Nick Darlington: A Freelancer Turns Bitcoin Into Everyday Money

Owning Bitcoin is easy. Using it in the real world, without wrecking your savings plan, is where things get interesting. We chat with Nick Darlington, a South African freelancer and builder who went from travel and a self-made writing career to launching Bitcoin Friendly SA, a project focused on growing Bitcoin payments and a local Bitcoin circular economy.

We get into the personal backstory first: leaving the corporate route, learning how to earn online, and the hard-won lessons that come from pitching, undercharging, finding mentors, and eventually charging what your work is worth. From there, the conversation widens into freedom, how regulation and social norms shape daily choices, and why online echo chambers on X can make you feel informed while quietly narrowing your worldview.

Then we go hands-on with Bitcoin adoption in South Africa. Nick breaks down the spend-and-save approach: keep your long-term Bitcoin stack separate, load a small Lightning wallet for monthly spending, and start paying for simple things like coffee. We talk about merchant onboarding, the difference between direct Bitcoin acceptance and rand settlement, and how tools like Nostr “zaps” make Lightning tips feel as easy as a like button. We also unpack how Bitcoin Friendly SA evolved from a directory into a curated online shop for Bitcoin-friendly merchants, plus Nick’s Proof of Spend push to grow real transaction volume. Stick around for the most South African closing: turning Bitcoin miner heat into biltong.

If you enjoy practical Bitcoin conversations, subscribe, share this with a friend, and leave a review. Where would you like to pay with Bitcoin next?

https://x.com/NickDarlington

https://x.com/BitcoinFrndlySA

https://x.com/MoneyBadgerPay

Links:

www.bitcoinforbusiness.io

X: @gavingre

X: @BTC_4_Biz

Primal: GavinBGreen@primal.net

NOSTR: npub12qv07tpwk8x8fy2uuqczghpappap395npuxvsx8pgksh97pezv7s8r7qta

Transcript

Welcome And Nick’s Story

SPEAKER_01 0:00

And now recently I've you know in 20 then in 2017 I also discovered discovered Bitcoin and for the last seven years I treated it main mainly as a as a store of value. Um and I think lots of people do that, they save it. But recently, in the about a year ago, actually, in May last year, I watched a video. Uh it was a video about stake and shake accepting. For those who don't know, it's a burger chain in the US that accepts Bitcoin and kind of really leans into that, accepting Bitcoin.

SPEAKER_03 0:32

And I was like, hey, wouldn't it be cool if we had a uh Hey there everybody, welcome back to the Straight No Chaser Podcast. This is the show where we talk about human freedom through money, technology, philosophy, and economics. Today we have a really cool fireside chat with Nick Darlington. Nick has a super interesting background, has done stuff that I think many of us would like to have done, and that is to sort of take a couple of years off, go and travel, go and see the world, uh exit from the corporate world when he came back and setting up his own thing, uh, deciding his own terms and conditions on working, and uh he talks a bit about that as well as his involvement in the Bitcoin space and a couple of really cool projects that he's working on at the moment. So this is awesome. Uh Nick Darlington, good morning and welcome to the show. It's great to have you here.

SPEAKER_00 1:46

Shot, man. Thanks, thanks so much for having me. I look forward to to chatting.

SPEAKER_03 1:51

So, Nick, I sort of bumped into you uh on Twitter, probably. Um if you can call it that. Um so you know, I was sort of like I I don't know how people get into your stream, but they do. And I started noticing your posts and sort of commenting on some of that. And uh yeah, since then uh we've actually bumped into into each other at uh adopting Bitcoin, which is always cool getting to go to a conference where you can meet people face to face that you may have just been dealing with Twitter mates or something like that. So it's always nice to see people. Um, but yeah, uh so it's it's uh the more I've uh chatted to you and learnt about you, the more interesting of a guy you seem to be. So I'm super chuffed to have you on the show today. Um and maybe just to start off, man, um tell us a bit about your background. Uh, where were you born bred, a little bit about your family, anything you feel comfortable sharing. Um, I mean, no need to overshare, but yeah, who is who is Nick?

Travel And Location Independence

SPEAKER_01 2:54

Yeah, just a quick note on that Twitter, like obviously Twitter's not I don't say Twitter's the real world, right? We when we go on Twitter, it feels like we're living in a I think Bitcoiners sometimes need to get off Twitter and and into the into the real world. Anyway, that's a side conversation. Yeah, so I was um I was born in PAL and actually grew up in in Franch um in a small town. And so I remember growing up and running around the farm barefoot. Back then it was like maybe two or three cars would come in the day into town. Um, yeah, I grew up in a little uh in Franchuk and kind of studied at Stellenbosch. Um and then kind of did two years at a sort of digital signage company and then decided no, I don't want to, I don't want to work, I want to go travel. So I went traveling. This was in my early 20s. I went traveling like backpacking, um went to Thailand, like Mexico, some uh, and then came back and was like, shit, I I don't really want to I want to become location independent. And so my goal was to set up a business and service of that. Uh so being able to work, work from anywhere. And so I kind of started with you mentioned it before we jumped on the call, get butterfly. Um, I don't know if it's possible to go through a quarter life crisis, but I guess that was my quarterlife crisis, like uh launching a site, like trying to figure out what I wanted to do. And I wasn't really making money off of it, but I was interviewing travelers, and yeah, I was just going through a kind of like a transformation, and that's kind of where the name Get Butterfly came from. It's like butterflies, you know, transform from a you'll see the G and the B is actually forms a butterfly. So that's you know, anyway. So it was more of a creative project, but it wasn't making money, and you know, not everything's about money, but you do need to pay the bills, and so I uh pivoted to writing. Um, that's also an interesting story. But uh essentially, uh I started writing for a company called LiFac, was getting paid very little, and then I came across this um Nigerian blogger, and I know lots of people associate um, I mean, this is a stereotype, but associate Nigerians are scammers. This guy was not a legit guy. Um, his name's Bamadile One Balusi, and he basically launched a writing challenge to show you how to become a freelance writer in I think it was a thousand uh thirty days or something, and like earn your first thousand dollars, and he had a roadmap of like set up your website, uh find a hundred businesses you want to call email, call email those businesses, follow up. And so I followed that, and that's how I built my writing business. This wasn't for context, like grew up in France, and then studying was in 2020, 2011. Work was uh for two or three years, and then traveling was around 2013, 2014, and the writing business started around 2016, and then I've been doing that for the last 10 years. Um had some cool mentors along the way. You know, I started chart, I mean I was earning dollars writing mainly for tech companies overseas. And there was a lady who works, I don't know if you know Freshbooks Cloud Accounting.

SPEAKER_03 5:55

Um yeah, I've I've seen the name, heard about them. Haven't you?

