War, History, And Why Bitcoin Matters w/ Coin Dad

Summary

---

War, History, and Why Bitcoin Matters

The "What is Money?" Show with Robert Breedlove

Guest: Tobias Barbier (aka Coin Dad)
Date: March 17, 2026

---

Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into the life and work of Tobias Barbier, known as “Coin Dad,” a true OG in the Bitcoin mining industry and the founder of the world’s most comprehensive Bitcoin Mining Museum. The discussion weaves through Tobias’s remarkable multi-continent journey: his immigrant background, military service, time in war zones, adventures in business, brushes with danger, early encounters with Bitcoin, “proof of work” in both life and mining, and his passionate mission to preserve Bitcoin’s physical and cultural history for future generations.

The conversation isn’t just about Bitcoin technology—it’s a story of serendipity, survival, relentless hustle, vivid war and street tales, profound lessons on scarcity, and the drive to build. Whether you’re a Bitcoin enthusiast, historian, or just love a great human story, this episode offers humor, inspiration, and a unique historical lens.

---

Major Discussion Points

1. Tobias’s Origin Story: Immigrant to Soldier

[02:08–06:55]

• Background—Born in Germany, Romanian mother, moved to U.S. as a child, didn’t speak English.

• Path to Citizenship—Joined the Army to gain U.S. citizenship, illustrating the reality of the “pathway” for immigrants.

• Military Service—Served honorably, became a mechanic, started a family young.

• Military Logistics & War Zones:

  • Worked as a Department of Defense contractor across Middle East conflict zones (Dubai, Qatar, Kuwait, Iraq, Afghanistan).
  • Convoy commander for supply routes; involved in recovering vehicles from ambush zones.
  • Life-and-death moments, reflections on risk, and stories about “shredded up Swiss cheese” vehicles.
  • Lessons learned about the real value (or lack thereof) in warzone currencies like the Iraqi dinar.

  Notable Quote

  “In Iraq… I bought I don’t know how many millions of dinar… ended up just being wallpaper and toilet paper till today.”
  — Tobias [07:03]

2. Love & Serendipity in War and Beyond

[08:00–22:39]

• Meeting Wife Online—While in a tent in Afghanistan, meets future wife on a dating site; serendipitous timing.

• She’s also ex-military and, through his connections, gets her a DOD job—in same remote Afghan base.

• Heart-racing tales:

  • Flower search in 120+ degree Afghan heat.
  • Mortar attacks, texting from bunkers for safety check-ins.
  • Ordeals during their evacuation journey home: stuck on bases, a plane losing an engine over ISIS-held Mosul, emergency landings in Turkey, losing time but making it home for Thanksgiving.
  • Car crash on their wedding day, crashed into their hotel room by an overdosing driver, four hours before marriage.

• Serendipity as a recurring motif.

  Notable Quote

  “My 14 year marriage right now wouldn’t exist if that one second was one second late.”
  — Tobias [09:12]

3. Early Bitcoin Encounters & Mining Initiation

[22:48–34:22]

• Post-Army struggles: Odd jobs, dangerous work as oil tanker driver.

• First discovered Bitcoin in 2013 after watching "Banking on Bitcoin" (BTC ~$30).

• Initial dismissal: Thought it was “Internet money for geeks.”

• 2015-2017:

  • Cousin introduces him to mining; gets personally involved.
  • Chronicles home mining struggles: excess heat, noise, equipment hacks (flex pipes, sound insulation).
  • First mining payout—small, but a powerful proof of concept.

• Professionalization:

  • Helps cousin build larger operations; deals with utility/transformer overloads.
  • Deploys 18,000 miners for Core Scientific, including mudslide-damaged S9s from China—details the restoration triage.

  Notable Quote

  “I learned my PhD with the pain. … The noise pissed my wife off and the heat and all that.”
  — Tobias [28:23]

4. Genesis of the Bitcoin Mining Museum

[34:22–36:27]

• The Crash of 2018: Has miners nobody wants; begins preservation as the “Bitcoin Mining Museum.”

• No one else is preserving mining history:

  • Contacts OGs for old machines; starts building out the collection.
  • Conferences: at first has to plead for booth space—eventually, museum becomes centerpiece.
  • Collection now: 136 unique miners from 15 countries; museum able to fill 1,500 sq ft.

  Notable Quote

  “Nobody in the world is bothering to preserve the history of the best things in sliced bread. How do you educate the future without preserving the past?”
  — Tobias [00:51 & 34:22]

  “My museum is the only tangible part of the bitcoin blockchain you can physically touch and see.”
  — Tobias [36:06]

5. Mining Tech: Evolution, FUD, and the Race for Efficiency

[37:29–43:02]

• Debunking FUD: Mining’s energy use vs. legacy banking system (much less per-branch).
• Journey of Hardware Efficiency:
  • From Satoshi’s CPU/GPU on a laptop, to FPGA, to early ASICs (Avalon 1, BE100 chips), toward today’s 3 nanometer chips.
  • Drastic scale: A modern S21 miner equals 1.2 million early USB stick miners.
• Anecdotes from hardware collecting:
  • Sometimes getting miners with spiders, mud, cigarettes from Chinese mudslide salvage.
  • Logistical nightmare stories.
• Noise problems: Neighbors’ complaints, zoning quirks.

6. Preserving Oral History: OGs, Anonymity, and Secrets

[43:16–50:14]

• Connecting with “OGs” at conferences:

  • Reluctance, anonymity, and the rare oral histories that can’t be Googled.
  • Collecting tales and confirmations, preserving otherwise invisible knowledge.
  • Example: Early miners from 2010 might be among first 100 ever; proof provided with vanishing evidence on Telegram.

  Notable Quote

  “AI doesn’t even know it.”
  — Tobias [43:02]

7. From Bootstrapping to the Bitcoin Discovery Center

[51:54–63:50]

• Nomadic museum, trailer misadventures, risk of historical loss.
• Establishing the Center in Dallas, Texas:
  • 30,000 sq ft facility (“Bitcoin Discovery Center”), collaborating with major repair center.
  • Hopes for classroom space, educational programs for students.
  • Partnership with Texas Blockchain Council, non-profit status, and naming rights for major donors.
  • Collaboration with professor Michael Kelly for pioneering Bitcoin/blockchain curriculum.

8. Scarcity, Collectibles & Cultural Spillover

[73:10–82:12]

• Bitcoin trading cards:

  • Scarcity lessons compared to ever-printed Pokémon.
  • Valuable pulls; Hal Finney card worth $10k.
  • “Tractor Day” story—traded a $25k tractor for a box. Recorded in an upcoming trading card series.

• Economic and cultural lessons from the street:

  • Teenage street-dealing days in Florida and Houston.
  • Selling to tourists, code-laden pager interactions.
  • Learned market dynamics and scarcity: “Hodling drugs” until competitors ran dry.

  Notable Quote

  “The scarcity aspect, though, there were moments where… I was holding drugs. I was hodling drugs. That’s wild.”
  — Tobias [85:49]

9. Lessons from Life—Serendipity, Risk, Action

[108:23–111:20]

• Serendipity: Repeated instances of uncanny coincidence and luck, from personal life to business.

• Advice for others: Actively seeking opportunities, embracing rejection, and learning from each “no.”

• **Manifesting through persistent focus and action rather than passive hope.

  Notable Quotes

  “Getting rejected is a part of the process of success, I think.”
  — Tobias [110:12]

  “Sometimes I feel like I’m the future walking through the present, waiting for the past to catch up to me.”
  — Tobias [70:59]

10. Spiritual and Philosophical Underpinnings

[70:35–71:10]

• The importance of preserving and teaching Bitcoin history for global civilization.
• Bitcoin as potentially the greatest invention or discovery in human history.

---

Noteworthy Quotes & Segments

• On Serendipity:
  Eric: “Your life is full of serendipity. Like, man, you and I have had…conversations at conferences…it's just like you got the magic touch.”
  — [19:33]

• Museum’s Impact:
  Tobias: “My museum is the only tangible part of the bitcoin blockchain you can physically touch and see.”
  — [36:06]

• Scarcity in Life:
  Tobias: “The scarcity aspect…there was moments where I was…hodling drugs. That's wild.”
  — [85:49]

• Advice for Life:
  Tobias: “People do have the power to put themselves in those situations instead of sitting at home waiting for things to fall in your lap. I'm an opportunist…”
  — [109:14]

• Preserving the Past:
  Tobias: “If you don't preserve the history of bitcoin, then how do you educate the future on it?”
  — [70:06]

• Bitcoin as Monumental:
  Eric: “As hyperbolic as it sounds, I think this is maybe the greatest discovery, invention—whatever you want to call it—in human history.”
  — [70:41]

---

Other Memorable Moments

• Crash of the $20,000 Wafer:
  At the end, a historic wafer containing 3000 ASIC chips is broken, underscoring the fragility and importance of preserving these artifacts properly [115:32–117:40]

  “This just threw me for a loop…Oh man. This is a $20,000 wafer with seven nanometer chips. … I should have done a better job protecting this.”
  — Tobias

• “Tractor Day”:
  Tobias traded a $25,000 Kubota tractor for a sealed box of Bitcoin trading cards, which is now memorialized with its own card in the trading card set—mirroring a “Pizza Day” legend for collectibles.
  [73:20–82:12]

• First Rapper in East Africa:
  Tobias recounts being the first white American rapper to perform in Kenya and the unlikely end of his Dubai record deal—cut short by the 2008 global financial crisis.
  [93:16–105:15]

• On the importance of bricks and mortar for preservation:
  “If I get T-boned with this trailer, all of my six, five, six years of collecting miners with all this history is gone. … These are irreplaceable items.”
  — Tobias [51:54]

---

Timestamps of Key Segments

• Origin Story / Immigration & Army: [02:08–06:55]
• War, Love, and Escape Stories: [08:00–22:39] ; [13:38 major Afghanistan stories]
• First Bitcoin Exposure: [26:47–28:23]
• Mining Museum Genesis: [34:22–36:27]
• Industrial-Scale Mining Tales: [31:15–32:40]
• Museum Today: [36:06–36:27]; [51:54–56:28]
• Energy/Efficiency Discussions: [37:29–38:19]; [40:10–41:50]
• OG Mining Anecdotes & Preservation: [43:02–50:14]
• Discovery Center Launch: [52:07–63:50]
• Bitcoin Trading Cards & “Tractor Day”: [73:20–82:12]
• Scarcity Lessons from the Street: [82:34–89:12]
• Philosophical Takeaways & Serendipity: [108:23–111:20]
• $20,000 Wafer Broken: [115:32–117:40]

---

Where to Learn More / Support

• Website: bitcoindiscoverycenter.com
• Twitter/X: @thecoindad (“Make sure it’s the blue check.”)
• Bitcoin Mining Museum: [BTCMiningMuseum online]
• Donations: Accepting BTC & USD, named blocks & recognition available for major donors.

---

Final Thoughts

Tobias is a living “hashtorian” whose determination, humor, and authenticity have preserved the hardware (and hidden stories) behind the world’s most revolutionary money. His story is not only a chronicle of technical evolution, but a testament to the “proof of work” ethos in both Bitcoin and life: serendipity favors those bold enough to seek it, and history must be preserved if future generations are to learn.

---

“If you don’t preserve the history of bitcoin, then how do you educate the future on it?... Sometimes I feel like I’m the future walking through the present, waiting for the past to catch up to me.” — Tobias Barbier (Coin Dad) [70:06, 70:59]

Transcript

[Tobias Barbier]

And right over ISIS territory in Mosul. Pilot gets, with his calm voice, gets on the intercom, and he's like, ladies and gentlemen, we just lost an engine. We're going to do an emergency landing in Turkey. We're freaking out. Engines out. And I'm trying to get home for Thanksgiving with my wife. Thank God we landed safely in Insurilik Air Force Base. They swapped the motor out overnight while we're in a barracks and put us back on the same freaking plane. So then we get to Spain, and then the pilot gets back on the intercoms like the crash happened in 2018. So when that crash bottomed out, I had miners in my shop. People didn't want them back, so I cleaned them up and I went online on ebay and started finding more. I started going online to find a museum to give them to. This is historic. And crickets. Nobody in the world is bothering to preserve the history of the best things in sliced bread. How do you educate the future without preserving the past? Maybe I start my own job out of thin air. I started talking to OGs and. And I'm like, hey, I got this in the shed. I got this in the attic. Yeah, this is at my mom's old house from when I was mining in the basement. And then it started to build into me becoming the bitcoin mining museum. Conferences started to pay us because we ended up being the center of the conference, basically because people see the museum, they're like, that's the coolest freaking thing that was at the conference. And now my museum can cover, like, a 1500 square foot space with. I have 136 different Bitcoin mining machines collected from 15 different countries over the last five years, including.

[Eric]

All right, Tobias, AKA Coin. Dad, welcome to the show.

[Tobias Barbier]

What's up, Eric?

[Eric]

Good to see you, man.

[Tobias Barbier]

Glad to be here.

[Eric]

Yes.

[Tobias Barbier]

Stoked to be here.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

It's a long drive.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

Huh.

[Eric]

With all your. You're rolling around the States with a collection of miners, huh?

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah.

