“Now that we’re in a time of peace - and we don’t need war anymore, and war is bad, and all that sort of stuff - we can do away with the whole warrior culture, the warrior ideology. And what do we become? We become fat slobs who don’t believe in reputation or morality or honour or any of that sort of stuff. And then the world decays and turns into shit.”— Aleks SvetskiAleks Svetski is an entrepreneur, author and Bitcoin advocate. In this interview, we discuss his upcoming book “The Bushido of Bitcoin”. W...

“The system is better off with a neutral asset that can price everything because, without a neutral asset, you have no pricing of anything…money must be neutral. And there is no neutral money outside of Bitcoin at the moment.”— Izabella KaminskaIzabella Kaminska is a journalist and founder and editor of The Blind Spot. In this interview, we discuss the failure of current mainstream journalism to cover subjects properly, why the destruction of the middle class is dangerous for democracy, the endemic problem of corruption in politics, and the need for an honest economic orthodoxy. ...

“Do we want everybody in the world to be orange-pilled, and to share in all of the shared values of the Bitcoin community? And do we think that’s a realistic goal? Or do we want as many people as possible to use Bitcoin as a thing, even though they might not share in the values and just don’t give a fuck?”— Sergej KotliarSergej Kotliar is the founder and CEO of Bitrefill. In this interview, we discuss enabling Bitcoin circular economies, the mission of Bitrefill to be a financial empowerment company, the risks and rewards of...

“That meatspace layer between the computer and your brain is unencrypted…if this last mile is not encrypted, then all of the securities that we can gain in cyberspace are null and void. Now, because you type in your 24 words, and the camera picks it up, all of a sudden, your super awesome anonymous money is no longer anonymous nor secure. And that’s a really, really big issue.”— Max HillebrandMax Hillebrand is an economist and open-source entrepreneur who runs Agora Towards Liberty. In this interview, we discuss fiat money’s fundamental weaknesses, the teachings of Austrian...

“We’ve politicised everything. Problems aren’t problems anymore. For the left: what is their approach? For the right: what is their approach? And it’s because the political system is broken. And obviously, most of the listeners and we know it’s also the financial system is completely broken.”— Trey WalshTrey Walsh is a nonprofit director and progressive Bitcoiner. In this interview, we discuss the problems facing Gen Z: climate change, high education and housing costs, wider economic problems constraining opportunities, the erosion of democracy, and social media-induced mental health challenges. We talk about why Bitcoin co...

“Ejection from the banking system can be random. Happens for political reasons in the US all the time. It’s rarely reported about. And, in a way, it’s more devastating than being on probation for having been convicted for something, because not being able to bank in 2023 is akin to not being able to function in society.”— DoombergDoomberg is an anonymous collective producing the world’s most popular financial substack. In this interview, we discuss coordinated action against the crypto industry being undertaken with limited congressional approval or oversight. We talk about historical precedents, what this co...

“The Fed’s going to end up having to expand its balance sheet again, to proverbially print money, in order to provide the extra cash for the banks to be able to meet the demand deposit withdrawal; the banks should have been sitting on that cash all along.”— Caitlin LongCaitlin Long is the Founder and CEO of Custodia bank. In this interview, we discuss the events that have led to three banking failures within a week, one of which saw the biggest bank run on record. We talk about anti-crypto coordination involving the US government, the inhe...

“With Bitcoin, we’re finally free. We’re finally free with our money to do whatever we’d like with it…so if a government becomes onerous, and they start to crack down on transactions or crack down on different types of races, religions, etc., you can take your money and you can leave. And that ability, that freedom, is truly what it means to be a human, it’s truly to be financially free.”— Dan HeldDan Held is a Bitcoin educator and marketing advisor at Trust Machines. In this interview, we discuss how to get involved wit...

“Bitcoin is beautifully simple: from a mind-virus perspective there are only 21 million, what you own, you own, it’s yours, you’re in control. It puts the burden and the responsibility back on the individual, and therefore the opportunity rests on the individual, and so Bitcoin is money for people who are ready to take responsibility for their lives.”— Harry SudockHarry Sudock is Chief Strategy Officer at Griid. In this interview, we discuss what Bitcoin is: specifically, on what ideological foundation was it developed, what problem was it designed to solve, how it solves that problem, a...

