FFS069 - Max Hillebrand

[00:00:00]

[00:00:00] Intro

Luke: Welcome back to the Freedom Footprint show with Knut Svanholm and me, Luke the Pseudo Finn. And we're here with our good friend, Max Hillebrand, CEO of ZK Snacks, the maker of WasabiWallet or Custodian or whatever you want to call it. And this is the second time on the pod.

So Max, welcome back to the Freedom Footprint show.

Max: Well, hello, Luke. Hello, Knut. And hello and welcome to all the audience. I'm looking forward to this fascinating conversation about fascinating topics, I'm sure.

Knut: Yeah. How do you feel when Luke calls you a custodian? Is that, uh, do you take that as a compliment or as an insult?

Max: Ah, that's, uh, I guess a bit of both, you know, uh, it's, uh, good to be custodian. I think, uh, we have many things to, to take good care of. And it's not just about other people's money and it's, uh, it's about, uh, other people's tools as well. Uh, so I think that, uh, is quite fitting in that regard.

Knut: Yes. Uh, other people's tools. Um, where do we go with that, Luke?[00:01:00]

[00:01:00] Open Source Software Development

Luke: the reason I said, the reason I said custodian though, right, is because Wasabi is actually, it's, it's open source and, and anyone can do whatever with it, run their own instance and all this. So it's, it's just more the emphasis on that, uh, you know, ZK Snacks and, and what you're doing with it, uh, you're, you're spearheading the development of Wasabi Wallet, right?

That's the, one of the things ZK Snacks does.

Max: Yeah, exactly. And I think it's, it's one of the big strengths of Wasabi Wallet to have a company behind it, uh, uh, to fund the development and, and really push it forward. I guess Bitcoin Core is like the only. Successful, open source, non commercial software project that has a plethora of development.

But if you look at any other project, many of them are just hobby projects with one or two guys working on it. That's not necessarily a bad thing. I mean, look at Electrum Wallet. It basically has Thomas doing... All of the work for [00:02:00] more than almost 15 years now, and still, it's an incredibly stable piece of software, very, very well reviewed and very well tested and it just works and has a bunch of features.

And so it's definitely possible, but. I mean, when, like, I really got to look closer into development, uh, for these last couple years of contributing to Wasabi and, and damn, it's difficult. Like, there's so many little nuances that have to be taken care of. So many, so many bugs, so many quirks, so many things that could be better.

Uh, and to have a, a large team working on it and knowing that the team will stick around for some time, uh, so that you can start long term planning. That's, that's really quite important. Um, so, it would be awesome if every free software project somehow finds its niche in the development of a business model.

Uh, I think that that would be very, valuable and meaningful. It [00:03:00] might be difficult to do, and it's not that easy to convince people to give over their magic internet money. but I think, uh, we can write software that's compelling enough for people to do that. Uh, and that's, I think, one of, uh, Wasabi's greatest success and to, to spawn a business model that, that sustains, not just the owners of the company, but, but especially the contributors to the free and open source software.

Knut: mempool. space and btcpayserver are similar, right? Uh, so, so how do they work? How much do you know about that?

Max: Yeah, neither of them have a business model. Right. BTC pay server has a non for profit foundation behind it, um, to do some of the paperwork. And unfortunately, that's, that's something almost necessitating, uh, in the modern world to have a legal entity to, you know, write invoices and pay them, et cetera.

Um, and mempool. space. They might actually also be an entity in Japan. I'm not [00:04:00] exactly sure. And they are just now starting their first products or offerings. Specifically the fee rate accelerator that you can bribe miners to include a transaction. Like without using the Bitcoin network to do so with things like child pays per parent or replaced by fee for some technical reasons that sometimes not, not easy or even possible to do.

So mempool. space is trying to venture into a business model where, where they get paid to bribe the miners to include their transactions. Um, and, uh, yeah, I think that's. It's good that these projects are looking for some business models. but yeah, so far, I think mempool. space was mainly worked on by The founders and some contributors who just love the project and they maybe have gotten some grants or donations, but probably not that much.

Knut: I think they have a lot of grants and donations. I mean, there's, uh, there's a ton of [00:05:00] companies and individuals on their supporters page or sponsors page.

Max: Yeah, that's true. mempool. space actually did quite well with that. You're right. And they also offer services to be added. Like, for example, Foundry paid, I think, a decent amount to get the mining dashboard included, so they're paying for features to be added to the software project. I think that's a pretty good way of funding development, like, if you would like to see it improved.

Pay for it. And that's a pretty reasonable method, I think. And then, yeah, a bunch of individual donators. I think that's, again, the big strength of free and open source software. People are so enthusiastic about it. They really want to... Just make sure that the project survives and contributes and when they get the shout out on the website, I guess that's for many people enough to toss over some sats.

But interestingly, if I remember that [00:06:00] correctly, mempool. space stopped that donation website. So that you can no longer get your profile picture on the website if you donate some sats. I'm not exactly sure why they stopped that offering, but yeah,

Knut: yeah. Do you know how Monty Python's Life of Brian was funded? they tried to raise funds for it here and there. Uh, they had this script, uh, and all of a sudden George Harrison of the Beatles funds the entire thing out of his own pocket.

And they ask him like, well, you didn't have to do this, why? And he said, I want to see the movie. And that was the only reason. So if you want, if you want to see something in the world and you're sitting on a bunch of cash, that is always an option, you can fund things.

Max: One other example in this space is probably Jack Dorsey with Nostr. And he has put a lot of money on the line to fund projects and conferences and [00:07:00] individuals. to keep going. And I think he does it for like a lot of ideological reasons. Uh, I think he thinks that there's, uh, that he made some mistakes with, with adding venture capital to Twitter and that that fundamentally changed the mission of the project and, and the product after all.

Uh, and he doesn't want to make the same mistakes again. And so he's very vocal about telling people to not take on venture capital funding for, for their Nostr projects. And instead just try to do it out of grants and donations. Um, uh, so I guess we'll see how that goes, uh, right? If, uh, if grants and donations are something that are long term sustainable, um, we had those thoughts with Wasabi at the beginning too, like, should we just do it based off donations and grants?

Um, and, well, I. I doubt that we could have gotten that sustainable and long term of a revenue model out of this, compared to [00:08:00] providing a service where the users pay for it. I think ultimately the users are the ones who get the most benefit of the software being written. They are the ones watching the movie.

And so to some extent, you know, they are willing to pay for it.

Knut: So, so, so a lot of touch points here. So, so I'll try to condense them into a question. Like, to a layman, bribing the miners probably sounds a bit weird and, you know, random donations that sounds a bit like foreign aid or something, which is basically taking money from poor people in rich countries and giving it to, to rich people in poor countries, which, which, which is not optimal the same with like this, all this structure of nonprofits and for profits, which are all very fiat things.

So, so how can, how does Bitcoin change? And so funding incentives, like when you give a large donation to someone, aren't you like messing with the market dynamics in a, in a way, [00:09:00] uh, so that people don't learn their lesson and don't build a business in a, in a sustainable way?

Max: Well, you know, profit is about producing more than you consume. And so ultimately, we all really have to be profitable. If you're not profitable, it's like a medical patient bleeding, and you should do everything that you can to stop the bleeding as fast as fucking possible. And so, um, being profitable is very essential.