[Eric]

You have the most comprehensive collection of bitcoin miners on the planet, Correct? Correct. Well, I'm definitely interested in hearing how you came to decide to start collecting bitcoin miners. So how about let's start a little bit with your backstory. It's my understanding you got a unique upbringing.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah. My name is Tobias, and Barbier is my last name. Out of North Carolina. And my life started as an immigrant coming into the US I didn't speak a lick of English, so I'm from Germany. My mom's Romanian, so I Speak German and Romanian fluently first and came to the US and started a whole new life here. Went through the proper channels, you know, stood in long lines, paid money, my dad and all that. So I had the green card when I was under 18, but then when I was 18 and it was time for me to leave the house and I still wanted to get my citizenship, there was actually a path in the army. Like the army would accept you with your green card. And as long as you serve three years active duty, then you earn your citizenship. So when people out there say that there's no path to citizenship, there is because I took it. So I served this country and got out honorably and got my citizenship and learn the language, learn the history. And in Miami, I went to high school and stuff and grew up there when I was young. And after the army, I went to Houston, Texas. And in Houston, Texas, after I got out, that's. I was a young kid, I was stupid, made dumb mistakes. 19 years old, I became a mechanic, had a kid already, got married already. So it's like I started my life really young with all that. So I'm 46 years old today and I already got, you know, 22 and 25 year old boys.

[Eric]

Wow.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah. So then I ended up, man, I don't even know where to be. Like, there's so much stuff I've done in my life. I don't even know where to begin.

[Eric]

So what was the catalyst that drove you to join the Army? Was it to get the citizenship?

[Tobias Barbier]

That was the main one. But also because I was a black sheep of the family. I didn't, I was, I didn't listen to mom and dad and I didn't do what I was supposed to do. So I ended up in Job Corps. If you ever heard of Job Corps, which is like a government, like where bad kids go when you, you know, don't finish high school or whatever. I'm not, I've never been to college. I went to Job Corps and got my, my high school, finished it there and then joined the Army. Then after the Army, I did Department of Defense stuff. So I was like a contractor. And I went to the Middle east for eight years and I've lived in Dubai for two years. Doha, Qatar, for two years. I was in Kuwait, I was in Bahrain, I was in Iraq for a couple years and then I was in Afghanistan. That was the last place. And did you see combat?

[Eric]

Were you in the mid?

[Tobias Barbier]

I did convoy. I did convoy commander stuff as a supply, running supply routes because that was my specialty. Was dealing with supply history. So we'd run from Kuwait into Iraq with a bunch of suburbans and MRAPs and stuff and humvees front and back. And we'd run up to the different bases and deliver things and then take stuff back I was in charge of. Also the boneyard is what it's called. That's basically when soldiers get ambushed or shot or whatever and the vehicle gets all tore to hell, Then we have to pull that vehicle out of the war zone. So we'd send flatbed trucks out there with a whole security team, go pick it up with a wrecker and stuff and bring it back to Kuwait where the boneyard was. So I was surrounded by all these tore up vehicles that soldiers used to be in. And you'd have to go through a hazmat process when the truck comes in and get in any brains or guts or blood out of the vehicle. And then we would recycle the parts out of there to bring them back into the supply chain. Because sometimes it was difficult to get parts from the US into the war zone. So we would pull, you know, like EMCs or, or alternators or whatever's still good in the vehicle and put it in the supply chain to put on other vehicles. So it's kind of. I've seen some, you know, shredded up Swiss cheese cabs. And what's crazy is they used to have these ballistic blankets that would take the impact of rounds coming in. And those blankets were better. And then the hard armor.

[Eric]

Wow.

[Tobias Barbier]

Because the hard armor would have all this impact from an IED or whatnot. And it'll go straight through the armor because it's so hot. But on the blankets, it would take that impact, absorb it. And some of the guys and drivers made it through alive with those blankets. I'm sorry, kind of veering off here.

[Eric]

No, that's.

[Tobias Barbier]

My thoughts are going, yeah.

[Eric]

And how did that impact you? I mean, seeing combat and seeing, you know, the devastation had to be impactful.

[Tobias Barbier]

Well, in Iraq, for example, they had. They have the dinar over there. And there was this whole hype back then of buy as much dinar as you can because it's at the super low level, because it's supposed to, once the government builds itself up and the war is done and the dinar value moves back up and you'd be retired and be stinking rich. And I bought I don't know how many million millions of dinar with these notes stacked like this. And I was able to actually get some back home. And they ended up just being wallpaper and toilet paper till today. And it's like, dang, the value of this money sucks. You know, it actually got worse since then, not better on the value of that. So that's like a little lesson that I learned from when it comes to currency and scarcity and all that was that. And then in Afghanistan, I met, I actually met my wife online while I was in a tent on a dating website.

[Eric]

Incredible.

[Tobias Barbier]

And I'm on this dating, Christian Dating for Free.com was the website because I got tired of all the fast girls because that used to be my old life. And I was like, let me find somebody that's, you know, more educated and settled down and mature. And I love this girl's profile that I read. So I'm in this tent in Afghanistan and typing back a little DM to her. And here's the crazy part. Well, several crazy parts that I already told you earlier. But the. She was on in Miami here off of, in Broward county where she was living, so 10 minutes away from my parents. Never met her before. So I'm blown away that she lives 10 minutes from my parents and she's typing, she, she's on the profile to delete it because she's tired of like, you know, older guys were messaging her and she didn't really find anybody, she didn't find it valuable to her. So she was with her finger on the button one second away from deleting her whole profile when my face popped up. So my 14 year marriage right now wouldn't exist if that one second was one second late.

[Eric]

Incredible.

[Tobias Barbier]

So she stopped and she's like, who's this white guy? Because my wife's black. So she opened it up and then we, we connected and then we got over to Facebook and back then we had Skype. So we were Skyping from my little video camera on my laptop in Afghanistan and then come to find out she's ex military like me. She was a staff sergeant in the army. She served for eight years and she has a master's and a bachelor's for it and stuff like that. And I'm like, wow, that's pretty impressive. And then to find out that she's so close to my parents, I actually, I don't know, I don't remember how I did it, but I convinced her to go meet my parents before I ever met her. And my parents are like, what the heck is wrong with our son? Like, why is this chicken? He's never met before. So my parents, you know, it's, it's a parent's mind frame, but they're like, our son is not the guy that you want to be with. So she's driving home, like, crying. Like, I like this guy, but his parents are pushing him away from me. So now it's a different story. My parents love her to death, actually. She actually calls my dad pops and stuff.

[Eric]

She didn't trust him. She had to verify for herself. Huh.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah. So. So then when I found out she was ex military, I actually ran through some connections because that's one of my. My specialties. I. I don't know how I do it, but I am able to connect two people that are looking for each other or two sources or that's how I did good with, you know, selling miners and finding somebody that needs miners or hosting for mining, finding a hoster. Like, I'm. I'm good at that middleman connection stuff. So I was able to go through the chain of command in Afghanistan, get her resume through the system faster than everybody else that was in line, and next thing you know, I got her a DOD job. And she's like, hey, I'm coming to Afghanistan to be with you over there.

[Eric]

Wow.

[Tobias Barbier]

So the first time we met, though, I came home for two weeks vacation and I lived in Houston. So she flew from Miami to Houston and was at the airport when I got off the plane. And that's the first time we kissed, first time we hugged. First time we ever see each other was in the airport in Houston. And for two whole weeks we were on vacation together, going around Texas, going to barbecue joints, going to different places, but even though we stayed in a hotel room, and this is part of the reason why I knew she was going to be my wife, she made me sleep on top of the blanket while she was on the bed. Really? Yeah.

[Eric]

Proof of work.

[Tobias Barbier]

You gotta earn it, huh? Yes. So, like, wow. Ain't no woman ever did that with me before. Like, I didn't even know how to handle it because I'm like, I'm on vacation. You know, this is gonna to be great. They're like, nope, got rejected. It was a polite rejection and it was for a reason, and I respected that. So even when I went back to Afghanistan, I'm like, I still. I know, I'm like, this is new to me, but I like it. Like, this is different. And then she ended up getting hired in Afghanistan. And there's like, in the. At that time, as far as I understand it, there was 120 different military bases in the Middle east that this company could have sent her to. There's, there's main fobs and there's main bases, then there's FOBS and there's COBs, like forward operating bases and then combat operating bases, and from all the places that it could have sent her to. I was on Shindan, Afghanistan, and she's like, yeah, they're sticking me in Shindan, Afghanistan. It's like, are you kidding me? Like, you're already 10 minutes from my parents where I grew up at. Like, this is wild that this is happening. So she comes from Bagram and they put her on some little out there. It's like if you want to get to another base, you, you, you do space A where basically you get in line with a flight and whatever comes, comes and you jump on it. It's not like here where you just log in and catch a flight and whatever. So she had to wait for a plane and then there was a plane full of like a one star general and a bunch of colonels that were coming to Shinan for some inspection or whatever, and they had extra seats on the plane and. And she was there in the little airport and they're like, well, come with us, we'll give you a ride to Shenan. So she's like, I'll be there in an hour. I got a flight. And I'm freaking out, like, oh my God, she's landing here and I'm in the desert and I'm like, what do I give her, like, for a welcoming? So I'm like, I got to find a flower. And then people are laughing at me because, like, there ain't no freaking flowers in the desert. So I jumped into Humvee and went to the Afghan side because we have our side military and then the Afghan like a pilot training program thing on the other side.

[Eric]

Did you get her some poppies? I know there's poppies there. At least that's my understanding.

[Tobias Barbier]

No, there is a lot of it too. But I get to the barracks over there in their side and I look up this like. I think it was like three or four floors and there was an Afghan guy that had a pot with plants growing in it, like on the top floor and like, oh crap, there's flowers. And then I had five bucks on me, which was a lot of money to Afghans. So I ran up there and I was like, hey, can I have. I just want one flower. He didn't speak English, so I'm pointing at the flower. I just need one. Here's five dollars. And he's seen the five bucks. He's like, hey, take it. So I'm sitting there and I borrowed a Humvee from somebody just to get around there, because usually you catch buses and all that stuff. They have these on base buses, but the buses didn't go to that side, so I had to get my own transportation. So I'm in this humvee, and it's 120something degrees outside. And I get back to the Runway on the other side, and she's landing on the plane, and I'm sitting there with this flower in my hand, and it's bent over facing the ground because it's hot. And 120 degrees. I ain't got no water or nothing. And generals and all the. The colonels coming off the plane, and then she's behind them and all these colonels are walking past just laughing because I'm standing there with this bent flower. And then she comes off and she's like, you found me a flower in the desert that's like so sweet. Like, that's what she cared about. And that's. That was a pretty cool moment from then. We spent several months working. She had her IT department. I was on the logistics side from her Apache attack helicopters and Chinooks and Kiowas and. And Blackhawks. So I was like, supplying all the parts for. For the helicopters on at that base. And there was this moment where we got attacked with mortar rounds. And these mortar rounds came in and they hit the airfield. And I'm on this side of the airfield, she's on this side. And back then we had these Nokia cell phones from Afghanistan with their local service. So it's like, you know that sound from back in the day and like, I'm in the bunker, she's in the bunker. And we're freaking out, like, is my girl okay? And she's freaking out about me. So we're texting each other like, are you alive? I'm like, yes, I'm okay. So we've settled on that. And like, then we had a serious conversation where it was like, maybe it's time to call this DOD stuff quits and go and get married and start a new life together. So we chose on doing that. And it was 2012, and it's a week before Thanksgiving, and we made the decision to resign from over there and come to the US So we had to wait on a Chinook to pick us up from Shindan, take us to Kandahar. We finally made it to Kandahar, and then they told us that we're being bumped because all these flights coming in were full cuz all these soldiers are going home for Thanksgiving and we had to sleep on metal benches. I have photos of my wife sleeping on her duffel bag on a metal bench. But we're sleeping in this place and we're doing bird baths in the sink, in the bathroom every day. And for four days we're stuck in this hangar. And then while we're sleeping at 2am the sergeant taps our shoulder and says, Hey, a C5 Galaxy plane just landed, just to refuel, but it's going to Norfolk, Virginia. You all want to ride home? Like heck. Yeah, we've been here for four days, so. But the crazy part is that we were the only ones. So we get on this plane that was never supposed to be there and I don't know if you know anything about a C5, but it's double decker. So there was these tanks and these Bradleys. I think they were in the belly going back home. And on the second floor the seats face this way while you fly this way. So we were able to like grab the whole row of seats and put all the armrests up and just go to sleep while we're flying home. Like this is dope. We don't have to be stuck, you know, like this. And so she got her own row, I had my own row. And then we're flying and we go from Kandahar around Iran over Iraq and right over ISIS territory in Mosul. Pilot gets, with his calm voice, gets on the intercom and he's like, ladies and gentlemen, we just lost an engine. We're going to do an emergency landing in Turkey. So peace. Put your seatbelts on. And me and my wife stared at each other. We're like, what did he just say? We're like, we're freaking out, like freaking engines out. And I'm trying to get home for Thanksgiving with my wife, I mean fiance at the time. And they, because it's such a big plane with three other motors, thank God we landed safely in Incirlic Air Force Base. They swapped the motor out overnight while we're in the barracks and put us back on the same freaking plane. Wow. I'm like mind blowing, like, are you serious right now? So then we get to Spain and then the pilot gets back on the intercom. It's like, yeah, we're too tired to cross the Atlantic so we're going to take a break here in Rota, Spain. So then they landed. I'm like, when the heck are we getting Home. Like we're a day away from Thanksgiving now. So then a charter flight shows up after we stuck for 11 hours in Spain at the airport because we didn't have a stamp to get out of the airport for the visa. And we get on this charter flight and it also went to Norfolk. So now on, on Thanksgiving Day, we landed in Norfolk in the US but my family's having dinner in Fort Lauderdale. So we have all this helmet, you know, and our bulletproof gear, our TA50 with us, and you have to turn that into CIF. And so we found an army base like an hour away. So I had to, from where we landed, I had to pay for a taxi, a couple hundred bucks to take us an hour to this army base. And we get there, crickets, all the soldiers are home for Thanksgiving and the place is closed. And I can't leave home until we turn the stuff in because it's like thousands of dollars and you get charged for that. And I wasn't rich at the time. So we're freaking out on there. And while we're sitting in the parking lot, one car comes rolling in and it's the sergeant that runs the whole place who forgot a piece of paper.

