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The Honest Money Show is your guide to understanding what money really is, and where Bitcoin fits in. Hosted by Anja Dragovic, Australia's female-led, Bitcoin-only podcast, it cuts through the noise to explore how money shapes our lives, why the current system leaves so many people behind, and what a clearer, fairer future could look like.
Expect honest, accessible conversations with some of the most interesting thinkers in the space, the kind that take you from "I don't really get this" to genuinely curious. No hype, no pressure, just money, made clear.
Whether you're brand new to these questions or already deep in them, you're welcome here.
Welcome to Honest Money. I'm your host
Anja and today's episode is brought to you
by Hardblock.
Joining me today is Wiz. He's a very
famous Bitcoiner in Australia. Sorry to
embarrass you, Wiz. And if you don't know
him, you probably should. So I'm really
pleased to have him on the podcast today.
Welcome to Honest Money. Hey Anja, thanks.
Thanks for the invitation. And I'm looking
forward to this chat with you. Me too, me
too. Now, I really want to speak to you
about Bushbash. But before we actually get
into that, I want to know a little bit
about your backstory because I actually
don't know that much about you. So would
you like to tell me about yourself? Sure,
sure. So I retired a couple of years ago,
ostensibly. Spent 40 years working in IT,
but mostly big corporate IT, banks,
government departments, logistics,
airlines. Worked on big complex stuff,
mainframes, old school tech stuff, but the
old school tech stuff that still runs the
majority of the economy. I was born in the
country, in Victoria, sort of in rural
areas. I grew up in small towns, moved to
Canberra when I was a teenager, when the
family moved and studied IT there. Went to
uni, worked for 40 years, worked all
around the world, which was great fun.
It's one of the great things about IT.
It's kind of the plumbing of the
information economy. So once you can
understand, once you've got plumbing
skills, you can pretty much work in any
industry sector and any place in the
world. Very portable. So I had a lot of
fun. Met a lot of people. Started and ran
a business for about 20 years. Sold out of
that a couple of years ago. And then I
guess my journey into Bitcoin, like a lot
of people, there was a few touch points
that I ignored. I think I read the
original Wired article and that was back
in 2011, I think. Moderately interested,
but very busy with business and, you know,
young family. And then I guess the second
touch point was a good friend was very
enthusiastically talking to me about
mining Bitcoin on a GPU in 20, same sort
of time, 2011, 2012. Explained that it was
going to be internet money and it was
purely digital. And, you know, I was in
IT. I knew that the, I knew you could just
copy that stuff. Didn't, didn't dive into
it. Didn't look.
2016, 2015, 2016 came along. I remember
reading about Ethereum and the Dow and
that was kind of interesting. Still really
busy. And then eventually 2017 came along
and, and the good old number go up and
it's like, Oh, Oh, Oh, maybe there's some
money to be made here. Oh, maybe I'll go
and learn a bit about it. So, um, I'm very
much of the doing category. I learned by
doing. So I started by buying some
Bitcoin. Um, and then I started learning
about it and then I ran a node and then I
got distracted by all the other shiny, the
bright, shiny balls and bought, um, bought
silly old shit coins. And, um, uh, I
refer, it took me about a year to figure
out that, uh, none of those were ever
going to, um, have the longevity that
Bitcoin had, which was why they all, they
all get paired as trading pairs against
Bitcoin. And when I eventually figured
that out, um, probably mid late 2018, um,
just market dumped them all and, uh,
bought Bitcoin and focused on Bitcoin ever
since. Um, uh, I always refer to that, you
know, people, a lot of people have similar
stories and their tuition fees. That's
that's the price of admission is learning
what learning, what matters and, um,
figuring that out. And sometimes,
sometimes you meet people who help and
accelerate that journey. Um, and I have to
say that the learning resources now, uh,
you know, almost 10 years later, so much
better. You know, here we are on one of
the many, many Bitcoin only podcasts in
Australia and around the world, and back
in 2017, it was, um, yeah, it was just
very hard to find the signal in the noise.
And so the quality of material that, you
know, people like yourself produce, um,
writing books, just, there's just so much
YouTube. There's just so much now. It's so
much easier to learn than it was. So
that's a little bit of my backstory. Yeah,
that's super interesting. So what was your
first impression of it from that article
in 2011? Like, obviously, I don't know
what kind of article it was, but like, it
didn't seem to explain Bitcoin like in not
well enough so that you can understand
that it's not replicable in the sense that
you thought maybe anyone can copy the
code. Yeah, I mean, it was kind of
interesting, but it was, it was at a
period in life when it was extremely busy.
Um, uh, a couple of young, couple of young
kids and, you know, it's a busy family
life, um, busy running a business and
really just not time to scratch myself.
Didn't, didn't pay enough attention. And
that, that story about having a number of
touch points where you hear about it and
discard it, sometimes because you're busy,
sometimes because you know better, um, is
a very, a very common one of, I've found
from talking to other, other Bitcoiners.
Yeah. I mean, I share a similar story. I
first heard of it in 2017, at least that I
remember of. Um, and I thought, cool. And
just dismissed it. Like didn't really care
for it at all. I just thought, okay, it's
like a cool thing that people are into
just that like they're into, I don't know
anything else. So I don't regret. It's
funny. Cause people, you ask people often
if they regret not making a move sooner, I
don't regret that. What I regret more than
anything is all the fiat I spent just not
knowing enough about money and, and just
frivolous things that don't really matter.