“The way in which you think about it will not be the way in which you think about it in 10 years time, but you are involved in something here that is going to be one of the defining things you do in your life; this will be the thing that your grandchildren ask you about.”— American HODLAmerican HODL is a Bitcoiner who has been promoting the innovation for over 8 years. In this interview, we discuss why is Bitcoin important: what makes it an improved version of money, why society needs it, how it improves inclusion and th...

“It’s a special thing when somebody comes in and they pay in Bitcoin. And they go through sort of the ritual of getting out the separate POS and it’s the Zeus wallet, which has an awesome user interface. And you’ll have people a couple of barstools down just sort of looking over, like ‘What the fuck is that?’”— Thomas PacchiaThomas Pacchia is a Bitcoin entrepreneur and the co-owner of Pubkey, a Bitcoin bar in New York City. In this interview, we discuss how a desire to revive a local bar after Covid inspired the est...

“I think money is an instrument for change, but it’s not the change itself. And it’s a very powerful tool, and it depends on who wields it and what kind of change gets implemented. If a bad person has good money to make change, they’re going to make bad changes. Throwing good money at bad doesn’t do a damn thing.”— George KaloudisGeorge Kaloudis is a senior research analyst and columnist for CoinDesk. In this interview, we discuss the validity of Bitcoin ideology. Can it replace governments? Does it promote individualism? Is Bitcoin’s dist...

“What they did back in 2008…they said, ‘Well, we’re going to create a tonne of new base money, we’re going to buy some of those assets to reliquefy the system.’ And so, it’s not an exaggeration to say it’s essentially like a Ponzi scheme, it’s something that has to keep growing in order to function.”— Lyn AldenLyn Alden is a macroeconomist and investment strategist. In this interview, we discuss her latest article: How the Fed “Went Broke”. Lyn explains how for the first time in modern history the Federal Reserve is operating at a loss. We...

“Bitcoin for the first time gives you the sovereign and particular right to your finances to spend, to trade, and that’s something we didn’t know that the government couldn’t take away from you. Bitcoin is the manifestation of the God-given right to have your value.”— JunsethJunseth is an OG Bitcoiner and the former co-host of Bitcoin Uncensored. In this live interview, recorded at Pubkey in New York, we discuss the latest Bitcoin phenomenon - ordinals. We also talk about the philosophy of Bitcoin: what it’s for, what it can be, and how it’s still...

“The whole point is that we have enough self-custody to where the system remains permissionless so that we don’t turn into digital gold 2.0. That’s the whole point. Maybe that’s 20% of all Bitcoin, maybe that’s 30%. I have no idea. But it needs to be as much as we could possibly make it based on the consumer utility trade-offs.”— Eric YakesEric Yakes is the author of ‘The 7th Property’. In this interview, we discuss how a Bitcoin native banking system could evolve, predicated on a practical vision where not everyone will be able or willing to self...

“Bitcoin exists. Any sort of moralistic lens of perspectives of what it should be doing is a conversation, but Bitcoin works as this anarchic system where there’s no one in control, and everyone gets to use it however they want; and if people can’t do that the project fails.”— Rob HamiltonRob Hamilton is a co-founder and the CEO of AnchorWatch. In this interview, we discuss ordinals and ordinal inscriptions: what they are, how they work, what risks and benefits do they present to Bitcoin, how would we mitigate negative impacts, and how the rest of th...

“A lot of regulators all around the world are looking to see how US regulators treat Bitcoin…I would say that anybody who is broadly involved in the crypto space, you want to see Grayscale win this lawsuit.”— Michael SonnensheinMichael Sonnenshein is the CEO of Grayscale. In this interview, we discuss Grayscale’s lawsuit with the SEC, Genesis’s lending practices and bankruptcy, GBTC and the intercompany relationships at DCG. - - - - The Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) brought institutional investment into Bitcoin and helped Bitcoin to mature. Launched in 2013, as a subsidi...

