We sat down with Carl Dong — former Bitcoin Core contributor, now founder of Obscura VPN focused on real-world censorship resistance. In this episode, we dive into: - Why Carl walked away from Bitcoin Core development to tackle privacy head-on - What sets Obscura apart from other VPNs - Lessons from the Great Firewall and routing traffic through hostile networks - Chinese numerology - Carl & Casey's long and storied shared history FOLLOW CARL: https://x.com/carl_dong Get bonus content by subscribing to @hellmoneypod on X: https://x.com/hellmoneypod/creator-subscriptions/subscribe Or support the podcast by sending a BTC donation: bc1qztncp7lmcxdgude4px2vzh72p2yu2aud0eyzys ORDINALS PROTOCOL SHIRT: https://shop.inscribing.com/products/ordinals-protocol-shirt TIMESTAMPS :0:00 Intro & Carl's journey to Bitcoin development 11:59 Hard problems in Bitcoin 16:00 Binaries, compliers, and reproducible builds 37:30 Transitioning from Bitcoin core to working on Obscura VPN 1:05:00 Advice for current Bitcoin core contributors 1:10:00 Ordinals numerology 1:39:00 Outro
