The next @Central Pennsylvania Bitcoiners Meetup is scheduled for this upcoming Sunday (2025-01-26) at Denim Coffee in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania from 13:00 to 15:00
Greetings Central PA Bitcoiners! Last night we learned that Ross Ulbricht, creator of the original Silk Road marketplace, is receiving a full pardon. This is a case that was closely watched by many bitcoiners and libertarians. The Silk Road was an online marketplace that was only accessible by using the tor browser, also known as a dark net market. This site served as an eBay for illicit items, mostly drugs. Like eBay, it used a user reputation system as well as an escrow system, minimizing the risk of purchasers getting scammed. Also, bitcoin served as the method of payment and escrow. Visa, Mastercard, Paypal and (if it had existed then) Venmo aren't options in such places on the internet. Bitcoin has come a long way since its days keeping the Silk Road machine running over a decade ago. Many nocoiners still bring up its historic association with dark net markets as a negative, as something that should make people reluctant to acquire or interact with bitcoin. Silk Road, as seemingly negative an association as it might be, was instrumental in bitcoin finding a use case early on in its history. The best money shouldn't pass judgement on what it's being used for, whether that's making a purchase on the Silk Road, donating to protesting Canadian truckers, paying a female employee in much of the Arab world, or buying a Bible in North Korea. Local laws prohibit those transactions, and third party payment companies won't facilitate them for you. Is your money really yours if you have to ask someone else's permission on who you can pay with it, or what you can spend it on? Fast forward 12 years from the Silk Road days, and both federal and state governments are making moves to add bitcoin onto their treasury balance sheets. California, Massachusetts, and Wyoming are the most recent announcements. As more and more entities recognize and admit that their cash reserves are consistently getting hammered by inflation, they'll want to adopt a similar strategy. Looking forward to our next meetup, which is at 1pm on this Sunday, Jan 26th, at Denim Coffee in Mechanicsburg. Hope to see you there! @Lonelypumpkins @Central Pennsylvania Bitcoiners
(Apologizes for Delayed Post) Greetings Central PA Bitcoiners! Happy Genesis Block Day! Sixteen years ago today, Satoshi mined the first bitcoin block, known as the genesis block. When a miner finds a block, there's a small text field in which they can put whatever message in it they want. Modern mining pools usually use the name of their pool. Satoshi chose the following for block #0: The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks There are two reasons for this. By including that day's headline from a major newspaper (London's The Times), Satoshi timestamped the block that he cast. This proved that he/she/they hadn't been mining on their own, keeping the mined blocks a secret, and preventing others from competing to mine for those new bitcoin. The crux of this reason is that it shows that it was launched fairly and on the date that he broadcast it to the network. The second reason is more symbolic: the 2008 financial crisis, and the government bailout interventions that followed, represented a breach of trust and alienated many, including Satoshi: "The root problem with conventional currency is all the trust thatโ€™s required to make it work. The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency, but the history of fiat currencies is full of breaches of that trust.โ€ The white paper laid out the framework for bitcoin: a new digital asset and decentralized payment network that doesn't rely on having to trust entities that have repeatedly proven themselves untrustworthy. ๐Ÿ“„.pdf Several years ago, bitcoin educator and podcaster Trace Mayer first proposed and promoted Proof of Keys Day, corresponding with the anniversary of the genesis block. The idea is that whoever has bitcoin on exchanges should withdraw them on January 3rd every year, and in doing so, force exchanges who might be running a fractional reserve to be exposed. IMHO, Proof of Keys Day is a great idea, and every bitcoiner should know the difference of what it means to hold their own wealth vs some exchange's IOU for bitcoin. However, bitcoiners who know this important distinction very likely don't keep sats on an exchange in the first place. If you do happen to have bitcoin on an exchange and want to celebrate Proof of Keys Day by making the exchange prove that they have the bitcoin they say they do, and you are comfortable and familiar with your self-custody setup, by all means please celebrate and withdraw! I do wonder about how many people realistically (1) have a bitcoin balance on an exchange, (2) are comfortable with self-custody and have software or hardware wallet, and (3) have Proof of Keys Day on their radar. Cheers nonetheless! Remember, friends...treat bitcoin exchanges like you treat public bathrooms. Walk in, do your business, wash your hands, and walk right back out. Our next monthly coffee meetup is at 1pm at Denim Coffee on Sunday, Jan 26th (1pm every fourth Sunday). Happy Genesis Block Day and Happy Proof of Keys Day! @Lonelypumpkins @Central Pennsylvania Bitcoiners
