How El Salvador's First Bitcoin Hardware Store is Driving Financial Inclusion in El Zonte & Beyond | Jamie & Ronny

Live from Bitcoin Beach in El Zonte, El Salvador, Jamie and Ronny, two passionate individuals who are founders of the first Bitcoin-related hardware store, share their Bitcoin journey, their initiatives for financial inclusion, the regulatory challenges they have had to overcome, and how their first Bitcoin-related hardware store is also their way to build a better Bitcoin community in El Salvador.

Jamie and Ronny are two entrepreneurs who set up the first Bitcoin hardware store in El Salvador, putting them at the forefront of Bitcoin innovators in the country. They share their personal Bitcoin journeys and what prompted them to start the world’s first Bitcoin hardware store in El Zonte. Their goal is to provide Bitcoin-related hardware and educational resources to El Salvador, showing the value of self-custody and financial freedom, which they promote through the products and workshops.

While in El Salvador Bitcoin is an accepted legal tender, Bitcoin adoption isn't generally smooth sailing, which both Jamie and Ronny are working on making this process easier for everyone.

Jamie and Ronny have been working on providing educational resources to make participants informed and active users and not just passive individuals. Bitcoin education empowers individuals and gives them a better chance to participate in the global economy. They encourage Bitcoin adoption among locals. They can already envision the growth of Bitcoin and how it would greatly contribute to education, economic empowerment, and financial inclusion for all.

Bitcoin adoption is more than just a financial experiment in El Salvador, it is set to transform the country’s economy and let individuals gain financial freedom. It is also set to transform personal lives like just with Ronny and Jamie. The experiences and insights showed us a glimpse of the challenges, but also the opportunities and other possibilities that can shape El Salvador as the pioneer country to adopt Bitcoin. Make sure to tune in and listen to know more.

Learn more about The Bitcoin Hardware Store and its founders:
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Live From Bitcoin Beach

Transcript

Jamie: 0:00

It's been great just kind of watching these projects coming here starting in El Salvador and just watching them grow. And seeing the growth and the potential for the kids is really what excites me the most. Is seeing the new generation of Salvadorans who are going to understand what Bitcoin really is. And they're going to be the first ones in line for that next upcoming job, you know. And as these projects continue to grow, we can keep the talent here in El Salvador and that's so exciting.

Mike Peterson: 0:55

Jamie, Ronny, the first Bitcoin hardware store, opened up here in El Zonte. Is Bitcoin hardware stores and other places was that you guys the first one that come up with that idea, or?

Jamie: 1:09

I think, I'm not sure. We haven't seen anything like what we build.

Mike Peterson: 1:15

In the world. It's the first Bitcoin hardware store in the world. That's always a good way to find out where other things are at. So, I saw that for the first time a few months ago when I was driving. I live on the other side of the river. And I was driving down and I was like, oh, my gosh, this is amazing. Where did this come from? And who's doing this and then I found out that it was you guys, so super stoked. So we'd love to give a brief history of where you guys came from, where this idea came from, your Bitcoin history, how long you guys have known each other, how this all came together.

Ronny: 2:00

All right. Well, Jamie and I we met at a Bitcoin Beach meetup in April.

Mike Peterson: 2:06

Nice, nice making things happen.

Ronny: 2:09

So I've been living here in El Zonte now for three years, just over three years, times gone by really quickly. And so I would go to these Bitcoin beach.

Mike Peterson: 2:17

But you're originally from El Salvador, correct?

Ronny: 2:20

My families from El Salvador. Born in Toronto. And I came back in 2014, and would come back occasionally. But after the pandemic, I decided that I needed to escape and I needed someone to go and El Salvador was just the first place that I had in mind. And so living here, learning from everyone around me and learning about Bitcoin, I decided I would stay here. And that's actually how my legs started, kind of started, I really enjoyed the company that was around me being here on in Bitcoin beach.

Mike Peterson: 2:49

And so you were introduced to Bitcoin in El

Ronny: 2:52

I would say so, for sure. I knew what it was before. And Zonte? you know, I might have had a couple of sets sitting on an exchange before getting here. But it wasn't until actually being here that I got introduced to what it really wasn't its and its potential. Yeah, I got that conviction actually being here. And that was due to the people around me, some of the great projects that are here in El Zalvador and going to these events, going to these networking events, and just hearing people speak. And so, you know, a fateful day in April, I met Jamie and he was from Canada as well. So we were just talking, he was asking me a bunch of questions about what it's like to live here. I did my best to explain, you know, what it was like being here.

Mike Peterson: 3:32

Were you just on vacation here or?

Jamie: 3:33

I was in fact finding mission and been sort of following what was going on and came down for a few days, and I got lucky there just so happened to be a big one beach meetup.

Mike Peterson: 3:44

Okay, sorry to interrupt your flow there.

Ronny: 3:47

No, that's what he told me. And I think that day, I was kind of just telling him what events were around because I don't think Jamie knew what was going on. But we hit it off. And he left and I stayed here in El Salvador, because this is where I live now. But then a few months later, I saw Jamie post in a group actually, that he was coming back to El Salvador, and we had kept in touch right, just here and there. But with all the people that come into El Zonte, you know, you don't know who's coming back with them and is going, but we kept in touch. And he said he was coming back. So I said, well listen, if you need any help moving down here, you need any resources, like anywhere to live, car, whatever, maybe I'll hook you up and help you out in any way I can. He comes down, and he's pretty much telling me he's like, I think I'm gonna want to stay here. Or I might, you know, came the first time loved it. And in one of these moments, I'd explained to him what my issues were in Bitcoin. And one of the things I was doing at the time was actually I was getting ready to set up my node. And I had searched all over Facebook marketplace for a Raspberry Pi trying to set up my own node. And Jamie had told me what is bad Everyone was so I was kind of just like asking him all these questions. And it was during that time where I said, this is a real problem here, I'm learning about Bitcoin. How to self custody my bitcoin. I consider myself somewhat techie, I like seeing gadgets and playing around with them. And so I'm also pretty resourceful, but I was having a really tough time, just being able to get the props that I needed to really, you know, become sovereign. And Jamie helped me out. And so I was like, hey, what do you think of this idea of, you know, us kind of doing trying to source these products for people because I can't be the only person struggling to do this. And if I'm struggling, I can't imagine what it must be for your regular Salvadoran who's just hearing about it for the very first time. It gets thrown lots of great, there's lots of great resources and especially here in El Salvador, you know, Bitcoin Beach, meet beloved Bitcoin great resources to get you started. But then you're kind of just left in like this void I wanted to say, and so how can we continue to support the project? How can we continue to support Bitcoin adoption here in El Salvador. And I think that's how the project really started. And Jamie was there to support the entire way. And so that's how I think you know, that's how it for me that's how the story that's how the story goes, I don't know if you have anything different to add.

Mike Peterson: 6:17

Yeah, a little bit your history and how you got

Jamie: 6:20

And yeah, so I started working in Bitcoin in 2013, I into Bitcoin. started a onboarding website in Canada, made it super, super easy to buy your first Bitcoin or you first fraction of Bitcoin. And back then there was no Bitcoin ATMs to like send your documents to this Mt. Gox websites. And it was not friendly. And so started this little website called clickbeatty.com and you can on the website, put in your bitcoin address, how much Bitcoin you want it, we only did up to 50 bucks. You could buy a little bit of Bitcoin and we get it in about 30 seconds. And so it was super fast, the whole thing was automatic.

Mike Peterson: 6:58

And how would you receive payment?