[Eric]

Wow. Yeah. Your life is full of serendipity. Like, man, you and I have had, you know, a handful of conversations at conferences over the years, and it's just like you got the magic touch.

[Tobias Barbier]

I don't know, God probably has something to do with all that. But the when, when we put our TA50 away, he gave us a handwritten receipt, said don't worry about it. On, on Monday, when I come back, I'll. I'll take it out of the system. Your name give you your credit. So then we jump on. Then I pay for a domestic flight to Fort Lauderdale and we actually make it to my parents dinner to eat 15 minutes before everybody started. It was like what was a whole week to get home. And I get home right before everybody starts eating. Then we chose to get married and we came up to do a quick one of those court marriages. It wasn't like official with a nice ceremony because I didn't have any money at the time or I didn't have a lot or enough. And so we're in a hotel by my parents house in Broward county and we're sleeping and some drug dealer in Broward was being chased by the sheriffs down us one and he didn't want to be caught with a drug, so he swallows them all and goes into an overdose while he's Driving and crashes his car right into our hotel room.

[Eric]

Oh my gosh.

[Tobias Barbier]

10ft away from our heads. And you can google it, you'll see my name and some helicopter. And then somebody took a photo of half the car sticking out of our hotel room. That's online. And, and four hours later we got married. It's like all that happened in such a short period of time of being bombed in Afghanistan were mortar rounds to the plane almost crashing to this accident in Broward. And it's like, geez, what's going on here? Like am I doing making the right decision? The other. And, and the final thing that let me know before I even got married to her that she's the one for me is we. I got a job as an oil tanker in Texas. So that's the job that I found. So we were getting ready to leave to Texas after we get married. And for that I needed some, some steel toe boots and some other, you know, vest and hard hat and all that. So I went to Sears when it was around and it was a Sunday and I got my boots I was trying on and she was in the area looking for rings like this little kiosk at Sears and it's a Sunday afternoon and we just so happened to be there for a two hour sale that's 75% off. And I didn't know it. We just, it's just that we happened to be there in those two hours. So she's looking at these rings and she finds and it was like a, with a 75 off sales, like 300 something dollars for a wedding band with mine and hers. And she's like, I like this. And I'm like babe, that's just 300 bucks. That's seriously. That's what you want? You know what her answer was? With the money that you save, I'd rather get a washer and dryer when we get our new place. That's a wife right there, man. Yeah, like that almost teared me up. I'm just telling it right now is actually getting me a little fuzzy. But yeah, so that's. She's my ride or die chicken.

[Eric]

I love that man. Yeah, I've met her. You two, you two have some chemistry. And we met Salvador love for each other. Yes.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah.

[Eric]

So what, at what point did you discover bitcoin?

[Tobias Barbier]

So after we got married and we were doing oil, I was doing oil tanker stuff. It was the type of job that I leave at 4 o' clock in the morning and they would have me running for 16 hours like no GPS. It's like a piece of paper with notes on it that said, cross the cattle guard, make a right at the tall cactus. There's three stones stacked on top of each other. 500ft down the road, make a left at the three stones. And then I'm in the desert and there's a big old freaking tank pumping oil. And I have to climb up there with freaking do stuff to connect the truck and fill the whole truck up. And like you have this yellow thing that checks the oxygen level. Like there's gases that come out. You can't see. That'll kill you. And I went through this whole training that if these gases come out and it hits you, you got to hold your breath. You can't take a breath. You got to hold what you got. As soon as this thing goes beep. And then you basically figure out which way the wind is blowing and go upwind from the gases so you don't die. Like people have died from that. And then there's rattlesnakes out there too. So you're out there trying to, you know, squeeze one out behind the bushes or whatever. Ain't nobody there to save you. So it's like a really dangerous job. And then you're dragging £80,000 of oil behind you too, because I had my CDL and my TWIC license and all that stuff. So I didn't. My wife didn't like the fact that I leave in the dark and come home in the dark. And she's like, we just got married, I don't even see you. So I respected the fact that, you know, she wanted to have more valuable time in our marriage and she had a hard time finding a job out there too, with. Even though. With her degree, because this is one of those small towns. So we, we literally decided to just get a U Haul truck. Eight little eight for the smallest one you can get because we didn't have nothing. So we put our little queen size mattress in there and a little furniture because we stayed in an efficiency the size of this, a little bit bigger. Like the bathrooms there, the kitchen's there, the beds here, everything's in one room in somebody's garage. So that was our first life, was in living in a garage turn in efficiency. So we hit I10 without no clue where we're going. We were like, God, can you take the lead? We don't know we're going. So we chose North Carolina because the army base was there. And since we both have that background, we can probably get a job there during The Obama days. But then Obama did the sequester. So as soon as we landed in Fayetteville, North Carolina, with our little trailer, and I wrapped it with chains around a tree at a hotel. We're trying to get on the base to find a job, and, like, hundreds of people walking off the base because they lost their jobs. So we're like, dang, this doesn't work out for us. And then that first night in the hotel, some dude gets killed at the Christian bookstore next to us in the hotel. So that was like another signal, okay, this is not the place for you. So then we hooked the trailer back up, and then I went on online, and I'm like, what's the best cities in North Carolina? And, like, Cary came up and Raleigh and safer areas, more jobs. So we decided to drive up there and wrap the trailer around the tree again. Paid for a weekly this time because it was kind of expensive to do every night. So I paid for a weekly hotel and I started job hunting. And my wife found a job at the hospital in the Uncle Michael Jordan's school area over there. And then I found a job working for some seed company that does seeds for golf courses and all that. Like, since I had my cdl, I would deliver all these pallets of seed around North Carolina. But the job was very mediocre, just entry level, just to pay basic bills around the house. My wife was doing more paying bills and holding the backbone at the time. And that made me feel less of a man. You know, it's like, I got to do better. So I'm online, just searching ways to make money. And then I ran across a documentary called Banking on Bitcoin. And I'm like, what the heck is bitcoin? And Charlie Shrem was in there and Nick Spanos.

[Eric]

This was what this was like into 2016, early 2017.

[Tobias Barbier]

No, this was 2013. February 2013. Bitcoin was $30. Okay, that's my first experience with bitcoin. But I blew it off as Internet money for geeks. That was my first thought, and I didn't take it serious. So then we found a duplex to move into after we got these jobs and started to finally build a Foundation. Then 2015 comes around, and I hear bitcoin again and again. I blew it off. You know, things comes in three come in threes. So when you hear something up to three times, that's usually when you take it serious. So then on the third time around was my first cousin, Tim, and he's my family member, and he's into bitcoin and mining. I'm like, I don't even know what mining is. So he. He shipped me a miner, and then over the phone told me how to connect to it. And then this is now when we had our first starter home with me and my wife. And we had a guest bedroom. And I remember connecting this miner and opening, cracking the window. Like, within hours, my house started cooking. I'm like, this is crazy. So he was like, yeah, get a flex pipe like you do with a washer and dryer and get the heat out the window so you don't have all the heat in the room.

[Eric]

So this was an ASIC?

[Tobias Barbier]

An ASIC? Yeah. S9. Oh, no, it was a D3 dash miner was the first one. So then I kind of got led into the whole shitcoinery era first.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

And that's how I learned my PhD with the pain. I think a lot of people have that story, but the noise pissed my wife off and the heat and all that. So I bought this beer cooler and cut holes into it and put it in there and kind of brought the decibel noise down and got the flex pipe out the window. And then the moment happened where I'm like, laying in bed with my wife. It's like Saturday, early morning, and my phone goes beep, beep. You know, a little notification. And she didn't say nothing. But I can see the look on her face, like, who the heck's texting you this late at night? You know? And I'm like, yeah, that minor next door. I just got my first payout.

[Eric]

Oh, really?

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah. So that was kind of cool. So I got a little dash payment, but then my cousin started.

[Eric]

So you got the block reward?

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah.

[Eric]

So find a block.

[Tobias Barbier]

No, it was the. It was a pool.

[Eric]

Okay.

[Tobias Barbier]

It was on a pool. So it was a little tiny payout. But then that led me into the S9 in 2017. And then my cousin was. I was going down there to help him. He's building a 5 megawatt facility himself because he started in the basement. And he blew the transformer for the community in his neighborhood. And they're like, what the heck are you doing? You know? And he was like, no, I need more. A bigger transformer. Like, they said, no, you don't. And then he blew the new one that they replaced. And they were like, okay, maybe you do need a new, bigger one. But he grew from that. And now he's like, on his third site building now. But he. I helped deploy a lot of stuff with him, he taught me a lot, took me under his wing and that led me into me doing my own thing on the side. So while I worked for the state of North Carolina then for more logistics stuff and the I started filling my own garage up. And then I had my garage door up like 6 inches just to let hot air out. Then I blew my own breakers in my garage and I'm like, all right, let me find another place. And I started renting somebody else's thousand square feet for a little spot. And then I started an llc and then I started refurbishing people's miners. And then the word went out to a local. At the time it was a publicly traded company that was mining on the smaller level. So they hired me to help deploy miners for them and that I wanted to get my name out there. So I was like super cheap. I'm like, just pay me 200 a day. I just wanted to have that resume buildup of what I'm doing. So I was like, all expenses paid, but only 200 bucks a day working on a mining site just to get my name out there. And then they told other people. And the next thing you know, I'm 2018. I'm at core scientific deploying like 18,000 miners with a team of people for two, three weeks. And like 18 wheelers coming in from China. And I remember S9s, they bought second hand S9s from a mudslide in China.

[Eric]

Really.

[Tobias Barbier]

So I had to put this whole triage process together with like eight foot tables. Eight foot tables. And every one of my guys on the team had their own job taking it apart, pulling and washing the mud out of them. There was like a dead spider. There was like cigarette butts from China found in some of them. It's like just wild. But these things are tanks. Like they have like a cat with nine lives.

[Eric]

These are S9s.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah, S9s, which are like the common

[Eric]

black big ones that everybody kind of pictures. When you think of a bitcoin miner,

[Tobias Barbier]

they're not the black ones. I have the S1 there. It's similar looking to that one. I should have brought the S9, but yeah, so, so we went through this triage process where everybody like, you know, you do the SD card and the control board and reprogram it and then we test them and if they run again, we swap hash boards to, to get each hashboard like consolidation project. And then when they're good, then we put them online. So all the miners that we put online were all working, but we Had a crapload of parts, too, but that was awesome experience and very big learning experience. So then from there, I started doing consulting work and brokering. So I've helped sell millions of dollars worth of miners over the years where I get my little cut. And from there, the crash happened in 2018. After 2017, run up to 20 grand.

[Eric]

Yep.

[Tobias Barbier]

So when that crash bottomed out, I had miners in my shop where people didn't want them back. They're just like, I don't care.

[Eric]

They're worthless.

[Tobias Barbier]

Right?

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

So I had the shelf, and I had a few of them sitting up there, like, maybe 10, 12 miners. And I'm like, oh, cool. I got a little collection here. I'm sitting there drinking my beer and realize that I just maybe start my own little collection. So I cleaned them up, and I went online on ebay and started finding more. So I got to, like, 20 and then to 30. And then I think when I roughly were around 30 to 40 miners in my personal collection, I started going online to find a museum to give them to, because I'm like, this is historic. And crickets. There's nothing. And nobody in the world is bothering to preserve the history of the best things in sliced bread. And it blew my mind. It's like, why everybody's talking so highly about bitcoin, but nobody. How do you educate the future without preserving the past? So when I realized that, I'm like, okay, well, maybe I start my own job out of thin air. It's exactly what happened. So then I went more like, I started talking to OGs, and I'm like, hey, I got this in the shed. I got this in the attic. Yeah, this is at my mom's old house from when I was mining in the basement. So I'm doing deals, you know, like, some people are paying bitcoin, some people are paying dollars. Some people donated to me because they didn't care. They just love what I'm doing. And then it started to build into me becoming the Bitcoin Bitcoin Mining Museum. And so I started bmm, got the website up and running, and then I found passionate people in the space through conferences where they love the history of bitcoin, too. So I got, like, Tyler Lance. I called them hashtorians instead of historians.

[Eric]

I like that.