“If I were a decision maker in the US I would probably want to figure out how to embrace Bitcoin to make the US dollar stronger. I think that’s a pretty smart move. We’ll see if that happens.”— Amanda CavaleriSHOW DESCRIPTIONAmanda Cavaleri is a Bitcoin entrepreneur and board member of the Bitcoin Today Coalition. In this wide-ranging interview, we discuss the upcoming Bitcoin Ski Summit Amanda is organizing, how Bitcoin can help the United States, whether Bitcoin should be radical or conservative, the importance of values in Bitcoin culture, and the promis...

“It’s the idea that you use logic to come to the wrong conclusion, and because you are using logic, you think you came to the right conclusion…what Henry Hazlitt argues in this book, Economics in One Lesson, is that there’s this network of logical fallacies that mutually support each other and obscure the truth.”— Ben PrenticeBen Prentice is a producer of What Bitcoin Did and co-creator of WTFhappenedin1971.com. In this interview, we discuss ‘Economics in One Lesson’, the seminal work by Henry Hazlitt. It’s as relevant today as it was when it was first...

“This industry has so much potential to be a demand side battery for any grid (but especially the Texas grid, because we have so much of it and we have so much stranded energy that because of transmission congestion) that it could be revolution — it could do for the Texas grid what batteries will do for grids in the Northeast or in Western Europe.”— Lee BratcherLee Bratcher is President of the Texas Blockchain Council. In this interview, we discuss the important work of the Texas Blockchain Council in educating decision-makers and providing a link to Bitcoin...

“Bitcoin’s an intelligence test, but it’s also an epistemic humility test. You don’t have to know everything about Bitcoin, nobody knows everything about Bitcoin. The question is, do you pretend you know when you don’t? And if you do you’ll be exposed.”— Troy CrossTroy Cross is a Professor of Philosopher and Fellow at BPI, & Shaun Connell is Executive VP of Power at Lancium & energy trading expert. In this interview, we discuss the evolution of the Bitcoin mining and energy debate: how Bitcoin mining has weathered the storm of FUD over its energy usage...

“We honestly just don’t know how much we actually need to fend off all of these potential attacks…it’s kind of like with physical security: you could spend $100,000 every month on physical security and someone might still figure out a way to kill you. It’s just a tricky thing with security in general. This is absolutely not unique to Bitcoin. It’s just insanely difficult to model for.”— Sam WoutersSam Wouters is a Research Analyst at River Financial. In this interview, we discuss Bitcoin’s hash rate: what it is, the factors affecting its grow...

“You may not care what the government’s doing and you may think what I’m doing is a total waste of time…but here’s the problem, they’re thinking about you…is Bitcoin going to work, are we going to see this revolution through and everything, I think any help we can get along the way is a positive help.”— Jason BrettJason Brett is a former FDIC regulator who worked through the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. In this interview, we discuss the events that led up to the 2008 GFC, the implosion of IndyMac & subsequent bank-run and what...

“If you believe that there is a pending climate crisis and you do not believe in nuclear energy technology, you’re anti-human and I no longer know how to relate to you on the merits.”— Harry SudockHarry Sudock is Chief Strategy Officer at Griid. In this interview, we discuss a range of narratives evolving in 2023: how Bitcoin’s value is to be explained to newbs, making sense of the general paranoia in society, the critical importance of nuclear energy, and making sense of 2022’s financial contagion within crypto. - - - - 2022 was...

“You’re seeing a lot of support for nuclear now… I think the momentum behind nuclear is growing more and more with climate change… we’re in a very good path moving forward to build out a lot more nuclear to provide that zero carbon-emitting energy 24/7, 365.”— Everett RedmondEverett Redmond is a nuclear engineer working as the Senior Director of Fuel Affairs at Oklo. We discuss the enormous challenges and opportunities in renewing the US’s nuclear fleet over the next decade, Oklo’s development of fast nuclear reactors, and how such small modular nuclear reactors will soon become c...