SPEAKER_01 5:59

Yeah, so yeah, but they're pretty cool. Like um, anyway, so I I they were one of my first big clients that I pitched, and I worked closely with the content head of content there, Jane. Um, and she was kind of like a mentor, and I remember she asked me to quote on a writing project, and she was like, No, no, you've this is way too low, like you need to be charging more. And that was like the you know, sometimes in your life you have moments that change, and so that changed my entire perspective on it, and um I just started charging more for my writing, and that's how I made a living, and that's what I've been doing. And now recently I've you know, in 20 then in 2017, I also discovered discovered Bitcoin, and for the last seven years I treated it main mainly as a as a store of value, um, and I think lots of people do that, they save it. But recently, in the about a year ago, actually, in May last year, I watched a video. Uh it was a video about stake and shake accepting, for those who don't know, it's a burger chain in the US that accepts Bitcoin and kind of really lends into that, accepting Bitcoin. And I was like, hey, wouldn't it be cool if we had a uh sort of platform and essay where you can see where you can pay with Bitcoin? Um and so like Bitcoin Friendly Essay was born, um and it's kind of morphed into uh a contents engine. Uh I've kind of focused heavily on writing content on Twitter so that you know for me, I enjoy the space. Um, and when I started, my goal was regardless of what happens with Bitcoin friendly essay, this is the industry I want to be in, and this is what I want to learn about. And if I get, you know, so it's like a stepping, like it's like well, regardless of what happens, this is where I want to be. If I get a job offer, cool, I might pursue that. So it's kind of like I decided this is the place. And now recently I launched the online store, and uh yeah, that's the sort of short of it. Um, I mean, so and yeah, the store of value side of Bitcoin. Um, yeah, I've I've seen it now more as a sort of um something you can spend, um, spend and save. And so that's I mean, I'm sure we'll dive into that. But in the last year, I've I've had that realization that it's you know we don't have to hoard it. Some people see hoarding as a negative word, sure, it might be, but the fact is lots of us do just hoard the stuff, right? And we don't spend it. And I think we need to spend it. Not saying spend your stack, I'm saying spend in addition to yeah, your stack.

SPEAKER_03 8:20

No, I hear you, man. Um, so listen, I I want to just actually jump back a whole lot. So that was a quick uh yeah, you you sort of uh you're ahead of me on the uh in school. You you well deep into the interview already. Uh, but I did want to actually ask you some stuff about um your travel. So Mexico and Samoa, um, perhaps not two countries that come first of mind as far as South Africans go when they think let's go travel overseas. Um, I mean, Thailand, yes. I think it's South Africans like to go there because it's a probably the only cheap destination on the planet for us with our dodgy rant. But uh the actual question is um what was your experience versus uh like perceived experience versus reality in both Samoa and Mexico?

SPEAKER_00 9:12

Um Jesus was yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_03 9:15

I mean, so so did you have a picture in mind? You know, like Mexico back in the 80s was always famous for drug cartels, hijacking, people losing fingers, yeah, ransom, blah, blah, blah. Um, so what mental picture did you have of uh Mexico and Samoa? And when you got there, what was pleasantly surprising about that?

Freelance Writing Mentors And Pricing

SPEAKER_01 9:36

Jeez, it was so long ago. Um at the time, the reason for going was my brothers to Mexico. So I kind of did a combination of soda backpacking and traveling with my family, I my brother, and his ex-wife, my ex-wife, he she was Mexican, and so we experienced Mexico. I love Mexico. I didn't really have a preconceived idea of oh drugs and this. I just went there and I enjoyed it. So yeah, that was Mexico. And then Samoa was Samoa like very underdeveloped. I had no idea. I'd never been, I mean, I'd I had no frame of reference because Samoa is not exactly a country that's in the media a lot, right? It's not like, hey, you know, the only reference point I have for Samoa is South Africa players them in rugby. So it's a very small island. Um, there's not much economy going. Well, at least then. I don't know what it's like now, but there wasn't much economy going on then. People are very chilled though, very, very relaxed life. Um, so yeah, I mean, that that was kind of my experience. I didn't really have a preconceived. I just I went with an open mind. And so I didn't really, you know, at least 10 years ago, I wasn't thinking. I was just thinking, go, I want to go travel. I wasn't thinking about like um the places I was going to per se. But maybe um being a first-time solar backpacker back in the day, I was, you know, someone who likes to think things through. I was like, shit, is this do I need this and do I need that? And is it safe? And you know, you have those questions with any country, I think. Um, Thailand, especially, I had those questions. Um yeah, I mean, and then I also spent some time in New Zealand. Uh I mean, New Zealand is a beautiful place, but it's I find it quite boring in terms of uh there's not the energy like South Africa. It's it's a stunning place, beautiful scenery, amazing people I met on my travels, but yeah, it's uh it's not South Africa. There's not that energy, and people always talk about that, but it's a real thing. I think once you go travel and you come back, you realize it.

SPEAKER_03 11:29

So yeah, 100%. So I mean, I was overseas in the US for a few years, uh, not exactly a third world country, I'll be honest. Um, but it it was interesting how uh I had a similar uh sort of uh awareness when I was there was that everybody is so law abiding. And it wasn't like in a negative way, but it was just an awareness of things.

SPEAKER_01 11:52

Um you'd have a conversation breaking the rules though by, you know, it's not like we break, it's just like people are very yeah, rule like it's uh I get you. Australia is similar, I've heard at least.

SPEAKER_03 12:02

Yeah, like everybody was like, what does the law say? Or what do the regulations say? Like they were so like uh clear about the what they could or couldn't do, and if they got anywhere close to the edge, guys were just not interested, very nervous, step back from that. Uh, yeah, I know we need to get guidance on that. And I don't know if it's because um it's such a litigious or they they litigate a lot over there, so everybody is very cautious about going anywhere close to any kind of possible lawsuit action uh that's made them like that. I don't know, but it was just something I didn't really expect. You know, you sort of see the American movies, you know, the Wild West movies, and um it was just like people on the ground were just completely different. Very cool, amazing people, super helpful, friendly, always ready to to chip in. Um but they seem to it, it's it's almost like they seem to have almost lost a level of freedom and excitement and wildness that uh comes through in the movies, but you don't pick up in real life.

SPEAKER_01 13:11

Yeah, I think that's the freedom in essays. We have a lot when we do have, I'd say we have a lot of freedom compared to some some other countries. That's why you have lots of other, I think lots of Europeans coming here to places like Cape Town. And I mean, we have a beautiful place and there's energy and there's you know, there's there's freedoms, and yeah, freedom's a funny thing. It's it's coming, uh say it's a funny thing, but it's people are more aware of it now than ever. It's uh yeah, it's uh I don't know, the world is a bit, I don't even know what to think at the moment about the world that's going on.

SPEAKER_03 13:42

But do you think South Africans think about freedom a lot? Uh I mean, uh it seems to me that there is sort of overt and covert definitions of freedom. Um the overt thing is yes, we're a rainbow nation, we're an open democracy, everyone equal this, equal that. Um but there also seems to be an undertone of actually not as free as we think we are. Um BEE laws, something that comes to mind. Um, you know, uh Labor Relations Act, uh hiring people, firing people, very, very difficult to do here. Um, as great as our banking systems are that we can send payments, we are actually world-class banking here. And once again, being in the US for a couple of years made me realize how absolutely dismal their banking uh is.

SPEAKER_01 14:33

I think FB won those uh well back in the day, FB is a bit annoying at the moment.

Bitcoin As Store Of Value

SPEAKER_03 14:39

Yeah, they've they're very cool. Someone said to me a while ago that uh any senior banking exec in South Africa gets um contacted constantly to go and work for banks overseas because our systems here are so good. But um, yeah, so so freedom is a funny thing. Um we seem to be uh bureaucratic regulation is certainly increasing all the time in South Africa. Uh, I mean, I'm a business owner, I can see it and feel it. Um, so we have this, yes, we're a great free nation, but uh I I think that's actually being stripped away from us little bit by little bit, uh, through bureaucrats. Anyway, that's just me on a bit of a rant.

