Bitcoin Audible

"If your money isn't sound, it is not reflecting any proof of work. It is not reflecting anything about who should be able to consume, or how much there is available to consume. It's just being corrupted, it's being defrauded, so that certain people get bad price signals. And this will incentivize them and everyone else to literally make economic decisions that appear to be economically profitable, that are actually destroying the society."

~ Guy Swann

Why is it that 5,000 years of human civilization built monuments and railroads and cathedrals – and we built WeWork and Quibi?

In this episode, I read Wyatt's case for a return to proof of work in the real economy, then push it further: sound money isn't just nice to have. Without it, the market doesn't break – it never emerges in the first place. And when it loses that property, society rots until it dies.

Check out the original article: The Bitcoinization of Finance by Wyatt O'Rourke (Link: https://braiins.com/books/bitcoinization-of-finance)

References from the episode

The Bitcoinization of Finance by Wyatt O'Rourke – the book this chapter is pulled from, available now (audiobook coming soon, narrated by yours truly) (Link: https://braiins.com/books/bitcoinization-of-finance)

Broken Money by Lynn Alden – referenced in the chapter and one of the best macro reads out there (Link: https://www.lynalden.com/broken-money/)

The Price of Tomorrow by Jeff Booth – also referenced, and a foundational read on deflation and innovation (Link: https://www.jeffbooth.ca/books)

Human Action by Ludwig von Mises – the original Austrian breakdown of boom-bust cycles (Link: https://mises.org/mises-wire/ludwig-von-misess-human-action-marking-70-years-continuing-relevance)

The previous Read episode on Nick Szabo's The Fabric of Desires – perfect companion piece to this one (Link: https://fountain.fm/episode/ByGugoFYLU0uFDPI6Z2t)

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

Guy on Instagram (Link: https://www.instagram.com/theguyswann)

Guy on TikTok (Link: https://www.tiktok.com/@theguyswann)

Guy on YouTube (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@theguyswann)

⁠Bitcoin Audible on X⁠ (Link: https://twitter.com/BitcoinAudible)

The Guy Swann Network Broadcast Room on Keet (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3na6v839)

Check out our awesome partners!

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://bitbox.swiss/)

Get ⁠10% off the COLDCARD⁠ with code ...

"It is not markets that made money possible. It is collectibles, which we now call money, that make markets possible."

~ Nick Szabo

What if everything we've been told about how money emerged is backwards? Nick Szabo's first article in nearly a decade tells the story of a stolen canoe, a tribal feud, and a string of shells – and uses it to challenge one of the most repeated ideas in economics. Did money come from barter, or did it come from something far older and far more human?

Check out the original article: The Fabric of Desires by Nick Szabo (Link: https://jan3.com/blog/the-fabric-of-desires)

References from the episode

Nick Szabo's blog, Unenumerated – where so much of his foundational writing lives (Link: https://unenumerated.blogspot.com/)

Aqua Wallet, the superapp by Jan3: Bitcoin, Lightning, and Liquid all in one, with USDT on Liquid too (Link: https://aqua.net/)

The Nakamoto Institute: the best archive there is for Szabo's work and early Bitcoin thought (Link: https://nakamotoinstitute.org/)

Carl Menger's On the Origins of Money – worth reading even where I think it falls short (Link: https://www.socsci.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/menger/money.txt)

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

Guy on Instagram (Link: https://www.instagram.com/theguyswann)

Guy on TikTok (Link: https://www.tiktok.com/@theguyswann)

Guy on YouTube (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@theguyswann)

⁠Bitcoin Audible on X⁠ (Link: https://twitter.com/BitcoinAudible)

The Guy Swann Network Broadcast Room on Keet (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3na6v839)

Check out our awesome partners!

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://bitbox.swiss/)

Get ⁠10% off the COLDCARD⁠ with code BITCOINAUDIBLE ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠(Link: https://bitcoinaudible.com/coldcard)

Get 10% off the best Bitcoin board game in the world, HODLUP! Or any of the other great games from The Free Market Kids! Use code GUY10 at checkout for 10% off your cart! (Link: https://www.freemarketkids.com/collections/games-1)

“There's always a story. It's all stories, really. The sun coming up every day is a story. Everything's got a story in i...

