Orange Pill Projects with Geyser Fund

Okay, fantastic. Thanks for the intro there, Brian. Uh, maybe Krista, you next.

Hi. Um, well, firstly, I'd like to say tervetuloa to the Finnish people here. I think this might be the only time in my life that I've been on a call with fellow Finns, and we seem to outnumber the other nationalities, so I'm kind of stoked about that. I'm half Finnish, for those Um, so, well, um, I am a co-founder of an organization called Bitcoin Policy UK based in the UK. Um, I actually live in Canada, but as you can probably tell, I'm also British. And, um, this, this organization kind of, uh, was born, I guess, out of the Bitcoin Collective conference in the UK, which Jordan Walker hosted. So I used to work for Jordan, and I was part of the team that, um, organized that conference. Put together that conference. And a bunch of us had connected there and started looking at the fact that we didn't really have an organization that was advocating for Bitcoin policy within the UK. So we thought we would just create one. And we're basically a team of volunteers who've got together. We're doing this off the side of our desks. And we're actually launching— we're going live on Thursday. So I didn't realize this was going to be livestreamed. So I think— I guess I'm announcing it now. But for those of us that— those of you that want to kind of, you know, contact us or participate, help in any way, our website is bitcoinpolicy.org.uk. So Mick and I had actually spoken because I had interviewed him for my own podcast, and he spoke at the conference as well, at the Bitcoin Collective conference in Edinburgh. And when we launched, we were talking about doing a Geyser fundraise. We're actually doing 2, so we're doing one to fundraise for a Bitcoin— some Bitcoin miners, so I can talk about that in a bit more detail as well later on. But then we saw that there was this initiative to send The Bitcoin Standard to, you know, regulators and legislators across the world, and so we thought, well, why not send it to the government? Yeah, that's right. The world, and we just thought it would be crazy not to get on board with this. So we're going to try and do the same thing for UK members of parliament. So anyone who donates, basically as much money as we raise, we will send as many books as we can. Um, and you know, if we don't raise enough to send the full amount, which is 650 books, then we will just target them at the people that we think most need to read it. Um, but yeah, I'm really happy to be on board, and I'm really glad that you guys in the Orange Pill app I thought you were a Bitcoin dating app. Just kidding. Um, but yeah, this is great. And, uh, damn Bitcoiners, you're all just so damn awesome.

Awesome. UK Parliament sure is massive, huh? Like, uh, a lot of the, a lot of the rest of them are a more manageable size, but, uh, you've got your work cut out for you anyway.

Yeah,

good. Uh, Niko, you next. I'm just going off who's on my screen.

All right, thanks. Yeah, my name is Niko. I'm from Finland, as mentioned. I run the Bitcoin publishing house called Consensus Network. In the background, you can see my personal collection. So we do a lot of Bitcoin Standard. That's our main, main book. We do it, we publish it in 10 different languages. And we also list a couple others. So we have more than a dozen versions of this book in our shop, which is bitcoinbook.shop. So that's kind of like my main gig. I'm also an advisor to the Orange Pi Lab. So that was a happy coincidence. So we've been working together there. We also supply books to these projects, like hopefully the UK one and also the US one. We have a hookup with the publisher directly. So maybe we can, we can even beat the Amazon price. But to be honest, Amazon price is pretty good. So, well, the least we can do is offer our Bitcoin payment rails. So once you have the Geyser Fund up and running, you gather some Bitcoin, whatever you can swing, give it to us, and we'll, uh, we'll get as many books as possible, uh, with that delivered to wherever you want. So really excited to be part of, part of this. This is the reason why I started the publishing house, to, to get the orange pill to the correct people and make the knowledge available. So to that end, all the books that are published in, in our house, we, we kind of give away at cost, at a 50% discount So if you want to orange pill in your own language, just get in touch with us and we'll give you a good discount. And also, as mentioned, like, if you can't reach your goal, whatever you can, then we'll round it up to the next, let's say, 10 books. So if you can raise money for like 11 books, we'll do 20. Like, that's the least that we can do. So yeah, that's mostly about me.

Awesome. Thanks, Nico. All right. Next, Zebrock.

Yeah. Hi. Actually, my real name is Sebastian. We can keep it between us. But yeah, I'm joining you from Germany. Inspired by the U.S. campaign to send the Bitcoin Standard to all of the members of Congress, I thought, well, we have a parliament as well. It's called the Bundestag. We have 763 delegates there, so that's kind of crazy. Um, and we, well, we're thinking about giving him this book which just recently came out in Germany. Um, it is called The Orange Pill by a guy named Ijoma Mangold, and he, um, approaches Bitcoin from a very different angle. Uh, he is a Column writer, so he's coming from the not from the technical bunch of Bitcoin people, but from a very very different angle. He's kind of he's he's almost a philosopher, so he he approached it in in a very different way, and and the way he's telling this story how he became orange pilled by just being convicted. Is very— is a very nice take. And it's been published in Germany and it's on the Spiegel bestseller list. So it's getting a lot of attention right now in Germany. In between— I'm sorry, the— More of the, how should I say that, intellectual folks, let's put it this way, which have never, which would never get into contact with Bitcoin because they have no technical understanding whatsoever. So we're excited about that and we're looking how many we can get and then take it from there.

Awesome, thanks a lot. And well, so I think that's everyone we have on the stream now. We kept on losing James and he kept rejoining. So we'll see if we get him back. But yeah, good round of introductions. And this is great to see so many projects. So now I think we're talking about the US, UK, Germany, and James, if he were here, would be talking about Nigeria. Is that correct? There's also one for Belgium and even super fresh, as in half an hour ago, Finland. So Yeah, I think we're looking at—

And also Japan, it's looking to be created, but we're still waiting for the final details.

Excellent. So we're really properly worldwide here, continents from— well, yeah, that's North America, Europe, Africa, Asia. Need to get some Latin America going maybe eventually here, but yeah, yeah, yeah, good stuff. Maybe Brian, you could talk a little bit about kind of a little more about the sort of the origins of this and how Orange Pill app kind of got this whole ball rolling.