Jamie: 7:00

Through Canadian debit cards, we only through Canadian debit cards, so it didn't support all the banks, it only supported a handful, but it was called interact online. And as an online payment method, it was a workflow checkout. So you would check out log into your bank as part of the checkout, and then it would bounce you back, we'd verify the payment, and then our system would buy the Bitcoin in real time, and then deliver it to your bitcoin address you gave us. And so we were like a noncustodial exchange, we're pretty pioneering at that at that time. And from 2013, 2018 I on boarded about 90,000, early Canadian Bitcoiners. Yeah, we were watching, Ronnie was asking me for more information on the website. And he was like this is quite the story, like, what's really going on here? And so he's like, can you have like a demo of a demo of it? Like, what would it look like? And so I was like, I think BTC sessions did a video on the website. And so we went and pulled it up. And in the video BTC sessions is like, this is where I bought my first Bitcoin. And both of us are like, okay, and he obviously went out and did all kinds of cool stuff. So I ran that for a while, got a lot of the early Canadian sort of in and the goal was you find out about Bitcoin and you get overwhelmed, there's like so much, you know, let little figuring it out, let alone buying some. And so my sort of project back then was, let's just get them there first 20 bucks worth really, really easily. And just focus on just that. And so ran that for a while. Working in as $1 exchanger in the Bitcoin space is exhausting. And so at five years, kind of felt like 50 and took some time off after that.

Mike Peterson: 8:35

So at that point, you just kind of shut things down, was it?

Jamie: 8:38

The Banks were on us, there was all kinds of stuff happening. And the number of banks that we supported was dropping, and it got to the point where it was kind of like, this isn't innovative, this isn't exciting. And I kind of wanted some time off, and we were noncustodial exchange, so I just sort of said, you know, I think I'm just gonna close it off.

Mike Peterson: 8:53

Yeah, that's what's nice about being noncustodial. You see some of these other projects that are custodial, and they're like, hey, take your Bitcoin, take your Bitcoin and there's no outside though you're like stuck.

Jamie: 9:04

Right. And so we lost a couple more banks at the near the end of 2018. And I just said, you know what, I'm just gonna shut her down. There's lots of other options. Now the market was sort of flush and I wasn't innovating so I said, I'm just gonna close down. And so close it down and then took a bit of time off.

Mike Peterson: 9:18

So, would bull Bitcoin had been like a competitor there?

Jamie: 9:21

Yeah, I don't remember what they were definitely competitor. Francis is a friend. He, you know, he had this, you know, he had bought Bitcoin going, I forget. You know, it feels like a long time ago. And so I don't remember exactly what he was offering at that time. But, you know, my service was definitely sort of the starting point in Canada for a lot of Bitcoiners because it was just so easy. And it was one page. It was just one page. It looked quite rudimentary, and you just pick one address, how much you want, click Pay, it takes you to your bank, make the payment, come back, and you're done. And so it was it was

Mike Peterson: 10:01

See if I would have known that was available. super. I'm sure you didn't deal with US citizens. I mean, it took me a long time to actually get bitcoin because it was so complicated and complex.

Jamie: 10:11

Yeah, and Charlie Shrem, Bitcoin's first felon. He was doing something similar in the US. And in the first six months So, but yeah, it was like, you know, it was a crazy time. And, of me running my site, he got arrested and charged with money laundering. And so I'm sitting there, like, really worried, like, am I doing something wrong here? And, you know, we weren't and we were actually we looked at all the money laundering all that stuff. And we structured the business. So we would, we weren't regulated. But if we became regulated, we would already be following the rules. That's kind of how and the small amounts was the big thing. but it was, it was a lot of fun. But yeah, it was only for Canadians. We just use that debit card payment method. And so they've been there for a while, took the time off. And then obviously, sort of following was going on in El Salvador. And I said, I want to go down there, I want to go on my go. I want to see what's going on with my own eyes. And came down for eight days, four days in the city and four days here. And I just got lucky. There was a Bitcoin beach meetup. And that kind of pivoted my entire life because I came to the meetup. And I met some incredible people, that the caliber of people that I met, and it was like, four hours was something else and Ronnie included, and I was like, what is going on? And so you know, went back to Canada but, you know, every day I'm like, managed Salvador, and then sort of messaging Ronnie, he helped me find a place got me sort of situated. And then we were hanging out a lot because we were sort of living roommates living together. And so, every night was Bitcoin, you know, I've ever been talking Bitcoin and doing all this stuff. And then we were brainstorming, and running had this idea of, you know, some type of retail store to kind of level up. And sort of go from level one to level two, and three and beyond. My idea really stemmed from my background, before I left Canada, I was working for a really big fortune 500 company, Sherwin Williams, one of the largest, and they focus on the paint company. And they focus a lot on retail, but they focus a lot on customer service, that's kind of what they stood out on. And when I left, they were doing$20 billion in sales a year. So you know, really large, really great at what they did, and really great at systemising everything and just having things in place. And so the idea was to offer a product, but beyond the product really offering, you know, those workshops or offering that help read that one on one help.

Mike Peterson: 12:36

Well, especially for Bitcoin wallets, because it's intimidating. I remember when I got my first one, I was like, I feel like I'm going to screw this up. Yeah, it's not that complicated, but you feel like, I'm gonna screw this.

Ronny: 12:47

I would watch you know, BTC sessions. And even after watching it three, four times, I'm like, I don't know if I'm still ready for this. And so sometimes you just need that person, that mentor to tell you that you're doing things correctly. And if you did one thing wrong, then to correct you and tell you exactly what it is that you did wrong. And so that was the part where I thought of, you know, well, Sherwin Williams did such a great job of teaching people and being, their slogan is asked Shawn Williams so I said to Jamie, this is what I want to do. I want people to feel comfortable coming into the store and playing with the products using them and then asking us any questions that they might have about self custody, and especially for the Salvadorans again, that's kind of who I'm looking after, or thinking of, yeah, when I'm thinking of Bitcoin beach when I'm thinking of Bitcoin adoption, I'm thinking of it as sort of a load. And Jamie just made me feel so comfortable. So I think that that tandem that teamwork, it just, it was natural. You know, I felt very confident. And after looking at what could be to us and looking at that BTC sessions video, it was a no brainer. So I started using him for my personal kind of one on one explanations of the nodes specifically, is where we started.

Jamie: 13:54

It's a great point about, you know, one of the things that we're offering is confidence, you know, and to your point about sort of being like a little overwhelmed here and then being able to sort of have somebody no, no, it's fine. It's not works, doesn't it? And that was on an airline flight one time and the stewardesses were like super unprofessional, and it made me realize like, when someone is confident and in front of you and just know you can do this, you got that it really has this ripple effect. You know, when it makes you feel more confident about what you're doing, and anyways, on that flight, I was like freaking out. Because I'm like, fiddling with the lights trying to figure out how to make the lights work. I'm like it ripple the wrong way.

Ronny: 14:28

But yeah, today someone came into the store and was just like, hey, you know, bitcoins pretty expensive right now, but I'm thinking what's the minimum I can buy here and we have the k one machine. And so part of the store as well was to showcase some of the products and projects you know, that are fantastic. like Jamie said, so many great projects and products here. And I was like, you can buy as little as five cents and you can buy this many SATs with five cents and he kind of just like amazing, really. So he pulled out $1 and he threw it into the k one machine and I just showed him how to use anything. Got it onto his Chivo app. And he's like, oh, wow, then he came to five dollar like right after.

Mike Peterson: 15:05

The k one machine is so easy compared to the other ATMs that are out there, specifically the Chivo.

Ronny: 15:12

Yeah, it's great to be able to, you know, discuss people's problems that they're handling with Bitcoin because some of them are just, they're kind of looking in the wrong direction. So the point is to guide them in the right direction. And the one thing I also told Jamie was, I feel that everyone's Bitcoin journey is different. People come from different places, different backgrounds, and no one runs the same, let's call it the same bitcoin system. You know, there's so many different products out there and different products are trying to solve different problems. And so for the Salvadoran, and for the person visiting here, trying to learn about Bitcoin that's not from El Salvador, there's different ways to do things. There's no one correct way. And the only correct way really would be like self custody, right? But there's many different ways to get that. And so we want to guide them depending on what their skill level is, and what their comfort level is. Guide them in the right direction. And that's all we can do. You can just guide. We don't we don't tell you you need to do this, we can just kind of guide you. And ultimately, will we let the customers decide what's what's best for them. You know, we have we have Blockstream Jade, we have SeedSigner, COLDCARD, and Passport Foundation. And so we let people play around with the products at the store, and then decide you know, they can you don't even have to buy anything. And we can go home, we send them more learning materials so they can see which one do they feel more comfortable.

