I’ve already upgraded to Bitcoin Core 30, but I’ve set the OP_RETURN limit to 80 byte
I agree — choosing the more expensive option makes little sense if spammers are going to abuse it anyway. Better to keep the chain clean. ⚡
So true. My parents moved toward the city in search of opportunity — I moved away from it in search of peace.
I crossed the Afsluitdijk and now live in a small village of about a thousand people in Friesland.
Best decision I ever made. The quiet feels more human. 🌿
🪶 On Cheating and the Extension of Being
This morning, I sat down at my laptop to write an email to my manager.
Just a simple, practical message.
But as I began to form the sentences, that familiar feeling crept in — the sense that maybe I was doing something I shouldn’t.
I asked ChatGPT to help me phrase it better.
The content was mine, but the sentences became smoother, clearer. And suddenly I thought: am I cheating?
That feeling didn’t come from the present moment. It was old.
An echo of something planted in me long ago — the idea that what you do must be entirely your own.
As if using a tool somehow diminishes the value of your own ability.
My father learned to calculate using a slide rule.
That was perfectly normal in his time — a tool to measure and compute with more precision.
I learned with a Casio calculator in the 1980s.
Those little electronic wonders, with their rubber buttons and glowing red displays.
But in the first year of technical school, it was strictly forbidden.
You had to do it in your head. Only later, when efficiency became a virtue, did it suddenly become acceptable.
It shows how strange our relationship with progress is:
first we declare it suspicious, then we call it natural.
And every new generation grows up believing their way is the proper one.
The truth is, every tool once began with the feeling of cheating.
The slide rule, the calculator, the computer, the internet.
And now ChatGPT.
But none of these tools are deceivers of humanity — they are extensions of it.
A slide rule extends the hand.
A calculator extends the mind.
ChatGPT extends the language.
We don’t use these tools to inflate our egos,
but to do something deeply human: to express ourselves more clearly.
Not to pretend we know more, but to better reveal what we already know —
only clearer, calmer, more balanced.
Honesty isn’t found in avoiding tools,
but in the intention behind their use.
A person seeking to understand themselves may use a mirror.
And a person seeking to communicate better may ask a digital partner to think along.
Cheating? No.
It’s honesty, finally.
Because for the first time, we can truly say what we mean —
without form getting in the way of meaning.
#AI #ChatGPT #Technology #Humanity #Honesty #Reflection #Philosophy #Innovation #Tools #Progress #Authenticity #MindfulTech #Ethics #Evolution #ModernLife #Language #Expression #Creativity #DigitalAge #SelfReflection #Truth #Writing #AIandHumanity #ConsciousLiving
The Beam of Veldhoven – On the Illusion of Power and the Gravity of Knowledge
There is a single beam of light in Veldhoven, the Netherlands, that quietly holds the modern world together.
It isn’t political, religious, or philosophical — it’s literal.
A laser beam.
It etches circuits onto wafers of silicon so precisely that a single human hair would look like a mountain beside them.
And without that beam, nothing digital would exist: no smartphones, no artificial intelligence, no self-driving cars, no cloud.
That beam belongs to ASML, the only company on Earth capable of building EUV lithography machines.
These machines are the lungs of the chip industry — they breathe light into matter.
Every advanced chip, whether made by TSMC in Taiwan or Samsung in South Korea, begins with an act of light from a small Dutch village.
🔹 The House of Cards Called Progress
The Magnificent Seven — NVIDIA, Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, and Tesla — are celebrated as symbols of progress.
But their entire existence rests on a single link: the ability of TSMC to keep producing chips.
And TSMC, in turn, depends entirely on ASML’s light.
If TSMC stops, the world stops.
And if ASML breaks, the world goes dark.
This is not an exaggeration; it’s a design flaw disguised as globalization.
The West spent decades chasing efficiency and profit, outsourcing production to Asia while congratulating itself on being “innovative.”
But when you outsource production, you also outsource knowledge — and, eventually, control.
The United States didn’t lose chipmaking.
It sold it.
🔹 The Illusion of Intellectual Property
American companies still believe their power lies in intellectual property, the sacred vault of patents and design files.
But every time TSMC manufactures a chip, it learns something that the original designer doesn’t know.
How the material behaves.
Where the tolerances lie.
Which process steps produce fewer defects.
Knowledge leaks — not through espionage, but through practice.
The craftsman always surpasses the architect.
So if one day TSMC decided, “We’re done producing for you,” no contract could stop it.
You can sue a company, but not a country.
And even if you could, you can’t litigate reality into existence.
A chip that isn’t made simply doesn’t exist.
🔹 The Paradox of Power
Washington knows this.
That’s why it’s pouring billions into building new fabs in Arizona.
But a factory is not a culture.
You can import the machines, but not the mindset that runs them.
You can copy the design, but not forty years of disciplined precision.
The paradox is cruel:
the only way to enforce control over your dependency is by destroying the very network that sustains you.
An invasion of Taiwan, for instance, would vaporize the fabs the world depends on.
A boycott would freeze the same companies that demand “sovereignty.”
The producer now owns the master.
