Avatar
Brad Mills
148d1366a5e4672b1321adf00321778f86a2371a4bdbe99133f28df0b3d32fa1
Angel Investing into #Bitcoin & p2p web Companies, supporting bitcoin culture at Geyser.fund Grants.

I’ve already got that under control thankfully because I stopped using Twitter, 90% less time on there now

I wrote my “why I’m nuking my X profile” manifesto today.

I’m not sure I will actually post it, but it was a fun exercise.

I used ChatGPT of course, it was kinda wild … I told ChatGPT to search my writing & 4 recent books I’ve written … and what it came back with was very impressive.

It asked me a bunch of questions and then gave me a proposal structure - I modded a few things and it wrote a whole manifesto.

I’m really struggling with the idea of nuking my twitter but I’m 50% more likely to do it this month than I was last month.

The more breaks I take from Twitter, the more I realize was a toxic cesspool of mind poison it is.

It is a source of unhappiness.

Do you know a detail oriented organizer type who wants to get paid in Bitcoin, or cuckbucks, a competitive salary to be my Executive Assistant to help me build my citadel?

Send them here, or if that’s you, apply: bradmills.ca/careers

Fellow Bitcoiner David Short has a great podcast NOT ABOUT BITCOIN.

https://fountain.fm/show/DUOG6Px62NEuWAHZwsl1

Business Books & Co, and I’m pumped to join them next week to review “Reminiscences of a Stock Operator.”

I'm hiring an Executive Assistant and paying a competitive salary.

This will be an important role in supporting my Bitcoin, entrepreneurial & personal adventures with dozens of projects across various industries from venture capital to video games to non-profit work.

I’m not an organized person by nature, I’m a “move fast break things” type of person. I’ve been very successful as part of a bootstrapped team and also as a lone wolf, relying on both my instincts and my long term convictions to create success. I’m a connector and my super power is seeing the future.

I need to find my very own Alfred who loves to create order from chaos & doesn’t mind giving me advice when I need it. Someone who loves meticulously architecting, priority sorting, crafting & maintaining to do list while interfacing with many people to keep projects moving forward.

I have a lot of passion projects on the go, including:

Fitness: I started a challenge to get abs and learn calisthenics! My goal is 165 lbs, 10% bodyfat & to eventually learn to be a calisthenics master. I’ve hired multiple coaches to help me get to this goal, and I’ve been exercising every single day, and eating clean. I hired a full time meal prep person and have been building a solid team of exercise friends. I’m committed to a new lifestyle of fitness.

Family: I want to spend as much time as I can doing relationship strengthening & fun activities with my wife & daughter like travelling, sports & hobbies. I also want to influence and encourage my extended family towards healthy habits & financial literacy.

Learning: I have conviction in my beliefs but I spend as much time as I can learning new skills, I’m a life long learner. I’m open-minded, coachable and flexible. Currently focused on learning about my own limiting beliefs & developing a new way of thinking to live a happier, healthier life. I’ve also invested in multiple business & mindset coaches to make me a better leader & life a more frictionless life.

Film: I was recently the executive producer of my sister’s award winning environmental documentary (which we finished with Bitcoin) & I'm producing/helping with multiple Bitcoin documentaries. I'm starting a film production company where we will be developing more educational documentaries as well as comedy films.

Podcast, Speaking, Events & Coaching: I run a Bitcoin education podcast & coach dozens of people on Bitcoin. I want to level up the events I do. I’m also a speaker at Bitcoin conferences & I am ramping up my media production team to create more educational content for social media that I'm passionate about.

Writing/Book: I’ve written a lot on financial markets, banking & money. I’ve got a first draft of a non-fiction book on financial literacy education and Bitcoin over the last few years, as well as working on a fiction book recently.

Advising: I’ve joined the advisory board / board of directors of a handful of companies and political groups including founding the Bitcoin Coalition of Canada, a non-profit aimed at educating policymakers and journalists in Canada about Bitcoin..

Investing: I’m a seed investor in dozens of Bitcoin startups, investing alongside prolific investors like nostr:npub1sg6plzptd64u62a878hep2kev88swjh3tw00gjsfl8f237lmu63q0uf63m & others, with a focus on investing in entrepreneurs globally in Africa & Latin America. I plan to start a fund & raise money to support early stage bitcoin entrepreneurs building bitcoin & bitcoin adjacent companies on bitcoin layers globally.

Charity & Philanthropy: As I mentioned, I started a non-profit in Canada to help increase financial literacy. I’m raising for the non-profit while also supporting multiple financial education non-profits internationally as well as donate to dozens of global groups supporting human rights & fighting financial oppression globally. I also donate to local initiatives & desire to show up more in the local communities where I spend time.

