February 19, 2025 • 35 mins
Ketan is co-founder of Ministry of Nodes providing educational content and tutorials on how to run Bitcoin nodes and private and self-sovereign computing.
We talk about freedom, privacy tech, threat models and the journey to being more private and secure in the way we use the internet.
---
Links:
Ministry of Nodes - https://www.ministryofnodes.com.au/
Ministry of Nodes YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/ministryofnodes
Ketan on X - https://x.com/_k3tan
---
Support this Show:
Support TTOV -https://www.thetransformationofvalue.com/support
---
Connect:
Instagram -https://www.instagram.com/codyellingham
YouTube -https://www.youtube.com/@ttovpodcast
---
Credits:
The Transformation of Value is produced by Cody Ellingham
Show music by Simon James French -https://www.simonjamesfrench.com/
---
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
That will be, you know, the focus for me in 2025.
Get as many node runners out there, get as many people
holding their own keys with, youknow, things like the ETF and
MSTR. There's a lot of people
interested in Bitcoin, but they're not actually Bitcoiners,
right? They're, they're just they, they
want the exposure to Bitcoin. Hello, I am Cody Allingham and
(00:20):
this is the transformation of Value, a place for thinkers and
builders like you where we ask questions about freedom, Bitcoin
and creativity. Today I'm joined by Katan who is
Co founder of Ministry of Nodes,providing educational content
and tutorials on how to run Bitcoin nodes and private and
self sovereign computing. We talk about freedom, privacy,
(00:42):
tech threat models and the journey to being more private
and secure in the way we use theInternet.
I would like to know what you think.
Send me an e-mail at hello at the transformation of value.com
and I will get back to you. Now, if you enjoy the show,
please consider sharing this episode with a friend who you
think might like it. You can also support my work
directly by streaming sets to the show's wallet or donating
(01:05):
directly through my website. Otherwise, onto the show.
I wanted to jump into it, man, just straight into the deep end
and talk a little bit about the big topic, freedom and freedom
technology. And I guess starting off trying
to understand what those things mean to you, if that's OK,
please. Yeah.
So I think for me, freedom is about, I guess, choice, choosing
(01:29):
who you want to interact with, choosing who you want to deal
with, and really just about whenit comes to a technological
perspective, not inviting trusted third parties that no,
don't really need to be there. And so for me, that's what
(01:53):
freedom is all about. It's the freedom to choose who
you want in your digital life and who you don't want as well.
So that that's kind of in a nutshell, what it means.
But yeah, I've, I've been, you know, trying to, I guess over
over the many years it takes is to remove these trusted third
(02:17):
parties out of my digital life. And so that's kind of what I've
been focusing on. And that comes to money through
my emails, through, you know, mydata, my photos, my location,
all of those sorts of things. I try and remove as much as I
(02:38):
can away from these third parties who who tend to sell
people out, really. So yeah, that that to me is what
freedom is all about. Yeah, and thank you.
What kicked off this journey towards exploring freedom?
OK, so I started really when I understood what Bitcoin meant in
(03:02):
that I don't have to use a central bank.
I don't have to use a bank or another trusted third party to
send, you know, value across theInternet.
Then I thought, well, what else can I sort of self host?
What, what can I, what else can I do by myself?
(03:24):
And that's where I sort of just dived into things like next
cloud. I don't, you know, just went in
and said, OK, well, what are these bits of data that I need
to protect and how do I go, go about protecting that as well?
And, and, and making sure that that data is not taken away from
me, but also, yeah, is kept secure and self hosted.
(03:47):
And it's always with me rather with another corporation or
faceless organization that I don't really want to deal with.
So that kind of Bitcoin was the start of that journey.
And then it sort of just went down as like, well, if I can
self host to this, then what else can I self host?
And then I just went down like video cameras and, you know, I
(04:09):
just, yeah, all, all sorts of gadgets that, you know, those
smart things that we use at homeand then, you know, home
assistant and all these sorts ofthings.
I just started to started using and building up a profile.
So yeah, that that's kind of where I'm at with it.
Yeah, that's fascinating. And you're based in Australia
(04:29):
and I'm just wondering if there was anything in particular or
there was something about Australia that began that
exploration. I know you've done a lot of
travel as well, but that relationship maybe with the
state, I mean, can you elaboratea bit more on that, please?
Yeah, look, I think Australia for me has always been a
fantastic country. Like I've always loved living
here. It is a phenomenal place.
(04:51):
It's given me all the opportunities in the world
really. I've got my private pilot
license, I'm a chartered accountant.
The the opportunities here, the job opportunity, it's just it's
fantastic, right. But at the same time, I think
things turned probably of 2021-2022 during those COVID
(05:13):
years something. Happened where?
We started to go, hey, hmm, thisdoesn't just doesn't feel like
Australia anymore. And yeah, it, it, it's, it's
look, the self hosting stuff andall, all that, that, that
freedom desire. It wasn't really Australia that,
you know, sort of I guess. Yeah, yeah, Like I, I, I, I
(05:37):
think what happened was what, what happened during COVID
solidified what I already kind of knew and what I was already
trying to achieve and what I wastrying to, you know, move
towards. And so, yeah, like I just feel
like that that's a better outcome.
(05:57):
And, you know, what happened during those years just kind of
just solidified it really. Like it wasn't, you know, oh, my
God, color me shocked. This is, you know, world
changing stuff here. I, I, I, I saw it for what it
was well before. And I kind of, yeah.
It's just, it was just it, it wasn't a wake up call for me.
(06:19):
It was more, hey, I was so right.
Yeah. Yeah, that's fascinating.
And you mentioned Bitcoin was the beginning of this journey,
and then you started looking at other things, including e-mail
and other services that maybe a lot of people outsource to the
cloud, basically someone else's computer.
But what do you think if we're walking through this kind of
(06:41):
journey of freedom? I mean, what do you think are
some really important first steps that people can think
about? Maybe people have never
considered freedom or freedom tech as a concept.
I think look, there's a few things that you can do that are
like 5 minute quick wins and then there's five year ordeals
where you have to get out of this relationship with Google,
(07:03):
right? So some of the quick wins that
you can do is like maybe use AVPN.
That's a very, very quick win. Changing your DNS on your
router, something like that is aquick win, right?
So instead of using the default,you know, DNS that's provided by
your Internet service provider that is obviously logging it.
(07:23):
And well, here in Australia, youknow, it, it's logged for up to
two years, your Internet historyby default.
And if you just change somethingin your router in your settings,
you can sort of remove that. That's a very, very quick win.
And and then there's obviously the hardest stuff like, you
know, getting rid of your e-mail, like you, you may have
(07:45):
had your emails, you know, sinceyou were 16 years old and trying
to sort of, you know, make sure that that's all moved over to
maybe an A more freedom respecting hosting platform like
maybe ProtonMail or Tuta Nota those, you know, that might be,
you know, something that you cando as well.
(08:05):
But there's a whole raft of things that you can, you know,
sort of move towards that, you know, takes ownership of your
own data and setting up something like the next cloud or
your own network attached storage where you own the data
and not somebody else. And there's other things that
(08:27):
you can do in between as well, like encrypting things and then
putting them onto the cloud so that, you know, if if someone
wants to sort of want to read that information, there's
nothing for them to read. But the, the issue with that as
well, the trade off is that, youknow, they can just cut off the
data altogether and not service you anymore.