[Tobias Barbier]

I gave him a new name, too. And then for roughly four years, I'm pushing, going to conferences. So initially, people were looking at me like, you got to pay us to get a booth. And I'm like, no, man, I'm the one you guys have a conference because of these miners. Like, nobody, you, me, anybody in the bitcoin space does not have a job without the history of these money miners.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

Because that's the DNA of the blockchain. So I'm like, I got to make something out of this to keep this alive and keep moving it forward. So I basically, my conferences started to pay us because we ended up being the center of the conference, basically because people see the museum, they're like, that's the coolest freaking thing that was at the conference. A lot of people told me that. I don't know if that's true, but I hope to believe that. But the cool thing about having the museum set up is when you're in the conference, newbies will come to the conference just to see if bitcoin, like, get the vibe, like, what's going on? What's this bitcoin stuff? So you have bitcoiners on the fence, but when you stand in, when you step into a museum, and now my museum can cover like a 1500 square foot space with I have 136 different Bitcoin mining machines collected from 15 different countries over the last five years, including right here. This is the world's first dedicated bitcoin miner, and they only made 300 from this batch. So when. When these people are on the fence and you see a chronological order of the history of 16, 17 years of Bitcoin mining, it's undeniable at that point. Because my museum is the only tangible part of the bitcoin blockchain you can physically touch and see.

[Eric]

Yes, so.

[Tobias Barbier]

So to convince politicians or to convince young people that bitcoin is real, you can't see it or touch it. It's hard to explain to them. But when you walk into my museum and you see all this, it's like a light goes off, like, okay, this is not fake. This is not a scam. And that's why I'm doing what I'm doing today.

[Sponsor/Ad Voice]

What if I told you that you could lower your tax bill and stack bitcoin at the same time? Well, by mining bitcoin with blockware, you can. New guidelines from the big beautiful bill allow American bitcoin miners to write off 100% of their mining hardware investment in a single year. That's right, a 100% write off. So if you had $100,000 of income or capital gains, you could write off that entire amount by investing it in bitcoin mining hardware. Blockware's mining as a service allows you to start mining bitcoin right now with minimal effort. Blockware handles everything from securing the miners to sourcing low cost energy to configuring the mining pool. They do it all. You can stack bitcoin at a discount every day and save big when tax season comes. So you can get started today by going to mining.blockwaresolutions.com BreedLove Again, that's mining.blockwaresolutions.Com BreedLove

[Eric]

so in those earlier days I'm sure you've seen a big change in the mindset around the FUD and the energy consumption used to run the bitcoin network. What's, what's, what are you seeing change? Because I don't think I haven't heard anything recently. Maybe AI has helped that because the amount of energy it takes to run these LLMs and these data centers is so much higher than bitcoin. The whole FUD around Bitcoin miners boil the oceans.

[Tobias Barbier]

That's kind of banks themselves. I mean all these branches, I think last time I checked was what, 53,000 branches in America. And they all have air conditioners, they have vaults, they have security, they have people that have to wash the windows. They got maintenance people. Like the energy around a branch is way higher than bitcoin mining. And you combine all that and makes bitcoin mining look like a drop in the bucket.

[Eric]

Yeah. And so this is. Would this be considered one of the very first asic?

[Tobias Barbier]

Official, Official and unofficial.

[Eric]

Okay, what's the difference?

[Tobias Barbier]

This is unofficial. So the difference is that the, the nanometer for example, efficiency has gone dramatic like it moved so fast over the last 12 years. But this is my oldest nanometer chip. This is 130 nanometers. This is 110 nanometer chips in here. They were made at the same time frame around end of 2012. There's a guy named Friedcat and Friedcat invented the BE100 chip that's on here. But he was self mining and then he was selling hash on bitcoin. Talk to people that wanted to get involved. Avalon though, they chose to go open to market instead of holding it for themselves. So unofficially this is first. Officially they are first because they're first to market so they get the credit. The awesome thing about them and is back then there was four founders. NG was the first one. And when they chose to go from fpga. Let me back up a little bit. I guess bitcoin mining with Satoshi started on his laptop cpu, then moved to gpu. Then there was a Short phase that was called the FPGA era. I have that one here too. Took me four years to find. But this is a FPGA. It's called a quad bitcoin quad miner from BTCFPGA.com and they only made 900 of these. They made roughly 200 bitcoin a day. Wow.

[Eric]

Gosh.

[Tobias Barbier]

So because this is two hundred and fifty megahash times four. One gigahash. And now we're at what's miner is M66s from what's miner was just released. I think it does 470 terahash.

[Eric]

And that's S21.

[Tobias Barbier]

No, that's. That's what's Miner. That's a competitor.

[Eric]

Okay. I don't know a whole lot about

[Tobias Barbier]

bitcoin miners on Bitmain side. Bitmain has a S21. I think S21 XP Hydro is probably one of the best ones that's out right now.

[Eric]

And so how many of those is an S21?

[Tobias Barbier]

So I didn't do the math on that, but I did the math on this little thing.

[Eric]

Okay.

[Tobias Barbier]

Which is even crazier than that. So this is 330 mega hash. So this is less than this. And this used to be plugged into the laptop. And what people used to have like, you know, a farm of like 50 on and with all lined up, plugged into a big old USB box or whatever. But one of these is 330 mega hash. And compare that to today's M66s. What's miner? You need 1.2 million with an M of these to equal today's miner.

[Eric]

1.2 million of these equals the modern S21.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah.

[Eric]

Which was about yay big, right?

[Tobias Barbier]

No, it's actually a rack. It's a server.

[Eric]

Okay.

[Tobias Barbier]

Get sliding and it's got hydro cooling and stuff like that. Because those chips we're now at 3 nanometer level. So it's. The efficiency is. It needs better cooling. Like air cooling is starting to slowly phase out.

[Eric]

It's probably good because there are people who have issues. Like I saw a news report last year someplace in Texas. The neighbors are really bummed. The place is, you know, it's vibrating. You could hear it all day long. Have, you know, are freaking out. It's kind of an issue.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah. So that depends on where you are. Some places are industrial zones. So can't nobody really say anything because this noise is allowed to certain level in industrial zones. But then when you do remote areas, you might have a few people, retired people that live in the area. They want to be in a quiet, remote area and you got these, you know, 40 foot containers humming away with high decibel fans on them.

[Eric]

Yeah, I had a similar issue. I was in an agricultural zone getting my property permitted to become a cannabis farm. And there was a few upset neighbors. It was ag zone, so I can have some experience there with upset neighbors. But what, what era was this from?

[Tobias Barbier]

That's 2013.

[Eric]

2013. And how much would somebody be running one of those mine in a day?

[Tobias Barbier]

I don't exactly know off the top of my head. This is a lot of information to carry in my brain. And that's another reason why I want to build this.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

Center that we're about to get into soon to preserve all that. Because like I've interviewed a lot of OGs and got stuff out of them that you cannot Google. You know, you cannot just. AI doesn't even know it.

[Eric]

You've told me you've had some interviews with OGs that like you can't even have a phone in the room. You got. They're literally, literally the conversation happened and the only history of it is your memory.

[Tobias Barbier]

Right.

[Eric]

And so how do you. You meet these guys? Because you're hunting down minors.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah, conferences have a lot to do with it. So every time I go to a new conference and I'm set up, like every single conference has been at least one or two sometimes more OGs that come through and see it for the first time. And then they walk through it and they're like, I got something you don't have. I don't see it here. And then I connect with them, you know, telegram, signal or whatever, and then talk to them later on offline, and then they'll let me know what they have and I'll let them know if I need it. And then we come up with a deal. But some of them like to stay anonymous and some of them took me a while to find some of them was just luck. Find, like I'm in a whale lounge one time just eating and then this, this guy's sitting next to me and he's eating. I don't know who he is. So we just start connecting with each other. Introduced myself, he told me what he does and stuff and I told him what I do and I'm like, yeah, I'm trying to find, you know, some OGs and stuff. And I named the person that I'm looking for and he's like, oh yeah, I just spoke to him last week and like I've been looking for four years. For this guy, and nobody knows him. And I'm like, can you please tell him about me? So he made me, like, do a recording of a video of myself talking to him. And he sent it to him. Him. And then the guy was, I guess, a little skeptical at first, but then he warmed up and then communicated. And then he promised at another conference to meet me. And I didn't really think he would. And then I'm laying in in this hotel in Vegas for the conference and getting ready to go to sleep at damn near like midnight, and he hits me up and he's like, hey, meet me in the lobby of this hotel, of this other hotel. Like, what? This is real? So I rushed over there and he gave me like three hours of his time till 3 o' clock in the morning. And we just. I wasn't allowed to take photos with him. I wasn't allowed to record anything. In a way, I kind of. Kind of sucks because my memory is not that great. I'm not 20 years old anymore for me to remember everything he said. But there was some confirmations in there for things that I doubted happened, but they actually did. So he was like a confirmation. Because I've already interviewed other people that told me certain things, and I'm like, yeah, I don't believe that. And then he mentioned them and I'm like, oh, wow, okay, so this is real. This is from two different sources now. But yeah, those are like. There was another one, for example, that he lives in China. He never really comes to the U.S. but he had some business in St. Louis, I think. And I jumped on the plane immediately, met him in the lobby. He gave me an hour in the lobby. So I just jumped on a plane just to be there to talk to him for one hour, went back home. But in that hour, he told me stuff that I didn't know. So I want to preserve some of the. Some of all this history.

[Eric]

Yeah. And so you have laptops from the early days?

[Tobias Barbier]

I don't have any laptops, but I have a PC.

[Eric]

Huh.

[Tobias Barbier]

From somebody that. That's my earliest one. I haven't even publicly released it yet. And he actually sent me a list of his. Newegg. Newegg used to accept Bitcoin back in the day or something, or that's where he got his parts from, anyway, to build this thing. But he was a gamer for a game called World of Warcraft, and he was playing with people in Asia and he was using PayPal. I don't know if it was the UK somewhere. He was paying using PayPal and then PayPal like cut him off because I don't know, I guess they didn't like the fact that he was dealing with Asia. I don't really know all the details. But then somebody told him, well, why don't you mine bitcoin and just pay us in bitcoin? He's like, what the heck is that? So then they told him about it. So he went to Newegg and got all these high end parts at the time. And this is 2000 April 2010. Bitcoin didn't have a price. Like there was no price for bitcoin. It was that cheap. So he was like mining off his lap of this PC and then he used to pay like 800 Bitcoin for a weapon on World of Correct. Like this is pre Pizza day era, you know, like Pizza Day is the first transaction.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

But this guy is actually the first transaction when it comes to some digital anyway, so Pizza Day is first physical. And I, I believe from, from, from doing some math on the size of the blockchain or the network at the time and the dates that he was using this thing, I believe he's probably one of the world's first 100 miners in the world.

[Eric]

Incredible.

[Tobias Barbier]

Because the network was so small.

[Eric]

Wow.

[Tobias Barbier]

And he donated that to me. And he wants to stay anonymous though. But he was like 1200 Bitcoin for like a bundle of weapons.

[Eric]

Oh my gosh. What? I wonder if he still has any of his.

[Tobias Barbier]

He, he, he told me no, he actually got out after that and because he was not into the tech, he was into the gaming side. So that's the other thing. Like I've, I've interviewed people like OGs that were from that era that they did. They don't have anything today. Like there's, there's one, I'm not going to say which miner in my museum, but there was a few months that it took for one guy to open up to me to, for him to even talk to me because he thought I was some scammer, scam or whatever, but finally convinced them I'm a real museum. So he told me that he actually works 9 to 5 at an IT company today. Even though he had thousands of bitcoin going in and out of his wallet. And he showed me, you know how you can do, you can send a photo on telegram and as soon as you look through it, it disappears. You can put a timer on it. He did that with me to show me proof of his history. And it was like 1500 bitcoin 2000 bitcoin 800 bitcoin in and out of his wallet.

[Eric]

What was he doing buying drugs on the.

[Tobias Barbier]

So he was, he. He was making small miners at home in the US and selling them. So that's how he got paid with all that. Because like in the early days, like for example, that PC, I think that PC was making 500 Bitcoin a day when there was no pool. So this is even pre like Luke Dash Jr. Doing the first pool ever. Matter of fact, I just found out in Naples when I was with Luke, I was on the podcast with him and Natalie Brunel and Dr. Baker, Sean Baker, the carnivore guy, that he was part of the software programming me for this one right here.

[Eric]

Incredible.

[Tobias Barbier]

So I got this with me and the guy that helped write the part of the software was sitting on the other table. It's like this. So dope, this industry. Just amazing.

[Eric]

Yeah. And so you spent many years driving all these miners around in a trailer?

[Tobias Barbier]

Yes, well, actually first of my Suburban because it was small. Then I stuffed it full until it looked like my belly, which is going away. Right. I'm on the carnivore diet now. But they. I needed a trailer and then there was like my suburban is only three years old and I got. I just hit 104,000 miles in just three years. So that by itself shows you my proof of work. And the trailer, I'm coming down I95 and I got it loaded for the whole shebang for Mining Disrupt conference in Miami, who actually gave us the first platform to show our miners. So shout out to them for giving me that opportunity to show my museum for the first time. And one of the. I hit a big pothole. My trailer hit the pothole, bounced and miners fell off the shelf and hit the ground inside and one of them broke. Luckily it was one that I could replace. But that's when my thought process like, I need a home. It's time for home. Because if I get T boned with this trailer, all of my six, five, six years of collecting miners with all this history is gone. Because I have one of a kinds like I have Scott for that in that that made the bitax. The founder of bitax and released open source for it. He came and gave me his prototype of the first bitax. So that's in my museum. These are irreplaceable items. So I don't want to lose that. So it's time for a brick and mortar facility and give them a stationary home for as long as possible.