Mike Peterson: 16:31

You guys saw the the dice there also?

Jamie: 16:34

To be dice, textbooks, merchandise, the set hammer

Mike Peterson: 16:39

I love that you guys instead of them having to buy the hammer in the set, they can just buy the plates, and then they rent the hammer. Right?

Ronny: 16:49

Six bucks, they bring it back anytime tomorrow. And we And that idea came from again, you know, meeting great people. And that idea actually came from the seat signup team, where they mentioned that you can just lend this to anybody, because as soon as you unplug it, there's no memory on it and wipes, wipes the seed off the plate. And so I was like, well, Jamie, you know, these are pretty expensive. And people aren't really going to show you kind of the technique on how to do it. use them more than a couple times, you can set up as many seed wallets or wallets as you like, and one day, if you only need to rent it. And so we just looked at each other and it just And so we want to be that resource where people can come and feel comfortable rented out, don't have to make a big like, yeah, that makes sense. Why not? investment, because that's also the thing people ask me, what wallet is the best one. And so far, I think the best answer I've been able to give them is the one that you can afford right now. And the one that makes you feel comfortable. And so that's what we tend to tell customers. And we want to make sure that the brand shows that off as well with the products that we are offering and the retail model of being able to rent what it is that you need.

Jamie: 18:04

Yeah. And we and the other thing, too, is, if someone comes in and they're just getting started, we'll say, you know, just get blue wallet on your phone, you know, like, do you need a hardware wallet at first? Maybe not. Just start with a self custody software wallet. Start practicing with that. And then you know, when you're ready, come back and building that trust. You don't get it goes a long way.

Mike Peterson: 18:23

Yeah, cuz you don't want to overcomplicate it for somebody, because then they're like, oh, this is too much work. Well, I love the timing of it. Because there's so

Jamie: 18:28

Right. And it's only about hundred bucks anyway, it's like, let's just start with something simple. This is what you need. And then when you're ready. These are the products. Take a look at the exhibits. And you know we are. many businesses here that have been accepting bitcoin for a while. And there's some of them now that have sizable stacks, and they need to move them off their phones and start to self custody. And so I think this is perfect timing for you guys Totally. We're seeing a good amount more than we opening up. expected a business customers coming in. And we sell we also have point of sale units. We've got one in stock right now. And we're trying to get a few other ones. Because, you know, Salvadoran businesses like hey, I have this obligation. I want to make sure I'm, you know, I want to take advantage of you doing right. And then yeah, you know, they start building a stack and they're like, wait a minute, it's all in the cheese on some custody app.

Mike Peterson: 19:21

Yeah, sometimes I'll see somebody's phone on media net you see the balance.

Ronny: 19:27

Making me uncomfortable. And the ones who were started stacking back in 2019, 2021, the project started. They're looking at me now and they're so happy. They're like, so happy to talk to me, whereas before they're like, oh, that big one. You're the only one that pays me in Bitcoin. And now they're super excited.

Mike Peterson: 19:45

Now you were paying them when Bitcoin was like 4000, 5,000 dollars.

Ronny: 19:49

Yeah, so so different. And that's something that you know, I see a lot of the people on Twitter talking about where you should prepare yourself for that when that bitcoin price just continues to rise.

Mike Peterson: 20:00

Yeah, cuz the need for a hardware wallet, it's sometimes can change. Well, even like we've seen in the last few weeks where maybe you were at a level where it didn't matter that much all of a sudden, it's sizable.

Jamie: 20:12

I think there's an NBK quote, and he said that you should be protecting your Bitcoin as if it's worth 10 times as much.

Mike Peterson: 20:22

Because it sneaks up on you, it really does.

Jamie: 20:25

And the method that was appropriate, when you got started is not appropriate anymore. And then you're even more intimidated. And you're even more like, I don't know what to do. And so sort of providing that, you know, that resourcing kind.

Ronny: 20:37

Bear market was actually the best time to learn which is what I was telling people. And that's what the phase that I was in, right. And so the businesses that were accepting during those times, I think they understand and they're starting to figure it out. And so we're just that resource for them. They're coming in and asking questions, you know, we have more Salvadorians than I thought we would have.

Jamie: 20:57

Yeah, that was part of some of the strategy was, you know, opening Bitcoin beach here. Most retail operations don't, you know, they struggle, right. A lot of retail doesn't, you know, a lot of most retail, it opens up, they don't make it. And so trying to get a retail project that's going to work long term, we said, okay, so if we open a Bitcoin Beach, we'll get a steady stream of tourists to kind of keep us afloat right out the gate. Because of what you've done here. And then sort of with tee that up with Salvadorans and will grow kind of the Salvadorian business sort of naturally.

Mike Peterson: 21:28

Well, I love how professional you've done the store. I mean, it's not, you know, ginormous. It doesn't need to be big. It's but it's like, really well done. And so like stands out. When you drive down that street, it is probably the most noticeable business on the street there, which I love.

Jamie: 21:43

Thank you. We worked really hard to keep it like, we're kind of making it like a little apple store, you know, yeah, be clean inside there. And like, these are the different exhibits, these are the different products, different manufacturers, and you can kind of work your way or when you go inside, you can kind of work your way around in this sort of circle. And then we're getting working on cafe and stuff.

Ronny: 22:01

Yeah, we had lots of back and forth as to like where we were going to do it. Because like you said that the products are so small. You don't need to have a large space. And we were going back and forth as to where we were going to do it. And then when people finally saw it, I don't even know this building existed.

Mike Peterson: 22:18

Did not building exist. I think it was built it.

Ronny: 22:20

We were the first ones. Yeah, we rented the first one.

Mike Peterson: 22:23

it's built?

Ronny: 22:25

Yeah, we have we worked on the business plan and just kind of going back and forth, which what we were planning to do and what kind of space we needed. So we looked around on El Zonte, and found this place, and it was about 80% done. I'd say when we approach them. And we said well, this is our idea, that's what we're trying to do. What do you guys think? And we went to the table, and then came up with a deal.

Mike Peterson: 22:57

So what were they building it for before? Who did they envision?

Ronny: 23:01

It is supposed to be a pharmacy. So hopefully we didn't take pharmacy away from you guys.

Mike Peterson: 23:08

We do need a pharmacy here so I think there's other buildings.

Jamie: 23:13

I think to the left that are to the right. I think he's building another one now. So he's happy with you know, with what we've done, how it looks, and he's happy with it.

Mike Peterson: 23:21

Now you guys have upgraded that area. You know, it really is like, leveled that area.

Ronny: 23:26

That I'd say thanks to Jamie with the vision of keeping it clean.

Jamie: 23:31

Yeah, like fine detail. I'm like, I'm looking at everything. Every little like box and everything. I'm like, wait, what's this? Can you get the line to fix this? Like, oh, my God this to be.

Mike Peterson: 23:39

I think that's why it stands out. Because in general, in El Salvador, they're not like focused on on details. And so usually like, the paints kind of slumped over, and then there's just things that are important, maybe to foreigners that aren't important to them. And so I found that doing construction projects, you're like, no tape, everything. Yes, I care if there's paint there. So I think that's part of why it sticks out is it's like so tidy, and it's it's like it just pops.

Ronny: 24:05

We were hoping to open on the side was Jamie could attest to that. Yeah, we were hoping to open for adopting Bitcoin. And so we were just rushing and rushing and cutting corners, like you said, and Jamie was like nope, this is not happening. Like we're not going to be ready for this. It's the last 10% that's the hardest part to finish. And that's why it looks like this because yeah, if it was for me we would have that started up and half done and I would open the door and everybody just come in all the all the Bitcoiners on November 11. Just come in don't worry there's construction at work everywhere, but it's fine.