So that's probably a bigger regret for me.
Yeah. I mean, regret is kind of wasted
energy. I mean, you do stuff, you succeed
or you learn. Um, and if you don't learn,
then you usually repeat it and life goes
on dishing out the same mistake with
increasing severity until you get the
bloody message. Yes. Um, yeah. Yeah. So
tell us about Bushbrush. I talk a lot
about it on this show, but let's do it
some justice. Sure. So, um, it, it came
about from a conversation that I had with,
uh, another friend that I met through
Bitcoin, uh, Bill and his very good
friend, Huey, and they live, uh, they live
down in the ACT and I live up in
Queensland. And so we'd met at Sydney
Bitcoin that, um, uh, JP and Catan and
others run. Um, so I, I was traveling
quite a bit for work at that time. So I'd
often managed to swing my travel so that,
uh, uh, I could attend a Sydney Bitcoin
meetup and, uh, Bill and Huey would come
up from Canberra and we'd meet and have a
few beers and enjoy the meetup. And, uh,
so then we got to 2020 when, uh, all the
crazy craziness happened. Um, and the
world got locked down and, you know,
especially in Queensland, they closed,
they closed the border to the other
states. Um, so whilst we weren't as locked
down as say Melbourne, which was, you
know, just tragic, um, it was still, we
still had no ability to travel interstate
and a family interstate. And, um, and then
about October, there was a rumor going
around that the Queensland premier at the
time was going to open the border at the
start of November. So I rang Bill and I
said to him, because we hadn't seen each
other all year, and I said to him, shared
the rumor. And I said, you know what, we
should get together and just have a
weekend, uh, having a few beers and a few
steaks and talk about Bitcoin. Um, where's
the halfway point? And he said, oh,
there's a little town in the Hunter that I
go to, to, um, play golf and, uh, get away
for the weekend, a little place called
Murrarundi. So I had to go and look that
up. I had no idea where it was. Uh, it
turns out that it was pretty much
equidistant between Canberra and Brisbane.
And so I said, all right, let's just
commit to that first weekend in November.
Uh, I'll drive down from Brisbane. You can
drive up from Canberra. Uh, he knew, uh,
he knew an old cheap country pub to stay
in the railway hotel. And so that was,
that was it. Or so I thought, and I was on
Twitter then as, as wizard of Oz. And, uh,
so a couple of days later, um, Bill, who's
a little bit older than me, but very, um,
very curious with technology and a bit of
an entrepreneur, uh, had a bigger Twitter
following than I ever did. And he tweets
out, um, uh, there's going to be a ripper
of a Bitcoin weekend. It's in Murrarundi.
Uh, all, all Bitcoiners welcome. Uh,
message, message me or message Wiz if you
want to come along. And here's the
website. And he set up Bitcoin bush bash
.info and, or the very first version of it
and tweeted that out. And then, so I was
starting to get DMs from people I'd never
heard of going, yeah, I'm interested in
coming to, to the, uh, to the Bitcoin bush
bash. I was like, well, what's this about?
Then I've gone and looked at Bill's,
Bill's feed and you know, he hasn't, he
didn't ask, he didn't ask me about it. You
know, he's ungovernable. And so he's just
put the website up. And then over the
next, I guess, couple of weeks, yeah, just
people started coming out of the woodwork
going, oh my God. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We're
a weekend away. We've been cooped up, you
know, we've been in lockdown. Um, what a
great idea. And so about 20 people said
they'd come. And I don't know if you've
organized events before, but usually half
to two thirds is usually the number that
turn up compared to people who say they
come. Um, and the bush bash, uh, by
Saturday lunchtime, we had over 40. And
that, that's kind of been the way it's
been ever since. So there was a few things
we said right from the start. So, um, it's
all, it's all volunteer effort. We held it
in the, in the, in one of the rooms in the
railway hotel downstairs, JP and Catan
came up from Sydney and set up a, um,
Blockstream satellite in the beer garden.
Um, and we had a bunch of people who said,
oh yeah, I can speak about this. We'll
speak about that. And, and so we had a
bunch of sessions, uh, over the Saturday
and Sunday. Um, but we said no
registration, no KYC, no tickets, no
costs. So it's very much a, a grassroots
event open to everybody. Um, a few other
things we kind of thought about,
especially sort of in that COVID and post
COVID era, especially in the years that
followed, was that we said we'd always run
it in a, in a remote or regional, regional
area in Australia. So partly that was
because COVID was just economically
devastating for the small places. And by,
by picking a small country town, we could
bring 20, 40, 60. I mean, now it's a
hundred plus sometimes into a small
country town for two, three, four nights,
a bunch of people eating meals, drinking
beer and wine, and, uh, generally just
having a good time. But, um, that sort of
thing, whilst it doesn't sound big on a
city scale, it makes a big difference to
small country towns. Quick one for the
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forward slash honest money and start
stacking stats today. Um, yeah, that's,
that's, that's, those are the, those are
the key. Oh, there was one more thing. Um,
to make sure we didn't do it in school
holidays. So pick a time outside of school
holidays. So there was a bit of proof of
work, but also we weren't going to be
competing with families, holidaying and,
um, going in quiet times when things are
generally a bit quieter, uh, which means
that, you know, things are a bit more
available, but also a bit cheaper. Um,
yeah. Yeah. That was the, that was the,
that was the first one. It was a, it was a
lot of fun. Um, got to meet a whole bunch
of Bitcoiners that I'd never heard of.
