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- [00:00]
A
Do we want other people to be the primary influence in our kids lives or do we want to be the primary influence? If someone's going to indoctrinate my kids, it's going to be me. Like that's really what it comes down to. I hate to put it that bluntly but like listen, everyone's indoctrinated by something. So it's like what do I want my kids to be influenced by primarily? And the decision came down to we want that to be us. And so we pulled them out of elementary school, started homeschooling. Anyone who can homeschool, I would just encourage you to, to really consider it and take, take on the, take on the work man. Like, like do, do the actual work because it, nothing easy is going to be worthwhile. And if you're going to invest somewhere it like this should be the one area where like all right, cool. I'm down to, to put in the work. It's easy to point to fiat and blame fiat on everything. But I mean I think it's true. We've gotten soft. Parents just like don't take their role seriously. They're too distracted chasing money because they have to keep up with inflation and so they're, they're less present with their, with their kids. I think that's a huge part of it is just like it's easy to just check out as a parent nowadays and put your kid in front of a, you know, a YouTube show. Parenting is the lowest time preference thing you can do. If you really think about it. You know, if we're changing the world, it's going to go beyond us, right? It has to go into the next generation. And so really be, be thinking about your level of intentionality with the next generation and your responsibility to raise your kids with, with a level of intentionality that is required of you. It's not something that happens accidentally. They're not going to fall into good habits. They're not going to fall into being mature or having self awareness. You have to do the work. This is where the ball is going. This is where the world is going. Everything is going to be repriced in bitcoin. Every company is going to be a bitcoin company. And it just, it feels like we're on our way to hyper bitcoinization. It feels like all the things that we've been dreaming up and we've been kind of planning for, you know, all of like the game. We've talked about game theory for so long and now it's like happening it's playing out and so it's exciting, man. I think I'm one of those people that, that believes this time is different. You know, I think, I think when you have bitcoin, treasury companies buying more bitcoin, that's being than is being mined, you know, quarter over quarter that, that gap is, is growing, not it's not going down, they're buying exponentially more. And so when you have a finite resource like bitcoin, like I just don't see us having a intense bare market like we have. I think the, the four year cycle thing is, is, is kind of over.
- [02:38]
B
Greetings and salutations, my fellow plebs. My name is Walker and this is the Bitcoin podcast. Bitcoin continues to create new blocks every 10 minutes. The value of one bitcoin is still one. And if you're listening to this right now, remember you are still early. If you're not already, go ahead and subscribe to this show wherever you're watching or listening and share it with your friends, family and strangers on the Internet. If you want to follow me in the show on Nostr and X, just head to the Show Notes to grab the links. If you are enjoying the bitcoin podcast and want to support it by becoming a paid subscriber, you can download the Fountain app, search for the bitcoin podcast and subscribe by paying with bitcoin via Lightning or Fiat via card. You'll get access to ad free episodes and early releases of select content. Plus you'll help support this show. Head to the Show Notes for product discount links. Go to walkeramerica.substack.com to get episodes emailed to you and head to bitcoin podcast.net for everything else. Without further ado, let's get into this bitcoin talk.
- [03:49]
A
I need to get, I need to get back into Noster. Man, it just fell off, dude.
- [03:54]
B
It's a lot of fun. I'll be honest, the vibes on Nostr are a lot better. Like the bitcoin Twitter Bitcoin X vibes. I've been a little weird lately, I think and the vibes on Nostr just feel good, I think because it's also so Gigi. I don't know if he knows, but he completely went off of X, doesn't use it at all anymore, deleted his account and he's exclusively using Nostr. One of the things he talked about, he did a really great presentation on it. Might have been at Baltic Honey Badger or somewhere else, but basically this idea that you Wouldn't zap a car crash. This idea that because you can send zaps on nostr. Because you can send value on nostr, people tend to give value to things that are positive or at least that show a proof of work, whatever. Generally, things that are like, good things is what you want to zap. If you're sending bitcoin to something. Like, you're not going to send bitcoin to a video of a car crash. That's horrible. It's tragic. That feels messed up to even do that. And so I thought that that's such a brilliant thing because it's like the attention algorithm on these centralized platforms absolutely prioritizes that car crash. Clickbait. Everybody stops to watch a car crash. But this idea that, yeah, everybody may stop to watch it, but you, you don't zap that. Like, you don't give that value. You might give that attention, but you don't give that value. And I just thought that's like a kind of like, Blew my mind when he said that, like, you don't zap a car crash. And it's like, wow, okay. That's actually insanely profound.
- [05:27]
A
Oh, dude. My feed on X is just like, it's all that. It's all. It's trash. It's like fights. It's. It's become extremely racist, too. I'm like, damn, this is like just everything is clickbait.
- [05:38]
B
But, yeah, it's wild. And I mean, I think that this is also just like, most people aren't going to come over to Nostra and start using it until the pain gets great enough on these other platforms where it's like, I need to make a switch. Or the pain might be censorship. Like, it may, it may be actual, like, you know, totalitarian crackdowns. I mean, the UK is looking weird right now, man. Like, I don't know what is going on over there, but it's, it is not good. I saw some crazy, like, there's like, like dozens of people getting arrested, like, on a. Like, I forget if it was daily or weekly. Either way, it's a large number for, like, social media posts, for, like, retweeting things. And, like, that's just insane. Apparently, yes. For even retweeting. You can, you can get this. And like, I don't know, I, I. For a while I thought all that stuff, like, oh, it must be overblown. Like, it must just be, you know, kind of, like catastrophizing it, you know, again, like, people doing it for clickbait.
- [06:32]
A
Right.
- [06:32]
B
But from like talking to people in the uk, it's like, no, no, this is like a legitimate thing and it's super messed up. And so it's. I don't know, it's. It's sad to see.
- [06:42]
A
So how do you. How do you balance both? Because you're on Both, right? X and Nostr.
- [06:45]
B
Yeah. Yeah. So I, I use. I use two Noster clients, I use Domus and I use Primal, and then I also use Zap Stream, which we are streaming on right now. And hello to anyone who is here live. But I guess for me, it's like, it's actually, I post my podcast stuff on both. I have a podcast account for both. And so that stuff I kind of put out that's like basically the same on. On both. No strain on X, just because it's like a workflow thing for me. But on a personal level, I. I guess I post different sorts of content on. On Nostr than I do on X. On X. Honestly, I troll a lot more on Noster. I don't feel the need to troll. It's kind of like, you, again, people aren't going to zap a car crash. I mean, maybe if it's a really masterful troll, but, like, it's a more open discussion, I think. Right, because you don't have people that are going to algorithmically get fed your inflammatory tweet as some sort of, you know, clickbait. It's like, people do less of that. It's kind of interesting. It's. You have this open protocol for communication where people can say anything they want or any heinous things. And of course, some people are going to.
- [07:57]
A
Right.
- [07:58]
B
But, like, that just gets drowned out. Nobody pays attention to that. That doesn't get amplified because there's no incentive to amplify negativity like that. So I think that that incentive model is really, really amazing. And honestly, like, go, you know, go on Noster and just start talking about your book and parenting. Like, you know, if like, that's not something you do as much on X like you were talking before this, like, oh, I need to, like, self promote a little bit more. Like, that's always a hard thing. It's a hard thing for. For me too. Like, Noster is a great place to do that. Because if you're just engaging honestly with people and being like, hey, I really care about parenting and this idea of sound parenting, and this is what I'm here to talk about, I think people will. Will vibe with that very well.
- [08:35]
A
Okay. No, that's good. Yeah. It's just been getting like the habit of it, you know what I mean? I have both on my, on my phone as well, both those clients. But it's just like the, I think just the addiction, frankly. Like I'm addicted to X. I hate to admit it. Like, I had to delete it off my phone for a little while because it's like the doom scrolling is just too much, bro.
- [08:52]
B
Dude, dude. It is what I mean. But it's literally like it's built for that. It's built to keep you engaged and hooked. And the weird thing is you find yourself like, you spend a few minutes on there and you try to think back like, what did I even, what did I even start looking at? What have I just been doing for the last. I literally can't remember what I was just doing, but I just feel more anxious now. I need to go walk outside. I need to chill. We really have no idea what the long term effects of just social media exposure are going to do to people and like, feel bad for like the, you know, the younger generations who basically were complete guinea pigs for it. Like social media came around when I was already. I mean, my prefrontal cortex wasn't fully formed, but it was, it was, it was getting there. Like mine just finished forming like last year. But like, for these kids that like, they grew up with a smartphone in their hands. I remember the first phone I had was a Motorola Razr. And I think I was 16 when I got it. And I was like, whoa, that was cool, man. Like, that was, you know, it was a razor like that.
- [09:51]
A
It was sweet.
- [09:53]
B
They were awesome. They were so cool. But like, you know. Well, first of all, okay, welcome George. It's awesome to have you here. We're gonna, we're gonna just go in a bunch of different directions today. But maybe we just kind of start out like on the parenting parenting side a little bit. Because you are a, you are a father who has been in this fatherhood game for longer than I have. I am very new to this. You've done it a couple of times over. You've got kids that are in their late, late teens. Yeah, I don't want to be too specific, just.