Um, but And profit is basically revenue minus expenses. Expenses are obvious. We have to pay the developers to build the stuff. Developers got to eat too. And there might be some other costs, for example, running a server. I'm sure that the mempool. space server infrastructure is quite expensive. They don't just run one full node, they run many full nodes in many different locations.

And that adds up, right? So, these are the costs that have to be paid. And then, if you keep paying a bunch of these [00:10:00] server costs and development costs, how do you know that where you're spending the money on is worthwhile? If it's actually a benefit for... Humanity, let's say, uh, and, and the way to find that out is if someone pays you to continue doing this, and if nobody pays you to continue doing that, then why are you wasting your time and the precious capital that we have on doing something that literally nobody wants?

but then who pays for it? I guess it's not even that important. I mean, as long as someone pays for it voluntarily, I guess that is proven enough that there is some certain demand for it. And even if it's just one single rich guy who funds a bunch of it, that's probably good enough, right? If that person, for whatever reason, sees that.

There's enough value in the project to keep it going. Um, and arguably, it is better if multiple people pay for it, right? Because then if it's just one guy [00:11:00] financing everything, well, maybe he's delusional and, and not really that important, for that project to continue. But just because of his weird pipe dream and his deep pockets, he can keep a project going for much longer than, than, uh, necessary.

But if, if a vast. If people are paying for a service, then the likelihood of it just being a pipe dream is, I guess, rather low. And if many people want that service so much that they are willing to pay for it, I guess that is a strong indication of it being a useful service after all. And ultimately then, The people who are using the service, if they are the ones paying for it, then we have a really nice alignment of incentives and someone wants the service.

Someone is actively using the service and they love it so much that they're willing to hand over some money in exchange for it. And if that's a large number, that seems to me that then the project is on the right track. [00:12:00] That we're spending and we're having costs, but they are appreciated. By by a lot of people.

and I guess then that's, that's what Bitcoin, well enables. Um, maybe another way of looking at this is that, uh, with, with Bitcoin, we've finally figured out programmable money, right? Where, we can write piece of code, some software and money transfers, right? That's, pretty magical. the cypherpunks have been trying to do this for many decades, and failed many, many times because it's a really fucking difficult problem.

But, but now with Bitcoin, We can literally write code to move money and, that means that we can embed the money transfer into the softwares that we are writing. and Bitcoin wallets are, I guess, the first pioneering software that, does that, right? Where, we write the codes to move money.

And that means we can write a code to move [00:13:00] money from the end user to the service provider, right? To the person or developers who are writing that software. And I think that's. super ingenious, and we can now write code to automate transfer of value from the user to the developers. And that means that if there are developers, sorry, if there are users, they automatically and by default will send money to the developers.

Um, and, and that's great because that means we can decrease the mental transaction cost of that. Value transfer from users to producers, um, and that, yeah, that, that, that's incredibly valuable, because if something is expensive and difficult and slow, then it won't be done. Sure, you could have always, you know, send cash per mail to the people who write software or services for you, but that's just super clumsy and you might do it once, but you're definitely not going to do it every day.

Um, but... With [00:14:00] software, it being totally automated, you can send a small amount of value to the creators of a service whenever you use it and with every minute that you're using it, probably just like people are paying for this podcast and the value for value model literally every minute that they're listening to this because there is a value in the information being provided, and we've made it easy and automated to send value back to the creators. That software automation, that decreases in complexity, that decreases in mental transaction cost is extremely key. It's super important, um, again, because it allows to, to just automate it and, and, uh, provide value to the producers.

Knut: Yeah, that's, this is sort of why I think that microtransactions are only valuable if they're, if the user doesn't have to make a deliberate choice every time he makes a microtransaction. They, they need to be automated to be valuable. Otherwise the, [00:15:00] the real cost to the user is, is larger than just the sats because he also needs to put the effort into deciding whether or not to make the transaction.

Max: And then the, the extent to the cost, um, I guess it will be considered. Maybe once or a couple times when you set up the system and when you, when you, for example, you download Wasabi and for the first time it will tell you, Hey, there's a 0. 3 percent fee for the CoinJoin service. so just so that you know, right.

With Phoenix Wallet, now there is a 0. 4 percent for each transaction, and the user is notified at the beginning of, hey, this is how it is, here's the code, you can review it, etc, and that means that there is consent. And if people would think that this is too outrageous of a fee, they would not use the service or look for an alternative.

And there are many [00:16:00] alternatives, you know, for example, with lightning network wallets on the phone. Many other wallets have other fee structures and now you as an end user have the choice of do you want to use this particular software with these particular services if it costs that much or do you want to use something else and then maybe you're willing to even take a little bit worse of a product you Uh, just because it is a bit cheaper, right?

Phoenix is probably the most expensive lightning wallet out there. It's also by far the most reliable one. It just works and it almost never fails. So people are willing to pay a bit extra for having that experience. And I think that's, uh, that's where also the market comes in. And especially the cool thing is.

Because this is all free software, like, there is no monopoly, there cannot be, because anyone has the opportunity and the legal justification to copy the software and provide the [00:17:00] service himself. It will take you not even a minute to set up a Wasabi CoinJoin coordinator yourself. And you can charge zero fees, or 5 percent fees, totally up to you.

As long as you can convince people to use... your service and your software, uh, then that, that is, that is all you need. Uh, so we, we have a way to automatically and with low friction move money from the end user to the developers. And simultaneously we have checks and balances in the sense that if the developers provide a shitty software or charge too much for it, users will simply not use that particular service.

They will fork the code base, provide the service themselves, uh, you know, improve it. And, uh, provide a cheaper, uh, and, and then hopefully they will get rich because they were providing a better service for less money and, and therefore a lot of users will, will end up using them probably enough for them to be profitable.[00:18:00]

Knut: Yeah, so every time you make a transaction of any kind, you do so because you believe that you will profit from the trade, like that you will have a, you will be better off with the product or service than without it. So, so this is, this is not exclusive to Bitcoin in any way, shape or form. I mean, Different services have different magnitudes of complexity to them. So buying insurance, for instance, is, is trickier than buying, you know, a bottle of water that you're, you're less sure about how much value the insurance policy will bring you than you are a simpler thing like a bottle of water.

[00:18:40] Wasabi Wallet and Coinjoins

Knut: And with Wasabi, like, I think the many users Don't know what the service does to a full extent.

Uh, I mean, and you don't know to which extent it will actually provide you with more privacy or not. Uh, you don't know to which extent it will, [00:19:00] it may have the risk of painting a target on your back. And also when you pay for it, you know that you're paying, what is it? 0. 3 percent fees or something for every coin join.

Uh, you, you don't know what the value of. Bitcoin is on a certain date. So, so you, so there's the, the volatility of, uh, I'm tempted to say the volatility of Bitcoin, but I would say the volatility of the world, uh, because Bitcoin is the only thing that isn't volatile, but there's a lot of, you know, uh, very.

Variable variables, uh, that factor into, to the decision to use wasabi or not. So what would you, what would you say to a user who's lost in whether to use this service or not, and why you should use it, and why, why, why? It's a good trade off.