[Eric]

And what's that journey been like? It's my understanding now you got a place here in Texas you're putting together. Yes, the bitcoin Discovery Center. Tell me, tell me what you got going on there.

[Tobias Barbier]

So the bitcoin Discovery center, that's another crazy story in itself. So I'm, I'm again, Mining disrupt showed us some love and booked us to go all the way out to Dallas. Because their first time, you know, usually they do it in Miami down here, but this time they chose to do it a second one in the same year. Last year in, in Dallas. So I drove all the way from North Carolina with all my, with half my miners. Excuse me. To Dallas, got set up. This time my show I had more like LED lighting, more cool setup. Like I try to change things up every conference to. So it's not the same thing because people will see the con. Some people will see it multiple times. And the cool thing is that I keep every conference I get another minor added on or another two or three historic pieces because a new OG came through. Like you don't have this. You don't. So it keeps stacking up. So every year like my museum just gets bigger and better and more stuff to see.

[Eric]

And you probably have a lot more people coming to you nowadays as opposed to the beginning where you had to go hunt this stuff down.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yes, that's true too because there's more. The word got out, more of us existing. So you know, sometimes people will tag my museum in a conversation on X between two people talking about historic miners and be like, hey coin dad, check this out and throw me into the conversation and I see something I might not have and then reach out to them. But so I'm in Mining Disrupt and while I'm there I get introduced to acs which is one of the largest repair centers in America. 100,000 square foot facility. I didn't know what to expect at all. But James is the CEO so James invited me to go and do a tour. And this is again how awesome bitcoin works with the full circle stuff. One of the guys that I took with me to go deploy miners back in the day on my team was somebody that I helped get into the bitcoin mining space and kind of, you know, gave him the basics knowledge to get into mining and educated him a little bit. Very smart guy, gentleman named William. And Will ended up going full speed ahead for the last seven years. I mean I really haven't paid attention to what he's doing, but I didn't know that he's 50% owner of this huge place. So he talked to James and they're both like Coind's looking for a museum. We have an extra 30,000 square feet on the other side of the wall of the center that they really didn't know what to do with. So I went in there and James was like, yeah, why don't you bring your museum and let's work together and do something here. So I'm like, are you kidding me? So I'm standing inside. 30,000 square feet is huge. 25 foot ceilings. Got already office space in the corner. Got a parking lot out front with 110 parking spots and it's like street front property. Like it's. It's 15 minutes from the airport in Dallas. There's like 12 hotels within a mile. Like everything is perfect. So I'm like, this is, I can't fill the whole thing up though. So we came up with this idea to do more than that. Include an art gallery in the back right corner. Do a classroom, bring some, bring a professor in and have like a director of education and start educating school students to come through my museum first learn the history of money and how it's a melting ice cube. And then go into the history of bitcoin and then get into the classroom and go through the whole question and answer phase with a professor and have like this orange pill crash course certification thing for students in the area. And then come out through a storefront. Like everyday traffic can come through, see the museum and go out like cracker barrel. They make you go through a store and you liable to buy something before you even eat or on the way out. So that idea was like crazy. But then I'm like, how am I even going to do this? Because I don't have the finances to do that because that's a lot of money to build in there because got to build out all these walls and set up the whole website and all that. But the name came to me pretty quick. And then I went online and I was shocked again. Another crazy moment. Here we are 17 years later and nobody took bitcoin Discovery Center.

[Eric]

Yeah, that's.

[Tobias Barbier]

The domain is open.

[Eric]

That's pretty wild.

[Tobias Barbier]

I got it for like I think 200 bucks. It's like crazy. So I purchased the domain and then it asked me like how many years And I maxed that crap out, I think at five or six years, paid for it all and then started building out the website. But then I go back to the conference next day, right? So Now I'm showing the conference and then there's this lady from Texas, Amanda, who came through and she's seen my museum before when I just had eight foot tables like and another conference. You know, my museum was small and she seen it and she was, I gave her a private tour, told her about some of these historic miners with these stories and stuff. And she literally sat down in the corner of the booth area over there and got on, I think it was her phone and sent out an email where she cc'd me to the email to the Texas Blockchain Council and Lee Bratcher, I don't know if you ever heard of him, but Lee Bratcher and Steve Canard, they're, they're, they run the Texas Blockchain Council, has like over 100 Bitcoin company members in this council for state of Texas, the whole mining space and all that. And he's also ex military like me. But she emailed Lee and then Lee replied, you know, saying I'm, I'm out of, I'm out of the city right now. And I really, you know, my schedule's busy, I won't be back until late tonight and I'm leaving back to North Carolina the next day. Like the conference is over, I'm packing my stuff up and going home. But this was so important to me to try to pitch this whole 30,000 square foot facility to him that I insisted and I basically let him know, like I'm serious, at least 15 minutes of your time. So he's like, okay, be here at 9am I'm gonna give you 15 minutes of my time in the conference room. And he did and he was all ears. And I showed up on time. A lot of people were inviting me to go out that night. I ignored all of it. I was like, no, I'm, I can't. So I got my sleep. So that way I'm up on time. So that way I don't look like shit the next day and had all my stuff lined up. And in 15 minutes I pitched, showed him the video of the facility, told them that, you know, if there's any help with figuring out a non profit situation then I would appreciate that. And then he was like, he called Steve Kinnard in the office and he's like, we have a non profit that's been lingering that we haven't done much with. Give it to Tobias. And I'm like, I almost started crying. I ain't gonna lie. Like, this is 24 hours after a facility. So this is right, this is what December like six weeks before the end of the year last year. So this is just like two months ago. And they had to take directors off with the Secretary of state in Texas. But there was some one document issue that happened right around Christmas. All the offices are closing, people go on vacation. So I had to. Things got a little bit delayed. But what ended up happening is as of seven days ago, roughly, I got the official letter from the secretary of state that I'm executive director of the nonprofit and James that owns the facilities, the other director. And then we found a professor whose heart is all about bitcoin who has built the first two year bitcoin blockchain curriculum course on a university level in New York.

[Eric]

Oh, really? That's important.

[Tobias Barbier]

Professor Michael Kelly. And he has a, he has a

[Eric]

Mike Kelly in the house as a producer.

[Tobias Barbier]

Oh yeah. Okay. What another coincidence here, huh? So, so he is actually, you know, somewhat got his hands tied in New York because of the bureaucracy over there. And he, he flew out like on his own accord, out of pocket, straight to the facility one time when we went to go meet over there and have a meeting about all this. And he loved it. And I was like, man, we can build you a classroom back here and you can get involved with education in schools around Texas and grow from there and to the conversation even happened to where eventually we would lead to into like training courses for technicians. Like if you become a mechanic in America, you know, you know, you usually go through ASE certifications, but we don't have nothing like that in America for the bitcoin mining side. And since there's a repair center on the other side of the wall, there could be like a, a whole, what do you call it when people temporarily work for somebody. I forgot.

[Eric]

Internship.

[Tobias Barbier]

Internships. So it'll be like maybe, I don't know, three, four month course or something where you're in the classroom with him. He educates everything about bitcoin mining. But you also get to work in the internship side where there's, they're literally manufacturing like the Bitax touch in there or they're doing high tech, you know, software solutions for troubleshooting, chip level repair. They're doing refurbishments, they're doing, you know, the whole nine yards with replacing the silicon, the, the, the rubbery stuff on, on the. I forgot the name of that for the boards. But it's amazing to see the operation back there. I haven't seen nothing like it anywhere in the world really yet. So having that education aspect, like I see school buses coming through and we have high school students going through, going through that whole process and, and we orange peel them, but also take them on a tour back there to see all this new technology and you never know, motivate some of them to actually become technicians or join the bitcoin space or get into bitcoin through physical education. Because I, like I said, I'm the only tangible part of the bitcoin blockchain. So it's easy to educate students and politicians to come through this museum and see all the history on top of the education side. So right now I'm on this kind of a fundraising tour. So everything is official now. The nonprofit is set, the banking account is set. Square is what we're using to collect on the US dollar side for donations. Then we have btcpay server set up to collect on the bitcoin side. So we have a QR code for the website or bitcoindiscoverycenter.com go on it and choose what you like. And it's non. It's a tax exempt donation. But since we're in a very early stages, what I'm also offering up is naming rights. So the pubcos in the space or the OGs or the Jack Dorsey's of the world, you know, be interested in giving back to the bitcoin community by helping preserve the history of bitcoin, get naming rights where I want to put like the bitcoin blockchain cemented into the ground of the museum. So when you every, all the traffic that comes in and out every day would see that such and such, you know, donated $50,000 and you get this block for the life of the museum or somebody that donated 100,000 would going to have on the left side. I want to do, I want to pay homage to the early OGs. So we actually have official endorsements from Adam back, from Luke Dash, from Charlie Shrem. A couple of guys might be coming up.

[Eric]

Charlie Shrem, isn't that a trip for you? You know, in what, 2013, 2014. You watch this documentary, Charlie Shrimp's in

[Tobias Barbier]

there and yeah, I mean he's the first person that I see about the bitcoin situation and learned from that documentary to see that full circle. I got to meet him in Tampa and I had the Avalon one with me. So that's a miner that you can look online. He had bitinstant, which is company the first exchange before Mount Gox and before he went to jail for that stuff. Excuse me. He was mining the Avalon one, one of the first Avalon Ones in the office, like right there on his desk. Like there's video of it.

[Eric]

Gosh, he must have had a, a monumental competitive advantage at that point running an Avalon one.

[Tobias Barbier]

Well, it was just, in a way, yeah. But as the miner started being delivered and going out like the block changes took off, the.

[Eric]

The hash rate went through the roof.

[Tobias Barbier]

So. So like Jeff Garzick, he's an early OG and he received the very first Avalon one in the United States before Charlie Shrimp had his in his office. And Jeff Garzick was interviewed by Vitalik Buterin because Vitalik never. He was a bitcoiner. He never invented Ethereum at the Point. And he was the owner of Bitcoin magazine and an editor. So he wrote the first article in Bitcoin magazine on the Avalon, on this miner right here. So you can go online, look up Bitcoin magazine and Avalon, and you'll see it's a silver version because batch one was silver, batch two was black. And I have both silver and black. So I have both batches, which is mind blowing. I only know five people in the world that have this and most of them don't want to sell them. I contact them and they're like, yeah, I'm not giving you that or selling it. And one guy said a hundred thousand dollars is what he would want for it. So that's kind of how I got the.

[Eric]

That's. That's what you think market value is on it.

[Tobias Barbier]

That's why I was doing that, to see gauge it. Plus I did auction one. I had three. I ended up auctioning one just to try to bring money in, to keep me alive with the museum. And it sold, I think for $45,000. And that was like two years ago. So, you know, with time things always become more value.

[Eric]

So this thing's going to be worth a. Approximately a bitcoin for a long.

[Tobias Barbier]

Forever. Yeah, that'd be pretty wild. Yeah. Like Steve Jobs has his Apple computers from his garage. And that's kind of what I equate this to for the bitcoin world and Steve Jobs, Apple computer, I think, what on auction sold for $1.2 million now. Wow, that's a computer. This is doing the transaction history of the around the world for finance. So it's different.

[Sponsor/Ad Voice]

One of my highest health priorities is keeping my brain in top shape. To take care of my brain power, I do many things such as striving to read, write, exercise, and meditate daily. One of the latest tools in my brainpower toolkit is Mind Lab Pro Mindlab Pro is a nootropic supplement that is scientifically proven to enhance your brain power. When I take Minelab Pro, my mind feels like it has a better grip on the world, my thinking is more lucid and the articulation of my speech is radically improved. Mindlab Pro has been tested in rigorous double blind, placebo controlled human trials and has been proven to enhance brain power for users in every age group. Mindlab Pro is an advanced formulation of 11 nootropic ingredients and is backed by research from over 1400 human trials conducted over the past 332 years. So if you're looking to enhance your brain power, Mind Lab Pro is an excellent Solution. Go to mindlabpro.com BreedLove to start enhancing your brain power today. Again, that's mindlabpro.com BreedLove

[Eric]

during this process of collecting all these miners, did you ever have a moment of thinking like, man, I could sell all these, get a lot of Bitcoin, or were you always really attached to the idea of preserving the history and having the museum?

[Tobias Barbier]

I was attached to the idea of having the museum for a while and that motivation led me to go to different influential people in the space to try to get the help to push it forward. And got rejected. Then I got rejected, then I got rejected, then I got rejected. And then I just got burned out and more burned out and more frustrated to the point where I'm like, okay, screw this, I just want to get rid of and sell it now. So then that's just a case. Then I started going to people like, hey, you want to buy it? Hey, you want to buy it? You want to buy it? And crickets. Because nobody really cares right now because like, some people are telling me I'm too early.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

And I'm telling them, like, well, how am I too early? Because I can talk to the people right now. You want me to wait until they're all dead for me to get the information out of them?

[Eric]

Super good point. Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

So it's like, it's easier right now. Imagine if Hal Finney was still alive and you're able to talk to him and get, you know, get more stuff out of him than what we know. So, yeah.

[Eric]

Are there miners that you are on the hunt for that you don't have that you want?