SPEAKER_01 15:18

Um, it's true. I mean, but what is what is freedom? I mean, if you can go and Google type in the definition, I mean, when I think immediately, freedom is like freedom of expression, freedom of of choice. Um but yeah, that idea of you know, if you're having to second guess every action you're taking, um, is that that freedom? Obviously, everything you do has what I mean, like things have consequences, right? And you think through what you do, you can't do something without um without there being some consequence. But if it's to the point of like, I don't know, like it governs your your entire yeah, anyway. I think I think I'm also gonna go on a rant there. It's not the topic that I think is a topic that's important, but uh yeah.

SPEAKER_03 16:02

Yeah, I mean, um what this show is specifically about human freedom around money, philosophy, technology, and economics. So uh freedom is kind of central to that. So always happy to chat. Um, and you know, I find freedom interesting when uh you take something like freedom of speech, you mentioned it earlier. Uh we have freedom of speech, but what does that actually mean? Um, I've heard you know people say, Oh, well, you can say anything you want as long as it's not deemed hate speech. Well, then it comes, okay. Well, what does hate speech actually mean? And why are there some words? What is defamation? Yeah, why are there some words some people can say, but other people can't say the same word? Um, like what is that all about? Uh do we actually have freedom? Who decides the freedom? Who decides the hate speech? Um, you know, we've got this ongoing issue, and I I really uh politics is not one of the four things that is this podcast is built on.

SPEAKER_01 16:57

So um politics is embedded in every aspect of like people like yeah, I whether you like it or not, it's part of every conversation. Like, so it's I don't think it's something you can avoid. Like when you're talking about freedom, inevitably politics comes into you know, so yeah, totally.

SPEAKER_03 17:13

I mean, my I like to think of politics as economics and philosophy combined equals politics. Uh so depends, you know, philosophy is your point of view on how the world works and how you see it. Uh, and economics, you know, obviously we all understand economics is about you know the money and where the money comes from. Um, and if you've got a certain worldview and you're in charge, you're going to try and get that economic engine to realize your uh your idea of what utopia is or a better world or whatever the case may be. Um so yeah, uh politics is pervasive. And I think South Africa, we probably like to think we've got worse political problems than everybody else, but I think every country will probably say the same thing about their own place.

Mexico Samoa NZ And Perspective

SPEAKER_01 18:01

Um yeah, I think we also tend to focus uh we're uh short-term bias, like our memory is we remember the most recent negative thing, and we tend to focus on the negative things and think a lot more. There's also lots of positives, like you can change the spin on anything, like it depends where you're looking, right? So, and it depends what media you're consuming, and it's very easy to think you're uh a rational, uh, open-minded being. But if you only if you if your algorithm on X, for example, like Bitcoin is where you get fed Bitcoin content, you know, that that's also a vacuum, right? So I don't know, you got to try to train the algorithm or yeah, you just try and have conversations with people who differ in your views, like even people who you disagree with. Um that's why I like a show. Like, I don't know if you know uh watch uh the pen penal show, like he interviews a lot of different people and people who might have different opinions with him. But the point is he's having these conversations, and I think as South Africans, we need to have those converts.

SPEAKER_03 19:02

So um, yeah, so that's an interesting one. Uh let's talk about that a bit more. I mean, you sort of you're a communicator, I think. If I to round you up into a single word, uh you're really good at written words, communicating, marketing, branding, which is just communication again as well. So in terms of getting out of that little echo chamber that you referenced earlier, uh, have you what have you found works for you to sort of break that a bit?

SPEAKER_01 19:29

Jeez, I mean, I mean, bringing that up, it makes me realize that I, you know, I need to actually make more of an effort to not, I don't know, like just uh interacting with I gave a good example for me, maybe this is not echo, yeah, is it's just being in the physical world and having conversations with people. Um I mean, that's the best way to do it, is not live your life on social media. And so whatever form that takes in the real world, like you know, often yeah, for me, when I go to coffee shops, I um well, obviously I love Bitcoin and go to coffee shops and we have conversations. Obviously, I'm extending the Bitcoin thing into the physical world, but I don't know, just having those conversations and you get pushback from people who sometimes like, oh, I think it's this and I think it's that. And you're like, okay, cool, you can think that, but maybe go check out this. And and if they have a view that maybe challenges yours, then you know that's also good. So yeah, I think sometimes we to answer your question, get out there and have conversations with try and have difficult conversations that make you feel uncomfortable. I mean, I struggle with it, I think we all do to some degree. I'm not someone who likes conflict. I grew up not like conflict, so but I mean we have to have those convos.

SPEAKER_03 20:40

So yeah, I think as I mean, I I think that's amazing. Uh great advice there. Just be with people, talk to people. At the end of the day, this is all about people anyway. It's about community and it's about life and the people around you, your and you know, your family, uh, there are going to be people in your family that you're gonna struggle to communicate with as well. So it's not just like a blood and water issue. And I think if you can get good at just talking to people, uh, you know, as I've gotten older, I've learned to maybe be less forceful, in my opinion, up front at least. I mean, if you get into a bit of a debate, that's fine. But um, I mean, I've been caught out so many times by sort of meeting someone and then commenting and like, hey, this COVID thing was such a disaster. You know, what a balls up, and I can't believe we fell for it. And then the person I'm talking to is like, yeah, yeah, we really should have done more to isolate longer, and you know, it really wasn't enough that the governments did. And um, and and they give me reasons why they think the way they do. Um, and it's always sobering for me to walk in there, guns blazing, and then you realize you've got the total wrong target here. Um and then you're funny one.

unknown 21:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:54

I mean, I've had I mean, this is totally side conversation, but I've had long covet. I don't know if you know what long COVID is, but it's Sort of silent thing. It's basically like chronic fatigue syndrome. I've had that for the last three years. And uh yeah, anyway. So I don't know why that's a whole other conversation, but um, I've actually written about it, and lots of people actually. I mean, this is a separate thing from you know, we can disagree on how the government handle it and whatever, but there are people like suffering with with with the after effects of this of this thing, and so yeah, it's something that I think more awareness needs to be brought towards is um is this issue. It's uh it's millions of people suffer from it. It's like this, I don't know if you know anything about it, but it's like a uh yeah, anyway, that's a totally different conversation, I guess.

Freedom Speech Rules And Regulation

SPEAKER_03 22:41

Look, I tested positive five times for COVID at separate occasions. Um, and uh at the time I was on a cycling team, and the guy that's basically owns the team, he phoned me immediately. And he's like, dude, there's this like possible myocarditis problem uh that COVID can uh cause. So here's the name of my cardiologist. You book and go see him and do a full battery test. So I went and did that whole thing and I got a clean bill of health. Uh, and I think that was after my second. Um did it affect you in any way?

SPEAKER_01 23:13

Like, did you feel any or you one of the lucky people who'd like just like participated as a bit?

SPEAKER_03 23:19

Yeah, I think there was only one occasion I actually felt a little bit sick. Uh all the four other positives, uh I don't know if they were false positives, but I actually felt 100% fine. The one I felt a little bit sick. So I suppose that probably also colored my perception of the whole thing.