Max: Yeah, the world is extremely complex, right? And, and, and there's, uh, difficulties and nuances. And the closer you look at any particular good or [00:20:00] service, the more it will blow up into complexity. Like, nobody knows how the fuck a car works. A car is such an extremely complex piece of machinery. And you as the end user, you don't care how it works either.

You have a problem, and you want the problem solved. You're here, but you want to go there, and you're too lazy to walk. And so the opportunity cost of not having a car means that you have to walk and potentially you have to walk so much that it's physically impossible, or at least not without great cost in terms of you need a lot of food and water to propel yourself there.

And then it's, I guess it's just about the entrepreneurs to provide an approachable rationale. and approachable reason for using a specific service. Again, why do you want a car? It's not because of the beautiful design of the combustion engine [00:21:00] or of the brake pads, etc. It's about getting to places where you're currently not at.

And this is, I guess, the motivational Or emotional value adds that customers ultimately care about. And so in Wasabi's sense, you just want to receive money and send money without telling the entire world that you're doing it. And that's basically it. And with using Wasabi, that's how it will work. You can receive and send money, and not everyone will know about it.

And that's... That's it. That's the emotional value add. And that's, I guess, what we're then trying to market and trying to sell. It's not about all of the crazy nuance and complexities of how we integrate a TOR or block filters or coinjoins. Because ultimately, Regardless of how compelling and interesting these nuances are, the vast amount of [00:22:00] people simply does not have the time, uh, to, to think about these things and try to figure them out.

Knut: So what are, what are in your mind is the most common reason that people are reluctant to use, uh, coin joins or, or use wasabi in general? Like, uh, and what is the, what are they getting wrong? What, what are they misunderstanding?

Max: well, probably number one reason is that their wallet does not support it. And then even if the wallet supports it, it might be complex and difficult and non obvious how to activate the feature.

Knut: You're talking about coinjoins now and not wasabi because most wallets, it's possible to send money to wasabi with most wallets, or if not all.

Max: Yes, that's true, but most people don't switch wallets. I think the vast amount of people just got a wallet years ago and are still [00:23:00] using the same. Probably even more extreme it's with hardware wallets. If in 2017 or something you got your first ledger, You're most likely still going to use that exact same ledger.

And maybe you've upgraded to a new hardware of the same brand. But most likely even that is not the case. I guess with software, it's software wallets. It's a bit more extreme to the other end that the cost of Creating a new wallet is way lower than the cost of purchasing a new hardware wallet, but still there is a substantial amount of cost there.

And you, you need to, uh, first of all, find out about the new wallet. You need to download it. You need to make a new backup or get out your old backup and import it. Um, and, and then you need to understand how the details of that new software work and all the new features, et cetera. Uh, so that's, that's just a lot of cost.

And, uh, then when are people willing to. to sacrifice this cost [00:24:00] will usually if it's a lot better than what they currently have. And we're not talking not just a little bit better, but like 10x better. And to be frank, it's very difficult to, to create a wallet that's 10x better than, than the default wallet.

Especially because Users have different preferences, right? Some users might want to have the, the shit Coin Casino Wallet where they can store all of their thousands of shit coins in the same user interface. Uh, and if a wallet like Wasabi is Bitcoin only, well that's not 10 x better. That's 10 x worse, right?

Um, uh, so, uh, that probably is one of the main reasons of, of why people don't use, uh, wasabi because it doesn't support Chino, INU coin or whatever the fuck, um, that, uh, is, is. Quite likely probably because the vast or a lot of people are going to have more than just Bitcoin and will want to store that. uh, but then on the other hand, the people who, who have Bitcoin and who care about [00:25:00] the security and privacy of their Bitcoin, they are, We're going to be willing to make certain trade offs.

For example, having two different wallets, one for the shitcoins and one for Bitcoin. But then they will optimize for a wallet experience that is secure and private just for their Bitcoin. And here then... You know, there are a couple wallets. Again, Electrum is a very popular choice, uh, because of its high security and immense feature set, uh, and also really good privacy if you use it correctly with your own back end, et cetera.

Um, but, but then Wasabi Wallet, uh, I guess, again, the, the, the, the aspect of why we're 10x better than, than any other Bitcoin wallet is, is that using Bitcoin anonymously is. It's easy and it's fast and it's cheap, um, compared to other alternatives, uh, but again, that aspect of privacy is key here, right? If users don't care about their privacy, they want to have some [00:26:00] publicly verifiable donation wallet or something, then Wasabi is just...

It's too difficult and too slow and too expensive for them because they have alternatives that are good enough on these fronts and are willing to use them.

[00:26:14] Bitcoin Wallets

Knut: Yeah, I can only speak for myself here, but like the, the, the first wallet I started using was blockchain. info back in the day. And that became so shit, uh, that I, uh, well, I, I opted out of it pretty quickly, but, uh, The sad thing was that I had, uh, recommended it to some of my friends when I tried to get the orange pill back in 2017 or whatever, uh, and nowadays, when I see that they still use that wallet, I'm like, what the fuck?

Why haven't you? This is scary. Uh, yeah, but you told me to use it. Yeah, but don't, don't you get updated on stuff? And most people don't, they, they don't give a crap. [00:27:00] Uh, so. But what that taught me is I switch wallets a lot more often now because of that experience, I think, because I had a, like, when they started making it hard for me to see my balance and wanting me to buy Stellaluna or something, uh, instantly when opening the app, like the, the, the red flags are everywhere.

So nowadays, I switch wallets more often and I try, I try to weigh the upsides against the downsides and I don't recommend a specific wallet anymore. I recommend like do your own research.

Max: And also the technology stack changes, right? Like years ago, there was no lightning network. There was no multi sig. Et cetera. So, so nowadays, um, many wallets still don't support lightning, right? So, so lightning enabled wallets is like this subsection of Bitcoin wallets. Um, and, and then you have like multi sig wallets, but, but even those [00:28:00] differentiate with something like Electrum that can do like its own hacky two out of three multi sig for, for some time now.

And now we have something like Liana wallet that Can do advanced, uh, mini scripts, uh, smart contracts, uh, et cetera. So there, there, the amount of, of technological progress here is, is pretty substantial. Um, and, and it's just difficult as a wallet developer to keep up with it and trying to, to solve one aspect of, of a Bitcoin wallet.

Well. is already really difficult. but then doing it with all of the cutting edge features that are possible and, and available, uh, is, is just simply impossible. So I think what we've seen in the last five years is, um, like a specialization in wallets, uh, like, like Wasabi Wallet, right? We, we focused really hard on on chain privacy.

Uh, like that's, that was our main and only focus. And. It took us five, ten years to fix this, to the point where we have it now. But that means that we have to [00:29:00] be blind and completely ignorant about other very important features. Again, like Lightning Network, right? To do a proper Lightning Network is like, yeah, five years of work at the minimum.

And then at the end result, you're going to have something like Phoenix, right? Which works amazingly well. But it, it took a long time to get there. like anyone who, who still remembers the, the Eclair wallet on mobile before Phoenix, like that was a very different, that was a very hacky proof of concept, man.

