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Andrew Barnwright
ecda3cb888e89b2d59f44479a9f34cee477f9af85e42f9efe5aa537280135b8b
Amateur woodworker & musician. Wannabe regenerative farmer. Timberframer in training.
Replying to Avatar John Dennehy

My First Bitcoin needs your help

We are in danger of running out of funding before some longer-term funding kicks in at the end of the year. If nothing changes, we will run out of money in September.

How did we get here? Well, in order to remain independent, we leave A LOT of money on the table

But for this post I want to give greater transparency into our expenses

With time we will make financial transparency part of our official SOP and publish everything on our website, but in the meantime, some context

Expenses are varied—we rent a house which we converted into school, we develop various open-source curriculum, we give sats to students as part of classes, we host 50+ meetups per year, we are building a Learning Management System (LMS) that anyone will be able to use, and lots of other expenses but I want to focus on payroll, which is our largest single expense

We have 20+ paid staff in addition to project-based contract work we hire for on an as-needed basis. Teachers are the largest and most obvious group, but this number includes some less visible roles as well. We pay developers & designers to build out infrastructure to help independent educators across the world. We pay lawyers, accountants and auditors to help us be compliant in multiple jurisdictions. We pay creators of open-source curriculum, lesson plans and activities.

This staff is the backbone of an emerging global movement. The commonality among them all—they are all underpaid. Not only did every current staff begin as a volunteer, many of them have quit much higher paying jobs to work here—often earning less than half of what they made in their previous job. Our payroll is about $24,000 per month

We need your help to maintain and make it to the end of the year, when some new longer-term and more sustainable funding will kick in.

if you do want to donate, visit our campaign on nostr:npub1kmwdmhuxvafg05dyap3qmy42jpwztrv9p0uvey3a8803ahlwtmnsnhxqk9

https://geyser.fund/project/miprimerbitcoin

Join me in supporting nostr:npub17cyatz6z2dzcw6xehtcm9z45m76lde5smxdmyasvs00r4pqv863qrs4ml3's mission to bring open source #bitcoin education to the world

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Replying to Avatar Peter McCormack

The studio is ready, Danny's flights are booked, and next week we’ll begin recording episodes for our new podcast.

I wanted to share the reasons behind this shift as many have been asking. Three primary factors influenced this decision:

1. I hate making remote shows—I never want to do them again. These interviews need the intimacy of being in person.

2. Traveling constantly has been detrimental to my health and my family.

3. My commitments here with the football club and local community are growing.

So, the solution was clear: build a studio in the UK and produce the show locally.

We’ve secured a fantastic space in Soho, London, and we’re ready to go but given the limited number of Bitcoin guests available in the UK or those willing to fly in, it’s time to retire What Bitcoin Did.

Our new podcast will be similar in feel but will cover a broader range of topics. While some episodes will focus on Bitcoin (though less frequently), most will explore other interesting topics or people.

Having made nearly 900 episodes covering a wide range of #bitcoin topics and guests, we’re now aiming higher. By diversifying our content and guests, we hope to introduce more people to the concept of sound money through podcast osmosis. If we get this right, it will be a bigger show, if we get it wrong, well we tried.

For a long time I have felt there is a need to get out of the #bitcoin corner of the party. Real Bedford FC was a way of integrating sound money into a traditional business model. CheatCode purposely did not include Bitcoin in the title, so changing the show feels like a natural next step.

Sometimes when stuck in the #bitcoin landscape you can lose site of how other people in the world think, lose empathy for the complexities of the world. I have felt this. I'd come home from spending two weeks with Bitcoiners and be with friends and family locally and notice a distinct difference in how we see the world. As everything feels like it is going to shit, I feel like there is a bigger job to do now.

The Bitcoin podcast landscape is well served, from Marty and Odell to Natalie and Preston, from The Blue Collar guys to Stefan Livera and anyone I haven't mentioned. There’s no shortage of high-quality Bitcoin podcasts.

However, there seems to be some fatigue in the space, with similar guests and topics being revisited. With our new show we want to bring fresh perspectives and ideas, aligning with sound money where relevant—think of the shows we’ve had with the likes of Eric Weinstein and Michael Malice.

On a personal note, I’m need the challenge, test myself wider, get fit and find a good woman. I can't do this travelling all the time.

When I started the podcast my life was a shit show - divorced, coming off drugs, heading towards bankruptcy. I've had an incredible 7 years, travelled the world, made amazing friends and got to live my dream by buying my local football club.