People came out of the woodwork. One bloke
who's a thoracic surgeon, um, in, uh, in
the region. And he heard a shout out on
RHR on the Friday. And he thought, well,
Marirundi's only a couple of hours drive
for me. So he just drove down and, you
know, he was sitting, you know, sitting in
the audience and, uh, Bill, Bill was
sitting opposite him at lunch and they
were having a steak and a beer. And it's
like, oh, you know, where do you fit into
things? And the guy's gone, oh, yeah, I
heard the shout out on RHR and I thought,
oh, I'll just come down. He said, it's
great. Yeah. And he says, there's no
Bitcoiners where I live. And he says, plus
no one knows I'm a Bitcoiner. It's like,
oh, but it's like, well, what are you
doing? He goes, oh, I'm the local heart
surgeon. Yeah. I love big stories. Yeah.
People from all walks of life, um, have
discovered Bitcoin for one reason or
another. And often, often it's a bit of a,
a lonely journey, not perhaps not so much
anymore. Um, there's a lot more meetups
than there used to be. There's a lot more
bushbashes than there used to be. There's
a lot more conferences than there used to
be. But, um, yeah, you can kind of wonder
whether you're, whether you're really
barking up the wrong tree as it were, or
whether you're onto something. And so it
was a really, for me, it was a, it was a,
it was a wonderful weekend and I really
just came away, uh, incredibly energized
and, um, uh, slightly more knowledgeable
than when I arrived. Cause you, you get to
talk to lots of people and they can fill
in gaps that you're curious about. And
over the years, you can start to fill in
other people's gaps as, as newer
Bitcoiners come along. And it's, you know,
often that face-to-face conversations you
and I have had at various bushbashes, um,
is really, is a really powerful learning,
learning, um, experience. Yeah,
absolutely. So how long was it from that
first bushbash to the next one? And when
did it start sort of sprouting out, out
into different states? Well, we probably
within, within a couple of months. Um, so
at the time when we had it at the start of
November, Victoria was still locked down
and there were a lot of Bitcoiners in
Victoria who would have liked to have come
up to Mururundi and the Hunter, but were
unable to cross the border. So we said,
oh, let's do one in the autumn, um, maybe
closer to the border in case Victoria did
silly border closing rules again. Uh, what
about Beachworth? And then I get a, I get
a DM from a guy who owns and runs a motel
in Beachworth going, yeah, let us know
when I'll just block out the whole motel
and you guys could come and stay. And so
that was the, uh, that was the first one,
uh, after that was, it was the second one,
first one in Victoria. Um, then I think,
yeah, that year, yeah, we ran, uh, because
I'm from Queensland, it's no good just
having all the Southern Socialists,
having, um, having all the bushbashers.
So, um, I figured there better be a, there
better be a Queensland one. So we picked
Yippoon, which is sort of on the central,
uh, on the, on the Emerald Coast. Uh,
drivable from Brisbane about seven or
eight hours, not too bad. And, uh, much to
my surprise, there was this, there was
this scruffy looking dude called Daz Beer,
who with a, with a few mates, uh, jumped
in the car and drove the 18 odd hours down
from Hens. Oh my gosh. Yeah. For the, for
the first Yippoon bushbash. And people
came, you know, a few people flew from
Canberra and flew into Rockhampton and,
um, yeah, it was a, it was another great
weekend. And then it was back to
Murrarundi and that became the cycle for a
few years. Uh, then, I think you went to
the very first Western Australian
bushbash, didn't you? I wasn't sure if it
was the first one, but that was my first,
um, the Busselton one. So, yeah, I met a
lot of the WA Bitcoiners there. And for
me, it was actually a funny moment because
someone had reached out to me via signal.
And because I was new to signal and
telegram, I just thought it was a scammer.
So I ignored it. It was like an Adrian
just going, Hey stranger. I'm like, just
didn't respond. And then I went to, um, to
Busselton and all of a sudden I get a tap
on my shoulder and I turn around and I see
a friend, like an old friend that I've
known for years. He's like, what are you
doing here? I'm like, what are you doing
here? So it was, it was, yeah, it was a
funny moment, like almost like a full
circle moment, um, that someone from your
like past that you've known from entirely
different friend groups happens to be like
in Bitcoin. I was like, yeah, it was, it
was, it was nice. Um, but yeah, um,
Busselton is a beautiful location. Um, I
didn't go to the last one, but yeah, I'm,
I have strong ties to the WA community
because my family's from Perth. So. Nice.
