Projects

Words and Code for Bitcoin

As of right now, I’m not involved in any of the projects listed below, and all of my solo projects are currently on hold, as 100% of my time is focused on building out OpenSats.

21 Ways

Bitcoin is different things to different people. 21 Ways is my attempt to embrace this prismatic nature of Bitcoin, exploring 21 different ways to look at Bitcoin. It is an ambitious project, trying to dive deep into Bitcoin’s different facets, including its roots, pre-history, history, civil war, technologies built on top of Bitcoin, surrounding economic thought, and much more. You can support me on Patreon if you want to have a look behind the scenes and get a glimpse of this work in progress.

21 Lessons

21 Lessons is a bit of an unusual book. But hey, Bitcoin is a bit of an unusual technology, so an unusual book about Bitcoin might be fitting. This book came to be because of one simple question: What have you learned from Bitcoin? I tried to answer this question in a single tweet. Then the tweet turned into a tweetstorm. The tweetstorm turned into an article. The article turned into three articles. Three articles turned into 21 Lessons. And 21 Lessons turned a book.

Bitcoin Resources

While falling down the Bitcoin rabbit hole I tried to absorb as much content in the form of books, articles, and podcasts as humanly possible. Bitcoin Resources is my attempt to catalog and signal-boost the best and most insightful content in the Bitcoin space. Since its inception, a growing number of people have started to contribute by selecting and curating content.

Nostr Resources

The awesome thing about nostr is that it is a protcol, not a platform. It’s a bit strange, and messy, and imperfect, and a little bit like Bitcoin, which is why I love it. This project evolved out of a gist that was quite hastily put together. Its purpose was to help people wrap their heads around nostr, and I guess this is the purpose still.

Bitcoin Quotes

Bitcoin Quotes is an experiment in micropayments around a growing collection of Bitcoin-related quotes. As of this writing, 300+ quotes have been sourced and indexed, in both audio and written form. The source of each quote will be revealed upon paying ~2¢ in sats. I hope that these quotes will inform, inspire, and delight those who stumble upon them. There is also a rudimentary API if you want to integrate these random quotes into a project of yours. Follow the nostr bot of this project to get random quotes in your timeline.

Value4Value

Value4Value is a comprehensive resource about the Value4Value model - a monetization model, content format, and way of life that emphasizes freedom, openness, connection, and free speech. The site explores how this model enables direct relationships between creators and audiences, leading to dynamic feedback loops of co-creation. It covers the philosophy behind V4V, practical guides for implementation, and showcases successful applications like Podcasting 2.0 and Nostr’s zaps.

Lightning Login

Lightning Login is a site to showcase LNURL-auth, a lightweight authentication protocol that is easy to use, easy to implement, and respects the user’s privacy.

Opsec Swag

In-your-face Bitcoin swag is not my thing. I like more subtle stuff, which is why I’ve built OpsecSwag.com. It links to various shops and outlets that sell bitcoin merch that is opsec friendly, i.e. bitcoin merch that doesn’t sport the bitcoin logo or has any other very obvious connection to the corn.

Einundzwanzig

Einundzwanzig - the German word for 21 - is a collaboration of multiple German-speaking bitcoiners, started by Markus and myself. Started as a simple weekly podcast focused on news in the Bitcoin space, the project continues to morph, evolve, and expand. In addition to the weekly news show, Einundzwanzig now also dives deeper into some topics by interviewing various experts in the German-speaking Bitcoin world. We also started to release readings of the best Bitcoin content, thanks to the growing availability and quality of German translations.

21 Lektionen

Since 21 Lessons is released under a permissive creative commons license, it has been translated into multiple languages. 21 Lektionen: Meine Reise in den Bitcoin Kaninchenbau is based on the German translations of Rene and CryptoMulde, revised and adapted by myself.

Quotable Satoshi Nostr Bot

Building upon the great work of the Satoshi Nakamoto Institute, I wrote a nostr bot to disseminate the most insightful and interesting quotes of Satoshi Nakamoto. Simply follow Quotable Satoshi on nostr to get historical quotes from the inventor of Bitcoin in your timeline.

Closing the Loop

Closing the Loop is a podcast hosted by John Vallis and launched by Seetee. The purpose of this project is to talk to the entrepreneurs, developers, and thinkers who are contributing to “closing the loop” of the Bitcoin economy.

It is also a value4value experiment. Listeners can stream sats and send boosts, including short messages if they choose to do so.