(08:49):
So yeah, look, there's a few things that people can do that
will, I guess, help them become a little bit more freedom.
Well, you know, take back that freedom from corporations and
people who are trying to really just spy on you.
Really. Yeah, it's interesting, Katan,
(09:09):
because there's sort of two things here.
There's the freedom of self hosting and running your own
stack, and then there's also theprivacy aspects.
And I think sometimes those are the same thing and sometimes
they can be different things. And often think of maybe people
who are not so technical and kind of what are the easy ones
and what is maybe not perfect, but still better than what
they've currently got. For example, instead of using
(09:31):
WhatsApp, maybe using something like Signal.
Signal. You know, and that's a service
that you just download off the App Store.
You, you're not necessarily going to self host that or
verify the code or any of that stuff yourself, but there's,
yeah, arguably more privacy there than WhatsApp or.
And So what are your thoughts onthat trade off between going
deep into running your own stackand kind of little baby steps
(09:52):
that are in the right direction?And, and I think that's what
needs to eventually happen. You, you, you don't just really
just dive into the deep end and,you know, see how you go.
It's, it's not going to work that way.
You're going to sync and pretty quickly as well.
You do have to take small steps and it it may take a few years
(10:13):
to get to your final destination, if there ever is
one in the privacy front. But you know, yeah, a small
quick, those quick wins that that just moving away from, you
know, messaging services that are we know that are invasive
versus, you know, something likeSignal, which is a bit more open
(10:34):
source and, you know, well vetted and trusted by the
privacy community is a better step than going down, you know,
like full self hosting your own Matrix server, for example.
Yeah, yeah. Well, I just think even my own
family and friends, you know, getting the monitor signals
pretty easy. It is.
It's a quick win. It's a quick win.
(10:55):
Yeah, it's a quick win to get that network effect and, and
Signal provides beautifully. And yeah, for me, even my family
is all on Signal and it's just, it just works like a breeze.
So yeah, that that's a great, great example.
Yeah. And I guess the other thing, I
mean, looking at the the literature on freedom and
privacy technology in particular, there is this idea
(11:15):
of threat modeling and sort of what is your threat vector?
And kind of there is a rabbit hole you can go down where I
actually recently watched that old Mel Gibson film Conspiracy
Theory. I don't know if you remember
from the 90s, and I've been going through those kind of
films from the 90s, Enemy of theState, conspiracy theory, The
Fugitive, you know, and it's alllike, you know, the state is
(11:36):
coming to get you. And I think there's some truth
in there. But I also wonder, you know, how
do you model your own personal threats and how do you use that
to make your decisions potentially?
Yeah. OK.
So from from my perspective, thegovernment, if they wanted me,
they will take me. That's that's like that's it
there. There is no real, I guess, you
(11:58):
know, hiding from them. It like, yeah, it's, it's
really, really difficult. If that's your threat model,
yeah, I, I, I think you're goingto be in a very, very difficult
situation or you've probably putyourself into a difficult
corner. But if you want to protect
yourself from other parties, like for example, Google,
(12:19):
Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, if you want to protect yourself
from, you know, other just, you know, small time hackers and
that sort of stuff, then yeah, I, I, I, I, I think it is
achievable. And yeah, I, I, I think it's
(12:40):
just it, it, it's something thatyou can sort of actively work
towards to remove these servicesand these these, you know,
things that they have that sort of lock you into an ecosystem.
Another example is Apple, of course, And yeah, I, I, I think
corporations and other individuals, definitely you can,
(13:02):
you know, sort of protect yourself against.
But if you're looking to, you know, evade the government, I
think that's going to be a much,much more harder or much more
difficult task. Yeah, that's how I see it.
Yeah. Look, that's a tough one,
really. Yeah.
No, no, I understand. I mean, and this is sort of, I
mean it's the spectrum, right? I mean, there's certain things
(13:24):
that already out-of-the-box giveyou some privacy from the state
and those are relatively easy things.
But then there's maybe other things that are at the end of
the day, you know, if you're a citizen of a country that you
know, it's generally going to beknown where you are, etcetera.
But the kind of that privacy andbeing able to choose when you
reveal yourself is certainly powerful.
(13:45):
And having more of that can't bea bad thing.
But Cortana, I did want to talk a little bit about Ministry of
Nodes. So this is sort of the umbrella
for a lot of your educational content and sort of if you could
share sort of what that is and where it came from, if that's
OK, please. Yeah, no.
So Ministry of Nodes is a an idea that a prominent podcaster
(14:08):
and myself had Stefan Labarre. We thought, Hey, look, we need
to live, we need to level up Bitcoin education because it was
at that time fairly weak. And we thought, you know, people
need to learn how to, you know, hold their own keys, but also
run their own Bitcoin notes. And whilst Stefan was had had
(14:29):
had a fantastic podcast, he, he spoke to, you know, just, I
guess he, he would talk about the principles and, you know,
roughly how you would go about doing it.
Whereas I would more focus on, OK, this is how you going to
achieve these principles that Stefan has spoken about in his
(14:54):
podcast in a, in a, in a, you know, in an achievable way.
So how do you hold your own keys?
How do you run your own node? These are types of, you know,
educational content that we would, you know, sort of give
out to people. And it it like if, if you want
to know like it, it just started, you know, I just
(15:14):
started it kind of like I was listening to Ministry of Sounds.
And so I just thought, OK, well,Ministry of Notes sounds like a,
a, a great name. We both agreed on it.
And, you know, kind of we started it in one July 2019 and
we had a seminar, I think like four people attended that
seminar. And then, you know, like the
YouTube content came out and then, you know, it just started
(15:36):
to grow from there. And then you've got, you know,
tutorials that are showing you basically how to run your own
Bitcoin node and how to connect that node up to your own wallet
and that sort of stuff. And then, yeah, we just like,
you know, private consulting as well.
During the COVID years, Stefan decided to sort of step back and
out of Australia. He, he thought that, you know,
(15:57):
Australia was a bit of a stranglehold on him.
So he, he, he departed and he just left me the whole business,
just sort of just carry on. And so since then I've started
to sell, you know, pre packaged nodes as well, alongside that
tutorial that shows you how I build them.
And then if you want the end product, you can just buy it off
me if you, if you so wish. So yeah, that's what I've been
(16:20):
trying. Like that's what I've been just
doing and yeah, you know, pushing out those nodes and
yeah, helping people to, you know, with their with their
Bitcoin related questions and even self hosting stuff as well.
So yeah, that's kind of just what we've been doing.
That's awesome. And how did you fall into that
education space? Had you done anything prior to
that in other fields? Teaching or?
(16:41):
No, nothing like that. I, I, I feel like if you know,
when you teach something, you actually learn yourself and it's
kind of it, it just solidifies your own understanding as well.
So when someone asks you a question and you don't know the
answer, it's like, oh, I better,I better go and find that out.
(17:02):
That sounds, you know, somethinginteresting.
So yeah, that's what I try and do.
And that's what I've been sort of, yeah.
I, I don't really have any formal, you know, experience,
but I have been through, you know, university.
So if you notice my videos are kind of tutorial based.
So it's very, very much mini mimicking the the education that
(17:23):
I received, I guess. So that that's kind of, you
know, that's my style and that'swhat I just yeah, have have gone
with. Yeah, no, I think it's awesome.