Nice. Good excuse to go back. Yeah,
exactly. Yeah. So we, so we ran that sort
of circle from, you know, Murrarundi to
Beechworth to Yappoon for a couple of
years. And then, um, then we decided to,
uh, move from Yappoon up to Palm Cove up
here, up near Cairns. Uh, so that became
the Queensland one, which it still is, uh,
still will be in July. And yeah, then
Busselton was added in, uh, Busselton, the
first time we went to Busselton was last
year, which was, was pretty extraordinary
actually, because for the first probably
four years, I emceed all of the
Buschbashers, which was fun, but
exhausting. Yeah. And, uh, then as, uh, as
I was getting closer to retirement and,
you know, there was a lot going on in
life, I, I knew, I knew a lot of the
Bitcoiners at the various bashers. And,
um, yeah, thankfully, uh, JP from Sydney
Bitcoin and Catan sort of stood up and
said, oh yeah, we'd love to, we'd love to
run the, the New South Wales one. Um, so
they're, they're running that now. And Aza
and Doc and Carmen and Crispy, um, are
running the Beechworth one and the John
and, um, um, Daz and myself are running
the, the Queensland one and Helen and Pete
Wynn are running, um, um, Busselton. And
then, um, then someone else stuck their
head up and said, oh, I want to run a
Buschbash as well. And, uh, suggested one
running one in Byron Bay. Yeah. I was
like, sorry, JP. Now there's two in New
South Wales. So there's like Northern New
South Wales and Central New South Wales.
And I think, yeah, I think that's only
like a positive thing. I hope in time
there's going to be multiple ones per
state. Um, yeah, I think, I think it's
really nice. We have an amazing community
here locally and what's unique about it.
Cause now I've been to a number of meetups
around Australia. This is like the only
place in Australia that has like 50, 50
split between males and females. Um, I
don't know what's wrong. Like I, I don't,
I don't understand the phenomenon, but
like, it just seems to attract a lot of
women in Bitcoin. I have no idea why, you
know, I went to BitDays recently as well,
which is more of a techie thing full of
women. Like it's, it's so, it's so
interesting. I love it. Um, so yeah, we
have a really nice community. I think it
brings a nice kind of balance. Um, there's
also food. We, we do like, uh, just for
the last bit devs, we did like, um, 21,000
sats for a Mexican bowl with like pulled
beef. That's grass fed, grass finished
rice, guacamole. It was just delicious. So
there you go. Yeah. She would tell me
about food coming up to dinner time. Now
I'm hungry. Sorry. No, I, um, I, I had the
pleasure to come down to the Northern
Rivers group, uh, what a couple of months
ago. And that was, it was fabulous. Yeah.
Great location and warm welcome and
friendly people. And I find that, um, I
find that in all of the Bitcoin meetups
is, and, uh, I used to have to travel
quite a bit internationally for work. So I
got to go to some of the conferences
overseas. I've been to, um, Bitblock Boom
that, um, uh, Gary Leland runs, uh, uh,
that was in Austin when I went in 22, I
think it was. Um, and been to, uh, Baltic
Honey Badger up in Riga in Latvia, uh,
that Max Kei from, um, Hodl Hodl runs with his team ,
the lighthning conference
yeah, what I find fascinating Anja is
you can join a conversation with a bunch
of Bitcoiners in a country you've never
been to, uh, with people you've never met.
And there's like, there's like an 80% kind
of overlap in the way you understand
Bitcoin and perhaps view the world. And
what becomes really interesting is teasing
out the 20% that's different. It's like,
how did you get to that position, Anya? I
don't understand. Because what I
understand is, you know, is that's
completely wrong because this, this, and
this, and then Anya goes, well, Tim, you
know, that second, that second assumption
you made, that is provably false. And this
is why boom, boom, boom, boom. So I'm
going to have to rethink that. And those,
those, uh, those conversations are
incredibly illuminating and very
educational. And the thing I've
appreciated is they're usually very
respectful. So it's pretty rare that they
descend into, you know, name calling or,
oh, you're a bloody idiot. If you think
that, um, most Bitcoiners have spent a
fair bit of time being ridiculed or
mocked, uh, for ideas, opinions, or just a
position they've taken in Bitcoin, you
know, financially. And so they've
generally got some pretty thick skins. Um,
some, some, a little thicker than others.
You don't look like yourself, Tim. Yeah.
My skin is still thickening. Yeah. Yeah.
It's good. It's a good process. Um, yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. So that's, uh, I, I found that
at meetups, at bushbashes, um, and it's,
uh, there's a lot of common, common
threads. There was a bush bash I went to,
uh, where I was emceeing quite a while
back. And, uh, one of the guys who, you
know, I looked around the room and went,
oh, you know, you, you and you, you're all
new, I think. Um, and one of them came up
to me, uh, in the break and introduced
himself. Having a little chat and, you
know, enjoying it. Yes. You know, I said,
oh, you know, you know, what's your,
what's your backstory to the Bitcoin? He
says, I got into Bitcoin in like 2010 and
I was mining it and, you know, 2011. And,
um, then I didn't really pay attention
and, um, you know, I learned a little bit
and I kind of figured it out by 2013. He
said, oh, he said, I should have just gone
all in when I, when I started. He said,
I'd have so much more Bitcoin. And he
said, I don't know why I ignored it the
first three times I read about it. And I,
I was, I was having a good laugh. And I
said, oh, look, I'm not laughing at you. I
said, but this just sounds like exactly
the same story as me, but like you had it
seven or eight years earlier. And I'm sure
that when people come in seven or eight
years time, they'll have exactly the same,
exactly the same idea. And it's not really
a problem because I'm not a big fan of
the, the thread that says, well, you need
more conviction. Yeah. Conviction is
about, conviction is about faith. And
Bitcoin is don't trust verify. You should
be able to independently evaluate
statements that people make about Bitcoin
and ask questions and poke and fraud until
you get the answers. And that takes a bit
of a while. And often there's some
unwiring you have to do about, you know,
education that you've picked up along the
way or misconceptions or, uh, for example,
in my case, I came from a tech background.
