Topic: Interview with the organizers of Adopting Bitcoin (El Salvador) (Read 208 times)

Thank you for listening! I also believe that adoption should happen at a grassroots level and should be voluntary, as opposed to having a government authority step in and tell you what to do. At the same time, I respect the efforts of the people who created Bitcoin Beach in El Zonte, of the educators who put together the "Mi Primer Bitcoin" classes, and everyone who tries to make the most of it. Something that I've had to accept is that purely ideological models rarely apply in real life. And sometimes you can either wait for your ideal to emerge, or else try to model the reality around you with the skills that you have and hopefully turn it into something which more closely resembles your own idea.

I still believe that the best action that governments can take in relation to Bitcoin adoption is to ignore it, so people naturally discover BTC and prepare for the collapse of the fiat system. But what makes me more sympathetic about El Salvador is that they never used force against people who don't accept BTC yet. So the efforts are still bottom-up, trying to educate every merchant and service provider to use a wallet and understand why self-custody matters. This is also the reason why I'm going there next month: I'll launch a Spanish translation of my magazine and tell everyone that it's open source so they can read, print, modify, distribute, and even sell without asking for my permission. It's something that they can use in their journey and I'm happy to help.

I understand that the adoption - making it a legal tender - of Bitcoin in El Salvador is now considered as one of Bitcoin's historical moments though we can see that things are not going smoothly in El Salvador but as they say this is much better than nothing because this puts Bitcoin really on international scene. In my own point of view, Bitcoin must be adopted by the people and not necessarily by the governments which got state power to do the things that Bitcoin can protect us from. And yes, this is actually a very good interview am gaining a lot of insights from it...thanks for sharing.

I've had Ben Arc on my podcast twice:

S8 E9, in which he spoke about his Bowser hardware wallet: https://bitcoin-takeover.com/s8-e9-ben-arc-on-bowser-wallet-lnbits-and-open-source-development/

S9 E6, in which he spoke about his left-wing anarchist views: https://bitcoin-takeover.com/s9-e6-ben-arc-on-anarchisms-left-wing-origins/

this is what their users should keep in mind. they can use the centralised wallets but only for small purchases or storing small funds for emergency use. but if you want to keep your privacy, you can always use noncustodial wallets as you have full control of your funds. also, if you are not disclosing your addresses, the govt won't know such funds.
what El Salvador is doing is truly a good step in further increasing the adoption in their country. there's no doubt that neigbouring countries will follow their path if they see positive impact on their economy.

Labitconf event is in Buenos Aires, Argentina right?
El Salvador is in totally different direction and I think Adopting Bitcoin summit sounds much more interesting to me.
Max Keiser will be there, and I see Ben Arc from LNbits is one of the guests, he make a lot of cool bitcoin based gadgets, I don't know if you made interview with him before.

What El Salvador did was a brilliant idea by adopting Bitcoin as legal, of which other nations such as Central African Republic took it's footsteps months after, so i think people whose funds can be confiscated are those who will probably use a centralized wallets or exchanges own by an individual and controlled by the government, because in as much as one uses a decentralized exchange or wallet in any of these nations, then he or she stands a greater chance of been anonymous in the midst of others, and whatever policy that may have been put in place, as government can not be trusted especially when it has to do with money.

I will not be that positive about other countries following their steps. Controlling exchanges are way easier and I think most governments will go this route so they don't have to risk their capital and use companies to do it instead. The 'small' part is also their benefit compared to other countries because it will be easier to manage if a crisis happens. Other countries usually don't have that 'luxury'.

They have been building foundations for other countries to look at and learn from. It is not easy as they are a small nation and the first nation makes Bitcoin legal tender.

They have to build things together with learning from reality, practice and adjust their plans. It is never easy but if they succeed (that I believe), they will achieve something very sweet. If Bitcoin won't die, El Salvador have many reasons to succeed with their massive plans for Bitcoin. But their President has to be very carefully and should not bet the all national budget into Bitcoin. He needs to have Plan B to avoid liquidation and national debt collapse.

This is just showing that everything is on track from El Salvador regarding adopting Bitcoin. This is very good news for everyone, especially the Bitcoin community.
Once El Salvador will have a huge effect for them adopting Bitcoin as legal tender, for sure neighboring countries or other countries will follow, it's just a matter of time.

Yeah, I'm about to buy my ticket. Didn't pull the trigger because I also considered Labitconf. But I finally came to terms with the fact that I can't afford both 😅

We should never forget how various governments confiscated gold, land property and everything else from people in history.
I am almost sure they will try to do the same thing with Bitcoin in future, maybe not in entire world but very likely it's going to happen in some countries.
With this stupid green agenda brainwashing it's just a matter of time when they are going to start targeting Bitcoin miners worldwide, so we better get ready for that.

I don't like how they started adopting Bitcoin in El Salvador with centralized wallet Chivo, but it's still better than nothing.
Vlad are you going to El Salvador or not?

We're only a month away from Adopting Bitcoin – the event which takes place in San Salvador, the capital city of the first country which accepted to use BTC as a national currency.

Though I'm no fan of top-down adoption and didn't join Bitcoin to deal with governments, I support the event for a very simple reason: I know that, at one point, the government is going to change and the legal tender status of BTC is rather fragile. But I want normal everyday people to be prepared for the inevitable changes and learn more about how to protect themselves against wealth confiscation and the money printer.

So I've recorded an interview with Kemal and Noor, two of the co-organizers of the Adopting Bitcoin event. If you're planning to visit El Salvador next month, you're definitely going to find this interesting.

The recording is available on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/episode/073uyo6G9jSF9sCEJ5gcoU?si=HYl_zmbMTgujLfyYKjMxpQ, Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bitcoin-takeover-podcast/id1451766883?i=1000581615885, and every major podcast streaming service. But if you're privacy minded, I recommend that you open this link in Tor browser – no registration is required and I don't care to know anything about your identity or whereabouts. Big tech options are only there for convenience: https://bitcoin-takeover.com/audio/?name=2022-10-05_s12_e3_kemal__noor_on_the_adopting_bitcoin_conference_in_el_salvador.mp3

Speaking of big tech and convenience, you can find the interview on YouTube in full video. https://youtu.be/F59G33zYKfk

I also wrote an article about the whole affair, just in case you're into reading: https://bitcoin-takeover.com/s12-e3-kemal-noor-adopting-bitcoin-conference-el-salvador/

Enjoy!