Bitcoin Audible

"Keeping Bitcoin running is the primary concern here. Making sure that Bitcoin is available to be used as money by everyday people, any actor who wants to come onto Bitcoin and send one UTXO from one to another. That's the most important piece for me when thinking about defending Bitcoin.
And the biggest difference, of course, is that this is a decentralised system. There is no central controller. There's no central control room giving out commands and saying 'this has to change, you must do this.'
We are a decentralised group of individuals who are acting on the network. And so the defence of the system is not down to, say, the CEO dictating that everyone has to have their password be 64 characters and change it every three months, which is bad practise, by the way. It's everyone working together to do their part. So that's the biggest difference."

~ Luke de Wolf

I sat down with Luke de Wolf to talk about the real security risks facing Bitcoin today. Luke has spent his career protecting critical industrial control systems like oil pipelines and electrical grids. Now, he is taking that hardcore cybersecurity mindset and applying it to the Bitcoin network in his brand new book, *Defending Bitcoin*. And trust me, it is a conversation you need to hear.

We spent a lot of time debating the heated topic of arbitrary data and the drama surrounding BIP 110. Should we enforce strict rules to keep the blockchain pure, or is trying to force a chain split a bigger threat to Bitcoin's integrity as money? Luke actually changed his mind on this recently, and he lays out exactly why the stakes could be too high to play games with consensus. His perspective really cuts through the noise and challenges the tribal thinking happening on both sides.

But we didn't just stop there. We also get into mining centralization, selfish mining attacks, and why we need to view Bitcoin as high-stakes critical infrastructure. The decisions we make now could determine if this network survives long-term.

Guest Links

Luke on X (Link: https://twitter.com/lukedewolf)

BTCHel's Website (Link: https://btchel.com/)

Defending Bitcoin's Website (Link: https://defendingbitcoin.com/)

Bitcoin Infinity Show on YouTube (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@BitcoinInfinityShow)

Affiliate Links

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://bitbox.swiss/)

Get 10% off the best Bitcoin board game in the world, HODLUP! Or any of the other great games from The Free Market Kids! Use code GUY10 at checkout for 10% off your cart! (Link: https://www.freemarketkids.com/collections/games-1)

(Under construction) Check out the list of products and services I use and recommend on BitcoinAudible.com (Link: https://bitcoinaudible.com/)

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

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Chapters

(00:00:00) - Introduction
(00:06:21) - Applying industrial control systems logic to Bitcoin
(00:11:29) - Real-world physical system risks and attacks
(00:20:15) - Bridging critical infrastructure cybersecurity
(00:27:45) - The CIA triad and decentralization
(00:32:32) - The arbitrary data and BIP 110 controversy
(00:38:28) - Hash rate centralization and mining power
(00:46:42) - Data limits and the op_return debate
(00:57:56) - Inscriptions as an exploit in Bitcoin script
(01:04:16) - Taproot consequences and the problem with Tapscript
(01:14:43) - Fee spikes and competing with arbitrary data
(01:28:54) - Why enforcing BIP 110 risks a chaotic split
(01:42:07) - Bitcoin Core governance issues
(01:53:35) - Closing thoughts and where to find Luke

The whole crew is back for another roundtable, and things get wild right out of the gate. I sat down with Steve, Mechanic, and Jeff to talk through the absolute mess that is the current state of things. Jeff shares an update on his Canadian immigration purgatory, which spirals into a bigger conversation about living like an outlaw and whether any of us are truly free from the system.

But we couldn't ignore the recent news. We talk about the crazy story of a guy who used Claude to brute-force a lost Bitcoin wallet from eleven years ago. It really makes you rethink how safe your standard passphrases actually are, and we share some wild visual memory tricks to secure your setup. We also rip into the current hype around ETF inflows and outflows. People track these numbers like they are predicting the future, but we explain why they really just tell you exactly what the market already did.

And of course, we had to get into the technical fights that never seem to end. Steve brings some fresh data exposing the true bimodal distribution of network users right now. We spend a good amount of time arguing about Taproot, chain bloat, and the massive confusion between true censorship and simply stopping spam. Mechanic lays out his latest case for BIP 110 and makes a really compelling point about why the healthiest participants for the network are actually the ones willing to mine at a complete technical loss. It sounds completely backward, but it makes total sense once you hear his breakdown.

We wrap things up by looking at the broader picture of decentralised movements. From Occupy Wall Street falling apart to the current crop of hijacked political factions, we ask if it is even possible to build a movement without a vulnerable central leader. Plus, we drop some thoughts on local LLMs and the ongoing Prime Trust bankruptcy drama.