- [10:22]
A
But no early teens, a 15 year old daughter and a 17 year old son. So yeah, it's definite teenage years, man. A whole new challenge. And I can't honestly, like, my parenting sort of advice is definitely not about teenage years. It's more focused on kind of where I'm experienced, which is the younger years. But yeah, it's been quite the journey, and it's been a lot of fun. It's something I'm really passion about. Like I was talking about with you earlier is like, watching the bitcoin scene start to mature. We're getting older, right? It's like, I got it in 2017, and there weren't a lot of kids in the space. But now, you know, bitcoiners growing up, starting to have kids. I saw a need and actually so kind of where the story starts, I guess I'll just dive right in. I started to bring my son Kingston, to bitcoin meetups when he was really young, probably like 10 or 11. And he always just loved it. He always vibed with the adults, and it was cool because bringing my kids around bitcoiners, I always felt comfortable. These are the people who I want my kids to be like, you know what I mean? And we homeschooled our kids, and so there's always kind of that stigma with homeschoolers, like, are they going to be socialized or whatever? And you meet my kids, and it's like that stigma is gone. They're like, they know how to talk to adults. We're trained at a young age to shake hands, look people in the eye, and kind of the basics, and brought Kingston to Bitcoin 2021. And he, you know, he got to see kind of Jack mallers make the announcement about El Salvador, and he was really struck by that was really influential moment. And that was actually the time period where I transitioned to working for btc Inc. I came on originally as a director of marketing, as my first. First role, got my foot in the door, got to leave my fiat job and get into. Into bitcoin full time. And from there, I started bringing him to all the conferences. And Bitcoin 2022, it was my first conference working there. He was 13 at the time. And I remember being nervous, I'm going to bring my son and I'm working. So I was like, how much do I have to babysit or keep an eye on him? And, dude, he just blew me away. He kind of just made himself useful. Dove right in, kind of picked up on what he learned at the meetups, and the staff really embraced him. And we're pulling him in, like, 18 different directions. Like, just, hey, this kid can actually help. He can actually contribute value and got, you know, a ton of compliments and was, you know, very proud as a father, obviously. But there's one conversation with one of my coworkers, Alan Helm, and his wife Sid. And they were like, dude, what did you do with this kid? Like, can you please help us? They were expecting at the time. They're like, can you, like, write a book or write, you know, write your ideas down, what you and your wife did? And I was like, I probably could do that, actually. And so that was kind of the genesis. That was originally what inspired me to write this book. And sat down and just started kind of writing all of the things that we did as parents. And the book is called I'm not your bruh 21 keys to sound Parenting. The thesis is right there in the title. It's like, we got to get back to sound parenting. We gotta get back to, like, the basics of, you're a parent, that's your child, it's not your best friend. You know, you don't. You don't treat them like they're one of your buddies. You. We have to, like, regain authority. And I think, like, this is really missing in. In society. If you look at. If you look at kind of some of the common, like, parenting habits. And so. So, yeah, the book is very practical. It's very. You know, there's literally 21 chapters, 21 keys of here's kind of how to. How to approach parenting.
- [14:03]
B
I mean, love that they're 21 keys as well. Like, a good. A good bitcoin pun, you know, is. Is never a miss. I'm curious what, like, do you think as a whole? Because I think we've all experienced that, like, the. The cliche, which is a cliche for a reason of, like, the, you know, the. I'm a cool mom or, you know, I'm a cool dad or whatever. Like, that exists for a reason. And, like, you know, like, we've all known those kinds of. Those kinds of people. I mean, is this. Is this something we. We trace back to fiat? Like, is part of this an issue of, you know, both parents being gone all the time? Like, during. During the day? Like, is that. Or how do you look at this in terms of, like, how did we get here to where we are today? And why did this problem become so acute?
- [14:51]
A
Yeah, I mean, I think. I think what you just touched on is definitely part of it. I mean, it's easy to point to fiat and blame fiat on everything, but I think it's true. Like, it's just we've. We've. We've gotten soft, and we're in that kind of that loop of, you know, the hard part. What's the meme? Hard men create soft times, and we're we're in that. It's like parents just like, don't take their role seriously. They're too distracted chasing money because they have to keep up with inflation. And so they're, they're less present with their, with their kids. I think that's a, a huge part of it is just like, it's easy to just check out as a parent nowadays and put your kid in front of a, you know, a YouTube and not be intentional with, with your role and your responsibility and just like let your kid kind of exist, you know? And so my, my whole thing is, no, we got to be active, we got to be present, we got to be hands on and teaching our kids how to be human. It doesn't just happen accidentally. Like, if you don't teach your kid how to, you know, again, look an adult in the eye, shake their hand, you know, things, like little things, and it really is little, just very practical things. When you're at a restaurant and you're ordering for your kid, rather than, you know, training them, hey, you know, look the server in the eye and tell them what you want, that, that becomes a very useful thing in life or just like introducing your kid. When your child is with you and you're in a conversation, it's like, are you in the habit of being like, oh, by the way, this is my son. And you know, training them in that moment to shake a hand and look people in the eye and, and be confident and say, you know, put your hand out. Say like, my name is Kingston. It's great to meet you. These little things that are ignored or dismissed or not thought about, they don't just, they don't just happen. You know what I mean? And so that's kind of what I try to instill is just like, we got to go back to the basics. We have to reclaim our authority. You know, being the cool mom is a very temporary thing that, that when your kid grows up, they're not gonna, you know, it's not gonna work. Like, the, the better approach is to actually be present in your kid's life, to be helpful and useful and, and train them and coach them and, and then when, when they get older. And actually this is what I'm realizing what's funny. Cause the book is called I'm not yout Brother. But like, my son who's 17 now has become like a really good friend, like in a lot of ways, right? Like, that's, that's my buddy. Like, and it didn't, it didn't start that way. Because, you know, I. I understood my. My authority in his life, and I understood ability to train him to be his own individual person. But it's cool now that I'm reaping the benefits of that because we're very close.
- [17:40]
B
I think that there's this idea that people have that, well, I want to have what you have with Kingston, right? I want to have my child be someone that I can feel like I'm actually a friend with later in life. So that must mean that I need to start just being their friend earlier in life. And it's kind of counterintuitive because it's like, no, you, like, you have to be able to set boundaries. Like, you have to, like, you. Like, you're. You do know better as a parent. Like. Because, like, I mean, like, I don't know about you, but I was a dumbass. Like, and I was a really good kid, too. But even I, like, I was a very good kid, and I was homeschooled as well, but I was still a dumbass because I was a kid. Like, you know, we do stupid stuff. I think, especially, like. Especially boys, obviously, we gotta start getting some testosterone just coursing through our veins, and we're like, yes, let's go.
- [18:27]
A
Right?
- [18:27]
B
But. But so. But I think people, like, they don't understand that that relationship can and should evolve. It doesn't have to start from the place that you want to get to. It should start from a place of, of course, love. Like, that should, you know, like, it doesn't. Authority and love don't have to be mutually exclusive. In fact, they're. They're definitely not. You were doing the things you're doing because you love your child. Like, it's not like. And I think people just lose that. I wonder how much of it, too, is just like, this. I. The kind of the participation generation. You know, the participation ribbon sort of vibe of things, and just wanting to make sure everybody feels good and everybody feels, you know, safe and nobody feels uncomfortable or they don't feel bad. Like, a failure to realize that difficult and painful moments are what shape you and make you better. Like, not exclusively good moments can. But, like, you learn often by force, not by choice. Like, you get smart by force. And so I think people have. I don't know. There's just a bit of a shift to where it's like, you know, the dad is not in a place of authority, and if the mom's not in a place of authority either, then, like, nobody's in a place of authority. You hear you know, horror stories about, you know, you know, kids, teens going crazy and everything. And it's like, man, I don't know. I think it's traditional methods of parenting worked pretty well for a very, very, very long time. And like, I remember growing up, it's like started to get into these, like, kind of participation, parenting style of things, and I just don't think that was helpful for anyone. Like, I learned a hell of a lot more from, you know, a baseball game where we lost than from where we won.
- [20:11]
A
Right.
- [20:11]
B
It's important. It's important to lose because then you realize what it takes to win.
- [20:15]
A
You know, it's important to lose and then not get a trophy ceremony after.
- [20:19]
B
Yeah, no, because you don't. Because you don't deserve one. You lost like you're a loser. Like, like that's not a permanent state for you, but you were a loser today. So what are you going to do differently? How are you going to make yourself better? Because otherwise you will be a loser. You'll lose again. But, like, you don't. You don't have to be. You can win. Hello, friends. You may notice that there are no sponsors for this episode and that is because this is a pure value for value episode. So if you find this episode valuable, consider giving value back. You can do that by becoming a paid subscriber on Fountain. You can send me a zap on Nostr, a boost on Fountain, or if you don't feel like doing any of those, one thing you can do that is totally free is just to share this show with your friends, family and strangers on the Internet so that it reaches more people. If you are listening on a podcasting app like Apple Podcast, you can also give this a five star rating so more people find the show. You can subscribe on YouTube, rumble, or wherever else you're watching. But again, I always recommend that Bitcoiners check out Fountain. You can also go check out the Big Print audiobook which I narrated. You also, of course, do not have to do any of those things. Bitcoin does not care. But I sure do appreciate all of your support, so thank you.
- [21:33]
A
Yeah, and I think there's a section in the book about discipline that was probably the hardest to write. The most controversial. I remember putting some, some of these ideas out that, you know, my wife and I started at, you know, a very young age. We, we had kids young. I was, I was 22 and Kingston was born and you know, we. It was shortly after we got married. So it was, it wasn't part of. To have kids that early. But we had to figure it out because there's a child here now, and we're parents. And so we adopted a few mantras. And in our household, mantras are really big. One of the things we talk about, words are really important. The use of words with intentionality is very important. But one of the things that was pretty controversial, pissed a lot of people off when I tweeted it was obey first and then ask questions is one of. One of the things that we've always taught our kids. And really what that comes down to is, like, if I give you instruction as a parent, you are to obey first, and then if you have questions about sort of why that instruction was put out, then you can ask questions. But it's after the fact. It's not when I ask you to do something, it's not why or like, you know, questioning or pushing back. Like, this isn't. This isn't a democracy, right? Like, this is very much a dictatorship. It's like, even like, little things like what we're eating for dinner. Like, I don't consult with my kids on that. You know what I mean? Like, it's like, here's what we're having for dinner, and this is what you're going to eat. We know. Another mantra we have is whiners get nothing. It's like, dude, if you whine about anything ever, I just. I'm not going to hear it, you know? And. And so it is being, like, hard in some ways, and it is being direct. And that's. That's difficult for the. The trophy, the participation generation, because, you know, in a lot of ways, that's not what we got. If, if you're a millennial, it's like you kind of were raised in that sort of softness where you kind of, you. You got the trophy even if you lost and you were told you're a winner, even when you weren't very, very talented in certain things. And, like, that just wasn't helpful, you know? Another one is delayed obedience is disobedience, right? It's similar to obey first, then ask questions. But it's like the, you know, the countdown method is one that I criticize pretty harshly. I'm like, if you do the countdown method, if you're like, three, come on, you better listen to me, or it's going to be really bad for you two. Like, a lot of parents do that. And what you're teaching your kid is that it's okay for them to not listen to you right away, right? And so One of the things we said is if you delay that obedience, you're actually disobeying. And so the expectation is you do something the first time I ask you, I'm not going to count down. And if you don't do it, there's going to be consequences.