Real Estate: I own an AirBnB that my mom runs, we plan to continue doing AirBnB projects, which require some attention now and then.

Travel & Lifestyle: Since my wife is Portuguese, we're interested in getting citizenship, buying property & starting a business in Portugal. We want to start taking more trips to other interesting countries, including family trips to places like Iceland, Jamaica, Japan & El Salvador. I want to mix my fitness & bitcoin education goals with this trips to make sure I’m also maximizing the opportunity to educate, speak & do podcasts in other countries when I visit.

Fun: I love to play video games, D&D, watch movies in the theatre, listen to comedy & play sports. I love to ski, surf & try new things. I desire to integrate more fun activities into my life in a healthy way to make sure it also fits in with my family & life goals.

With all of these projects plus more continually being evaluated, you can image my inbox & calendar is in need of someone to help wrangle everything and unlock hidden value that I have not had the time to even read.

This role is not just about administrative tasks; it's about becoming a key partner in achieving strategic business and personal growth goals.  Our journey will be one of continuous growth and organizational structuring. I’m looking for an EA who will be pivotal in helping me level up in all areas of life.

If you know someone that sounds qualified, please send them to bradmills.ca/careers and have them apply.

Please share this post with anyone who you think might be qualified to join me.

Replying to Avatar fiatjaf

nostr:nevent1qqsg0lsd9mqq2yaenw52qxlmgagzvqmxt6kmqeu7087l0jv86pqm85gpr3mhxue69uhkummnw3ezucnfw33k76twv4ezuum0vd5kzmqzyqzfwwzt276rcyr6w7y8q33fqxlk3c8gtqan9c5pv434g0q9j7z2gqcyqqqqqqg7fwe8a

What if we replaced follower counts with some other addictive metric in Nostr clients -- but one that was specific to Nostr and could actually work reliably and not be gamed?

(No, I am not talking about zaps, these can also be gamed, and this is not a trivia question, I don't have any answers.)

Web of trust is what makes the most sense to me.

Verification and followers don’t matter.

A trust score that is relevant to the accumulated of the vouchers/connections in the network makes the most sense imo

PSA: nostr:npub1mutnyacc9uc4t5mmxvpprwsauj5p2qxq95v4a9j0jxl8wnkfvuyque23vg PWA version does not work in lockdown mode as it disables webassembly.

I had lockdown mode on for 4 weeks as I was kinda stress testing Mutiny to see if I’d lose my funds leaving it on so long.

After turning lockdown mode off 1 month later, everything was fine.

No errors, no forced channel closes etc.

I’m loving the Coldcard Q.

I did my very first airgap signed txn from a BIP85 key loaded on Nunchuk.

Such an incredible platform.

Well done nostr:npub1az9xj85cmxv8e9j9y80lvqp97crsqdu2fpu3srwthd99qfu9qsgstam8y8 and team

I woke up at 330 am today on purpose. AMA

Replying to Avatar Mandrik

Ever wonder what it was like working for a Bitcoin company in the early days? Did you know users back then were part crazy, part generous?

I started working at BitInstant late 2012, which allowed people to buy Bitcoin with cash. In the fall of 2013, I joined Blockchain(dot)info (BCI). The early days at BCI is what I want to focus on here.

BCI was the biggest non-custodial web wallet & the most used block explorer. I wore many hats as the first employee, but my main job was handling the support tickets.

My first day at BCI was chaos. I logged into Zendesk and saw THOUSANDS of tickets as old as January 2013. There was one guy, Ben Reeves, doing everything since inception. Support wasn't the highest priority.

After initially feeling overwhelmed, I decided to clean things up. I closed all tickets older than a few weeks, and included a message apologizing for the lack of response. I assured people this would no longer be the norm, and to open a new ticket if their issue was ongoing.

I had free reign over my job, and became obsessed with making sure users received help in a reasonable amount of time. It started as a goal to respond within 24 hours of a new ticket, which turned into 12 hours. Within a few months, the average response time was down to 2-4 hours, only because I had to sleep at some point! 😂

I didn't realize how little I knew about Bitcoin until I had to answer tickets about the Bitcoin network itself. After all, we weren't just a web wallet, but a block explorer! I spent many late nights digging around on BitcoinTalk, trying to learn more, so I could help users with their questions. Learning about Bitcoin back then wasn't impossible, but it wasn't easy.

