Why I Joined Swan Bitcoin

It is a quote by Aaron Swartz and my daily reminder for two things: (1) life is short, (2) impor­tant things exist, and working hard on them is worth the sacri­fice so that the future might be brighter than the present.

To me, that impor­tant thing is Bitcoin.

I believe that the people behind Swan — Cory, Yan, Brady, Brandon, Brekkie, Jörn, Reed, and many others — under­stand the impor­tance of Bitcoin. They under­stand that making the transi­tion to a sat-dominated world as painless as possible, for as many people as possible, is one of the most impor­tant things you could be working on. As more people opt into Bitcoin, having a way to seamlessly move from the fiat world into the Bitcoin world is essen­tial. 

I know no better way than auto-DCA: set it and forget it. Ignore the noise, focus on the big picture, and consis­tently stack sats on the way to hyper­bit­coiniza­tion. Switching from manual buying to auto-DCA was one of the best decisions I ever made as a Bitcoiner, and I am delighted to join a company focused on that. Less FOMO, less trading, less zero-sum games. More building, more outreach, more Bitcoin Zen.

It seems that the amount of your exposure to fiat is inversely corre­lated with your under­standing of money. Conse­quently, educa­tion around this and other topics related to Bitcoin are dear to my heart. Swan has a strong focus on educa­tion from the start, with Yan as the author of Inventing Bitcoin and Brady, Citizen Bitcoin himself, as the head of educa­tion. 

Most people still have no idea what Bitcoin is, how it differs from other forms of money, and why they might want to use it. I hope this will change over the coming years, and I hope I can contribute to Swan’s effort of bringing Bitcoin educa­tion to the masses. There is only one way to build an intran­si­gent minority: one Bitcoiner at a time.

As David Foster Wallace famously said in his commence­ment speech: These two young fish are swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, “Morning, boys, how’s the water?” And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventu­ally, one of them looks over at the other and goes, “What the hell is water?”

The metaphor may not be perfect, but in the world of Bitcoin, code is the water that David Foster Wallace is speaking of. I feel that I’ve been so immersed in Bitcoin that I forgot what makes it all work: code. 

I’m excited to return to my roots as a computer scien­tist and programmer to work on what makes Bitcoin and its ecosystem work. I will continue to write words as well, but damn, does it feel good to write code again.

I feel blessed to be part of something so monumental, so profound, so optimistic as Bitcoin. An orange beacon of hope, in a world that seems to be split­ting apart at the seams. I feel blessed that I can work along­side so many amazing bitcoiners — inside and outside of Swan — people that tirelessly work towards a bright orange future.

I have the feeling that we are on the verge of something great. This giant bird is about to take flight, and I hope the world is ready. We will do our best to get as many people on board as possible, as safely as possible. It won’t always be easy, but I know in my heart that it is the most impor­tant thing in the world I could be working on right now.

Onward!