[Tobias Barbier]

See, at this point, I've collected so many of them that to answer that question is hard for me because I don't know what else is out there. So it's easier for people that might have something to just go to the website look at the gallery and see if they see it. If they don't see it, then I need it.

[Eric]

That makes sense.

[Tobias Barbier]

That's. That's easier to do that way because I don't really know what to ask for, because I don't know what else was made out there. Because I'm at that bottleneck where I basically collected, I'm guessing maybe 80% of the history of all the miners ever made.

[Eric]

Wow, that's just incredible. What a unique niche. That is really important. I think you're going to look back in many years and just be blown away at the impact.

[Tobias Barbier]

Some. Some people say I'm becoming the Smithsonian for bitcoin. And it's important for sure because it's like I said, if you don't preserve the history of bitcoin, then how do you educate the future on it? We have so many museums around the country and some of them to me are like, why is there a museum for that? It's like, like, weird. This is to. This is like globally important. You know, it's not just some little regional thing in some country somewhere. This is a global thing.

[Eric]

Yeah. It seems that bitcoin is the thing that's changing the direct. It should change the direction of our civilization.

[Tobias Barbier]

This is.

[Eric]

I mean, I'm one of the believers that, as hyperbolic as it sounds, I think this is maybe the greatest discovery, invention, whatever you want to call it in human history. This is a monumentally big deal. So I have a lot of admiration for you.

[Tobias Barbier]

Thank you for going for.

[Eric]

Just kind of.

[Tobias Barbier]

Maybe I'm thinking too far ahead sometimes. I don't know, but sometimes I feel like I'm the future walking through the present, waiting for the past to catch up to me.

[Eric]

I like that.

[Tobias Barbier]

That's pretty good, if that makes any sense.

[Eric]

It does. The discovery center, you're gonna. You're gonna be able to do education. You're gonna have. You're gonna sell, you know, merch that's like.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah, like the merch.

[Eric]

Houses, museums.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah, the merch side is to, you know, to show people that there's bitcoin trading cards that there's, you know, get a node or get involved in having. Buying a bit axe. So, you know, I've been in talks with Start nine and Solo Satoshi and bitcoin trading cards with Aladdin and stuff. And they're all in on it. I spoke to Natalie about bringing her book and also Lawrence with his book and any. Anybody else that has a published book, bitcoin authored book that can be on the Bookshelf in the storefront. So then some of the profits will go back into the nonprofit to help it. The other cool thing that I, that I haven't mentioned is that because of the size of the event center, it would be an event. It would be an event center the size of the center. So I'm planning on doing display boxes with these LED lights and casings for these miners like this to where you can move them around mobile. So let's just say, you know, you go to the bitcoin conference and two bitcoiners meet and they fall in love and they want to have a bitcoin themed wedding. They can book my place out on a Saturday.

[Eric]

It'll happen.

[Tobias Barbier]

Or have like the Michael Sailors of the world having like a C suite quarterly meeting in there privately, but being surrounded because if you try to orange pill people, like I said, it's much easier to do that in a place like that when you're surrounded by the history or like conferences that come through, you know, Mining Disrupt or the North American Blockchain Conference or Bitblock. Boom. Like these are all Texas conference events that they can do side events and book the center for that. So we would have some income coming in from having events of booking the place out for various different reasons. Coinbase, I heard, move their headquarters to Dallas. So maybe they might have their next Christmas party there for employees or something. I don't know.

[Eric]

Wild, you mentioned bitcoin trading cards. You also have one of the most comprehensive collection of these trading cards. And I think some of our viewers are aware of the trading cards of them probably aren't.

[Tobias Barbier]

I left them in the truck. Yeah, with me.

[Eric]

But you told me recently that you traded a tractor worth approximately $30,000, 25 grand, $25,000 tractor for a box of trading cards.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah. So there's. There's one gentleman in Canada that, that beat me to it. But I was trying to get the first S1 set fully completed because again, like my experience of being. I lived in Chicago when we first came as an immigrant, so I was there for the Chicago Bulls. And I got to see some games with Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen. And I had a rookie card from Michael Jordan, but I didn't take it seriously. I don't know what happened to it. That era is gone. And then the whole Pokemon craze. When it came out in 1999 again, I was into that. I had series one stuff from, you know, the first edition. Now it's like $6 million for a Charizard and I didn't think about it. And now here comes bitcoin trading cards. And because I'm a historian on these miners, I already understand scarcity. And then when I learned that there's scarcity in these trading cards, because basically Aladdin with his company is taking the concept of bitcoin scarcity into the trading card world, which is by itself historic because this is. This is true stats. Pokemon cards, they're popular as heck today. Like, you can't even find places. Like right now, GameStop is sold out around my neighborhood. You can't find any as we speak. But they have printed 75 billion bitcoin trading card. I mean, Pokemon trading cards since 1999 with a B. So Pokemon cards are kind of like the US Dollar. They just keep printing and printing because the demand is there, but there's no scarcity. So you pull like a Charizard today, and you're like, whoa, I got a Charizard. And you find out it's like 90 bucks. Like, oh, okay. But on the bitcoin trading card side, I pulled a Hal Finney out of a pack, and I'm blown away. Like, there's only a hundred of these serialized in the back from S1, and it was in immaculate condition. I went and got it graded at PSA and PSA brought it back as a gem. 10 perfect card, $10,000 card right off the rip.

[Eric]

Wow.

[Tobias Barbier]

And they charged me $1,000 just to grade it because of the value of that card. So, like, I got the whole S1 set collected now, and there's only two people in the world that I think have made maybe three. There's one other person that might have one, I'm not sure. But this is. This is becoming kind of a big thing now where people are realizing that these scare all the cards are all scarce because there's only 21, 000 packs ever made every single year. And this is not something I've put out yet to like a podcast like this. But because of my museum, Aladdin has respected what I've done for the space to get to preserve its history. So in S4, pre orders are coming out, I think in the next month. But I have my. My own card in there. Two cards, actually. One for the bitcoin mining museum. And then what you were just talking about the tractor Day card. So what happened there is. We're just in this telegram chat with like, over 800 different Bitcoin trading card people that love trading card bitcoin trading cards. And I put out there, I think I said, I'm looking for an S1 box, and I'm willing to pay. I don't know how much. I don't remember how much, I said, but I'm willing to pay X amount. Does anybody out there have one? Because they're hard to find. And this guy Chester responds back, and he was like, yeah, I'll take one for this amount. I'm like, no, that's too high. And then he was like, well, I am looking for a Kubota tractor. And as he said that, and I got my phone open, I look out the window, and I'm staring at my Kubota tractor, and my mind starts rolling, because on my. On my. I got 15 acres in North Carolina, so I do a lot of land work, but on my. On my property, I've already built the pond. I already built the garden. I already built the chicken coo. I already, like, I've done all the work that I can pretty much do with that tractor. So I'm at the point where I'm like, I don't mind that another family gets it to do what they need to do, because I found out he's got some land, but he's starting off to do all the things that I've already done. So he's been holding on in a. He had it in a safe, like, just the box. Just a safe just for the box. Sealed, never been open. And he's held it since day one. So we actually. He responds, so. So where was I? I was on a video call with somebody, kind of. It was. I think it was Adam back and somebody else I was on a video call with, talking about something different with my museum, when I have two screens, and the other screen, there's telegram is open, and the group is there. And after I responded saying, yeah, I have a Kubota tractor. Here's the year2021. And the value of my tractor equals the value of what he was almost asking for. So he actually came down a little bit. I went up and we met. But I. I did it as a joke, to be honest with you. Like, it was a joke where. Where his. His message said, I'll take. I'm looking for a Kubota. I was like, well, I got one. I showed the photo of it, I think, and I left that alone. Now I'm in my video call, right? And. Oh, yeah, it was. I think it was Adam back and professor and some other people. We were discussing some things about my museum. And in the middle of this video call, I see a Message pop up on telegram again that said D, E, A, L. And, like, I forgot about Adam back. Wait, what? Sorry, Adam back. Love you. But I'm like, did he really just agree to this? So now I'm like, do I back out? Because I already put my foot in my mouth publicly now in this whole group of 800 something people in there. And then people started responding like, no way is this for real? Are you guys serious? Like, it just started popping off. So I'm getting done with my video call, and then me and him discuss and DM privately. Like, he's like, are you serious? I'm like, yeah, I guess I am. I was a little hesitant, but at the same time, I wanted his box. And at the same time, I'm a man of my word. I already publicly said it, so I stuck to it. So then we agreed to meet up, but everything happened so fast that I ended up loading this tractor onto the trailer. And we agreed that he initially wanted some money with it too, but he pulled out of that when I offered that I'll deliver it to him. I should have kept my mouth shut about that too, because I didn't know he lives 10 hours away,

[Eric]

stocking miles on that Suburban.

[Tobias Barbier]

I drove 10 miles with this for 10 hours with this tractor to where he lives and delivered it. So it's actually a little documentary that we shot all the video to for that whole trip. But that moment was a historic moment on the bitcoin trading card side, equal to pizza day in the bitcoin world to where Aladdin felt that this was powerful enough of a moment that they make a card out of it. And October 15, 2025, will forever be known as tractor day.

[Eric]

That's funny. How much was that box of trading cards? How much did he buy that for, you think?

[Tobias Barbier]

600 bucks.

[Eric]

600 bucks in 2023. I think 2023 is when.

[Tobias Barbier]

That was when it was released.

[Eric]

So this guy did better by buying a $600 box of trading cards than buying bitcoin.

[Tobias Barbier]

And then the value of the touch and grass scenario, like, he's all about, you know, the. The farming and eating healthy and teaching his kids, you know, touch grass and all that. And like, he. So he's. So he's looking at it like, yeah, I could sell it for money or bitcoin, but I'm getting a valuable tractor that immediately he can put it to proof of work and build his farm and his homestead. So I'm happy that it go into a new. A good home, too, for the right reasons. So it's like we're both cool, you know, to this day about that decision. Even if I look back 20 years from now and it was any difference with, with the price of the box or whatever did I like I, I didn't get 25 grand out of the cards. I pulled the Hal Finney. So that's a ten thousand dollar card. Then there was a few other high end cards, maybe 1500 bucks, $2,000,000. So maybe I got half the value out of the box, but out of that became a card that's edged in the history books of a trading card for tractor day with a historic moment. So to me that's, that's valuable by itself and I appreciate Aladdin doing that.

[Eric]

Yeah, I mean I've, I've gotten many packs of those trading cards. I never get the desirable cards but like I always just give them to my like 3 year old daughter. She just like shreds them and destroys them and whatever. I wonder how many of those good cards that people are looking for for just ended up in the hands of a toddler.

[Tobias Barbier]

Well, you're helping the scarcity aspect of it, that's true. Burning cards, just burning cards.

[Eric]

I've helped with that.

[Tobias Barbier]

But. Oh, speaking of scarcity, learning about scarcity.

[Eric]

Yeah, yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

So. So the one thing that puzzled me personally is like people within my inner circle, family or people close to me that have like master's degrees in finance, they still don't understand bitcoin. And I have never been to school in a college level, university level, I'm just a high school graduate and that's pretty much it. With some certifications for logistics. But being in the war zone with that whole dinar thing with the money, being in you know, Africa and seeing the money situation face to face face, that's one aspect of me understanding and learning bitcoin. But again, what I'm about to say I've never said on any interview before. But it's not a proud moment in history of my life. But it is a part of my life that made me who I am today. But during the younger years I used to slang drugs, I don't know what word I'm allowed to use.

[Eric]

You can say anything you want. I sold drugs, but not. But the, the weak kind. Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

And, and you were more official too.

[Eric]

Yeah, I was eventually licensed by this mine, mine.

[Tobias Barbier]

I was a street guy so I might not look it but I, I got some, some history in the, some hood in me from back in the day. But I, I used to here in, in Miami, Liberty City. I used to go to a place called the Pork and Bean Projects back in the day, and there's. They ripped it, tore it down, and built new stuff now. But they used to have like tree logs blocking the roads around this whole apartment complex. And it was just one way in, one way out. And the police did that on purpose. So when they go after somebody that's killed somebody or rapist or big drug dealer, whatever, they can't just drive out of there from any direction. So they could block it off. But I used to go in there and like, get these little bunch of baggies and stuff. Like, it was crazy. Like there was like a fence at the intersection where they would unscrew the cap of the fence and that's where they would hide the dope. And. But then somebody would stand on the street corner and they would take shifts, eight hour shifts, and just like a regular job and a blue angel, whatever you wanted to call your, your drug company on the street, come get it, we got it. We're. We're here. And you just pull up to the stop sign, roll your window down, tell them what. He goes, uncaps the thing, pulls it out. And then they have, you know, young people watching on the rooftops for anybody coming, and they have their own little alarm system or whatever. I don't know how to warn if cops come into the place. And then I. And then I came back to my neighborhood, but then I realized that it's kind of congested. Like there's a lot of people that are doing the same thing. But then I found out this slick side of me, I guess I found out that tourists actually smoke crack and do drugs and weed and they come down from Canada and from France and from different places for the winter and get their little spot and you know, Hollywood beach and Dania and Broward county area. That was my stomping grounds. And I used to go straight on the beach. And I was slanging on the beach, the tourists. And I used to hop from hotel to hotel like every two, three days because they had a team from, from the drug task force from Broward county called the Jump Off Boys. Back then, this is like 90s. So for me to escape the Jump Off Boys, I hopped from hotel to hotel just to keep moving. But I had a pager and these clients of mine knew the code and they would page me and I'd meet them at a certain payphone and then they would, they would go and put the money where the quarters come out at. They put the money in there, like a twenty dollar bill. And then I put my bag right on top, grab the money. So they come first, they walk away, then I act like I'm talking on the phone, phone. Grab the money, put the thing, put it back. And then they come back and take the.