Jamie: 24:40

We're good team. We can we balance each other. Like that's a good balance and the compliment something that really

Ronny: 24:46

That day at the Bitcoin hardware store is always great. well. It's always a good day.

Jamie: 24:51

Some really interesting people come in.

Mike Peterson: 24:53

Yeah, I'm curious. What does the day look like as far as the customers that flow through?

Ronny: 24:58

Yeah, I mean, It's a good sense, it's a good flow of foreigners who are coming here and wanting to come wanted to see Bitcoin beach just like Jamie it's very first time. And people who are looking to learn about Bitcoin is what they hear online real, you know, coming to see if if it's real.

Jamie: 25:18

It asked us a lot of questions about Bitcoin beach and generally, it's sort of like hey, so what's going on here?

Ronny: 25:22

Yeah, we want to know you know what Bitcoin adoption is like in El Salvador? Can I pay for Bitcoin? Is it really, you know, is it the whole country? Or is it a small percentage? The ones who don't get a chance to spend Bitcoin they're the ones complaining no, this is not true. And I've been having such a hard time and I just told them like, look, it's here on El Zonte , it's a really high percentage of businesses that are accepting bitcoin. Berlin now has really high percentage of places that are accepting bitcoin, San Salvador has a lot of places.

Mike Peterson: 25:50

If you're a Bitcoiner you know, it's very easy, you know the places but if you're just walking down the street and picking the first place you go to.

Ronny: 25:57

And so in San Salvador, I'm like, yeah, you know, you go to these places, you go to the big places, the Walmarts, the McDonald's, the you know, the PriceSmart, they'll take, they'll take you back on a problem.

Mike Peterson: 26:08

And it works easily now, like, it used to be a PriceSmart. I mean, I had one time wait there, we waited like four hours because they wanted to confirm a few times and now they're on lightning and it's just faster than a credit card. So it's been great. Just seeing how much the experience has improved.

Ronny: 26:30

Yeah, even the gas station.

Mike Peterson: 26:33

Which gas stations because that's the one that I've still had issues with which gas station can be found there.

Ronny: 26:38

The closest one to us is the Puma.

Jamie: 26:41

They're good. They know what they're doing.

Mike Peterson: 26:43

Is there a lot of times they say they take it, but then it's only the Chivo app, and you're like, no, I want to pay with Bitcoin. And they're like, well, this is Bitcoin, you have to explain to them no, that's not really Bitcoin.

Jamie: 26:54

That the Puma, they'll ask me, they'll say Lightning? And I was like, yep, Lightning. And they kind of know that if I think they kind of look at me and they go, Okay, if Salvadorans can be Chivo and if it's foreign, or it's kind of lightning, I think they kind of figured that out.

Ronny: 27:09

When I heard they started accepting bitcoin, which is very recently. And so I was like, anytime you see me just assume I'm gonna pay Bitcoin. So they see me and they just bring out the POS, they're ready for.

Mike Peterson: 27:24

Well, that's where I'm gonna get on my guest for now on.

Jamie: 27:27

Been doing a good job keeping it charged and keeping the device updated and the staff are trained, they should have a few pillars that all have to get checked.

Mike Peterson: 27:34

That's a problem if they don't have enough people spending it then they like the device is dead. I know bitcoins down right now you're like this quiet not go down.

Jamie: 27:50

I'm trying to think of some good excuses I've heard of. I've heard some interesting ones.

Ronny: 27:53

Yeah, managers not around, POS systems were down, or you have Bitcoin down. That's the funniest.

Mike Peterson: 27:58

But the key is to have enough purchases that today that is normal for them. Well, the gasoline had been the one thing

Jamie: 28:03

And I think it was one of the like, when the rollout I wasn't here for the rollout. But when it was like everywhere, I guess, theoretically, at one point, it was like in a lot of places. There wasn't that like concentration. But now that the Pumas staying like, I feel like there's lots of Bitcoiners that are like going there. They're making an effort. And so it's like you kind of grow them, like on ad hoc basis, like each one kind of grows. that I everything else, like pretty much paying Bitcoin, but I'd given up really asking because I was frustrated. So I'm glad now I know that. I'm working on the Texaco next door.

Mike Peterson: 28:34

Okay, tell him hey, you're losing.

Ronny: 28:38

And I think that's something that people are, I'm seeing businesses now that a year or two ago, and maybe you can relate Mike that said they would never accept Bitcoin. But now they are, because I think they see that they're losing business, they see that people are going to certain places repeatedly. And I do this all the time where I, for me, it's more convenient to live on a Bitcoin standard. And so when I'm choosing between two places to eat to find no one place doesn't accept Bitcoin. And I don't want to ask them because I do ask all the time, just so they can repeatedly hear it, I don't have cash. I don't walk around with Fiat on me. So I'm just gonna go to a place that I know accepts Bitcoin. And I think those businesses are actually starting to see that now. So they are businesses that I thought would never be accepting bitcoin are now accepting bitcoin. So when people come to me like, yeah, I just bought something from over there with Bitcoin. What really? Since when?

Mike Peterson: 29:29

Yeah. I've had that happen to ones that I had asked and asked, and they were like, they start to get like grumpy. And so I just stopped going. No, you can pay with Bitcoin there. Since when?

Ronny: 29:39

Yeah, it's a good problem to have. It's exciting. It's exciting that these Salvadoran businesses are using what is now a global advantage, right? Because that's why people are coming. That's the people that we get coming into the store. I'd say right now it's about 80, 20 split between foreigners that are coming and want to experience of what this is.

Mike Peterson: 30:02

At the Bitcoin hardware? So, 80% foreigners

Ronny: 30:05

Correct. And then 20% Salvadorans who are looking to right now? upgrade, looking to learn about self custody, like you said, have been building a stack. And now that stack has gotten bigger and Fiat price, that denomination. And then Salvadorans who are just hearing about it, seeing the price go up like gentlemen, today. Today, I had two Salvadorans and three foreigners. So that's a pretty good split. The other day was And so me, myself, and Jamie, we talk about how, you know, as the just a couple of Salvadorans looking to use the k one machine. And so the split has been very surprising. And I'm very excited. business grows, the Spanish English has to be the whoever's at the store. Spanish, English and Bitcoin and three languages you have to speak to to be an employee of the Bitcoin hardware store. Because we have been considering or talking about how we can grow the store and scale it people have been asking us, when are you going to open a store in San Salvador? When are you going to open a store here in this country? Well, it's a good problem to have.

Jamie: 31:11

We've had some people come from far. Where are some of the places that was like Iceland?

Ronny: 31:15

Yeah. We had our first visitors from Iceland. And it was a family. And she was so excited. And they were talking about how it's so difficult where they're from to use Bitcoin. So we've had Iceland, South Africa today, I had people from Germany, just from the Korean. Fantastic, they were so excited. They're like, oh, wow, I can buy anything with Bitcoin. And sometimes they just want to buy something. Right. To experience their first lightning transaction.

Mike Peterson: 31:42

I love that you guys have the K1 there, because then for tourists that don't really have never used Bitcoin before. They can download. One of the mobile wallets, they can buy, you know, Bitcoin right there with the K1 and then they can go around town and spend it.

Ronny: 31:58

The other day I had a customer who she said she wanted to buy she doesn't I don't think she has any bitcoin from the side of it. But she said she wanted to gift her grandkids Bitcoin. And so she's like, what's the easiest way for me to give my grandkids Bitcoin and I showed her the cable machine. And then right beside it, we have the tianqi bowl cards. You can buy these bulk cards, and then you can load them up with as little Bitcoin as you like, as much Bitcoin as you like. She's like, this is fantastic. She bought one for each of her grandkids. And she's just loaded them up right there. And she's like, oh, my kids are gonna love this. She just bought them, a couple of which she bought about 3000 SATs at that time. And I told her, I'm like, You know what, in the future that'll be $3,000 worth of Bitcoin you just bought. And so she was really excited how easy it was, she was in and out in about five minutes. And she was super excited. She said she'd never bought anything with Bitcoin before, but she just wanted to gift it to her grandkids.

