Laser pointers and fire crackers
I was in the seventh grade and about 12 years old, which is 16 years ago, when I got my first urge to buy sets of firecrackers and laser pointers to generally enjoy and sell to my classmates who would also enjoy these asynchronously fun nuisance machines.
Wanting to buy these items, I needed to find a retailer. I of course turned to the internet and remember finding a retailer offering most of the products.
But once I knew where I’d buy these, I needed to figure out how I would buy them. And now I had a few concerns about the buying process:
I did not want my parents finding out I had bought these. If they found out, I could lose my products before ever getting them unboxed.. they surely did not want me having these (however innoucuous) michiveous toys.
I needed a digital form of payment. This was tough. I didn’t have a bank account — just about $70 in small bills saved in my bedroom lockbox. This meant I had no credit card or checks.
From here I started figuring — I don’t have a credit card and more importantly, I can’t use my parents’ credit or debit cards because they’d see the receipt and I’d be caught red handed.
My next line of thinking came to : I had seen gift cards begin taking the form of debit cards — now what if I could buy one of these in a local retailer with my $70 cash and then use it to buy the online products I had my eyes on.
Well looking back I realize this event catalyzed lines of thought for me:
Privacy is important. I knew I believed this then because I didn’t want my parents knowing what I was buying. Later this expanded to a broader understanding: There are plenty of reasons people should have privacy: even ones as simple as not giving others the opportunity to judge our interests, which could include laser pointers, firecrackers, books of choice, and anything else, weirder or less weird.
The financial system feels like a shrouded abyss for regular folk. I knew there was something that wasn’t being explained to me about money and the digital financial medium. The case in point here was the difficulty with which I needed to go through just to buy simple products on the internet. And even then, it was unclear what was backing up all these tools like gift cards. And I remember the feeling of asking myself to learn more, with curiosities demanding to be understood, such as “how come some cards are allowed to enable zero traceability (gift cards) while others aren’t (credit cards).”
Though I finally managed to get laser pointers that year, my twelve year old mind put the more serious issues on hold. It was not until I read about Bitcoin in 2013 that I began to understand why those thoughts had stuck with me.
Stay curious.
— Ned
I remember speculating about the legitimacy of taxation; and came to the conclusion that since we were using 'their' money, taxation was perhaps justified.
They were printing and distributing it, backing it's value etc.
At least here in Australia they weren't stopping us from using alternatives like silver or barter, (only really requiring Aussie dollars for payment of taxes), so it felt disingenuous to get all the benefits of using their money without paying for the privilege.
When I first discovered bitcoin, I realised we now had an alternative (not just 'we' Aussies, but you and I, on opposite sides of the globe)
That's a very interesting argument. I might have to use that one at some point.
More privacy coming to Steemit?
LOL Hopefully before our parents get accounts!
@ned For every action a thought was the root :D Best wishes to you always.
![](https://steemitimages.com/0x0/https://media.giphy.com/media/IL4iTvQH0MjS/giphy.gif)
Having a private wallet would be nice :)
I guess so :)
A lot of people are going to have this same story about @steemmonsters
@goldmatters why exactly?
Being a curious person has its example benefit if "Alexander Graham Bell" if he were not curious to invent a communication device he was never invented the phone.
Your curiosity for the cryptocurrency came to the point of creating your own cryptocurrency your curiosity brought you fruit at the end of it all.
umm hehe awesome sir nd thanks for the steem😍😍
Be an inspiration to me. thanks the story Captain @ned
Wow brother, in my opinion the life was already written the path of Steem and the base was created 16 years ago by putting curiosity in your mind regarding those gift cards and their traceability and afterwards how you've related that moment to 2013 phase of Bitcoin, just see how amazing beings we are, no matter what we do one day one action will connect with other and this cycle always continues, and i want to accept that the GIF which you shared is really funny and sometimes we can fool our pets in an fun way. Ha ha 🙂
There are many ways from which we can produce something which can effect humanity in an good way no matter how many people will get touched with that idea but if some people are effecting in an good way then we have done an amazing thing. And in my opinion, your explorative mind and curiosity came up with this Revolutionary Platform as Steemit, it's not free from pros and cons but nothing is better than this till now and over the time it will get upgraded and it will improve more and it will always move forward and as i said this platform is Revolutionary because the change which third world countries needed, is possibly Steemit is fulfilling to some extent and that's why it's revolutionary and Steemit may be an platform but it's spreading like an idea in lives of people.
Thanks for sharing this post with us and wishing you an great day. Stay blessed. 🙂
Wow!!! Features of a talented and innovative entrepreneur has been within you since before teenage age.
Monday motivational story
So the Steemit idea comes from Laserpointers? Thank you for being curious and giving the teachers @steemiteducation a chance to earn more money so that we can continue to help little Ned's to stay curious. Just imagine if we could get the 360 million teachers worldwide to all be part of steemit. Won't that make a difference in the world?