- [24:24]
B
I think that I remember hearing, because we were on a, like, a bitcoin parenting panel at the conference this past year, which was an awesome panel. I remember you were discussing that with somebody backstage. I hadn't heard that it phrased that way before with the countdown, because that feels like that's just like, something that, like, a lot of parents do. I'm not at that stage yet, you know, where my son, like, would understand, like, why I'm counting. He'd just, like, start counting with me, and I'd be like, oh, this is fun. We're playing a counting game. Okay. But, like, there was something, you know, it's interesting in this parenting journey. It's like so many of these things are only abstract concepts to you until you get there yourself. Like, until you get there. We were talking about this just off camera. It's like, you know, you don't even realize little things like, oh, why. Why do people denominate their baby's age in months for so long? Like, it sounds ridiculous to say 20, 21, 22 months old, or whatever. Just, you know, say two years. And it's like, oh, because those couple months make a world of difference in your child's development. But you don't know that until you're actually in it. And I think that's the case with. With a lot of things, like when it comes to discipline, like, when it comes to any of these things, you. You don't really, really internalize what that means or the implications of it until you are in it, in the moment, living it. And it's no longer just abstract and theoretical. It's not academic. It's real life. It's like this. What you do right now as a parent will make a difference. And I think that that's. Again, it's like you don't know until you know. You don't know about how you're going to feel and how you're going to change as a man until that baby is there. And you're like, holy shit. What happens after I die? What. What I need. Like, I need to. I. I thought I had a low time preference before. I didn't. I didn't. It was all a lie. Now I need to buckle down and work harder. But I also need to balance that with still being there and being present and being a key figure. And like. And how do I do that? And, like, shit. I'm just thinking about so many more things than I ever was before. But while I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world.
- [26:23]
A
Right, right. No, absolutely. I think it's easy again, to just, like, check out and coast and not be present. And your kids need you to be there. You are the automatic authority figure. Whether you like it or not, your kids look up to you. They want to be just like you, which is kind of terrifying if you think about it. And it's funny. As I was writing this book, it challenged me to think through the level of intentionality that's required, down to the littlest, stupidest things of, like, if you're. If my office is messy and I'm going to tell my child to clean their room, I'm just a hypocrite. Right? It's. And, you know, that's. Again, it's a very simple concept to think about, but a lot of, like, parent, like, basic parenting really comes down to bettering yourself. That's what I learned is, is that, like, you know, be a better person, work on yourself. And, like, that's 90% of the battle, because your. Your child is looking to you as an example. And so they're gonna mirror you. They're gonna reflect who you are and who you're becoming and how you're acting and how you're treating people and the words that you say and how messy your room is. Like, all of those things matter. And so it really does. It's funny, like, I almost want to rewrite the book and just have it not be a parenting book and have it be just like a how to be a human book, because so much of it is just, like, practical application, things that, like, we just. We should just do better. And they'll, you know, they'll. They'll be adopted by our children. So. So, yeah, that's. That's really the thesis. It's like, sound parenting, sound money. They're. They're. They're back to the basics type. Type of things, like, strip away all the bullshit and just go back to just being a better person showing up. But, like, to your point, you don't really think about a lot of these things until you're in it. You know, my wife and I read a ton of parenting books, and we had to learn, again, learn on the fly. And so I do think it's one of those things where it's Like, I'm not like, an expert in any way other than, like, I've just been through it. And so I wrote down, you know, the practical things that we did that I think are helpful, the lessons that we learned along the way. And so I think it can be really useful if you're in that. In that season of life.
- [28:39]
B
How much do you think. Do you think about the nature versus nurture kind of debate at all? Because it's something I think about, like, all the time, and I. It's wild. How much, to your point, about, like, oh, your child is looking at you and they want to be just like you. Boy, you realize that real quick when they start either repeating everything you say or mimicking whatever action you did, and you're like, oh, my God, I need to make sure I'm not being a complete piece of garbage. Like, you know, like, you really, you do want to be better. But I'm curious, like, where you stand on that. How much. I mean, it's obviously an interplay, right? Like, it's not. It's not a binary there, but how much of an interplay do you think it is? How much are they just, you know, some people are like, well, what, you know, when they're born, like, that's just the person they're going to be. And you can nudge them a little bit, but they're basically. That's who they are. Or, or do you think, you know, the nurture does make a bigger difference?
- [29:28]
A
Yeah, I mean, I definitely think that it is an interplay. It's not binary. Both are. Both are definitely factors. But I do think that, you know, nurture does have an important role. If it's. If I had to quantify it, I'd probably say it's 80, 20, maybe 70, 30, in terms of, like, what you actually do, what you instill in your. In your children. I always tell my kids that I want them to be better versions of me and not like, you need to be like me. But I'm just saying the whole, like, well, you did this when you were a kid. Like, that doesn't work because actually I want you to be better than me. Like, if you're looking at an example of, like, my life, of something that I did where I fell short, and you're using that as an excuse of, like, well, you did that. Well, guess what? The goal isn't to be me. The goal is to be better than me. I think a lot about leadership too. You know, I want my kids to be. To be leaders. One of the Mantras that we use has been make good choices, be good leaders. Make good choices, be good leaders. Every time, every time. We left them somewhere, dropped them off at school or whatever. Make good choices, be good leaders. And I still actually use this one. It's kind of funny. And they're like, okay, dad, yeah, whatever. But I think it's important to think about this, especially as bitcoiners. I believe that bitcoiners are developing some of the best leaders in the world. And I think that responsibility is on us to raise up leaders. I think leadership is one of those things that's, that's. That's lost in our society. There's not. There's not a lot of good leaders you can point to as examples in the world anymore, which is terrifying. Right. I'm talking about, you know, presidents and people who are in positions of leadership, you know, industry leaders. There's not a lot that you want to really emulate. You know, effective leadership is. Has become scarce. And so I think on the nurture side, you know, let's just talk about us as bitcoiners, this community. It's on us to raise up the next generation of leaders. And I think that's. That's critically important if we're going to be, you know, leading the world. Like, we're trying to change the world. And I don't, I don't want to downplay that. I think it's a. It's a really important thing for us to embrace and be real about, like, if we're changing the world, if bitcoin is going to be the global reserve currency and, you know, the people who, who have bitcoin, right. It's the. What was the old thing is those who have the gold, he who has the gold makes the rules. Now it's like he has the. Bitcoin makes the rules. We're going to be running a lot of aspects of society. This next generation is going to be in positions of authority and leadership. Right. That's what we hope for. That's what we want to manifest. That's what we want to instill in our children. So I want to nurture that. I want to influence that as much as I can.
- [32:18]
B
Yeah, I think that it's something that is growing increasingly difficult in our society. When you have an education indoctrination system that is specifically made like the public school system is not built to produce leaders, it's built to produce followers. That's explicitly what it is. And there's a whole rabbit hole there because it's Like, I know you know this. You homeschooled your kids again. I was homeschooled myself. I went to high school. I made that decision. My parents said, this is your choice to make, and you live with the consequences. You know, go and do it if you want to. I'm so grateful to my parents for homeschooling me. Like, and I grow increasingly grateful the older I get, because the more I learn about it, you know, at that time, it just. It felt right, but I didn't fully appreciate the totality of it. Wow. And now it's like, I go back and I look and I started researching these things, and you find out. It's like, oh, so wait, this compulsory public education was like, that's like a Prussian model that they use to basically produce good workers and good soldiers. Okay, well, that's a little weird. Oh, Germany still has. Still makes it illegal to homeschool your kids. Why is that? Where did that policy start? It started with Adolf Hitler. Really? Oh, well, that's interesting. Why would the Nazis not want you to homeschool? That's so weird, huh? I can't. That just cooks my noodle, you know? And so. But, like, it's sad that. And obviously, maybe homeschooling is not for everyone either. And it's not for everyone. For the whole time that your child is going through school, I think your kids now have moved into, like, a. We can maybe talk about that a little bit. Moved into kind of like a hybrid model. But I think that it is something where you have to acknowledge, like, if you're gonna send your kids to public school, you have to acknowledge that you can bring them through that in one piece and they can still be good leaders. But that is entirely on you as the parent, because the school system is not going to do that. They will create little sheep out of them, because that is what the school system is designed to do. That doesn't mean every teacher is bad. Doesn't mean that every school is bad. It means that overall, the public school system, and this is not just in the U.S. but across the world, is designed after the neo Prussian model, and it is made to turn them into obedient little worker bees and obedient little soldiers. And so I'd love to maybe if you can talk about kind of how that changed for you guys homeschooling to, like, not homeschooling. You know, where. What. What made that change for you guys? And just kind of like, how do you. How do you view that in terms of their early education versus Their later education.
