My friend introduced me to Bitcoin, but regretfully I derided him for wasting his money on a Ponzi scheme. There were too many red flags on the surface for me to be willing to deep dive into the rabbit hole. Additionally, as an investor, gold was never appealing to me, so the metaphor "digital gold" wasn't any better. My friend later asked me if there was anything he could've said to convince me about Bitcoin, and I replied no probably not! So keep that in mind as well that as much as you may want to teach your friends and family about Bitcoin, sometimes they need to reach out to you themselves.
I came for the number go up technology, but I stayed for the once-in-a-civilization monetary revolution!
Source 1: Financial News
My first source was financial news: "Bitcoin breaks above $20,000 for first time ever", and "Tesla buys $1.5 billion in Bitcoin"
Those financial headlines made me consider for the first time ever, was I wrong about Bitcoin?
Source 2: Investment Studies
Then I read more fiscal studies from financial institutions I trusted: Fidelity Bitcoin Investment Thesis, Ark Invest Big Ideas 2021, and Grayscale's Bitcoin 2019 Investor Study.
The investor study had such a profound impact on me that I later dedicated my book "to the 89% in Grayscale's Bitcoin 2019 Investor Study who would consider investing in Bitcoin if they just knew a little more."
Source 3: The Bitcoin Whitepaper
The investor in me was now open to Bitcoin, but the software engineer remained unconvinced. I've always preferred primary sources, choosing to read the study an article references rather than a summary of the study. So in Bitcoin, I knew the best place to start was the Whitepaper, which was no easy read.
Source 4: Bitcoin News Podcasts
I started listening to Bitcoin podcasts like Coindesk's The Breakdown with NLW talking about Bitcoin, Macro, and the Power Shifts reshaping our world.
Source 5: The Bitcoin Standard
That really got me thinking bigger, and I finally read the book that would ultimately explain money and Bitcoin so clearly, The Bitcoin Standard.
Source 6: Cryptocurrency Coursework
It was at this point I came back to my (now multiple) friends who I derided earlier to ask for help! My concerns about the Mt Gox hack and leaving my Bitcoin on an exchange still weighed heavily on me, and they recommended I get the cold storage hardware wallet they had, a Ledger. While not Bitcoin Only, the Ledger Academy taught me what a seed phrase is and how to safely take self custody of my Bitcoin to which I'm forever grateful! Ironically enough, it was Ledger Academy's endless articles about staking every altcoin you can think of that screamed circular logic scam, and reassured me Bitcoin isn't "crypto." I'm proud to say I've been Bitcoin only since Day 1! While I had yet to buy Bitcoin still in my journey, I now had a ledger so I'd be ready for cold storage the very first time I stacked sats.
Source 7: Technical Bitcoin Books and Videos
Feeling more confident on the tech side, I tackled Andreas Antonopoulos' Mastering Bitcoin to read how Bitcoin actually worked. I started watching his videos on YouTube, and was blown away his lecture that Bitcoin consensus is achieved by Rules without Rulers and how he "doesn't believe in Santa Claus."
Again, I revisited the Bitcoin Whitepaper and could now understand it with my further background information.
Final Source 8: Bitcoin Culture Articles
I listened to Guy Swann's Bitcoin Audible reading of Croesus' article published in Citadel21, Why the Yuppie Elite Dismiss Bitcoin. Jesse Meyers gave the high signal meow I needed out of the chaos I was battling internally. Was I the yuppie elite? Could I be wrong about Bitcoin?:
"For the business and financial elite, who have honed their heuristic abilities for filtering out the deluge of noise they sift through on a daily basis in order to be effective in their professions, Bitcoin's red flags are a non-starter.... A typical member of the yuppie elite flags Bitcoin as garbage to be ignored upon their first investigation of its merits, and because of the groupthink of yuppies only paying attention to what other yuppies are interested in, that's where Bitcoin remains.... Of course, this will all change as Bitcoin's mechanics continue to play out, making Number go Up. In time, everyone will have to face the painful realization that their reasons for writing off Bitcoin were wrong."
While this culmination of sources (none of them Twitter/Reddit or prompting from my family or friends) led me down the Bitcoin rabbit hole, it was this cultural opinion piece that finally led me to pull the trigger. I purchased my first satoshis in April 2021 at the low low price of $62,000 USD/BTC, and I've been buying the dip ever since, all the way down to $16,000 USD/BTC in November 2022.
It bears repeating: I came for the number go up technology, but I stayed for the once-in-a-civilization monetary revolution!
After making my first purchase, sending it to cold storage, and having some skin in the game, even if just a little, my appetite for Bitcoin knowledge became voracious; reading everything I could about Bitcoin! Eventually, I felt like I was out of things to read, so then I thought, "Well isn't Bitcoin open source? Why don't I just read the C++ code for myself!" So I read the Bitcoin Core Github, Bitcoin stack exchange posts from Peter Wuille, and Peter Todd's blog posts.
As a software engineer, I was so enthralled reading the actual code that I started driving my wife insane with my ramblings about Bitcoin! So I did what any respectable husband would do, and channeled my Bitcoin energy into publishing a book about our dog, Sheila, running around the Australian Outback. But not just any dog, The Bitcoin Dog: Following the Scent to the Bitcoin C++ Source Code! And of course as a good global Bitcoin citizen, I spun up a Bitcoin full node to help write the book and support our decentralized peer to peer network!
Since then, I haven't stopped writing! 280 characters a tweet on Twitter or Nostr, and now contributing to ~BooksAndArticles on Stacker News!
While I enjoy giving plebs a platform on my Bitcoin podcast, "It's So Early!", and highlighting fellow Bitcoiners in my newsletter, my goal is to do my part to further Hyperbitcoinization. I'm grateful that it's not all on my shoulders (even Satoshi walked away in 2011 and Bitcoin is thriving!). Still, reflecting on My Bitcoin Story, the following are the Bitcoin sources I could provide to turn no-coiners into Bitcoiners:
- Report factual financial news (no clickbait!)
- Report factual Bitcoin news (Bitcoin only!)
- ✅ Publish a book to explain Bitcoin
- ✅ Publish technical bitcoin & lightning guides
- ✅ Publish articles to drive home the culture
Rather than start reporting the news, I've started writing a fun action adventure young adult Bitcoin novel Bitcoin Girl Save the World. Who knows! If it turns into a worldwide cultural phenomenon, maybe it will take less than eight Bitcoin sources to turn the yuppie elite into Bitcoiners! It's a long shot, but then again, so was Bitcoin.
This article was originally published in Satoshi's Journal on December 30, 2022 https://satoshisjournal.com/my-bitcoin-story-will-schoellkopf/
Will Schoellkopf is author of Bitcoin Girl Save the World, AND The Bitcoin Dog: Following The Scent To The Bitcoin C++ Source Code, and host of the Bitcoin podcast It's So Early! Will publishes a weekly newsletter featuring his favorite Bitcoin Tweets of the week! He is anthologized in 21 Futures: Tales from the Timechain, published in print at Bitcoin Magazine, Citadel21, Stackchain Magazine, and online at Satoshi's Journal. Follow him on Twitter @realBitcoinDog, or email will [@] realbitcoindog [.] com