“I don’t like to call myself an environmentalist because that’s such a subjective term, but I’m very, very, very conscientious of the environment... I try extremely hard to make sure that my carbon footprint is very small, and I’m telling you, Nuclear is 100% the answer... there is nothing even comparable, not even in the ballpark by an order of magnitude.”— Anthony JaredAnthony Jared is a 30-year Navy veteran and who has operated nuclear reactors on both nuclear submarines & aircraft carriers. In this interview, we discuss the truth about nuclear energy, the safety concern...

“People have forgotten what a freedom to transact means…without having to involve a third party intermediary, without having to prove my identity to some panopticon, without having to demonstrate that I’m a good and loyal subject. No, the government is subject to me, I am the source of sovereignty, you are the source of sovereignty. So let’s take that back.”— Natalie SmolenskiNatalie Smolenski is an Executive Director of the Texas Bitcoin Foundation and a Fellow at the Bitcoin Policy Institute. In this interview, we discuss why America needs to be re-found. We talk about t...

“Many of these organisations that were carrying the water for this nightmare regime are still in place today…the New York Times, which did everything in its power to obscure Stalin’s starvation of millions of Ukrainians, is still the paper of record. It’s the Atlantic, it’s the New Republic; this isn’t metaphors or analogies, it’s literally the same organisations.”— Michael MaliceMichael Malice is an anarchist, author, and podcaster. In this interview, we discuss his latest book, The White Pill: A Tale of Good and Evil. It charts the rise and fall of Russia, it...

“When we made that drive home, we got home, we got in the driveway. And when we were in the driveway I was crying because it was a realisation that, at that point, I didn’t accomplish what I wanted to accomplish in those six weeks where I thought I was just going to walk out.”— Kale HyderKale Hyder works in an investment bank. In this interview, we discuss how his life 7 years ago changed on a dime: a rare spinal inflammation led an aspiring high school basketball player to have to deal with becoming quadripl...

“Every species that becomes sentient and develops “When you tell people they cannot speak, that is when they scream. But when you tell people they cannot scream, that is when they tear things down.”— Vivek RamaswamyVivek Ramaswamy is an entrepreneur and author. In this interview, we discuss his thesis that social and political struggles are rooted in the rise of a managerial class dominating society at the expense of everyday citizens. We also talk about the need to revive a binding national identity, and how the social justice movement may be causing more harm than good...

“Every species that becomes sentient and develops technology that is sufficient to start creating signals that propagate through the universe, eventually also hits this inflexion point, which we may be close to, wherein the power of the technology becomes uncontrollable, and they destroy themselves for one of a million different reasons.”— Jameson LoppJameson Lopp is the co-founder & CTO of Casa. In this interview, we discuss why Casa has extended custody support to Ethereum, important security lessons from the Luke Dashir hack, Bitcoin security & inheritance planning, and how AI came of age in 2022 with the release of Cha...

“The bad guys are kicking the shit out of the good guys. Look at what just happened, this shit is in shambles right now. The space has this attack vector from intelligent sociopaths, and they’ve done so much damage at this point.”— Travis KlingTravis Kling is the Chief Investment Officer at Ikigai. In this interview, we discuss being on the frontline of the FTX collapse: Ikigai had a large majority of its investment funds in FTX when it stopped withdrawals; Travis had a majority of his liquid net worth also stuck in the bankrupt company...

“There’s 600 million people in Africa that don’t have access to electricity. That’s a lot. That’s two-thirds of the world’s total that don’t have access to electricity that’s here. And so what we all should be trying to do is focus on how can we help electricity proliferate across this continent. Bitcoin mining just happens to be the missing link.”— Erik HersmanErik Hersman is an entrepreneur and the co-founder of Gridless. In this interview, we discuss how half of all Africans are without access to electricity, the affordability issue affecting the rest w...

“There’s this weird thing with economists: we always talk about ‘monopoly is bad, competition is good,’ but then when it comes to money, we’re like: ‘oh, no, just the Federal Reserve can do the money.’”— Josh HendricksonDr. Josh Hendrickson is an associate professor of economics and chair of the Economics Department at the University of Mississippi. In this interview, we discuss how Bitcoin has influenced his economic teaching, the importance of Bitcoin in the current unprecedented global debt bubble, and why people continue to dismiss Bitcoin. - - - - “Bitcoin and th...