Jamie: 32:54

It's fun seeing customers eyes light up, you know, there's like a kid in a candy store, you know, and that's kind of what we tried to build is like that, where you can come and check come into the store, and you're like, wow, like, I've seen all these products online. But I've never seen them all in the same place. And I can actually try them they're on like, so the wallets are on, we have dummy seeds, we sort of show, okay, this is what a seed looks like. And we kind of have a whole should be able to give them. And you can actually, you know, press the buttons and feel what feel what they're like and mess around. And I wouldn't recommend sending any bitcoin to the seeds of privacy by lots of people now, but but you can sort of, you can just sort of play around with the device and get a sense of like the call card mp4 is one of our favorite devices. He's a lot smaller than you think, you know, when you first read open it up, you're like, wow, this thing's like six pretty small, like it's compact. And we're just good for concealing and all that. But yeah, you don't realize it. And so it's great to sort of see it, feel it, touch it. And it's sort of an experience that we can you can do in person that you can't do online.

Ronny: 33:54

Yeah, we just, we just wanted to feel comfortable. Right? I think that's the main goal of the stores. Make people feel comfortable at whatever stage they're at. Because you know, people come in at different stages, you'll have people who are like, alright, we have all of these. But this is cool, I'm glad you have them and then they'll buy like a sticker just because they want to support it. That's great. That's fantastic. And then we just, you know, we chop it up, we talk back and forth and the ideas and they're asking about El Salvador what it's like opening up a business and instead of a load what it's like to live here where they can work in the build a community just people are very optimistic and lots of people have lots of questions about summer load and what it's like to open up a business, start a family, where can they go, what can they visit, what can they see. So it's not just tourism anymore it's people who are really looking to grow and spread this Bitcoin happening.

Mike Peterson: 34:46

They see like themselves as leaving their home country and coming here to put down roots?

Jamie: 34:52

We have the whole community board, a big community board with a bunch of different sort of local businesses and you know, immigration how brand of cars, all that kind of stuff tours, all kinds of information. So people sort of go and check out the community board. They're like, oh, cool.

Ronny: 35:06

So we want to be that place where people can find what it is that they're looking for. And, you know, we are all trying to support we're trying to support everybody who has a great project, great product. And we want our software to grow. I think that's part of our mission, part of our goal.

Jamie: 35:21

And we definitely put a focus on domestic El Salvador companies, like with the K1 machine, Tiankii, man, like, you know, in the merchandise, we try to get all the merchandise locally. We're getting our seed metal plates we have made here in El Salvador. And so we're trying to sort of have domestic product. Yeah, people really appreciate that. And we've got, I don't know if you can see in there. But inside, we've also got two big monitors. One shows the time chain calendar, and the other one shows mempool.space. And so we can we sort of use mempool.space to sort of explain, you know, what the mempool is how fees work. How you know, blocks are critical. Here's the beer, there's the blockchain, here they are, and you can see the times and, and we can kind of give people a crash course, in like five minutes on just some concepts. I enjoy it. I enjoy being there.

Mike Peterson: 36:16

It's like I tell people about El Salvador in general, but especially being there. It's like you're at a Bitcoin Conference, you just set people stopping by and wanted to talk about Bitcoin and you, you meet people that you've never met before, but you have this instant connection, or people that you've, you know, through Twitter, then all of a sudden you're like, wait, we know each other, but not in real life.

Jamie: 36:40

Totally. And yeah each kind of, there's like a bunch of, it's like, almost like a bunch of different vendor booths. And here are the different vendors. And we sort of curated it to do what we think people sort of at level two and level three sort of would need, you know.

Ronny: 36:53

And the important thing is, it's Bitcoin only as well. Yeah, that was a big part for us as well. Picking out the brands is not easy. There's so many different projects, so many different products out there. But the one thing that we both agreed on was it needed to be Bitcoin only.

Jamie: 37:06

We're focus on solving the money. And let's stay focused on that.

Mike Peterson: 37:13

I love that. How long is it open now?

Ronny: 37:18

Three weeks to change.

Jamie: 37:23

Soft launch, so we just kind of quietly opened, we didn't have any like announcement or anything. We just all of a sudden the door was open, and we're like, alright, let's see what happens.

Ronny: 37:32

I think we opened because everybody was asking us.

Mike Peterson: 37:33

Yeah, I was asking you guys and I was like, hey, when's it gonna be open? Is it ready?

Ronny: 37:39

That's why we didn't want to put the sign up until we were pretty much ready to.

Jamie: 37:42

Yeah, we waited. Yeah. But then we were like, okay, let's get it up. And then as soon as it came up, it was like, I started hearing from everybody. But yeah, so we still we're planning a launch event soon. And we'll have a bit of a formal launch. And so we're just kind of refining everything. You know, it's interesting, just collecting the data on what are people asking? What how long do they spend in the store? When did they come? You know, we get a lot of rush in the morning and rush in the afternoons sort of mid days a little quiet.

Mike Peterson: 38:09

Are you guys planning on doing anything during the Bitcoin week around the having party?

Jamie: 38:16

We're targeting a grand opening during the having events when everyone's here. We haven't finalized anything yet. Everyone's here. We're definitely gonna be open. And we'll be here. And we'd like to do like a ribbon cutting, you know.

Ronny: 38:31

And if we can get it organized and have it done. Because we are focusing as well on the side that you don't see in the photo. But on the left, yeah, on the left, we want to have this space where we would like to host workshops and have a little cafe so people can sit down. Because the store is quite small. And so people come in, and by the fourth or fifth person, it's you know, it's crowded. And so we want there to be a space where you can come have that sit down, have a coffee, chat with people who are there and free Wi Fi, we offer free Wi Fi. And so we're waiting for that part to be completed before we announced it very well.

Mike Peterson: 39:10

Who you guys using for your Wi Fi?

Jamie: 39:12

Multi net. We're using them.

Mike Peterson: 39:16

I had tons of issues with my internet lately. I think we use Multi net.

Ronny: 39:22

We've been pretty good. There was one day where it was down.

Mike Peterson: 39:24

I feel like on the outside the river works better, but I don't know. It's just my house or if it's just me, but I'm just like, what's going on.

Ronny: 39:30

We also have a backup though, because of that reason.

Jamie: 39:32

Yeah we have a dual win setup. So we also have Tigo. We have a SIM card as well. So we don't, if there are little interruptions, we're not feeling them.

Ronny: 39:40

A time where there were both.

Mike Peterson: 39:44

I think I'm gonna switch mine all over to Starlink because we're using that down in Punta Mango and it's been working really well so it's sad because part of the problem is the lines run here. If there's like one post gets hit by a semi or something, it takes the whole.

Jamie: 39:59

The whole, every one is down. The dual. The dual winds nice. And it just automatically figures it out. And you can program it to sort of which one you want.

Mike Peterson: 40:10

Or you just have a SIM card and the other?

Jamie: 40:15

So there's standard modem. And then there's another modem. It's literally just a little box. It's like a phone, you put a SIM card in, and then it's got a network cable, and both of them go into our router.

Mike Peterson: 40:26

But it knows like if one's down the automatic to the other?

Jamie: 40:29

Yeah, so the router has two spots for internet. And the router is programmed to do everything on the main one and everything it's like 10 seconds, check to make sure and it pings some service. And it checks. And then if it doesn't, if it doesn't get a response, then it switches everything over to the second one. And we have it like that. Because the second one is like paper gig, it's your cell phone. If it was Starlink, then we probably just split the load and just packets would just get split across both of them. But yeah, we were thinking about bringing the free Wi Fi to the big one farmers market. Because everyone's at the farmers market. They don't have data. And so we're like, you know, we should provide free Wi Fi at the market. And so we finally just had that idea yesterday. And so we're that's something we're concocting.

Mike Peterson: 41:15

Let us know, we'd like to help sponsor that. Just, I'm not technical at all. So you figure it out. And we'll figure out a way to pay for it.