Greetings Central PA Bitcoiners! Happy Hodl Day! What's Hodl Day, you might ask? It's the anniversary of when the meme "hodl" was born. Eleven years ago today, on the bitcointalk.org forum (Source Link Below), user GameKyuubi, frustrated by his failed trading attempts, went on a drunken and profanity-laden rant. He lamented that he kept making bad trades, and regretted that he didn't just hold his bitcoin position rather than trying to outsmart the market. The title of his post was "I AM HODLING". Little did he know that his typo would go down in history as a favorite term of bitcoiners. There are some misconceptions about what hodl means. One has been propagated by corporate news, who created the backronym "hodl = hold on for dear life". Not one of the more dastardly pieces of misinformation they've tried to disseminate about bitcoin, however hodl's creation stems from the aforementioned post on the bitcointalk forum, not an acronym. The other big misconception is that hodl means to never spend one's bitcoin. A crucial function of a money is spending it at a later date, hopefully on something that improves your life or the lives of those you care about. One can still be a hodler and spend some of their bitcoin...the process of hodling does make one more choosy about what they spend their money on, however. Hodl can also be used as a noun, ie "I keep my spending sats in Blue Wallet and my hodl on a Passport hardware device". An analogy to fiat would be making the distinction between dollars in a checking account and dollars in a 401k. Your hodl is the stack that is in its forever home, so to speak. When you expect your money to consistently go down in value, you want to spend it quickly to realize its maximum value. The dollar bill in your pocket will never be worth more than it is right now...its value will only go down. When you expect your money to consistently go up in value, you want to spend it more conservatively...you want to hodl it. Happy Hodl Day! @Lonelypumpkins @Central Pennsylvania Bitcoiners Origin Story:
Greetings Central PA Bitcoiners! Our next meetup is taking place at 1pm on Saturday, Dec 28th, at Denim Coffee in Mechanicsburg. Although our coffee meetups typically take place on the fourth Sunday of each month, end of year commitments necessitated we chose Saturday the 28th for this month. @Business Cat has graciously agreed to host on the 28th in my absence...I'll catch you at the Jan 26th meetup. 2025 is looking bright for Central PA Bitcoiners! We're in the process of putting together coffee meetups on the fourth Sunday of each month, and then have our quarterly educational meetup in February or March. Some news items: Big milestones...BTCUSD finally broke $100k this month. Although its all-time high (ATH) had been breached in nominal terms in March, as written about in the October 31st newsletter, we were still a long way from attaining new highs when considering inflation-adjusted USD terms, gold terms, real estate terms, or in terms of the stock market (S&P 500). The exchange rate at 100k BTCUSD not only added another zero in our base-10 focused psychology around price levels, it surpassed its ATH when priced in assets harder than the dollar as well. Also, 100k BTCUSD corresponds to a market cap of $2T, another round number that garners attention. A word about unit bias: people can have a bias if things are framed a certain way. There are lots of people who think "well, I would like to invest in bitcoin, but I don't have $100k, so no dice...oh well", or "$100k is so expensive! Normal people aren't going to be able to get any." Anyone can buy $5 of bitcoin, which would net them about 5,000 sats. Making sats the standard is what some propose. Like there are 1,000 meters in one kilometer, there are 100 million sats in one whole bitcoin. $100k BTCUSD means you can get 1,000 sats for your dollar. I like to think of it in terms of global assets. There are $900T of global assets, and BTC now at $2T makes up 0.22% of that. Is it a stretch to think that it'll eventually be 0.5%, or 1%, or 2%? What sounds more expensive to you...gold's market cap, 2% of the world's assets, or $900k BTCUSD? They're all the same thing, however the framing of the last one makes it sound least realistic to most people's ears. Putin declares "no one can ban Bitcoin." This is a big change of stance from what his words and actions said in the past. Bitcoin is strongest when there are many different participants, with different incentives, and that don't/won't coordinate with each other. The US has become a hub for development and mining activity in the past years, and other countries, especially ones that the US isn't on good terms with, bringing development and mining hash power to the table makes for the best network conditions possible. I'll paraphrase Jeff Booth, great thinker in the space and author of "The Price of Tomorrow". He was asked "what's the worst thing about bitcoin?", and his response was "the worst thing about bitcoin is that you have to be ok with the idea not only that your enemy can use it...your enemy being able to use it makes it stronger and better for yourself". Microsoft shareholders reject bitcoin treasury proposal. Microsoft, the fourth largest company in the US by market cap, has $79B of cash on its books. A proposal was on the table to convert 5% of that into bitcoin. Michael Saylor gave a presentation at their board meeting making a great case for why keeping all of their treasury in dollars is doing their shareholders an injustice, as inflation eats away at it constantly. Even at 2% inflation, that's a $1.6B loss every year. Nevertheless, this proposal was rejected by the shareholders, as was expected by most apparently. More proof of how early we are, friends. ETHBTC drops to lowest level since March 2021. I view talking about altcoins, AKA shitcoins, as a frustrating waste of time generally. However, this article reminded me of something important about them: over the long run, they all trend to zero in bitcoin terms. Yo-yo coin and XYZcoin might draw attention for their short lived pumps here and there, but chart them against bitcoin on a timescale of months/years, and they're all headed the same direction...zero. Many people get drawn in to the hype, and have to touch the stove themselves to learn that they shouldn't. Take this bitcoiner's word for it...avoid the noise. Stay humble & stack sats. That's all for now, folks. Remember, December coffee meetup is 1pm on Saturday the 28th at Denim Coffee in Mechanicsburg. Happy holidays! @Lonelypumpkins Central PA Bitcoiners
New Episode of @Rock Paper Bitcoin is available from our guys @Business Cat and @Phundamentals! Check it out!