To everyone who has helped us get this far - the guests, the listeners, the sponsors, we could not have done this without you. I am forever in your debt.

I hope you’ll check out the new show and enjoy it, though it may not be for some of you. Regardless, Danny and I will work hard to deliver the best show possible, like we always have.

Roll on The McCormack Show!

Awesome. Look forward to it. Congrats!

Signal 📡

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Read your kids Little House on the Prairie.

Hell, read it to yourself.

A man doesn't need nails to build a house or make a door 🪚

Looks awesome. How are the 'top plates' being attached to the vertical poles?

Almost a year later, the family room reno is nearly finished. Damaged panel ceiling wall paneling replaced with shiplap and drywall. Up next: refinish floors & repair fireplace 🪵🔥

Replying to Avatar rev.hodl

The tiny house custom RV is complete and earning revenue for the homestead!

After seven and a half years, I've finally completed and put the tiny house RV I've been building into operation at the homestead.

I started building it in November 2016 thinking I could complete the project in a year but I fell victim to the common homesteading practice of building many systems at once. Since my time and energy was split between so many projects at once, the time I had for working on the tiny house was quickly narrowed down to a few months in the winter.

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The days were short and the weather was challenging, plus I was learning many of the techniques from scratch, teaching myself as I went. This made for very slow progress.

However, there were some benefits of moving small and slow on the project. I was able to avoid making any critical/costly mistakes. I also had lots of time to souce cheap and unique reclaimed/recycled materials. Plus, I was able to totally customize and build each component to be unique, leading to it feeling like a work of art rather than a construction project.

For now, I don't think I'll be taking on another project of this scale again anytime soon. But in the end, I taught myself all the skills to build a house from framing and roofing to plumbing and electrical, on down to the finishing techniques for trim.

The intellectual and experiencial capital was definitely worth having so much financial capital tied up in the project for so long. Before I know it, I will have earned it all back anyway leaving me with much more capital than I started with. Low time preference paying off.

#permaculture #permies #homesteading #meshtadel #carpentry #woodworking #tinyhouse

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Beaut! Hope to make one some day

Have you tried dropping it into chatgpt or similar? I was pretty blown away when i asked it to create a ppt and it did 😄

Will drywall for sats

They just don't make 'em like they used to.

Look at the joints on this old door 😮‍💨

They just don't make 'em like they used to.

Somewhere buried deep in your 90 year old neighbor's garage are the most beautiful bits of history. And you can have them for a couple bucks and some patience as he recounts the history of his hardware collection one last time. Hell, if you don't they'll probably be tossed in the trash by his kids in a few years.

Visit that man's yard sale, inherit some of the relics he collected over the years, and put them to use.

I mean, look at these picture hangers! 🖼️

What's the latest on relays? Do I need to be curating and subscribing to certain ones? I just reset to default on nostr:npub12vkcxr0luzwp8e673v29eqjhrr7p9vqq8asav85swaepclllj09sylpugg, is this bad? 😅

10/10 for function. We'll see what my wife says about the form 😁

Gm. This house was built before America was founded.

Let's return to building things that last for centuries 🪚

They just don't make 'em like they used to.

Nail pulled from 200 year old barn beam. Heavy af. Good as new.

Replying to Avatar BitcoinEkasi

Posting this here first. Twitter can wait.

nostr:npub13ljnkd633c7maxatymv3y2fqq8vt3qk7j3tt0vytv90eztwgha9qmfcfhw is now represented in the township!

Been using the batch payment feature to pay weekly salaries for over two months, for all 16 staff. Loving it!

Thanks for making life easier and making #Bitcoin salary payments simplified!

🙏🏿🔥🧡🤩

https://video.nostr.build/8675ce9b9f5ec2241033c870ca747473adaa1aa447ebb9faba689b6c1da95443.mp4

🧡🫂 honored to work on a project that's useful to the community!

Steady lads, deploying more nitrogen

Replying to Avatar Stu

Oh I might should have watched more closely 😆

Haha, i'm just stoked the thing is running and lifting well (lighter loads for now), given the long trail of transmission oil I painted the driveway with in the fall 😂

Gm. Build the good. 🫂

Citadel Sunday with nostr:npub16cay92zxv6wmqryxemwygcdmqhnr5r300dre6yawdy58p64lkg8qvss4mx & friends on the 🎧

A 2020 conversation with my 2 year old daughter. As relevant as ever 🇺🇸

Morning coffee thoughts.