Um, and totally not comparable to Phoenix. there's just so many different technological nuances here, and the cost of researching and developing them is extremely high. And then, if the implementation of this tech is not in an intuitive and approachable way, then it won't get used much either.

So, it doesn't just have to have technical functionality, it needs to have a great UX as well. Um, and all, yeah, all of that just. Keeps making things difficult and [00:30:00] difficult.

[00:30:00] Bitcoin Development in a Bull Market

Knut: So what does the development of Bitcoin development look like in a bull run, say, we 10X or 100X from here in a, short period of time, what does that look like? Do the Facebooks and Googles and Amazons of the world start working on, Bitcoin development? Is there all of a sudden a an inflow of cash from large entities and what, are the risks how do you see that?

Max: Well, actually, uh, probably in the bull market, there's going to be way less development because everyone's kind of focused on number one, customer support and explaining to people how this stuff works. And then number two, just spending all of the money that we have. So it's going to be a big party with very little development.

Probably, but then no of course there is going to be a lot more interest and a lot more well funded, companies and projects in the space, that will develop the, niche [00:31:00] applications that, they want. but still, actually, I think that the bear markets have, always been a much more substantial time for building, compared to the bull markets.

Um, I'm not exactly sure why that is. But it seems to be the case, and I've really enjoyed this bull run for the fact of just the immense progress in terms of Lightning Network, privacy, and usability of all the different applications. But yeah, more people, more developers, more products is going to be interesting.

I wonder if we will see decentralization in the sense of less products and consolidation. I know back in the days there were like a hundred different search engines and now there's like one or two. And I wonder if we will see the same with Bitcoin software. Arguably, maybe yes. As time passes, the [00:32:00] different software projects can, work on more and more aspects.

And, you know, all of a sudden we have a wallet that does not just have perfect on chain privacy, but also has lightning network support and, a great multi sig vault or inheritance planning structure. Uh, and, uh, you know, maybe also in the same interface, you can lend your Bitcoin to others and get some leverage or, uh, do some trading with discreet lock contracts and RGB assets, etc.

With enough developer power, all of this could be done within a single software project. and the question is that would people prefer a kind of do, uh, everything app that just does it all? Uh, versus something that's more specialized. Yeah, exactly. Right. So apparently there, uh, there has been a lot of these centralization tendencies and software in the past.

Now, is that because of fiat and because of VC funding, uh, or [00:33:00] Is that inherently how technology goes? I mean, with Bitcoin, we, we now have way more wallets than we had five years ago. And so, uh, arguably we're seeing a trend in a different direction currently happening in, in, in Bitcoin, but maybe that's just the initial experimentation phases and consolidation comes later, maybe in the bull market.

who knows really, it's going to be interesting to see.

Knut: to the point about the reason for bear markets being better for building than bull markets in the past, at least it has had a lot to do with just the sheer amount of noise and shit coinery going on. Like, there's a ton of money going, going to that there, there has been so, so the next bull run, hopefully we'll have less of that.

Uh, I'm unsure.

[00:33:46] The End of Shitcoining

Knut: There's still, there's still plenty, plenty of people to fool out there if you wish to. Unfortunately, but as it was, I think we'll see less shit coiner in the next bull run. Certainly hope [00:34:00] so. What do you think? Like, when is Coinbase and Binance going down? And when, when do we finally rid ourselves of this bullshit?

Max: And it's a really good question. I, I think it will be different. Um, but, but still the amount of scam and opportunism is, is still going to be there, arguably from different players, arguably from bigger players, right? Maybe Facebook is going to make another run at their own shit coin. Um, most certainly each, each central bank is going to make their run at, at a new shit coin.

Um, and, uh, I. I wonder of, yeah, who the players will be. We've decreased the cost of creating new money substantially, right? Money is just software now. And that is, yeah, that just means that there will be a lot of supply for different currencies. However... It feels like that, especially in this last bear run, um, we've, we've increased and improved the, the education around [00:35:00] money, um, substantially, right?

That, that might just be because we're in our nice Bitcoin bubble here, uh, and we think all of us are super smart, but, uh, maybe it really is the case that, the educational front has, has improved. Substantially enough so, so that people who, who want to learn more can learn more and, will not necessarily be misled into weird and nasty projects.

but who knows? And, uh, there, uh, the, well, for one, there's a lot of money to be made, uh, and that warrants a lot of marketing effort. so it has been the case in the past that, that, uh, these altcoin projects had a humongous marketing budget versus Bitcoin had zero. Um, and, um, yeah, that, that will probably be continued to be the case, right?

That, that, uh, certain projects will have a lot more money to be spent on [00:36:00] enticing users to use that product. And I really wonder, uh, if, if let's say some central bank launches their own, um, currency with a universal basic income baked into it, uh, on. Uh, you know, here you get a hundred units of the shit coin each week, and you can use that to buy all of your stuff.

Probably a lot of people would use it. And because again, a lot of people don't care much about monetary economics in the first place, and a hundred units of something that I can buy food for my kids, that sounds better than this Bitcoin thing where I actually have to work for it. And, uh, we're, it's going to be really hard to get your hands on, on it.

that will, you know, be for sure. Interesting. I think excitement is guaranteed.

Luke: Alright, you might have noticed that we've recently partnered with AmberApp. After our episode with Izzy, their CEO, and our close friend, we knew we would have to partner with them in some way, If you haven't seen our episode with Izzy, definitely go check it out, you'll see why it's such a great fit, and honestly, [00:37:00] they're following the orange glowing light like Izzy always says, and that's exactly what we try to do here at the Freedom Footprint Show.

The big news about AmberApp is that on Jan 3, 2024, they're going to be launching their version 2. I've seen some of the screenshots and it looks fantastic. They're going to be including a non custodial on chain wallet, an anonymous lightning wallet, a fiat wallet, And finally, it's going to be an exchange, of course. it's going to be just this super app, They're also going to be launching globally.

Everyone's going to be able to use it. we're really excited about all that. Stay tuned with us and you'll hear all about it. And for now, check out their website, amber. app and the episode with Izzy to find out more.

Next up WasabiWallet. The privacy by default, open source, non custodial Bitcoin wallet with CoinJoin built in. It's the easy to use, comprehensive, affordable way to make your coins private. And the best part is, they've been making huge improvements to the app.

They're really [00:38:00] focusing on the user experience, adding advanced features for power users, they just keep getting better. You send your coins to your Wasabi wallet, and they get combined with loads of other coins using the Wabi Sabi protocol, so they're private on the other end. Your tracks are covered so you can work on expanding your Freedom Footprint without worrying about your privacy.

So, check out wasabiwallet. io and download Wasabi today.

[00:38:24] Growing the Bitcoin Tribe

Knut: Yeah, the fact that people are still falling for the fiat scam is sort of alludes to that they're going to fall for other scams as well, like they're still using euros, for instance, and that's pointing somewhere like, but still, like, my, my experience is last. My yearly conference run, maybe the conference has had a bit,

uh, fewer attendees, uh, a hundred less here and there. Uh, but I felt the signal to noise rate ratio was way higher this year. I mean, [00:39:00] The, uh, even the conferences that are more apologetic to shit coiners had a higher signal to noise ratio. Is that, is that your experience as well? That we as a tribe are growing even in the bear market.

