How To Earn Your Stripes.

Bitcoin is a permissionless system.

You do not need the approval of anyone to join the community or to take part in the monetary revolution. In fact you are already a member of the Official Bitcoin Cash Foundation.

You do not need a team or council or company to build the next big thing that is not only going to change the world and make you super rich AT THE SAME TIME!

What a lovely community to be a part of.

In case some of you are still on the fence and do not feel welcome yet:

BY THE POWERS VESTED IN ME BY GREEN SKULL I HERBY DEPUTIZE YOU AS AN OFFICIAL BITCOIN CASH AGENT WITH ALL THE POWERS AND AUTHORITY THEREIN!*

Now that is out of the way and you understand you are able to join the bitcoin community, I have some bad news for you.

You can not force anyone to work with you. You can not force anyone to listen to you or your ideas. You can not force any team to build the thing you want. Even if it is the best idea since fidget spinners.

This is all voluntary

Just like you do not need anyone to grant you the freedom or permission to make the thing you want, everyone has the freedom to ignore you.

"But I am new to bitcoin and no one is paying attention to me! I want to be included! I want to be an insider! I want to be one of the cool kids on the cool as a cucumber team!"

Recently in Telegram some people have said that our community is not really welcoming to "outsiders". While I disagree with this sentiment. I think it is more an issue with new as yet unproven ideas and projects meeting skepticism, part of the perception is no doubt due to the history of bitcoin and many people having PTSD from when new developers came in and pushed out Gavin Andreson and Mike Hearn and turned bitcoin upside down. I think people probably also have PTSD and are tired about having to listen to people making bold claims suck up all the oxygen in the room with drama trying to pull BCH into in a drastically different direction.

None of that matters at all though. You do not need me or anyone else to give you permission. Build your thing. Convince people your idea is amazing through demonstration and keep your emotions in check. If it is truly an awesome idea people will see it and support you for building it.

"OH SHIT! I HAVE TO BUILD IT?"

Yep.

Wait, you didn't expect me or someone else to run with your idea did you?

Ideas are a dime a dozen. Even good ones.

BCH Should.....

Someone Should......

The Community Should..........

The "someone" problem strikes again.

There is no shortage of ideas. They are not impressive. What is impressive is someone taking that idea and working on it.

Before you ask, no just talking to people about it is not really working on it. Gathering information and doing research for your idea sure.

I'll give you an example, an idea off the top of my head:

A game where you use NFT's to combine them together to make super NFT's. The more you combine them the stronger they get until at a certain date combining them is no longer possible and the final super NFT's can battle highlander style in a 0 sum game also with a deadline. By the end there can be only 1. This ultra NFT owner gets to keep the NFT and 50% of all minting profits.

Sounds great right? Well someone has to write the code. Someone has to make the art. Someone has to do the marketing. $1 Billion dollars for my idea pweez.

So while the idea is maybe amazing the hard part is everything else.

Bitcoin's very famous unofficial motto is "Don't trust. Verify"

This is a lovely thing about bitcoin. The code is all right there. You do not need to trust I sent you the money I promised. It is all there on the blockchain. You do not need to trust my word or my handsome whiskery face. You do not need my credit score. You do not need references or feedback. I sent the money or I did not and anyone can verify it.

Humans however are not code.

We require trust with one another. Trust is built over time. It is earned and not given. Actions also speak much louder than words. Writing on reddit or twitter or telegram will certainly help your name get known, but you should consider how you can contribute something tangible. There is no shortage of projects that need help and can make great use of all the help you can offer.

POW!

In bitcoin POW actually stands for "Proof of Work". This is the work that miners do to try to find the next block. The more work the miners do, the greater chance you have to be rewarded.

POW also applies to your street cred or trust. The more work you do, the greater the chance that people will see you and come to trust you.

Anonymous

This is also why being anonymous vs. DOXed or public is not really an issue in my opinion. No one knows who Satoshi really is/was. But we can verify the code to know bitcoin works as intended.

2 incredibly important people in the history and survival of BCH, freetrader and im_uname are both anonymous. It is their years of public and documented hard work that has built trust with the community. Not their faces or their passport photos. In our decentralized system filled with faceless people your work and your reputation are really all that matter. An anonymous person can theoretically rug and escape to the wind easier than someone who uses their real face/name. This is true. However it takes years or at least hundreds of work hours to build up a reputation and only seconds to destroy it all forever. Sure anyone can re-roll and try again. But it is normal to not blindly trust those we are unfamiliar with. So if you are a new faceless person. Have no fear you are in good company. All you have to do is demonstrate through your POW that you can, will and do follow through on the things you say you will do. If you say you are going to make a meme for a contest then do it. Probably no one is going to scrutinize you too much. If you make a token and want to sell it to the community.... well then now you are asking the community to give you money for something. Expect a bit more scrutiny.

Are you planning on building a bridge or a dex or run a flip starter and hope to get millions of dollars?

Then you had best be prepared for exponentially more scrutiny and questions. Don't worry though. If your project is truly awesome and you do your best to answer questions and be open about your project and code etc. you will be virtually hugged in no time by the whole community.

Bitcoin cash has no leader. But that does not mean there is no leadership.

There is a big difference between being a leader and leadership

Roger for example has without a doubt been a thought leader, an investment leader, a motivation leader and a leader in many other ways. He is not however the leader of BCH. He, as far as I know, does not control enough hashrate to dictate the consensus rules and is not a full node developer. He has made a number of requests to the node devs. Some of the things he has wanted have been added. Some have not. A request is not a command or decree and can be ignored.

BCH is one of the very few projects that have shown the community is completely willing to eject the person or people that have accumulated the most power if they no longer are heading in the direction the community wants to go.

If you think BCH should or NEEDS to change direction. It is up to you to present compelling evidence and convince enough people to make those changes undeniable.

Declaring yourself a "leader" does not mean that people will automatically follow you. Some will. But without using force, coercion or bribes, the only way to get followers is to demonstrate your leadership ability by perhaps having a clear vision that is easy to follow and delivering on your promises.

The best and easiest way to earn your stripes is to say what you mean, mean what you say and prove it with action.

*certificates are available for $29.95 plus shipping and handling while supplies last.