Well, yeah, I mean, it's, it, it was such a simple, like stupid beginning to something that I think is gonna be so amazing in the end. It started with a tweet from Matteo. And he just, I mean, so I'm, I'm not the founder of the company. So I'm not gonna go out and tweet something that's gonna cost the company, you know, $10,000 worth the books. And so, so he just— one morning I wake up and he's, he's already tweeted like, hey, I, uh, if Saifedean joins Orange Pill app, we're gonna, we're gonna sponsor a book for Bitcoin Evangelism— or not Bitcoin Evangelism, The Bitcoin Standard— for, um, every, uh, every politician or every, every congressman and woman. And, uh, I remember sitting there thinking like, has this dude lost his, lost his marbles? Like, I don't know if we can afford to do this. We're a startup. Like, you know, I got nervous. And so, and I'm the marketing guy, I'm the one that's supposed to be doing the stupid crazy stuff out there and, and taking chances and stuff. And sure enough, and you know, I think maybe in the back of our head was like, hey, you know, let's, let's just throw this out there, this would be a cool initiative. Saifedean's never going to join, join Orange Pill app. And of course he texts us back and says, yeah, game on, let's do it. And so then we're sitting there thinking, and, and so me and Mateo are talking, and Mateo, he's, he's got, you know, He's in that founder role for a reason because he really has great foresight. And, uh, well, I'm sitting here nervous like, how are we gonna, you know, collect all these funds? We're a startup, you know, that sort of thing. And he's sitting there thinking, this is exactly why we exist in the Bitcoin space. I mean, he had clear vision from, from, from the first moment, obviously since before he, he tweeted that. And it was like, hey, if, if we expect to build this social network where the social layer is like the substrate for Bitcoin, we need to be a part of the that's ushering this in. Like, there's not gonna be a Bitcoin social layer unless the network starts, you know, continues to grow. Like, Bitcoin has been growing obviously for 13 years, but things either grow or they die. And so, you know, we want to be part of that continued growth. And we know that Bitcoin is kind of in that then they fight you phase, right? Where we're seeing jurisdictions like maybe Texas that are adopting Bitcoin mining, and maybe they're putting some more positive Bitcoin regulation out there, maybe some some anti-crypto regulation and stuff out there. So maybe we're seeing some things in certain areas that are coming together and coalescing in an appropriate way in terms of legislation. But certainly for federal governments, for national governments, we're not seeing it on that level. We're not seeing it really within the regulatory agencies. And so if we wanna see true growth in this industry and not have this, this issue where people are worried about, um, okay, if I'm a Bitcoiner, I'm going to be hunted by my government. Like, this is the time where we put in that work so that 10 years from now we're not fighting to have to be, you know, the black market alternative to the CBDC. Like, there's, there's a chance going forward— we're at this, this cross, you know, this cross-section of history where we can establish Bitcoin. Us as the Bitcoin community, we can establish Bitcoin as an alternative money system that is, is just— it's a side rail to these, these inevitable CBDCs. I don't think that in most cases Bitcoin's going to make it so that, that sovereign nations aren't going to create their own currency, but we can show enough people, we can show enough people in Congress that, hey, this is, this is something that's actually healthy for your government currency. Like, it's good to have this alternative. It's actually going to provide a healthier economy, a healthier ecosystem, so that everything that you guys want to do can also, you know, be protected by a sound money. We've seen that in societies of the past with, you know, with currencies that ran tangentially to gold and things like that. So we think that if we help illuminate the tenets of Bitcoin to enough people, enough people that are in power that make decisions, that they can see the light and that it's a, it's a less combative future and it's a more cooperative future. I think we as Bitcoiners, I like to to default on the side of, yeah, F the man, like, let's, let's go, let's fight back against the government. But why do we— why should we put— why should we dig in our heels and say we need to fight when we're still at a point where we can say, let's educate, let's, let's bring people into the fold? I think we've— we, we have this default mindset that it's going to have to be a fight. I don't think anybody's like predetermined that that's how it has to be. We, we might have a future where there's cooperation with government where there's a cooperation. Not that we're gonna allow— you know, Bitcoin's strong. We don't have to worry about Bitcoin being taken over and centrally controlled. That can't happen to Bitcoin. So I think inviting in legislators to this process might be a really positive outcome. And so I don't see any harm in doing this. I don't think anybody sees any harm in educating the, you know, the decision-makers on the tenets of Bitcoin. So, you know, worst-case scenario, we have some politicians that know a little bit more about Bitcoin. Best case scenario is we have, you know, a government system that maybe protects people's freedom to transact a little bit better. So it seemed like a win-win situation. But again, yeah, I think that that was all Mateo. I mean, you know, he had this brilliant foresight to say we need to take a step forward and kind of leap out in faith. to make sure that we're putting our money where our mouth is kind of thing.

Awesome to hear. And then how did Geyser get started with all this?

