more secure, and more focused on on what it needs to do.
[00:53:13] McIntosh:
Alright, Kenshin. Let's wrap this up. Why don't you, chat for just a second about, about how people can support the show?
[00:53:22] Kenshin:
Yeah. So if you want to support the show, of course, you can, share this podcast with your friends and family members. You can help us by posting a question to to us on the podcasting 2.0 platform. Okay. For example, on fountain, you can leave a comment and boost the show, and that will help us a lot because, we don't run any ads here. And running ads would not also be good for the podcast because we want to stay impartial. Mhmm. And how do you say we want to stay? Neutral. Neutral. Exactly. So we we need to criticize the companies that come out, in the news every week. And if it's a company that they have asked us to support them, we might be yeah.
We might not be honest with you, so we want to stay impartial. So, yeah, don't hesitate to to tell your friends about the podcast, and don't hesitate to get in contact with us. We also want to improve and find new ways to interact with the audience. And, yes, you can contact us through, by email. We we have the email, makintosh@satoshis plebs.com.
[00:54:50] McIntosh:
Yeah. I need to set you up an email on there, by the way. We need to get that taken care of. So we'll actually, I'll go ahead and do that. So you can send Kenshin an email at Kenshin@satoshis dash plebs.com as well, and I'll go ahead and get that set up.
[00:55:10] Kenshin:
Right. And, of course, you can find us on, on Twitter. You can find me as Kenshin_, what is it? Ninja.
[00:55:23] McIntosh:
Ninja. Right. Yeah. And I'm, Macintosh Fintech on Twitter. We both have Nostra as well, but the the keys for Nostr are not really human readable. I pinned mine to the top of my Twitter post, and I'm also going to add this is all in our show notes as well so that you can go there to, if you need to to to see this.
[00:55:53] Kenshin:
Yep. And I have done the same. So and I check from time to time, for sure, a couple of times a week.
[00:56:02] McIntosh:
Awesome. Yeah. I need to get more diligent about that. I actually probably do check a couple times a week, but it's just not not part of my cycle. And like I was talking about, I need to be able to do kind of both at the same time because I personally have a feeling that, you know, Twitter may be around for years, and I just I don't know. I don't wanna lose that audience. But, anyways, I appreciate it. As always, Kenshin, I I want everybody to stay humble. Go out, make it a great week, and we will talk to you all soon. Goodbye.
