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Replying to Avatar Joël Valenzuela

Today I learned that Ionia left the crypto business. 😱 This is very sad because their products DashDirect and Cake Pay (the US-only Cake Wallet in-wallet gift cards, not Cake Pay Web) were some of the best adoption tools in all of crypto!

Ionia's a US-based company interfacing with both crypto and the banking system. The US is NOT a place to run a crypto company, especially if you need to deal with banks! Crypto users and projects should take care to not be US-reliant until the regulatory climate improves.

I like on crypto, and DashDirect was one of my favorite tools, so I'm very sad to see it go. But thankfully, I have plenty of other tools for spending Dash: Bitrefill, Spritz, Coinsbee, and I'm sure others.🫶 Well-integrated crypto projects will be fine.

On the other hand, Monero users in the US had fewer options outside of Cake Pay. It's not on Bitrefill, Spritz, Flexa, or many of the other tools I use to spend. The community should start scrambling to get on new platforms and build redundancy in spending tools! Also, the government hates Monero and branded it a tool for criminals (as has its own community). It's much easier to allege an always-on privacy "criminal coin" was used for laundering! 🕵️ I suspect (PURE SPECULATION!!!) that Ionia supporting Monero may have played a role.

In summary, it's a sad day for crypto adoption in the US, but we're going to be okay. Keep building, keep integrating, keep using. We'll outlast the central banks. 💪 Also remember: crypto is censorship-resistant, but you aren't (pour one out for Ross Ulbricht 😢).

That’s a big blow. Rip 🪦

Good morning Nostr plebs. Be great.

for sure. validation is a human want.

The "global" side of nostr is wild.

the nym does, but if they want to stay a nym... privacy matters to high profiles.

Digital transitioning stats:

iPhone: 10%

Graphene 90%

Bird app: 5%

Nostr: 95%

Almost there.

Prepaid cards are a bandaid solution. They do the job, but don't fulfill the need.

Better option is to move to Bitcoin accepting services ... Just need more services accepting Bitcoin.

Privacy is a process...

Death by a thousand papercuts?

Found out my little brother is on track towards diabetes. Sucks because he use to be the strongest person I knew (wrestler and powerlifter), and what kind of hurts is knowing that he knows what he needs to do to turn it all around and doesn't.

My brother-in-law on the other hand; a year ago, he was also on the road to diabetes but made a huge sea change to his diet (way of life) and not only has he risk free of being diabetic, but he's stronger and looking much healthier than he was when I first met him.

Having the will and desire to do anything is key to being successful in life.

You need to want it like a drowning man wants air to breathe.

I expressed this to my bro, and hope and pray that he finds the desire, the will, to get back up and make a difference for himself.

In a way, I kind of needed to be reminded of this too... I've been slumping as of recently in my personal life... and haven't been as fired up as I use to be.

I could always do better, too.