Max: Yeah, it definitely feels like it, right? This last year of conferences was really good, um, and, and the amount of conferences was staggering too. I mean, I don't know, I've seen you at like 20 different conferences this year or something. So, um, and, and we still haven't, couldn't even make them all, right?

There's so many that, that I missed, um, and that's definitely encouraging. Um, I think that. Uh, the, the, the fact to, to meet and meet space and to share ideas there and, and to work on, on projects and, and to meet people and network is, uh, it, it shows, it's, it's real fruits in the long term, right? It, it'll take a couple months or [00:40:00] years for the projects that were started at such conferences to, to flourish and, uh, and, and.

be realized. Um, like I remember the lightning network hack days in Berlin. Um, like so many cool ideas were born there, uh, that are just now, you know, hitting full stride and, and providing amazing services and products to people. So just again, it takes a lot of time to build. And, uh, it seems that we've been able to do quite a lot of building in the spare market. And then also in terms of onboarding, right? There were quite a lot of new people I met here at these events who instantly had the knowledge to ask the right questions. And that is, I think, very powerful. The frame has been shifted and the overturned window has been shifted quite substantially, I would say.

And I just always have to giggle when I hear at some conference in the corner. People [00:41:00] talking about inflation being theft and, the evils of the Cantillon effect, etc. that's outrageous to think that 10, 15 years ago this would have been a casual conversation that you hear while walking past someone. uh, completely impossible. nobody knew what inflation was, um, like 10, 20 years ago, nobody cared. Um, but. But nowadays, it is something that at least in our little bubble, uh, is, is where even the newcomers are aware of, of these facts and, and, uh, thinking about them. Uh, so that's, that's just very encouraging.

Yeah.

[00:41:36] Bitcoin's Inevitability

Knut: Absolutely. Uh, I mean, and that's, that's the part of the inevitability of this thing, right? Whenever people wake up to, to a reality that, that was there all along, but they just weren't aware of it, because they were indoctrinated. Like the waking up process is, is It's spreading like people are realizing that they've been [00:42:00] lied to about inflation in particular, like once you realize that, like, because there are no good counter arguments.

I've never heard a central banker or a politician. Give a really, really solid counter argument to inflation. I mean, there's the Keynesian, uh, argument that spending is more important than saving and because, because you create value each time you make a transaction, but that's so easy to, it's so easy to debunk that argument.

Like that, by just, as Hoppe says, just ask the very simple questions, like, how can you create wealth by printing more pieces of paper? And if central banking works, why are there still poor people? Like, it's. It's very easy to debunk, and I, I think that message will just continue to spread and, uh, that in combination with, with this, the, the, the video conferencing, the social media, which is, [00:43:00] has turned out to be more about connecting with people you don't know than to reinforce the connections you already have and finding like minded people, like that's just, It, it really does obsolete borders.

I mean, there are no borders involved, involved in this call, for instance, and we could send bitcoins to one another if we want to do, there's nothing stopping it, it doesn't matter what kind of a gun you have, uh, it's, it's unstoppable.

Max: Yeah. These technologies are extremely, extremely powerful, right? And, and we're still reeling from the after effects of the internet. The fact that our computers can talk to each other regardless of where we are, that alone is such a profound shift in human collaboration. The fact that you can look up any book and read it within like 30 seconds of having the idea to read it.

That alone is so profound, and again, we could have stopped development [00:44:00] of cyberspace technology 10, 20 years ago, and it would have already been a profound, profound change to the human experience, but we didn't stop development. In fact, we've increased the speed of development because of the internet.

we could Build something like Bitcoin, right? Satoshi could not have even closely come up with Bitcoin without the ability to, talk to other people around the world and, to get their ideas and, download ancient books, right? This, uh, like. Satoshi would have had no chance of developing Bitcoin without Mises.org just alone that one website. It was a fundamental requirement for Bitcoin to come into existence. Um, and, and then of course, with, with, with Bitcoin being there, it's just the next level step of. advancement in [00:45:00] technologies. the rate of change is going to be even more intense because of Bitcoin.

And again, we could stop Bitcoin development today and the consequences of what we've already achieved over the next 10, 20, 50 years would be absolutely staggering. But again, it seems that we will just continue to build. Um, and. like, I wonder if that's actually the case though, right? Because it seems so ridiculous and preposterous, um, and, you know, reading about, ancient or not that ancient, but like a hundred years ago in Vienna, the, amount of optimism and the appreciation of the progress seems to have been very similar, right?

People thought that it could only go up and up and up, and we will just continuously improve human existence, through forever. But then the, the first world war happened and the second world war [00:46:00] and, um, century of war ever since. Right. So I wonder if we're a bit naive in terms of thinking that Bitcoin will continue to, excel and, exponentially so. But, you know, arguably, despite all the fiat meddling with the economy of the last hundred years, we have seen this rate of improvement and change. And despite all the taxation and all the theft and all the misallocation of resources and, uh, all the, the, the just, squashing of the human spirit.

But imagine what could be if, that stops, if that, uh, invention, interventionism, goes away or at least becomes irrelevant, right, when, uh, that it's just very profound. it's, very all encompassing. And I think we get to experience at least a little bit of this being at the forefront of Bitcoin as, as a cutting edge technology.

Uh, but again, like the. The [00:47:00] second and third generation of this will be insane. Nostr is one perfect example for this. It's a technology that probably could have only come up by some bitcoiners or at least cypherpunks. Uh, it, it's just such a beautifully simple solution to, to such a enormously big, uh, problem, like arguably bigger than the money right on, on, uh, human collaboration and communication like that predates money by quite a lot.

Then the consequences of having a protocol that is secure and resilient and that works in different sets and settings. Uh, I mean, wow, like what, what can we build with just that? And forget the money for a second. Uh, just the ability for humans to communicate in a structured and orderly fashion about, well, notes and other stuff.

Uh, there's a lot of other stuff that we can talk about. Is, is. is [00:48:00] absolutely insane. But combining that then on top of the internet and the searchability and indexability of it, and on top of Bitcoin and the money system that cannot be stolen or inflated or corrupted, it is just staggering. So I'm so pumped for the future.

It's going to be wild.

Knut: Yeah, that's why we're here. For the reasons you just stated, we're like, we see it too. It's, uh, it's absolutely amazing.

[00:48:27] The Impact of Ideas

Knut: And this, this is one thing we talked to Jeff about yesterday. Jeff Booth was on the show yesterday and we talked about ideas and how there's no way to measure what kind of impact they have on other people.

And you alluding to Bitcoin not being able to exist at all without Mises. org. It's, it's one such thing, like, I don't think the people, I think the majority of people working on mises. org are totally unaware that that is the case, that there would be no Bitcoin without them. [00:49:00] so, so that's so interesting about ideas in general that we, we don't know what impact this conversation has on.

So it might lead to another person, uh, getting an aha moment and figuring something out and drawing connections between dots. That's. Not even megabrains such as, uh, yours and, and, and maybe Luke's can, can come up with. So, so, um, yeah, I, I don't know, uh, it just feels so, so good to, to talk about these things.