So, you know, I spent the first few years
learning about Bitcoin from a tech
perspective. I, you know, ran a node. Um,
in the early days, I was, you know, I was
running a lightning node when it was still
in alpha and hashtag reckless. And there
was 50 nodes on the network and one of
them was mine. Um, and so I was fascinated
with the tech, but it probably took me
three, three or four years before I
realized that the major innovation in
Bitcoin is not the technology. Some of the
innovations in Bitcoin are very, very
important, but what they do is enable the
actual innovation, which is provable,
verifiable, absolute digital scarcity and
verifiable, absolute digital scarcity only
comes once, but it's an economic
innovation, not a technical one. And
that's ultimately what underpins all the
value in Bitcoin. Bitcoin. And so for me
coming from a tech space, it was a
gigantic blind spot, economics, money. How
did I get into my fifties and not
understand how money worked? Yeah. Yeah.
Ridiculous. We all did, right? Yeah, yeah,
yeah. And, but, but look at you, you know,
you're so much younger and you've got all
this runway to do stuff with that
knowledge and benefit from it. And I look
at my runway, I was like, oh, but you
know, to, to my earlier point that, um,
you know, regret is kind of wasted energy.
It's like, well, at least I understand it
now in my sixties. Um, and I'm not
learning about it in my eighties going to,
I wish I'd learned about this 20 years
ago. Yeah. So yeah, it's such a beautiful
thing to learn about. And yeah, like I was
new to economics and I was new to tech and
I probably, if I was going to categorize
myself, whether I'm more of a computer
person or a money person in Bitcoin, I'm
probably more on the money side, but I
find both things so interesting. And every
time I kind of read a new book, I'm
constantly blown away. Like, how is this,
how is this even a thing? Yeah. I love the
definition of Bitcoin. Um, Bitcoin is
everything you don't know about money
combined with everything you don't
understand about computers. Simple and to
the point. Yeah. And, and it's often what
makes, you know, learning about Bitcoin,
um, you know, quite, quite challenging
and, you know, in some cases confronting
and, um, yeah, it can seem, it can seem
like a, a bit of a mountain to climb and,
you know, to sort of come back to, come
back to the bush bash. Um, I think those
face to face meetings, um, and talking to
other Bitcoiners, some of whom are perhaps
a bit earlier in the journey and some of
whom have been, been around a bit longer.
It was, it's just such a gigantic
accelerant for understanding because you
can be stuck on a particular thing and
you've done some reading and watch some,
watch some YouTubes and listen to some
podcasts, but you really haven't got to
the heart of understanding what the, what
the thing is that you're stuck on and over
a meal and, you know, perhaps a few drinks
and an evening or a weekend, you go, ah,
there'll be one conversation where it's
like, ah, is that what that's about? Ah,
okay. Tick. Right. Next. What's the next
thing I don't understand? Need a way to
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Yeah, it's, it's a never ending rabbit
hole. Uh, you know, sometimes I'll hear
things from people and I'll circle back to
it later on. And I was like, that's what
they meant by it. Like they're very, some
people are very intentional about the
language they use. And, you know, like
just to give you an example, whether
Bitcoin was an invention or a discovery, I
used to hear that all the time. And then I
was like, let me dive into this. So yeah,
it's interesting. There's always like new
insights to explore. And I love that my
parents are now going through this, um,
experience and first they're like, oh, I
know with this Bitcoin, come on, like,
stop it. And now they're there, like, it's
the best thing ever. Yeah. Yeah. And then
you, then you get into the annoying
evangelical phase, as I refer to it, where
you've, you've understood enough that you
realize it's really, really important. Um,
and that for me, I was in my, I don't
know, mid fifties. I was like, this isn't
a get rich quick scheme. This is a stop
you getting poor scheme. Oh my, oh my God,
all my peers and my friends and my family,
you all need some of this and you need it
right now. And I became that annoying
Bitcoin person that wouldn't shut up about
it. Um, whereas after a while, I think
you, you, you get to the point of just
like, well, you know, maybe I'll drop a
mention in a conversation. If someone
picks up on it, maybe to talk about it.
Otherwise people just glide past and, you
know, maybe it's one of their touch points
and two or three touch points later,
they'll, they'll, uh, they'll pick it up.
But, uh, I think the best thing you can do
is make people curious. And I think
that's, that's why conversations like this
and podcasts like yours are so important.
Yeah, I definitely went through that
phase. Uh, luckily I don't think it was
long lived, but I did get warned that I
would go through that phase and a hundred
percent did. Um, so now I'm like, yeah,
have a more of a gentle approach. People
will ask me and I'll just say it very
casually. This is what I'm into and leave
it at that. And then they'll be the ones
to come back to me and ask more questions.
