What does the Bitcoin Cash community look like to a newbie? My honest feedback
So I'm totally new to the Bitcoin world (less than 6 months) and I wanted to give the Bitcoin Cash community some feedback from the perspective of someone who's new to all of this stuff.
I'm not an expert on cryptocurrency but I do know a few things about marketing & sales, and there's a few things the Bitcoin Cash community does/says that is not helping the mission of "peer to peer electronic cash for the world"
1. Stop saying bad things about BTC
People who are new don't know enough yet to understand or even care what you have to say about BTC - all they will hear is "Bitcoin is bad" which will push people away since to most new people "bitcoin" is synonymous with cryptocurrency.
Think of it like this - let's say your 65 year old Mom wants to buy her first computer, she knows absolutely nothing about computers but wants to learn. If the first thing you do when she tells you she wants to buy a computer is go on a long RANT about why "Windows 10 sucks" because the "latest patch includes a buggy version of Java" she's going to get scared and confused. She has no idea what you're even saying, all she knows is you're saying something is BAD and that makes her FEEL BAD. People who feel bad, scared & confused are less likely to try something new.
The goal should be to educate people, get them interested, show them what makes this stuff really cool - if that means helping your friend buy some BTC then do it! Instead of telling him why BTC is bad, tell him why BCH is good & let him play with both.
2. Embrace the term BCASH
I once onboarded this bar owner here in bangkok and watched him teach his staff how to start accepting Bitcoin Cash - during this short employee training he called Bitcoin Cash "Bitcash"
Why? Because saying "Bitcoin Cash" is 3 syllables and kinda hard to say.
This is why people say "Shouldn't" instead of "Should not" - and fighting this normal human tendency to gravitate towards the easiest simplest way of speaking is a losing battle. Let people say bcash, don't get upset over something this trivial.
People who are brand new to this don't know the nefarious history of the term, they don't care, they just want to say what's easiest to say.
Instead of fighting "Bcash" just turn it into a meme, make it funny & most importantly don't let new people see you getting upset over something this small.
3. Focus on building not fighting
Some random BTC guy on twitter said something stupid? New people don't care.
You got blocked by a BTC guy? New people don't care.
Your post was deleted from r/bitcoin? New people don't care.
Focus more on the POSITIVE things, spend more time MAKING something cool than talking badly about BTC or people. When a community spends most of it's time talking badly about people and projects it does not help your community.
Show people that cool app you found, that coin swapping service, the crypto debit card, the website you found that let's you book hotels with BCH - that's what get's people excited - not posting negativity.
BTC is often the first thing many of us use, spend, earn or buy - and what's good for BTC is good for BCH since it means more people are entering the ecosystem of cryptocurrency. People will find out on their own that BTC fees are high and transactions are slow, when this happens they will discover BCH... That's what happend to me, and it will probably happen to them.
I've long said that we need to be closer to the people we're looking to onboard. One of the steps to get there is to stop having a currency where you spend a tiny decimal - like 0.041052 BCH. There's some people in the community trying to get BCH to get a more standards-approved unit ticker (XCH) where the decimal point is shifted 6 steps to the right (so you get 2 decimal points, like ~95% of all common currencies out there), and give it a new name so it's not conflicting with the BCH unit: bits, cash, bitcash, cashbit, bcash - whatever works works.