The federal reserve is a system that you can’t audit. The federal reserve is an opaque financial system. Jimmy Song, a blogger, podcaster, computer programmer, gives two-day seminars around the globe to teach coders how to use bitcoin. With bitcoin you can actually audit this stuff, which is what I am teaching my students.”
Song’s class, Programming Blockchain, is 16 hours long and includes lectures as well as hands-on activities. The same course was taught by Song as part of an entire semester at University of Texas at Austin. “When I was teaching that one semester, I had some pretty brilliant…grad students in electrical engineering, computer science, and business,” he says. His seminar students are paid out of pocket to learn, but they weren’t as motivated and driven. The UT-Austin students “cared very much about their grades and…getting the right credential.”
Rigel Walshe, a native of New Zealand, attended Song’s 2018 seminar in Australia when he was changing his career. Ex-cop Rigel Walshe became interested in bitcoin after discovering Silk Road. This e-commerce website allowed people to purchase drugs and other items until 2014, when it was closed down. Silk Road users bought black market products with bitcoin. This website played a crucial role in the early days of the bitcoin network’s growth.
Walshe says that Silk Road operated for two years under American law enforcement agency’s noses. There was no way they could stop it. I don’t believe most people realize how huge of an issue that is.
Walshe currently works at Swan Bitcoin as a software engineer. This is his dream job.
Song also teaches and writes. Song has contributed to Bitcoin Core, an open-source project to research, test and upgrade the software people use around the world to connect to this decentralized money network.
No matter where you live or your degree, anyone can submit and review new code. Because bitcoin is an open-source program, all rules regarding its operation are fully transparent.
Song and Walshe say this is the core of what they love most about bitcoin. They emphasize radical transparency and demonstrated skills over credentialism. Walshe asserts that anyone can create any kind of thing. All the code, and the necessary information is available online for no cost. [and]Anyone can access it from anywhere on the planet and take part.”
ReasonJimmy Song was my guest at the 2021 Oslo Freedom Forum in October. This conference brought together the Bitcoin community and the human rights community in Miami for two days. He recently published a book. We are thankful for Bitcoin. The creation, corruption, and redemption of money.This article is about the disdain he has for traditional education as well as the way he feels that bitcoin compliments Christian Theology.
John Osterhoudt wrote, produced, and shot the film. Lex Villena added graphics.