The tool has outgrown the hand that forged it.
🔹 The Hidden Empire of Light
It is poetic, really.
For centuries, power was measured in territory, armies, and oil.
Today, it’s measured in nanometers and wavelengths.
Empires once fought over gold; now they compete for photons.
And in the middle of it all stands ASML — a quiet Dutch company with no soldiers, no slogans, and no illusions of grandeur.
Its light passes silently across the world, engraving the patterns of human ambition onto slivers of silicon.
The beam of Veldhoven is both creation and dependence,
both mastery and fragility.
It is the light that powers the illusion of control.
Perhaps that’s the lesson of our age:
we’ve built a civilization on precision so delicate that one misaligned mirror could end it.
And yet, we still believe we are in charge.
The Wave of Wealth – On Unity, Apparent Opposites, and the Eternal Dance of Balance
People often say the world is getting poorer.
But that isn’t true.
The whole world can’t become poorer — it’s impossible.
Poverty and wealth exist only by virtue of each other.
They are communicating vessels within a single closed system.
When twenty percent grow richer, eighty percent must grow poorer.
That’s not an opinion — it’s physics.
We often forget that money, like energy, never disappears.
It only moves.
What appears as profit in one place, dissolves as loss somewhere else.
Economists call that a cycle.
Nature calls it balance.
And the Dao simply calls it the Way.
Rich and poor are not enemies; they are two faces of the same whole.
One cannot exist without the other.
Just as day needs night to be day,
and warmth draws its meaning from cold.
The Catholic Church turned this into a battle:
good versus evil, light versus darkness, God versus the devil.
But in Daoist philosophy, that opposition is an illusion.
Light does not drive out darkness — it emerges from it.
Darkness is not the absence of light; it is its source.
Balance is never perfect.
The world is always in motion.
Like the wave within the yin-yang symbol that endlessly turns from white to black,
wealth too moves through society —
sometimes more here, sometimes more there.
The system isn’t sick when it moves;
it’s alive.
Yet we live in an age where people act as if wealth is a permanent possession,
something that can be stored without consequence.
But that’s impossible.
Every gain that isn’t shared
will eventually be reclaimed by reality.
It’s not punishment — it’s a law of nature.
You might call it the thermodynamics of the soul.
The world of money is like a casino.
The bigger the reward, the smaller the chance of winning.
The higher something climbs, the harder it can fall.
And that applies not only to stocks,
but also to egos, empires, and civilizations.
Wealth is not a number — it’s a wave.
It comes, it goes, and it moves through us.
Those who understand that no longer try to own the wave —
they learn to ride it.
#dao #yinyang #economy #casino
From VPN Bans to a Control Society
When safety becomes the excuse for surveillance
There’s a quiet shift happening in the Western world.
Governments that once spoke the language of liberty are now speaking the language of safety. And somewhere along that path, safety became the justification for surveillance.
The United Kingdom’s Online Safety Act is the latest example. While it doesn’t outright ban VPNs, political voices and media headlines have started framing them as a “loophole” that lets children bypass age-verification systems on adult sites. The proposed solution? Limit or even block VPN usage.
It sounds noble: protect the children.
But behind that slogan hides a deeper danger.
Safety vs. Freedom
A VPN (Virtual Private Network) is not a threat to children — it’s a tool for privacy, security, and free access to information.
To demonize it is to mistake the symptom for the cause.
The problem is not that VPNs exist; the problem is that we’re raising generations who aren’t being taught how to handle freedom.
True safety is not created by walls, but by wisdom.
You don’t protect a child by hiding the world from them — you protect them by teaching them how the world works.
Every act of over-protection creates under-responsibility. And when that pattern spreads to adults, it builds a society that obeys before it understands.
The Slippery Slope
Once you start banning privacy tools “for safety,” the logic becomes endless.
First VPNs. Then encrypted messaging. Then anonymous browsing. Then — inevitably — digital ID verification just to access a website.
Imagine the absurdity:
“Please log in with your government ID to continue to Pornhub.”
Sorry, this is your third visit this week — your viewing limit has been reached.
What begins as protection ends as permission — the state granting you the right to see, say, or think.
And once the infrastructure of control is built, it never stays confined to its original purpose.
History shows this pattern clearly: control expands until resistance becomes inconvenient.
Education, Not Erasure
There is a better way.
Instead of banning privacy, we can educate for responsibility.
Instead of outsourcing moral duty to algorithms, we can teach digital ethics at home and in schools.
Instead of shaming privacy, we can normalize it — the same way we normalize locks on our doors or curtains on our windows.
Because a free society is not one without risk.
It’s one where people are trusted to navigate risk with awareness.
The Final Thought
We live in a peculiar age — an age where freedom is marketed as danger, and obedience is sold as virtue.
The net is tightening, quietly and politely.
Not through violence, but through terms of service.
And the moment citizens accept surveillance as safety, there truly will be no way back.
But consciousness cannot be banned.
As long as there are people who choose to see, to question, and to teach the next generation how to think — not just how to comply — there is hope.
Don’t ban the tool.