SPEAKER_00 23:37

Um when I was in the keep going, sorry.

SPEAKER_03 23:40

No, I was just saying when I was in the US, I was chatting to uh actually quite a good friend, um, South African guy. He had been there for like 30 years, and he was a a big, like a senior guy in a massive American corporation. Um, and we were just taking a walk around our neighborhood, uh, because you can do that over there. Uh, it's really cool. And uh this topic came up, and I and I said that I said, Hey, what a disaster that whole thing was, what a stuff up, and hope we never you know make such bad decisions again. And he was the one that was like, well, you know, we should have done more. We had people in our office that died from it, and uh, I don't think we did enough to prevent it, blah, blah. Um uh, so yeah, that was just like a direct communicate uh conversation I had with someone, and I just realized, hey man, you know, stop trying to put your view of everything on the world. Um, I mean, some of my best mates uh have zero, zero interest in Bitcoin. In fact, they probably think I'm a bit of a bit of a nutjob because I grant on about the government and control and lack of freedom and censorship, and they probably look at me and go, oh, here he goes again. But they're amazing people, and I wouldn't I wouldn't switch them out as friends for any anything in the world, and the nicest guys, and they've helped me out and always have done. Uh there you go.

SPEAKER_01 24:59

I mean, and they're just my mates, yeah. You can have different opinions or you can believe different things, like your one mate can be Christian, your other mate can be Muslim, you know. As long you know, if one of your mates is extremely extremist and stuff, then you know that's a different story. You'd maybe have to challenge them on that, like on that. But even then, like you know, people obviously are just different in in how they think, how they see the world, and obviously your worldview shapes shapes it's like people you can't expect someone to under like empathy, for instance. I was having this conversation with a doctor yesterday. Empathy is you know being able to put yourself in someone else's position, and but that's quite hard, right? If someone has uh cancer or uh I don't know, name anything, um, you try and be empathetic and feel what they're feeling, but unless you've actually felt it or maybe had someone in your family who's close to you who's had it, it can be hard to be empathetic. And so um I think just being aware of it, like you are, and just being like, oh, okay, that's that person's worldview. So my worldview is this. It doesn't mean mine is wrong, it just means it's different, and it's okay that that that person has a different. We're not wrong, that's our experience, and the two can exist together, you know.

SPEAKER_03 26:15

Yeah, I I think what's been interesting for me is to see my own journey through life and how my own opinions and views on things have changed. Some haven't changed at all, some have been the same from as far back as I can remember, but certainly a bunch of opinions about things have changed. Uh, I mean, if you had spoken to me in my 40s, I probably uh in fact, I mean, pre-COVID, in fact, I was, in fact, when COVID started, uh, and that wasn't that long ago, I was sort of like on board with the like the government response, sort of seemed to make sense to me. And I thought, oh, good. It's like, okay, cool. Um, so you know, just being aware that I've had ideas that have certainly changed dramatically, even over a short space of time. Uh, everybody is going to have that same thing. Some people will have ideas that'll never change, some people will have ideas that will always change. Um, you know, I spoke to a friend of mine, uh, she's a cyclist as well. So we actually happen to be riding next to each other. And she said to me, How's the podcast coming? And I said, Awesome, when are you coming onto the podcast? Because she's quite uh uh she's an academic, very smart girl. And she said, No, no, she wants to wait until she's got 10 more years of ex work experience before she sort of comes onto it. And I said, Hey man, you're quite entitled to have your opinion now, and I'm pretty sure in 10 years your opinion would have changed, but that's fine because that's how we as people live and learn. Uh, you work with information you have, then you get new information. Does that change your worldview or not? Uh, maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. But if you're not changing your opinion on some things at least in your life, there's actually a problem right there.

SPEAKER_01 27:55

Yeah, because you're just living the same way. I mean, it's uh yeah, and changing your opinion is quite hard. I think Bitcoin's a very good litmus test of changing your opinion.

SPEAKER_03 28:06

Um yeah, so tell me about uh tell me what Bitcoin did to your opinion.

SPEAKER_01 28:11

Jeez, oh but obviously, like okay, so I don't know how you when you got into Bitcoin, like in 2017. I remember I got involved in uh that bear market where I think the price, I remember the price when I bought my it was 100,000, 100,000 Rand. And that had been going up that year, and then you know you hear it hear about it through friends, and the price has gone up. That's I mean, I'm not saying that that was my experience getting into it. I know some people have different experiences. I know Herman from Bitcoin Ecasi, for instance, started on the medium exchange side, but anyway, I got involved then and then you know watched it go up to like 300k, and I was like, wow, this is and then it just crashed. And I was like, Oh, okay. And I I dabbled in other shit coins back then. Um, and then over time I just kind of just DCA'd into Bitcoin, treated it as a round cost average as an investment, like store of value, and that's how I saw Bitcoin, right? At the time.

Echo Chambers Real Conversations Long Covid

SPEAKER_03 29:04

And sorry, just to jump in there for someone who's listening and doesn't know the DCA term. Uh, I mean, that's basically just buying a small amount at a frequent, like set monthly rhythm, whether it's a weekly rhythm, daily rhythm, or monthly rhythm.

SPEAKER_01 29:19

No, better thing is RCA, RAN cost average. We should be saying that, not dollar cost. I mean, we don't work in dollars, but yeah, exactly. Small amount, it could be weekly, it could be daily, it could be monthly, whatever your your cadence is. Um, just so you like you say, you even out the price differences, and like I remember buying like a thousand rands worth when the price was like 50k or whatever. Um, and yeah, I so I treated it as like a store of value, and I dealt with those that volatility, which was hard to stomach, but for some reason I just kept putting in because I thought, okay, this is interesting. And that's what I did really. And then I think, you know, like I said, in May last year, kind of launched, got interested in Bitcoin payments, and I was like, this is the space I want to be in, I want to learn about it, and I want to meet all the people. And within a short space of time, I met, you know, Bitcoin community is quite small in SA. Um, and I met lots of the guys in the industry, learned a lot, and so my my perception of it has changed to being it's money, and so we can spend and we can save it. And you know, I've done a few posts on Twitter where I'm like, so what do you do to increase it, get more people spending it, and then you get or like you know, move people away from just hoarding it, and then you get loads of you know, maxis coming in and jumping and saying, Oh, hoarding is a negative word, and like they take offense to my framing of the question, which is fine. I mean, that's your that's how you you perceive it. But the fact still remains is Bitcoin is money, and you can choose how you want to whether you want to hoard it. Let's call it saving, if you want to use that term, if that's if you prefer that term, save it, um, and spend it, or you can just do one or the other. And so I I see it now as money, and so I save and spend. So I have my stack, which I keep, and then I have my spending amount, which I just convert each month, right? And so I don't think about it in that way. Um, I don't worry about the volatility, I just you know, cool, get on with it.