Well, yeah, I mean, to Brian's point, Matteo had this great idea, which, I mean, honestly, we have to give credit to Orange Pill App for being this, like, enabling these insane kind of constant kind of viral marketing. And you guys are doing fantastic work on the marketing side. So congrats. Congrats to you guys and to you, Brian, specifically, because, you know, really trying to kind of engage the Bitcoiners, right? Kind of going beyond the super shadowy super coder and more into like, let's go out there, let's like be proud of who we are, let's actually make this social movement happen. And actually, that's kind of what Geyser is also very much about. Geyser is also that kind of social layer. But guys, it was more about making things happen. And social, uh, social, um, uh, Orange Pill app is more about bringing people together. Bitcoin guys was bringing people together towards something. And, and that's why I saw that tweet one morning, and I was actually in Poland for the— for the Bitcoin Film Fest conference, um, also sponsored by Orange Pill app. And, um, and I'm just sitting there, coffee as I'm having breakfast, And I see this tweet that's taken off, like hundreds of likes. And then I see in the tweet section, Saifedean saying, hey, let's do it. And then I messaged Matteo. I was like, you are so screwed, man. But I have a solution for you. How about you create a project on Geyser? And he's like, genius. And he's like, at one point he's like, oh, Thank God a lot of that anxiety has been relieved. Yeah, of course we can ask. We have this community. Why not ask the community to sponsor it? And that was his next tweet. We are doing a crowdfunding campaign on Geyser to help us, to help you guys, to have you guys help us fund this, right? And this tweet took off more than the previous tweet. So I got like 1,200 likes. I've never seen— I think that's probably the most viral tweet for a project that we've ever seen, even higher than the one that was retweeted by Nayib Bukele, who retweeted a project once, got 1,000 likes. This one got 1,200 likes, insanely viral. You know, everyone retweeted it. Preston Pysh, so many Bitcoiners retweeted it. Apparently Michael Saylor was there behind the scenes. Also retweeting and even funding possibly. So yeah, it was just— it sort of took off beautifully. And I think what's really interesting is that it took off. And the question, why did it take off, I think it's an interesting question that I'd love to hear your guys' thoughts on, because I think there is a sense among the Bitcoin community that there are just no-brainer things that just should be done, like The Bitcoin standard is the basic 101 of Bitcoin, and if politicians don't know it, well, this might well be, you know, one of the greatest chances we have to at least explain what Bitcoin is and kind of provide that additional layer of understanding of what is money, which most politicians don't know about. So if you think about people like Pierre Poilievre, that politician in Canada who is running as the conservative leader. Well, he is literally and very eloquently reiterating what Saifedean Ammous is saying about what is money and the hardness of money, right? He's literally— he's read The Bitcoin Standard, no doubt about that, right? So it makes sense for— and I think for 95-98% of Bitcoiners, It makes sense to have to have to explain to politicians what this is so that they can represent us better. And and it's interesting also to see that there is some pushback. There are people like no, let's not let the politicians shouldn't shouldn't know about Bitcoin or you know let you know. But it's interesting to see. I think what's more interesting is that it's the majority of people do want to see this project go live. And it's one of those, again, no-brainer ideas that can have a significant impact. Just paying $15 for a book towards a politician has what, a chance of what, 5% of getting in their hands, 5% of them reading it? Well, that 5% chance is worth that $15. So yeah, so it's kind of, it was a beautiful idea. And then we started thinking, oh my God, why don't we do this in other countries? And then boom, and just sort of spreading like wildfire. And, you know, yeah, we're happy to kind of fuel that wildfire, happy to support, happy to, you know, spread the word and make Geyser the platform where this can happen as well.

Fantastic. Thanks, Mick. And now we've got James with us and we've actually got some video. So maybe, James, if this is going to work, can you introduce yourself?

Yeah. Hello. Sorry for coming late, and I'm just heading home from work, and we have been having serious light issues. You know, that was—

I guess a bit of a tough connection here, unfortunately. Yeah, it says the network connection isn't quite working. That's okay. We'll try that again. I'll try that again later. Maybe I'll pass this back to— because I think one of the things here that you were starting to mention here, both Mick and Bryan, kind of about that Bitcoiners want to get involved and to help with this stuff. I think part of it, at least from my point of view, that the organization needed to do something like this. Theoretically, anyone could send a book or a letter or whatever to their representative, but it's really the collective thing, right? the project and making this happen on the scale. That's what everyone's hoping to do, right? So can Krista or Sebbe, both of you, can you talk a little bit about kind of what the organization for this is looking like and how you plan to get this done and get all these books to these politicians? Krista?

I mean, I can jump in, although I'll say we jumped into this project So I think Mick sent me the, the, the invite late last night or something like that. So yeah, we've, we've kind of scrambled to get it live. And like I said, we haven't actually officially launched Bitcoin Policy UK yet. But I guess in practical terms, asides of myself, most of the team are in and around London. So once we get hold of the books, however many we manage to buy with the funding, we're just physically going to go there, I think, and drop them off at Parliament. Um, And hopefully, you know, be able to take some pictures with the various parliamentarians that receive the books. And, uh, yeah, we'll see how best to distribute them. But yeah, the more we can send to Parliament, the better. And I fully agree with your statement as well, but I think that The Bitcoin Standard is a very foundational book, so everybody should really read it. And, um, I think it is incumbent on politicians to understand it because it's such an important technology. Personally, I think it's more meaningful than the internet. It's obviously built on the rails of the internet, on the backbone of the internet, but I think its potential to completely revolutionize our societies and our cultures in a very, very positive way is almost limitless. So I think it's incumbent on everybody to understand this and study it. And I would encourage everybody to go out and buy, you know, The Bitcoin Standard and The Fiat Standard and read them to really understand the system that you currently live and operate in and what a different system might look like. So I think this project is incredible. And again, kudos, Brian, to you and Mathieu for doing all of this, and Mick for jumping on board. Mick, your bandwidth is just unbelievable. You're so responsive. I just have no idea when you're sleeping. And actually, James is on now, so I'm going to mute so he can give an update as well. But yes, that's our plan.

Awesome, dear. Yeah, James, let's try this again. Looks like we got better network connection.

Yeah, so sorry, the network connection has been very poor recently also. Um, so as I was saying, I'm a politician and also a Bitcoiner, and, um, I contested in the last election, the just completed elections in Nigeria, where I ran for the State House of Assembly to represent my state's constituency. And it was an amazing experience, especially, um, for me coming in as a Bitcoiner and trying to get the locals to understand what Bitcoin is all about and the freedom associated with owning Bitcoin as money. I want to really thank Orange Peel. Ben, yeah, what's up, man? It has been great following you guys, and thank you for the opportunity to kickstart a revolution. I call it a revolution because, um, I didn't win the elections. I came third, um, and there was massive rigging, and the cost of going to court is very astronomical. It's very high. And, uh, for an average Nigerian that I consider myself to be, I believe that people should have freedom. I'm in politics not because I just want to be a politician, but because I believe that one of the easiest ways to get down to people to get the right things done is by being a politician in the sense that we have direct impact to policies and local lives of the local people and to shape how things will be done in a constituency and all of that. So when Orange Mule app came up with the idea, I saw it. I think I was surfing Twitter at around 1 AM in the morning. And I sat and I was like, wow, this is crazy, this is crazy, this is really, really crazy. And I, um, I still loved the idea. And immediately I, I checked the modalities of getting that done in Nigeria, and I discovered that, wow, um, we have well over 400 National Assembly members, and I was like, oh, I have to be realistic. I'm a Bitcoiner. I don't believe in free money, you understand? So I had to be realistic. Yes, the Nigerian Bitcoin community is very huge, but we don't have the kind of traction that we find in the West and the Global North. And so I had to, okay, okay, I can start by orange peeling the guys that won. In my constituency, you understand? So that was where I came up with the idea, okay, let me give out 4 copies of The Bitcoin Standard to the guys that won, politicians that won from my constituency. And luckily for me, I have a senator, I have a House of Rep member, I have a House of Assembly member, and the governor-elect, all from my constituency. And I consider it very, very lucky because it's a direct opportunity to be able to influence this guy and kickstart a conversation on Bitcoin policy and all of that. Thank you very much.