Many early users were shocked to receive a response to their questions. To hear back so quickly was unheard of. There were many Bitcoin projects back then, but most didn't have dedicated support staff. If you received a response, it would be from the founder or some other developer. These guys didn't have the resources to tackle support, especially in a timely manner.

I quickly learned about the generosity of bitcoiners. Many users requested a btc address from me so they could send a tip for the help provided. Even when I told them it was unnecessary, as I was a paid employee, they insisted on tipping.

Many of these users were nuts. 😂 Here's an example that didn't happen frequently, but it happened:

A user opens a ticket during the time I'm actively watching the queue. I see it come in, respond within minutes with a solution, and he insists on tipping. I'm like, "Bro it's cool, don't sweat it," but this madlad won't leave me alone until he tips me.

I look at my tip jar - 0.5 BTC, which is worth a few hundred USD at the time. WTF, ARE YOU INSANE?! 🤯

Part of this generous attitude was about saying thank you, but I believe a bigger part was about the early proliferation of Bitcoin.

We preach the HODL mentality today, but Bitcoin wouldn't be what it is without the generosity of early adopters. So many bitcoins were given out freely so people could learn about it firsthand.

I believe many of the tips I received were from people who, at one point, also received free btc. It felt wrong to HODL these tips, so I paid it forward. I purchased work related items so I could do my job better. I tipped people on Reddit. I donated towards bitcoin-backed fundraisers, including when Andreas fundraised for Dorian Nakamoto. I did everything I could to keep that spirit of giving alive.

The landscape today has changed, but that spirit of generosity lives on. The best example is zapping on Nostr, where people are tipping each other via LN for posts and comments. It's beautiful to see!

Thank you, early adopters, for your generosity. You're a big part of why Bitcoin is what it is today. 🧡

Be kind, be generous, and be a little crazy. 😄

Awesome story and this is why I’ve invested in (and am such an advocate of) @geyser

To keep the spirit of bitcoin giving strong 💪

Day 1 of the Canadian Bitcoin Conference in Montreal.

Started it off right, went to bed early last night, up at 5 for a 630 gym session.

Plate nostr:npub1fmuxjyjekv66rvglcygqtn89270mep09gx4dwnhf65vqc9vdg7sqnteyzm paid for our day pass like the great guy he is.

nostr:npub12ym4gud920vsfrudtuey6xc99aamgxtemfg056sgxgd855u93vpq7m2gc5 wants me to stay up later tonight to hang out with everyone … I kinda want to but I’m also enjoying my early routine!

What do!?

https://m.primal.net/IHfw.mov

Replying to Avatar Lyn Alden

Both taxes and money-printing redistribute capital, but the difference is that money-printing does it less transparently.

With money-printing, the effect works behind the scenes in ways that are harder to quantify. That's why when a government can't find a solution between hard spending choices, they print money. It's the easier method.

People know their personal tax rate, they will riot if their taxes are too high, and they know exactly who is responsible for tax levels.

But inflation is a more complex beast. It comes with a lag, for starters, since it takes time for printed money to work its way through the system. And when it comes, propaganda built on grains of truth is effective at making it unclear to people who is responsible. "It's the greedy corporations that are responsible for raising prices, not the fact that we increased the money supply 40% over the past two years!"

And so money-printing effects people not directly based on their income, their need, or other things, but based on their level of awareness of what's happening. It rewards people who are aware of it, and are borrowing the devalued currency, owning scarcer assets, and denominating contracts in harder currency. It harms people who are not aware of it, who are earning wages in and keeping their savings in cash or bonds. Many of them are led to believe that CPI is the target to beat, which is a false low target. The real target is the money supply growth rate.

And capital gains taxes, if the cost basis is unadjusted for the rate of money supply growth, further recoup some of that value from the various harder assets that aware people try to protect themselves with.

A lot of MMT advocates act as though they found some grand formula. But really what they have re-identified is nothing new: it's that the less transparent that government spending is, the bigger it can be before people will complain. People will complain about taxes right away, but currency debasement is the sneakier method for which the consequences come with a lag. So it sidesteps hard decisions this year, and leads to bigger issues a year or two from now, when someone else can be blamed and the whole ordeal can be obfuscated.

And it's not new, despite how some MMT advocates would spin it. Currency debasement has been occurring since the adoption of coinage. And even MMT-scale currency debasement has been occurring since World War I. It is turned to so frequently because its lack of transparency allows it to occur at times and magnitudes when more transparent taxes would not.

It’s very difficult to convince the average person why inflation is the result government spending not greedy corps.

They rather boycott the grocery store than understand it’s the government & banks they should be directing their anger towards.