“Wealth attracts many friends, but even the closest friend of the poor person deserts them.”
– (Proverbs 19:4)
In the heyday of the software firm I ran in the past, I made a lot of money. A ridiculous amount, in fact, which I talked about in my initial substack article. That money is gone, but the lessons I learned from having it are not. One of those lessons is that the above proverb is true (at least the first half).
When I was wealthy people came out of the woodwork. Calls, texts, compliments – and requests. Everybody had a sob story, everybody was in need of help. I don’t doubt the requests were legitimate, it’s just that I never heard from these people when I wasn’t loaded and now all of a sudden there they were. I also got invited to a lot of functions, some of which I went to and many of which I didn’t.
After coming into the Bitcoin space and adopting a Bitcoin-only mindset, I’ve realized that this behavior is a byproduct of the fiat world. Not that it didn’t exist before, but fiat makes it worse. In a sound money world, you can live on less than you make and save the rest knowing that its value will persist through the years. In a fiat economy your money wastes away, losing value every year through inflation due to money printing. “Desperate times call for desperate measures” as they say, and so people do whatever it takes to stay afloat. There’s nothing wrong with needing a helping hand sometimes, but sacrificing your dignity by looking for handouts from strangers is encouraged by the desperation created by fiat.
Bitcoiner culture is different. The phrase “value-for-value” is common in the community. You do something for me, I do something in return. Maybe I give you some sats or maybe I return a favor. For example, I’ve been working on improving my graphic arts skills and so posted an offer on Nostr to create an animated profile picture for anyone who replies. I didn’t ask for anything in return, nor was I expecting anything, and yet every single person I created an animation for sent me some sats for the effort. My past experiences of people with a freeloader mindset makes this value-for-value culture very refreshing.
One wonderful example of value-for-value is the Konsensus network, which I’m now partnering with. My goal is to work fulltime in the Bitcoin industry, and to that end I began contacting people to see what kind of work I can do. As a software developer with a lot of experience in video and audio editing, I was sure I could find projects to help out with. One person I reached out to was Niko Laamanen of Konsensus. I thought he was the CEO or President or otherwise “man in charge” of the company, but as it turns out that is very wrong. He started it, but it’s built on the Starfish model of business.
That is, Konsensus is made up of different teams of people working on different projects. Each team has autonomy to do that work as they see fit, but because everyone is a Bitcoiner the teams all share a certain set of ideals that unifies the work they’re doing. Teams can take on new people as the need arises. There’s no boss to ask for permission or red tape to get through first. Each team profits from the work they do and splits that profit up based on the value-for-value system. Tasks that require more effort get a higher percentage of the return, but everyone is remunerated for their work. The teams all help and support each other as needs arise, which results in higher productivity and product quality. It’s a wonderful model that I’m excited to be a part of.
Imagine a world where all companies were run on this model. Rather than offering a paycheck, businesses would offer an ideology and a percentage of the profits. This model naturally attracts people who are passionate about the business, which results in better products. For example, Konsensus is a media organization that produces videos and podcasts but also publishes and translates books about Bitcoin. In an interview with one of the people I work with at Konsensus, Luke, Niko said that the translations produced by the teams are of the highest quality, not because the people doing the translations are professionals, but because they’re passionate about Bitcoin. They want to give these books to their friends and family to “Orange Pill” them, so the translations have to be flawless to make sure the thoughts are properly conveyed. That’s one of the benefits of value-for-value.
Another benefit of this passion-attracting culture is dramatically increased performance. An example of that is the many apps (clients) being produced for the decentralized social network Nostr. While not a Bitcoin-only platform, at least for the time being it’s mostly made up of Bitcoiners. The apps and servers (known as relays) are rapidly improving because the people creating them are passionate about the censorship-resistant network.
Value-for-value is alive and well in the world of Nostr. I developed a search engine for the network, something I always wished Twitter had, and I frequently get sats tipped to me via the Lightning Network for my efforts. It's not a lot of money yet, but the fact that so many people spontaneously choose to offer their support stands in stark contrast with my past experience.
Compare all of that to the fiat world we live in, where people vote for the candidates they believe will give them the most handouts so they can keep their heads above water. Of course, what they don’t realize is that by voting in fiat-oriented politicians they’re only making their situation worse. My wife and I were discussing this yesterday morning. As a child, her parents enrolled her in a government program that paid for healthcare treatments for young children. On the surface this looks like a benevolent thing – helping children to get the care they need if they’re parents can’t afford traditional insurance.
However, programs like these are only necessary because fiat money printing and insane taxation have put people in a situation of requiring government assistance to take care of their basic needs. In fiat clown world money flows from the pockets of the poor into the hands of the rich. That coupled with the Cantillon effect (those closest to the money printer getting the most benefit) leaves the common person in dire straits while the cut of the 1% grows ever larger.
The only solution to this hamster wheel fiat death spiral is sound money, and the most superior sound money in existence today is Bitcoin. Combining the decentralized hard money of Bitcoin with the value-for-value culture it inspires will create a world with financially better-off people purchasing superior products. The only people who won’t benefit are the fiat leeches that suck at the teat of the money printer. Value-for-value means you have to actually produce value if you expect anything in return. That doesn’t mean charity won’t exist, it just won’t be nearly as necessary.
I was interviewed on the Freedom Footprint Show (episode coming out in a couple of weeks), and the host of that show, Luke, made an excellent point in a discussion about charity in a sound money world. I noted that people’s psyche only allows them to really care about around 150 people (a value known as Dunbar’s Number), and so large-scale charity is difficult to inspire. Luke’s response was that, in a sound money world, just looking out for the 150 people in your Dunbar’s Circle could very well be enough. If everyone did that, there would be few left unsupported, and the edge cases would be able to be helped by those who give to community charities. It’s beautiful in its elegant simplicity.
The more I apply the concepts of sound money and value-for-value to current world problems, the more I realize that the Bitcoiner axiom is true: “Fix the money, fix the world.” While Bitcoin won’t bring about a Utopia, it will lead to the solution of so many problems for so many people. It’s a future I believe in and eagerly anticipate. May it be so.