Jamie: 41:25

Free Wi Fi provided by Bitcoin beach. Yeah, no problem. There's a little agree page too. So we can actually put logos and stuff.

Mike Peterson: 41:31

You guys can do it as the hardware store. We just want to help out. Because I know that can be like, you'd like to tell me how easy it is.

Jamie: 41:42

And you finally get so far in the in the sales process, you know, and then it's like

Ronny: 41:46

It happens at the store. And then I'm like, oh, no, we have free Wi Fi. Go ahead. And then they're like, oh, okay, so then they have no excuse. I feel like sometimes they don't want to buy. We got free Wi Fi. At that $1 okay, that'll be fine. We'll make it work. So it's been a great, it's been a great month. Very excited for what's to come. Very excited about the people coming in. And I was telling Jamie, I was pretty scared, worried and nervous, you know, that this wasn't gonna work out as well as I thought because, you know, you think of Bitcoiners. And they already have everything that they need. Right? So I was like, where's the new market? As someone who has built businesses work with large companies before, where's our new market coming from? Which is obviously bitcoin is still at a very early, early stage. But, you know, in my opinion, is taking a little bit longer than I've been, I would have liked. And so that was a genuine worry. A genuine concern of mine. What if you already have products that people are already having already using? And it's turned out then no, you know, people are excited about the store. People are excited to support what we have going on.

Mike Peterson: 42:53

I like to have an additional device that way.

Jamie: 42:56

And they'll just toy with it. Just what they're like, hey, let's try this. And then I'll maybe I'll migrate a couple bucks to it. And then if I get more comfortable once I'm confident.

Ronny: 43:04

Lots of people really want to upgrade from their old you know, Ledger's and anything.

Jamie: 43:08

We get a lot of people coming and say, well, I have a hardware wallet, but I'm not really that comfortable with it. I'm like, I wanna like, what should I be using? That's an

Mike Peterson: 43:14

I'm gonna have to come over and get, you know, get interesting. some lessons on some of these. I have a cold card, but it's, it's not very user friendly. I don't like to move the chip and do this and that and so.

Jamie: 43:30

I like to cold card because of all the, all the security features, like they have these, like, if someone's doing a $5 wrench attack, yeah, they've got the duress pin. And so you can enter a PIN to like, destroy the device or lock yourself out for a week or like they have all kinds of like cool features like that.

Mike Peterson: 43:51

For somebody like me, obviously, the type that I would like, oh, wait, that's the 10.

Ronny: 43:58

I've got to appreciate those things. Because I'm not as techie as as Jamie is, but I like playing around with the things and when I saw the cold card, I was super intimidated by it by but now I've come to appreciate what it does. And, you know, the mind behind it. The team, you know, and we came and that whole point i team, I just looked at the products and like, okay, I'm understanding why you've done everything the way you have. Opened, I'm a product that I had no idea what it was before we got it to the storm before Jamie introduced it to me. And I was like, wow, this is great. Like, this is such a genius way of being able to move Bitcoin, you know, without really having to move on chain. You can secure, you know it's secure. You know, no one's looked at that seed. And it's just, it's a product that I think could last forever. And so I'm still playing with a lot of the products, which is great. I think that's the best time in the world.

Mike Peterson: 44:52

You didn't do what you want to be doing.

Jamie: 44:55

We can order all the latest stuff. Let's try to see what's going on.

Mike Peterson: 45:01

So I know that some people might say like, oh, but it's just like a small store. But for me, it was like, wow, this is like a physical representation of what like, is happening all over El Salvador, because we see the beginning stages of these companies setting up and getting ready. But you know, it takes a little while to actually roll things out. But this was like a physical like, no, look, things are transforming here. Which brings up another subject that might be a little more delicate. And I want to preface this with saying, we're all super fans of El Salvador, we think what's happening here is amazing. We are heavily invested here. But there have been you posted something on Twitter the other day about some concerns that you have of trying to operate a business here. And so I think it's important that we flush these things out, really, so they can be fixed. And totally make sure that this continues to be the hub for Bitcoiners. So tell me a little bit about what the things you've run into. And then I'll want to share some of the concerns I have and things I'm seeing.

Jamie: 46:02

So I have another startup. I have another company it's called AcceptLN.com and it's a website, you can go on this website and you can send Satoshis over the Lightning Network to any email address that has not consented or not pre configured in any way. You can just type in someone's email address, gives you a little numpad you can type in how much you want to send them, gives you an invoice, you can pay it to them. And previously before accepting LAN, if you wanted to send somebody some Satoshis get them you know, you're getting somebody started with Bitcoin lightning, because it was over the Bitcoin, you'd have to get them to set up a wallet, and then you can send them some Satoshis. And that's the same thing with Bitcoin too, you have to have to get a wallet. And then you can get again, Bitcoin and it's a little, it's a tiny barrier, but it is a barrier.

Mike Peterson: 46:49

No, like even if you're like dealing with a waiter or something, you're like, hey, Bitcoin, I have a wallet, and they don't have their phone with them you're like, and they write down your email address for me.

Jamie: 46:59

Right. You have to make some important decisions, you have to pick which wallet you want, to understand the custody trade offs, there's a couple of minutes of decisions, and you can't really do that with a waiter with somebody right there. So with AcceptLN kind of flips that around, you just get their email address, type in their email, send them some stats, we short custody, the Satoshis. And then we send out a welcome to Bitcoin email, and they get this email and it's got all the information, they need to pick their different wallet, the different trade offs, they can take up to 60 days to pick the wallet that they want. And then once they're set up, they click the claim link. And there's a super easy claim process, they just they make an invoice on their wallet and So you can also use this for businesses. So if your business, paste it in there. And then we fire them Satoshis. And as long as you claim within 60 days, it's totally free. We don't want to be your forever bank. So after that, we start charging a daily inactivity fee a business can just type in like a business email, and they can and sending reminder emails and all that but so I started this company up as kind of a first foray into bitcoin lightning and El Salvador, I should get excited about Bitcoin lightning accept Bitcoin lightning very easily. Without having to do a is in writing, what could I make. And I came up with this concept to help onboard people and got incorporated here, got lot of setup and especially for business. Some businesses will registered with the central bank here under the Bitcoin law, and got the temporary authorization to run a Bitcoin company here and be a wallet provider and a payment processor. accept Bitcoin lightning very infrequently. And so with this service, they can just very quickly get set up and then kind of test the waters and see how it goes. And so we've got ping browser and wallet services, and everything's going great. There's a bunch of provisions to the Bitcoin law that companies are held to here, which is, I think, a good thing to make sure they're accountable. But they're sort of informally sort of looking the other way on on a few of them. And they said, no, I want you to don't need to worry about that don't need to worry about that your startup, don't worry about it, you're just getting started. And about 45 days ago, we got this email saying, hey, we'd like to have a meeting. I had a meeting with them. And they said, no, we need to make sure you're doing everything under the under the Bitcoin law, which inherently add on the problem with them want to follow the law, I want to do the right thing here. But some of the things they were asking for, were discouraging. And the first thing you know, in the first thing they sort of asked for is, hey, we want all of your data. We want all of your customer data, your transactional data so that we can review it. And that includes customer information, personal identifying information, and I sort of said, well, what do you mean you want all my all my data? They have not pushed hard on it, which is good.

