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'Be Your Own Bank' and the 'Luxury of Apathy'

The powerful idea and meme at the core of Bitcoin self-sovereignty is incredibly empowering but has an unspoken element that requires persistent competence and at least for some makes it more trouble than it's worth.

Updated Sep 14, 2021, 8:49 a.m. Published Jun 7, 2020, 2:15 p.m.

The best Sundays are for long reads and deep conversations. Recently the hosts of the Let's Talk Bitcoin! Show gathered to discuss the systemically important "Be Your Own Bank" bitcoin narrative and what it means around the world today.

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The episode is sponsored by eToro.com and The Internet of Money Vol. 3.

On today's episode of Let's Talk Bitcoin! you're invited to join Andreas M. Antonopoulos, Adam B. Levine, Jonathan Mohan and Stephanie Murpy for an in-depth discussion about the ups and downs, the good and the bad about being your own bank in the modern world of bitcoin.

The powerful idea and meme at the core of Bitcoin self-sovereignty is incredibly empowering but has an unspoken element that requires persistent competence and at least for some makes it more trouble than it's worth.

As the world reels from the response to COVID-19 and disorder seems the trend on the rise, we discuss how although Bitcoin makes it possible for anyone to be their own bank, who actually wants the constant vigilance and anxiety that goes along with it? And what happens when things go wrong and there's no-one to blame but ourselves?

"...There is tremendous luxury in having institutions that at least appear to be stable over some period of time where you don't need to worry about the details of how they work and what happens under failure conditions. That luxury is pretty concentrated in just a few places in the world and at some point you can't afford that luxury of apathy. - Andreas M. Antonopoulos, LTB! #437

Credits for LTB #437 'Be Your Own Bank' and the 'Luxury of Apathy'

This episode of Let's Talk Bitcoin features Stephanie Murphy, Jonathan Mohan, Andreas M. Antonopoulos and Adam B. Levine. Music provided by Jared Rubens, FromEther and Adam B. Levine, with editing by Jonas.

Podcasts Discussion lets talk bitcoin be your own bank

Adam B. Levine

Adam B. Levine joined CoinDesk in 2019 as the editor of its new audio and podcasts division. Previously, Adam founded the long-running Let's Talk Bitcoin! talk show with co-hosts Stephanie Murphy and Andreas M. Antonopoulos.

Finding early success with the show, Adam transformed the podcast's homepage into a full newsdesk and publishing platform, founding the LTB Network in January of 2014 to help broaden the conversation with new and different perspectives. In the Spring of that year, he would go on to launch the first and largest tokenized rewards program for creators and their audience. In what many have called an early influential version of "Steemit"; LTBCOIN, which was awarded to both content creators and members of the audience for participation was distributed until the LTBN was acquired by BTC, Inc. in January of 2017.

With the network launched and growing, in late 2014 Adam turned his attention to the practical challenges of administering the tokenized program and founded Tokenly, Inc. There, he led the development of early tokenized vending machines with Swapbot, tokenized identity solution Tokenpass, e-commerce with TokenMarkets.com and media with Token.fm. Adam owns some BTC, ETH and small positions in a number of other tokens.