Awesome to hear. Great story, James. Thanks a lot for that. And well, you'll have to let us know how that goes. And I guess one question as well, is it the English version of Bitcoin Standard that you'll be distributing?

Yes, we predominantly speak English. in Nigeria. But I'm looking forward to translating that to what we call Pidgin English, a variation of a local variation of English. You know, the kind of dem say.

No, that's great. And I mean, the reason I ask is kind of making this stuff more accessible to people is definitely something that we're passionate about with ConsenSys. So I think if you need a hand with the publishing or distribution or something, make sure to reach out to some of us and yeah, we can help. And maybe I'll actually pass that to Niko quickly here.

All right. Yeah.

No, go ahead. Continue.

Okay. The people I intend to kickstart this conversation with, the legislator and the governor-elect, they predominantly speak English, although my constituency is 89% rural. So you can understand a lot of work we have to do there. But the challenges of translating to my local language, as the Efik language, is going to be— it's going to be enormous because the Efik language is not a majority in Nigeria. So, but the Pidgin English It's a majority and it's well spoken across the country. So if we can translate to Pidgin, it doesn't mean, it doesn't mean just reaching out to just my demographics or my constituency. It also involves reaching out to the whole of Nigeria. And that would be great.

That would be fantastic. And I'll let Niko jump in to say a couple of things about this maybe.

Yeah, thanks. Yeah, it's actually funny. James contacted me over Orange Pill app about this project, and we are working together to supply those 4 books. So, you know, no matter how small or big your project is, you know, we can all work together and there's always synergy. So, I mean, don't be shy. And I just wanted to go a little bit back, like you asked why this project took off, and, you know, to be able to answer that, I I would like to share the story of how I got into Bitcoin publishing originally in Finland in 2019. I just wanted to translate The Bitcoin Standard so I can give it to my dad, essentially. What I didn't know is that there's actually desperate need for some kind of glimmer of hope in the current world that we live in. And it took me by surprise, even though I kind of like knew it from inside that something is not right with the world. It took me kind of by surprise how overwhelmingly positive the feedback was to translate a fringe topic book like Bitcoin into a fringe language that is being spoken by 6 million people. Then I thought, you know, if I can do this in Finland, I can probably do this anywhere in the world. And we actually did like donations to politicians. We even donated to kindergartens and schools this I don't know if you know this Bitcoin Money book, this children's book by Bitcoin Rabbi. Great book for orange-pilling adults as well as kids. But yeah, it was funny because we just did it on our own. We just raised some money and then sent those books to all those schools and kindergartens and then also to libraries, mostly Bitcoin Standard for the libraries. But the fact is that, you know, there was people in Finland from all the places, funding it from their own pockets using Bitcoin and sending it to our nodes so that we can send books to these libraries and kindergartens. That's just like, I would have never expected that. So I think the same thing here is in play, same desperate need for a glimmer of hope, but in a global scale. And that's kind of like the mission of Orange Pill app as well, to bring us all together and work together so we can make this like a global movement. And it's not to say that, you know, something like a legal tender law, this— that's not the point. Not at least, not for me at least, you know, that we're going to impose this new world order that is just the Bitcoin standard. It's just more like a Trojan horse. Like, once you start looking into Bitcoin and what it makes possible, it is very, very possible and even likely that you start questioning everything that you took for granted. And that goes for politicians as well. So that's why I find it so powerful to put these Trojan horses on the plate of these politicians. And even if they don't read, like maybe some of them will, like 10%, even if 10% read them, and they start questioning the ways of the status quo, statist quo rather. And that's a win for us. Like there's no downside. At all, and and yeah, like there's also other books. Like Bitcoin Standard is obviously not the only one, and I just wanted to bring out another example of of a good book that we can use for this. It's called Layered Money. I'm sure you guys read it by Nick Batia. It's a little bit shorter and goes a little bit more into like the the current fiat economy. And what's wrong with that? Because I feel like that's the crux. Like, it's not really super sexy or interesting to talk about money. And you don't really understand why would you need hard money system or hard money base if you don't understand what's wrong with the current soft money, the easy money system. So that's why I wanted to bring out Layered Money because the Finnish campaign is actually, as far as I know, the first one that is doing a non-bank loan. Bitcoin Standard donation round, which is the layered money. So that's something to consider as well. It might work in some settings better than others. But hey, you know, it's all about opening people's eyes and bringing the information available. Like, that's why we keep expanding our library. And most people are not ready for it. And we're not going to chuck it down their throats, but we can give them books Right? I mean, that's pretty innocent.

