20: Archipelago Meshtadels w/ Shadrach
"Bitcoin doesn't need more believers. Bitcoin needs more understanders."
Shadrach & Gigi take a walk in Madeira. Recorded during SEC-07 .
Listen on sovereignengineering.io
Projects & tech mentioned:
- Archipelago (sovereign home node and mesh network platform)
- Archipelago Foundation
- Archipelago promo video
- AtoB (interoperable service protocol, co-authored with Gzuuus)
- Angor (Bitcoin-native crowdfunding; Archipelago placed 2nd in the Angor pitch contest )
- Podcasting 2.0 (open podcast ecosystem)
- #DeMu (decentralized music on Nostr)
- Fountain (podcasting app with value-for-value)
- castr.me (Nostr-to-RSS podcast feed)
- Indie Hub (independent film distribution on Archipelago)
- Plebeian Market / Shopstr / Conduit (Nostr marketplaces)
- Zap Store (Nostr-based app store)
- Fedimint (federated eCash) / Cashu (eCash on Bitcoin)
- Framework (modular laptop hardware)
- Meshtastic / Meshcore (mesh networking)
- Start9 / Umbrel (existing node platforms)
- GrapheneOS (privacy-focused Android)
In this dialogue:
- The episode opens discussing the podcasting 2.0 publishing workflow: AI models can now generate the XML spec, value splits and all
- Spencer's idea: every venue gets an npub, the venue starts the live stream rather than the artist
- Shadrach's #DeMu journey: tried to orange pill Austin musicians, but they were too disillusioned. Pay-to-play venues, Spotify killing label revenue.
- Value for value as social signaling: free-to-play games make millions from cosmetic skins. Adam Curry gets it -- his listeners aren't listeners, they're producers.
- Shadrach's path: punk rock DIY ethos to sysadmin, industrial Bitcoin mining in Texas, S9 miners sold for scrap metal
- The Meshtadel: a network of citadels meshed together. Any node can be taken out and the system routes around the failure.
- "I'm here to orange pill the Amish": moved to Lancaster, PA for food security, rented a farmer's market stall just to talk about Bitcoin
- Printed Cashu certificates for the Amish, horse and buggy to the Bitcoin bank drive-through. Fedimint stability pools make this feasible.
- "Bitcoin doesn't need more believers. Bitcoin needs more understanders."
- Archipelago: sovereign home node on Framework laptop hardware, plugs into your TV, companion app, modular and upgradeable
- Indie Hub: independent films on day one, directors set their own pricing, distributed via paid torrents
- The reversed marketplace: broadcast what you want to buy as an encrypted blob on Nostr. Agents match buyers and sellers.
- "Salespeople will hate it." -- "I know."
- AtoB protocol: made ride-sharing apps (Ridester, Drivester, Trotter) interoperable. Two devs refactored in a day using AI.
- Web of trust is Nostr's killer feature: people wrote about it in the seventies, PGP signing parties never caught on
- Nostr VPN: every device gets an npub, devices find each other the same way people do on Nostr
- SovEng: "the most incredible experience I've ever had in my life" and "some of the most exhausting"
- "We are back again in the early days. And we just have to make it work."