[Eric]

You're a teenager.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah, that was, it was crazy. But I was slick to the point also when, when I, I ended up doing some of that stuff even in Houston later on because I had some rough times that I went through and I wasn't making enough money. So I'm like, let me do a little bit of this on the side. It was more, more weed that then I didn't want to do all the hardcore stuff because I seen what actually pulled me away from the hardcore stuff was I was on us one once and I was in a hotel near South Broward High School, and I was on a picnic table at 2 o' clock in the morning and I had a wad of money and there was a couple of crack rock bags in there, little blue baggies that we had. And I had weed in this pocket and this wad was here. And a sheriff pulls up and it's like, I'm underage, like under 18, you know, 17, whatever, 16 and a half, something like that. And he, he. Back then it was like the whole frisk thing like that, whatever they wanted to do, they just check you and see what you got. So he found it weird that I'm sitting on a picnic table at a hotel lobby at 2 o' clock in the morning at that age. So he was like, hey, come here. I got nervous as hell. I'm like, oh my God. I have freaking like rocks on me. And he pats me down against the hood, pulls out the wad with a rubber band around it, smacks it on the hood, and the rock is inside the wad and it never fell out. So all you see is just the wad. And then he pulls the weed out and he's like, oh, I thought you said you ain't got nothing now. What's this? It's just weed. Like everybody does it, you know, I'm like, come on, man, give me a break. But I'm sweating because that would have been like. It was one of those moments when back then where you get caught the first time you're getting in trouble. Ain't no three strikes you're out crap. So he looked at the wad. He's like, where you get this from? It's like, well, I. I work at the Howard Johnson on the beach. And I cook over there, which I actually did. I was doing some regular day job doing breakfast and stuff, like a little cook, assistant cook. So he believed me on that because it wasn't that much. But he gave me the wad back and took the weed and threw the weed in the gutter and said, don't ever let me catch you out here again with weed in your pocket. And he threw the weed in the gutter, gave me my wad back, I put it back in my pocket, and he drove off. And that was such a moment for me that I opened the wad myself, took the crack out and put it right where I threw the weed.

[Eric]

Sobering moment, huh?

[Tobias Barbier]

Done. Okay. You know, I don't need no felony on my record for me to screw up my whole future. But the scarcity aspect, though, there was moments where, where I, I was like slick enough too to wait for my competitors to go dry in the neighborhood. I just held. I was hodling drugs. That's wild. So, like the neighborhood goes dry and I could jack my price up because I'm the only one now. So they're like in, in Houston, they used to call me Bubba from the Valley because I lived on a street called Imperial Valley. And yeah, I'm, I'm like everybody in the neighborhood knew me and I'd go out and do my thing and I was like so slick with like, like, I remember with my connect of getting like. I mean, I used to have like 10 pounds of, you know, I can say what I want. Yeah, all right. Ten pounds of weed, marijuana, whatever you want to call it on the table. But I used to get this, this, these pounds in. I used to meet my connect at a Subway. I had a 1988 box Chevy Caprice with like 15s in the trunk. I got bandana, I'm leaning, I got gold teeth from Paul Wall. I'm like straight hood man, and just beating the block. Like if everybody knows me, everybody's chunking deuces. And then I go meet my connected Subway. He comes with a Subway sandwich full of freaking weed. All compressed shape of a Subway sandwich. And I go and buy a real one, sit down and we just swap while it's busy with people around us. And then I grab mine, throw it in the, in the passenger seat of the, of the 88 box Chevy Caprice out in the open. So if I ever get pulled over, the cops just see the sandwich laying there from Subway and show my credentials or whatever. I always stayed straight with my paperwork so I don't have no issues there, so I don't have a reason to go and check more. But I mean I was just, I was slick, but I, I learned the scarcity off the streets and I think that's what helped me to understand bitcoin more versus, you know, the, the master degree finance people that are so deep into the whole finance stuff that they don't even understand the basics.

[Sponsor/Ad Voice]

So there's a very special place called the Farm at okefenokee that's a 1000 acre regenerative farm community about 45 minutes northwest of Jacksonville, Florida. The farm is a completely off grid community. It has total food, water and energy independence. Everything on the farm is 100% organic and it even features one wild boar and bear hunting. The farm at Okefenokee is right next to the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge where you can do camping and canoeing tours. So if you're like me and you're interested in the self sovereign lifestyle, then you can get your own lot on the farm at Okefenokee if you tell them that I sent you. Once you get a lot, you can build one of three custom cabin options. So if you value freedom, self sovereignty and living in touch with nature, then join me and my family. We have lot number 21 and we're going to be building a cabin there starting December 2025. To learn more about the Farm at okefenokee, go to okifarm.com and make sure to tell them that I sent you.

[Eric]

Yeah, well, it's Keynesian economic pseudoscience, man. Doesn't make sense. These people pay a shitload of money to go be indoctrinated and try to make sense of something you just simply can't make sense of. Yeah, that is wild. You were, you were a rapper for a period of time. I just picture you doing teeth rolling in the hood. You.

[Tobias Barbier]

You went there, huh?

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

So just for the record, the only thing I wrapped now is Christmas gifts.

[Eric]

You unwrap bitcoin trading cards.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah, yeah, that's true. But yeah, I, I have a stint in my history. I wanted to become a rapper because, because then when I was growing up in Houston with the streets, I was telling about in Houston that then, you know, hip hop comes right along with all that. So I was there for the beginning era of like Paul Wall and Slim Thug and Killer Caleon and Mike Jones and 0&H Town and like slow jams too. But like I was there when Slim Thugger was selling like five dollar CDs out the trunk of his car. So that whole era of music from Houston with. With even Chop and Screw music, I don't know if you ever heard of Chop and Screw. Like DJ screws, the one that invented it, basically, when they take a. You take the hook of a track or something or any part of the. Any track, and you slow it down and chop it up. That. That was invented in Houston. And I was there for that era growing up, so that kind of influenced me. And I like writing. I'm not a freestylist or anything, but I like writing. And I ended up going with the Department of Defense overseas, and there was a studio in Doha, Qatar, where I was like, after work, I was kind of bored, so I started renting studio time and just on my own, just doing my own little thing.

[Eric]

While you're in the Army?

[Tobias Barbier]

While, yeah, it was not in the army, but his Department of Defense contract work for the army. And I'm in. I'm in Doha, Qatar, in the studio doing my own thing. But I didn't know that the technician that done all. The engineer guy that done all the work for putting my track together knew the DJ that's on the radio station in Doha, Qatar. So there was this moment where I had. I was driving from the villa back onto the army base to go to work, and they have roundabouts everywhere over there. They don't have really red lights or not. And I'm just swinging through the roundabouts. And then we get hit some traffic before we get to the army base. And I'm just listening to the radio station and my track Southern Swag comes on. I'm like, what? That's me. I freaking pulled over. And there's sand everywhere. It's desert. I pulled over on the side of the road in the sand, and I'm like, oh, my God, that's me. And I'm telling people in traffic, they don't even know me. That's me. That was like a moment that kind of motivated me to do more. And that song actually ended up becoming number one for six weeks in the country of Qatar. And, and, and, and in Qatar at the time, it was techno and house was popular. Hip hop didn't really hit over there. And then I ended up doing a show at the Ritz Carlton in Doha. They have, like, the club, and I ended up filling the whole club up, even though I'm a nobody, just because it's hip hop, because they have never experienced hip hop. So, like, the club filled up, and me and my hype, man, I got photos of this on My phone right now. Like, me on stage and. And doing my first gold show. Yeah, Paul. Paul Wall actually made my grill in Houston. John Johnny, he's the other, the guy that made makes grills with Paul while they team together. Like, remember Nelly? Let me see my grills? Yeah, that. That was that era. But then I'm at work on the army base in Doha. And then those six weeks that that song became popular, that bled into Dubai. And then a record label called FSR Records heard my track and they were, they liked it and they reached out to me and they're like, hey, you want to come to Dubai and let's meet, let's talk. And I go in there and it's like a professional studio. And they got like an engineer from Canada and some other guy from another part of the country. They're all working there. And they already have two other artists. One of them is like R B from Nigeria, and then another one was from the uk. It was a girl who did like house music and singing on house music, but they didn't have a hip hop person. So since I'm already living there and I just finished my contract over there, I was ready to come home. There's like, no, come to Dubai. And I ended up getting a record deal. And I can I believe that I'm the first American ever in the Middle east to get signed to a record deal on a deal. And it wasn't a huge deal. It was small. Starting off small, but I got a free place to stay. They gave me a rental car. And where I stayed at was 37 floors up on one of those. Sheikh Zayed Road is like the main i95 corridor type thing in downtown Dubai. And they have Dubai Mall. And then there's the. The Burj Khalifa, which is the world's tallest building, but it was halfway built. So I'm out of my kitchen window, I'm looking out like buses of hundreds of employees coming every single morning to go build this thing. And like 28 people died falling off of it while I was there. Because they don't have really OSHA at that time. But it was kind of mind blowing that I was there to watch them build the world's tallest building. But then from there, when I got signed, we started recording. And the studio time that I've. I've always had was like, in four hours, I'm done with the track, you know what I mean? And then I get into their studio and we spent like 13 weeks on one song with 14 different variations of different levels of the track and it's blowing my mind, like, dang, there's that much involved. And then when, even when you're done engineering the track, it gets sent off to Canada to get mastered because mastering was done somewhere else too. So I started to understand the inner workings of what it's like to be as a part of a record label in the studio studio on a more professional level. And then Shaggy came into town to do a concert for the Dubai Music Festival. And then they actually got a contract set up where they had a rider with, you know, put me in a hotel over there close by and whatever. I'm. I'm nothing big like these other people that want all purple M M's or whatever on the nightstand. But I got set up with a contract to be the opening act for Shaggy in front of like 12, 000 people. And that was my biggest concert. But that was nerve wracking. And from there it led to going to Thailand to perform. I went, there was a, there was a, A rock concert with different people from Metallica and all these other guys. But their opening opening act for this rock festival in Dubai was a group in India called Junkyard Groove. And they had like a six piece band and they're rocking and they were on point, spoke perfect English in their tracks. So I met up with them or they heard about me and we met up and they were like, yeah, when we're done here, we go back to India. We're going to do our own little tour and Chennai and Bangalore and some other place, I forgot the name of it, but more in the southern side of India. And there's like we love your track with Bubba Sparks because I have a guitar in there live. And it's got like this Lincoln park type vibe. So it kind of blends in into their rock band. So all of my experience has been a dj, you know, doing my tracks where they take my voice out. But my ad libs are there and the beats there and. And the DJ is just pumping my music out and I'm just doing my live vocals or rapping. But they did a live band with six piece band on my track and learned my track. Man, I got gung ho. My I. I got a photo with my face red with a microphone because I've never heard a six piece band in real life. Real life doing my track. But the crazy part is in Bangalore you're not allowed to dance.

[Eric]

What?

[Tobias Barbier]

You get a fine.

[Eric]

Really?

[Tobias Barbier]

You get fined for moving and dancing in the club. So I want you to imagine me on stage with a rock band, with a six piece band performing in front of like 300 people that don't move. So it was kind of wild experience, but. And I'd end up doing touring in India and then I ended up going to Kenya, Africa. And in Africa I did a 10 day tour. And then I met like big artists over there like Joakali and Red sun and Wiri and Nonini. And I befriended Nonini while we were there. And I performed there as well at the MTV Africa Music Awards in 2009. Out in the open in downtown Nairobi. I think I showed you the video yesterday. So I got. And so I'm. I'm the first white rapper to perform in East Africa. Like I thought Paul Wall or Bubba Sparks or something beat me to that already. But they all told me that they have never had a white American rapper ever perform in Kenya at the time. So I made history there. A little piece of history. So that's kind of cool. But yeah, but Frank became friends with Nonini and then he comes to the US and he'll hit up, you know, Washington D.C. houston, Chicago, different cities that have the African community from Kenya because there's a lot of communities in the US from there. And he'll do shows and he'll do a whole tour in America. So he came through Houston while I was living there. And that's when we decided to collab on a track and recorded like 16 hours in three locations in a day for a music video. And I showed you that yesterday too. Oh, sorry. But yeah, then what actually. Oh, so what. What happened is again, this leads into Bitcoin, the record label. After these tours, I come back to Dubai and we're ready to shoot my second music video. And I'm. They got the fifth largest club in the world in Dubai at the time and they had train tracks in the dance floor area with the cameraman on it, like riding around with this eighty thousand dollar cinema camera and all that. And then I'm like, I'm just blown away at the professionalism of all that. They interviewed me for the music video just as an intro type thing. And then I started recording the music video and like there's like I got a photo again on my phone of like 12, 15 women from different countries behind me. And I got this towel and getting ready to get in the groove and do my track and my gold teeth. And then my manager stops the whole show and walks up with this blue look in his face like he's about to tell me some bad news. I'M like, oh, Lord, what's going on? And he's like, yeah, the. The entire global market is crashing from the housing market crash that started in the US and it bled into the rest of the world, including dub. And the person that owns the record label, owns real estate, who's a local Emirati, very rich person. And they basically lost all the funding to the record label and all the artists, including the other two and myself basically got laid off. Right.