So I'm just like a lot more gentle with
it. Yeah. And, and even if they don't do
it at that time, later down the track,
you're there, you're their Bitcoin friend,
right? You're there, you're their person.
They can go, I've just started learning
about Bitcoin here. Oh, what's a good book
or what's a good YouTube channel or what's
a good podcast? Oh, and you're all know.
And they'll, they'll come and talk to you.
And then, then you've got a conversation
to have and some help to give. But yeah,
people have got to be receptive. Um, yeah,
but choices and consequences. Yes. Right.
It all, it all boils down to that. Right.
Um, but circling back to the bush brush
again, I'm really keen to understand,
cause like, I'm so new in this space. How
have you seen it evolve over the years?
Like, I think, sorry, before you answer, I
just want to say my, my favorite, uh, bush
brush that I've been to was definitely the
last one in parks. It was just so special.
Everyone got along. There was like so many
families and kids and we played sport and
it was just like the best vibe. And, and I
don't know if you're kind of seeing it
evolve or yeah. Yeah. It's definitely,
it's definitely grown. Um, but the, the
thing I guess I'm most happy to see is
that those core values of, um, it being
grassroots and volunteer based and people
in the community stand up to speak, you
know, there's not, you know, we're not
flying in famous people to, you know,
attract crowds so that we can charge
ticket prices and so on and so we can
charge them for the first time. Um, and
that's been really heartwarming. Um, the
thing that makes the bash, the, the
Bitcoin bush bash work is the people who
come to the bush bash because they'll come
along, they'll sort of suss it out, you
know, what's this really going to be like?
And then usually by the end of the
weekend, they've had a good time and
they've got a good handle on, on what the
bush bash is about. And then they'll often
come back. And then after a while, um,
particularly for people who are curious or
obsessed about some fact or some aspect of
Bitcoin, they'll volunteer to share what
they know. And that's where we get such a
rich tapestry of speakers. Um, some very
polished, very experienced, long
professional speaking backgrounds, um,
deep, deep pools of knowledge about the
things they're talking about and other
people, um, never spoken in public before.
Uh, they start off a bit apprehensive
about, about whether they should do it,
but they always get such a warm respect, a
reception because all the people in the
bush bash who are there are there for the
same reasons. And they're, they're
thinking about themselves being up there
and stumbling over words or, you know,
slides, not, not, not showing the way they
wanted them to show all, all the usual
things. Um, and so it's a very forgiving
and welcoming group. So as the groups have
got bigger, those, those values haven't
been diluted. And yeah, it was, it was
lovely at parks, uh, last year at the end
of the, on, on the Sunday, when there's,
uh, there's a bit of a barbecue and yeah,
seeing people playing soccer in the park
and lots of, you know, I guess it was
easily a hundred people there. Um, and
just hanging around talking and discussing
things, you know, presentations that were
interesting to them and talking to the
people who presented, learning more,
sharing more, making connections. Um, and
yeah, one of the things I've said over the
years is the bush bash is about building,
building the bonds that matter. And as we
get more and more into a digitally driven,
uh,
community maybe, but more just society
that engaging digitally is a lot easier
when you've met the people for real, in
real life. And that's very much the focus
of the bush bash. You know, there's, what
do we have? A couple of hours of
presentations in the morning, you know, 10
o'clock start, long leisurely breakfast,
couple of hours for lunch, good chat time,
maybe a sneaky beer at lunch, uh, and then
done by five and then, you know, off, off
to a restaurant or a bar for dinner and
talking late into the evening until we all
get kicked out and then do it all again on
Saturday and all again on Sunday. And the,
the time for, for talking and connecting
and chatting is, uh, just as important as
the, the presentations and learning about
the things that people talk about, I
think. So yeah, seeing, seeing those
things not change, whilst the group
dynamics have got bigger, um, it's been
wonderful. Yeah. Really happy. Yeah. And
I, like I've now witnessed a number of
times, like you said, we go into a local
community somewhere in the country and we
all engage with the business owners that
are serving us food and drinks. And I
think that alone kind of changes the
hearts and minds of people when they
actually get to see what the community is
like and how down to earth most people
are. Like there's never any real drama.
Like people are just so, like you said
early on, like people are really polite.
And even if we have, uh, topics that we
disagree on, it's always like a very
respectful debate, at least in person
online, it might be a bit different on
Twitter. Yeah. Like sometimes we'll pick
like, you know, very controversial topics
and have a conversation about it. Like,
I'm like, yeah, I don't see that in other
kinds of communities like doing Bitcoin.
That's very interesting. I love that about
us. Yeah. Yeah. Me too. Um, yeah. And,
and, and for people who've not been in
those communities and they don't have
local meetups or haven't been to
conferences before, um, it can be a bit
overwhelming, but also very heartwarming
too. The, the, the guy I was mentioning
earlier who'd been in Bitcoin for a very
long time was the first time he'd met
other Bitcoiners. And I found that I was
like, um, because I love a chat and, and
so this guy knew so much about Bitcoin,
you know, deeply understood it and had
been in Bitcoin for well over a decade,
but hadn't had the opportunity to engage
with other Bitcoiners and, you know, steel
sharpens steel and iron sharpens iron. And
he had, uh, he had a wonderful time. As
you, as you know, there are none of the,
oh, do you know, Bitcoin's got 21 million,
never have more than everyone knows that
who comes along to a bush bash. And so
there's a much, there's a much higher
level of conversation. Some of those are,
you know, much more deeply technical. Some
are, you know, much more deeply economic.