And certainly this goes through all of the steps you need and,
and I like the emphasis on the command line and verifying
packages and all of that stuff that you go through with your
tutorials. But I, I was also wondering when
(17:44):
it comes to Bitcoin education more broadly, I mean, there's so
much out there to learn, right? You know, there's kind of quite
a lot of things and it's changing all the time.
What do you think are the areas where there's the most surface
area to perhaps build more educational content or where
there maybe needs to be more information?
With respect to Bitcoin. Yes.
(18:07):
Look back in 2013 when I first started, there was really was
very light on in terms of education.
It, you know, you had to sort ofdissect what was conspiracy
theory, actual conspiracy theoryto what was actually true.
And it was difficult. We just had random Reddit posts
(18:29):
and you know, that that they were just, you know, throw away
accounts. Yeah.
You, you really had to really decipher what, you know, factor
or fiction and it was really, really tough.
But if you look in today in 2025, I think that the signal
there is phenomenal, right? I just yeah, like if you just,
(18:51):
you know, open Twitter and follow a few Bitcoiners, they
will be over time, over a year long period of lurk, lurking.
They will point you to resourcesthat I think are phenomenal.
Like one just came out recently called What's the problem?
It's a 40 minute, you know, video on what exactly is the
(19:13):
problem? And I've been trying to, you
know, tell people this for over 10 years and this guy's just
done it in 40 minutes. And if you, if you're really,
really stressed for time, put iton 2 speed and you'll get it
done in 20. Like it's, it is phenomenal
educational content out there. I wish I had that 'cause then I
(19:35):
wouldn't have spent, you know, the, the, you know, thousands of
hours trying to figure this out.And yeah, look, in terms of
opportunities, I'm, I'm really, really, really pressed to find,
you know, an Ave. that hasn't been, you know, uncovered.
(19:57):
So yeah, like, I think you just need to be pointed in the right
direction. Otherwise, I think you're going
to end up down some paths that you may not want to take other
coins and other, you know, just general.
Mistakes that I think bitcoinerscan make.
But yeah, generally speaking, I think there's a solid signal.
(20:18):
You, you follow a few bitcoinerson, on, on Twitter and you'll
get the signal and they'll pointyou into the right direction.
I think that's, yeah, I, I thinkthat's probably the best way of
doing it. That's fascinating.
And I ask as well, because last year I, I did a workshop or
hosted a workshop. It was kind of relatively entry
level. And certainly the question of
(20:39):
like what is money and why is any of this even important?
Is it's kind of the one of the first barriers that once you're,
you're past that everything else, it's just a matter of, you
know, following the tutorials and RTFM.
But before that, you know, what is the problem?
Why do we need this is actually the hard part, right?
And kind of getting people who may be curious, but they don't
quite see the the challenges andand sort of communicating that
(21:01):
side of things. So I mean, is that something
you've, I mean, you've tried to do?
I mean, obviously over the yearstried to orange peel people,
but. So, so for me, given the amount
of time that I've been doing it and just the amount of heartache
that I've had as well with like my, my percentage rates, right,
I'm not a very good orange Pellar.
(21:21):
I'm, I'm not gonna lie, like I sit here as an educational, you
know, to, to ministry of notes. And I'm telling you, I'm not
very good at orange peeling people from zero.
Right. It's not my cup of tea.
I leave that to like Stefan. I leave that to, you know,
what's the problem, guy? These are the guys who are going
to probably change hearts and minds.
(21:43):
I'm probably gonna be like, OK, I I genuinely want to speak with
people who are kind of already along their journey a little bit
further rather than, you know, fresh don't get it, have
thousands of questions which have, by the way, all been
answered satisfactorily. But I just want to speak more
with people who, you know, who are along the on board with
(22:06):
Bitcoin and just want to improvetheir existing knowledge of it
and how to achieve it on a day-to-day basis.
That's kind of where I sort of fit in more than, hey, I wanna
do this, you know. So look, I, I've absolutely
decimated relationships in the past as a result of trying to
get people on board. It's come off as arrogant.
(22:26):
It's come off as, you know, narcissistic.
These are all words that have been thrown at me.
You know, I'm a conspiracy theorist.
I'm a, you know, lunatic. So, so at that point that, that
kind of after, you know, 10 years of that or even just seven
or five, really, you start to go, well, look, I you become a
(22:46):
bit more recluse and you only want to focus on people who,
who, who kind of get it. But yeah, it, it, it's tragic
that, that, that has happened. But yeah, it's, it's part of my
journey and my experience. And yeah, I've, I've decimated
relationships over this and, butI, but I'll still die on the
hill for it. So, so you know.
Yeah, no, that's, that's a shamewhen when that happens.
(23:08):
I mean, I've, I've been through that myself, so I understand.
But one another thing I wanted to just explore with you is, is
the Lightning Network. So this is something you'd
provide a lot of tutorials on. And certainly it's a very
exciting space and sort of maybea little bit a little bit
harder, just a little bit harderthan running a Bitcoin node.
(23:28):
But what has been your approach to the Lightning Network?
How have you seen that evolve since it started?
And sort of how do you feel about the future of lightning
and lightning education? OK, so with lightning, I've had
a bit of a I've had an interesting relationship with
lightning when we first would like when it first sort of came
out and started to come become popular, I ran my own lightning
(23:49):
node. Stefan had his lightning node
and we were flinging sats. I was in like somewhere like
Vanuatu and Stefan was in Germany and we were just
flinging sats between each otherwithout the permission of
anyone. And our nodes were back home in
Sydney and we were just, we werelaughing like we were like, wait
till the world catches on this like, no KYC, none of the BS.
(24:12):
It was, it was, it was a dream. Then it went into sort of how do
we back this thing up? Like if, if my hard drive
failed, you know, or if Stefan'shard drive failed, are we going
to lose some Sats here? What what's going to happen?
And so, yeah, the, the backup scenario, whilst it is it, it,
it is possible, I still think is, is challenging, particularly
(24:35):
with, you know, channel backups and that sort of stuff.
You have to sort of keep on top of that if you're running your
own node. However, these days many people
with on the Lightning network are just using a custodial
solution or using something likePhoenix where you still hold the
keys that they provide you with the, you know, the, the LSP type
model Lightning service provider.
(24:57):
And so I think that's, that's a game changer as well where, you
know, companies can come in and sort of help you out with the
nuts and bolts. Whereas I'm, I'm, for me
personally, I, I, I know what's kind of the, the, the nuts and
bolts of it. So I know how to, you know, on a
day-to-day basis, run a, run a, a lighting note, but it is
involved and it is very technical.
(25:18):
It is very, you know, command line based, whereas if you just
use something like Zeus and use their LSP or you know, go fully
custodial for a small amount of funds on wallet of Satoshi, for
example, you'll get a great experience.
You'll get a fantastic experience.
But if you have to start openingchannels, dealing with
liquidity, all that sort of stuff, it's just going to take
(25:40):
up capital. It's going to take up time and
you're going to have to, you mayget some routing failures and
that sort of stuff, which by theway, have significantly improved
over the years. So I'm, I'm hopeful that
lightning is something that we can use.
I still use it. I still use it for payments.
I still use it to receive money.And I think it's a great, great
(26:01):
tool that we have, particularly in a high fee environment as
well. So when Bitcoin, you know, seems
to, you know, want want to do 300 sets per V byte for, for,
you know, for for whatever reason, then falling back to the
lightning network to do those and settle those transactions is
a really, really good tool to have in the toolkit.
