Got boys aged 7-10? Introduce them to Willard Price

The Adventure Series

The guy was a genuine spy who actually used "birdwatcher" as a cover while hopping between islands and noting their fortifications in 1930's Japanese Pacific.

I'm nearly 60 now, and while I was a voracious reader as a boy, these I remember, but all those other writers I must have read back then, nope.

He did invent the best villain name ever - Kaggs

Bitcoin, Hard Money, and TAXES

A word....

BTC is hard money with friction free transactions.

By existing, it will force Gvt to adopt hard money policies, or lose control of their fiat.

That has a HUGE consequence that crypto people hate talking about. Taxes.

Gvts will need to reshape their tax base, and crack down on leakage. The most simple way for them to do this is enhanced financial monitoring, tracking, KYC and tighter AML, including being able to track back to source wallets.

Long term, financial privacy is dead. BUT ALSO, rich person loopholes and deductions will get closed, so more equitable.

BLACKROCK

Some home truths for those who on one hand talk about bitcoin as the only sound money and we're gonna hyperbitcoinisation baby! BUT WHO ALSO somehow think that institutions are going to sit it out?

Mate, the first rule of money is that you do not get to choose who uses it. BTC isn't your personal CBDC... Money does not care about your philosophy. It just is. BTC doesn't care about Gvts, which is why we love it, but also, it doesn't care about us either. It just is what it is.

Institutions will jump in and do what they do. Which, for now, will be to pump the price. Because an ETF opens the door to many many TRILLIONS of retail investment. That doesn't mean it all goes to BTC, it means that a couple% does, and that can pop market cap by INTEGERx

This is good news for people who are long BTC.

Now for the paranoia.

Might that include a FORK to POS? Not in the short term. Would you use POS BTC? No. Would the FUD trash the price? Yes. Is that in the interests of institutions at this stage? No.

But longer term, AFTER BTC is a decatrillion* asset, and as such having serious impact on fiat? Still NO.

UNLESS

Unless Gvts decide that they will get together and regulate the privacy and ease of use away from OG BTC. And you do that by controlling the EXITS. You don't have to KYC a single onramp if you simply require that businesses accepting BTC, or offering an off ramp have to KYC and do reporting (inc wallet addresses).

Then you are made an offer that boils down to "use POS BTC and maintain your buying power" or "stick with OG BTC and put it in a safe with your Confederate Dollars".

The GOOD NEWS. If you are long on BTC today, and it does pan out dystopian, you'll be able to cry in your Ferrari, possibly while sitting in the drive of your beachside mansion.

My take, I'd love BTC to stay POW. Privacy, is probably going to die, at least for ticket items like houses, cars, and $10K+ off ramping. But if the worst comes to pass, there are worse fates than mortgage free home by the sea:-)

*Yes, decatrillion, 20x, 30x, 50x. That means BTC has scaled into a standard asset class and widely used money, threatening tax bases and no longer ignorable by Gvts.

Women complain we leave the seat up.

But THIS SIGN isn't aimed at us. And I know which is the worse crime :-)

Securities ? Yes, yes they are, get over it. Except bitcoin

Now, I can buy any crypto i like until the cows home because the SEC isn't trying to protect me and the UK has, so far, got sane regulations.

I used to be in finance, and digital money has been of interest since Chaum.

But by USA rules, and sticking to fundamentals, (ie ignoring the wriggle room where the lawyers live) it seems to me that all the crypto tokens are arguably securities except BTC. Even ETH. ETH is very much a bet on the work and future efforts of V himself.

Sensible regulation would focus on the proper management and systems of exchanges, and not so much on the products sold.

FWIW, I am mainly BTC, with a small experimental ETH and a couple of tiny, - badly timed :-( - L1s.

Bitcoin. What is important, in order:-

ADOPTION IS EVERYTHING : Bitcoin is, in theory, the best money ever invented. But it NOTHING is money unless it's adopted as such by general users.

So, Lightning is the practical money for bitcoin. ALL THAT MATTERS is adoption. It doesn't matter if a wallet is custodial or not. Just get people on a simple wallet, easy to use, loaded with a few bucks and tell them to SPEND.

All the rest is, for new people, confusion. Just keep it simple. "Here's your browser wallet, now I've sent you some sats, you can buy more with your card, and send/spend them."

Let them find the rest out later.

Whatever happened to Nostrgram.co?

I really hate doomscroll layouts and loved his multi column desktop

But all seems stuck since April 22...

Seeking suggestions for other columnar web nostr clients...

nostr.naut.social

admit it, best named relay out there, you need to join :-)