“Even if bitcoin has all of this native adoption and organic use, the real driver of all of this, globally, is the 100 trillion dollars of a forced buying of dollars; because you’re short dollars, it’s dollar liabilities.”— Dylan LeClairDylan LeClair is a Bitcoin and macro analyst working for Bitcoin Magazine. In this interview, we discuss the carnage in crypto in 2022 that’s bleeding into 2023. We talk about the clear signs of Ponzi schemes, the lost fortunes of crypto billionaires, and how Bitcoin regains its footing in the market. - - - - It...

“I’m not trying to single out you. There are many, many content creators in the space, event planners in the space, that give rosier coverage to sponsors. And then when the sponsor rugs all of their audience they say ‘no one could have seen it coming, it wasn’t my responsibility.’ But meanwhile, there’s plenty of us that didn’t do that.”— Matt OdellMatt Odell is host of the Citadel Dispatch, co-host of Rabbit Hole Recap, venture partner at Ten31 and co-founder of Bitcoin Park. In this interview, we review 2022: the attacks on privacy, the reaff...

“Bitcoin goes in four-year cycles based on halving, and I’m sure two years from now when everything is fine again, and prices go up again, people are going to get excited, they’re going to get greedy, and they’re going to pump things up on leverage. And I hope people remember this point in time and say, okay, stop, cut it out…leverage isn’t bad, over leverage is bad.”— Steven McClurgSteven McClurg is a Co-Founder of Valkyrie Investments. In this interview, we discuss the causes of the crypto crash of 2022 and the effects seeping...

“It’s not being looked at properly as a realistic scenario that, say, by 2030 you could have several countries that have meaningful holdings of bitcoin as part of this geo-economic arrangement, and this is a way for them to hedge.”— Matthew PinesMatthew Pines is a Managing Consultant at the Krebs Stamos Group and a Fellow at the Bitcoin Policy Institute specializing in national security. In this interview, we discuss the rapidly changing geopolitical order as China competes with the US for dominance, and how Bitcoin may become one of a number of alternative global reserve assets t...

“In much the same way that the internet changed the world, and changed how we interact with information, Bitcoin has changed how humanity interacts with value and money.”— David ZellDavid Zell is a co-founder of the Bitcoin Policy Institute and Director of Policy at BTC Inc. In this interview, we discuss how the Bitcoin Policy Institute engages to educate politicians in DC through combating FUD, distinguishing Bitcoin from crypto, and aligning Bitcoin with US National Security interests and American values. - - - - Bitcoin was developed on the shoulders of the cy...

“If you have a recession, and you print a tonne of money and throw stimulus at it, you can get out of that recession quicker. But then you’ve done it at the cost of higher debt, and then potentially for a more inflationary rebound in the future, which then you have to then raise rates very quickly and potentially put yourself into another recession. And so there are levers you can pull, but every lever has a cost associated with it.”— Lyn AldenLyn Alden is a macroeconomist and investment strategist. In this interview, we look for...

“Harnessing low-energy fuels is an entirely different challenge, as we’re finding out, and Germany is finding out the hard way; look, everywhere it’s tried it ends up with a more expensive grid, a dirtier grid, and a less reliable grid.”— DoombergDoomberg is an anonymous collective producing the world’s most popular financial substack. In this interview, we discuss the roots of the 2022 energy crisis, why nuclear power needs to be the basis of our energy needs, and how pragmatic decision-making is needed if we’re to best fulfil our energy needs. - - - -

“In a libertarian society where the government doesn’t do anything the responsibility falls on citizens to do stuff, at the moment, that responsibility is the state’s; so, with freedom comes responsibility.”— Dominic FrisbyDominic Frisby is a British author, comedian, voice actor and musical curator. He also produces one of the top 20 financial substacks. In this interview, we discuss a range of issues highlighting how dire our current economic situation is, and if sound money and libertarianism are the solutions, the responsibilities this imposes on us as free citizens. - - - - ...