- [34:56]
A
Yeah. So definitely I'm a massive advocate for homeschooling. I know it's not practical for everyone. I know it sounds difficult because it is. It's a lot of work. You know, I was, we've been fortunate enough where, you know, I've been able to work. My wife stayed home and homeschooled the kids. And that was, you know, her primary, like, responsibility. She did all, all the heavy lifting and she took it very seriously. She took her role as teacher, you know, very seriously. Our kids started in public schools in elementary and we just, you know, started noticing that what exactly what you're talking about. It's like, do we want other people to be the primary influence in our kids lives or do we want to be the primary influence? If someone's going to indoctrinate my kids, it's going to be me. That's really what it comes down to. I hate to put it that bluntly, but listen, everyone's indoctrinated by something. So it's like, what do I want my kids to be influenced by primarily? And the decision came down to we want that to be us. And so we pulled them out of elementary school, started homeschooling. Actually, we started homeschooling right before COVID you know, right before it became cool and everyone started doing it. But at the time it was like, it was a pretty common sense kind of a decision for us. We had the opportunity, we had the means to do it. And so it was a pretty easy decision from that standpoint. And yeah, we, we've homeschooled our kids all the way through. Kingston. Stayed homeschooled. He actually just graduated. He's 17. He graduated a year early. He was homeschooled, you know, all the way up through, through high school. Saxon, our d. Um, when she got into high school, she, you know, approached us and said, you know, I'm interested in, in going to getting a kind of a high school experience is the way she kind of, she framed it. And so we found a local private Christian school that she's now attending. And you know, she, she's 15, but she's, you know, she's got the mind of a adult already. And you know, I credit a lot of that to homeschooling and her being, you know, around us, frankly. And so, you know, the way she approached us even was very mature and, you know, very like, here's kind of how I'm thinking about it. And so we were like, all right, cool, if that's what you want to do. You can't really force your kids at that age to. To do something they don't want to do. Then you just kind of. They start to resent you and all that kind of stuff. So she, you know, we. We made the decision and she's now. She's now doing that, and it's been great. It's been. It's been a solid shift. I think everything she's learned in homeschool, she's taken with her. And, um, and so that's. That's been a little bit of a shift. But again, anyone who can homeschool, I would just encourage you to. To really consider it and take. Take on the. Take on the work, man. Like. Like, do. Do the actual work, because nothing easy is going to be worthwhile. And if you're going to invest somewhere, it, like, this should be the one area where, like, all right, cool. I'm down to. To put in the work.
- [38:03]
B
Yeah. I mean, it is undeniably a lot of work. I am so grateful to my parents for doing it. Again, that's as you. I think as you become a parent, you appreciate so many more things about what your parents did that you maybe didn't fully grasp at the time, and you realize, oh, wow, you know, like, you made this sacrifice or that's. And like, wow, you know, I tell my parents, thank you a lot more now at this stage of my life, let's just say that. And I'm so grateful for them. And, you know, the homeschooling piece, I think, is just. It's sad that more folks, I think, view it as something that's out of their reach for a couple of reasons, and I think there's a couple of reasons for that. One of the reasons is they feel like, okay, well, I'm not equipped to home. I'm not a. I'm not a professional teacher. And I've been told that to teach kids, you need to be a professional teacher and go and, you know, go to, you know, university for this and do all these things. It's like, my mom was not. Guys, she was a. She was an English major. She. She did not have any teaching experience whatsoever. And I turned out. I mean, I'm a little bit, you know, the wackadoodle and conspiracy theorist, everything. But I turned out pretty well overall. Not to toot my own horn. I'll toot my mother's, though, because she's responsible for it. But, you know, like, they feel that, oh, I just. I don't know how to do it. It's like, if my mom can do it in, like, the 90s and early 2000s, I promise you can do it now. Because you have literally everything available to you online, like, for free.
- [39:28]
A
Yeah.
- [39:28]
B
She would get, like, you know, curriculums, you know, for guidelines, like, you know, ordered in the mail, sent to us. Like, this was a different time. You have so many options available to you. You can. There's all sorts of cool stuff with AI tutors now, too. Like, to be able to work through specific subject matter. Like, you might not be great at math. That's okay. Like, my mom wasn't either. I just had to read my Saxon math book cover to cover. But, like, you can get a cool AI tutor. I also had a Mennonite woman named Edith who tutored me in algebra for a while. That was actually. She was pretty cool. She's pretty cool, dude.
- [39:57]
A
Saxon math is still a thing. That's. I think. Yeah, we used. But dude. Also, the bar is so low. I mean, if you think about what you're. What public education is like, providing in terms of actual education. Yeah, the bar is incredibly low. It's funny. One of the things that, you know, Saxon, when she approached us that she kind of alluded to, and we, you know, we have a great relationship with our kids. They talk to us about everything that, you know, they share pretty openly. One of the things she pointed, she was like, homeschooling is hard. Like, mom is like, she makes it hard. And I was kind of proud of that. I was like, okay, good. Like, it should be. It should be hard like school. If you want your kids to actually be trained in how to. Again, how to be a human and how to. How to learn. Right. It's not. This is the thing that you don't learn at public school. They don't teach you how to learn. Right. They just throw shit at you and, like, expect you to memorize facts and, you know, and by the way, their version of the facts. Right? And so it's like, what we instilled in our kids was, here's how to learn. And we would use phrases like, even when we're going through the curriculum, you know, that. That we bought or whatever. It isn't. Here's what happened in 19. Whatever. It's. Here's what this book says happened. This is one version of history, by the way. There's other viewpoints on this that, you know, are interesting. And so that's really the key is it's like, you don't want your kids just to, like, memorize a bunch of Facts that they were told that this is the way that it is that you may or may not agree with. By the way, if you're sending them off to a public school and someone else is telling them, here's what happened in this, you know, this version of history, you get to teach your kids. No, this is how you learn. And this is one version of the way the story is told. And it's especially important when it comes to history, in my opinion. I think history is one of those subjects where it's just like. Like, we're. We're told, you know, here's the way it happened and don't question it ever. And you know what I mean? And it's just like, that's not how things work at all.
- [42:02]
B
No, just jumping off on. You mentioned just about the rigor. Like, you know, homeschooling is hard. It's funny. The primary reason I wanted to go to public school, that I told my parents I want to do that was because I was pretty convinced. I was like, I'm. I. What if I'm an idiot? Like, what if I, like, you know, and we do something like, you know, like, you have to do something like, still like, standardized testing and stuff like that as a, you know, part of, like, being homeschooled. But I was just like, man, I was looking around, you know, and I had, like, plenty of friends and everything because I did a bunch of sports. I was involved in a bunch of different community activities. You know, the. This idea of, like, this freakish homeschool recluse, like it didn't exist. I knew a lot of other homeschooled kids, too, you know, and, like, wasn't the case and. But I was worried because I was like, I see my friends who go to public school and they do hours of homework every night after they've been in school for eight plus hours, and then they come home and they do more homework. My God, they must be so far ahead of me. They must be just crazy far ahead of me. So, like, I just. I need to go test myself. I need to go test my mettle and see, you know what? Make sure I'm not an idiot. Maybe I am. And then I need to work hard, okay? And then I get to public school, and you're laughing because you know, what happens next. I was like, oh, my God, this is so easy. Like, this is stupidly easy. This is honestly, embarrassingly so. I found one of the biggest shocks to me was, like, I mentioned I would do every problem in my Saxon math book. I Would never skip a problem, never skip a chapter. Front to back. Reading these myself, and then had my nice Mennonite tutorial who would. Who would come in and help me out with concepts I didn't understand. Kind of helped. Found like a little small charter school with like, you know, 10 or 15 kids in our area as well. And I got to public school and I found out they were like, okay, we're going to be skipping, you know, this chapter here, and we're just going to be doing odds today or even today. The problems. I'm like, you guys aren't doing all of them. And then I remember the first time I found out that all the answers were in the back of the book because I just hadn't, like, looked and someone was like, why don't you just look in Bob? I'm like, bob? Who's Bob? Back of book. I was like, what's going on? No one's learning anything. You also realize I was the kid who was very eager raising my hand because especially in math and everything, I was like, I know all the answers to this. The teacher's asking. Nobody's raising their hand. Well, I'm going to raise mine. You start to realize that that sort of behavior gets socially punished as well. That gets. That gets you looked down on as the, you know, the know it all or whatever it might be. So, I mean, I ended up graduating valedictorian. My school was not. Not huge, but I graduated, you know, number one.
- [44:40]
A
Yeah.
- [44:41]
B
And so I was confirmed. Not to be an idiot, or maybe still am an idiot, but the bar was so damn low. But I was just. I was blown away. I was blown away at the lack of rigor. And there were some. I had. I did have some really great teachers who. I'm from a small town. And I was like, I don't know what business you have being here, but I'm really glad you are. Like, you're a very bright spot in this. Really. I think a lot of teachers are there because they truly care about kids. They really, really, truly care about kids. They are handicapped by a system of administrative bureaucrats. If you look one of those what the fuck happened in 1971 graphs that they've got on that site. It's like, number of school administrators versus number of teachers versus number of students. And it's like teachers and students is basically like the same, but administrators just goes through. So that's all of your counselors and, you know, all of the different bureaucratic layers that don't do anything for actual education. They don't actually help the kids. It doesn't increase the teacher to student ratio at all. They're just there to, you know, basically create problems for the teachers so that the teachers have to jump through even more hoops when they're just trying to get through their day and teach your kids. It's like. It's crazy. I'll have to find that graph and send it to you because it's one of those shocking things where you're like, well, look, here's the problem. And it happened kind of started around 1971 to see this divergence. I'm not trying to say if fiat ruins everything, but, boy, it really seems to ruin most things.