If I could just jump in there real quick, I think people— we've had people say, yeah, kind of like Mick was saying earlier, why would you spend this time orange-pilling these people? They're, they're, they're part of the establishment. They're never gonna, you know, change their minds or anything like that. They've already made up their mind. I think that that's an oversimplistic view of it. Certainly there are entrenched bureaucrats, there are entrenched politicians that have been in office since the 1960s. Maybe those people, maybe we can't wake them up or change their opinion. Maybe we can. But my point is, when you start to learn, kind of like what Niko's talking about, when you start to learn about what sound money is, it illuminates the possibilities and it unlocks some solutions for these politicians. These politicians and these bureaucrats, and even the central bankers, are looking down the barrel of a gun of hyperinflation across the world on a scale that we've never seen. Because of globalization, we have so many intertwined fiat currencies, And so we're kind of, we have this perfect storm brewing that history's never seen before of hyperinflation across currencies, hyperinflation across the world. Like everybody remembers Weimar Germany, that was just in Germany. And then there were some other European nations that faced hyperinflation, but in the US we didn't have that. And in China, they didn't have that at that time. So there was places that you could go to refuge. There was currencies you could go out, You could, you can move somewhere and not have that problem. What politicians and central bankers and, you know, the IMF and all these, these different, you know, agencies are looking down the barrel of is hyperinflation where with nowhere to run to as far as other fiat currencies. And so going back to the Weimar Germany example, it's how did Weimar Germany fix their hyperinflation? They, they had their, their, their mark, the German mark that was the hyperinflating currency. And then they had the Rentenmark. They had this new currency. It was a fiat currency, but they had a limited supply. I forget what the number was, but we'll call it 100 million. They said, okay, you have this one that's the smallest note is a trillion marks. And then we have the Rentenmark where there's a fixed finite supply. And that was part of the way that Germany fixed their hyperinflation. They created artificially a scarce currency to run side by side with a hyperinflating currency. And they didn't force anybody to use it, but they just said, you can use either one. Both are accepted in this economy. Economy, people naturally, you know, went over to the scarce currency because they knew that they could depend on that buying power. And it lasted for a few years, then they switched over to the Reichsmark, which was another fiat currency that they could, they could print because they wanted that power, you know, for their economy to, you know, stimulate it and all that kind of stuff. But to fix the hyperinflation, they went to a scarce currency. And so when politicians start to realize that Hey, there's this universal, universally available scarce money that we can use potentially as a tool to fix our hyperinflating currencies. Like, that's going to be a lifeline that a lot of people— that's a very hopeful message, right? That's not just a doom and gloom, hey, your currency's going to hell in a handbasket, come over to Bitcoin. It's like, hey, if you want to have one more arrow in your quiver as far as a politician— I mean, politicians, you think about this, They want to get reelected. And so what better way than to campaign on a Bitcoin stump speech of, hey, we know how to fix this problem because we can look to history to fix this problem. There's gonna be politicians that are gonna be reelected off of pro-Bitcoin principles. So we're actually giving some of these people a lifeline. Here's the Bitcoin Standard, here's layered money, here's a Bitcoiner in your office sharing what these things are all about. And this is how you're going to get reelected. You better make sure you stick to it. Don't just say it and then not do it. But if you want to bring a hopeful message when everybody else is complaining about hyperinflation, when everybody else is complaining about high inflation, you get to talk about the solution to it. That is a— that's a recipe for a successful political career if they can stick to it. So politicians, they, they're, they're not always known for being ahead of the curve, but they're certainly outstanding politicians, politicians that stand out from the crowd, that love to be able to say, hey, I knew about the fix to the problem 5 years before, 4 years before. Look at me, look at my track record. I was talking about Bitcoin before we actually had the full-on wave of hyperinflation. This is a very optimistic message. So if we can tee this up to the politicians of, here, here's the Bitcoin standard, here's the roadmap to your reelection, If you can hold to this, if you can keep it, this is the path forward. So to me, I think that that's a really exciting way to approach these politicians.

Could I just make a comment there as well, just to say that I fully agree with that? And I think people lose sight of the fact that politicians are people too. So, you know, they're also— they also care about the economies, they care about the communities that they live in. I 100% agree with that. And the number of Bitcoiners that I've met, And many of these voters are single-issue voters now. So I think this is really going to be, in the next 5 to 10 years, a defining position for politicians. You know, if you threaten people's wealth that they're preserving in Bitcoin, and if you threaten the stability of their communities through unsound money, and you're not educating yourself properly on this, I think you will increasingly become a very unappealing option for people to vote for. So 100% agree with that, Brian. Bang on.

Right. And to piggyback off both those thoughts, it's also— there's also this idea that at the end of the day, yeah, politicians, you know, try to innovate, although they're really usually quite slow at that. But one thing that they're looking for is who's gonna vote for me, right? So if we're showing these, I think this is where these projects are a signal. Like, they're, they're basically a signal of these shadowy super coders living on the internet. And not just that, now obviously we're growing quite a lot, and it's, you know, there's all sorts of Bitcoiners leaving fiat mining jobs, etc. But it's like sending a signal, hey, we exist, we are ready to vote for you, right? Consider our perspectives. And if we're doing this around the world, if we're, you know, okay, let's talk a little bit about the project, right? So the US Congress project by the Orange Pill app, I think raised 180 individual donors, right? $6,000. Oh no, probably around like $3,000 to $4,000. So that's not like, you know, gonna be, oh my God, that's not gonna be a revolution to a position. But it's still a signal. It's there, right? And in this current cycle, and as we go, as the community grows, I'm sure there is gonna be more and more signals, more and more touchpoints that these politicians can have that tells them what? That tells them, A, this is a real organic bottom-up community of people that care passionately about this thing. 2, that they should start paying attention about what the content of it is. Like Brian said, I have to get informed about it. And then ideally, actually instilling that message of hope that Bitcoin brings, as Niko was saying, that can really actually kind of trigger the leaders in some of these politicians. Because from what I understand, this is actually what's really— what's really something really interesting that is often not thought about. And if you look at the, like, the politician's job in theory is, is pretty boring. Like, you just have to, you know, I mean, it's incredibly important, but I think politicians themselves are very— are people that are often leaders that want to motivate, that want to have an impact on the world. But unfortunately, a lot of the impact that they've been having lately has actually been quite negative. So it's been restricting people's freedoms Or it's been, oh yeah, let's do this because it's good for the environment. So let's like remove people's welfare by limiting how much they can consume and decreasing the amount of energy that they can access. And let's lock down so that they can, you know, be safe, but by the decreasing, you know, liberties. And Bitcoin represents this one change of the narrative whereby actually it's having a massive impact on people's well-being by actually providing them, uh, sound money and a more freedom kind of a more, more freedom, a more sort of human rights-centered approach to things. So in some way, it might actually be the spark that gives politicians hope as well of a new narrative, of a new a world that we can inhabit. Because yes, to bring the point home, politicians are not only human, but they're not only people, but they're incredibly— like, usually they're leaders, the people that want to, you know, show the direction and motivate and feel like they care and like they matter. And Bitcoin could really be that message of hope for them as well.

Yeah.

And if I can just chime in a little bit there, because like, we are politicians. What we're doing here is this is politics and you might not like it. And I think we are all PTSD'd by the fiat politicians. So whenever we hear like, oh yeah, you're working with politicians or you're doing in politics, kind of has like, you know, gives you a bad name. But I don't think politics are ever going to go anywhere. What is politics? It's just human interaction, right? Influencing people with your own opinions and knowledge and oratory skills. That's literally what we are doing here. So we are politicians. So that's a good thing to keep in mind. Not only that politicians are people, but people are politicians.

Okay, can I weigh in?

Go ahead, James, please do.

