Thanks for the invitation. My answers to some of these turned out to be much longer than I thought they would:
1. When and why did you become interested in cryptocurrencies?
I first head about Bitcoin around mid-2013. I had started to distrust the national media, so started watching news channels from other counties. While watching RT, I happened to catch an episode of the 'Keiser Report' where they frequently discuss how corrupt the traditional banking sector is. Naturally, that resonated with my own impressions of the world, so I got into a habit of watching it. In a few episodes they started talking about Bitcoin.
I didn't quite "get it" at first because they only discussed the speculation side of it, but figured I'd look it up. Found some Andreas Antonopoulos videos and started to understand the idea a little better. Played with a few faucets (as they were actually worth the time in 2013) until I was ready to buy. Kept digging and learning more. Fast-forward a bit and here I am today. I grew tired of Max Keiser after a while, though. Bit over the top. Too much bluster. Also, that altcoin he launched was an absolute atrocity, so that was probably the nail in the coffin.
2. When and why did you buy your first bitcoin?
I bought my first bitcoin in late 2013. Seemed like a no-brainer after what I had learned and also taking into consideration the torrid state of traditional finance. I wanted an "out" and here it was. It was an in-person cash trade because handing out bank account details is extremely risky and I've always been wary of that. Met them at their house, which I'd been to many times previously, handed them a wad of cash, they sent the BTC to my address (along with a much smaller amount of LTC and NMC to their respective addresses, since I figured I'd diversify a bit).
The whole thing felt a bit frantic, as the BTC price was climbing pretty rapidly on a daily basis at that point, so I was naturally eager to get the trade done. Managed to get onboard around the halfway point of that early bull-run to ~$1200. Then continued holding all the way back down to around $200. It was a concern, initially, but I never considered selling. Quite the opposite, In fact. I bought a little more on the way down, having originally planned to buy more on the initial purchase if it weren't for the price rising so quickly.
3. How did you get on the forum?
Can't remember exactly. Probably just found it on a search engine while researching. Glad I found it, though. I've learned more here than on any other website. Aside from bitcointalk.org, the only other social platform I'd recommend to others is bitcoin.stackexchange.com because pretty much all other social media is terrible. This place is a veritable treasure-trove of information and knowledge. I like to think I do my part in helping keep it that way.
4.1. What prevents mass adoption of cryptocurrencies?
In short, bad first impressions and bad habits. Lots of people are somehow given the impression Bitcoin is some sort of get-rich-quick scheme, so straight away they're off to the wrong start with some pretty big misconceptions about what they're getting into. Or they avoid getting into it at all, because they would naturally be wary of get-rich-quick schemes. On top of that, most people have spent their entire lives trusting financial institutions and don't know how to function any other way. People tend to leave their funds in the hands of third parties because it's "convenient" and then they effectively receive a third-rate experience of what Bitcoin really is. If they don't embrace the mindset Bitcoin was founded upon, they're probably going to have a poor experience and they definitely won't receive all the benefits Bitcoin potentially confers. I know some of us die-hards sound a bit stuffy and boring when we talk about the underlying principles and personal responsibility, but Bitcoin was designed this way for a reason. Person A signs the transaction over to person B and that's it. Job done. You don't introduce any middlemen to the equation, because they can then block your transactions or lose/steal your funds. Which kind of defeats the purpose.
As controversial as it may sound, until people can understand crypto properly, I'm beginning to feel like "mass adoption" would actually be a bad idea right now. I don't think human beings, generally speaking, are ready for Bitcoin. They've got too many bad habits to unlearn. I want Bitcoin to be for everyone, but at the same time, I want everyone to be safe when they use Bitcoin. And right now, most of them would use it in an unsafe way. They need a bit more time and a lot more common sense so they don't hand their money over to twitter scammers impersonating celebrities, as they're seemingly prone to doing. We don't need more of that, so mass adoption can wait until people are smarter (again, generally speaking). I know it sounds harsh, but I don't think it's wrong to believe that, given the depths of sheer foolishness I've witnessed recently.
4.2. How do you think mass advertising of gambling projects has a positive effect on the development of the forum or harms the community?
Honestly feeling a fair amount of indifference to this question. I figure if these projects are going to find a way to advertise somewhere on the internet, it might as well benefit our little economy here. Probably doesn't make a big difference in the grand scheme of things, though.
4.3. How do you consider whether 2-3 years of experience in cryptocurrency is enough to successfully invest or does an investor need to receive special education?
Firstly, I'd draw a distinction between investing financially and investing conceptually. Not everyone does both. If people are just looking to gamble, they don't require a great deal of education to do that, aside from being able to spot obvious scams. But if people really want to understand the ethos of Bitcoin and get involved in the correct way, then yes, spend as much time as you can educating yourself before taking the plunge. As I pointed out regarding mass adoption, there's a great deal to learn.
5. What do you think of the current Merit system and signature campaigns? Do they harm the forum?
Having been around prior to the creation of the Merit system, I can comfortably say the forum is a much better place as a result of it being implemented. There's now a certain expectation that junk posts won't be considered acceptable, which is healthy for the community as a whole. It's still sometimes a challenge to find a stimulating conversation, but that might be partly due to the fact that I've been around long enough to have heard many similar ideas rehashed over and over. But the quality is still higher than what it was in the olde days.
And I think, even more important than merit, is the sterling work some users do in reporting plagiarism and bots. It's bad enough to have similar ideas rehashed, but when it's the exact same post you read just two pages prior, suddenly duplicated next to another username, that's when it gets really tedious. It really is a community effort to keep that crap to an absolute minimum, so my thanks go out to those people.