Guest Links

Steve Simple Nostr (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3s6a8yn8)

Steve Simple on X (Link: https://x.com/stevesimple)

Bitcoin Mechanic Nostr (Link: https://tinyurl.com/2tm827ut)

Bitcoin Mechanic on X (Link: https://x.com/GrassFedBitcoin)

Jeff Swann Nostr (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3sjc3bcp)

Jeff Swann on X (Link: https://x.com/agoristview)

Jeff Swann's petition (Link: https://www.change.org/p/help-us-home)

Affiliate Links

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://bitbox.swiss/)

Get 10% off the best Bitcoin board game in the world, HODLUP! Or any of the other great games from The Free Market Kids! Use code GUY10 at checkout for 10% off your cart! (Link: https://www.freemarketkids.com/collections/games-1)

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

Guy on Instagram (Link: https://www.instagram.com/theguyswann)

Guy on TikTok (Link: https://www.tiktok.com/@theguyswann)

Chapters

(00:00:00) - Intro
(00:02:42) - The bimodal distribution of network users
(00:11:00) - Jeff's immigration limbo
(00:13:16) - Claude AI cracks an 11-year-old wallet
(00:21:40) - Visual memory and human adaptation
(00:28:56) - Why ETF flows are just lagging indicators
(00:32:38) - MicroStrategy and the financialization of Bitcoin
(00:41:20) - Elites, cults, and unaccountable power
(00:47:20) - Disillusionment and controlled leaders
(00:54:05) - Occupy Wall Street and hijacked political factions
(01:02:35) - Running local LLMs
(01:06:00) - Do movements need a vulnerable central leader?
(01:11:27) - The BIP 110 debate and network spam
(01:29:43) - Is mining just a sunk infrastructure cost?
(01:40:17) - Soft fork precedents and survivorship bias
(01:48:54) - The Prime Trust bankruptcy clawbacks
(01:52:55) - Outro and Jeff's petition

"Bitcoin is being embraced by the U.S. and the U.S. financial system and it is it being embraced by Iran and the Iranian regime at the exact same time and both of them know that they can use it without the other one threatening it. And that puts it in an insanely unique place in a world where there are no monies that work like that anymore."

~ Guy Swann

We live in a world where global money printers are silently bleeding your savings out the back door. But the real threat isn't only the U.S. dollar. China's money supply is huge right now, and nobody asked your permission before letting international policy dilute the value of your hard work. We are watching an incredible shift happen in real-time. Powerhouse nations and heavily sanctioned regimes are suddenly eyeing the exact same monetary network, proving that true, neutral money works whether you are allies or sworn enemies.

I recently sat down with Walker America to pull the curtain back on this whole financial illusion. We talked about the completely made-up nonsense of the Federal Reserve's inflation targets, and how the legacy system lets financial giants buy up the world with free fiat, just so they can rent it back to us. But the biggest paradox we explored is why the United States dollar actually cannot hyperinflate right now. A total currency collapse requires a giant release valve, and you might be surprised by what has to happen to the Bitcoin network before that pressure can finally escape.

A huge thank you to Walker for hosting this conversation on RoxomTV. We had such a great back-and-forth about our breaking financial system that I had to drop this episode straight into your feed.

Guest Links

Walker on X (Link: https://twitter.com/WalkerAmerica)

Walker on Nostr (Link: https://primal.net/walker)

Walker's YouTube channel (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@walkeramerica)

The Bitcoin Podcast's Website (Link: https://bitcoinpodcast.net/podcast)

Affiliate Links

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://bitbox.swiss/)

Get 10% off the best Bitcoin board game in the world, HODLUP! Or any of the other great games from The Free Market Kids! Use code GUY10 at checkout for 10% off your cart! (Link: https://www.freemarketkids.com/collections/games-1)

(Under construction) Check out the list of products and services I use and recommend on BitcoinAudible.com (Link: https://bitcoinaudible.com/)

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

Guy on Instagram (Link: https://www.instagram.com/theguyswann)

Guy on TikTok (Link: https://www.tiktok.com/@theguyswann)

Guy on YouTube (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@theguyswann)

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Chapters

(00:00:00) - Introduction
(00:05:49) - Global M2 money supply and China fiat printing
(00:08:19) - Historical monetary transitions and hard money adoption
(00:14:02) - Bitcoin radical neutrality and money for enemies
(00:21:08) - Early Bitcoin culture and The Good Wife television episode
(00:28:05) - Economic necessity driving everyday Bitcoin adoption in Iran
(00:34:34) - The Federal Reserve arbitrarily manipulating public inflation metrics
(00:38:08) - Why the United States national debt constantly doubles
(00:41:53) - Free rent for the rich and fake interest rates
(00:48:55) - How fiat credit allows corporations to buy real estate
(00:53:35) - The dollar endgame and prerequisites for fiat hyperinflation
(00:57:43) - Why Bitcoin needs massive liquidity to replace fiat systems
(01:01:10) - Closing thoughts and Pear Drive update

"Generation X and the millennials both tried to do everything right, according to what the boomers told them was the path forward: save money, study hard, get a ‘job’. At every stage we got rugpulled. Most of us have nothing to show for any of that.