“Visa and Mastercard, SWIFT… the innovation on them has grinded to a halt, it doesn’t really change, nothing really happens, it doesn’t move, it’s very centralized, it’s very controlled. What we have with the Bitcoin Lightning network, it’s open, interoperable, that allows for innovation to happen overnight.”— Danny ScottIn this episode of the podcast, I sit down with Danny Scott, the CEO of CoinCorner, a bitcoin exchange based in the UK. Danny has built CoinCorner into a successful business without relying on VC funding, and he shares his insights on the challenges and...

“It’s a gigantic pyramid scheme with all sorts of organised crime and money laundering angles to the story as well, but at the centre of it, it’s just this woman who built a very sophisticated scam and then disappeared with all the money; and then the FBI finally put her on the 10 Most Wanted list about three months ago.”— Jamie BartlettJamie Bartlett is the co-writer and presenter of the BBC's podcast The Missing Cryptoqueen, an ongoing investigation into OneCoin and the disappearance of its founder Ruja Ignatova in 2017. In this interview, we discuss the latest...

“It’s not like you can just evaporate the UK from the system; if you did this, if you knocked out UK sovereign debt, you would cause a domino effect that took out the entire western financial system.”— Dan TubbDan Tubb is a podcaster and former venture capitalist. In this interview, we discuss the unprecedented levels of debt within the US and UK. Dan goes through one by one the various options open to the state to bring debt levels back down to manageable levels; tl;dr “none of those options is going to be viable.”

“It’s just impossible for me to believe that there’s this set of perfect rules, that if you follow them you will achieve this moral maxima and we will get closer to utopia.”— Mike BrockMike Brock is the lead at TBD, the Bitcoin-focused subsidiary of Block. In this interview, we discuss being a post-libertarian, reconciling the best elements of libertarianism with support for liberal democracy, and how Bitcoin improves the incentive structures within governing institutions.- - - - The persuasiveness of libertarian ideology is incredibly effective: the idea of individual...

“If you look at the long-term secular trend, there’s been three trends: one has been globalisation; so we’ve increased peace, we’ve increased global trade. Two, we’ve increased the population. And three, we’ve increased the money supply…and all three are reversing.”— Mark MossMark Moss is a serial entrepreneur, author, speaker and host of The Mark Moss Show. In this interview, we discuss his recent co-authored book “The UnCommunist Manifesto”, which is a critique of Communist theory in response to its continued influence in our modern world.- - - - The Commun...

“He messaged me, and he said: ‘Hey, man, I’m on a backup phone, just so you know, police just raided my house and they literally took everything. I just wanted to give you a heads-up.’ And I’m thinking: is that about to happen to me?”— BTC SessionsBTC Sessions (Ben Perrin), is a Canadian Bitcoin educator with a well-known YouTube channel. In this interview, we discuss his experiences as part of a group of Bitcoiners organising Bitcoin funds for Canadian truckers being targeted by the Canadian government. - - - - In January...

“Bitcoin mining is everything you don’t understand about energy, combined with everything you don’t understand about Bitcoin.”— Brandon QuittemBrandon Quittem is a writer and Communications Director for Swan Bitcoin. In this interview, we discuss his latest article: ‘Bitcoin is a Pioneer Species’, where he compares Bitcoin miners to species that settle and populate barren landscapes triggering the development of more advanced ecosystems. - - - - The acceptance of Bitcoin is an acceptance of the need for continuous education and receptivity. This past year has shown why: Bitcoin mining has been trans...

“The story I want to be true about mining is that it strengthens grids, it lowers electrical rates for citizens for ordinary ratepayers, and it helps us green the grid, helps us mitigate methane…those stories were wrong during the bull run because everybody’s just plugging in, now those stories are coming true.”— Troy CrossTroy Cross is a Professor of Philosopher and Fellow at the Bitcoin Policy Institute. In this interview, we discuss the changing narrative around Bitcoin mining: is it finding its real utility in a bear market as the ultimate auxiliary tool, and how ea...