As for signature campaigns, the honest answer is it depends on the campaign in question. Some definitely have higher standards than others. It's clear there are always going to be a few companies that just want to advertise their product cheaply and aren't overly concerned if their participants are producing good-quality content or not. Sometimes it feels like they target a bare minimum, but could probably do better if they tried. It's a tricky one to get the balance right.
I do think signature campaigns should be prevented from forcing participants to make a minimum number of posts per week/month/whatever to qualify for a payout if that hasn't been done yet. Making people post when they have nothing worth saying is a really bad idea.
6. The most useful forum topic? Most helpful users?
Wow, where to begin? There are so many fantastic people dedicating their time and effort to help. I suppose if I had to nominate one person in particular, since they're noticeably absent at the moment, I'd give a shout out to DannyHamilton. I do miss their well-reasoned and informed contributions to the forum and hope they return at some point. For topics, this one is crucial reading for anyone who isn't quite clear on what this Bitcoin stuff is all about:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/bitcoin-the-social-phenomenon-52159277. 3 things you would implement on the forum?
Uh... I think I proposed adding descriptions for some of the subforums that don't currently have descriptions once. I'd like to see more strict guidelines for the Press/Media board to prevent spam and maybe cut out the cryptoblogs who sadly haven't proven to be any more respectable than the mainstream media in terms of journalistic integrity. Other than that, I'm fairly content with how things are.
8. Do you trade on exchanges or invest in projects?
I'm quite cautious. I used to dabble with altcoin trading in small sums, but haven't logged into an exchange in ages. There are just too many reasons not to do it anymore. I don't trust any of them and can't comprehend how people just leave vast sums of wealth in the hands of total strangers on the internet. It's downright crazy when you stop and think about it. Another factor in the decision was the increase in prevalence of KYC/AML requirements, which I'm convinced creates more identity theft than it prevents. Fortunately, when the exchange I was primarily using annouced they were implementing KYC, I was up overall and decided to quit while I was ahead. Dumped any alts I had on that and any other exchanges for BTC and withdrew it all. I don't have much in the way of altcoin holdings these days. Only the ones that never got deposited online.
9. Tell a story about your big profit or big loss?
Since I was always pretty cautious back when I did trade on exchanges, most of my "losses" are theoretical ones caused by not selling at the right time. I'm still holding some Byteball/Obyte which at one brief, glorious moment was probably worth around 3 BTC. It's sadly nothing like that value now. Definitely regret not selling that when I had the chance. But they were completely free to obtain (via what was quite possibly one of the only few credible and legitimate "airdrops" the community has ever seen), so I take solace from the notion that it's not an actual loss.
10. What do you think about the DEFI ecosystem?
In theory? Sounds good. In practice, based on what little I've seen? Sounds utterly abysmal. I call shenanigans. If it really was decentralised finance, it wouldn't be so profitable to exploit and there wouldn't be anywhere near as much hype around it as there currently is. Maintaining a safe distance unless I start to see signs of legitimacy. For the moment, I just get the impression people are brazenly glossing over all the negativity and obvious scams with ICOs and simply rebranding them DEFI, or "wrapped" tokens to pull the same old stunts all over again. They're just trying to make a quick buck with marketing buzzwords and outlandish claims. Avoid at all costs for the moment. There might be a few honest attempts in the mix, but most of it looks pretty toxic.
That said, I'd love to see a day where we can completely abandon custodian exchanges and consign them to the history books where they belong. I still love the idea behind "atomic swaps" which would allow purely peer-to-peer trading between blockchains. It's just the current trend I'm not keen on, where some people are clearly abusing the idea to sell snake oil through mindless tokenisation. Overall, it feels like the technology isn't there yet. There's still a fair bit of development work to go before atomic swaps are truly viable to enable the kind of genuine decentralised trading this current, largely illegitimate, DEFI fad wishes it could emulate.
11. Is your anonymity a vital necessity or precaution?
Not really. I certainly wouldn't go as far as saying it's vital, but at the same time I feel like I could have easily done more to obfuscate it.
12. The last cryptocurrency book you read?
Never have, heh. In some ways I like to think I'm a clever person, but in other ways I'm an absolute philistine. I should read more books.
13. Advise 3 cryptocurrencies/tokens for investment in the next 1-2 years?
Can't offer any specific advice, since I'm mostly out of the altcoins game. And wouldn't feel particularly comfortable doing so even if I could. If you are going to speculate, make sure you're thinking for yourself. You can't rule out the probability that someone is a bagholder of any given coin and is looking for a way to pump the price so they can get out. I've said this already in a recent topic, but never ask for investment advice unless you're in a position to be able to verify what you're being told or you trust the expertise of the person providing the advice implicitly.
Also remember that trading is often as much blind luck as it is looking at the fundamentals of each coin and reading charts and so-called "technical analysis" (which you need to take with a large pinch of salt). Speculation is a variety of gambling. No ifs or buts about it.
I will, however, say sternly what to avoid. People need to get the hell out of Tether/USDT while they still can. I can see that ending badly for all involved. Stablecoins in general seem pretty shady to me, but Tether is blaring all the warning sirens.
14. How much will Bitcoin cost at the end of 2020?
Ask me in thirty years or so. I've got no plans on selling any time soon. My concept of "value" isn't in how much fiat I could obtain for my Bitcoin in the short term. Future purchasing power is certainly of interest. Maybe one day I could buy a house or something. But for the most part, this is my "nest egg" or retirement fund. I can't trust society with safeguarding my conventional state pension and I sincerely doubt many in my generation are going to get one at all, let alone one they could actually afford to live on comfortably. Troubling times ahead, methinks.
15. P.S. (Optional)
Caught me a bit by surprise, so thanks for asking me. Honestly wasn't expecting to be contacted for one of these. Hope people find it interesting or useful. I better get on with reading a few of the other interviews I've missed since I last checked in on this topic. Cheers.