Mike Peterson: 49:38

That's the one that I'm most concerned. I'm

Jamie: 49:39

I understand that in you know, the financial world. If El hearing from other companies to say, hey, they're pushing us for all of our history of all transactional data, right? Including and that's and not the essence of Bitcoin. Salvador wants to play ball with them, they are trying to rebuild the reputation globally and Important that also does that they do have to have rules. You know, if there's large amounts, they might say, hey, we want the details on this transaction, it was doing $50,000. We want you know the details of that. And that's fair to sort of spot, you know, spots to, hey, we need information on this. And if you want to play ball on the global financial world, I understand you have to do that. There has to be some give and take, but to sort of, say carte blanche, we want everything. And, you know, again, they haven't been firm on this one. But they asked for it. And that kind of like, took me aback. I was like, what? And so we gave them a data dump without those columns with just doing here's so here's the transaction, just to give you a sense of how big we are, we're not very big. We've on boarded about thousands people to Bitcoin lightning, we're not, we're not that big a company that transactions are mostly 50, Satoshis, you know, customer will send just a little bit just to try to, it's mostly honest, it's mostly already Bitcoin people testing the service to see how it works before they recommend it, and use it on more people. But they're tiny transactions. And so from a basic data dump, without any personal information, you can get a sense of how big the businesses and I think that's, you know, fair. And then the other thing they wanted was audited financials. And again, if you're customizing a lot of customer funds, you know, that probably makes sense. But if you're a small lightning startup, a one man show, by the way, if you're a small lightning startup, you know, having audited financials is pretty cumbersome. And furthermore, I'm not even sure and I'm having I am fielding some auditors trying to get some some auditors just to sort of go down this path. Who can audit and properly put a rubber stamp on a lightning node and look at the you know, this is not a public blockchain. This is private, cryptographic proofs on your lightning node. This is and so, you know, who has the technical expertise in an auditing firm to do that? I don't know if anybody globally yet does. And so like, I'm not even sure I can provide meaningful audit information.

Mike Peterson: 51:57

And I'm, as I said before, I'm very untechnical. So maybe this wouldn't be a concern, but with letting an auditor in to review that, is there any security issues that would arise with that? Or is that not really not?

Jamie: 52:10

There may be, there may be like just saying, here it is, they may be able to take that data and then make transactions on our behalf. I'm not hundred percent certain because, you know, I haven't gone in, you know, I'm not even super far in, you know, in the raw lightning transactions, you know, I'm using the thunder hubs and the LMDS. This the software that's available, and the node software, and that's what I'm using to run this company. And so there may be issues there, where it's like, you're asking me for the private portion, you know, you could sweep funds. And so, you know, I can certainly take them in and show them the node and say, here's the node, here it is, under, you know, a few different display, you know, here's the thunder hub, here's this, here's a lightning terminal. And here's a few different ways to see the transactions. But for them to meaningfully audit it, you sort of need to double check, you just kind of have to, you know, if they were auditing Bitcoin on chain transactions, I would give them my records, they could go and, you know, audit those on chain separately and sort of have a double check and say, alright, we believe what you're saying. And so I'm not even sure I'm able to produce audited Lightning, the old company is gonna be just has Lightning node. So all the transactions are Lightning, it's Lightning only. And so I have concerns about that. And so I'm hoping that they'll be some dialogue here and sort of maybe like a bit of a working group into, hey, these are the things that we that we're running into. I think what makes the most sense, at least just the quick, you know, quick solution is, if you're doing under this much volume, or if you're costing this much funds, if you're under this line, you're in the startup camp, you're still a startup, we want you here, we want to incubate startups, and you're exempt from this, this, this and this, as long as you're not costing over $100,000, and customer funds or something like that, some number 50,000, whatever the number is. And as long as you'e under that you don't have you're fine. And that was kind of what they were doing before is they were kind of just not enforcing certain portions because they want it to foster. And that was just my understanding.

Mike Peterson: 54:07

And in all fairness there is there is risk with any custodial service that they could rug pull, whether Auto Satoshi or your company or blink wallet. I think that falls on the user that they have to weigh that and that anytime any government body gets involved, that usually leads to more problems because right data gets leaked everywhere and it turns into a mess. So I don't think that's the right solution. But I understand what their concerns are when they're trying to you know. They're trying to cover their bases they don't run a black eye of like, hey, there's a company we approved that rug pulled.

Jamie: 54:48

Japan wasn't happy about Mt. Gox these countries are not happy about their embarrassments. And so they got there has to be a balance. I understand that. And so my goal is with this companies that I start with, it was quick to just do small transactions. And so if my, you know, if the amount of money that the relationship that I have with the customers is$50, you know, $100 $200, the impact is so much less. And, you know, that could also be something that, you know, could be codified into law. It's like, hey, if your relationship with each customer is small, you're more of a convenience product. You don't need to do all of this stuff. And you can, there's a lot of potential convenience products out there. And we want to support them, we want them to exist, and we want them to come here.

Mike Peterson: 55:33

And in all fairness, El Salvador is trying to figure this out because they are going first.

Jamie: 55:42

I'm confident that we will figure it out. I'm actually not, you know, I made this sort of comment responded to John attack and made this comment and kind of all of a sudden, there was like, you know, 60 to 60,000 impressions or something. And I was like, I've got 500 followers. It's, you know, there's a lot. And so, but I do want to figure it out. And this, you know, except Atlanta is like a two page website. And it's kind of a litmus test in the sense of like, hey, how easy is it to just start a lightning company here, get a corporation setup, get a registration under the Bitcoin law, you know, run the company, and how easy is it? And if there are problems, let's pick some. And let's make sure that that we can keep, you know, attracting the next startup. And so I actually am pretty hopeful, sort of, in my comment, I sort of said, I were weighing options. I don't know what to do, we have to move our Corp. But I'm sort of like, it's so serious that if we don't solve it, we would have to or close. And so let's, let's find a solution.

Mike Peterson: 56:33

Let's figure it out. And that's why it's so great that we have Stacey and the Bitcoin office advocate.

Jamie: 56:37

The balance and sort of say, hey, if you're going to be Yeah, sits there as a liaison. There's things we don't know about, they're getting pressure from, you know, whether it's the US government, or the IMF. Threatening to kick them off the SWIFT system and write these things. And so, but on the other hand, I have known other people who came to El Salvador, planning on setting up a company and said, it doesn't make sense, like, the requirements are too stringent, and for what I'm doing, could never afford it, and they go set up somewhere else. And so we don't want to see that happen. And so I'm hopeful that they're able to, you know, as they go through the process, figure out, okay, these are the things that are important, but the rest of it, you know, we can get rid of the red tape. a massive custodial exchange and handling millions and millions of dollars, then this is what we need from you. And if you're a startup, or you're doing this, then we don't need any of this stuff from you, and you're protected. And kind of figure out that structure right now, you know, the Bitcoin laws in place. Obviously, it's groundbreaking. You couldn't have foreseen everything, but it's like, hey, let's try and let's, let's modify this and amend it. And so that's what we'd like to see. And there's, there's another area too, there was the $200 thing that John attack brought up. And, you know, they've changed that. I think it's coming to effect soon. And it's now it's $25,000. And so there's a sort of a whole tax side of things. And there is a new tax system here. That's pretty comprehensive. And so that's, I'd like some feedback on that, too. And there's a lot of I feel like there's dialogue, you know, and so I'm hoping we can sort of find a working group and get everybody, everybody talking.

Mike Peterson: 58:22

Well, I think it's great that I mean, they're all in on Bitcoin. And they know, with that comes self sovereignty and privacy is important. And so I, you know, I know, there's parts of the government that want to know everything, but hopefully there's other parts of the government are like, hey, if we want this to be the hub for Bitcoiners, we need to make sure that we find that right balance where I totally feel like yes, we need people to pay the taxes they owe. But otherwise, we don't need to be in everybody's business and know all their transactions.

Jamie: 58:53

A lot of the target market, like the people are Salvador's trying to attract and bring here are leaving places where the government is like, going down the wrong path. Like I used to live in Canada, and it's just sort of feels like it's dangerous, you know, the amount of the direction they're going and the amount of power that some institutions have. And, you know, it's, there was a saying a couple of years ago, that I heard it was called turnkey tyranny. And it's a concept but the idea is that, you know, when you give the government all of these powers, they're sort of turnkey tyrannies, it's to your needs to be a balance. And you know, we're sort of going through that growing going face here and so I think it's fun I'm gonna have fun doing it. And but yeah, it was made the comment and all of a sudden it was like, whoah.