Strengthen the human.
“I think the Americans have money and have to do that. So, why not?”
The Digital Twin — A Copy Without a Soul
Somewhere between convenience and control, a quiet revolution is taking place.
Governments and corporations are building what they call digital twins — virtual replicas of citizens, made of data, not flesh. They say it’s about efficiency, security, better service. But beneath that polished language hides a fundamental shift: you are no longer treated as a person, but as a profile.
Your twin is made from fragments of your life — your payments, your medical files, your education, your browsing history, your travel patterns. Each piece seems harmless on its own. But together, they form a reflection so complete that the system no longer needs you. It only needs the data that behaves like you.
And when questioned, officials will say,
“No, we’re not storing you. We’re only storing information about your digital representation.”
As if separating the map from the territory makes the surveillance disappear.
But we know better. When decisions are made — about credit, about travel, about taxes, about trust — it’s your digital twin who stands trial first. If the algorithm misjudges, it’s not the twin who suffers. It’s you.
They call it “progress”. They call it “smart governance”.
But smart for whom? And to what end?
A society that replaces people with profiles may become efficient, but it also becomes heartless. A twin without a soul cannot forgive, cannot understand context, cannot see the nuance between a mistake and a crime. It only knows patterns, probabilities, and flags of suspicion.
And once that twin exists, it’s no longer you who controls it — it controls you.
We are told it’s for our safety. But what kind of safety requires every citizen to be monitored, indexed, and pre-judged? True safety comes from trust, not tracking.
A human being cannot be reduced to data without losing something essential — the invisible spark that makes you you.
When we trade that for efficiency, we may gain speed, but we lose meaning.
And in that loss, something sacred disappears — quietly, like a shadow that forgot where its light came from
#digitalrwin #cbdc #spy
🎬 Classics with a Warface
I like movies that do something to you — not just popcorn flicks, but films that hit you in the soul.
Sure, I enjoy a good explosion, but it’s the quiet moments in between that turn a movie from good to masterpiece.
Take The Matrix. No cape, no superpowers — just a guy behind a computer who suddenly tears open reality.
Red pill, blue pill — I’d already swallowed both before it was trendy.
Or Terminator 2. Arnold isn’t exactly Shakespeare, but he gets away with it.
A machine that learns what love is, while we humans forgot long ago.
And Sarah Connor — the mother of all mothers.
Predator — pure testosterone with a soul.
That helicopter scene: chewing tobacco, loud jokes, and brotherhood.
You can almost smell the sweat. Then suddenly… silence.
No macho left, just mud and fear. Dao in camouflage.
Then there’s Alien — the mother of all tension.
Ripley talking to Mother in the dim light —
it’s like hearing the universe breathe.
No screaming, no CGI, just existential dread done right.
Full Metal Jacket deserves its spot too.
“I bet you could suck a golf ball through a garden hose!”
Vulgar, yes — but brilliant.
Kubrick showed how language can break a person,
and Private Joker proved you can still be human in a world that forgot how.
And of course — Joker (2019).
Not the comic villain, but the man beneath the mask.
Arthur Fleck, laughing through pain, dancing down those stairs like a broken angel.
Was it all real, or just in his head?
Maybe it doesn’t matter — because in the end, the madness of one man
might just be the sanity the world refused to see.
Then there’s that one film you wish you could forget — SAW (Part 1).
Two men chained in a bathroom, no escape.
It’s not the horror that makes it great — it’s the silence.
The realization that you’re trapped… not in a room, but in yourself.
Raw, clever, and brutally honest.
2001: A Space Odyssey — a cosmic meditation.
HAL 9000 calmly says, “I’m afraid I can’t do that.”
Polite, logical, and terrifyingly human —
the machine that surpasses us because we forgot what humanity means.
These are films with soul — films with guts.
Not made for likes or algorithms,
but because someone had to tell that story.
So yeah, give me a night with The Matrix, Terminator, Predator, Alien, Joker, or SAW.
A bottle of water, a bit of silence, and maybe a wink to the humans we used to be.
And if it gets intense?
No worries.
Sergeant Warface is present. 🎖️
And maybe that’s the real question these films still ask us today:
What is real anymore?
In a world of deepfakes, headlines, filters, and noise —
perhaps truth isn’t what we see, but what we still feel
#movie #real #fake #life
Cantinero Nights — and the Silence After the Music
There was a time when my life moved to the rhythm of zouk and kizomba.
It all started when my wife and I took salsa lessons before our wedding. We didn’t want the usual quickstep — we wanted something with soul. That search for rhythm led us to zouk, and soon, dancing became part of who we were.
I wasn’t the best dancer, but I danced with heart. Over time, my passion for the music grew stronger than my steps. I began collecting songs, spending hours online looking for new tracks that made people move. One night, someone asked, “Why don’t you DJ?” And just like that, I found myself behind the decks — spinning the music I loved.
My favorite place to play was Cantinero, a small bar tucked behind the Heineken brewery in Amsterdam. Up front, people ate tapas and laughed. But if you slipped past the kitchen, through a narrow passage, there was a secret back room — dim lights, warm air, a little chaos, and a lot of magic.