- [46:05]
A
Wow, that's fascinating. Yeah. I think also, too, one thing people don't realize, this is just kind of like, on a really practical level, like you mentioned, a lot of people think that homeschooling is out of reach. It's amazing. Not just the resources and technology, but, dude, the state will sometimes give you money to homeschool, I mean, depending on what state you're in. So I've lived. We homeschooled in when we lived in California, and now we live in Arizona. Both. Both states. I can't believe this about California actually give you money. They will. They will literally write you a check for things like curriculum and whatever you need for school. And I think that's. That's actually pretty prevalent in most states. So depending on where you live, like, Arizona gives you, like, six grand a year per kid. That, you know, it's not cash in your bank account, but it's. It's money that you can use to buy, like, a MacBook for their education, you know, and so that little. Those little things do help, you know, if. Again, if you feel like it's out of your reach, so don't just, like, dismiss it out of pocket. Like, no, that's not. That's not for me. I could never, like, you know, give yourself some credit, you know, be a leader and, you know, try to make it happen. Looking at the resources.
- [47:15]
B
Yeah. I think the other piece of it, feeling out of reach for a lot of people is both parents are working because both parents are forced to be working because we are on a fiat hamster mill treadmill. And you need to do that. So you spend. Both parents spend their whole days working outsourcing the care of their kids to the state.
- [47:40]
A
Yeah.
- [47:40]
B
And it's like, that. That can't be what you want. Like, you. You don't. Most people, like, if given the choice, like, should One parent stay home and like, like, let's be honest, like, usually the mother, because they are more naturally caregiving and nurturing like this. This is just a fact, folks. And anyone who has a mother or knows women knows this. So, like, this shouldn't be controversial, but, like, we have gotten so far away from that to now. It's the point where it's like, oh, both parents are working, but most of one parent's salary is going to pay for the expensive inner city preschool or inner city elementary school, private school, because they can't send them to the public one. Because in Chicago, for example, it's just complete garbage. The literacy rates are insanely, embarrassingly low. And so it's like you're spending all your time working to pay for somebody else to raise your kid. In what world does that make sense? Well, in the fiat world, it makes sense, right? Because that's just how it has to be done. We need more. We need more tax slaves, you know, like, ever. More tax slaves. That's the, that's the only answer, right?
- [48:45]
A
Oh, man. Yeah, that one's heartbreaking because, you know, it's. It's hard. It's really hard to tell someone who's, you know, has two parents that are working that, you know, one of them should consider quitting their, their job or stopping their career to do this. But, I mean, what else do you say other than, like, you should. You should really consider it, you know, like, figure out a way to make it work. Figure out a way. And I agree with you practically, and sort of like, throughout history, it's been the mom that, that, that stays home and takes care of the kids. Like, that's just kind of how the world has worked. And if we're talking about going back to the basics and going back to, you know, sound parenting, that's. That's what my encouragement would be if you can find a way to. To. To do that. So, yeah, I mean, I think we're. We're selling homeschooling pretty hard here, Walker. And hopefully people get the message. But, like, I think. I think this message is, Is needed. Like, people don't talk about this because it's. Because it's controversial, hard to say these things and people push back because, you know, it's hard to afford life right now, you know, and it feels like if you don't have two jobs, like, how am I going to pay the rent and how am I going to put food on the table and all that kind of stuff, but you'll find a way just like, in the same way that, like, when you became a parent and all of a sudden your instincts came, you know, kicked in and you just figured it out how to. How to care for a child. I think this is. It's kind of similar in some ways. Like, you'll figure out where to cut costs, you'll figure out how to adjust your lifestyle to make this work. But it won't happen if you don't make it a priority and if you don't think that it's important and if you think that, oh, they'll be fine. That kind of a thing like, this comes back to intentionality. Like, you have to make a decision that you are the best person to be in your kid's life and be the influence and be the role model and be the teacher. Like, actually be the person that teaches them. I think we kind of were born in this world and we have all these assumptions. One of those assumptions is that sending your kid to public school is what people do, because most people, that is what they do. And it is in a lot of ways the easier choice. But if we're thinking sort of as bitcoiners, if we're thinking from first principles, we have to question this. This isn't the automatic thing that we've done throughout history, and we should question why most people do this and if it's actually right for you. As somebody who thinks differently. If you're listening to this podcast, you probably. Or a bitcoiner, you probably think differently about the world. And this is one of those areas that, you know, I think you should be challenged to think differently and make some maybe uncomfortable decisions.
- [51:21]
B
Well, I think the other. I couldn't agree more with you, first of all. And I think another thing that people really aren't grokking yet is that the current public school convention is really not prepared for the post AI world. Like, it's really, It's. It's just not like rote memorization was never that helpful. Like, except with. In certain cases it can be. But like, generally, just as that being the, you know, the. The gold standard of public education. Well, let's just have a memorize stuff and take this test and that, you know, that's how we'll make them, you know, better little worker bees that are great at following instructions. But, like, in the, in the post AI world, you need to radically rethink what education should look like. And like, to the earlier point of me being blown away when I found, you know, I was like, my friends are in school all day long. And then they come home and they do more homework. I would do all of my work within like two to three hours in the morning, wake up, you know, wake up, wake up early at the crack of dawn, do all my work, and I'd be done by like 9am, 10am after putting in a few hours, I'd go play outside or go do random things where my mom would. One day she sent me off to a practicing blacksmith's house and just some random dude, super cool guy who's still a blacksmith. And so the first one who taught me about the Fibonacci sequence and how that informs his work and all these things, and then show me the practical application of that in smithing. And I was like, that was really cool. I'll never forget that day. And that's the other thing. Bitcoin gives you more control over your time.
- [52:54]
A
Right.
- [52:55]
B
And I think one of the best things that you can do for your child is to give them more time, more time that they're not just sitting in a chair having their butts planted and being told to walk in a straight line on the hallway to cater to the lowest common denominator of student. And like, I'm sorry, but like, you know, like, if you're listening to this, you're, you know, you at least have a few brain cells to rub together and hopefully your kids will not be the lowest common denominator. But all what you have to understand is that all of the public school system, all so much of so many of our systems, but let's focus on public school. All of the public school system is built around catering to the lowest common denominator. It's like it, it just is. And so if you, like, your child will revert to that, like, they will revert towards that. They are not going to be, they're not going to get better than, than they, or, you know, better than they could be. Because the system isn't built for that. It's built to keep everybody basically in line. And it has to be just easy enough and just pleasant enough that it caters to the people who are at the very, very bottom so they don't get left behind.
- [53:59]
A
Yeah.
- [54:00]
B
And maybe that's what you want for your kid, but I kind of doubt it. I kind of doubt it. Like, most, most parents who give a shit about their kids wouldn't. And so it's like, yeah, I would, I would highly encourage people, like, as somebody who was homeschooled, as somebody who's, you know, we are going to homeschool Our son, like, you know, at least give it a shot.
- [54:19]
A
Like, I love your point about, I love your point about time. I think it's a really important thing. It's not just, it's the flexibility of time too. It's like the opportunity to bring Kingston to every conference, you know, since I've worked there. That wouldn't have happened if he was in public school, right? Like the flexibility to be like, oh yeah, we're going to go on a, you know, four day trip to Miami and he's going to come with me. I don't have to worry about, you know, getting whatever, dismissed from school and getting like a excused absence or whatever. It's like, no, I just talk to my wife and like, what better classroom than a bitcoin conference for him to be at, right? And that's, I mean, I think it's paid dividends. I think it's. You want to talk about socialization, you want to talk about just education on the fly. It's like your version of going to a blacksmith's house is going to a bitcoin conference. And so that having that flexibility of time and just like being able to get up and go on a vacation or whatever it is, that's also a huge benefit of homeschooling. You don't have to mess with like, oh, no, we can't do this because they got school or they got a test next week or whatever. You make the rules, you take control of your time back and it's such a huge advantage for your kids and just for your lifestyle, reclaim that, you know, you, you become a prisoner to that, that, that school schedule that is very oppressive. And, and so I think that's a huge benefit that isn't, isn't talked about a lot, you know, and to your point about AI, like, dude, absolutely, this is kind of a terrifying one. But like, if you think about AI in public schools too, you know, just like to kind of, to flip the conversation a little bit, it's like it's, it makes public the public school system so much more useful knowing that, you know, ChatGPT exists or useless, I should say, knowing ChatGPT exists, it's like I'm just going to plug my homework into that and it's going to, it's just going to do my homework for me. So it's like it kind of exposes how useless public school is because everything can be done by ChatGPT. Okay, so now what? Now what is education? Right? It was already done when you got the answers in the back of your book. Now you can just have a robot do your thing. It's just like, okay, that covers every other subject. And so it goes back to flexibility. Like having the flexibility to adapt and to figure out, okay, what does this mean? How do I teach my kid to integrate this new technology that's not going anywhere and be able to make that adjustment on the fly? Meanwhile, the public school structure and infrastructure is so far behind, it's like there is no way it's going to pivot anytime soon. It's already trying to catch up to the Internet, right? It still hasn't even caught up to what's happening with the world of the Internet existing, let alone AI existing. And so that flexibility is invaluable. To be able to say, okay, this exists. How do I incorporate this? And technology in general, I mean, that was another discipline, was probably the hardest section to write. The technology section was probably the second hardest. But, you know, how do you teach your kid, you know, to have a cell phone responsibly? What are you, what are you teaching them about taking photos or being in photos or their, you know, online identity? Like, these are all very practical or even just like manners, you know, manners with, with phones. Like, one of the things that we have in our home is, is like very practical. No, no screens at the table. We don't allow any, you know, whatever devices or whatever. Like, you're not going to be sitting at a restaurant on an iPad ever. That's not a thing. And you're not going to be pulling out your phone and, you know, checking your texts while we're sitting at the dinner table eating. And by the way, you should be sitting at the dinner table and eating with your children. I guess it's like a very back to basics type of a thing. But so much, so much parenting happens at the dinner table. It's ridiculous. And so not having devices, not having the distraction of that is like creating a sacred space where you're communicating with your children and you're actually having conversations and protecting that space and saying, like, you know, we're not going to be interrupted by anything that's outside of what's happening right here as we share a meal, I think is a really important thing. So kind of off on a tangent in 18 different directions, but I think I love it. It's all kind of connected.