But like if, if it's, you know, a low fee environment, that's
(26:25):
when you can start to open up channels and build for that, you
know, future state as well. So I, I'm quite OK with where
lightning is at. It's tough for, you know, the
full on, you know, if you want to do it, you know, self
sovereign type, but there are other, you know, in betweeners
like Zeus and Phoenix and that sort of stuff that will help you
(26:48):
get there without being too technical and straight just on
your mobile phone. So yeah, look, I think it's it's
I think it's great to be using that layer 2 technology.
I have been told, though, that Idon't I don't know if that can
scale like like Lightning Network to, you know, 8 billion
(27:10):
people. Maybe we're just not, you know,
ready for Bitcoin for 8 billion people just yet.
And even on chain, like not every person in the world can
have a UTXO is is the common thread that I'm I'm hearing out
there. So, you know, we still don't
really have a visa style solution, but I think Lightning
(27:33):
is probably the best solution that we have today.
Yeah, yeah, that's fascinating. And there's a, perhaps a, an
emergent effect where as more people want to use it, the
solutions make themselves known to us.
I am curious just as a tangent to that, whether you've explored
things like fidiments and that sort of side effects.
(27:55):
So I I. I think if we have an array of
options like I, I feel like bitcoiners are doing the the
scattergun approach. Like just throw shit out on the
wall and see what sticks. So fetti mint would be part of
that. Just throwing some ideas out
there to see how can we potentially scale this and then
grow the pie, you know, the E cash and then the cashew mints
(28:19):
and all that sort of stuff is coming on on and I'm interested
to see where it goes. Personally, I haven't looked too
far into it because I'm already kind of in the self sovereigns
camp. I don't think fetti mint would
be or someone like me. So I don't really, you know, you
know, want to degrade my own sovereignty to go down someone
(28:39):
who can potentially rug me. But I understand that, you know,
if we do have these little fettybanks or mini banks running
around, I think it's a better solution than say, you know, the
big four banks controlling everything and, you know,
blocking all about transactions and all that sort of stuff.
So, you know, I, I, I, I think it's better than what we
currently have in the Fiat system.
(29:01):
But is it the best? Yeah, time will tell.
Yeah, fascinating. And I also was curious, Katan,
on your use of the value for value model and and how that's
helped your business and and what you're doing.
Yeah. So I, I generally for, for
consult consultations, I don't really charge a fee.
(29:23):
It's just pay what you think it's worth and it's been
actually really good. You know, there is a little bit
of a difference to what an American would tip versus what,
say, someone from India would tip.
And I'm OK with that. Do you know what I mean?
As long as you, you know, respect the, the, the time and
(29:43):
the, the, the, the effort that I'm putting in and you, you,
you, you pay, whatever you thinkis it, it was worst.
I'm happy with it. And I also just get to meet
Bitcoiners. And I think it's always a
pleasure to speak to, you know, people who, you know, want to
get involved and want to, you know, learn more.
So it's an opportunity for me. I think it's a great thing and I
(30:05):
enjoy it. And I've never really been
burned by it because the guys who pay really, really well make
up for the guys who, you know, in, in numbers of sets wouldn't
pay as much. And I'm happy with that.
That's fine. You know, with the shop, though,
I mean, there's a cost price there.
So, you know, I have to charge a, an amount, but you know,
value for, value for, for for. My time has been it's it's been
(30:28):
great. Yeah.
And I mean just extending that alittle bit though to maybe what
other businesses could look at and and kind of maybe other
services. I mean, do you think this has a
broader impact on the future Bitcoin economy?
Is this something that others can maybe look to adopt or?
Yeah. And and this is the thing, I
think because we're in this phase of we don't actually know
(30:50):
what a SAT is worth. It's really hard to price what
you think without referring to a, you know, a, a Fiat currency,
like usually it'll be like 100 bucks an hour, right?
And you're like, OK, that's fine.
But then when we go into a SAT'sworld, what, what do you charge?
Like we just, we, we're still discovering what is 1,000,000
(31:12):
SAT's worth? What is a Bitcoin worth?
And so it's, it's kind of becomea little bit more difficult to,
to sort of price yourself and then have to harv it every
single time because the price is, you know, just gone.
The the value of it has, has gone on, but I think that more
businesses hopefully will take that on board.
(31:33):
But obviously they've also got acost.
Like if you've got a cost base, then I think you need at least a
little bit of value there that it's sort of baked in.
But if, if you know, it's kind of like a consulting base still
something like that and you tip whatever you think it's worth,
that's that's fine as well. Yeah, I admittedly I'm, I'm for
(31:55):
choice for, you know, whatever businesses want to decide to do
and what they think is best, I'mhappy for them to, you know,
make the call and see what sticks and, and learn because
that's how I've done it as well.Like I, I don't know how much to
charge and I'm just like, all right, well, value for value
seems like the best option for me.
It may not work for everybody. It works for me.
(32:16):
It works for a few. I know Nosta the guys on there
like you send out a well, a postand you get, you know, there's a
couple of sats back and that post just ends up being a really
good, you know, post and, you know, you end up with, you know,
a few 100 bucks for it. That's quite cool.
(32:39):
Yeah, No, absolutely. I think it's, it's really
interesting and sort of seeing more of this with kind of within
the Bitcoin world. But it is not necessarily a new
concept that, I mean, it has existed and other forms and it
can be very valuable, as you say, because you know, you're
not putting a a price on yourself.
You're, you're letting the valuecome to you from the other
person. And you can be surprised quite
(32:59):
pleasantly when when it comes through and it's a very large
amount, for example. Yeah.
Absolutely. And for 2025, what I mean, what
are you looking forward to? What's what's up for Ministry of
Nodes? What's up for you personally?
Yeah. So for me, 2025, I want to, you
know, put out more nodes out there, whether that's, you know,
(33:20):
through my tutorials where you build it yourself, which I
strongly, strongly encourage, oryou want to purchase one off me.
That would be my goals for 2025.Get as many nodes out there as
possible so that we're all using, you know, our own node
rather than somebody else's. And I think that really matters
from a privacy perspective as well as just your own self
(33:41):
sovereignty perspective as well.So I think that will be, you
know, the focus for me in 2025, get as many node runners out
there, get as many people holding their own keys with, you
know, things like the ETF and MSTR.
There's a lot of people interested in Bitcoin, but
they're not actually Bitcoiners,right?
They're, they're just they, theywant the exposure to Bitcoin and
(34:02):
that that's all well and good, but you can get rugged in those
services. You can get rugged via an ETF.
You can get rugged through, you know, wrapping Bitcoin in
something else, you know what I mean?
So I just want people to sort ofhold their own keys, run their
own note. The more I can do that, that
kind of helps people out. But yeah, you know, that that's
(34:25):
kind of it. Like just yeah, get more people
on board and get people understanding the technology and
using it to their advantage. Yeah, that's awesome.
And if people want to follow, they want to see tutorials, they
want to see what you're up to. Where can they go, Cortana?
Yeah, so youtube.com/ministryofnotes or
you can just go to the website ministryofnotes.com and that
(34:48):
will have all of the links to, you know, the YouTube, the shop,
some articles that you know, both Stefan and I have written.