Others of them delve into the, into the
theoretical, the philosophical. Yeah,
it's, it's absolutely fascinating. Every,
every, every bush bash I go to, I learn, I
learn new stuff. Not your keys, not your
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money. Yeah, it's really interesting. I
actually just want to read you a message
as well, like from the last, it just goes
to show like the proof of work people put
in to get there. And I've mentioned the
bush bash a number of times on this
podcast. So during Beachworth, the last
one, someone texted me saying, Hey, Anja,
I hope you're going well. Just letting you
know, there is a bloke here in Beachworth
from Newcastle who drove to his first bush
bash ever, listening to your podcast and
you posting about Beachworth bush bash on
X. He doesn't know any Bitcoiners, even in
Newcastle. We will get him connected
though. Great work on your outreach. I
will introduce you, him, if he comes to
Byron. If you're listening, I hope you
come to Byron, but I love that. Like
you're absolutely right. A lot of
Bitcoiners are out there, solo being
introverts and not realizing that this
community is like quite large. Um, so
yeah, it's really heartwarming. Yeah, it's
a little bit like, um, throwing pebbles in
a pond. The ripples go out and out and out
and you don't actually know where they end
up. Uh, there was, there was a big corner
I'd seen on Twitter, um, pretty noisy. Uh,
and he made some tweet about, uh, being on
the Sunshine Coast and, and that's only,
you know, an hour and a half sort of north
of where I live. And I thought, oh, I'll
message him. And, you know, he was
apparently going to be there for a couple
of weeks. And I was like, oh, fancy, um,
fancy meeting for a beer. He said, I'll
just come up after work and, um, have a
feed and have a couple of beers. And he's
like, oh, okay. And yeah, so we had a, we
had a great, we had a great old chat and,
um, you know, he, he went back to his
family and then continued to enjoy his
holiday. I expect, um, I drove back home
and went, yeah, went, went about my normal
thing. And then a couple of years later,
he's written a book and he wrote me a,
wrote me a lovely, a lovely little note in
the front of the book, um, which he gave
me a copy of. And he said, you were the
first Bitcoiner I ever met in real life.
It's like, look, those funny things that
you, you just have a chance meeting and
they have, they have, um, little ripples
that, that affect other people in a
positive way. Yep. And speaking of
ripples, I don't want to dox this person
in case they don't want to be doxed, but
you'd know, we've had a number of overseas
guests as well, who just hear about this
event and decide to fly for like 20 hours
to come. And they're like, you know, this
is my first event in Australia. I've never
been here before. I'm going to come back,
bring my family. Yeah. It just, it just
attracts, like it pulls people in. Yeah. I
was talking to that person, um, uh, at the
end of the bash and, and I said to them,
what was your impression? You know, you,
you've been in Bitcoin a very long time, a
lot longer than I have. And I said, oh,
this is, this is how Bitcoin used to be.
This is, you know, this is much more
grassroots and, um, much more, much more,
um, much more interesting than the big
conferences. I've been to some of them,
but I have no desire to go to the, you
know, the really big ones. Um, I find the,
maybe it's, maybe it's just getting old
and grumpy, but, um, I'd rather, I'd
rather have a small dinner with four or
six people and, you know, have a bit of a
chat and, uh, drill into some specific
topics than, you know, try and try and
talk to thousands of people over, over a
week. So yeah, it's a, it's different,
it's different horses for different
courses. And that's the, another of the
nice things about the bush bash getting
bigger is, is finding your tribe, even
within the bush bash. And I wrote a, I
wrote an article called gather your tribe,
which is on Citadel 21, um, after the very
first bush bash, because it was, yeah, it
was a, it was a really sort of life
changing thing for me, going to that first
one and having such a positive time. I
thought, oh yeah, there's something in
this, you know, this is about finding
your, finding your people. And that's kind
of resulted in lots of things have come
out of the bush bash, not by design, but
just by people knowing each other and
connecting and knowing who to reach out to
with a particular technical or economic
question. Um, some businesses have come
out of, um, out of the bush bash, which
has been, you know, delightful to see.
Yeah. Yeah. Like I'm in constant awe of
just the talent that we have in Australia,
like not knowing about Bitcoin much when I
first started out. I just thought it was
like US based. We have incredible
Bitcoiners here in Australia. It's, it's
yeah, like really, really nice to see. A
lot of it is, is that they're Bitcoiners
who are prepared to do something. You
know, you look at people like JP who runs
Sydney Bitcoin, um, he's been running that
for, for forever. Like, you know,
consistency on those sorts of things is,
you know, takes real grit and
contribution, you know, K3tan in Sydney,
who runs Ministry of Nodes and produces
the Nodebox series and lots of technical
articles and offers, you know, technical
consulting for people who want to do
something. Same with peers that mine
wraps, Mineracks up in Brisbane, the
Frostnat team, uh, who came together in
Australia and producing literally a, uh,
world-class next generation hardware,
hardware wallets. Um, there's so many
things. Um, and it's as much about people
being smart as it is people being prepared
to get up off their backside and have a
crack. And, you know, that's, that's,
that's the really awesome thing. Take me
back to the first Bush Bash. I'm really
curious to know when K3
tan and JP showed
up with this like satellite dish to
connect to Blockstream, what were the
other people in the pub like thinking and
saying, walking around? What are these
people? Well, we, we basically had the
whole run of the back part of the pub and
the beer garden because it was, it was
deep in COVID time. It was, you know,
early November, uh, 2020. Um, so people
were still not coming out much and we had
the whole sort of back area downstairs and
had hooked up a projector and a screen
and, uh, someone brought a mic and, um,
well, maybe we didn't even have a mic.