- [58:50]
B
No safe space for tangents. I'm curious too, because your kids are now getting to this age. How are you guys looking at college? Is this something that they're planning to do? Are they Going more of a trade school route. How have you guys been thinking about that or talking to your kids about it?
- [59:07]
A
Yeah. So Kingston's already decided he's not going to college. He's like, that's not for me. And he's 17 years old, trying to really start his career and he's been applying for, he already works at Chick Fil A. He had like an internship actually at Strike because he met Jack Mallers at a conference and Jack was very impressed with him. And he's like, when you're old enough, we're going to get you on the team. And you know, he was a man of his word and got him on the team. So he spent some time on Strike, spent some time with BTC Inc. Actually as an intern too. So he's already got like some, some experience in the workforce and he's, he's actively, you know, interviewing and looking for, for a job. Bob Saxon, you know, she's a sophomore in high school now and it's, it's an open question. It's one that, you know, we're, we're holding very open handedly, I would say. My wife and I are, you know, come from different, different sides of this. She went to, to college. I did not. And so we have opinions and we share our opinions very openly. And Saxon ultimately is going to make a decision. I'm actually still pretty curious on what she's going to decide because, you know, I could kind of see it going either direction for her. So yeah, it's one that is an active conversation in her household.
- [60:24]
B
It's such a, it's such a tough one because, you know, and obviously my son is a lot younger, you know, under, under 2 years old. So like Carl and I talk about this all the time. Like what is, what is college? What is the university system going to look like in, you know, 16 years when, you know, he'd be the typical age of going to college? What is that even going to be like? Is it going to exist in the same way? Is the price of it going to continue rising with inflation or is it going to start to be repriced to its utility value instead of its credentialed fiat value? Because that's a huge issue. Also. Carl and I met in school. We met the first week of college. So it has some benefits. I don't use a lot of what I learned there in school in the classroom room, but I wouldn't be where I am today. I wouldn't have my wife and our son without it. It's not to say you can't meet somebody outside of college too, but was it Mark Twain who said, never let school interfere with your education? So it's a tough question. I think a lot of people are struggling with it. I'm kind of glad I don't have to worry about it for at least a little while yet. Have a little bit of time to see how the dust settles and see what the collegiate education system looks like. Because honestly, I think I, I have no idea how it's going to look in, you know, 10, 15, 20 years. I, I, I struggle to figure out what that's going to be.
- [61:49]
A
Yeah, no, totally. I mean, you raise a good point. It's one thing as, as your kids get older, you start thinking about more is who their potential mates are going to be, you know, and then the, the environments that they're in kind of dictates that. So it's like if they're, if, if they are going to college, like, what college is it? And are they going to be around people that make good suitors? This is a tough one, this one. You know, this is the current struggle with teenagers is like, you know, I don't like Tinder and all that. Like, man, I just, it's stressful as a parent because the, the dating pool is not great, you know, and, and so I think this goes back to wanting to surround my kids with bitcoiners, because that would be the dream, right? Like, is like almost like a pseudo like arranged marriage. Like any, anyone out there have like a 15, 16 year old. Let's talk. You know, I think, I know that sounds crazy. I know it sounds crazy, but I'm just like, I want to be very intentional about every, every part of this. And it's, it's not like a matter of like literally like arranged marriage, like forcing my kids into anything, but it's literally just putting them in environments, a high likelihood that they're going to meet somebody that is going to be a good match. Right. I, I just believe in that. I just, I just think, like, I have a very specific list of criteria. I tell my daughter, I'm like, listen, don't bring home anybody that's like vaccinated. First of all, sorry, that's just a high bar. Bring home, say, you know, someone from a good family, somebody who, you know, is, is, is thinking about, about their future and has like, career aspirations. Somebody who works hard and he has a lot of things that like bitcoiners are. And so that would, that would be great. That would be ideal. Obviously, I'm not telling her you need to bring home a bitcoiner, but just hinting at it. Yeah, totally. So, yeah, the. The spectrum of like, arranged marriage and to Tinder is a crazy wide spectrum. Right. And. And I am like, let's find something in the. Maybe in the middle. Maybe we can find, you know, something. Yeah. More traditional.
- [64:05]
B
It's. It's crazy because, like, I mean, I was. I never, like, used the dating apps because it was just like, that was like after kind of, you know, my. My time. Right. Like, I mean, yeah, they existed, but like, you know, when, you know, like when I was in college even. But, like, they weren't to the extent they are today. And I feel like that's like, it used to be. Have you seen the. The chart? It's a visualization basically showing the breakdown of where people met or how they met their spouse over time. And it's like it used to be like church, neighborhood, community event, that kind of thing. All very physical kind of local type things. And it starts to change and it goes to workplace, and workplace comes in there because more when they're entering the workplace, and then it comes to university as well. And that starts taking up a larger point part of it, you know, so school takes up a bigger part of it. And then it's like, you know, more recent, like, since dating apps, it's like that one just starts outstripping, like, everything else. And it just. It's kind of wild because it's like, it's. It's this very, like, it's this very fiat selection. You know, it's like literally instant gratification. It's. It's swiping, right. Like, it's, you know, just looking, looking for the, the next best thing and always wondering, well, did I, did I find the best thing, best option that I could? And I think that that, like, that ultimately, like, just doesn't work super well. Not that like. And I know plenty of people who met through dating apps. Happily married, having kids. That's fantastic. I could not be happier for them. But, like, I mean, I guess we'll see, like in the next 20 years if divorce rates start to go down because dating apps turns out really fix the, you know, the problem or if they continue going up, like, we'll see. But. But I don't know. I don't envy your position right now. I'm glad my son is still very little. It has a long way to go before that because. Yeah, that sounds rough as a dad.
- [65:59]
A
Oh, man. Yeah, it's my Next big challenge. So, yeah, keep me in your prayers.
- [66:07]
B
Well, you know, okay, we have hit on the parenting stuff a lot and we had some other stuff to get into as well. But honestly, this has been just a fantastic conversation around parenting. So I hate to cut it at all, but are you down to get into some other stuff too? I mean, we've done a pretty good job during the parenting side of things. Is there anything else you want to leave folks with on the parenting side before we maybe just kind of we get into some more like some more bitcoiny stuff? Not that parenting isn't actually what's more bitcoin than parenting. Right. But you know what I mean.
- [66:39]
A
No, definitely. I mean, I actually believe that parenting is the lowest time preference thing you can do. If you really think about it, you know, if we're changing the world, it's going to go beyond us, right? It has to go into the next generation. And so I guess the last thing is just really be thinking about your level of intentionality with the next generation and your responsibility to raise your kids with a level of intentionality that is required of you. It's not something that happens accidentally. They're not going to fall into good habits. They're not going to fall into being mature or having self awareness awareness. You have to, you have to do the work. And so yeah, again, I'm not very good at promoting my book. I need to get better because it's something I really believe in. I love this book. You know, I feel like it's helpful. Everyone who's, who's. Who's read it has had really, really good things to say about it. So I do. I need to be more confident in saying like, you know, check it out, it's on Amazon, it's on Bitcoin magazine store and would love your thoughts. And you know, honestly, we'd love to talk about it more. I think we need to find more, more opportunities to have this conversation. And so yeah, appreciate you giving me the, the opportunity to share, dude.
- [67:53]
B
For sure. Yeah. Everyone should. I still need to order it. You know, full, full disclosure. So I'm super like, especially after this conversation, I'm super stoked to dig into it. I am not your bra. And yeah, you know, maybe we start that bitcoin dads podcast. Who knows? We just had a bunch of people in the, in the comments on zapdot stream just say, you know, like one, one guy just, just did their first day of homeschooling today, which is awesome. Got another father of five, bunch of dads here in the chat. So, like, I think it may be a. It may be a niche. Maybe a niche for now, but I think that, like, as bitcoin devours the world, you know, hopefully we get more and more bitcoin dads as well and bitcoin moms. Like, we. Turns out you need both.
- [68:38]
A
I love it.
- [68:38]
B
Wild. Who could have seen that coming? But. Okay, so let's. But we'll shift gears a little bit again. Everyone should go check out the book. So you have this side, right? You have your dad's side. Then you also have your bit. Well, they're one and the same. Two sides of the same coin. But you work in the bitcoin industry. You have now for a number of years. You are now working with bitcoin for corporations. Let's start with that a little bit. So are you still at BDC Inc. As well, or is it part of it? I wasn't clear on that. Okay, right.
