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1/ Listening to @PeterMcCormack's #bitcoin podcasts. Technical discussions are great, but damn does it make me cringe when guys like @rogerkver or whoever else living in their ivory towers start talking about how Bitcoin is for the "unbanked" in the 3rd world. They know nothing.
2/ The level of ignorance about this is unbelievable, but what's more shocking is their confidence that they know what's best for "these people living in Uganda or the Philippines who can't afford to spend bitcoin on the "main chain" because muh fees." This is laughable.
3/ NO, they will not choose BCH or whatever crypto over BTC because the fees are lower. Literally nobody cares about that shit. You guys need to stop using this narrative. It's condescending and ignorant. #Bitcoin is a tool that will be used for the benefit of the world, yes, but
4/ not in the way you guys envision them using it like you do in San Francisco or New York or London. It's not all of a sudden going to make their lives so much better. The problems of the 3rd world are systemic, and no tech solution will solve it overnight.
5/ Sorry to burst your bubbles but "blockchain tech" is still in its infancy today and in no meaningful way will it have an impact on the systemic problems we have in the Philippines like corruption, poverty, etc. The tools are just not there yet, the tech is not ready, not now.
4/ I am Filipino, born and raised. My country has 100M people, 80% of which have no access to formal banking. Only 3% credit card penetration. 99% of all commerce is done in cash. People live from paycheck to paycheck. 21% live in poverty. A big chunk of those live on $2 a day.
5/ Sounds bad? Well, it is. But there's hope. 50+M people are 23 yrs old and below, 60+M use the internet, we have the fastest growing smartphone penetration with 60+M users, and a fast growing middle class. We're resilient, and Filipinos are some of the happiest people on earth.
6/ What more, we have a thriving Bitcoin/Blockchain industry. That's why we are building the tools for that. That's why we started a Bitcoin remittance startup here 5 years ago, when none of these shitty narratives were being used to promote shitcoins.
7/ There are services here making Bitcoin and other crypto accessible to people that want to use it, trade it, get paid in it, exchange it. Millions of people have been exposed to it, especially young people. Through the efforts of the industry, -
8/- in 2017, we became the 2nd country in the world with a central bank that regulates "virtual currency" exchanges. They see the potential in the technology. It's happening, but again, not in the way roger ver types see it. It's an infrastructure play, building rails.
9/ Thanks to the efforts of the Filipino crypto industry, you can easily convert Bitcoin (and some other cryptos) to fiat and vice versa in the Philippines, pay your bills, buy phone credits, send and receive money, etc.
10/ They're using third-party services, yes, but just like how internet cafes made the web accessible to those who couldn't back in the 90s, it allows the technology to be used by all with minimal costs, which I believe is how it will be used by mainstream users in the future.
11/ To say that Bitcoin is not the right tech because it is too expensive to use is no different from saying that public internet infrastructure is not the right tech because internet connections and computers were too expensive in 1995. Again, internet cafe analogy stands.
12/ I believe one day everyone will be using #bitcoin or something close to it as an underlying technology used by layer 2 or 3 services that are easily accessible and intuitive to use, unfairly cheap, and open/inclusive. It'll take some time, it's not going to happen in 2019.
13/ In the meantime, please stop using my country or other developing nations as a sales pitch for shitty projects and shitcoins. We are not sitting in the jungle waiting to be saved. We are busy building for our own future.