In this roundtable, we sit down with Steve, Mechanic, and Jeff, and honestly, we struggle to stay on Bitcoin for half of it. Our catch-up quickly turns into a rant about LLMs acting like corporate yes-men, and the frustrations of running AI locally.

But we do get back to the money. We talk about the St. Louis Fed literally copyrighting Bitcoin price data, France tracking self-hosted wallets, Steve’s update on UTXOracle, and why the quantum computing threat looks a lot more like a funding scam with terrible marketing.

On the technical side, we get into the proposed cluster mempool changes in Bitcoin Core. Mechanic also shares his view on renting hashrate, and how much money giant pools waste by ignoring empty block speedups.

Guest Links

Steve Simple Nostr (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3s6a8yn8)

Steve Simple on X (Link: https://x.com/stevesimple)

Bitcoin Mechanic Nostr (Link: https://tinyurl.com/2tm827ut)

Bitcoin Mechanic on X (Link: https://x.com/GrassFedBitcoin)

Jeff Swann Nostr (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3sjc3bcp)

Jeff Swann on X (Link: https://x.com/agoristview)

Affiliate Links

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://bitbox.swiss/)

Get ⁠10% off the COLDCARD⁠ with code BITCOINAUDIBLE ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠(Link: https://bitcoinaudible.com/coldcard)

Get 10% off the best Bitcoin board game in the world, HODLUP! Or any of the other great games from The Free Market Kids! Use code GUY10 at checkout for 10% off your cart! (Link: https://www.freemarketkids.com/collections/games-1)

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

Guy on Instagram (Link: https://www.instagram.com/theguyswann)

Guy on TikTok (Link: https://www.tiktok.com/@theguyswann)

Guy on YouTube (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@theguyswann)

⁠Bitcoin Audible on X⁠ (Link: https://twitter.com/BitcoinAudible)

The Guy Swann Network Broadcast Room on Keet (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3na6v839)

Chapters

(00:00:00) - Introduction to the Roundtable
(00:05:16) - Building the UTXO Oracle Reference Price
(00:15:09) - Ocean Mining Pool Hashrate and Core Drama
(00:23:40) - Analyzing AI Model Costs and Economic Feasibility
(00:37:05) - Iran Reportedly Taking Bitcoin Tolls for Shipping
(00:42:08) - VPN Usage and Legal Realities in Autocracies
(00:53:12) - Governement Advancing Self-Hosted Wallet Regulations
(00:59:06) - Debunking Google Quantum Computing Encryption Threats
(01:16:45) - Analyzing Cluster Mempool Feasibility in Bitcoin Core
(01:28:01) - AI Agents Operating Wallets
(01:33:14) - The Rise of Decentralized Rentable Hashrate
(01:44:26) - Hosted Bitcoin Nodes and Stratum Uptime Solutions
(01:57:17) - Non-Custodial Wallet Adoption on Nostr
(02:02:37) - Lightning Network UX Challenges and Bolt 12
(02:13:14) - Updates and Final Thoughts

"They say the ruler is bent, then use the bent ruler to measure the table.

They say the clock is broken, then solemnly read out the hour.

They say the instrument is false, then ask it, with perfect seriousness, for one final certification.

This is, in itself, a form of bondage.

To measure gold in fiat terms is, in Jung’s sense, to deny the shadow: to denounce the paper system in public while continuing, in private, to let it decide what counts as value." 

~ Craig Tindale

1 BTC = 1 BTC. If fiat is broken, why do we still trust it to tell us what gold or Bitcoin is worth? Craig Tindale argues that even the rebels against fiat money remain captive to its grammar – measuring their escape in the very units they claim to reject. But is stepping outside the fiat frame really that simple, or does the nature of price itself trap us in ways even Bitcoiners haven't fully reckoned with?