- [69:09]
A
Yeah. So bitcoin of corporation started about a year ago. I partnered with Sharish at MicroStrategy at the time. We came up with this concept of, like, look, there's going to be a lot of people that are going to be following the Michael Saylor playbook. So we created this initiative as a partnership between BTC Inc. And strategy. And so bitcoin for corporations is a network of these bitcoin treasury companies. We're now up to about 40 members. So it's been growing at a ridiculous rate. So originally it was a product of bitcoin magazine. So it was just one of the things that bitcoin magazine did. At the time, I was managing director of bitcoin magazine. So I was leading our entire media operation. And bitcoin corporations was this, you know, this thing that I started I was really proud of. That was just kind of one of the things that we did. And as it grew, we decided that, you know, we're going to spin it out to be its own division within the company. So now BTC Inc. Is the parent company of bitcoin magazine, the bitcoin conference, utxo and then bitcoin corporations are kind of the four business lines. And so when we spun it out, I had to make a decision like, am I going to go lead this thing that I started or are we going to hire a director to kind of take over? So made the decision that I wanted to stick with this bitcoin corporations thing. I think I had a lot of potential. So now I'm the managing director of bitcoin for corporations. So so that has been a very exciting journey. It's obviously like the main narrative in the bitcoin space right now. The demand for this is crazy. I mean, everybody wants to be close to Saylor, to be close to the companies that are doing this. And so this network that's kind of emerged has been, man, it's been a whirlwind. Like I just got back from Hong Kong and so my head's kind of still spinning. But you know, the pipeline of new companies that are coming online, you know, from, from outside of the bitcoin space I think is probably the most exciting development because we're seeing just like the, the growth in various sectors and, and companies who are like, okay, I'm going to add bitcoin to my balance sheet because this is just a smart thing to do, not because they're just like, you know, crypto native or whatever. And so I think what we're seeing, there's a number of different aspects to this. You got kind of the pure play bitcoin treasury companies that are just like, we're going to raise money and we're going to buy bitcoin and we're going to raise more money and we're going to buy more bitcoin. And that's like the flywheel. I think that's great. And there's a handful of companies that are doing it. The ones that are first to market in their region are usually the winners. There is very much a first mover advantage to this that's taking place and I think that that probably has a limited time horizon in terms of like, there's only so much capital that can go around for the pure play bitcoin treasury companies. And that capital is probably going to be allocated to again, the first mover in a market. But now kind of this next wave, the second wave is again, you know, these non endemic companies that have a, you know, core business, they have an operating business that's making money and they're going to raise money, but they're also going to use their profits to buy bitcoin. And so to me that's probably going to be the more sustainable thing that we're going to see happening as capital kind of gets allocated to the pure play companies. What's going to need to happen is you're going to have to have a real business, you're going to have to have an underlying company that's profitable, that makes money, that uses its profits to buy bitcoin because that's going to be the more sustainable flywheel. So yeah, that's been a really fun. Part of what's been emerging is seeing the different companies that are, that are coming online that have nothing to do with bitcoin. But just recognize that this is where the ball is going, this is where the world is going. Everything is going to be repriced in bitcoin. Every company is going to be a bitcoin company. And it feels like we're on our way to hyper bitcoinization. It feels like all the things that we've been dreaming up and we've been kind of planning for all of the game, we've talked about game theory for so long and now it's happening, it's playing out now and so it's exciting, man. I think I'm one of those people that believes this time is different. You know, I think when you have bitcoin treasury companies buying more bitcoin that's being than is being mined. You know, quarter over quarter that that gap is, is growing. It's not, it's not going down. They're buying exponentially more. And so when you have a finite resource like bitcoin, like, like I just don't see us having an intense bear market like we have. I think the four year cycle thing is kind of over.
- [73:48]
B
Well, it'll be interesting too because we've been in a fairly tight monetary policy period for some time as well and bitcoin has actually done shockingly well during that same period. So it'll be very interesting to see what happens when the printers have still been purring along. But we did have like a decrease in, in M2 during the last half of Biden's admin that happened. Liquidity came out of the system. So it'll be very interesting to see what happens when that really goes full bore again. I think we're backed up to new all time highs in the M2 money supply, but we haven't seen anything yet. It's going parabolic. I'm curious too. So you mentioned the operating business versus the peer play. Do you think that operating business becomes even more important in a. Okay, yes. Four year cycles you're saying maybe dead, but bitcoin's still going to have drawbacks, right? We know that's the case. Maybe they're not extended bear market winters like we've had in the past. But of course bitcoin will take a dip and that dip may last for longer than people would like. Does that operating business become kind of especially important during those times because then you have cash flow to fall Back on, you're able to take advantage of those. You can maybe invest in more bitcoin without needing to, you know, further dilute or things like that. How do you see that?
- [75:09]
A
No, absolutely. I mean, I think it's going to be exponentially more important. I think, you know, there's exceptions to this strategy is certainly one I think, you know, they have a level of like escape velocity where they're going to be able to survive any, any downturn really. Like, I think they can survive that 80 or 90% drawdown from here. Meta Planet's another one. I think they have a level of escape velocity where it's like, like they're good, they're chilling. There's a couple others that, you know, I think are going to be able to, to survive the bare market or, or the, or even an intense drawback just based on, you know, raising more capital and, and, and kind of living off of, of their bitcoin. But not every company is going to make it, unfortunately. And I, I hate to say that there's, there's pure play companies that are probably going to get acquired by the bigger companies. I think that's going to be part of this next cycle where companies that get over leveraged or don't deploy capital responsibly, they're going to not be able to survive if there is a big drawdown. And I don't think that's going to be catastrophic for the bitcoin industry. A lot of people think this is the next Terra Luna or whatever the FUD is, but I just don't think that's the case at all. I think it's, if anything, it's just, they're just going to be M and A opportunities for Saylor to be like, okay, well I can buy your company and your balance sheet for pennies on the dollar. I'm going to do that. And you know, bitcoin's gonna, Bitcoin's gonna be fine. So even the worst kind of case scenario that people can, can draw up isn't really that bad because of, of the, the companies that already exist in the space that are kind of like a little bit of a backbone for sort of this, this treasury strategy. So yeah, it's, there's a lot to be excited about. I'm, I'm, I'm obviously, you know, more on the bullish side, very optimistic. You know, I just, I think though, regardless, we're, we're going back to the basics where you have to be able to make money, you have to be able to produce value, you have to have a product or service that people want and ultimately that's going to be the thing that, that helps you sur. Survive. Not just survive, but thrive. If your goal is to continue to accumulate bitcoin, the best way to do that is to make money and use your own revenue to acquire more bitcoin. So yeah, I think we're going to see different dynamics. I think the market right now has bitcoin companies priced in not really the most accurate ways. And sometimes in some cases, especially when it comes to these companies that have operating businesses, they're almost being penalized by the market. Which is interesting, right? Like, it's weird.
- [77:56]
B
It's, it's weird. Yeah. Like, I mean like, like Semler is one that I, I think about there where like, you know, and Semler has been pretty, pretty forward thinking in terms of having a big operating business and a successful business but realizing there's somewhat of a, you know, a quote, zombie company, you know, and, and they've made the switch. And yeah, it is strange. It seems that people, I mean right now they're all kind of getting, as we record this September 2nd, they're all kind of getting hammered as bitcoin has, because bitcoin died. I don't know if you heard, but it crashed down to 108,000 infinitely printable petrodollar cuck bucks per coin. It's really sad to see it die like this. So I think people are understandably skeptical of this. I would also, I, whenever I have these conversations about bitcoin, treasury companies, which is a lot lately because it comes up in some way, shape or form, I like to remind people, like for the average person, you should just buy bitcoin, accumulate a large enough utxo, transfer it to cold storage, live your life. These are certainly not for everyone. And you're probably not a good trader. I know I'm not. And so buy bitcoin, put it in cold storage, live your life, save the value of time and energy in bitcoin, great. But it is really important to talk about these things because I think they were inevitable. On the one hand, I think nation state adoption is also inevitable. If bitcoin was going to succeed, which I believe it is succeeding, then naturally every individual, every corporation, every nation state is going to want it. Of course there's no situation where bitcoin's winning, but a corporation or nation state says no, no thank you, I don't want any of that. I don't want any of the best performing asset. No thank you, sir. No, sorry, that's not realistic. And so it's like, I think this is ultimately very positive for bitcoin. I do think that a lot of these companies, to your point, I think you're exactly right with the thesis about acquisitions during drawdowns. I think this is a winner take or a couple winners take most couple winners take all. Like size matters in this sailor. Obviously he's got the size, you know, like he's, he's the. So I don't think anyone's catching him. Like he's got more bitcoin than most countries combined. Like, so I don't think that's happening. Meta Planet has been acquiring massive amounts. Super impressive. Then there's kind of like a, you know, there's a race. You've got Nakamoto, you've got 20, you know, 21 with Mallard, you've got a few, you've got Semler, a few of these others. Then you've got a long tail of very small ones. And I think it will be interesting though, if bitcoin doesn't go through a protracted bear market, is it just going to come down to some of these companies are going to be managed poorly, they're not going to execute the right strategy and it won't be the bear market that destroys them. It'll just be a bad implementation of these bitcoin treasury strategies. Is that where you're at given the assumption that if the four year cycle is down said then is that necessarily true?
- [80:59]
A
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think, you know, execution matters, the team that you have matters, how you deploy capital. All of it is, is critically important. And I think that again, some, some companies aren't going to make it and it's going to be fine for bitcoin, but it's, it's, it's going to be tragic for a lot of people. And so I agree with you, like buy bitcoin, put it in cold storage. This is in a lot of ways is on the retail side. This is still kind of a degen play. This is like I, I feel like we, we got through like the meme coin cycle and now a lot of capital is like what else can I gamble on? What else can I speculate on? And you know, bitcoin treasury companies for retail is a very speculative play. So like, I don't think it's for everyone. You know, I, I think if you, if you think back to sort of how this all started, Sailor's original thesis for kind of what was going to be his, like Major unlock was attracting pools of capital from, from, from different parts of the market that didn't have access to bitcoin. So his original thesis wasn't even like retail is going to be what, you know, makes this thing happen. It was like, you know, fixed income markets and you know, the equity markets and like giving exposure to bitcoin to pools of capital that just couldn't buy spot bitcoin. And so, so that's important to kind of keep in mind. I think that's the companies that can do that well in their respective markets unlock capital that doesn't have access to bitcoin. Those are the ones that are going to succeed if they keep that kind of the main thesis. The ones that are more kind of focused on trying to get retail hype and sort of meme their way into getting their stock to go up. If that's the strategy, I think that's a little bit less sustainable. And again, if you get over leveraged, if you do this irresponsibly, you're going to have a hard time. So there is a right way to do this and there is a way that's very speculative and may or may not work out depending on a lot of different factors. And so I would encourage people to be very cautious with kind of how they're using their own funds and recognize that this is a speculative, this is a very speculative play. And be careful.
- [83:14]
B
Amen. And it is interesting what you mentioned. Kind of like relying on this community for some of these moments. It is the same sort of narratives that you saw during that. You see with meme coins and NFTs, it's no longer about utility. It's just like, well, we've got the best community. Our community is so. And it's like, I'm not saying they're the same thing, because they're not. One is fundamentally, I think, pulls meme coins shitcoins across the board. NFTs, whatever it is, is they are taking capital that would otherwise flow into bitcoin and they're putting it into this garbage and enriching a small group of founders with bitcoin treasury companies. The capital still ultimately flows to bitcoin. It just flows through a proxy vehicle.
