Bridging the Freedom Gap \ stacker news ~bitcoin

As someone who spent a while in startup circles I once believed in Bridging the Gap within what now clearly is a digital gulag...

Bridging the right gapBridging the right gap

Bridging the gap was all about identifying new tech which was poised for large scale adoption early on, build a company and/or product during and then after the initial surge of early adopters, so that you could really scale once the way larger wave of real adoption got started.

After 2020 it is clear that if we do this within the system all you're doing is building your own jail, we have to buidl outside of existing, fiat based systems. Anything that does not have real freedom as its core function and promise should be shunned and attacked.

An abundance of toolsAn abundance of tools

A bit into 2020 all privacy and freedom oriented projects experienced a surge, and is there any really sharp minds these days that do not at least put some effort into the fight in the their free time?

We have all the tools we possibly need to bridge the freedom gap, many individuals have decoupled completely, and are well positioned to keep earning a living that cannot easily be taken away from them, of course including buidling and providing all of these tools.

But what about any average, freedom minded individual who is able to adopt tools and at least buidl something like a freelance career in freedom?

The real challengeThe real challenge

Almost anyone can start posting content, or even build microservices within the only free markets that exist globally: within the Bitcoin sphere and the Monero markets as the prime examples. The cost can be close to zero, and there are thousands of niches that can work well for anyone putting a lot of energy and courage into it.

But what about ROI? Not the "get rich and scale" ROI, what about the first weeks or months? This is the challenge, this is what we all need to rebuild an online civilization in freedom...

Motivation and long term thinkingMotivation and long term thinking

Earning sats is a great experience since anyone who are here and similar places know that its totally uncensorable, and that its real money that will hold real value in the future, and in this context clearly value that is more important than the fiat buy & sell price.

Of course there is a lot of real generosity and examples of the V4V model working, and I'm not implying that we need to replace the fiat printers and state to prop up anyone trying. What is needed is better takes on how to really get going, how to get a million Freedo Startups going!

Hunger & FreedomHunger & Freedom

In the early days of the building of the Digital Gulags there was a lot of idealism, many coders and some content creators took on jobs for peanuts, and kept pushing hard until their project took off, or until they got a good offer from those that did. They were hungry, curious and open minded, but few saw that all they were doing was building their own jail...

Bridging this coming Freedom Gap will be even harder, but this time we know what it is all about, and that the fight is necessary and totally real.

Can buidling microservices and content bridge this gap for individuals? What if you can live for next to nothing for an extended period of time, would you be 100% into it?

I do have that option, and for the past years I've been cutting costs until I live like a peasant here in Asia ;-)

So this is my main objective now, and for the coming years, come what may: I will try to bridge the gap, doing as many days living on what I earn the previous day in uncensorable, real money like especially Bitcoin, and while doing so producing content around the process...

The future we needThe future we need

Things look bleak and full of doom as of now, and wishful thinking is one of the main killers in the years to come. Yet for this one thing I will afford myself a not so rational decision based on gut feeling and deep conviction: freedom will prevail, through rough storms of all sorts millions of people will emerge with thousands of viable projects of all sorts, from all parts of the planet!

We will Bridge the Freedom gap, and I will be in that fight every hour I'm awake, and also some dreaming. And since this time around the deep motivation and vision is right it will be far easier than when I tried bridge the fiat surveillance gap ;-)

46 sats \ 1 reply \ @globalmerchant 2 Sep 2024

A lot of thought, emotion, determination in your words. Briefly I share this hoping in might help some way somehow.

I'm long term Bitcoin, ESPECIALLY in a circular use economy, rather than JUST "stack SATS". As an importer, exporter, wholesaler I've tried hard, really hard to get my friends, customers and suppliers to actually use Bitcoin, NOT just to buy a cup of coffee using a lightning wallet, but to use on our wholesale B2B transactions. NOT easy, 99% they are still addicted to ONLY using fiat.
At 72 years old, I do not relate to guys in my age range, they have retired, I work in my business seven days a week, with that said I'm also active in our local Bitcoin dev group in Honolulu.
Two of my websites accept Bitcoin using Open Node, interestingly only people OUTSIDE of the USA seem to be excited to actually use Bitcoin. And this is why I focus on people, companies that are 100% positive, active, forward thinking, optimistic. I've changed (read "dropped") a lot of those who are not in my similar thinking, at my age time is taken more seriously.

So I guess I'm trying to say that are many out there that think like you, but you haven't met them yet, they can bring other ideas, revenue, opportunities, just keep keep up the good fight.

Good Luck, God Bless Rich

21 sats \ 0 replies \ @einherjer OP 2 Sep 2024

Thanks! And yes, these things are the result of going through anything I remember back into even the early seventies in the light of 2020 :-)

I'll answer your well structure points as best I can:

This is more of an investment and savings mindset, which of course is totally necessary for us to succeed! I do follow that myself, but in order to bridge this gap I need to train myself hard in seeing it all as a revenue stream. How would I act, and what revenue stream could I get going if I was left close to empty handed in the streets of Kathmandu or Cairo?
I totally get that... I started splitting off from my age peers even well before I was 18 haha, and these days I feel that I have more in common with other species :-) That being said I do plan on doing the mother of all " what did I tell you!!??" soon, logged into the slave camp on LinkedIn yesterday. Left that late in 2020 leaving only "Bitcoin" for my header and "Did you get any?" as the main text haha... Also did my only ever public prediction ever in October 2019, telling them all that they should get metals & Bitcoin after the REPO market blew up...

So what all of this leads to is that at some point soon I think many of us will have a lot to do as organizers, almost as seers that got it right. At this particular juncture in history it might even be a good thing to be almost arrogant about it all, certainly pushing hard to get people over that hard bump they're struggling with!

The world is a completely different beast outside of the US and Europistan... I do think that there is a huge market also inside these failing states, but as of now people for good reasons are very careful of touching the live rails, paying with traceable cryptos that is.

This will also be part of what I'll be doing, looking into how the Freedom Gap can be bridged in a global sense, forgetting about what was the free & prosperous West, all of that is of course gone now...

We will need a lot in the near future, its almost as if we all have to turn into remote viewers! ;-)