Check out the original article: Stepping Outside the Fiat Frame by Craig Tindale (Link: https://x.com/ctindale/status/2040918715961901280)

References from the episode

My recent two‑part series Read episodes: "Number Go Down" by Allen Farrington & Sacha Meyers and "Modern Money Only Works by Cheating" by Tyler Durden – both great companions to this episode.

(Number Go Down: https://fountain.fm/episode/fLqds61ds9YbsnqGOkE8)

(Modern Money Only Works by Cheating: https://fountain.fm/episode/UN8NHIQ3tR9tdc9ER89h)

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

Guy on Instagram (Link: https://www.instagram.com/theguyswann)

Guy on TikTok (Link: https://www.tiktok.com/@theguyswann)

Guy on YouTube (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@theguyswann)

⁠Bitcoin Audible on X⁠ (Link: https://twitter.com/BitcoinAudible)

The Guy Swann Network Broadcast Room on Keet (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3na6v839)

Check out our awesome partners!

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://bitbox.swiss/)

Get ⁠10% off the COLDCARD⁠ with code BITCOINAUDIBLE ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠(Link: https://bitcoinaudible.com/coldcard)

Get 10% off the best Bitcoin board game in the world, HODLUP! Or any of the other great games from The Free Market Kids! Use code GUY10 at checkout for 10% off your cart! (Link: https://www.freemarketkids.com/collections/games-1)

"When you really dig into the heart of how finance, how our monetary system and how our political system work, and how deeply married they are, you begin to see something that's pretty disturbing. That cheating and manipulation aren't simply something that arise in bad behaviors. They're fundamentally required by the system itself. They're baked in. They are the standard. It is the law. And if that is our reality, then the only way we can actually restore honesty and sensible standards is to create a money that refuses to bend to the law. So the question is, have we done that?"

~ Guy

What if the cheating, the manipulation, and the bailouts aren't bugs in our financial system, but the very features that keep it alive? In this rant, I push back hard on the idea that "elastic money" saved us from the 2008 collapse, the 1929 catastrophe, or any other economic event we've "papered over", and argue it's the very thing guaranteeing a far worse one. Is hard money really the villain of the 20th century, or have we been telling ourselves a comforting lie?

References from the episode

The previous Read of "Number Go Down", the essay by Allen Farrington and Sacha Meyers (Link: https://fountain.fm/episode/fLqds61ds9YbsnqGOkE8)

And the previous Read of "Modern Money Only Works by Cheating" by Tyler Durden (Link: https://fountain.fm/episode/UN8NHIQ3tR9tdc9ER89h)

Custodia Bank's ongoing fight for a full-reserve banking charter (Link: https://bankingjournal.aba.com/2026/04/tenth-circuit-denies-rehearing-en-banc-in-custodia-banks-lawsuit-over-master-accounts/)

Affiliate Links

Become sovereign, hold your keys, be censorship resistant with the Bitbox hardware wallet. Get 5% off everything in the store with code GUY (Link: https://bitbox.swiss/)

Get ⁠10% off the COLDCARD⁠ with code BITCOINAUDIBLE ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠(Link: https://bitcoinaudible.com/coldcard)

Get 10% off the best Bitcoin board game in the world, HODLUP! Or any of the other great games from The Free Market Kids! Use code GUY10 at checkout for 10% off your cart! (Link: https://www.freemarketkids.com/collections/games-1)

Host Links

⁠Guy on Nostr ⁠(Link: http://tinyurl.com/2xc96ney)

⁠Guy on X ⁠(Link: https://twitter.com/theguyswann)

Guy on Instagram (Link: https://www.instagram.com/theguyswann)

Guy on TikTok (Link: https://www.tiktok.com/@theguyswann)

Guy on YouTube (Link: https://www.youtube.com/@theguyswann)

⁠Bitcoin Audible on X⁠ (Link: https://twitter.com/BitcoinAudible)

The Guy Swann Network Broadcast Room on Keet (Link: https://tinyurl.com/3na6v839)