And yeah, you can find us there.Yeah, awesome.
Thank you very much. No worries.
Thank you for listening. I am Cody Allingham and that was
the transformation of value. If you would like to support
(35:08):
this show, please consider making a donation either through
my website or by directly tipping to the show's Bitcoin
wallet, or just pass this episode on to a friend who you
think may enjoy it. And you can always e-mail me at
hello@thetransformationofvalue.com.
That will be, you know, the focus for me in 2025.
Get as many node runners out there, get as many people
holding their own keys with, youknow, things like the ETF and
MSTR. There's a lot of people
interested in Bitcoin, but they're not actually Bitcoiners,
right? They're, they're just they, they
want the exposure to Bitcoin. Hello, I am Cody Allingham and
(00:20):
this is the transformation of Value, a place for thinkers and
builders like you where we ask questions about freedom, Bitcoin
and creativity. Today I'm joined by Katan who is
Co founder of Ministry of Nodes,providing educational content
and tutorials on how to run Bitcoin nodes and private and
self sovereign computing. We talk about freedom, privacy,
(00:42):
tech threat models and the journey to being more private
and secure in the way we use theInternet.
I would like to know what you think.
Send me an e-mail at hello at the transformation of value.com
and I will get back to you. Now, if you enjoy the show,
please consider sharing this episode with a friend who you
think might like it. You can also support my work
directly by streaming sets to the show's wallet or donating
(01:05):
directly through my website. Otherwise, onto the show.
I wanted to jump into it, man, just straight into the deep end
and talk a little bit about the big topic, freedom and freedom
technology. And I guess starting off trying
to understand what those things mean to you, if that's OK,
please. Yeah.
So I think for me, freedom is about, I guess, choice, choosing
(01:29):
who you want to interact with, choosing who you want to deal
with, and really just about whenit comes to a technological
perspective, not inviting trusted third parties that no,
don't really need to be there. And so for me, that's what
(01:53):
freedom is all about. It's the freedom to choose who
you want in your digital life and who you don't want as well.
So that that's kind of in a nutshell, what it means.
But yeah, I've, I've been, you know, trying to, I guess over
over the many years it takes is to remove these trusted third
(02:17):
parties out of my digital life. And so that's kind of what I've
been focusing on. And that comes to money through
my emails, through, you know, mydata, my photos, my location,
all of those sorts of things. I try and remove as much as I
(02:38):
can away from these third parties who who tend to sell
people out, really. So yeah, that that to me is what
freedom is all about. Yeah, and thank you.
What kicked off this journey towards exploring freedom?
OK, so I started really when I understood what Bitcoin meant in
(03:02):
that I don't have to use a central bank.
I don't have to use a bank or another trusted third party to
send, you know, value across theInternet.
Then I thought, well, what else can I sort of self host?
What, what can I, what else can I do by myself?
(03:24):
And that's where I sort of just dived into things like next
cloud. I don't, you know, just went in
and said, OK, well, what are these bits of data that I need
to protect and how do I go, go about protecting that as well?
And, and, and making sure that that data is not taken away from
me, but also, yeah, is kept secure and self hosted.
(03:47):
And it's always with me rather with another corporation or
faceless organization that I don't really want to deal with.
So that kind of Bitcoin was the start of that journey.
And then it sort of just went down as like, well, if I can
self host to this, then what else can I self host?
And then I just went down like video cameras and, you know, I
(04:09):
just, yeah, all, all sorts of gadgets that, you know, those
smart things that we use at homeand then, you know, home
assistant and all these sorts ofthings.
I just started to started using and building up a profile.
So yeah, that that's kind of where I'm at with it.
Yeah, that's fascinating. And you're based in Australia
(04:29):
and I'm just wondering if there was anything in particular or
there was something about Australia that began that
exploration. I know you've done a lot of
travel as well, but that relationship maybe with the
state, I mean, can you elaboratea bit more on that, please?
Yeah, look, I think Australia for me has always been a
fantastic country. Like I've always loved living
here. It is a phenomenal place.
(04:51):
It's given me all the opportunities in the world
really. I've got my private pilot
license, I'm a chartered accountant.
The the opportunities here, the job opportunity, it's just it's
fantastic, right. But at the same time, I think
things turned probably of 2021-2022 during those COVID
(05:13):
years something. Happened where?
We started to go, hey, hmm, thisdoesn't just doesn't feel like
Australia anymore. And yeah, it, it, it's, it's
look, the self hosting stuff andall, all that, that, that
freedom desire. It wasn't really Australia that,
you know, sort of I guess. Yeah, yeah, Like I, I, I, I
(05:37):
think what happened was what, what happened during COVID
solidified what I already kind of knew and what I was already
trying to achieve and what I wastrying to, you know, move
towards. And so, yeah, like I just feel
like that that's a better outcome.
(05:57):
And, you know, what happened during those years just kind of
just solidified it really. Like it wasn't, you know, oh, my
God, color me shocked. This is, you know, world
changing stuff here. I, I, I, I saw it for what it
was well before. And I kind of, yeah.
It's just, it was just it, it wasn't a wake up call for me.
(06:19):
It was more, hey, I was so right.
Yeah. Yeah, that's fascinating.
And you mentioned Bitcoin was the beginning of this journey,
and then you started looking at other things, including e-mail
and other services that maybe a lot of people outsource to the
cloud, basically someone else's computer.
But what do you think if we're walking through this kind of
(06:41):
journey of freedom? I mean, what do you think are
some really important first steps that people can think
about? Maybe people have never
considered freedom or freedom tech as a concept.
I think look, there's a few things that you can do that are
like 5 minute quick wins and then there's five year ordeals
where you have to get out of this relationship with Google,
(07:03):
right? So some of the quick wins that
you can do is like maybe use AVPN.
That's a very, very quick win. Changing your DNS on your
router, something like that is aquick win, right?
So instead of using the default,you know, DNS that's provided by
your Internet service provider that is obviously logging it.
(07:23):
And well, here in Australia, youknow, it, it's logged for up to
two years, your Internet historyby default.
And if you just change somethingin your router in your settings,
you can sort of remove that. That's a very, very quick win.
And and then there's obviously the hardest stuff like, you
know, getting rid of your e-mail, like you, you may have
(07:45):
had your emails, you know, sinceyou were 16 years old and trying
to sort of, you know, make sure that that's all moved over to
maybe an A more freedom respecting hosting platform like
maybe ProtonMail or Tuta Nota those, you know, that might be,
you know, something that you cando as well.
(08:05):
But there's a whole raft of things that you can, you know,
sort of move towards that, you know, takes ownership of your
own data and setting up something like the next cloud or
your own network attached storage where you own the data
and not somebody else. And there's other things that
(08:27):
you can do in between as well, like encrypting things and then
putting them onto the cloud so that, you know, if if someone
wants to sort of want to read that information, there's
nothing for them to read. But the, the issue with that as
well, the trade off is that, youknow, they can just cut off the
data altogether and not service you anymore.
(08:49):
So yeah, look, there's a few things that people can do that
will, I guess, help them become a little bit more freedom.
Well, you know, take back that freedom from corporations and
people who are trying to really just spy on you.
Really. Yeah, it's interesting, Katan,
(09:09):
because there's sort of two things here.
There's the freedom of self hosting and running your own
stack, and then there's also theprivacy aspects.