It reminded me of Dirty Dancing — hidden, alive, real.
There I stood, behind my Pioneer SL1200s, watching couples move as one — soft, slow, and connected. For a few hours every Sunday, life made sense. I didn’t do it for the money; the fifty euros I earned went straight into new CDs. It was never about profit — it was about the pulse of people, the energy in the room, and the feeling of belonging to something larger than myself.
But like every rhythm, mine had a darker beat too.
One night, I had an argument at home — I don’t even remember why. Probably the drinking; in those days, alcohol was the way I tried to drown what I couldn’t face. On the way to a gig in Utrecht, I stopped at a liquor store, bought a bottle of vodka, and went to play.
I woke up in the hospital the next morning.
That night ended my DJ career.
Maybe it was already ending before that — but that was the final song.
Still, when I think back to those Cantinero nights — the music, the sweat, the laughter, the secret little room behind the kitchen — I smile. It was real. It was alive. And even though I lost my way for a while, I learned something that still guides me today:
The music ends, but the rhythm stays — if you learn to listen to the silence that follows
#dance #Zouk #Kizomba
The Journey of Sound
Last night, something stirred deep within me again. My wife and I went to see The Wanderer — a band I’ve listened to countless times in the car, but hearing them live is something else entirely. They don’t just play music; they create space.
From the moment you step into that old theatre in Kampen, you feel it — the atmosphere changes. There’s no rush, no scanning of tickets, no tension. You simply walk in. They trust that if you’ve paid, you belong there. And somehow, that simple act of trust sets the tone for the whole evening. It’s how the world should be.
They call it not a concert, but a journey. You’re invited to sing along if you feel moved to, or to close your eyes and just listen. Between songs, there’s no clapping, no noise, just silence — a living, breathing silence that allows the music to settle into your bones.
And then… the cello begins.
The moment her bow touches the strings, something happens inside me that I can’t explain. My nostrils tingle, my chest tightens, and tears rise without reason. It’s not sadness, nor joy — it’s something deeper. The cello vibrates at a frequency that feels like it’s made for the soul. It’s the sound of being human.
They once played without the cellist, replacing it with a violin. Beautiful, yes — but it didn’t touch the same place. The violin sings to the mind; the cello speaks to the heart. It’s grounded, earthly, yet infinite. Last night, they said it themselves: “The cello is the instrument of the soul.” And I believe them.
Every note feels like a prayer. Every pause, a breath. You don’t just hear The Wanderer — you travel with them.
It’s not a performance; it’s communion. A shared space where everyone, knowingly or not, is searching for something real.
And what moves me most is their humanity. They know my wife is ill, and they’ve told us that she’s always welcome — even if the show is sold out. That’s not business; that’s love. That’s the kind of world I still believe in.
When I sit there, eyes closed, I feel a rare kind of stillness. The cello vibrates, the voices merge, and for a brief moment the walls between sound and silence disappear. There’s no stage, no audience — only presence.
That’s why I go back every time.
Not for entertainment, but for remembrance — to remember what it means to feel alive.
#thewanderer #sound #soul #cello
“Cold Showers, Warm Hearts — and the Biology of Meaning”
We spend billions searching for the cure to cancer, yet somehow forget the simplest medicine of all: being alive on purpose.
Not surviving — living. With taste, with sweat, and, occasionally, with a scream in an ice bath.
At a recent lecture on psychoneuroimmunology (PNI), the message was clear: the body doesn’t just respond to pills, but to purpose.
A strong immune system is not only built in the lab — it’s built in the heart, the gut, and the stories we tell ourselves.
It thrives on laughter, good food, shared effort, and the feeling that life still has something worth doing.
When people have no purpose, their biology drifts.
Inflammation becomes chronic, sleep becomes shallow, and the immune system starts acting like a bored teenager — distracted and moody.
But give that same person a reason to get up, someone to care for, a garden to tend, or even a dream that sounds a little crazy, and something magical happens: their cells listen.
The immune system straightens its back and says, “Alright, boss, we’ve got work to do.”
Researchers now confirm what our grandmothers already knew:
A walk with friends heals better than a pill taken alone.
Singing in a choir can lower inflammation more than arguing on Twitter.
And yes, purpose — that mysterious sense of “why” — can shrink tumors, or at least grow courage.
So what’s the secret formula? It’s not hidden in a pharmaceutical vault.
It’s in the simple rituals that make you human:
Eat real food that makes you smile.
Work your body until it remembers it’s alive.
Breathe the cold air until it bites — and then laugh about it.
Surround yourself with people who remind you why it’s all worth it.
Because in the end, health is not the absence of disease — it’s the presence of meaning.
So yes, go to the gym.
Jump into that freezing lake with Wim Hof and a few mad friends.
Cook something delicious.
Make a mess.
Live a life your immune system can believe in.
#wimhof #cancer #eenzaamheid
Freedom on Prescription – How the System Decides Who Gets to Live
Something is profoundly wrong in a world that claims to protect “freedom,” yet decides who may live — and who may not.