SPEAKER_03 31:08

Yeah, I mean that question comes up at our local Bitcoin meetup every now and again. Um, the whole spending question. And I just say to the guys, pretty much exactly what you've said. I've got my savings and I don't I don't touch that, never have, sort of never will. Well, not never will, but haven't so far touched the savings. Um, but then each month, uh, what I probably would have just swiped on my credit card, I'll take that money and I will buy a little bit of Bitcoin and put it onto a wallet, and then I'll just go tap and pay for stuff that way instead of using my credit card. So um, I mean, it's it's a little bit of a it's an extra little bit of work. It's much easier to take my phone out and just tap to pay off my card, load it on my phone. Um, but I do want to see the circular economy improve. So I just buy a little bit of Bitcoin, stick it on a little lightning wallet on my phone, and tap around as I go. And when that's used up, I wait till the end of the month and then I just take a little bit more and off I go. So that's just personally how I decide to do it. Just keep it two very clear, very simple, very separate things. I'm not mixing wallets or addresses or don't get in, you know, that's a bit technical, and I don't want to get too far down that road for that's a whole the taxing thing, and yeah, it's uh I mean, anyway, that's uh we can get into that if you want, but no, that's a good way to do it.

SPEAKER_01 32:31

Separate it, it's an emotional separation in your brain, so you don't feel like you're losing this thing, right? Because that's the thing, people like I gotta hold it and I want to lose it, and you know what I mean.

SPEAKER_03 32:39

It's yeah, okay. So so you walk into a coffee shop, you talk to a guy, you buy a coffee, and you say, Hey, do you accept Bitcoin? I'm I'm guessing that's kind of a kickoff point.

SPEAKER_01 32:49

Uh yeah, I just say, Hey, can I pay with Bitcoin? I believe you accept it. Sometimes I just say, I believe you accept it. They're like, Huh? Especially Google. They're like, What? I'm like, Yeah, and then they ask her, I either leave them to figure it out, or I'm like, okay, show me the QR code. Look, and then I show them and like in Bree Street yesterday, I was chatting to someone and uh she was interested. And I was just talking to her, and I said, Okay, download this wallet and I'll come back in two days and I'll send you some just to you know from my spending wallet, just so you can get used to it. So there is curiosity amongst people, like people are curious, and some people know what it is, and some don't.

Bitcoin DCA Volatility Spend And Save

SPEAKER_03 33:23

So, yeah, I find um I need to be mentally ready to talk to someone about it. Uh, I mean, sometimes I'm just busy, I just want to get in, get my coffee, and move on. Um, but sometimes I've got a bit of time on my hand, and then I'm like, okay, I'll take a bit of time and talk to someone. And then also sometimes I see the person behind the counter is flipping busy. They're up and down, there's long queues. I'm like, you know, read the room. Totally, totally read it. So, uh, what has been uh the best experience you've had with that? Do you accept Bitcoin uh when you're buying your coffee or whatever it may be? Like something that really stood out for you that was like totally unexpected but awesome experience.

SPEAKER_01 34:06

I wouldn't say it was unexpected, but um just a memorable experience. It's it's engine. There was a it's uh obviously you can pay with uh a Bitcoin at engine by scan to pay. And I was chatting to the petrol attendant, his name is Lutando Toolo, I think that's how you say it. Um and he was just curious, and I was explaining we got into a conversation about what it is, and and then I was explaining like cool, like it's uh the peer-to-peer angle, but I explained it in a South African context, it's like it being chore me to chore me or peer-to-peer cash. And anyway, that that was memorable in the sense that I I posted about the story because I want him to download the wallet. I sent him some and well, sorry, I didn't at the time, I came back later and sent him. But I posted this on Twitter, the story about explaining it and how it's this chore me to chore me stuff. And someone, I think it was one of the guys in the Bitcoin community comment like tweet, uh quote tweeted or whatever and said, uh, Bitcoin, uh electronic cash system. And I was like, Oh, that's cool. And so from that, I had my t-shirts made, uh, the Chom Me to Churchill Digital Cash t-shirts, which is obviously a South African uh the Bitcoin now and chew me to Chomi Digital Cash. And so that was memorable in the sense that it created a I was an experience that I had and it was linked to Bitcoin, and yeah, it was there's a story around it, and so I'm actually in the process of I need I need to write that story online and share it. But yeah, that was probably one of the most memorable experiences I had um with it.

SPEAKER_03 35:40

Cool. So in turn, I mean you've mentioned Twitter a few times. I take it do you find that that is kind of your biggest platform or uh most widely distributable? I don't know what how you define it, but is is that like is that like the biggest loud halo?

SPEAKER_01 35:57

Yeah, I think for if you're in in the Bitcoin space, it's probably where most Bitcoin is hanging out. I know Nostra is another one. I'm not actually on there. I've I have looked at it, I'll probably get involved. But for me personally, it's X um Twitter. Uh and yeah, I think I think Twitter is a good tool for brand building. I don't always think it's necessarily, you know, content creators, it can be hard to make money on Twitter. You know, you have to meet certain thresholds. And um, I don't think it always converts as well. Like I sometimes find that, for example, I'll share something and you get amazing like feedback and views, and I call it fantasy metrics, but it doesn't necessarily always convert. And a good example of this is is my online store. Get loads of traffic to a post on Twitter, but it doesn't convert into a sale on my store, and that makes you realize that yeah, that for me. So for me, Twitter is a brand building place, and it's a place where I can interact and connect with people in my community, share what I'm doing, learn about what other people are doing. Um, and so that's basically what I use it for.

SPEAKER_03 37:00

So I do definitely want to talk about the store, uh, but just before that, um, I mean, I'm I'm on Noster. Um, I think I'm using Primal both on my laptop uh and on my phone as the client. Uh yeah, Noster is actually a protocol itself.

SPEAKER_01 37:20

So Nostra, right? Noster.

SPEAKER_03 37:22

Yeah, yeah, it's N-O-S-T-R-E. I think it's it stands for notes and other stuff transmitted via relay. Okay. Good old Americans came up with Nosta from that whole mouthful. Um decentralized, right? Yes, yes. So I actually happen to have a Noster relay running on a survey here at uh server here at the office. Uh and that just it's I suppose it's kind of similar-ish to how Bitcoin works. You can get a Bitcoin node running on a server and you can just help secure the or well, um, not really help secure the network because that's what the miners do, but basically uh maintain the network and verify transactions and all that sort of thing. Uh, but Noster is the same. You can download a Noster relay and then you just help messages going through and you can store your own content on that. And it's I think I haven't dug into it too much, but I think you can restore some stuff if if you lose out some stuff and you've got your and you're backed up to your own relay, you can restore some chat or something like that. But anyway, um that's getting technical. But the point was so what I've I mean, I'm not a prolific social media poster, but what I have been doing is I'll open up Twitter, open up Nosta at the same time, and whatever I'm going to post on Twitter, I just copy and paste into Nosta and push send. So I literally just copy the entire post and send it through. And my thinking was well, Nosta's pretty small at the moment, there's not that many people on it, so you could get bigger bang for your buck in terms of audience reach. Uh yeah, zaps, right? People can pay you, they can zap you. Yes, yes, they can certainly zap you. Uh and kind of my thinking was if I just kind of do this consistently over a few years, I don't think I'm gonna have any impact on the Twitter world because that's already so big, but maybe at some point uh I'll have a bit more impact on the Nosta side. But yeah, the the zaps thing is super interesting, and uh, that's just a lightning payment, right? 100%, yeah. So if uh uh Nosta, if you use primal for as your client for Nosta, um and and Darmus, Amethyst, there's a few of them. You can choose any which one client.

SPEAKER_01 39:35

Sorry, I like I I looked into this and I at the time I was like, okay, I need I need time to figure this out, and then I just went away. Um yeah, so what is it?