And I think sometimes those are the same thing and sometimes
they can be different things. And often think of maybe people
who are not so technical and kind of what are the easy ones
and what is maybe not perfect, but still better than what
they've currently got. For example, instead of using
(09:31):
WhatsApp, maybe using something like Signal.
Signal. You know, and that's a service
that you just download off the App Store.
You, you're not necessarily going to self host that or
verify the code or any of that stuff yourself, but there's,
yeah, arguably more privacy there than WhatsApp or.
And So what are your thoughts onthat trade off between going
deep into running your own stackand kind of little baby steps
(09:52):
that are in the right direction?And, and I think that's what
needs to eventually happen. You, you, you don't just really
just dive into the deep end and,you know, see how you go.
It's, it's not going to work that way.
You're going to sync and pretty quickly as well.
You do have to take small steps and it it may take a few years
(10:13):
to get to your final destination, if there ever is
one in the privacy front. But you know, yeah, a small
quick, those quick wins that that just moving away from, you
know, messaging services that are we know that are invasive
versus, you know, something likeSignal, which is a bit more open
(10:34):
source and, you know, well vetted and trusted by the
privacy community is a better step than going down, you know,
like full self hosting your own Matrix server, for example.
Yeah, yeah. Well, I just think even my own
family and friends, you know, getting the monitor signals
pretty easy. It is.
It's a quick win. It's a quick win.
(10:55):
Yeah, it's a quick win to get that network effect and, and
Signal provides beautifully. And yeah, for me, even my family
is all on Signal and it's just, it just works like a breeze.
So yeah, that that's a great, great example.
Yeah. And I guess the other thing, I
mean, looking at the the literature on freedom and
privacy technology in particular, there is this idea
(11:15):
of threat modeling and sort of what is your threat vector?
And kind of there is a rabbit hole you can go down where I
actually recently watched that old Mel Gibson film Conspiracy
Theory. I don't know if you remember
from the 90s, and I've been going through those kind of
films from the 90s, Enemy of theState, conspiracy theory, The
Fugitive, you know, and it's alllike, you know, the state is
(11:36):
coming to get you. And I think there's some truth
in there. But I also wonder, you know, how
do you model your own personal threats and how do you use that
to make your decisions potentially?
Yeah. OK.
So from from my perspective, thegovernment, if they wanted me,
they will take me. That's that's like that's it
there. There is no real, I guess, you
(11:58):
know, hiding from them. It like, yeah, it's, it's
really, really difficult. If that's your threat model,
yeah, I, I, I think you're goingto be in a very, very difficult
situation or you've probably putyourself into a difficult
corner. But if you want to protect
yourself from other parties, like for example, Google,
(12:19):
Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, if you want to protect yourself
from, you know, other just, you know, small time hackers and
that sort of stuff, then yeah, I, I, I, I, I think it is
achievable. And yeah, I, I, I think it's
(12:40):
just it, it, it's something thatyou can sort of actively work
towards to remove these servicesand these these, you know,
things that they have that sort of lock you into an ecosystem.
Another example is Apple, of course, And yeah, I, I, I think
corporations and other individuals, definitely you can,
(13:02):
you know, sort of protect yourself against.
But if you're looking to, you know, evade the government, I
think that's going to be a much,much more harder or much more
difficult task. Yeah, that's how I see it.
Yeah. Look, that's a tough one,
really. Yeah.
No, no, I understand. I mean, and this is sort of, I
mean it's the spectrum, right? I mean, there's certain things
(13:24):
that already out-of-the-box giveyou some privacy from the state
and those are relatively easy things.
But then there's maybe other things that are at the end of
the day, you know, if you're a citizen of a country that you
know, it's generally going to beknown where you are, etcetera.
But the kind of that privacy andbeing able to choose when you
reveal yourself is certainly powerful.
(13:45):
And having more of that can't bea bad thing.
But Cortana, I did want to talk a little bit about Ministry of
Nodes. So this is sort of the umbrella
for a lot of your educational content and sort of if you could
share sort of what that is and where it came from, if that's
OK, please. Yeah, no.
So Ministry of Nodes is a an idea that a prominent podcaster
(14:08):
and myself had Stefan Labarre. We thought, Hey, look, we need
to live, we need to level up Bitcoin education because it was
at that time fairly weak. And we thought, you know, people
need to learn how to, you know, hold their own keys, but also
run their own Bitcoin notes. And whilst Stefan was had had
(14:29):
had a fantastic podcast, he, he spoke to, you know, just, I
guess he, he would talk about the principles and, you know,
roughly how you would go about doing it.
Whereas I would more focus on, OK, this is how you going to
achieve these principles that Stefan has spoken about in his
(14:54):
podcast in a, in a, in a, you know, in an achievable way.
So how do you hold your own keys?
How do you run your own node? These are types of, you know,
educational content that we would, you know, sort of give
out to people. And it it like if, if you want
to know like it, it just started, you know, I just
(15:14):
started it kind of like I was listening to Ministry of Sounds.
And so I just thought, OK, well,Ministry of Notes sounds like a,
a, a great name. We both agreed on it.
And, you know, kind of we started it in one July 2019 and
we had a seminar, I think like four people attended that
seminar. And then, you know, like the
YouTube content came out and then, you know, it just started
(15:36):
to grow from there. And then you've got, you know,
tutorials that are showing you basically how to run your own
Bitcoin node and how to connect that node up to your own wallet
and that sort of stuff. And then, yeah, we just like,
you know, private consulting as well.
During the COVID years, Stefan decided to sort of step back and
out of Australia. He, he thought that, you know,
(15:57):
Australia was a bit of a stranglehold on him.
So he, he, he departed and he just left me the whole business,
just sort of just carry on. And so since then I've started
to sell, you know, pre packaged nodes as well, alongside that
tutorial that shows you how I build them.
And then if you want the end product, you can just buy it off
me if you, if you so wish. So yeah, that's what I've been
(16:20):
trying. Like that's what I've been just
doing and yeah, you know, pushing out those nodes and
yeah, helping people to, you know, with their with their
Bitcoin related questions and even self hosting stuff as well.
So yeah, that's kind of just what we've been doing.
That's awesome. And how did you fall into that
education space? Had you done anything prior to
that in other fields? Teaching or?
(16:41):
No, nothing like that. I, I, I feel like if you know,
when you teach something, you actually learn yourself and it's
kind of it, it just solidifies your own understanding as well.
So when someone asks you a question and you don't know the
answer, it's like, oh, I better,I better go and find that out.
(17:02):
That sounds, you know, somethinginteresting.
So yeah, that's what I try and do.
And that's what I've been sort of, yeah.
I, I don't really have any formal, you know, experience,
but I have been through, you know, university.
So if you notice my videos are kind of tutorial based.
So it's very, very much mini mimicking the the education that
(17:23):
I received, I guess. So that that's kind of, you
know, that's my style and that'swhat I just yeah, have have gone
with. Yeah, no, I think it's awesome.
And certainly this goes through all of the steps you need and,
and I like the emphasis on the command line and verifying
packages and all of that stuff that you go through with your
tutorials. But I, I was also wondering when
(17:44):
it comes to Bitcoin education more broadly, I mean, there's so
much out there to learn, right? You know, there's kind of quite
a lot of things and it's changing all the time.
What do you think are the areas where there's the most surface
area to perhaps build more educational content or where
there maybe needs to be more information?