Mike Peterson: 59:38

I think it's important for us to we're obviously pro El Salvador. We let the government here is doing is amazing. We're 100% sport, but when we see things that aren't working, you know, we got a bit of a wallet or yeah, these type things we got to speak up to make sure they get fixed because otherwise people are just going to leave. That's what we don't.

Jamie: 59:59

There's this silence, you know, people just silently exit. That's not good for the project. And I think, you know, especially from, you know, people like yourself and people that you know, have El Salvador best interests at heart, you know, like, I'm a huge believer in the vibe up into my whole life and moved here, you know, I there's I when I say things, I'm not saying it to be hurtful, I'm saying I'm trying to be constructive. And, you know, just sort of figuring out that, you know, bounce from the constructive people and sort of saying, hey, we want this to work. Let's make it work. And so I think we'll get there. We'll get there. It's coming.

Mike Peterson: 1:00:33

So just kind of the finish up, curious for you, Ronnie. Living here for three years you've been here? What are you seeing as far as Bitcoin adoption, both in El Zonte and then like, nationwide. Like is it feel like it's improving? Do you feel like it's kind of plateaued or what do you see?

Ronny: 1:00:54

Oh, I definitely see it improving. I see a lot of people who were negative about it at the very beginning and now kind of asking more questions. And even then just going from negative to neutral that's an improvement. I'm seeing a lot of more businesses accepting bitcoin wanting to learn asking the right questions being curious about Bitcoin. Bitcoin curious I want to call them you we have the Bitcoin Berlin project now you have a whole town that's just totally you know, onboard.

Mike Peterson: 1:01:22

Which is so exciting to see that just like blossom.

Ronny: 1:01:24

I don't know if you've been up there.

Mike Peterson: 1:01:26

I haven't yet, I've a couple times I supposed to go and things came up but but we've been communicating with them and trying to support the different things but that's, I love that. Like that's what we wanted to see was these decentralized little like projects popping up everywhere.

Jamie: 1:01:43

I just want to add one thing to Berlin, I had an experience when I was in Berlin, there was a person had a little tea and they were selling souvenirs. And I went to go buy something from them ask them if they take Bitcoin. And the way they responded to me was the most like organic like yep, I take it like without like without hesitation or without like grunts you know not like oh yeah, we take Bitcoin it was like yep, like, I don't have to give you change. I might go up in value, I can use this at the grocery store, no problem. And just the way she said it, just like struck me I was like, wow, like, you know, it wasn't like oh my god. Yes. It was just like Yep, yeah. And just the way she said it, it was super cool. It was like wow, like I you know, you see Bitcoin accepted in lots of different places, but to just be like, yeah, no, this is I'd actually like prefer it like it's easier.

Ronny: 1:02:29

Seeing the Bitcoin accepted sign is fantastic. It just, I don't know. It's hard to explain you really have to go up there to see it. It's absolutely fantastic. The Bitcoin Farmers Market has become now my favorite event. On a bi weekly basis I look forward to that. The Bitcoin beach meetups, like there's so many different events now. So many different places for people.

Mike Peterson: 1:02:50

I love that these other things are happening in Berlin because I was saying, I feel like we need some friendly competition because I feel like some of the people in El Zonte had become kind of complacent. And I appreciate what an amazing revolutions happening here. So now let's see these other cities grabbing on. It's they're like, oh, wait, we want to make sure we remain like a Bitcoin place. Like, you know.

Ronny: 1:03:14

It's good, friendly, competition I wanna say.

Jamie: 1:03:20

You have substance for the fact finding trips. They're like, alright, I'm gonna go do a couple days in Berlin, couple days in El Salvador, couple days on beach, on surfing.

Ronny: 1:03:29

We want to Santa Ana. The stuff that we permitted bitcoin is doing with the Bitcoin diploma, then no nation going to schools and teaching kids how to build a node. Like what I'm seeing at the I think the level that most people don't see, which is the headline price that doesn't matter here. And I think that's what's really great.

Mike Peterson: 1:03:50

Well, no, but that's what's so funny. Nobody hardly ever, I mean, many case people will remark like, oh, well, I can, you know, our budget will work better because you know, we have things have gotten cheaper in Bitcoin prices

Jamie: 1:03:59

We have a couple TVs in the store. And there's no like but nobody really talks about price. big price TV, you know. And it's true.

Ronny: 1:04:15

Yeah. It's been it's been great just kind of watching these projects, coming here starting in El Salvador and just watching them grow. And seeing the growth and the potential for the kids is really what excites me the most. Seeing the new generation of Salvadorans who are going to understand what Bitcoin really is. And they're going to be the first ones in line for that next upcoming job, you know, and as these projects continue to grow, we can keep the talent here in El Salvador and that's so exciting. Seeing, I have a lot of friends who run businesses here, and El Zonte and they're excited. They're no longer bullying me about the price of Bitcoin, now they wanted to know what can I do to get more Bitcoin? And so it's been a great, you know, obviously, it's been a great year 2024, I'd say. And so I'm really excited to see how El Salvador can continue to grow. People like Jamie who are coming here bringing excitement and bringing great projects to El Salvador. So I'm on board with what Jamie says, you know, I want make sure more people feel comfortable coming here in El Salvador and start new projects, support the system, and then support the Salvadorans. I'm super excited to see where we go. I'm excited for 2024.

Mike Peterson: 1:05:21

So, have you gotten your passport, yet?

Ronny: 1:05:22

I had, thankfully, I had my passport. And my parents, my parents took care of that for me when I was when I was younger. So that was a little easy for me. And I'm super proud to have it.

Mike Peterson: 1:05:33

I thought I was gonna be able to get mine this year, but I guess I need to have one more year residency.

Ronny: 1:05:38

Oh, no. One more year.

Mike Peterson: 1:05:42

Well, I just wanted to have you know. Maybe they'll change it next year and make it harder you know.

Jamie: 1:05:47

Right. I'm in year one. So I've just get started. And but yeah, it's exciting. It's great to be part of something that's just going up in a world that kind of feels like it's teetering, you know, it's so cool to be somewhere we're where things are going up.

Ronny: 1:06:06

The one thing that I can't say I remember at Bitcoin doubling Bitcoin 2022 was my first Bitcoin Conference, adopting Bitcoin 2023. How the second day, I went to all Spanish sessions and seeing all the Salvadorans and then having them reach out to me back hey, you're you're Ronny, right? And in Spanish, and people that spoke no English, and it was just, it was, it was such a great moment to see that the difference from 2022 to 2003, and how that's growing. And then the Santa Ana meetup where it's people that I never met before these new faces, but they're so excited that they started their own meetup, started their own group, and their orange building people in their own community. It's absolutely fantastic to see. It's fantastic to see from the ground level going up. Yeah, I'm excited.

Mike Peterson: 1:06:51

I think that's a good note to finish on. But let's make sure people know where they can follow you guys on Twitter. Any websites? Obviously they're gonna have to come to El Zonte to come to the store.

Jamie: 1:07:05

You gotta come the store. At Twitter, you can follow us at tbh_sv and websites tbhs.sv. You can email us at hello@tbhs.sv.

Mike Peterson: 1:07:24

And what about you guys? Are you using Twitter?

Ronny: 1:07:28

Ronnie Avendano on Twitter.

Jamie: 1:07:30

Mine's like a keyboard Smash. It's like JY, Jamie Robinson. Find me. I'm there.

Ronny: 1:07:36

And then if you're looking for us here on El Zonte we're at in Treba Numero Dos. So entrance number two to El Zonte Bitcoin Beach.

Jamie: 1:07:42

Google maps though.

Ronny: 1:07:44

BTC maps and the Blink maps.

Mike Peterson: 1:07:48

And then what about the other project? Where

Jamie: 1:07:51

Except LN.com. Please check it out. Yeah, AcceptLN.com. I'd love your can people find that? feedback. AcceptLN.com, you'll just see it right at the front because he has an email address at the front. And you just type in on whatever email and then you can take it away. And they will explain sort of the process and yeah, so thank you so much for having us.

Mike Peterson: 1:08:12

This was a lot of fun.