Ep. 96: Max Hillebrand - Building Weapons of Defense for Freedom

My guest today is Max Hillebrand, praxeologist, cypherpunk, and open-source advocate dedicated to building freedom tech that empowers individuals through economic and technological sovereignty. As a contributor to projects like Bitcoin Core, Wasabi Wallet, BTCPay Server, JoinMarket, Lightning Network, Bisq, Angor, White Noise, and Amethyst. In this episode, Max shares his journey from Austrian economics into Bitcoin privacy, recounting how tools like CoinJoins, Wasabi, and the Taproot upgrade push Bitcoin closer to true anonymity. We explore the battle between fiat and freedom, the broken incentives of inflation and war, and why opting into Bitcoin is both a moral imperative and a form of resistance. Max also introduces Nostr as the communications layer for a censorship-resistant future, explains the axioms of human action, argumentation ethics, and resistance, and highlights why he believes we now have the technological weapons to end modern financial slavery in our lifetime.

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-- SPONSORS --

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-- LINKS –

Max’s Website: https://towardsliberty.com

Max’s Nostr: npub1klkk3vrzme455yh9rl2jshq7rc8dpegj3ndf82c3ks2sk40dxt7qulx3vt

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-- CHAPTERS –

00:00 – Coming Up

01:23 – Intro to Max

05:56 – Max Passion for Austrian Economics

06:56 – Bitcoin: Bridging Economics with Computer Science

11:16 – Building Freedom Tech

14:16 – CoinJoin and Bitcoin Privacy

18:56 – Legal & Regulatory Challenges for Privacy Tech – Samurai, Tornado, Wasabi Wallet

26:36 – Why Is Privacy Important?

29:06 – Economics of Wars & The Broken Window Fallacy

41:23 – The Value of Cash and Fiat Currency

45:38 – Moving to a Bitcoin Standard & Influence on Businesses

50:03 – Max’s Take on Bitcoin Treasury Companies

52:03 – Nostr & Decentralized Protocols

1:00:03 – “White Noise” - Building Nostr Private Encrypted Messaging

1:04:48 – Austrian Economics Axioms: Human Action, Argumentation, Resistance

1:13:10 – Max’s Book Recommendations & Reasons to Stay Hopeful