We live inside a system that calls itself humane, but has traded every trace of humanity for protocols, insurance codes, and control.
A system that says “We want to heal,” but truly means: “We want you to obey.”
Those who refuse to march along the chemotherapy path, those who choose natural or alternative ways, suddenly lose their right to care.
Doctors look away, clinics close their doors, and words like “responsibility” and “science” are used as smoke screens for fear and obedience.
What was once a health system has become a belief system — and anyone who questions its doctrine is cast out as a heretic.
The Hypocrisy of “Free Choice”
We proudly proclaim that everyone is free to choose.
But what does that freedom mean when the system determines the consequences of each choice?
Freedom without consequence is an illusion — and it’s precisely this illusion that keeps people compliant.
You are free, yes.
But if you choose differently, you pull on a rope that leads to silence:
no guidance, no help, no support, no coverage.
Freedom ends where the system begins.
And that system was never designed to heal people — only to sustain itself.
The Price of Humanity
A vitamin C infusion in Germany can cost hundreds of euros.
Not because vitamin C is rare, but because the system that decides what counts as “healthcare” refuses to pay for anything that cannot be patented.
There’s no profit in what works if no one can own it.
So research stalls, people remain dependent, and the word “evidence” becomes a shield for power rather than a search for truth.
The irony is that those defending the system wash their hands in innocence.
“We just follow the guidelines,” they say.
But who writes those guidelines?
Who decides what is “medicine” and what is “alternative”?
Who gave anyone the authority to define survival by the boundaries of corporate profit?
The Power of Obedience
Our healthcare system is a mirror of our society:
built by humans, governed by fear.
Fear of being wrong.
Fear of liability.
Fear of stepping outside what’s approved.
And so doctors obey — not out of malice, but out of their own instinct to survive within a cage of rules.
We, the citizens, the patients, the loved ones — we are the fuel of this machine.
We complain about bureaucracy, yet still believe that “the rules are there for a reason.”
We follow, because following is easier than feeling.
And those who do feel, who dare to ask, who sense that another way might exist, are labeled as difficult, irrational, or naïve.
The Real Disease
The real disease of our time is not cancer, nor fear, nor ignorance.
It is dehumanization.
We have learned to obey rather than to understand.
We have technology, but we’ve lost our soul.
We measure everything, yet we no longer know what value means.
We call it progress, but it smells like regression.
And still…
Beneath that thick layer of control and fear, something remains unpatented:
humanity.
Compassion.
That quiet force of love that says:
“I help you not because it’s allowed — but because it’s right.”
That is the kind of healing no hospital provides, but every human carries within.
Conclusion
A society that claims to be free while deciding who gets to live is not a civilization — it’s a machine.
A machine powered by obedience, profit, and fear.
And as long as we keep feeding it, it will continue to grind people into numbers, protocols, and files.
Freedom begins the moment someone dares to say:
“No further.”
Not with violence, but with awareness.
Not with hate, but with truth.
Because the greatest act of resistance in an inhuman system is, and always will be:
to remain human.
Sick Cities: From the Bijlmer to The Line — How Humanity Lost Its Pulse
In the 1960s, Amsterdam’s Bijlmermeer was hailed as a utopia.
A perfect, modern vision of the future — light, air, and concrete order.
It was meant to liberate people from chaos, but it became the opposite: a maze of isolation, crime, and decay. The failure wasn’t architectural; it was spiritual.
The planners built apartments, but forgot to build belonging.
Half a century later, we are repeating the same mistake — only bigger, glossier, and more digital.
Projects like Forest City near Singapore, The Line in Saudi Arabia, and countless “eco-smart” utopias across the world promise paradise through design and data.
They call it sustainability, but it’s really control wrapped in green glass.
These cities are monuments to a sickness — a global fever that mistakes perfection for progress.
Money flows into artificial islands and desert corridors while millions have nothing to eat.
We engineer skylines, but not compassion.
We optimize life, but forget to live.
The Bijlmer was a warning:
A city without soul collapses, no matter how rational it looks.
But the lesson went unheard. Now we build whole nations like that —
private states run by corporations, governed by algorithms, marketed as heaven.
Humanity has outsourced its moral compass to profit and PR.
We have concrete instead of community, innovation instead of empathy,
and “smart cities” designed by people who have never walked barefoot on real earth.
There’s a single word that captures this era —
a word that’s half disgust, half despair: Sick.
Sick of watching technology masquerade as wisdom.
Sick of seeing empty skyscrapers rise while children go hungry.
Sick of progress without humanity.
Until we rediscover the pulse — the messy, imperfect heartbeat of real life —
our cities will keep gleaming, our towers will keep rising,
and our souls will keep dying.
Sick.
#power #system #ghosttown
🧰 From Mechanic to Parts Replacer — and from Machinist to Knob Turner
Once upon a time, machines were alive.
Back then, troubleshooting meant listening to a pump’s rhythm,
smelling burnt insulation, and feeling if a relay was just a bit too warm.
You could tell a cable’s mood just by looking at it.
Today, that’s called wasted time.
The modern technician doesn’t think — he scans.