Paying With Bitcoin In The Wild

SPEAKER_03 39:45

Yeah, so so Nosta is the protocol. Um, and the client is the program you use to access the the network, the Nosta network. Gotcha. So a little bit like with Bitcoin, for example, you can have a Bitcoin node running, but you need to download a Bitcoin wallet to be able to send and receive Bitcoin. Um, so I I just like to think of Nosta the same way. You have this protocol to actually use it, you've got to download a client. Um, and there's some really good ones. Um, as I've mentioned, Primal, Dharmus, Amethyst. Some are iOS only, some are Android only, some are both. Um, but it looks like uh Twitter. It's the same kind of user experience, top to bottom scroll thing, but where they've got the like repost bookmark like you have on Twitter, they've got this extra little lightning bolt, which is the zap button. And you can actually kind of preset it. So you can say every time I push the zap button, I want 21 sats to go, or I want 500 sets to go, or I want a thousand. So you can custom that number to whatever you want.

SPEAKER_01 40:53

But the person knows when they're clicking, you know, you're not going to be surprised by getting whacked with a bitcoin. I mean, obviously, no one keeps that in mind in their lightning wallet, but it's they can see what they send before they send it, I assume, by clicking on it, right?

SPEAKER_03 41:05

Well, you set it up in when you set up your uh when you connect your lightning wallets to Nosta, you choose how much you're going what a zap is going to be. So you you decide that up. Once you've set it up, it's set up. And then you when you tap it, it tells you how much you've sent, but it doesn't give you a oh, you're gonna send 21 sets, confirm or deny. Uh it's then that's what I'm asking.

SPEAKER_01 41:33

So what happens if someone decides to to make it some ridiculously high amounts, and then you zap them, and then you just sent like I don't know, shitloads of bit uh bitcoin or or sats.

SPEAKER_03 41:43

Yeah, so you're only well, you're basically screwed. Your only hope is that the the payment fails due to some uh something that's done.

SPEAKER_01 41:52

I was wondering about that. That just seems like a a loophole.

SPEAKER_03 41:54

Maybe I I don't understand it properly, but yeah, I think I mean for me, I kind of set mine as 21 sats. Uh I just kind of liked the number. And I mean, 21 sats is like an absolute fraction of a penny. I mean, it's so small. If I if I zap the wrong person or whatever, I'm not gonna lose anything. So uh I hope I never leave my phone lying around unlocked, where I've got a mate who knows how Noster works, will open up my phone, go and change that to 21,000. That's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_01 42:28

There must be a uh a thing like if I want to zap you before I can see how much I'm gonna zap you, because otherwise that just allows for like people to scam other people.

SPEAKER_03 42:40

Maybe sorry, I maybe I misunderstood it, but well, it as far as I know, at least on Primal, which is the client I use, it doesn't give you that. Uh, and I they've probably decided to go for an easier user experience where it's a single click to zap the oak and then you scroll onto the next thing. But that's very cool though.

SPEAKER_02 43:02

Like, I yeah, yes, 100% tell me about it.

SPEAKER_03 43:06

So the the cool thing is like you scrolling through, and what I've started doing is I click like if I truly like the post, and then I click a zap as well, and I send 21 sets to that person.

SPEAKER_01 43:18

So it comes down to this like click, click, it's like a it's like a it's an automatic action, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 43:26

It's like clicking the like button, it's as simple as that.

SPEAKER_01 43:28

Uh and maybe just before you know, you just zapped and zapped away all your your spend for the month.

SPEAKER_03 43:34

That's why I keep it to 21 sets. So uh, but um Lynn Olden actually pointed out something really cool about the whole zapping uh angle on Nosta, and she said, you know, before Nosta, uh you would have to get a lightning invoice from somebody to be able to send them sats, or you would need to scan their code, their QR code, or they would have to send you a QR code or something. There's some uh requirement from the receiver to to do something first before you can send something through to them. Um unless you're using like a blink wallet and you're sending to someone you've already sent it through to and they saved in your list of contacts in your blink wallets. But I mean that wasn't around at the time. But Nosta was the first place you could send Bitcoin to somebody without them being aware of it, requesting it, or even not wanting it. It's like sorry, I'm sending you Bitcoin and there's nothing you can do about it.

SPEAKER_02 44:33

So yeah super cool.

Nostr Protocol And Zaps

SPEAKER_03 44:36

So I yeah uh kudos to Lynn Olden who's you know really brilliant uh for just pointing that out I thought that was such an uh eye-opening yeah the closest I think of that is a is the donation button that Blink allows you to set up on your site I actually have that set up I've had a few people send me like randomly like where is this coming from that's so cool I just got sent a hundred Rands worth of sats from some random person.

SPEAKER_01 45:00

You know it's pretty cool when it comes in it's quite a nice feeling so listen let's jump right into um Bitcoin friendly essay so talk to me about that um I you've created uh I mean before you got the store you were kind of we'll talk about it what was the phases that you went through until you got to where you are today so the thinking was uh it would be like a a Bitcoin business directory I know we do bitcoins at CLZA does it um you know I know Bitcoin map exists um but I just found Bitcoin map a bit sort of developy and clunky and I I was looking to create something specifically for South Africa that was more a cooler thing to kind of engage with and so it was a Bitcoin business directory I thought okay cool also I'll write content so it was a content hub I call it a content hub where I write about how you can pay with Bitcoin how you can spend it how business can accept it alongside the directory and the idea was cool the the content hub was education and the the directory was a place where businesses then could get exposure for the fact that they accept Bitcoin and so um I listed lots of those businesses manually I just go in online and found and actually verified and reached out to business but like hey do you still accept is this legit and I discovered very quickly that lots of the information online is outdated and incorrect and those businesses don't accept like Gardens Bowling Club doesn't accept Bitcoin for example anymore even though it's listed Bitcoin map um but I quickly realized as the the payment space was evolving I mean look at Money Badger onboarding all those merchants obviously via an integration which means many of those merchants either don't know they accept Bitcoin and obviously it's not a and they settle in rans right many of them most of them and so I was like geez I don't I mean I don't want to list 8000 stores or whatever so I was like this isn't really a a big focus um I don't want to list all those stores so I kind of kept it to small businesses that accept Bitcoin directly and so you can still go to my site and list your I still have people listing because it's a great way like to let people know that you accept it especially the small independent businesses and then I still write content about it but then I was like cool let's I more kind of morphed it into online store and where that came about is I was at adopting Bitcoin Cape Town I was speaking to lots of people I mean I had this conversation with Ben from Money Badger before and a few other guys like this idea of an online store and it popped up in different circles but at the conference I had it again with a few people and then I went to the the circular economy in Kylicha Bitcoin logs in and I went to Siki's coffee and there he was his coffee he roast his coffee um I don't did you go on that that tour to the to the Kalicia no I was flying out Sunday morning so you were flying yeah I missed all of that but it's and then I was just like okay this makes sense this is how I'm gonna do it like I'm gonna create an online store I'm only gonna list products from businesses that accept Bitcoin uh curate some of their products and so I I I found a few that I'd already listed on the site so uh Northern Plateau Robus in Woodstock uh Siki's Coffee Cafe um in Kailicha uh Ikaya Coffee Roasters in Strand and then I just reached out to them I met them uh several times and I still interact with them and uh yeah they agreed to it and you know so now essentially I have some products listed I keep a small amount of stock because I want to fulfill orders myself and I I I pay them in Bitcoin for for any amount of stock and I receive sats from people so it's a basically what Louis said it's an online Bitcoin circular economy in many ways.