With respect to Bitcoin. Yes.
(18:07):
Look back in 2013 when I first started, there was really was
very light on in terms of education.
It, you know, you had to sort ofdissect what was conspiracy
theory, actual conspiracy theoryto what was actually true.
And it was difficult. We just had random Reddit posts
(18:29):
and you know, that that they were just, you know, throw away
accounts. Yeah.
You, you really had to really decipher what, you know, factor
or fiction and it was really, really tough.
But if you look in today in 2025, I think that the signal
there is phenomenal, right? I just yeah, like if you just,
(18:51):
you know, open Twitter and follow a few Bitcoiners, they
will be over time, over a year long period of lurk, lurking.
They will point you to resourcesthat I think are phenomenal.
Like one just came out recently called What's the problem?
It's a 40 minute, you know, video on what exactly is the
(19:13):
problem? And I've been trying to, you
know, tell people this for over 10 years and this guy's just
done it in 40 minutes. And if you, if you're really,
really stressed for time, put iton 2 speed and you'll get it
done in 20. Like it's, it is phenomenal
educational content out there. I wish I had that 'cause then I
(19:35):
wouldn't have spent, you know, the, the, you know, thousands of
hours trying to figure this out.And yeah, look, in terms of
opportunities, I'm, I'm really, really, really pressed to find,
you know, an Ave. that hasn't been, you know, uncovered.
(19:57):
So yeah, like, I think you just need to be pointed in the right
direction. Otherwise, I think you're going
to end up down some paths that you may not want to take other
coins and other, you know, just general.
Mistakes that I think bitcoinerscan make.
But yeah, generally speaking, I think there's a solid signal.
(20:18):
You, you follow a few bitcoinerson, on, on Twitter and you'll
get the signal and they'll pointyou into the right direction.
I think that's, yeah, I, I thinkthat's probably the best way of
doing it. That's fascinating.
And I ask as well, because last year I, I did a workshop or
hosted a workshop. It was kind of relatively entry
level. And certainly the question of
(20:39):
like what is money and why is any of this even important?
Is it's kind of the one of the first barriers that once you're,
you're past that everything else, it's just a matter of, you
know, following the tutorials and RTFM.
But before that, you know, what is the problem?
Why do we need this is actually the hard part, right?
And kind of getting people who may be curious, but they don't
quite see the the challenges andand sort of communicating that
(21:01):
side of things. So I mean, is that something
you've, I mean, you've tried to do?
I mean, obviously over the yearstried to orange peel people,
but. So, so for me, given the amount
of time that I've been doing it and just the amount of heartache
that I've had as well with like my, my percentage rates, right,
I'm not a very good orange Pellar.
(21:21):
I'm, I'm not gonna lie, like I sit here as an educational, you
know, to, to ministry of notes. And I'm telling you, I'm not
very good at orange peeling people from zero.
Right. It's not my cup of tea.
I leave that to like Stefan. I leave that to, you know,
what's the problem, guy? These are the guys who are going
to probably change hearts and minds.
(21:43):
I'm probably gonna be like, OK, I I genuinely want to speak with
people who are kind of already along their journey a little bit
further rather than, you know, fresh don't get it, have
thousands of questions which have, by the way, all been
answered satisfactorily. But I just want to speak more
with people who, you know, who are along the on board with
(22:06):
Bitcoin and just want to improvetheir existing knowledge of it
and how to achieve it on a day-to-day basis.
That's kind of where I sort of fit in more than, hey, I wanna
do this, you know. So look, I, I've absolutely
decimated relationships in the past as a result of trying to
get people on board. It's come off as arrogant.
(22:26):
It's come off as, you know, narcissistic.
These are all words that have been thrown at me.
You know, I'm a conspiracy theorist.
I'm a, you know, lunatic. So, so at that point that, that
kind of after, you know, 10 years of that or even just seven
or five, really, you start to go, well, look, I you become a
(22:46):
bit more recluse and you only want to focus on people who,
who, who kind of get it. But yeah, it, it, it's tragic
that, that, that has happened. But yeah, it's, it's part of my
journey and my experience. And yeah, I've, I've decimated
relationships over this and, butI, but I'll still die on the
hill for it. So, so you know.
Yeah, no, that's, that's a shamewhen when that happens.
(23:08):
I mean, I've, I've been through that myself, so I understand.
But one another thing I wanted to just explore with you is, is
the Lightning Network. So this is something you'd
provide a lot of tutorials on. And certainly it's a very
exciting space and sort of maybea little bit a little bit
harder, just a little bit harderthan running a Bitcoin node.
(23:28):
But what has been your approach to the Lightning Network?
How have you seen that evolve since it started?
And sort of how do you feel about the future of lightning
and lightning education? OK, so with lightning, I've had
a bit of a I've had an interesting relationship with
lightning when we first would like when it first sort of came
out and started to come become popular, I ran my own lightning
(23:49):
node. Stefan had his lightning node
and we were flinging sats. I was in like somewhere like
Vanuatu and Stefan was in Germany and we were just
flinging sats between each otherwithout the permission of
anyone. And our nodes were back home in
Sydney and we were just, we werelaughing like we were like, wait
till the world catches on this like, no KYC, none of the BS.
(24:12):
It was, it was, it was a dream. Then it went into sort of how do
we back this thing up? Like if, if my hard drive
failed, you know, or if Stefan'shard drive failed, are we going
to lose some Sats here? What what's going to happen?
And so, yeah, the, the backup scenario, whilst it is it, it,
it is possible, I still think is, is challenging, particularly
(24:35):
with, you know, channel backups and that sort of stuff.
You have to sort of keep on top of that if you're running your
own node. However, these days many people
with on the Lightning network are just using a custodial
solution or using something likePhoenix where you still hold the
keys that they provide you with the, you know, the, the LSP type
model Lightning service provider.
(24:57):
And so I think that's, that's a game changer as well where, you
know, companies can come in and sort of help you out with the
nuts and bolts. Whereas I'm, I'm, for me
personally, I, I, I know what's kind of the, the, the nuts and
bolts of it. So I know how to, you know, on a
day-to-day basis, run a, run a, a lighting note, but it is
involved and it is very technical.
(25:18):
It is very, you know, command line based, whereas if you just
use something like Zeus and use their LSP or you know, go fully
custodial for a small amount of funds on wallet of Satoshi, for
example, you'll get a great experience.
You'll get a fantastic experience.
But if you have to start openingchannels, dealing with
liquidity, all that sort of stuff, it's just going to take
(25:40):
up capital. It's going to take up time and
you're going to have to, you mayget some routing failures and
that sort of stuff, which by theway, have significantly improved
over the years. So I'm, I'm hopeful that
lightning is something that we can use.
I still use it. I still use it for payments.
I still use it to receive money.And I think it's a great, great
(26:01):
tool that we have, particularly in a high fee environment as
well. So when Bitcoin, you know, seems
to, you know, want want to do 300 sets per V byte for, for,
you know, for for whatever reason, then falling back to the
lightning network to do those and settle those transactions is
a really, really good tool to have in the toolkit.
But like if, if it's, you know, a low fee environment, that's
(26:25):
when you can start to open up channels and build for that, you
know, future state as well. So I, I'm quite OK with where
lightning is at. It's tough for, you know, the
full on, you know, if you want to do it, you know, self
sovereign type, but there are other, you know, in betweeners
like Zeus and Phoenix and that sort of stuff that will help you
(26:48):
get there without being too technical and straight just on
your mobile phone. So yeah, look, I think it's it's
I think it's great to be using that layer 2 technology.