Greetings Central PA Bitcoiners! Next meetup is at 1pm this Saturday, Nov 9th, at the Simpson Library in Mechanicsburg. This educational meetup will be geared towards what steps one can take to improve their financial sovereignty. Beginners welcome! Topics: What does it mean to increase one's sovereignty? What is the staircase of sovereignty? What does it mean to get off zero? The importance and significance of getting off zero Approachable steps that incrementally increase sovereignty What is a seed phrase? What makes them so powerful? Ideas for leveling up your skills and setup Thoughts on how to approach holiday conversations with family when you feel that itch to orange pill Hope to see you there! @Lonelypumpkins Central PA Bitcoiners
Greetings Central PA Bitcoiners! Two meetups lined up for November: an educational meetup on Saturday, Nov 9th, and our monthly coffee meetup on Sunday, Nov 24th. See below for a sneak peak of Nov 9th meetup. After 6 months of chop, the exchange rate of bitcoin against the US Dollar is approaching its former ATH (all-time high). The ATH has already been breached when measured against other fiat currencies, and exceeded 100k Canadian Dollars yesterday. Keep in mind the shortcomings of these fiat measurement tools, though. Fiat currencies, due to constant debasement, AKA legal counterfeiting, bleed value continuously. Imagine if other measurement tools that we rely on constantly changed in value! For example, say your height is 60" this year, and next year it's 63". This wasn't because you actually grew, though...it'd be because the length of an inch keeps insidiously getting smaller. Imagine if a carpenter were building you a house, and that when he showed up every morning to work on it, the length of each inch on his measuring tape decreased by some inconsistent amount overnight. How do you think that your house would turn out? Value is subjective, and the fluctuating value of a thing can only be measured against the fluctuating value of another thing. Another way to measure bitcoin's value would be against assets scarcer than fiat currencies. Some examples are stocks (the S&P 500), precious metals (gold), or residential housing (the Case-Shiller Index). When measuring bitcoin's value against these scarcer assets, we've still got a bit to go before we eclipse the ATH, set for each of these in 2021. Compared to three years ago, we're still 24% under the ATH priced in stocks, 38% under the ATH priced in gold, and 16% under the ATH priced in houses. Keep staying humble, and keep stacking sats. ------------------------------------- The Nov 9th educational meetup will be geared towards what steps one can take to improve their financial sovereignty. Beginners welcome! Topics: What does it mean to increase one's sovereignty? What is the staircase of sovereignty? What does it mean to get off zero? The importance and significance of getting off zero Approachable steps that incrementally increase sovereignty What is a seed phrase? Why are they so powerful? Cold vs hot storage Ideas for leveling up your skills and setup Hope to see you there! @Lonelypumpkins Central PA Bitcoiners
Greetings Central PA Bitcoiners! Subject Title: Meetup This Sunday; Then They Fight You Our monthly coffee meetup is this Sunday, Oct 27th, at Denim Coffee in downtown Mechanicsburg. Come join us at 1pm! This is the second time I've used "then they fight you" in the Subject Title. The first time was in April of this year, and it was referring to the arrest of the Samourai developers. There were some news items this week that evoke that same notion. ECB economists publish a paper attacking bitcoin Italy proposes plan to increase capital gains on bitcoin from 26% to 42% Minneapolis Fed suggests banning or taxing bitcoin to sustain deficits The hypocrisy is off the charts with these. In the first one, the argument is made that early bitcoin adopters are getting rich and capturing wealth from later adopters, in a zero-sum scenario. Of course, this is not zero-sum, and it's how holders of any capital asset are compensated for their risk and correct choices. People who bought AAPL at $1/share 20 years ago are able to realize profit due to the buyers that value it more than that now. Likewise, today's asset buyers will profit in the future if future buyers value it more than they do now. A wonderful juxtaposition with these news items is a recent video which compares the current Bitcoin-focused pushback to pushback against past disruptive technologies, entited "Bitcoin and the Death of Energy Misinformation" on Swan's YouTube channel. There is a long history of instances where the old guard attempts to FUD the thing that's disrupting them. For example, the bicycle came to prominence in the 1890's, and disrupted several existing industries: horse and buggy, riding apparel, railway, and public transit. A newspaper article was written that claimed "the bicycle to be the most dangerous thing to life and property ever invented". The bicycle since has become the most ubiquitous means of mechanical transportation worldwide. Lastly, I'll leave you with this gem of a video I recently came across called "Six reasons to withdraw your bitcoin from exchanges" by Arman The Parman. My favorite is reason #6: "Unless you take coins into your own custody, you will never fully appreciate how bitcoin works. If you don't appreciate it, you won't buy enough of it, and this you will regret." Reminds me of the saying "let your education drive your allocation". Enjoy the rest of your week, friends. Hope to see you on Sunday! @Lonelypumpkins Central PA Bitcoiners