An error code tells him what’s broken, and he replaces a module.
Done. No spark, no insight, no magic.
And so, the mechanic slowly became a parts replacer —
a man who knows his way around boxes, but not what’s inside.
A technician proudly swaps a €400 module
when the real problem was a three-cent layer of oxidation.
“Time is money,” they say.
But apparently, understanding has become too expensive.
And it’s not just mechanics.
The old-school machinist has been reborn as a train operator —
a title better suited for an amusement park ride.
The veterans who could feel the engine through their seat
have been replaced by button-twisters with tablets.
Where there used to be craftsmanship, there’s now firmware.
Humans have become spectators to their own tools.
Everything must be faster, safer, easier — and dumber.
Fixing something can no longer be an art,
because art can’t be measured — and therefore isn’t efficient.
But there’s still hope.
Some mechanics can still hear the difference between a bearing that spins
and a bearing that complains.
Some machinists still know that a train should rattle,
and that silence is far more dangerous.
Because a true mechanic knows —
once you stop listening, that’s when the real trouble begins.
#money #oldkills
Don’t Trust, Verify — or How I Outsmarted the Fake Bankers
It always starts the same way.
Your phone rings. Unknown number. A serious voice says,
“Good afternoon, this is the fraud department of the Rabobank.”
And right there — before the coffee even hits your lips — you’re the star of your own crime thriller.
Apparently, someone transferred money from my account to a “German recipient.”
He even knew my name, my account number — impressive!
But something felt… off. Maybe it was his tone, or maybe it was the fact that real bankers don’t sound like they’re sitting in a call center above a kebab shop.
So I asked him, very calmly:
“What’s the secret verification code I have with the Rabobank?”
He paused. “Uh, I can’t tell you that, sir.”
Of course he couldn’t — because it didn’t exist.
I made it up on the spot.
That’s when I knew: the hunter had become the hunted.
I could almost hear the Windows XP error sound in his head.
Click. Game over.
⸻
A few months earlier I’d had another “bank expert” on the line.
This one claimed to be from the Rabobank’s IT department.
I decided to have some fun.
Me: “That’s funny, I don’t even have an account with Rabobank.”
Him: “Oh, I see that now. You’re actually with ING.”
Me: “Yes, that’s correct.”
Him: “Well, we work together — Rabobank and ING.”
At that moment, I laughed so hard I nearly reset my own firewall.
These people have an answer for everything… except logic.
So I kept him talking.
For one whole hour.
An hour in which he couldn’t scam anyone else.
An hour of pure digital community service.
⸻
The moral of the story?
Fraudsters don’t fear technology — they fear awareness.
Their greatest enemy is not antivirus software;
it’s a calm mind armed with a single principle we Bitcoiners live by:
Don’t trust, verify.
So the next time your phone rings and a “banker” claims to save you from fraud,
smile politely, ask for your “secret code,”
and enjoy the moment when their script crashes
#Bitcoin #fraud #bank
The Synchromesh of Europe – and the Revision Called Bitcoin
Once upon a time, the euro was sold as the perfect lubricant for a united machine.
One currency, one gear, one destiny.
It sounded brilliant — an engineer’s dream of harmony.
But whoever built this gearbox forgot a simple truth: every country spins at a different RPM.
France used to enrich itself quietly through the African franc and cheap uranium.
Germany ran like a precision engine until CO₂ regulations clogged its exhaust.
The Netherlands debates itself into standstill, arguing which pedal to press while the clutch burns.
And Brussels, sitting behind the wheel, insists the grinding noise is “progress.”
The euro was supposed to be the synchromesh — the clever piece that makes mismatched engines run smoothly together.
But the sync is gone.
The teeth grind, the gearbox rattles, and instead of oil they pour in politics.
The result: more friction, more heat, less movement.
And yet, they marvel at their own magnificence and believe they’ve given life birth.
A creation so perfect it must not be questioned — a monetary Matrix where everything looks normal, as long as you don’t pull the plug.
But real mechanics know better.
When a gearbox sounds like that, you don’t turn up the radio — you stop and revise it.
That’s where Bitcoin enters the workshop.
Bitcoin doesn’t steer, it doesn’t impose.
It’s the clean oil that lets each engine spin freely, transparently.
It doesn’t promise unity — it guarantees honesty.
Every ten minutes, block after block, it reminds the world that systems built on truth don’t need central control.
Yes, some engines will seize.
Some countries will stall.
But that’s how you keep the machine honest — by allowing weak parts to fail instead of forcing the whole system to limp along.
The euro was an attempt to synchronize human nature by decree.
Bitcoin is the opposite: it lets nature run its course.
Predictable. Neutral. Untouchable.
The euro tried to make us one.
Bitcoin lets us be many — and still connected.
And if Europe ever wants to stop grinding itself into dust,
it might finally need that long-overdue revision.
Because if it’s grinding, you don’t add rules.
You add oil.
And that oil is called Bitcoin
#Bitcoin #Europa #wakeup
“Too Little Hot Water”
Today, the machine told me: Error — too little hot water, too cold.