I have been told, though, that Idon't I don't know if that can
scale like like Lightning Network to, you know, 8 billion
(27:10):
people. Maybe we're just not, you know,
ready for Bitcoin for 8 billion people just yet.
And even on chain, like not every person in the world can
have a UTXO is is the common thread that I'm I'm hearing out
there. So, you know, we still don't
really have a visa style solution, but I think Lightning
(27:33):
is probably the best solution that we have today.
Yeah, yeah, that's fascinating. And there's a, perhaps a, an
emergent effect where as more people want to use it, the
solutions make themselves known to us.
I am curious just as a tangent to that, whether you've explored
things like fidiments and that sort of side effects.
(27:55):
So I I. I think if we have an array of
options like I, I feel like bitcoiners are doing the the
scattergun approach. Like just throw shit out on the
wall and see what sticks. So fetti mint would be part of
that. Just throwing some ideas out
there to see how can we potentially scale this and then
grow the pie, you know, the E cash and then the cashew mints
(28:19):
and all that sort of stuff is coming on on and I'm interested
to see where it goes. Personally, I haven't looked too
far into it because I'm already kind of in the self sovereigns
camp. I don't think fetti mint would
be or someone like me. So I don't really, you know, you
know, want to degrade my own sovereignty to go down someone
(28:39):
who can potentially rug me. But I understand that, you know,
if we do have these little fettybanks or mini banks running
around, I think it's a better solution than say, you know, the
big four banks controlling everything and, you know,
blocking all about transactions and all that sort of stuff.
So, you know, I, I, I, I think it's better than what we
currently have in the Fiat system.
(29:01):
But is it the best? Yeah, time will tell.
Yeah, fascinating. And I also was curious, Katan,
on your use of the value for value model and and how that's
helped your business and and what you're doing.
Yeah. So I, I generally for, for
consult consultations, I don't really charge a fee.
(29:23):
It's just pay what you think it's worth and it's been
actually really good. You know, there is a little bit
of a difference to what an American would tip versus what,
say, someone from India would tip.
And I'm OK with that. Do you know what I mean?
As long as you, you know, respect the, the, the time and
(29:43):
the, the, the, the effort that I'm putting in and you, you,
you, you pay, whatever you thinkis it, it was worst.
I'm happy with it. And I also just get to meet
Bitcoiners. And I think it's always a
pleasure to speak to, you know, people who, you know, want to
get involved and want to, you know, learn more.
So it's an opportunity for me. I think it's a great thing and I
(30:05):
enjoy it. And I've never really been
burned by it because the guys who pay really, really well make
up for the guys who, you know, in, in numbers of sets wouldn't
pay as much. And I'm happy with that.
That's fine. You know, with the shop, though,
I mean, there's a cost price there.
So, you know, I have to charge a, an amount, but you know,
value for, value for, for for. My time has been it's it's been
(30:28):
great. Yeah.
And I mean just extending that alittle bit though to maybe what
other businesses could look at and and kind of maybe other
services. I mean, do you think this has a
broader impact on the future Bitcoin economy?
Is this something that others can maybe look to adopt or?
Yeah. And and this is the thing, I
think because we're in this phase of we don't actually know
(30:50):
what a SAT is worth. It's really hard to price what
you think without referring to a, you know, a, a Fiat currency,
like usually it'll be like 100 bucks an hour, right?
And you're like, OK, that's fine.
But then when we go into a SAT'sworld, what, what do you charge?
Like we just, we, we're still discovering what is 1,000,000
(31:12):
SAT's worth? What is a Bitcoin worth?
And so it's, it's kind of becomea little bit more difficult to,
to sort of price yourself and then have to harv it every
single time because the price is, you know, just gone.
The the value of it has, has gone on, but I think that more
businesses hopefully will take that on board.
(31:33):
But obviously they've also got acost.
Like if you've got a cost base, then I think you need at least a
little bit of value there that it's sort of baked in.
But if, if you know, it's kind of like a consulting base still
something like that and you tip whatever you think it's worth,
that's that's fine as well. Yeah, I admittedly I'm, I'm for
(31:55):
choice for, you know, whatever businesses want to decide to do
and what they think is best, I'mhappy for them to, you know,
make the call and see what sticks and, and learn because
that's how I've done it as well.Like I, I don't know how much to
charge and I'm just like, all right, well, value for value
seems like the best option for me.
It may not work for everybody. It works for me.
(32:16):
It works for a few. I know Nosta the guys on there
like you send out a well, a postand you get, you know, there's a
couple of sats back and that post just ends up being a really
good, you know, post and, you know, you end up with, you know,
a few 100 bucks for it. That's quite cool.
(32:39):
Yeah, No, absolutely. I think it's, it's really
interesting and sort of seeing more of this with kind of within
the Bitcoin world. But it is not necessarily a new
concept that, I mean, it has existed and other forms and it
can be very valuable, as you say, because you know, you're
not putting a a price on yourself.
You're, you're letting the valuecome to you from the other
person. And you can be surprised quite
(32:59):
pleasantly when when it comes through and it's a very large
amount, for example. Yeah.
Absolutely. And for 2025, what I mean, what
are you looking forward to? What's what's up for Ministry of
Nodes? What's up for you personally?
Yeah. So for me, 2025, I want to, you
know, put out more nodes out there, whether that's, you know,
(33:20):
through my tutorials where you build it yourself, which I
strongly, strongly encourage, oryou want to purchase one off me.
That would be my goals for 2025.Get as many nodes out there as
possible so that we're all using, you know, our own node
rather than somebody else's. And I think that really matters
from a privacy perspective as well as just your own self
(33:41):
sovereignty perspective as well.So I think that will be, you
know, the focus for me in 2025, get as many node runners out
there, get as many people holding their own keys with, you
know, things like the ETF and MSTR.
There's a lot of people interested in Bitcoin, but
they're not actually Bitcoiners,right?
They're, they're just they, theywant the exposure to Bitcoin and
(34:02):
that that's all well and good, but you can get rugged in those
services. You can get rugged via an ETF.
You can get rugged through, you know, wrapping Bitcoin in
something else, you know what I mean?
So I just want people to sort ofhold their own keys, run their
own note. The more I can do that, that
kind of helps people out. But yeah, you know, that that's
(34:25):
kind of it. Like just yeah, get more people
on board and get people understanding the technology and
using it to their advantage. Yeah, that's awesome.
And if people want to follow, they want to see tutorials, they
want to see what you're up to. Where can they go, Cortana?
Yeah, so youtube.com/ministryofnotes or
you can just go to the website ministryofnotes.com and that
(34:48):
will have all of the links to, you know, the YouTube, the shop,
some articles that you know, both Stefan and I have written.
And yeah, you can find us there.Yeah, awesome.
Thank you very much. No worries.
Thank you for listening. I am Cody Allingham and that was
the transformation of value. If you would like to support
(35:08):
this show, please consider making a donation either through
my website or by directly tipping to the show's Bitcoin
wallet, or just pass this episode on to a friend who you
think may enjoy it. And you can always e-mail me at
hello@thetransformationofvalue.com.
Popular Podcasts
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.