Secret Satsa

Secret Satsa is an experiment in altruism. Imagine it’s Christmas time and you are at a gas station, and the person in front of you is buying a small item for herself or a loved one. For whatever reason she can’t pay, so you step in and pay the bill. It’s the holiday season after all, right?

That’s exactly what Secret Satsa is about. Strangers share lightning invoices using the #SecretSatsa hashtag, and other strangers pay them, just because they can.

Twentyone World

Due to the immense success of EINUNDZWANZIG, a couple of people decided to start their own forks of in their respective countries. Twentyone World was created to visualize and encourage this. The site serves two purposes: (1) show trusted bitcoin-only communities on a map, and (2) make it really easy to start one. The idea is to provide an open-source blueprint, a step-by-step guide of sorts, that should help and encourage others to start their own local—and localized—bitcoin-only community.

Fucking Shitcoins

A very serious campaign to shame merchants into bitcoin adoption. Very serious. Seriously.

Sovereign Engineering

The best way to build a better future is to, well, build it. Sovereign Engineering was created to put the ideas of sovereign technology into practice. It started as an experiment: what happens if you bring 21 builders to Madeira for 6 weeks and let them focus on creating tools for a self-sovereign world? The result is an intense, in-person program focused on high-bandwidth collaboration and rapid shipping. No buzzwords, no bullshit. Just building cool shit on Bitcoin and nostr, with a demo day every Friday to hold everyone accountable.

OpenSats

OpenSats is a 501(c)(3) public charity dedicated to supporting the developers and contributors of free and open-source software and projects that help Bitcoin flourish. We provide sustainable funding for contributors working on freedom tech and believe that Bitcoin and FOSS are essential for the future of the internet. All of our funding decisions are made by a transparent, public-facing, and accountable nine-person board.

No Solutions

Some of the best ideas aren’t born in front of a screen, but on a long walk. The No Solutions podcast was born out of the many walks that took place during Sovereign Engineering, based on the simple premise that there are no easy solutions, only trade-offs. In a series of walking dialogues, the podcast explores what it means to build a better internet, embracing the idea that freedom is an engineering practice. The philosophy is to start ugly, iterate publicly, and keep walking. It’s a journey, not a destination, and this podcast is its travel log.

Contribution: The Bitcoin Times

Launched by Alex Svetski in 2019, The Bitcoin Times is a publication that distills complex topics in the world of Bitcoin into digestible pieces. As of this writing, two editions have been published. I was one of the co-authors of the second edition, along with Rory Highside, Nic Carter, Aleks Svetski, Robert Breedlove, Dan Held, Connor Brown, and Hass McCook.

Contribution: Citadel 21

Citadel21 is a Bitcoin cultural zine launched by Hodlonaut and Katoshi in May 2020. Its mission is to pull nuggets of high signal content out of the noisy chaos. I wrote an optimistic letter to bitcoiners around the globe, published in the first volume, and a piece on identity and pseudonymity, published in the fourth volume.

Contribution: 21ism Bitcoin Art Collective

21ism aims to celebrate artists across mediums, inspired to create by the ultimate expression of freedom – Bitcoin. Art is one of the languages it speaks & every month, 21ism takes a spin on the “Creative Carousel” to feature new Artists. I had the pleasure and the honor to be the first featured writer. My article “What is 21ism?” is accompanied by a multitude of visual and multimedia art that make the words shine in more ways than one.

Contribution: Reckless VR

Reckless VR started in 2019 to create a virtual place where bitcoiners can hang out, have some fun, and talk bitcoin among other things.

I helped moderate some of the more formal sessions and took pictures of events, which you can find on twitter.

Contribution: Human B

“Human B” is a documentary about six people from different countries and their individual journey down the Bitcoin rabbit hole. The film evolves around the question “What is Bitcoin?”. Directed by Aaron Mucke & Eva Mühlenbäumer, this 73-minute documentary explores Bitcoin through the personal stories of people from Germany, USA, and Mexico, featuring interviews in German, English, and Spanish. I appear as one of the featured subjects in this documentary alongside Alessandro Cecere, Marc Friedrich, and others.

Code Contributions

When I’m not writing I try to contribute to open source projects where I can. Apart from trivial fixes and contributions in various projects, I’ve worked on adding Tor and Dojo support to Samourai Wallet’s Sentinel app for iOS (see video). I also made some corrections to BIP 2, BIP 16, and BIP 69. I used to be part of the Swan engineering team and published a set of extended public key tools as open source software. Follow me on GitHub to see what I’m up to.

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