Max: Yeah, it's pretty profound, you know, and I've, I've met now a couple people who like were watching my obscure videos from like five, seven years ago, uh, talking about economics or, or anarchy or cypherpunk. Um, and like these videos have a couple hundred views, right? They're very much not successful in the classical sense, but, but still.

People come up to me and saying that [00:50:00] they, they were extremely impactful in their journey of becoming a Bitcoiner. And then I look at what that person has achieved in the last couple of years and how many people he has influenced, um, with, you know, his ideas or his music. Uh, it's, it's just staggering.

Like the fact that, you know, the little kid like me in his parents basement making some videos about economics can have an impact. Not just for one generation, but two and three and four generations to come. It's a butterfly effect, right? a tiny impact or a tiny action can have a monumental impact.

And I think we've just... Underestimated the, power of the individual. and, Bitcoin is, holding a, mirror in front of us like, look how fucking powerful you are. Like seriously, that's, it's, it's absolutely insane. And, and so having technologies that, [00:51:00] foster and, strengthen this individual empowerment will again be, just a, staggering, staggering achievement in the long run.

Knut: Absolutely. I mean, they described it so perfectly there. I mean, whenever, whenever I experienced such a moment, like with one, a person saying that I am a help. The I orange spilled them or something. It's just like, and you see what that person has achieved. It's just a magic feeling because you get a reminder that you're not doing this for nothing.

There, uh, it's, uh, and, and as you say, superpowers, it's magical internet money. And it's good. And it, it, the mirror shows you how, how important just communication is just putting the ideas out there and not being ashamed of them. It's extremely powerful.

Max: Yeah. And it's so easy. It's so easy. I mean, what you and I are doing, it's not hard. It's like, it takes nothing. It takes fucking nothing, man.

Knut: no. We, we had no clue what we were going to talk about today. It was like, do you know what we're [00:52:00] talking about? Uh, this is pre-show and, uh, uh, and Max is like, no, and I have no idea either. Luke, do you have an idea? Uh, maybe ask Max about the year. Uh, and that's it. And we, that's it. Hit record.

And this conversation happens and I love it. Like that's the, just follow, follow the orange glowing light.

Max: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it's, it's like already having these conversations and all that's. That's a very easy thing to do with, with a huge impact. Um, and, and then developing software, it's not rocket science. Come on, guys. it's, totally doable to, write code that's, impactful and look at the impact of something crazy like Bitcoin or, like Wasabi or the Lightning Network.

these were just a couple of dudes, you know, having fun coding up some stuff and shipping it, but the consequences of it are. Just simply profound. and it doesn't take anything special. It doesn't [00:53:00] take a massive genius. It doesn't take huge amounts of courage. it doesn't take much dedication either.

It doesn't even take much work. the amount that we can achieve with, just a little bit of effort is crazy, right? But, what if, we activate. Not just a couple of tens of thousands of people like right now, but a couple of millions, billions of people to just do a little bit in terms of human flourishing and individual empowerment...like wow, it's

Knut: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's totally crazy. Yeah. I'm, I'm thinking of even pre Bitcoin era little snippets of software, like VLC media player, for instance, or Winamp, change the world or Napster. That's also a dude in a basement just with a hobby project.

Max: Yeah, exactly, exactly. And, um, so the, and yeah, that it. It [00:54:00] changed the world so profoundly and very much in a better direction. And this is something that has always been possible. And I guess now we get to experience just how much the impact of it can be. And that's really cool to see.

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[00:56:12] Resisting Tyranny

Knut: Luke, you haven't gotten a chance to say anything for, um, for more than an hour now, so it's time to let you in. What's on your mind?

Luke: Thanks Knut. And no worries, as always, this is excellent to have our lovely guest and you Knut, both just riffing, it's loads of fun. But Max, so maybe another angle on what's going on in the Wasabi world. There's lots of these regulations. These days, or either they have been implemented or, or there's some kind of plan to implement that are, uh, saying that using mixers, wasabi, some alternative is, is going to be banned.

I mean, I think I know your answer to this sort of, but [00:57:00] what do you think of that? And, and what is there practically as far as, uh, some, some resistance to those sorts of regulations to maintain privacy?

Max: Yeah, I think a lot of people are very afraid, because of the realization of how powerful these technologies are and that the world simply is not the same anymore. Um, again, we have anonymous money now, like money that cannot be inflated. Money that cannot be stolen. That changes everything, right? And it changes everything in such a profound way that people who have a lot of power in the old world are afraid of having to give it up, and I guess still thinking that that they can stop it when, when in reality they, they cannot, um, it's a, uh, that's, that's just very profound, right?

Um, the, the, the march of technology is relentless in this regard. Uh, and it's, it's not just up [00:58:00] to, to any one individual to like to make or break it. It's, it's a, it's a tendency and, and, and ideas are powerful and ideas are bulletproof, right? Uh, so Yes, there is going to be a lot of pushback, I think, in, in the near term future, um, because a, a transition of power is rarely, uh, like calm and peaceful and bloodless.

Um, it is probably going to be very wild, uh, the next couple of years. Um, I, I wonder if we've already seen the worst of it. Uh, or if the worst is yet to come, I, I don't know, uh, but there is definitely going to be a lot of, uh, pressure to try to put the genie back into the bottle. Uh, and I wonder what happens when, when people realize that that's just not going to happen anymore.

Uh, I, I hope it is going to be a path of, of reason and, [00:59:00] uh, and, and calm. Uh, and. Uh, yeah, peaceful cooperation, but it's probably unlikely to happen like that. So, yeah, guys, be careful out there. It's going to be a wild ride, especially in the next years. And we will see how it goes.

Knut: I often like to envision Bitcoin as the little kid in the emperor's new clothes who points out that the emperor is naked. And it was, it's, it's, it's so obvious when you see it. most people, uh, haven't, just haven't met that kid yet, pointing out, pointing out, pointing out the blatantly obvious.

Max: Yeah, but it is obvious, and it is true, right? That's, that's, that's, I guess, what gives me the most hope is, is that it's, it's just obviously true and obviously good. And [01:00:00] the truth prevails, I believe. So, the, despite a lot of pushback. The forces behind good are just a lot more powerful than those of evil.

And especially when we collaborate and coordinate and organize, which I think Bitcoin has shown as well. And the amount of people that we have connected with is This is insane and extremely, extremely powerful. The friendships and collaborations that have been forged over the last couple years, especially in the bull market, will be those that will get us through all types of trouble.

And I think that... That is very important. Strength in numbers. That's very much the case. And it's, it's about distributing the risk as well. And, uh, to, that there's not just one entity that, that can be taken down in order to stop the system, but that you would need to, I mean, in order [01:01:00] to stop Bitcoin, you would need to kill.

Tens of thousands of people at this point. Hundreds of thousands of people. And I guess such a genocide would lead to enormous pushback. And that's a good thing. And we should work on protocols with more of these aspects, right? To distribute risk and to just to ensure that people working on these projects are secure.

But yeah, like, I mean, one of the other rabbit holes is free private cities that are flourishing like crazy. In the last year, the amount of progress on that front is just staggering. And so we will have a plethora of small jurisdictions offering legal and jurisprudence services. Uh, with free market ideals, right?

