For the May edition of our 21 Questions series, we managed to track down an extremely busy DeCommerce frontliner and had them sit down long enough to get through our questions!
LocalParticl is one of the many thousands of believers who are working to build the infrastructure that decom and defi require to establish a robust ecosystem and deliver a reliable and usable experience for all. Worthy work, indeed!
Let's get into it...
decentralize.today: if you could choose three words to describe yourself what would they be and why?
- Self-descriptors feel somewhat simplistic but here we go: determined, optimistic, and eccentric. Hopefully further responses will seem to match up.
DT: How, why and when did you get into digital currencies and their applications?
- I was led to bitcoin in 2011 after the headaches of dealing with international bank transfers. A digital money that was easily sent anywhere in the world without pages of paper work, days of delays, high service fees, and additional currency conversion fees, sounded too good to be true. Bitcoin lived up to all of this and the future only looks brighter.
DT: What were you doing professionally before this?
- I was operating a manufacturing business, specializing in the design and creation of film making equipment.
DT: How would you describe your current work to a 5 year old kid?
- I help people use internet money.
DT: What was your first ever job (even as a kid)?
- I was hired on as web developer for a business I later became a partner of.
DT: Who is your biggest inspiration when it comes to work/business?
- Both of my parents were great role models for hard work and financial responsibility.
DT: What’s the best life and work advice you’ve ever been given?
- Learn to fail elegantly. Failures are a chance to learn and get you one step closer to success.
DT: Your favorite superhero or fictional character, and why?
- Sailor Moon, because with a catch phrase like “In the name of the moon, I’ll punish you!” you know you’re gonna lose.
DT: What were you like as a student?
- I did just enough to get by so there would be more time to watch anime.
DT: What would be your dream project if money were not an object?
- Industrial scale vertical aeroponics for food production with the goal of vastly reducing pesticide use and water consumption.
DT: What is your favorite sport or game to watch?
- Being a spectator of competitions doesn’t tickle my pickle.
DT: Working in digital currencies, which is huge space in terms of both size and opportunity, how do you decide your strategic focus and determine the programmes required to address these?
- After the Particl team released what I felt was one of the most user friendly private decentralized marketplaces, and also proposed a re-imagined vision of a self-governing economy, I decided to focus on supporting this ecosystem. I consider localparticl.com to be a necessary “last mile,” bridging the Particl platform to fiat moneys without the need for any financial institutions. With the high penetration of mobile devices around the globe we all effectively are a network of decentralized ATMs in the cryptocurrency era. I see a large part of my job to be convincing people of that.
DT: Who are your real life heroes?
- Steve Wozniak has been at the top of my list since I was a kid. It’s been great to know he thinks positively of cryptocurrency, stating bitcoin is more “genuine and real” than gold.
DT: What does your family and friends think of your work?
- They are rooting for my success even if the details of what I’m doing are a bit fuzzy.
DT: What was the last book you read that you would recommend to others?
- “The Man Who Wasn't There: Investigations into the Strange New Science of the Self” by Anil Ananthaswamy. I’ve found myself referencing this text numerous times for examples of how bizarre the human mind is. This is a fascinating examination of what the self means by looking at what part of it mental disturbances can destroy. And perhaps shining a little light and understanding for the little bit of crazy in us all.
DT: What grinds your gears or are your pet peeves? What do you really dislike?
- People being extremely late for a meeting when they selected the time.
DT: Do you have an “I lost my private keys” type story or a crazy privacy/currency related story? Do share!
- I had numerous tokens in a Parity wallet account which were permanently locked away due to a bug that killed all contracts stored in this fashion. A hardware wallet was then promptly purchased.
DT: Where do you see digital currencies in ten years time? Where would you like to see them?
- Digital currencies will be working in the background on lots of software and everyday transactions for settlement; recording our most important data.
DT: What’s your go-to form of entertainment or pastime? What do you do for fun?
- Brewing beer and attempting culinary feats then consuming the results with friends and family.
DT: You have the power to solve one world problem forever. What would you choose?
- Providing universal access to clean water on a planet mostly covered in the stuff.
DT: What would be the one thing you would say to your 18 year old self, if you had the chance?
- Stay in school. Talk to your school counselor.
Whilst we have you on the line, so to speak, maybe you would like to share the 'what's next' for you and LocalParticl?
- The biggest tasks at hand are providing support for additional cryptocurrencies and the development of a marketing campaign. When the pandemic was ramping up it seemed like poor business sense to promote a business centered around people meeting up, forcing a focus shift. This led to the creation of WizardSwap.io, a non-custodial exchange platform utilizing existing infrastructure and allowing localparticl.com users to optionally provide liquidity for this service for a fee over (or under) market rate of their choosing.
Many thanks to LocalParticl for that refreshing insight into the motivations behind your sterling efforts! We salute you!
