Oddbean new post about login | logout #gm Good morning. I wanna do a pilgrimage to Bitcoin Beach. I wanna take a bunch of my Normie friends and do an exploration of how it works (as a currency, an exchange of value) *and where it doesn't* and then do the Diplomado program and along the way, document it all to inform the community. Think it'll stick? Wanna ask questions? I'm obsessively trying to solve the two biggest problems I see here in the #bitcoinjungle-- but that's me. I have a lot of free time in the temporada baja. Basically, Scuba Mamí is bored. Need to #gtfo of #paradise for a minute and go find all the 🧆🥙🧆 in Central America. RULE #1: Where there's falafel, they accept Bitcoin. Should I keep talking? HINT: it's about education #bitcoinjungle #newbie #normiebutopentolearning #grownostr #teachmeabout #bitcoin #education WHY I'M OVER HERE ON NOSTR WRITING ABOUT THIS: Today I stumbled upon a treasure. I PayPal-ed $50 for what turns out to be a well-curated list of access to gated content about my actual dream, something which is popularly referred to as "homesteading". ¡¡SCORE!! As I scroll through this list, I see lots of ethereal messaging, marketed to appeal to exactly me and my #eatpraylove demographic. We're the OG Gentrifiers 😭, back when it was just called "discovering" and just before the Influencers came and ruined everything. Anyway, I'd be more than happy to share the link to the curated list if someone actually read this far.
I love the idea of Bitcoin Jungle and Bahia and would love to go to Bitcoin Beach sometime! So much so that I wrote my own novel so I could visit Bitcoin Beach and El Salvador with my fictional characters. I even had them buy pupusas with Bitcoin! Too much fun for me. “Bitcoin Girl: Save the World” https://www.amazon.com/Bitcoin-Girl-Save-World-Dog/dp/B0BS8XB72K/?&_encoding=UTF8&tag=realbitcoindo-20&linkCode=ur2&linkId=e352f33f7e64f43daf2b40053ca04dee&camp=1789&creative=9325
ok, THIS is funny: "she starts reconsidering if an environmentally friendly, violent uprising is the best reason to be famous" I can't think of a BETTER reason. congratulations on publishing a (second?!) book on Amazon. how do I convince you to send me an autographed copy? I'd like to read it. some of my favorite books ever were my teenage daughters' dystopian romance novels --the Hunger Games and the Divergent series. I often get through post-corporate life --it's been SIX years since I gave away everything and just... left-- pretending to be Katniss Everdeen. I passed my pandemic on Koh Tao and Koh Pha Ngan. (I wonder if they've got bitcoin yet? I'd like an excuse to go back. got a little unfinished tattoo work to be done.)
Ha I just donated some books to the Peer-to-Pier Santa Monica Bitcoin festival coming up!! But yes highly recommend you read. Anyone who has read it has loved it! If you leave an Amazon review I’ll definitely send you a personal signed copy. I’ll wanna know your favorite parts! Can do .epub to read on iPhone, or kindle, paperback, or hardcover:) I had so much fun writing! Hope you finish your tattoo💪
Here's two minutes you'll never get back. 🫣 First things I did when the whole world shut down (1) deleted the FB app (2) buzzed off all my hair (3) got to know the tiny, Thai rastafarian bamboo tattoo artist down the street. This was early in the project. When the dragon was the ONLY thing. But, as we discovered, there was a lot of blank real estate on this part of me that I can't even see... (and lots of days with nothing to do). I've not really ever seen the whole work, per se, and ironically it's the thing I'm (2nd) most notorious for. (That blonde lady with the full back tattoo.) The thai-style dragon (not an actual thai dragon because then it wouldn't have feet or wings) looked unbalanced and so the other side became a phoenix. Much symbolism. Balance became the thing of my liberation, a key concept in Buddhism. Here, he's doing the unalome which is a representation of the struggle and (the last bit) the dot dot dots at the top are the path to enlightenment. Having a tattoo tapped into your spine feels like re-wiring your soul. Every time I watch this video, I remember how strong I am. I didn't move, and the only "tell" was that muscle in my neck, tightening up fiercely. Haha, your main character sounds like a kindred soul. #gm from the #bitcoinjungle. Shall I expect you to visit us anytime soon (for that hardcopy) or should I cheerfully accept an eCopy and promise to write a review on amazon for you? https://m.primal.net/LLwy.mp4
bitcoin lake was also a huge underwhelm for me a lot of these so called 'bitcoin circular economies' are a whole lot of marketing with very little substance turns out the locals don't want some strange, confusing, volatile financial instrument they just want easier access to dollars and credit don't shoot the messenger - i spent 2 years in mexico trying to build my own circular economy. i take responsibility for my failures 🫡
did you ultimately decide the circular economy isn't a thing? I'm not ready to give up yet... I'm sure we all have different motivations, all my friends are locals. we're surrounded by people who have SO MUCH. but sadly the Bitcoin ethos doesn't seem to gel with charitable giving or even treating others. it's awkwardly stingy, in fact. my fiat friends are far more likely to just be nice and share. kinda breaks my brain.
yeah i pretty much gave up. i came to the conclusion that bitcoin is a great store of value but it will be decades, at best, before it's a useful medium of exchange. and it might never happen. in that time frame we'll get digital fiat and the herd will continue to prefer the devil they know over the devil they don't 😢 i actually changed my thinking somewhat through this process and really opened up to the steel man idea of credit money. spent a long time studying it, as well as commodity theory, and i'm still on the fence as to whether a deflationary currency would even be more useful as MoE and UoA (and for generating debt for productive uses) than a well-managed, low-inflation credit money. the key is 'well-managed', but i lean more in that direction now. bitcoin is a great SoV. maybe that's enough.
ps circular economies in the 21st century are a bit wishful imho, and based on 'thought exercises' that don't conform to reality outside highly remote, deprived communities. the vast majority of the world is just too interconnected nowadays - the value loops are far bigger than we realise, and basically impossible for a neo-currency to capture without some sort of top down (eg town mayor, county municipality, regional government) involvement, and even then, most fizzle and die (checkout Tumin in Mexico - it's another, non digital, well-supported and good-hearted attempt at this kind of programme that has, like other similar projects - digital and non digital - withered on the vine) people just want dollars/national currency and credit. and more people to spend money on their products/services. well-intentioned as we are, bitcoin doesn't fix this. at least not yet.