And, um, the, the more of these free citadels pop up, uh, the, the more difficult it will be to, [01:02:00] to, to stop the entire system, right? Because if, if we have places in meat space that are protected under property rights and, and with, with real law and order, uh, then. Uh, again, it will be more and more difficult to stop the people acting peacefully within them.

Knut: Yeah, not only that, but like the, the rise of passport theory and, and, uh, getting a residency where it's better for you and like people voting with their feet, as they say, um, and just nomads in general, just not giving a fuck about borders anymore. That's very promising. And like, it reminds me of the, the Soviet Union.

Once again, and how they, a bad system can only win as long as everyone's playing by those rules. Like if we refuse to play the game at all, that's, that's how we win. That's how, that's how you emancipate yourself from, from whatever clutches you [01:03:00] happen to be bound by. It's a lot of hard words there.

Max: Yeah, but it's so true, right? And it's, uh, you know, these are strategies that work, like right now, um, and, and show a huge promise of improving in the future too. And, uh, the, the aspect of, of citadels, uh, or free cities popping up all over the globe, uh, and having secure travel in between. In between them, like that, that's going to be a reality within the next five years, very much so, right?

Seasteads on the high and open ocean are definitely going to be a reality within like one or two years. Um, and that, you know, all of, all of these things together with, with the advancement of, of liberation of, of pockets of freedom in meat space. Together with the unstoppable technologies of cyberspace are extremely [01:04:00] powerful.

Again, with certainly a lot of pushback and a lot of turbulence in the short term. But in the long run, I think there is... There's definitely a tendency towards greater human freedom and individual empowerment to come.

Knut: Yeah, Seasteading is about the only type of free city that I don't believe in, uh, having spent, lived half my life at sea, because, uh, I think there's a lot of problems with that, but yeah, the disclaimer here, I'm an ambassador for the Free Cities Foundation, and I think you are too, Max. I didn't, I didn't have the time to, to look that up, but, but this is happening everywhere.

And, uh, we are everywhere. Bitcoiners are everywhere. Um, um, yeah. Citadel advocates are also everywhere. Like, uh, when I, like last week in Germany, like the, the, the thing I love about the German community is that. You know, you're in the smallest of [01:05:00] places, and Bitcoiners are, the conviction is strong, like, everyone's technical knowledge is high, there was even a role playing game, like, where we taught the kids and everything, how the network works, in a very, very thorough way, so the game was so complicated, so that it never really started, it was just a setup, and to explain, um, oh!

Uh, you know, nodes sending packages and requests to one another back and forth and really thorough explanation of how this works. And, and these educational efforts are happening everywhere at once as well. And in, in Germany in particular, I think there's a meetup like every two weeks in each major city of Germany.

There's, uh, because of the, uh, Einundzwanzig, uh, movement. It's just amazing. And not to mention Czech Republic. It's everywhere. Prague is the Bitcoin capital of Europe, isn't it?

Max: [01:06:00] Yeah, definitely. Right. And like, I'm to some extent, I was very bearish on Germany. Like I escaped it in 2019, um, uh, for, for numerous reasons. Um, and the, it's, it's very much on a downward path on, on so many fronts, right? Energy, politics, uh, just bureaucracy and, and the hindrance of entrepreneurship. It's absolutely staggering, um, like insane, right?

The, the intervention into everyday life is, is so substantial and, and so hurtful, uh, that, uh, that led not just to me fleeing the country, but thousands of people fleeing the country, and nevertheless. There is an extremely solid remnant in Germany of people who care and who want to see the place improve and who will fight like hell to ensure that the bureaucrats don't take the last soul of the country away.

And that's, like, Einundzwanzig is, like, it's unspeakable to what has [01:07:00] been achieved with, again, just like a couple dudes starting a podcast, right? And, like, a couple years later. As you say, every tiny village has a Bitcoiner meetup now, um, and, and, and people building the, the community and the circular economy and, and the education, it's just so staggering again, what, what, what can be achieved, uh, with, with a little bit of effort and dedication, uh, and organization.

Right? That's, that's again, the other thing, like, um, uh, there, there are so many isolated Bitcoiners who are feeling lost in a sea of fiat culture. And, if, they remain lost and isolated, then they are not powerful, right? They, are...Or not as powerful as they could be. but, with coordination and collaboration, and, a little bit of working together.

The long term effects are just staggering. And I think the German speaking area is definitely an example [01:08:00] to follow on that front. And we see that it is spreading to other European cities now with this particular type of organization. And that's just super encouraging. And it needs to be done. There needs to be this bottom up grassroots movement of dedicated freedom fighters.

To, say no to the tyrants and, to stand their ground. that, is extremely important, right? And, we need to do that on many fronts in, all the directions. Like stand your ground and, ensure that, that the tyrants don't have an easy path, towards theft and tyranny, right?

we need to increase their cost of attack, while decreasing our cost of defense. And cypherpunk technology enables that, and now it's on us to use these technologies to ensure that humanity survives. And not just that, but [01:09:00] thrives. I mean, we've seen what's possible with bitcoin and freedom technologies in our own bubble.

it should not be a bubble. Right. this, spirit, this ethos, this, love should be everywhere.

Knut: Absolutely. And once again, to Germany, the soul of the country is it. Meticulous tinkering. There's a lot of meticulous tinkerers in basements building, like, it's a country of the descendants of fathers who built, you know, Märklin model train tracks in their basements. And now they're tinkering with nodes instead.

That's how I view it. And that's the real soul of the country. Unfortunately, the word. The dark forces that have every once in a while gripped the country with seeing the entire country as a model train track, totalitarianists and social engineers have been in charge too much and it's a constant [01:10:00] fight between the two, the ones who actually want to build things, and That allows for technological progress and the people who just want to socially engineer everything.

And when you say programmable money, I mean, and referring to Bitcoin as programmable money, we should, uh, we should, uh, state a warning that Uh, whenever, in whatever other context you hear the word programmable money, you should avoid it like the plague, because programmable money in the sense of a CBDC means programmable you, like the thing it programs is you and your behaviors, and that is just the darkest path imaginable for humanity to take.

So, the only way is to take matters into your own hands.

Max: Yeah, exactly. Like Bitcoin is a money system where you can program your own money. And CBDCs are a system where someone [01:11:00] else is programming you. Very, very big difference.

[01:11:03] The Future of Wasabi and Tor

Luke: with all of this sort of forward looking in a theoretical sense, what about on a practical level, what's coming up for you for ZK Snacks for Wasabi?

Max: keep building. Right. In any shape or form. Again, the progress of the last couple of years is staggering and will just keep going, basically. One of the big things is a mobile wallet. That is going to be a huge work in progress that we just now started. It actually runs on mobile now already, at least in emulator.

Somewhat, still a lot of errors and bugs that have to be ironed out. But it's faster progress than I could have imagined, actually. One of the key blockers to this is [01:12:00] the Tor network. Um, again, the... Tor is one of these open source projects with, without a company that has struggled for funding very substantially.

And, um, so we've tried to address that with the Onion Service Resource Coalition, uh, like a funding group of, of external companies to ensure ongoing development of, uh, the, this highly critical, uh, infrastructure project. Um, and the work of that is, is paying off really nicely. Um, uh, there is a new. So Tor implementation, a library written in Rust, which is kind of the next generation client or software architecture for Tor.

