The Bitcoin Bear Market Diaries are a series of interviews featuring various important voices and perspectives in the Bitcoin ecosystem. Each interviewee was carefully selected and asked the same group of questions. The main goal was to provide the world with a collection of commentary and opinions on the state of the current Bitcoin and crypto market. Some of the names you will recognize while others don’t wish for the limelight but have great insight and experience we all can learn from.
These interviews are raw and unfiltered with no agenda other than giving each individual their opportunity to speak their mind. If you like what you see, please share with your friends. If something offends you, you should probably X out and find another crypto fluff piece that gives you warm fuzzies.
Jeremy, formerly known as @SeasideCrypto, is a low key Bitcoiner who founded SeasideCrypto in Seaside, Oregon where people could go to purchase Bitcoin. The shop has since shut it’s doors, but Jeremy’s practical experience is a perfect example of the trials and tribulations of a Bitcoin entrepreneur. Jeremy is currently putting together the Portland Bitcoin Conference on May 19, 2019 and has an interesting story we can all learn from.
Name
Country
Seaside, Oregon, USA
How do people know you?
First as @SeasideCrypto, now as @________jeremy
How long have you been into Bitcoin?
First Contact: Early 2012
First Purchase: Early 2013
First Capitulation: Late 2013
First Payment Accepted: Early 2014
First Node: Late 2015
Started Seaside Crypto: Mid 2017
Best Bitcoin experience?
There were several times people came to my shop and brought along a skeptic — usually a family member they couldn’t convince. I was able to help them frame their arguments differently, allowing them to talk to their loved one in a more productive way. Those were good experiences for me.
Worst Bitcoin experience?
Overextending myself with Seaside Crypto and hanging on too long when it obviously wasn’t attracting much attention locally. I don’t regret it, but I probably could have found a cheaper way to accomplish my goal of spreading awareness and education.
What do you think is Bitcoin’s biggest threat?
Climate change.
What are your thoughts on the various Bitcoin forks?
I never understood the logic. Bitcoin has always been about its network of users, and any fork is just a smaller, less secure network. I don’t understand the appeal.
What are you optimistic about in this space?
The ultimate destruction of surveillance-fascism.
Biggest regret during the last Bull market?
I actually feel like I handled the last bull fairly well. The one prior I royally screwed up. But you live and (hopefully) learn.
What have you learned during the current bear market?
To set aside the fear of my own technical incompetence and try to implement as many different types of software as possible, even if I make a mistake. And to tweet more openly and honestly about the challenges I face in that process, even if it makes me look dumb.
What is the biggest fail you have seen during the bear market?
My own arrogance regarding my ability to predict price movements. I try really hard not to do that anymore.
What do you think helped trigger the current bear market?
I honestly don’t know what that means. Is this a bear? Maybe it’s a bull if you change your perspective. Bitcoin is up over 30% since the beginning of the year. I’m not sure these labels offer any real insight. I have the feeling they are merely projections we use to reinforce our egos and satisfy our own inner narrative about what we hope will happen.
What kind of damage do you think latest price drop has done to buyer sentiment?
If a price drop like the one we’ve seen over the last year affected your sentiment, you aren’t really a buyer of Bitcoin. You’re a speculator dealing with just another financial instrument. I think there is a fundamental difference between the two.
How do you feel about the current state and future of lightning network?
I feel optimistic. The BOLTs are very clever and many intelligent and capable people are bringing their efforts to bear. There are a great number of challenges ahead, some we’ve only begun to discuss, but I think they’ll be solved in due time.
What are your thoughts on HODLing Bitcoin?
Identify a reasonable, terminal value for Bitcoin. I say we hit 2019 dollar / Satoshi parity before 2030. This is an aggressive position, but I have my reasons. But make your own determination. Once you’ve decided on a terminal value / timeframe, acquire the amount you’d like to have at that point and put it in a cold storage method of your choice. Then for good measure, do it again and put it in a different cold storage method. Repeat as desired. Once you’re satisfied with your level of redundancy, acquire more and spend it supporting interesting projects and people in the space.
What are you thoughts on alt-coins?
I’ve been interested in ‘digital money’ since the late 90’s. Back then I was in the Army, as a Legal Specialist for a Military Intelligence Battalion that investigated, among other things, a sort of proto-privacy coin called DMT that was being developed in Costa Rica by a team of expats, and I became fascinated by the subject. This experience gave me an advantage toward understanding the value of Bitcoin when I finally discovered it (although it still took an embarrassingly long time to ‘get it’). So I’ve followed with great interest a number of different projects over the course of the last 20 years. Before I understood Bitcoin as I do now I thought there might be some value in fostering an ecosystem of different coins. I now see them as irrelevant and inefficient. The point is to create a new money that actually works well for everyone. That’s Bitcoin. Everything else is a software project that doesn’t need its own money/token to work. Some of those projects may be really awesome, but they aren’t money.
Do you hold any? If not, why?
No. I did buy one ethereum when it first listed and tried to sync a geth node to experiment and see what the fuss was about, but I was unsuccessful and sold it back fairly quickly.
What kind of impact do you think the radical drop in alt-coins will have on their future?
I haven’t really given it much thought, but I imagine it would increase the pressure from early investors on the respective development teams, leading to a vicious cycle of unrealistic expectations and unmet demands resulting in the projects being abandoned. Few will survive beyond a hobbyist level of development.
Thoughts on the notion of bitcoinization?
1) It’s inevitable. 2) It represents an existential crisis for the aristocracy. 3) It won’t be pretty, but if we survive it and don’t burn down the planet in the process, it will be regarded as a revolution along the same lines as the agricultural, industrial, and information revolutions. This will be the monetary revolution.
What Bitcoin startups are you excited about?
I’ll take a broad view of the term ‘Bitcoin startup’…
1) Blockstream
2) Square
3) Wasabi
4) Samourai
5) BTCPay Server
6) Twitter
7) Bisq
8) Lightning Labs
9) Tor Project
10) Zap Wallet
11) Hackernoon
12) Purism
13) GoTenna
14) Nodl
15) Cyphernode
16) Coinkite
17) Paralelní Polis
18) Betterhash
19) QubesOS
20) Cwtch
21) Infinite Fleet
22) DCentralTech
23) Trezor
24) Bitrefill
What “crypto influencers” do you think get it wrong and why?
See below.
What “crypto influencers” do you think gets it right and why?
I’ll take both of these together. Ignore these people and follow folks who build things instead.
What’s it going to take for this bear market to turn around?
I’m not sure and I don’t really care. It will happen when it happens and everyone will have a theory.
How bullish are you on Bitcoin despite this recent pullback?
My last doubt about Bitcoin vanished on August 1st, 2017.
Any tips you want to give to people new to Bitcoin?
Go sign up for an ‘Intro to Linux’ class at your local community college.
Best tips for storing Bitcoin?
Buy a cheap computer with cash from a pawn shop. Install Bitcoin Core. Send your Bitcoin to it. Unplug the computer. Wait 10 years.
Name some of your favorite information sources and/or podcasts in the space.
I have enjoyed (in no particular order) WorldCryptoNet, Block Digest, TFTC, Stephan Livera. I am sure many others are good too, but I prefer reading to podcasts, so I don’t listen to very many.
Any last words of wisdom?
There are far more Bitcoiners that are building the future than there are people who are trying to stop it from happening. Don’t let anyone fool you into believing otherwise. Don’t let idiots divide us, we are powerful and we will win a new world, a fair and free world. I look forward to seeing you all there!