Bitcoin Audible

In this re-release episode from "Run Your Mouth" with RobbieTheFire, we delve into the intricate world of economics, exploring the challenges posed by the US dollar's status as a global reserve currency. Robbie and I discuss the complexities of tariffs and their impact on the economy, questioning whether they truly address the underlying issues or merely mask symptoms.

The conversation n...

When authoritarian regimes double down on financial surveillance and criminalize basic crypto activity, can new freedom tech offer a lifeline—or is the deck still stacked against dissent, privacy, and financial autonomy? We dive into the latest Financial Freedom Report, unraveling Hungary’s draconian digital asset laws, El Salvador’s murky Bitcoin policies, and cutting-edge tools like Bi...

Why does this Bitcoin cycle feel… different?

In this Roundtable, I sat down with Simple Steve, Bitcoin Mechanic, and my brother Jeff Swann for a deep dive into what’s really driving the current phase of Bitcoin adoption. We break down the quiet buildup behind this cycle, the politics creeping into the space, and the shifting nature of Bitcoin treasuries — including why some are already f...

"A myopic focus on personal freedom — the nights out, the "me time", the money saved — is a spiritual mirage: You think you want the paradise of nothing ever being asked of you, but it turns out to be the hell of nobody ever needing you."
~ David Heinemeier Hansson

What if the relentless pursuit of personal freedom is leading us to a deeper kind of emptiness? Today we dive into David Hein...

"You can delete your Lightning transactions.
So unlike a blockchain, a blockchain's an append-only database and every transaction that gets stored in a blockchain is stored there forever. Lightning transactions don't go on a blockchain. Where do they go? A SQL database. And what's great about SQL databases are they're not append only. They have a delete function.
So you can turn off your L...

"Privacy is not a bunker. It’s not cutting every wire, ghosting every friend, and hoping the grid forgets you exist. That’s fantasy. Romanticized exile for people who don’t understand surveillance capitalism. The truth is simpler and harder."
~ GHOST

What if privacy isn’t about isolation—but about trust? Today we dig into a short but powerful perspective by _Ghost_ that flips the script o...

"Either you don't have a fiat currency or you don't have a democracy. But the two things together, and this has been proven, cannot coexist happily without the complete erosion of purchasing power of a civilization and the complete erosion of an empire - which is exactly what has occurred and what has occurred throughout history.
The natural bedfellow for a fiat economy is a dictatorship.
...

Human innovation knows no limits, and our first assumptions regarding what is possible with the tools at our disposal, are almost invariably found to be wrong. Today we dive into Kiara Bickers’ piece on DahLIAS, a groundbreaking new signature scheme that could make massive gains in efficiency and privacy possible without changing Bitcoin’s core cryptographic curve. Is this the missing pi...

"In order for something to be used as ubiquitous money, the spender has to already have it, and the recipient has to want to hold it. Notably, people usually want to receive more of what they already have. After all, if a potential recipient wanted to hold it, they likely would have already bought some. So, if a new type of ubiquitous money were to arise, the majority of people would lik...

If Bitcoin is a paradigm shift, it gets to that stage, like it will be an even bigger product than AI, than chat GPT. And like, okay, now imagine the world where not everyone's fighting Bitcoin, but everyone's like, holy shit, I want to start a Bitcoin business. Like I want like, I need to integrate Bitcoin to my business. I'm going to create a business about integrating Bitcoin into you...

Sometimes a story isn't what it seems... and that's exactly what happened in Take_100.

In this follow-up, I revisit the mysterious movement of 80,000 Bitcoin and unravel the confusion sparked by a misleading legal message. I walk through the details I missed the first time, what changed my interpretation, and how easy it is to connect dots that don’t belong together.

This is a real-time ...

Almost $9 Billion in Bitcoin just moved for the first time in 14 years, and it seems like the person who moved them, are not the original owners. Did quantum just break something in Bitcoin? Is there a critical exploit that old balances need to worry about in the cryptography or software for wallets?

Is this a major hack hiding behind apparent legitimacy? Or did someone who knows bitcoin...

Everyday the world is becoming more connected, but there are consequences to this at every level of society, and its been made perfectly clear, that the powers that be will not relinquish control of the narrative without a fight. Today we are diving into the HRF’s Financial Freedom Report #77, exploring crackdowns on speech from El Salvador to Saudi Arabia, digital repression in Cuba and...

Today we dive into a piece by Brunswick that makes it crystal clear why characteristics even claimed to be major defects or Bitcoin's design - from its "ossification" to its limited throughput - aren't defects as often claimed, but deliberate and essential characteristics for building the world's monetary foundation. Can a protocol that prioritizes integrity over speed truly solve the fu...

We are BACK with the roundtable, after 2 long and crazy months and more to cover than the judge examining Craig Wright's forgeries. We dive into chain archaeology, the mempool spam wars, Zoom weddings in Utah, why nobody actually wants to run a node, and whether DARPA invented Rust to destroy humanity. Also, are we fixing decentralization or just soft forking our way into creative bankru...

The future of banking and payments will be run on old laptops and built by rebels. But really. As inspiration from Callebtc's announcement of successful multinut payments, Marty gives a short but interesting rip on where ecash is headed, and we get the audio today in my lovely voice followed by an unnecessarily long rant about network lock in and how to prevent it, what the "one step bac...

"As will become clear as the argument progresses, I actually think the outcome to which I am building up is where things have to go. I think the technical and economic incentives at play make this an inevitability rather than a “choice”"
~ Allen Farrington

What if the stablecoin boom isn't a threat to Bitcoin, but a stepping stone? In this episode, I dive into Allen Farrington’s "A Half B...

"I think there's a very clear distinction between inflation and hyperinflation.
One is a rational response to an increase in the money supply. Right? So if the money supply is increasing by 10%, you increase the price of your assets by 10%. That's inflation.
Now, hyperinflation is emotional. Hyperinflation is a forced liquidation of your assets and your currency. And you're doing a market ...

What if everything you think you own in the financial system—your stocks, your retirement, your savings—could be taken away in an instant, not because of your own mistakes, but because the institutions holding them are “too important” to fail? Today we finally unpack the horrifying reality behind asset ownership in today’s fiat-driven world, laid out in the shocking work from David Roger...