BitcoinFriendlySA Directory To Shop

SPEAKER_03 48:38

And so I'm just looking to at the moment build out the store um it's a very small market right uh we you know we need to accept this like like you said you have a small spending wallet and lots of bitcoiners don't want to spend their Bitcoin and that's fine right so um yeah the spending yeah I mean I could go on the tangent now with the spending that's the next segue but is there anything you want to specifically ask me about the store uh no I was just curious as to how you had evolved to where you are at the moment and have you got a psychological next step yeah yeah so I mean I have to agree with you for me I mean I love the Money Badger guys what they've done is absolutely incredible and it's something the whole world can look at and learn from um and yet I do feel like an affinity to shops that take virgin Bitcoin payments if you can call it that a guy that's got his little uh point of sale or his little whatever blink wallet on the countertop there or there's a QR code and you can scan it and pay it and you know he's he's it's not been converted into fiat deposited his rands in his bank accounts it's like it's actually going into a wallet Bitcoin wallet and he can see it come through um I've got a friend of mine that's got a coffee shop um it's a really really nice coffee shop um in Pretoria and um I I got her set up on that and I always wonder I I I fantasize or hope that she gets a smile on her face every time she just gets this pop-up on her phone even if she's not at the store um and people order my stomach oh some of and it's not a huge amount but that feeling is great so yeah sorry I screamed she did I can read I I need to ask her some time about that but um I I just I hope she gets a smile on her face every time just like ding something comes through uh there aren't many people that are actually paying in Bitcoin at her coffee shop uh somebody said it's me and one other crazy Australian uh I think there might be a couple of others that are doing it or I mean some people don't yeah but well with the direct payments people will probably let you know but with the ones via money badger as cool as that is right it's great because you you know you're merging two worlds I think it's a good way to onboard lots of people but lot in that instance like people walk in the shop and just pay and you you can basically pay without ever letting anyone know that you paid in Bitcoin which is fine that's you can do that. But that also in my opinion doesn't really drive adoption in the sense that no one knows that you're paying with it like for them you could just be paying with rands right so yeah so I do agree with you that it doesn't seem to drive or I don't think it drives Bitcoin adoption but it certainly drives um so yeah I was just saying that um it doesn't it probably doesn't drive Bitcoin adoption but it certainly will drive Bitcoin spending because I I think it's that whole sort of chicken or the egg thing that um until the money badger guys came on board like where did you find anybody that was going to accept Bitcoin for products or services it was like hens teeth you couldn't find it.

SPEAKER_01 51:48

It's like a puzzle I think all these it's like all these things play their part in driving it in one way or another. And I always some purists always I post something and say oh yeah but it's always like some people just don't want it to succeed they'll say things like oh but that person's setting in runs you're just wasting your time or oh the transaction volumes aren't high it's never going to succeed I'm just like okay well it's just weird like some people like anti-bitcoin is like will just randomly just come out and just comment on posts and I'm like okay cool I'll just keep doing what I'm doing and you talk to me in 10 years.

Proof Of Spend And Circular Economy

SPEAKER_03 52:22

Yeah I mean I I kind of guess it's a bit of a human condition issue that um people are generally negative towards things they don't know much about uh I mean it's easier to say no to a foreign idea because you don't have to think about it any further. If you say yes now you have to okay engage your brain really think about this okay what do I actually think? So in most cases people are just negative because it just shuts down the conversation and they can just move on to their favorite topic probably themselves um and carry on talking about that. So I I try and take it with a pinch of salt when guys get super negative. You know unless they're really Twitter builds your skin your your your you become I'll just ignore like I if I if I'm like I look at my I consider my energy levels I look at the comments I'm like ignore because at some point like I do engage but at some point I'm just like my energy is more important than engaging with this so yeah yeah um actually I think uh talking about that it was something else that uh Lynn Olden once again had commented on her it was a Twitter comment I stuck in my mind for some weird reason she she posted a thing about a guy that had been on Twitter for X number of years and had so many thousands of tweets go through his profile or on his feed or whatever you want to call it and he hadn't commented once in all those years on everything. And she just said how freaking awesome is that some guy can just sit back look at this stuff and not feel the need yeah not feel the need to throw his uh that is he should get an award for that yeah because everyone thinks they're smart and everyone thinks that they've got a pretty unique world of uh view of the world and they've got to do that I'd probably yeah I think everyone has you know we have an ego and we like to think we we we know a thing or two especially about a topic you um passionate about and I guess you know Bitcoin is uh an example of one of those passionate topics that most people know nothing about so it is kind of easy to come across as a bit condensating uh I think I've just butchered that word um but um condescending not condensating uh condensating is happening on the windows outside here at the moment uh yeah so it's always like a good reality check just like hey you know calm the egos uh the stay humble stack sets comes to mind I think Odell is um why don't I watch the video Carl said stay humble spend and stack sets or spend and stack sets like I watched it last night with one of the old adopting bitcoin cadewn ones and I was like that is I don't know if he that is his catchphrase now but that to me is the best it should be the new bitcoin catchphrase stay humble spend and stack sets not yeah or even just stay humble spend sets uh keep it closer to the original one well don't only advocate for spending because you'll get lots of hate as I have so proof of spend which I launched was kind of like to at the adoption bitcoin c time conference I at the end of my talk I kind of you know mentioned this reluctance of people to spend for because of the hotel culture because of you know tax implications you know this idea that this it's this bitcoin is this thing that you only keep and you don't you know you don't spend and so I encountered this directly on with the Bitcoin friendly essay online store you know reluctance to spend and and I was chatting to Ben and anyway so this idea of a proof of spend movement to encourage bitcoin spending was kind of launched and um I know you're a part of it um and we need to get your your your uh your bull song listed on the on the site actually that's a whole other conversation but my idea is to get a hundred South Africans committed to spending X amount each month uh for 12 months and yeah it's gonna be a bit of a challenge and alongside that I'm looking to get more merchants who want to earn Bitcoin for their stuff but I'd be curious to learn about your so the bulkong you're making sorry for those who don't know Gavin's making bulk on um you're using miners can you explain that so I feel like I'm interested now but yeah no worries um so uh I wanted to heat yeah I'm don't want to get too complicated with this but the short story is I wanted to heat part of my office using S9 Bitcoin miners now s9s are older generation miners uh they're not very efficient these days but they do produce 40 degree warm air it's part of the cooling process they suck air it's an air-cooled unit sucks air in the one end and blows out warm air in the other end that warm air is 40 degrees um a lot of people in the US are using those old devices to actually heat their houses so instead of paying the heating company uh for heat they will uh plug their miner in and they'll heat their house like that so uh I thought well that's a cool idea maybe I can do because I've got an office downstairs that's flipping ice cold everyone there moans and bitches about it in winter and they've all got oil heaters plugged in there's probably six of them plugged in at any one time and I thought well I can use some S9s to warm the space up but they're also noisy units and uh I heard actually shared the video they were noisy. Yeah yeah I mean it's like having a vacuum cleaner plugged in like next to your head um so I couldn't solve the noise problem um and get the warm air where it needed to be uh at the same time so anyway these things sat in the garage and then funny enough adopting Bitcoin um I was chatting to someone down there and someone just said hey you know just use the warm air to make built on or something and I was like damn that's a great idea so came back uh revived the whole idea pulled the thing out had to figure out how to switch it on how to connect it how to log into the IP address just get the whole thing working uh and now I've actually set it on a timer so the the theory is uh we've got solar at the office and I only want to use solar power for this so we don't use all our solar that we generate during the daytime. So I've got an on-off switch it starts at nine in the morning and it switches off at four in the afternoon. And so when it requires uh a certain temperature right so the miners are able to maintain that temperature that's in essence the thinking behind it right yeah so um if you buy a built song miner from a store uh they have these ones and they sort of recommend anything between 20 to 25 degrees uh temperature is what you need but that's sort of in quite a small little enclosed box so I thought well hey I'm producing 40 degrees um but it's a much bigger room and it's not 247.