Zoomers looked at what happened to Gen-X and the millennials and said, quite rationally, fuck that."

~ John Carter

What happens when you raise an entire generation on the promise of a second marshmallow – and never deliver? John Carter's piece reframes the tired boomer/zoomer spending war through the lens of the Stanford Marshmallow Experiment, and the implications are genuinely devastating. Is high time preference a moral failing, or the only rational response to a system that has been lying to young people their entire lives? And if broken social trust is the real disease, can sound money actually cure it – or is some of the damage already permanent?

Check out the original article: When the Experimenter Fails the Marshmallow Test by John Carter (Link: https://barsoom.substack.com/p/when-the-experimenter-fails-the-marshmallow)

References from the episode

Number Go Down by Allen Farrington and Sacha Meyers – this read fits hand in glove with today's piece, and if this episode hit for you, that one will too (Link: https://fountain.fm/episode/fLqds61ds9YbsnqGOkE8)

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

Guy on Instagram (Link: https://www.instagram.com/theguyswann)

Guy on TikTok (Link: https://www.tiktok.com/@theguyswann)

Guy on YouTube (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@theguyswann)

⁠Bitcoin Audible on X⁠ (Link: https://twitter.com/BitcoinAudible)

The Guy Swann Network Broadcast Room on Keet (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3na6v839)

Check out our awesome partners!

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://bitbox.swiss/)

Get ⁠10% off the COLDCARD⁠ with code BITCOINAUDIBLE ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠(Link: https://bitcoinaudible.com/coldcard)

Get 10% off the best Bitcoin board game in the world, HODLUP! Or any of the other great games from The Free Market Kids! Use code GUY10 at checkout for 10% off your cart! (Link: https://www.freemarketkids.com/collections/games-1)

"The only two ways to coordinate human societies at scale are free markets and physical power. Any ideology rejecting free markets is just advocating for power. Socialism, communism, and fascism all converge to the same endpoint–rule by the biggest thug."

~ Naval Ravikant

"The peso scam is around a thousand times larger than the Libra scam, and its victims are the poorest, about 95% of Argentines."

~ Saifedean Ammous

Javier Milei swore he'd burn down Argentina's central bank and dollarize the economy. Two and a half years later, the money supply has quadrupled, the debt has ballooned, and a quarter-trillion-dollar carry trade is hollowing out the nation. Is the self-proclaimed Rothbardian actually running one of the most inflationary presidencies in Argentine history? And what does it mean for Austrian economics when its loudest political champion looks more like just another Latin American demagogue?

Check out the original article: Milei's Austrian Scam by the Numbers by Saifedean Ammous (Link: https://x.com/saifedean/status/2056436088944631996)

References from the episode

Safedean's previous piece on the Argentine carry trade (Link: https://saifedean.substack.com/p/anatomy-of-the-milei-ponzi)

Hans-Hermann Hoppe's work, since the Mises Institute apparently parted ways with him (Link: https://hanshoppe.com/)

Anything by Murray N. Rothbard if you want the real Austrian foundation (Link: https://mises.org/profile/murray-n-rothbard)

The story of Cincinnatus if you've never read it, it's worth your time

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

Guy on Instagram (Link: https://www.instagram.com/theguyswann)

Guy on TikTok (Link: https://www.tiktok.com/@theguyswann)

Guy on YouTube (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@theguyswann)

⁠Bitcoin Audible on X⁠ (Link: https://twitter.com/BitcoinAudible)

The Guy Swann Network Broadcast Room on Keet (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3na6v839)

Check out our awesome partners!

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://shop.bitbox.swiss/?code=GUY)

Get 10% off the best Bitcoin board game in the world, HODLUP! Or any of the other great games from The Free Market Kids! Use code GUY10 at checkout for 10% off your cart! (Link: https://www.freemarketkids.com/collections/games-1)

“Frodo: I wish the Ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had happened.

Gandalf: So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.”

~ J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings