A year ago, Bitcoin (BTC) was in pretty bad shape with its fees climbing to ridiculous levels due to some arbitrary network limitations. This caused a lot of problems in the marketplace with people not wanting to use their BTC to make purchases at local businesses around the Keene area who were accepting the world’s first decentralized cryptocurrency.
Thankfully, Portsmouth-based Anypay came along to save the day at retail with the launch of their Point-of-Sale crypto merchant payment processing system that added DASH as an alternative to BTC. With the ability to choose what to accept at their POS for the first time ever, local merchants eagerly jumped onboard with Anypay and got set up to accept DASH in addition to BTC. As a result, customers were able to avoid the BTC fees by paying with the sane, fast, affordable DASH.
However, only retail’s problems were fixed by Anypay. Cryptocurrency activists in the area were still hurting because the BTC fees had killed one of the most effective forms of direct outreach – printable Bitcoin tips! We had for many months been giving away printed Bitcoin (BTC) tips to local restaurant servers and others with whom we wanted to gift BTC. These tips were made possible by an innovative site called BCTip.org. Sadly, the insanely high Bitcoin fees at the time made using BCTip impossible to justify in late 2017. Since BCTip had at one time been an advertiser with Free Talk Live, my radio show, I reached out to the operator and asked if he were considering adding any other cryptos to the site and he said he was not but pointed out the site was open source.
Creating six $10 Cryptotips with Bitcoin Cash.
So, I teamed up with Michael Hampton of Ringing Liberty and he actually programmed a whole new site from scratch to do the same thing that BCTip did for Bitcoin (BTC), except do it for the alternative cryptocurrencies like DASH and Bitcoin Cash. We launched quietly with a public beta early this year with DASH as the only initial crypto available to print as tips. This month, I’m happy to announce we’ve now added Bitcoin Cash (BCH) to the site and it’s now the default option when creating new tips.
These printed, business card-sized tips are super-easy to use. Just visit Cryptotip.org and create a batch of tips in the US Dollar value of your choice (or international currencies including GBP, EUR, RUB, JPY). Choose which crypto you want to use to fund the tips, DASH or Bitcoin Cash, put in your refund address and print up the tips. Cut them out and then put your tips in your wallet so you can easily give them out wherever you go.
When your recipient visits the URL on their tip, they’ll be given a brief introduction to cryptocurrency and instructed on installing a wallet so they can redeem their tip into their crypto wallet. If they never redeem it, YOU GET YOUR CRYPTO BACK! When you create the tips, you choose the expiration time. THe default is one month. Once the tips expire, you get any unclaimed tips back in your wallet. Cryptotip is a killer app for crypto and a low-risk way to spread cryptocurrency to new people.
They make great stocking stuffers or other gifts as well. Maybe you can think of new, fun ways to give away your Cryptotips!
Don’t forget, a Cryptotip should only be given as a bonus on top of an already good cash tip. You want the server to take you seriously and look at the Cryptotip so be sure to be a good representative of crypto and leave your Cryptotip in addition to your cash. Visit Cryptotip.org to create and print as many tips as you’d like!
Sadly, the very exciting DASH-Back promotion that had been mostly going strong for nearly two months in Keene and Portsmouth has become sporadic in recent days. I’m not sure if it’s technical difficulties or a planned change. I hope it’s the former and that it will return, but for the moment, DASH-Back is effectively over and is no longer providing consistent rebates, as it was over the past couple of months.
As a result of the loss of DASH-Back, I’ve re-edited and combined my recent how-to videos featuring Thomas Parisi of Cheshire TV’s NIGHTSVP visiting Route 101 Local Goods in Keene, NH armed with a cryptocurrency wallet called Coinomi on his phone and a $20 bill. Here’s the new video featuring both parts:
First, in under two minutes, Route 101’s proprietor Chris Rietmann showed Thomas how to buy crypto at the Cryptocurrency Vending Machine. Then, Thomas spends some of his newly-purchased DASH at the register, showing how easy it is to spend crypto at the point-of-sale, thanks to the NH-based Anypay merchant crypto payments processor. Anypay is the POS merchant system in use at nearly all cryptocurrency-accepting businesses in the Monadnock region.
You can see a map of local businesses that are accepting crypto and learn a lot more about why they are accepting it at MonadnockCrypto.com. In the area? Please join our local Meetup group, now with over 100 members!
Thanks to the NH-based company Anypay who provides Route 101’s Point-of-Sale system for crypto-acceptance, it’s super-easy and fast to pay with cryptocurrency in various businesses across Keene! Reasons to accept it at your business, and more can be found at MonadnockCrypto.com.
Before he paid for his DASH coaster, Thomas purchased $20 worth of DASH at the Crypto Vending Machine, also at Route 101 Local Goods. You can see that video here.
Thomas Parisi of Cheshire TV visited Route 101 Local Goods in Keene, NH to buy some cryptocurrency from a Crypto Vending Machine that sells Bitcoin (BTC) and DASH. Rt. 101’s proprietor, Chris Rietmann gives him a full walkthrough in under two minutes!
Note, Thomas already had a multi-crypto wallet on his phone. If you want a wallet for your phone, I recommend “Edge Wallet” or “Coinomi“.
Please drop into Route 101 Local Goods at 661 Marlboro Rd. in Keene, NH Tuesday through Sunday if you have any cryptocurrency questions, or join our local meetup group, which has over 100 members and is one of the most popular meetups in the region!
For a longer, more interview-oriented version of this encounter, please watch the latest episode of Thomas Parisi’s NightSVP, which features Chris talking more about cryptocurrency in general and the soon-to-open Bitcoin Embassy in NH. (more…)
Thanks to Darryl W Perry for putting together his ongoing Candidate Spotlight series. This five minute speech will be airing on Cheshire TV, the local cable access channel until the 2018 election. Here’s an HD version with the correct campaign website (http://ianfreeman.nhliberty.info) on-screen. I misrecalled the URL when we were recording.
Ian Freeman, NHLA Endorsed Candidate for NH Senate District 10 in 2018.
According to a letter I received this week by the Chairman of the New Hampshire Liberty Alliance Keith Ammon, I have received their endorsement for the NH Senate District 10 race in which I am the Libertarian candidate against a Democrat incumbent and Republican opponent here in the Monadnock region.
The New Hampshire Liberty Alliance has become a respected force in the NH state house over the last decade plus, where they are constantly informing all 400 state reps and 24 senators of the pro-liberty positions on various legislation. They also rate every legislator in New Hampshire each year based on how pro-liberty their voting records are. Here are the recently-announced 2018 rankings of the current state legislature.
As a mere candidate, they can only rate me on my answers to their candidate survey and not surprisingly, I received their endorsement along with a very generous check, which I politely refused, as I’m running a near-zero-budget message campaign and am not accepting contributions.
This year, Ammon’s letter informed me that the NHLA is tightening up their endorsement requirements and only endorsing incumbents who receive a B+ or better in their yearly liberty ratings over the last two years and only endorsing candidates who score at least 85% on the survey. That’s great news! I’m glad to see the NH Liberty Alliance demanding more adherence to principles by their endorsed candidates. I’m proud to be one of them. Here’s their list of endorsed candidates statewide so far for this year’s election.
As part of my near-zero budget campaign for NH Senate district 10, I’ve been posting my responses to various candidate surveys and questionnaires. Here are the latest ones I received this week.
First up, the Marijuana Policy Project’s survey, where I had to answer no to one of their questions about supporting regulation and taxation of cannabis. That’s because I’m against government control of cannabis in any way. I understand MPP is trying to lobby politicians and that’s why they propose such schemes to them. As a principled libertarian, while I’d vote for a tax-and-regulate bill if it were the only way to end prohibition, I don’t support taxes or regulations. I only support freedom, which means ending drug prohibition across the board and letting people grow, sell, possess, smoke, and distribute cannabis without annoying and restrictive government licenses.
Next, it’s the NH Right to Life survey. Abortion is an issue that libertarians have strong disagreements with each other over. While all real libertarians are against aggressive force against other humans, none of them agree at which point a fetus becomes a human. I choose the side that as long as the fetus is dependent on the mother’s connection to survive, it is a part of her and she can decide what to do with it, which will likely not make me popular with the anti-abortion group. That said, I do respect their right to protest and express their opinion. The correct libertarian position on abortion is that the government should neither prohibit or pay for them.