SPEAKER_01 59:06

Okay so essentially the the temperature then would be I mean you probably checked it's probably like close it's about 25 or 30 probably or something.

Closing Links And Contact

SPEAKER_03 59:13

Yeah it's probably around about I think 28 it sits around 28 um which does help the Bitcoin the built actually cure a little bit faster like the warmer the air the faster it sort of cures. I noticed those quick trick when you shared those photos of the curing it it felt like it would be super quick. Yeah I hung out on Friday uh morning and pulled it off Tuesday morning and started slicing it and eating it so that was four five days or something very cool and so you have for it no no I don't hey I I made a note of it uh this morning that I I need to get this done today I've got to come up with the name Claude give me a 50 names or 10 names and I mean that's that's how you that's how you come up with ideas for that I mean anyone out there can I mean I think it's a great great thing I'd love to sell the built on on the on the on the shop because I could then just buy I don't know 50 30 packets from you keep it here and then just ship it out to everyone across the country yeah I've also been kind of messing around with the idea of do I pre-make a whole bunch packets seal it and have it ready to ship like if someone orders must the order go out you know like within an hour or two of the order coming in or do I say hey man we only make fresh batches um so if you it's gonna take a week for you to get it or you can pre-order um which kind of boils to the same thing I mean you pre-order nothing's gonna ship ask what's easier for you like I know when I was doing the online store I grappled with the fulfillment first I was gonna get the merchants to drop ship it but then you lose control and drop shipping can be messy because everyone sends things differently and some guys don't have the tools or whatever and so I just ended up bringing that in-house and buying a small amount of stock so yeah fulfillment is a and deciding how to do that is actually not it's not hard but it well it's work you got to think about it it's quite I find that that was a bit of a challenge with performance so yeah cool well I need to solve that sort of problem um so yeah if but for me for the biggest issue you have is you don't want to make stock and then no one buys it right is that the issue in essence you want to be sitting on stock how long does built on keep for I mean it's gonna it's gonna keep for a cup you can keep uh a whole stick like unsliced you know for a couple of weeks in in the cupboard I mean I I can eat Biltong so that's not really the problem but I don't want a ton of the stuff sitting here so um that's why you solve the problem with on the spending side and this is what I've like so proof of spend is that idea of like taking having volume so that I can go to merchants also as part of it and be like because it's like a chicken and egg thing you said it's like do you need more merchants or do you need more spending to because if you have the volume of people buying your stock then you just keep making it then you then you don't think about it right then but I think pre-orders might actually be a good way to go about it yeah cool man I will um I need to get that done real quick because I do want to get listed on your store and just see what happens uh it's an experiment I'm excited about to see um it's not about the money it's just about doing something different and interesting 100% so that's what I want to do is try and get as many smaller businesses either you can also be a reseller so smaller businesses who are ready accept Bitcoin who have a few products they want to sell online and see they can earn earn Bitcoin or ones that are curious about it and are happy to take one of their products and and test it out because the fact is we're still early with this and lots of people most people aren't paying with Bitcoin and that is just a fact so we can talk about 800 000 stores where you can pay but you know transaction volumes are still low and yeah I think it will just be cool to to try and build a online Bitcoin economy I've also got this mini I've been chatting to Herman from Bitcoin Icarsi those mini surfboards I put in a little order for those mini surfboards so I'm gonna sell those on the site like I want to support the the the circular economies as well so yeah those surfboards are amazing um I saw one I nearly nearly bought it uh I I can't remember why I didn't but uh uh they uh at at the conference they had one and it had a picture of Samuel L. Jackson from Pulp Fiction and he was he had that scene where he's pointing the gun and he says say crypto one more time uh I won't say the rest of it um but it's crap I mean I also I don't know why I didn't I was like uh and I'm just like so I want to get five I'm gonna get five in and I'm gonna list them on like this um I'll share it on the on the group and you can do design you can also design your own one they give you like a blank canvas and you send the design what you want and you work with them but I mean yeah if you're really into that otherwise you just buy the stock standard I think there's like nine different variations of it. Yeah oh listen on that topic um you might want to check in with Max uh there was one of the delegates for adopting bitcoin had a board game that she brought out yeah yeah yeah blanc yeah yeah uh yeah I can't remember her uh Audrey uh Audrey something or other I think was her name but she her the shipment got delayed so she arrived at the conference with no stock I think she had the one she brought in her suitcase with her just as a demo unit and then after she left back to Canada I think she's from uh the stock all arrived so Max is sitting with a pile of these board games uh and it might be a good idea to list them on your store so because not everybody will know who Max is and how to get a hold of him because I'll reach out to Max because Max also has other merch and stuff he wants to he wants to list um but yeah man I the I'd love to do this built on thing I have to get built on my store because Biltong it's a South African product we all have it like I eat a lot of Bilsong and drill horse and I think we all do as South Africans.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:07

So it seems like a no-brainer like Biltong and coffee and tea and like you know a few shirts or whatever. Yeah it's the basics hey is what we need to start every day uh that's what we need coffee bullsong listen uh Nick we're uh pretty much out of time um I anything that you wanted to mention that we haven't sort of covered uh you know just maybe uh punt the store one more time tell us how we can get hold of you where we can reach out to you yeah the store if anyone is interested in the store you can just go to the bitcoin friendlysa.cl.ca um slash uh slash slash shop or just head onto the site and there's links to it directly from the home page and then if you want to follow me on on Twitter is probably the main place just at at Nick Darlington and then also I have a handle Bitcoin friendly essay it's spelt weirdly because it wasn't available but you can get That's directly from at Nick Darlington. So X X and yeah, if you want to email me directly, you can also just at Nick at Nickdarlington.com or Nick at BitcoinfriendlySA.ca.za. Either one of those is uh is good.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:15

Awesome, man. I will put those links in the show notes as well so people can reference it and get to it uh easily as well. Um excellent, my friend. This was a great conversation. Uh I think we covered some wide topics. Um and uh I will get this out and look forward to uh seeing you again in person uh at probably at the next conference.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:36

Really appreciate it. And sorry about the washing machine, it was gonna drown out our conversation there at some point.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:42

No, it's cool. Uh okay, man, have a great day and all the best for the rest of the week. Cheers, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:46

Thanks so much. Really appreciate it, man. Cheers, bye. Bye.