One of the reasons why I decided to take on these challenges. You know, in Nigeria, the new government, once sworn in already, the new president-elect and the new government-elect have a— how would I put it— they are bullish on cryptocurrencies. And we are having signals that Nigeria might join one of those countries that will legally make cryptocurrencies legal. But as a Bitcoiner, I have to weigh in and I have to start that conversation to keep Nigeria on a path. It sounds very, very ambiguous, but actually it takes— how do they call it? How do they say it? They say a drop of water makes an ocean, something like that. But it takes one person to actually kickstart the right conversation. So one of the reasons why I'm doing this is to actually kickstart this. Look, we don't want crypto. We don't want to go down the way of Congo. We don't want to go down the ways of— we want to go down the way of El Salvador and all of that. So I think it is imperative that a lot of attention should be pushed to the Global South and especially to Nigeria. I was just looking at some statistics recently. And I discovered that Nigeria still tops the ranks when it comes to crypto, crypto and Bitcoin itself. It tops the chart both of people that buy, hold, and spend and all of that. So I have a very strong belief that the global attention should be thrown down to Africa and to Nigeria in particular, because if Nigeria gets it right when it comes to Bitcoin, then so many African countries will key in. And it's going to build the Bitcoin ecosystem.

Fantastic point. And yeah, it's great to see what you're doing there and coming at it from a different perspective of being kind of more directly involved, you know, running for your local office and all that. So yeah, when Niko says we're all politicians, it's in some sense you're You're taking that a little more directly there. Um, I think I— Brian or Seb, were you, were you saying something?

Yeah, well, all I was going to chime in with, uh, was it's, it's really cool. In addition to these books, these books are kind of the, the peace offering, right? That it's the foot in the door, like, hey, we're here, we are, we're in Washington, DC, and this is kind of our excuse to talk to you. Look at— we raised all these funds for these books. And here we are, and we're having this conversation. But so in June, we have it scheduled. We don't have the exact date. There's, again, talking to Dennis Porter, he's helping us coordinate this to find out when the House and the Senate are both going to be in session so we know everybody's going to be there, and when we can have some meetings preset up so that we just don't go walk around aimlessly in the Capitol. But I will tell you right now, we have it planned to be strategic in these conversations. These conversations aren't just going to be, hey, nice to meet you, here's The Bitcoin Standard. These conversations are going to be, look, there's a community of people that thought this was important enough that we raised thousands of dollars. Then a company got behind it and matched those funds and blah blah blah. And so just so you know, this isn't just 3 dudes that wanted you guys to have these books. There is a community of people out there. What are you doing as a politician? You're seeking out communities of people that will vote for you, right? And so we get to follow that conversation up with, hey, we are from Orange Pill App. What is Orange Pill App? We're a social networking app where you can find Bitcoiners that are in your area. So what are you as a congressman? You're a representative of a certain area. So I'm going to challenge you. Go home, download Orange Pill app, and look at how many people are in your area. Because that's— this is one of the cool things. And let me, you know, I promise I'll bring this back to the politician thing, but we're launching our Orange Pages in a couple of months. And our Orange Pages, it's a partnership with BTC Maps where you're gonna be able to find local companies that accept Bitcoin. Now, I'm excited about this as the marketing guy for Orange Pill app for a very specific reason as far as like the mission of Bitcoin. Because we're gonna launch campaigns of people to go in and find businesses in their community that aren't accepting Bitcoin right now. And you can go in and use Orange Pill app. You bring in your phone and you say, hey, look at nail salon or massage place, someplace that would probably not be a Bitcoin preferred type of merchant. You can go in there and say, look it, there's 40 people in your area, there's 50 people in your area that are Bitcoiners. And if you accept Bitcoin at your nail salon starting today, the way Bitcoiners work is we support Bitcoin businesses. You're gonna have 50 new customers come in and either buy a pedicure for themselves or buy one for their wives, and they're gonna pay for it in Bitcoin. So all of a sudden, you're gonna have these merchants that didn't previously accept Bitcoin, but now, just because— just like the people that, you know, started, started using email Like they didn't learn about SMTP. They learned by just using email. So we're going to be able to orange pill merchants by saying, look, just have this QR code out there and you're going to be able to start accepting Bitcoin payments. You're going to unlock 50 new customers, 100 new customers, because with Orange Pill App, we can show the demand side of the equation. BTC Maps, awesome service. You can find places that accept Bitcoin. But with Orange Pill App, we have the demand, not just the supply, but the demand. Now, bringing that back to the politicians, we can say the exact same thing to the politicians. Look, you need votes. We have the demand side of that equation. If you are pushing for pro-Bitcoin or not even just pro-Bitcoin legislation, but you're being hands-off towards legislating with Bitcoin, we have people that you can actually find in your jurisdiction that will do this. And guess what? What's the other thing that politicians want? They want fundraising ability, and that's why Geyser Fund is such a seamless plugin to this. Because with Orange Pill app, you can find your voters. With Geyser Fund, you can find a crazy group of diehard people that will raise funds for an initiative. So when you're trying to raise funds for your next campaign and you want to tap into the Bitcoin community, we have both things that you need right at your fingertips. That's the message we're bringing to people. So yes, they're gonna sit down, they're gonna read The Bitcoin Standard, but they're going to have a clear path to how do they execute within the Bitcoin community. And so that's, that's part of what's so exciting about this is I don't think people are just going to get orange-pilled. People are going to get plugged in to a pipeline of how to access Bitcoiners and the Bitcoin vote.

Nice.

Yeah, sorry, Brian, I, I think you would, um, actually also— it would be nice to have you launch your campaigns in Nigeria because Nigeria actually needs OPA. Like, we need OPA. I've met some Nigerians in OPA, but I think you should be very active because Nigerians have a lot of Bitcoiners. Let's be factual, a lot of Bitcoiners that are silent. In fact, I could— I would— 2 years ago, I met a young man, a young guy that has about 4 billion nairas, about $10 million in Bitcoin. And he's just like an average Nigerian walking on the street. And the beauty of Bitcoin, what Bitcoin does, Bitcoin allows you to walk, walk around without carrying security and all of that. And he was just like, oh my God, I have, I have all the money on my phone. And it was just actually crazy. So I think OpenAI needs to really come down to Nigeria and do some very, very active marketing to the Nigerian community. I am very, very certain that Um, hope you will sell Nigeria.