- [83:55]
A
Right.
- [83:56]
B
And so ultimately that is accretive to bitcoin. I think that is good for bitcoin. But again, that being said, be very careful out there, folks. There is no substitute for bitcoin held in cold storage. Most of the benefits are lost if a trusted third party is still required. But you should know that if you're buying bitcoin treasury companies, you're not buying a claim on bitcoin. You're buying a security. You're buying equity. That is different. You have no rights to any of the bitcoin that they have. That's not how it works. So if you want actual bitcoin, buy actual bitcoin. And if you want to speculate. Right, speculate. Nobody's going to stop you. Do whatever you want with your money, but just be conscious of that. Yeah, like, it's, you know, buyer beware. But like, yeah, a lot of people are going to get fabulously wealthy at the same time.
- [84:46]
A
100%. And I love what you just said. I think it's such an important distinction. It's like, I think the companies that are doing this that are focused on accumulating as much bitcoin as possible, and they're not really. It's not like they don't care about their stock. Obviously they want their stock to go up and they want to create shareholder value. But if they keep the main thing about actually acquiring bitcoin and having an accretive strategy and not focusing so much on kind of the meme aspect of this, those are going to be the winners because they recognize that we are in the digital gold rush and the name of the game is to acquire as much bitcoin as you can, as responsibly as you can. And there are going to be factors beyond your control, and stock price is certainly one of them. But on a long enough time horizon, like, you know, right now, again, we're seeing all these companies kind of a pullback in their stock price. But, dude, the ones that are still stacking hard and, and kind of just like keeping their head down, executing their strategy, they're going to win. Like, we know that they're going to win because they have. Yeah, they're increasing their bitcoin on their balance sheet. And so, yeah, keeping the main thing. The main thing and, and recognizing that, you know, if you're buying retail stocks, that, and, you know, you're speculating, then there's a lot of value to be created and there can be a lot of winners. So it's an exciting time. It's a precarious time in a lot of ways. But, yeah, this is what we signed up for. This is like you said, when corporations got wise to the fact that, oh, this is a race. There's only so many of these things. And I can just tell you, based on the conversations we're having, like, this is not going anywhere. And, and in a lot of ways, we're just getting started. Like, the pipeline that we have, the number of the inbound that we have is overwhelming. It's crazy. And so I don't see it slowing down anytime soon.
- [86:36]
B
What's your take on. Okay, so we've got bitcoin treasury companies. We've got pure plays. We've got bitcoin treasury companies with an operating business. Then we've got bitcoin companies that also have a bitcoin treasury, like Fold comes to mind as one. And that is a public, publicly traded company. Right. You know, they, they don't have the biggest treasure, but they've got a pretty darn good one. They're actually like, you know, they're hardcore bitcoiners. They're a bitcoin company. And then you've got bitcoin miners who in many cases, like some of them have, have raised capital to buy bitcoin. But also a lot of them, obviously they, they mine bitcoin. Like, that's, that, that's what they're in the business of doing. So they have accumulated treasuries through that. How, how do you view that dynamic of bitcoin companies with bitcoin treasuries, bitcoin miners with bitcoin treasuries, is that an even better play? That's ultimately, I've noticed recently because I do follow this stuff and I have small stakes in some of these companies. Miners and a couple of the treasury companies. I have some strategy. Full disclosure, again, I recommend everybody just get cold storage bitcoin. That is all I will ever recommend. But I guess it seems that miners have been actually doing pretty well lately, even amidst this drawdown, this tiny little drawdown. But how do you view this playing out? Is there one of these categories that outperforms? I've already said, okay, the pure play is having a moment, but can it last? Operating business is good, but what about a bitcoin operating business or a bitcoin mining operating business? Is that inherently better for long term?
- [88:08]
A
Yeah, I definitely see a scenario where it could be like, Fold is a great example. It's one of my favorite companies. Full disclosure, I've been a full card holder since they rolled out the card. And I think that they're, I mean, I think the top, top 20 bitcoin treasuries. But you're right, they're focused on their operating business. And it's a little bit tragic that, you know, the market doesn't. Isn't rewarding that right now. But I Think that long term, you know, again they got their head down, they're building a good product, they're creating value, they're creating revenue and they're buying bitcoin with you know, their excess cash. So like I think eventually the market will reward that. Again, I think the market right now is kind of distracted by the, the shiny object which is the pure plays and M Nav and you know, I think we overhype M Nav a little bit. I get it, it's a valuable metric but like let's just chill with thinking it's everything. And then you got miners and that's a whole different beast. You know, I think again the market is pricing in, in just like the overhead risk primarily and they're looking at how quickly can you accumulate bitcoin. Okay, cool. You got this whole mining operation, whatever. And that's another thing that I think is just like not going to be the case for very long. I think people are going to look at, you know, Mara, that has, I think they're number two if I'm not mistaken, 50,000 Bitcoin on their balance sheet. You know the mining industry right now is a little bit in an interesting spot because I think a lot of these, these public miners especially got over levered in a different way. They got over levered with too many machines. A lot of them, A lot of these mining companies have machines they don't have plugged in because that was what was being demanded essentially of the market is like increase your hash rate. And I think that period is kind of starting to subside. And so miners are having to correct. And now the dynamic that you have right now in the mining industry is that the new machines aren't really that much better than the previous generation machines. And so what we've seen in the past is like the four, around the time the four year cycle was starting to hype up, you would be able to deploy these new machines that were way outperforming the previous generations asics. Now that's not the case. And so it's like all right, I guess we'll just keep mining these other machines so that we don't have to buy these other machines. And so you have this oversupply of ASICs and so the ASIC distributors aren't making money. And so there's all these unique dynamics in mining that are happening during this particular cycle and there's a lot of things that are on the horizon that are exciting. I think proto is one square is new miner. I don't know if You've seen this, but it's super cool. Ridiculous specs on this machine. If they can get this thing up and running and deployed, I think that could actually change the mining industry in a very positive way. Yeah. It's hard to say what's going to happen with the public miners. A lot of them are in the top 10, top 20 of Bitcoin holders, but they don't necessarily run an accretive strategy. And so they're not really kind of participating in this current hype cycle of bitcoin treasury company. A lot of them are considering pivots like, how do we do this? How do we actually become a bitcoin treasury company and increase our M Nav and do all that. Everyone's kind of scrambling to keep up with this narrative. I don't think any company, even outside of the industry, is exempt from having to evaluate like, okay, what are we going to do about this? How are we going to address this? How are we going to get involved? And so I think what we're going to see over the next six months is a lot of companies pivoting to kind of do this. A lot of companies recognizing that they need to participate in this digital gold rush. And yeah, it's hard to predict who the winners and losers are going to be, but like you said earlier, I think there's going to be a couple breakouts and yeah, yeah, it's going to be. It's going to be. It's going to be a wild run, man.
- [92:15]
B
What a time to be alive, right? And yeah, you were. You were correct, Mara. Mara is number two, just over 50,000 coins and then Riot number seven with a little over 19,000. You got CleanSpark as well. Clean Spark with almost 13,000.
- [92:33]
A
Wow.
- [92:34]
B
It's interesting. Coinbase cracked after losing the top 10 spot. They're back in at number 10 with 11,776 coins. So even the shitcoin salesman finally capitulate and start stacking, backing bitcoin again. What a shocker.
- [92:51]
A
Oh, man.
- [92:52]
B
Yeah, it's going to be wild to see it play out. It's amazing to be alive at this moment in time as we see this, because I think we are undeniably so early. We're so early to bitcoin, we're so early to treasury strategies, we're so early to all of this. We get to be here for it. What an amazing thing. It's going to be a different world that our children get to experience, hopefully a better one.
- [93:13]
A
No doubt. That's our role. We have A role to play in that hope isn't a strategy. I think we can be active in. In determining kind of how this. How this thing plays out. And like we talked about earlier, it does kind of start with raising children intentionally. Full circle.
- [93:30]
B
Yeah. I love it, man. Well, George, this was great to have you on. I love the conversation. I think folks are going to get a lot out of it. And there's something here for the dads and the bitcoin treasury degens. So I got a little bit for everyone, but appreciate you coming on. Where do you want to send folks again just in case they missed it the first time around, around.
- [93:49]
A
So, yeah, you can find me on X. I'm going to be more active on Noster after this conversation. That is my goal. So. But yeah, I'm on exit G. McHale. And then, you know, check out the book I am not your bra. It's kind of hard to find on Amazon. You can't just. You have to type in I am not your bruh book. That's how you find it. Go to. Go to the bitcoin magazine store and you can find it there as well.
- [94:11]
B
Awesome. Well, George, thanks for coming on here. Appreciate it. We'll have to.
- [94:15]
A
And I'll.
- [94:16]
B
I'll hit you up about maybe we. Maybe we spin. Spin off a dad's po. Bitcoin dad's podcast. I'm into it as well, but appreciate your time and I look forward to seeing you in the flesh again soon.
- [94:25]
A
All right, Cheers, man. Thank you.
- [94:34]
B
And that's a wrap on this bitcoin talk episode of the Bitcoin podcast. Remember to to subscribe to this podcast wherever you're watching or listening, and share it with your friends, family, and strangers on the Internet. Find me on noster@primal.net walker and this podcast@primal.netcoin on X, YouTube and Rumble. Just search at Walker America and find this podcast on X and Instagram at tcoin Podcast, Head to the Show Notes to grab sponsor links. Head to substack.comwalkeramerica to get episodes emailed to you. And head to bitcoin podcast.net for everything else. Bitcoin is scarce, but podcasts are abundant. So thank you for spending your scarce time listening to the bitcoin podcast. Until next time, stay free.