Maybe we just had a shout, but it was a
smaller, smaller room. Um, so yeah, they
were, they were just happy that there was
lots of people there buying beers and, uh,
we ate all their steak. We ate, we ate the
entire kitchen out of steak. I had to go
on the Sunday night. We had to go to a
different, a different hotel to eat. Um,
yeah. And then, yeah, the JP and K3tan, JP
brought the satellite and K3tan brought
all the, um, all the node and connectivity
gear and the two of them, uh, in
coordination set that up. And, uh, we,
what did we do? We, I think we sent, uh,
we sent a message via the lightning
network onto the Blockstream satellite,
um, from within the pub. And then the node
that was connected to the Blockstream
satellite, but not to the internet
received the message. And that was, that
was just a real demonstration about how
Bitcoiners are working to make Bitcoin
very, very resilient, even to the point of
going, well, what if the internet goes
down? Well, Blockstream satellites. Oh
yeah. Oh my gosh. Like, yeah, I'm
completely in awe, amazed. I love us. Lots
of Bitcoiners who we're all very special
in our own way.
We really are. Um, and you just inspired
me to double check. Now, obviously the,
the Byron Bay event is coming up in mid
-May and I'll have to call the restaurant
in advance and make sure they have enough
stakes. I think they'll have enough stakes
in Byron. Byron's pretty good for steak.
Yeah. Yeah. We do have a lot of beef here,
So tell me about other bushbashes
in other countries. Yeah, that's been, um,
it's been bizarre. So after the gather
your tribe article that I wrote in Citadel
21, uh, a Welsh Bitcoiner called Dragon
Bitcoin, who's still on Twitter, uh, he
reached out and we had a long set of
messages and that resulted in him and many
others in the UK starting the UK beach
retreat, which is organized along the same
lines as the bash. Um, bash was
inspirational, but they're not the ones
who've, uh, but they're the ones who've
done all the work. We're not fighting
credit for that by any stretch of the
imagination. Um, and that's, that's one
I've, uh, I'm keen to go to, uh, and they,
they run that in, in Wales somewhere, I
think on the coast and it's camping and
yeah, over a weekend, lots of much like a
bash, you know, people, people come along
with things they want to talk about. Um,
and mainly they just spend the weekend
talking to other Bitcoiners. Uh, there's a
guy, Tom Tabor in the US. I think he lives
in Colorado. So he ran a, um, a bush bash
type event, uh, over a weekend on his
property. Yes. Um, a rural spree. And then
more recently over the last couple of
years, in fact, I think it was last
weekend, uh, bush bash japan.fyi, uh,
launched. And so that's the second bush
bash in Japan that's been held. And that's
being run by a Bitcoiner who used to be
based here in Brisbane, um, and is now
living in Japan and decided that, um, he
wanted, he wanted a bush bash, uh, but now
lived in Japan. So he better start one.
So, and that's, that's really the nub of
the nub of being a Bitcoiner is you kind
of see a gap in what you'd like in the
world. And well, it's up to you to go and
fill it. I love that. I would love to go
to those bashers. Like they all sound
really great. Can you imagine having ramen
instead of steak? Yeah. Yeah. And sashimi.
Sushi. Exactly. Exactly. No, that sounds
amazing. And many other awesome things.
Yeah. I absolutely love that. And, and
this is what it's all about. Um, do you
have any final things you want to share?
Obviously I will link everything in the
show notes. Um, the article that you
mentioned as well on Citadel 21 and the
bush bash website. Um, but is there
anything else you want to share with the
audience? Yeah, just, I guess, just know
that you're welcome. If you're, if you're
into Bitcoin or curious about Bitcoin, um,
come along, you'll, you'll find lots of,
lots of friendly, welcoming people. Um,
you'll probably be able to get a whole
bunch of questions answered. Uh, and
you'll, either way, you'll have a pretty
enjoyable weekend, I would expect. So come
along. There's one in not quite every
state, but plenty of states. We're getting
there. We're getting there. And hopefully
this episode might inspire Northern
Territory and, and what's South Australia
as well. Yeah. Yeah. And Tasmania. Yep. I
keep inviting the Tassie guys. I was like,
Hey guys, come to bush bash. Um, they want
to, but yeah, um, not, not the best timing
for them that I think the group is only
like 29 people, but it's going to get
bigger. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well,
thanks so much for your time, Wiz. Loved
having you on and I'll see you soon, I
guess. Thanks, Anya. I'm looking forward
to seeing you at the Byron Bush Bash.
Thank you. All right. Thanks. All the
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