Well, yeah, man, we, we would love to. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna circle back with you. I know we've talked a little bit offline, but, uh, yeah, let's, let's figure out a strategy for that because I think Nigeria is a, is a great spot for us. I mean, I see Nigeria, Nigerian people in all sorts of things in the West. I mean, I follow the UFC. Last year, like, half of the champions in the UFC were from Nigeria. It's like In music and pop culture, there's Nigerians. There's something going on in Nigeria. So so certainly OPA would love to be a part of what's going on there, especially with the Bitcoin community.

There needs to be someone on the ground. So James, I hope you're up for it. I see a connection building here. Hey, so we've we've been going here for a fair while here, almost an hour. I think maybe circle back with everyone some last words, and maybe I'll put. Seb on the spot. Uh, you've been the one to talk the least, uh, in this room of big voices. So, uh, anything, uh, else to add here, Seb?

Also, sorry, just to highlight, um, also I would love to also know a little bit more about what's, what's next in the project as well. Like, we'd love to know, um, what stage you are in the project. I know obviously you already talked about that, but like also what you're looking forward to and Yeah, in terms of bringing that project to completion.

Yeah, sure. Well, I first wanted to add to the why we're doing this for politicians, and I've received a lot of tweets, well, you know, you shouldn't give it to politicians, it's not worth it, and stuff like that. But I'm more on the side, I think, like Brian said, if just 10% of those guys read it, uh, and get, um, and get it. And I've been, uh, also asking if, if I should put out this book, this book, or The Bitcoin Standard. And, um, more than 50% said I should rather put out this one. Uh, not too many know it already. It's, uh, it just came out in March, end of March, mid of March. Um, so yeah, what, what's next? Um, actually, and the same thing that you asked Krista, where she said, well, we're not, not really, um, organized yet and how we're going to actually put this in, in, into effect. So, uh, it's the same here. Um, I just, I just kicked it off because, um, if nobody else is doing it, so why not, right? Um, and, um, I'm still looking into different concepts. We were thinking about decentralized distribution So in each of the delegates' districts, we could find somebody to give it to them there, or we could actually go to Berlin. I haven't really reached out to Ijoma yet. He's probably up for making a little event there. And also, I haven't been talking to any guys. We have a a store, um, Apricot Media, where they're putting out, um, books, uh, and probably they, they are going, going to join as a sponsor. So yeah, we're just, you know, just, just starting it and, and seeing whether— where it goes. Um, and it's just, it's just too many people to not give, uh, information like this to, um, because my son might ask me, why didn't you tell the politicians?

Perfect. Yeah, great updates there. Maybe Krista, anything else to add?

I just think, yeah, I just want to say thank you. I'm just every day absolutely amazed by Bitcoiners who are just rallying together, doing things off the side of their desk, and just putting so much personal time and effort into, you know, making the world a better and a fairer place. So yeah, thank you for having me on. Our website— so as I said, we're launching on Thursday, Bitcoin Policy UK. Our website is bitcoinpolicy.uk. You can find us on Twitter @BitcoinPolicyUK, the same for Instagram, and obviously at the Geyser Project as well, which I guess you guys will be sending out with the show notes And we have the 2 projects on there. So we're doing the, the orange pill to the UK Members of Parliament, and then also we're looking to raise some money to buy some Bitcoin miners so that we can put those onto a site that has, you know, renewable and stranded energy and, and provide a showcase for Bitcoin mining in the UK. That's the objective. So yeah, just thank you very much, and I'm so happy to be a part of this, and we're really happy to be working with all of you guys. Thank you. Excellent

to hear. Great to hear there are other initiatives as well going on with that. James, anything else from you? Anything to add?

Yeah, my last words are this. The Global South is the future of a lot of things, and we should not ignore the Global South. Now, as Bitcoiners, Sorry, excuse me. Now, as Bitcoiners, um, I think it's our duty to push the adoption message to the ends of the earth. And, um, one of the reasons why we are— I'm toeing down this path again is, um, Nigerian politicians are one of the hardest people to, to convince. When it comes to a lot of things and things that would not actually allow them to siphon some monies into their pockets. So taking a direct approach is one of the easiest routes for me. And I actually have to show my community that yes, it is worth being on the Bitcoin, on the Bitcoin standard. And that was why I was pushing for, you know, when I started the campaign, Within two days, I had gotten up to seventy percent completion, and we have been stuck there around seventy-nine right now. So, and but it was amazing having so much support from the Bitcoin family around the globe. And I was like, wow! Like nobody, nobody, nobody knows me. Like and people are supporting the Bitcoin project, and nobody knows me. Like I am from a third world country. Nobody knows, and people are actually sending sat. Down for a project of that nature. So I would say kudos to everybody and kudos to ourselves as Bitcoiners. Let's keep up the work and let's keep pushing. We will get it right. And I am very certain that if I could succeed in this and kickstart the conversation, we are looking forward to a very, very robust Bitcoin— would I say industrial ecosystem, Bitcoin, whatever— in Nigeria. In fact, I'm looking forward to seeing you guys in Calabar, Cross River State by December, where Calabar will be hosting what we call the Calabar Carnival. It's the biggest and largest street party in Africa. So, and that is where I am racing to. I want Cross River State to be on the Bitcoin standard and be able to accept Bitcoiners to come and party with us. Thank you very much.

Awesome to hear. Glad to have you working on this stuff down in Nigeria, James. Um, Brian, any last words?

