Latest version is https://alevchuk.medium.com/bitcoin-good-start-c70ef23092c2
People who have previously bought bitcoin yet left it on the exchange.
A service that helps you buy or sell bitcoin for another currency. For example Coinbase or Cash App. Exchange is where you keep your funds if your not planning to hold them.
[Image: img_2830.jpg] Bitcoin is a shield, not a sword. What I mean by that is that bitcoin is not a get rich overnight scheme. Instead, bitcoin let's you keep what’s yours. It’s a shield that protects you from inflation, bureaucracy fees, and financial repression. It's the peaceful opt-out from the fiat system.
Technology growth is exponential. Bitcoin adoption is exponential. Bitcoin is growing faster than the Internet did. Yet there will never be more than 21 million bitcoins. When you hold bitcoin over the years you rightfully earn the exponential increase in your purchasing power.
Bitcoin left on the exchange is not your bitcoin.
[Image: image.jpg] By withdrawing bitcoin from the exchange to your possession you make your funds:
- Censorship resistant: Exchange can censor your transactions so you will not be able to send or receive. This is not possible when you hold your own bitcoin because bitcoin has censorship resistance as a core attribute.
- Avoiding third party risk: Exchange can be hacked or perform an exit scam. There is no insurance. For example, in 2014 the case of hackers stole 740,000 bitcoin (which is today worth 50 billion USD) from the Mt Gox exchange. In addition, exchanges are exposed to censure by government - a likely threat if bitcoin becomes widely adopted. This is not possible when you hold your own bitcoin because you will not be using any third parties.
- Portable: Another important example is 1933. The US government ceased gold from people, a lot of the the gold was stored in banks because it was hard to transport. This is not possible when you hold your own bitcoin because you bitcoin is easy to move across the planet within a moments notice.
- Verifiable: You trust the exchange to tell you everything about “your” bitcoin. An exchange can pretend that a payment was made, not made, or present a counterfeit as real. You don’t have the assurance that the exchange is holding less bitcoin than it owes to it’s customers so this makes you vulnerable to a bank run, an event when the exchange is not able to let some customers withdraw their bitcoin simply because they no longer have the bitcoin. This is not the case when you hold your own bitcoin because you can verify that everything that you own is genuine.
SeedSigner is a hardware wallet made from general purpose off-the-shelf parts. The advantage of not buying specialized security parts is that you are avoiding being targeted. Order the parts listed here https://seedsigner.com/hardware/
- Cost is under $50
- Can take up to a month to get everything shipped from separate sellers. Yet, if you order it as a kit from SeedSigner, it's about 1 week shipping.
- SeedSigner uses a specific version Raspbery Pi single board computer which purposely does not include WiFi or Bluetuooth for better security. Yet, that version does not come with connection pins soldered. Having gone thru the trouble myself I don’t recommend doing the soldering. Instead you can buy a GPIO Hammer which should connect everything in a more straight forward way.
In Part 1 you have performed a withdrawal for a small amount for learning and testing. You can repeat Part 1.4 to withdraw more funds. Yet before you move a large amount of bitcoin to your hardware wallet you should consider the follow:
- How big is the risk of someone stealing your secret words?
- Online risk: If you followed part 1 then risk of someone stealing your bitcoin over the Internet is small. Yet, there may some risk. E.g. If a camera catches a glimpse of your secret words. SeedSigner is not connected to the internet, yet it’s theoretically possible that SeedSigner device (1) has bad software; and (2) the software manages to communicate the secret to other devices thru unorthodox communication channels.
- Physical risk: Can someone physically get a hold of your secret or get you to surrender the secret?
- What backups do you have for the secret words?
- For example, fire. If you write the secret words on paper that it’s easy to loose them in a fire.
- For example, typos. Is there a possibility of a typo in one of the backups.
In the bitcoin world people are continuously thinking about how to mitigate these scenarios.
You can practice sending bitcoin your friend, yourself, or back to the exchange in the following way.