[Eric]

Wow. I've heard a lot of stories about the 2008 financial crisis, but not one bitcoinerg was collecting miners who lost his rap job.

[Tobias Barbier]

So. Yeah, so. So. So the very thing that killed my possible music career is the very thing that gave birth to where I am today. Sitting here in front of you right now with this bitcoin discovery center.

[Eric]

Incredible, man. Yeah, you've had. You've had a very interesting life, that's for sure.

[Tobias Barbier]

There's more. Yeah, yeah, I can imagine there's more. Like I almost died with my wife three times in three months, you know, so you're all screen.

[Eric]

So I got two questions. One just that popped into my head kind of go back a little bit. These bit axes.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah.

[Eric]

People are actually mining blocks and getting significant reward from these bit axes. Wasn't it a handful of people last year with bit axes?

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah, I mean, last time I checked, I think it was seven. When I was checking towards the end of last year, but then even since then, there was a couple more. So I think we're at 9, give or take, for 20, 25 of winning a whole block of 300 something thousand dollars out of a little bit axe from home.

[Eric]

Oh, my gosh.

[Tobias Barbier]

So it's like

[Eric]

the evolution of the bitcoin mining industry and these, these now S21s, it's still relevant to run a little device and help support the network.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah. Because the efficiency of the chips have gone from like the one that I showed you here is 130 nanometers. So now the chips that are being used into the S21 plus or S21XPS, the newest chips, they're being put into these bit axes.

[Eric]

So an S21 is 1.2 million of these little guys.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah. And how. That's the old ship, though.

[Eric]

Yeah. I mean, that's so the incredible. The evolution in what, 12 years.

[Tobias Barbier]

And that's one thing that, you know, the, the naysayers against bitcoin mining, for example, you know, the, the, the green people and all that stuff that are against bitcoin mining. Something that they Never really point out, like, the banking system hasn't changed in the last 12 years. It's the same efficiency. You still got the brick and mortar, still got the same AC system, same vault, same everything. Just older employees working in there. Okay. Your Internet got a little bit faster since then, you know, but you still got people like, I'm right now with my llc, with the consulting firm, or even with the museum stuff. I still have to go walk into a bank and stand in line to do stuff, like, certain things. And when I'm standing in line, like, I see somebody pull a checkbook out in front of my face, and I feel like throwing up inside because, like I said, like, I'm. So I'm over here, and everybody's still back there, and we're in the same room together, and it feels weird. Like, why am I here? This sucks.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

So with. With the. With. With the efficiency, like, if you compare that to the banking system with the brick and mortars, there's no efficiency there. But this is Bitcoin is. It just gets better and better every year. Every two years, there's better miners, better chips, and just gets faster and better and faster and better while the brick and mortar is still a brick and mortar.

[Eric]

That's absolutely incredible. I had another question. It's totally slipped my mind. But, yeah. Impressive stuff, man. Oh, yeah. This was it. Maybe this is a little, kind of like spiritual or whatever. What. Do you have any advice or suggestions? Like, how. How does somebody create the level of serendipity that you've had in your life? Because, you know, I've met you a couple times at conferences, and you have stories of just like, endless stories of being in the right place at the right time. And an example. You start carnivore, what, 17 days ago?

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah.

[Eric]

You're going on a tour to talk about the Bitcoin Discovery Center. You got your miners with you. You end up in Naples. You're sharing an Airbnb with Sean Baker.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yeah.

[Eric]

The guy your whole life has been,

[Tobias Barbier]

like, on a Carnivore diet.

[Eric]

Yeah. What. What.

[Tobias Barbier]

What is.

[Eric]

Where does the magic touch come from?

[Tobias Barbier]

I. It's a hard question in a way, but I guess one thing that I know does help is that people do have the power to put themselves in those situations instead of sitting at home waiting for things to fall in your lap. I'm an opportunist. Where I see an opportunity pass me by, where the window might be two seconds, but if I see that two seconds either, I'm going to be pissed off. Kicking rocks 20 years from now because I didn't jump into that two second moment or I jump into that two second moment and see what happens. And if I get rejected, so what you learn? No, yeah, yeah, I got rejected. Okay. There's another two minute, two second window. I jump into it. Got rejected. All right. But then the seventh or eighth or ninth time, hey, what's up? Let's work together. Boom. I got a whole new road to go down that I didn't have before. So getting rejected is a part of the process of success, I think.

[Eric]

Yeah, yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

And there's a learning curve to every rejection too, because every time you get rejected, then within that rejection, there's something that happened that you learned from it to better yourself for the next opportunity.

[Eric]

You either win or you get rejected. And you learn and you're winning.

[Tobias Barbier]

Correct.

[Eric]

You're always winning. So it's a mind state thing really, more than anything, huh? Staying in a positive state of mind, taking action work. You can't just sit at home and manifest greatness.

[Tobias Barbier]

I believe in manifestation verbally as well. And that's why I think I got to this bitcoin discovery center too. Because I've been talking about doing this for a long time. And while I'm talking getting rejected. Talking getting rejected, this has always been the center of my focus to do something like this. And all of a sudden, 30,000 square foot building. Here you go, nonprofit. Here you go. You know, it's like, oh my God, like everything just come to an head right now. But one of the reasons I'm sitting here in front of you right now is I'm at that head and I can't move forward because I don't have the money to get to the grand opening finish line. And that's why I'm asking the community for help to bring us there and help me with the rest of the way.

[Eric]

And how can the community help you? So you have the bitcoindiscoverycenter.com correct? Yeah. So what can people do?

[Tobias Barbier]

How can they find bitcoin? They can donate US dollars. Like I said, you. If, if there's any large OGs out there or pubcos that are interested and, and I think it's great optics for anybody that has a pubco or a company that you, you know, you're showing your own shareholders or followers that you're. You're actually not just giving all your money to Uncle Sam and doing some nonprofit work and giving back to the community to help preserve what's important. This stuff like this because if this is all gone, how do you teach future generations about it?

[Eric]

Yeah, it's an incredible niche. It really is. And it's really important. You know, I've been shocked. Every time I speak with you or think about what you're doing or see any of your posts, I'm just like, man, ahead of the times. You. It's a lot of serendipity, but it's a special thing and I'm grateful. I'm sure a lot of us bitcoiners, I can speak on behalf of a lot of the people in the community who are grateful for your work in doing this.

[Tobias Barbier]

Thank you. I really appreciate it and I appreciate this platform that you giving me to speak to share some of my stories. Some of them I've never shared with before.

[Eric]

So, yeah, it's been fun, man. Any final words of wisdom? And if not, where can people find you? X Any other websites?

[Tobias Barbier]

X It's the coin dad. Just make sure it's got the blue check mark because there's some scammers out there. And then right now it's BTC Mining Museum for the Discovery Center. But I'm hoping that I can get that name changed to something closer to the center's name. But you'll see it in my profile on the coindad.com I mean the coindad on X. But bitcoindiscoverycenter.com it's the new website and you see our team on there. We have advisors. Oh, this is important to me. Shout out to Bryce McDowell. He's our senior advisor for the bitcoin Discovery center and he's contributed $100,000 to the Bitcoin Discovery Center. Already 25 grand we received a few days ago. And as of today, right now, as soon as we're done with this, I'm going to go check the account because I think he's already sent for today. The other 75 grand, I'm going to show proof of work right away. So as soon as I'm done with this tour down here with these various podcasts that I'm on is to go home, kiss my wife, repackage, wash my clothes, and I'm grabbing my GC that helped me build my house and his best helper and we're driving all the way to Dallas to the facility. So with this hundred grand that we're already receiving, I'm going to start buying supplies and paint and wood and we're going to build those 10 foot walls and start painting the place out in the orange bitcoin Orange and, and dark gray. This is the colors of the facility inside. And start showing proof of work with the money.

[Eric]

I love it.

[Tobias Barbier]

And then that way I have some more content to show, you know, online that we're actually doing something with the funds. I'm not posting no AI generated what it might look like photos. I'm. I'm here to. To do something real about it.

[Eric]

Incredible. Absolutely incredible.

[Tobias Barbier]

I'll jump on the ladder myself with a brush just to save some money.

[Eric]

Yeah, man. Well, thank you for your time. Thank you for bringing these miners. And you. Do you had a couple more. Is there any other miners you wanted to show before we're done?

[Tobias Barbier]

No, the miners I've showed. But this is super dope right here. So before miners are made. You got these chips here and underneath are the ASIC chips. But before the manufacturer starts making the miners. Oh my God. That's new.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

Oh my God. It broke. No, this was not broken as of Naples just now.

[Eric]

Gotta get that museum, man. That's why it's so important.

[Tobias Barbier]

And I have pelican cases. Oh, this just threw me for a loop.

[Eric]

Is it replaceable?

[Tobias Barbier]

No. I mean in a way.

[Eric]

But if anybody can find a replacement, you can.

[Tobias Barbier]

Oh man. This is 3, 000 ships from TSMC. I'm. I'm blown away right now. Like three people came up to me in Naples and said where did you get this from? Because they have never seen one and they've been to mining a long time because that's how hard these are to get. And the reason why I got it is there was a merger in China, but between a smaller bitcoin mining manufacturer and you know, Jihan Wu that made Bitmain. He's now Bit Deer. And they purchased a company and that company during the merger had this extra and donated it to the museum. And this really sucks. I should have done a better job protecting this. I thought I was because of the pelican case. Oh man. But this is roughly a twenty thousand. It was a twenty thousand dollar wafer with seven nanometer chips. Three thousand of them on here. But if you were to zoom. I'm shaking right now. I'm sorry.

[Eric]

That's okay.

[Tobias Barbier]

Man.

[Eric]

Bummer moment. But you know what this is? Maybe this is a good moment to exploit and maybe strike a highlighter across why it's so important that you get this stuff set up a permanent location to keep it safe.

[Tobias Barbier]

Yes. This is a very good reason why.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Tobias Barbier]

Cuz that should be in a plexiglass right now with some LED lights. Around it, man, what a bummer.

[Eric]

I, I, I promise you, if anybody on planet earth can find another one, it's you, man.

[Tobias Barbier]

Get some duct tape for the back or something. Right now it looks like Pac Man.

[Eric]

You still got both pieces.

[Tobias Barbier]

Okay.

[Eric]

Better than nothing.

[Tobias Barbier]

Well, there's that show and tell, but yeah, this is basically what I would call like the embryo of mining, because that's TSMC makes these wafers. They got thousands of chips on them, goes to the manufacturer, they cut all these little squares out, then they go on to the hash boards and then miners are made and the history, I mean, the entire blockchain is run off of bitcoin mining. So I consider what I've collected basically like the DNA of the bitcoin blockchain and everybody that's involved into bitcoin, you know, even Mike over there doing his job and you doing yours and Robert with his and myself, you know, every job comes off of the backbone of bitcoin miners.

[Eric]

Yes.

[Tobias Barbier]

If it wasn't for the bitcoin mining, none of us would exist with a job. You'd still have a nine to five, I'd have a nine to five. Or whatever. Or whatever you would do. You know, we wouldn't be full time into bitcoin because of, so we got to pay. How much to this?

[Eric]

Yeah, this is the equipment that digitizes energy and makes these forever pieces of information. So it's important stuff, man. Well, thank you for all that you do.

[Tobias Barbier]

Thank you for having me.

[Eric]

Thank you for your time, man. This was fun.

[Tobias Barbier]

Appreciate you, man, so much.

[Eric]

You too.

[Sponsor/Ad Voice]

We lock our doors, we encrypt our hard drives, and we use strong passwords. But most people leave one thing wide open, their phone line. Sim swap attacks are one of the fastest growing methods of digital theft. In minutes, a hacker can clone your accounts, reset your passwords, and drain your life. Unfortunately, this is not science fiction. It happens every single day. Afani is the only mobile service protection designed exclusively to protect you from SIM swap attacks. Fonny offers military grade encryption on their product and offers up to $5 million of SIM swap insurance. And to date, there have been exactly zero SIM swaps on any of Afani's over 50,000 protected accounts. So you don't need to live in fear. You just need to protect your weakest link. Go to afani.com breedlove to secure your phone line today. Again, that's Afoni. E f a n I.com breedlove for the past 25 years, I've been reading roughly one book per week. Almost entirely difficult nonfiction books. The kind that really shift your thinking. Books on physics, money, power, psychology, spirituality and philosophy. The real stuff. But I get it. Most people don't have time to read 50 books per year. So I hand selected my favorite nonfiction books and distilled each one of them into a course that you can take in 50 to 100 times faster than it would take you to read the entire book. Each course gives you the key insights, mental models and frameworks that matter. We launched with 15 book courses and we are building toward a library of 100 by the end of year one. So if you are a seeker of truth, wisdom and personal growth, then my book course is for you. To sign up, go to course Breedlove IO. Again, that's course Breedlove IO. Thanks for watching. If you enjoyed this episode, click here to find more just like it. And here to find our most recent episode. Also, make sure to like this video to help shine light on the corruption of money. And be sure to subscribe to this channel to stay connected.