Yeah, thank you guys for, uh, you know, putting this out there. I mean, I think that, yeah, just being able to get people, um, to getting people in earshot for people is how this stuff, um, grows even more. So, um, you know, I'm gonna sign off with just— I gotta pitch Orange Pill app one more time. It's not because we're just trying to grow this thing, it's because I think it's, it's fundamentally important to the future of Bitcoin is to have a social layer, a substrate, a layer zero, um, where the people connect. Um, and, and, and there's— it's beyond just connecting on Twitter, right, where there's a lot of noise. It's beyond just having these online connections. Online connections are great, but there's something magic, there's something extra that happens when we have in-real-life connections with other Bitcoiners. Um, so you can go into the App Store, you can go into the Google Play Store, you can go to the the orangepillapp.com and get started with an account. Just like Bitcoin, we all know network effects. We know the importance of network effects. Every Bitcoiner that comes onto the Orange Pill app makes the social layer exponentially stronger, right? And so people are always looking for ways, you know, people are stacking sats and they're— I don't know if you want to call this a bear market or whatever we're going through right now. It seems like it's actually going a little bit better in the last day or so or the last couple weeks. Weeks. But I still think of this as, as the time to build, and I think that that's what we, we all share in this group. You, you're never going to be able to judge whether the market's up or down, but what you can control is building and participating in the, the, the network of Bitcoin, the people of Bitcoin, asking your, you know, local businesses to accept Bitcoin, those types of things. So get on the Orange Pill app, plug into the social layer, go to Consensus Network and buy some Bitcoin books, buy them for gifts for your friends, and then get on Geyser Fund, find a project that interests you, and contribute to it. If you want to build, like, you can do that today. We might have to wait a while for the price to go to $100K, we might have to wait for it for a while to go to a million, whatever it's going to go to, we can't control that. But we can control building today. And there's 3 really, really easy projects with low, low-hanging fruit that every Bitcoiner can participate in literally today. We can jump off this stream, and start participating in those projects right now. So I suggest everybody does that, and that makes a brighter, oranger future for all of us.

Wow, Brian. For fairness, we have to let Niko and Mick talk again, but that's quite the way to close out the stream. Well done. And actually, before I hand it back to them, I'll also quickly shout out the brand new Finnish project that's, that's just starting here. We've got a brand new big Bitcoin. I don't even know the translation. Yhteistyö, the community there. So it's association or something, and it's, yeah, trying to get more of a Bitcoin-only leg in the community there. And it's great that a project like this can be something that we do. So you may all have noticed I'm not actually from Finland, but I really like Finland, and I'd like to see Bitcoin get some more traction here. So I'm going to be working on that to help with that as well. So on that note, maybe Niko, any last words from you?

No, that was beautifully said, Brian. And I also highly recommend Orange Pill app. It's really a powerful thing. And once we get merchants, we already have the events there. I mean, you can maybe in the future actually just buy a book to a politician straight from the app, something like that. You know, why not? I mean, I remember I sent The Bitcoin Standard to the Finnish Prime Minister by myself. I just put her details on the order and have it shipped. Probably didn't read it. Anyway, like Bryan said, everybody can help. Like, you can do— you can start working right now. You can start contributing, even small stuff like that. Every little bit matters. And, you know, if I can grow consensus from one single fringe language book in a fringe country from 2019 to covering over 60, maybe 70 books already across a dozen languages. And that's a testament, by the way, to the hardworking nature and selfishness of the Bitcoiners everywhere. Like, it's such a pleasure to work with people like this. I've never experienced it in my fiat life. So, I mean, there's not really any limitation except the limitations we set to ourselves what we can achieve with this when we work together. And if there's any authors or self-publishers hearing it, I would love to check out your book and have it listed on bitcoinbook.shop. We try to make it kind of like a hub to share all this knowledge. And I know there's a lot of publishing companies out there, so we should cross-list our stuff and work together. Like, there's no There's no reason to, to be greedy and competitive because we can all actually have it all by just working together and division of labor and focusing on things that we do best. All right, that's all. Thanks.

Awesome. Thanks, Niko. And Mick, you want to close us out?

Yeah, guys, it was an absolute pleasure. I learned a lot from all of you today. I think maybe I'll leave I think you guys have said already pretty much everything, so I'll leave some final thoughts. One is the main— I think the per— like Niko just said regarding the power of how the Bitcoin community is selfless and how we are collaborating. Well, we're all— the incentives are aligned, right? If Geyser does well in bringing people to Bitcoin, Orange Pill app wins, right? Because that's more users for Orange Pill app and vice versa. And if Krista gets more politicians involved, or maybe they use Geyser, they, you know, I don't know, that's a little bit of a long shot, but we're all connected around the same incentives of growing this network and expanding it. And it's really win-win-win. Like, if we all If if if we if one loses, probably everyone else also loses. So coming together for the incentives is is so powerful. And then there's this other thing about Bitcoin, which is the which releases the selfish selfishness, selflessness, which is the fact that because Bitcoin goes up in value, well, in the long term, it makes us better off. And because we are better off. we're more able to share. We're more able and willing to part, to depart with a portion of our Bitcoin, of our wealth, because, well, we already broke even. If not broke even, you know, even actually increased our wealth. And when people have their belly full, well, they're much more likely to share with others, and they're much more likely to spread the wealth. If people instead, on the other hand, are suffering through inflation and losing wealth, well, they get meaner, they get angrier, theft goes up, violence goes up, and that's the poverty world we're living in. So this is important because we think with Geyser, it's a lot of it is about donations and also rewards, but we believe that the world, a hyper-Bitcoinized world, will look very different, especially the world of donations. Because again, as Bitcoiners are growing their wealth, they're going to be much more likely to share towards initiatives that they care about and that actually that are important for the network to continue. So we believe the donation economy will go up incredibly much in a Bitcoin world. And yeah, this is by nature of how Bitcoin works. And the last thing I wanted to mention was our main kind of motto at Geyser, which is playing a part in world-changing ideas. And you can play a part by donating and supporting valuable projects and initiatives, but also play a part by actually launching your project. If you have a fiat job, if you're bored out of your mind with your normal life, you can you can do anything, right? You don't have to be a developer. You could be an artist. You could be, you know, just someone with an idea, and you could just launch it and let the community support you in that idea. So play a part and then change the world. And I think all of us today in this conversation have been talking about a project, an idea that can really change the world. So really excited to see where this goes, and maybe we should You know, do another one in a few months and see where this has led us. Could be fun.

That I completely agree with. And thanks again, everyone, for participating. It's great to kind of get an update on all of this as we're kind of kicking off in relative early stages on this stuff. And so I think circling back again in a few months is a fantastic idea. And so just a last thank you to everyone participating here. It's been great to hear about all these great projects. And yeah, let's connect and stay in touch. So yeah, thanks so much again, everyone. And thanks for everyone who's watching. And you can find the replay of this on the ConsenSys Network YouTube channel as well. And I think Geyser will make it available as well somehow. So yeah. Let's follow all these projects. And thanks again, everyone. Thanks for watching. And yeah, this has been ConsenSys Network, Orange Pill App, and Geyser Fund all working together to orange pill all the politicians in the world. So thanks for watching or listening.

Thank you, guys.

Thank you.