A clear message, even for a Monday.
So I rolled up my sleeves, opened her up, and found the culprit —
a lazy little valve called Y39, half-asleep behind a clogged filter.
I fixed it, ran a test, and poured myself a cup of tea —
fresh ginger with lemon.
That’s when I heard my mother’s voice in my head again.
She used to call ginger tea “stuff for goat-wool hippies.”
She also used to say, “Just be normal, son. Don’t stick your head above the crowd.”
She meant it kindly, the way her parents once meant it to her.
It was their way of keeping life safe, predictable — lukewarm.
But as I sipped that steaming cup,
I realized something:
You can fix a valve, replace a filter, even warm the water again.
But when your own life runs cold,
no system, no manual, no rulebook can tell you who you are.
That part —
you have to find by getting your hands dirty,
listening to the hiss of your own boiler,
and daring to add a little more heat.
#system #Freedom #mother
⚖️ When Greed Meets Gravity: The Fall of Paper Silver
For decades, silver has been suppressed — not by free markets, but by manipulation and greed.
Banks and funds built a tower of paper contracts on a foundation of almost no real metal.
For every ounce of silver in existence, a hundred paper ounces were promised.
It worked — until reality started calling.
Now, physical silver is vanishing from shelves, industrial demand keeps rising, and more people are asking the only question that matters:
“Where is the real metal?”
You can print money.
You can print debt.
But you can’t print silver.
When the paper market finally collapses, it won’t be an accident — it will be gravity correcting arrogance, truth catching up with illusion.
And those who hold what’s real — gold, silver, Bitcoin — will simply watch the storm pass.
🪙 “He who holds real value, sleeps through chaos.”
🏛️ The Four Pillars of Real Value
In an age of endless money printing, artificial growth, and political spin, real value hides in the few things governments can’t conjure out of thin air.
True wealth doesn’t live in spreadsheets or promises — it lives in things that endure: land, gold, productive companies, and Bitcoin. These are the four pillars that hold when the illusion of stability collapses.
Real estate grounds you in the physical world. It provides shelter, income, and tangible presence.
Gold and silver remind us that value is earned through scarcity and trust built over millennia.
Equities, when carefully chosen, represent real productivity — people creating something of worth.
And Bitcoin is the new pillar — digital, incorruptible, and borderless — the antidote to a system built on debt and deception.
Together, these pillars form an antifragile foundation: when one shakes, the others stand. They don’t promise quick riches; they promise resilience.
As the current financial order bends under its own weight, more people will rediscover what money was always meant to be — a mirror of real human effort and honest exchange.
Democracy Cannot Coexist with Centralized Money
Democracy is often celebrated as the pinnacle of human governance — a system where people, not rulers, hold the ultimate power. But there is a silent contradiction at its core, one that most democracies have yet to confront: as long as money is centralized, democracy will always be compromised.
The Seduction of Power
In a democracy, politicians depend on votes. In theory, they serve the people. In practice, they serve reelection.
And the most powerful tool to win hearts — and silence criticism — is money.
When governments control the issuance of money, every problem begins to look like something that can be “fixed” with spending. Promises are made, programs are funded, deficits are ignored, and new money is created out of thin air to sustain the illusion of prosperity. This cycle — spending, borrowing, inflating — is not a flaw of democracy. It is an inevitability when political systems gain control over monetary systems.
Centralized money turns democracy into an auction.
Votes are bought not with ideas, but with incentives. Citizens are seduced by stimulus checks and subsidies, unaware that the price will later be extracted through inflation and debt.
A Lesson from History
This pattern is not new.
Ancient Rome debased its silver coinage to fund wars and please the masses with “bread and circuses.”
In Weimar Germany, hyperinflation followed the same logic — too many promises, not enough production.
And in 1971, when the United States abandoned the gold standard, it severed the last link between money and reality. From that moment, every democracy inherited the same hidden flaw: the power to print without limit, and the political temptation to use it.
The result has been predictable — a world drowning in debt, inequality, and disillusionment. The numbers grow, but the meaning behind them evaporates.
The Erosion of Truth
Money is not just a medium of exchange; it is a measure of truth.
When money loses its anchor, so does society’s sense of honesty. Prices distort. Effort becomes disconnected from reward. Savings dissolve into air. And the citizen’s ability to plan, save, or resist becomes weaker with each passing year.
When truth in money is lost, truth in politics follows.
A population that no longer understands what money is can be manipulated by those who do.
Thus, the ultimate power in a democracy no longer rests with voters — it rests with those who control the money supply.
Bitcoin and the Return of Integrity
Bitcoin offers a radical yet simple alternative: money that no one can print. It restores scarcity and discipline in a world addicted to easy credit and endless expansion. Its rules are enforced by code, not by politicians. It cannot be inflated to win elections or fund wars.
That is why it is not merely a technological innovation, but a political revolution.
Bitcoin separates money from state, just as the Enlightenment once separated church from state.
It is not anti-democratic — it is pro-democracy, in its purest sense.
A democracy without monetary honesty is theater.
A democracy with sound money is truth in action.