It's going to be critically needed to ensure a network level privacy on the mobile phone. Um, currently, the Tor implementation we have on the phone is, is kindergarten. It's, it's very, very much not good enough, uh, and it, it would not work [01:13:00] to sustain a sophisticated Tor user like WasabiWallet. Um, so that library has...

has now been released in version 1. 0, actually, um, and, uh, can already now be tinkered with, and next year, like the second or third quarter, uh, there will be a stable RPC version, uh, for this new Tor implementation, and that is today. something that will unlock the next wave of innovation in terms of mobile phone privacy.

Uh, like it cannot be overstated of how important that project is and people should definitely look into contributing and supporting it wherever they can, including financially. Um, so that, uh, yeah, that's, that's a key one, right? And, uh, another really interesting path is, uh, hardware wallet coin joints, uh, the, the biggest.

The most left over problem with, with CoinJoin technology is that it is difficult to sign a CoinJoin transaction with the private keys on a [01:14:00] secure offline environment, like a hardware wallet, um, that, uh, Trezor has made enormous progress. And, and, uh, last year, no, this year, oh, so much happened this year.

Crazy. The first implementation of a hardware wallet signing these coinjoin transactions securely. Um, a ungodly amount of research and development went into that project, uh, and we want to replicate it so that it's not just the Trezor hardware wallet, uh, to be able to sign coinjoin securely, but hopefully any hardware wallet, um, that requires some collaboration with the hardware wallet manufacturers and the firmware that that they have, uh, but it is something where we're gonna, uh, help and support wherever we can.

Um, and these, these two things, or three things, the, uh, mobile wallets, uh, with a better Tor integration and hardware wallet signing. Um, it is like the next big [01:15:00] milestone, um, that we will hopefully achieve very soon. Uh, and after that, it's about, uh, lightning network, right? I think that's then the, the next leftover big problem to tackle a privacy preserving lightning network, uh, infrastructure, uh, that, uh, there have been enormous improvements.

on that front on the protocol for the last two years, especially, um, and, and now we have like, for example, route blinding, uh, being, uh, deployed in Sea Lightning and LDK. And I think in L& D also with the upcoming release, uh, so that means that you can receive payments in the, over the Lightning Network without revealing the public key of your node.

And so that it's not clear to the sender of who is actually getting paid, which Lightning Node is getting paid. So that's a very critical part of, of the privacy game that, that even the person whom you pay. The person who pays you that they cannot [01:16:00] spy on each other, right? That, uh, uh, if, if that is, is fully achieved in lightning, that that will be a pretty big deal.

Um, there's then, you know, other routing privacy improvements that that can be done, uh, that probably still requires some research and development. I would love to see what a mix net on, on lightning looks like. And so we have onion routing similar to the tour network. Um, where you route your package across a linear line of nodes, right?

From node A to node B to node C to the destination. Um, and, and MixNets is basically that the routing nodes wait a couple of seconds before they release the package to the next node. Um, so we wait and, and accumulate many users. Uh, uh, uh, who all have different routes and everyone is stuck at the node for some couple of seconds.

The node shuffles the packages and then forwards them on. Um, this [01:17:00] is a much, much superior privacy architecture. Um, and It is used in communication networks, so TOR is an onion routing network versus something like Katzenpost or NIM is a mixed network. Similar aspects can be done with lightning routing, and it's an area that's not yet very much explored, but something that is extremely interesting for Uh, like the long term privacy improvements to Lightning.

Um, uh, yeah, that's, but like after that, it's going to be very boring guys. Like, I think we, we fixed, we fixed the money, like it's done now. Um, arguably it's already done right now. And things like a mobile wallet or hardware wallet signing or Lightning integration is, or even Lightning is like. Decently fine on the privacy front and decently scalable too.

Um, so it's, yeah, like, I think the money is solved and [01:18:00] then the question is what do we do next? And then, uh, probably something like Nostr is, uh, This is where a lot of room for improvement is still to be made, um, both in terms of its security and privacy, uh, as, as well as just usability. There, there is a thousand and one amazing product ideas to be built on Nostr, uh, and, and someone's got to do it.

And someone's going to have a lot of fun doing it, and it's probably going to be us as well, right? We Bitcoiners who are now bored with having fixed the money can finally go on and fixing the rest of the world. And then it's going to be fun.

Knut: you got it. The money is fixed. Now go out there and fix the world. Start by liking, subscribing, clicking the fucking notification bell button and brushing your teeth and make the world a better place. Like Michael Jackson said, yeah.

[01:18:56] Wrapping Up

Luke: Yep. I think that's it, Max. Yeah. Uh, unless we [01:19:00] have one that dig into another rabbit hole or three, but, uh, I think, I think that was a great note to end this one on.

Knut: I know Max is the type of guest who thinks the best content comes after the 4th hour has started. So, but I don't think we're going there today. So, Max.

Max: it's alright. I understand. I've bored you to pieces and you're kicking me out now before it could get interesting. It's okay. You're only hurting my feelings a little bit.

Luke: Oh, is that why you wanted to start two hours early? You wanted to leave this room for a four or five hour rip? In that case, I'll go get a, I'll go get a beer or something, but,

Knut: Alright, well, we um, when do we see each other next time? Atlantis, probably,

Max: Most likely Atlantis and Madeira, right? That's, that's going to be a hell of a fun. Um, the sovereign engineering bootcamp before or cohort before, uh, that's going to be wild. Um, like it's, it's [01:20:00] another crazy thing, right? Gigi and Pablo were like, yeah, we should like get together, hang out and meet space a bit.

Let's see, let's open it up to the public. Maybe one or two people will join us. But no, like over 200 people signed up for this commitment to, to come there, pay for their own rent and accommodation and flight and add like 200 dedicated cypherpunk

Knut: beautiful and insane. Yeah.

Max: yeah. And it's the first one, right? What if we don't just have one, but like 10 of them in parallel all over this globe?

Like, just imagine, just imagine the amount of crazy shit that we can build if we get our act together, right? With projects like this, like it's going to be mind blowing of what comes out of this one cohort in a couple months. Uh, and again, extrapolate that to the future. And then, uh, increase it in intensity.

Like, I think we all have to like retire soon because [01:21:00] it's going to be so fucking intense that we just can't handle it anymore. And we have to, the young kids have to take it over them.

Knut: Yeah. Max, you are a world class hopium salesman, and I as a hopium salesman myself. I hope you, you, you, you never lose your hope And keep on hop hoping ho, ho hop.

Max: Hopping. Read Hoppe and you will get a lot of hopium.

Knut: Read Hopper, uh, enjoy hops and, uh, in, in every way, shape or form. And yeah, keep on fighting for freedom.

Max: And that's the spirit. Well, thanks very much guys for the invite again. I'm really looking forward to hearing your next upcoming shows. You just keep crushing it on them and looking forward to my next appearance on them as well. Thanks very much guys.

Knut: Thank you. That means, means a lot to us coming from you. Uh, so yeah.

Luke: and you're welcome anytime. You're welcome [01:22:00] anytime. Absolutely. So thanks again. This has been the Freedom Footprint Show. Thanks for listening.