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20 sats \ 3 replies \ @Coinosphere 19 Aug 2023 \ on: BOB = Bitcoin-Only Business bitcoin
I can regale you with the tale of one of the very first BOBs, which I attempted to launch right as MtGox fell at the end of 2013.
It was called Coinosphere, and it was the first attempt at a bitcoin merchant Directory. I had a web scraper built and scoured the web that November for literally thousands of businesses that offered to accept BTC for their products & services. Like 2500 or so if I recall correctly.
I planned to monetize it by selling, for bitcoin only, ads and prioritized listings. You could move above your competitors in a category for $20 worth of sats at the time, or banner impressions site wide for much more.
I got it working and filled with all those listings, (Tons of data entry work) then went to a conference and handed out lotsa flyers & lapel pins, made a few contacts, and by Christmas started seeing some traffic.
But at that time absolutely NO ONE wanted to spend a single satoshi, anywhere at all.
I got dozens of new merchants joining the directory every single day for months at that point, but they were basically my only traffic. And as the directory grew, so did the server expenses. :p
I was completely misjudging bitcoiners' ability to part with their sats. I had to shut it all down mid 2014; what huge waste of coin I should have been stacking. Lesson well learned.
You got a great lesson!!
I also feel some diehards do not want to spend their bitcoins. Some bitcoin millionairs do have to spend because that is the only thing they have.
But do you feel you were too early? Or do you think bitcoin only is just not happening in next 10 years?
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Bitcoin it’s happening now… will still here if you continue using it in your daily life.
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I was definitely too too too early.
Since that time I've been living off bitcoin, on zero fiat. (Technically I use credit in fiat as a 2nd layer to my bitcoin.) I do try to spend sats where I can, obviously VPNs and servers and other such things make it easy, but day-to-day expenses will be in fiat until fiat starts hyperinflating, I'd say.
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