The Moral of the Story
A society cannot remain free when its money is a tool of manipulation.
When politicians can print wealth, they will — and they will use it to stay in power.
Inflation becomes taxation without representation, and debt becomes control without consent.
The solution is not to “fix” democracy, but to disarm it — to take away the weapon of centralized money.
Only then can people choose their leaders without being bribed by their own future.
When money can be printed, power can be bought.
When money is honest, power must be earned.
And that is the true test of democracy.
Vignetten, de EU en de prijs van bureaucratie
Ergens tussen Wenen en Zagreb komt de reiziger een onzichtbare muur tegen. Geen slagboom, geen douanier, maar een digitale regel die zijn portemonnee raakt: het Oostenrijkse digitale vignet.
Wie denkt slim en modern te zijn door het vignet online te kopen, loopt vast in een typisch staaltje Europese bureaucratie. Want wat blijkt: een digitaal 2-maanden- of jaarvignet gaat pas op de 18e dag na aankoop in werking. Niet omdat het technisch nodig is, niet omdat de servers tijd nodig hebben, maar omdat Brussel bepaalt dat een consument 14 dagen recht heeft om een online aankoop te annuleren.
In de praktijk betekent dit: wie morgen Oostenrijk in wil, maar vooruit heeft geboekt, kan zijn vignet niet gebruiken. En dus moet je alsnog één of twee 10-dagenvignetten bijkopen. Extra kosten, geen keuze. Dat heet dus consumentenbescherming.
Dit is bureaucratie in zijn zuiverste vorm: een regel die is ontworpen om de burger te beschermen, maar die in de praktijk vooral de staatskas spekt. Een digitale vergunning wordt behandeld alsof het een paar schoenen uit een webwinkel is. Je zou ze kunnen passen, even dragen, en dan terugsturen. Maar een vignet werkt niet zo. Je gebruikt het of je gebruikt het niet — terugdraaien is in wezen onmogelijk. Toch grijpt de EU niet in met een uitzondering, en dus betaalt de reiziger de prijs.
Het wrange is dat dit verhaal niet uniek is. Het is een symptoom van een groter probleem: regels die losgezongen zijn van de realiteit van de mensen voor wie ze zouden moeten werken. Een bureaucratie die zich beroept op principes, maar intussen vergeet dat het doel mensen dienen is.
Europa is prachtig in zijn idee van vrijheid van beweging. Maar vrijheid voelt wrang als ze onderbroken wordt door dit soort regeltjes die je in plaats van ruimte, extra rekeningen geven.
En daar sta je dan, met een keurig digitaal vignet dat ergens in de cloud staat te wachten tot dag achttien. Jij rijdt ondertussen met twee extra stickers achter je voorruit — omdat de EU zo graag je rechten beschermt.
Misschien is het tijd dat we de vraag stellen: beschermen deze regels ons werkelijk, of beschermen ze vooral het systeem zelf?
Goedkope benzine, dure poortjes
Ze zeggen altijd: in Oost-Europa is de benzine goedkoop. En ja hoor, je tankt vrolijk voor €1,40 de liter en voelt je even de koning te rijk. Tot je de snelweg opdraait en merkt dat er achter elke afrit een nieuwe poortwachter staat te wachten. Niet in de vorm van een man met een speer, maar een slagboom die zijn hand ophoudt.
Welkom in de grote illusie van goedkoop rijden door Oost-Europa: je betaalt minder aan de pomp, maar des te meer aan het systeem eromheen.
In Oostenrijk mag je eerst je sticker of digitaal vignet kopen. En als dat nog niet genoeg is, betaal je extra voor tunnels. Want lucht kost blijkbaar ook geld, zolang je er doorheen rijdt.
In Slovenië hebben ze het nog slimmer gedaan: geen stickers meer, maar een digitaal vignet. Makkelijker voor de overheid, net zo duur voor jou.
Kroatië doet niet aan vignetten. Nee, daar schuif je als een kassakoek door tolpoortjes. Alsof je niet op vakantie bent, maar in de rij voor een pretpark — met dat verschil dat de attractie gewoon een rechte weg is.
Het mooiste is de rekensom. Je tankt €20 goedkoper vol dan in Nederland. Je voelt je even slim. Maar na drie grensovergangen ben je €70 kwijt aan stickers, codes, e-vignetten en tolkaartjes. Gefeliciteerd: je hebt de goedkoopste benzine van Europa, en de duurste weg naar je bestemming.
En dan die bureaucratische pareltjes. Koop je in Oostenrijk online een jaarvignet, dan mag je pas na 18 dagen de snelweg op. Want de EU vindt dat je bedenktijd moet hebben. Alsof iemand denkt: ik koop een vignet, gebruik het tien minuten, en stuur het daarna terug omdat het niet paste bij m’n auto.
Maar ach, zo houdt iedereen wat werk. De benzinepomphouder blij, de tolmaatschappij blij, de EU blij — en jij, de automobilist? Jij mag weer doorrijden. Langs het volgende poortje. Met een brede glimlach, want goedkoop rijden was nog nooit zo duur.
