The Australian baseball team announced plans to fully adopt bitcoin, including ticket sales, paying players in bitcoin and making a bitcoin-related jersey.
This is a recording of a recent Twitter Spaces conversation about the Australian baseball team, Perth Heat, moving to a bitcoin standard.
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So there are quite a few different parts to our operation. One of the smaller parts, but quite interesting ways we present ourselves is with our uniforms. This season we had two jerseys, which were Bitcoin baseball jerseys, the white and black one which had been incredibly popular worldwide in terms of people and fans who wanted to purchase those. For the coming season for 22/23, we thought it was important that we could put it out to the Bitcoin community to design our jersey. As of today, we’re running a competition, which as you said is global. We want you to design our Bitcoin baseball jersey and there’s really no rules or guidelines in terms of how this jersey needs to look or what it has to include.
The guidelines are simple. It can be any color, pattern tone, that you decide, and it can be as subtle or as loud as the individual wants to make it. Traditionally, Perth Heat, if you looked at our colors, they’re red, white, and black in terms of our jerseys, but that’s not to say that this one can’t be orange or it can’t be bright yellow, it can’t be a mixture of those colors or any of that. Be creative. This is a jersey for the Bitcoin community to design. We’re really excited by the combinations that we’re going to see come through.
We’ve just sent through a tweet which has got a link which can go to our website. There’s a template there, which you download, design the jersey, and then send it back to our office and we’ll start sharing those designs as they come through the next couple of weeks and then announce the winner. The other Jersey, which we judge to be the best will be the Bitcoin baseball jersey for 22/23, and that will be one in games on our global broadcast. It’s going to be pretty cool and that’s going to be someone from the Bitcoin community who’s in some ways helping the global adoption of Bitcoin by designing a jersey, which will proudly wear throughout the season, which we are planning on being a championship season.
[6:18] Q: I love it. Very, very exciting. I love the fact that you guys are bringing in fans from all over it. I’m assuming that in the same way that last year’s jerseys were on sale, everyone in the world, these would also, whatever Jersey is selected, would also be the jersey marketed and sold to everyone. [6:38] Perth: Absolutely. This will be our Bitcoin baseball jersey. Not only will we wear it, but it’ll be online for Bitcoiners around the world to purchase and wear proudly. The Bitcoin community has got so many talented people in so many different sections, departments, areas, were very, very talented and creative group as well. Like I said, my ideas with our marketing team in new balance as to how to put Jersey together for this season, but what we’ll get from the community will be so much better. What excites us so much is that there’s many talented designers throughout the Bitcoin community. Let’s see what we can put together. As said, it doesn’t have to be necessarily loud and have a million Bitcoin logos all over the jersey. Something that’s going quite subtle. Maybe something that looks the sharpest but let’s get the designs coming through. We’ll post them, we’ll get reaction, we’ll get feedback from across the network and through Bitcoin Magazine and it’s got to be pretty powerful, the jersey that we get together and maybe the story that’s attached to it as well.Also, a really nice part of this exercise is that no doubt some of the jerseys that come back with the designs will also have a really nice story to it as well, which will be great to share. That story can be anything from here. Someone’s journey with Bitcoin, how they got started, who orange pilled, a whole heap of things. As I said, there are no rules with the design. I think that’s pretty important for people to understand. So in different shades of color, textures, patterns, let’s get as creative as we can.
[8:36] Q: This is going to be a lot of fun. I’m really excited to see some of the submissions. I already have a couple people that I’m going to DM and be like, “You should submit something to this.” I’m curious because I’m a loud guy. I like wearing loud clothes. If you saw me in Miami, I looked ridiculous most of the time. But in American sports, they love to make all these ridiculous extra jerseys sometimes that have nothing to do with the colors of the team, but maybe have something more to do with the city. In my mind, you brought up the fact that your colors are synonymous with that of the Miami HEAT, but this last year, I thought the freshest jerseys in the NBA were the Miami Vice jerseys. Obviously, there’s the tie into the show. Is there anything culturally relevant to Perth that maybe you’d love to see incorporated into this as well as Bitcoin? [9:27] Perth: That’s a really good question. Some from Perth that we could incorporate, probably the state colors. If you looked at that, they’re gold and black. So there’s that attachment to the city, we’re a coastal city. If the jersey was blue, naturally be very different to anything that we’d previously worn that would have a connection, huge mining, and resources, state. So up north, there’s a lot of the red dust coming through, but nothing specific. If it’s a complete contrast or anything we’ve had, we’ll give it more relevance in some ways stand out and people understand. So if this jersey was the most foreign jersey ever seen on a sporting team, well that could become a pretty good marketing play for Bitcoin as well because people around them will be going, “Have you seen that baseball jersey on Perth Heat?”It’s 27 different colors, become a talking point and how are the Bitcoin baseball team. And then suddenly, the orange peeling process with people that had nothing to do with sport or Bitcoin becomes relevant because they’re introduced to Bitcoin in a different way through what could possibly be the most horrendous jersey that anyone’s ever seen in world sports. As I’ve said, have some fun. I think going to be important, and being created.
[11:01] Q: I apologize in advance for the absurd submission that you’ll receive on my behalf. [11:08] Perth: No, no, that’s good. Keep it coming on. As I said, we’ll sharethem all and we’ll get feedback. I’ve got a feeling that something loud be well-liked.
[11:23] Q: I’d love to expand a little bit. You brought up something, I think that every Bitcoiner loved to discuss and love seeing when teams or people, especially in sports, start to take on Bitcoin. Perth Heat was one of the earliest adopters who’s taking on Bitcoin. We’ve since seen efforts by teams all over the world now, as well as athletes all over the world. I’m curious what the reception locally in Perth has been since your adoption of Bitcoin, what that conversation’s been like with fans as well as community members. [12:02] Perth: Yeah. Maybe I’ll get Patrick to come on here and speak to this as a Chief Bitcoin Officer who’s been instrumental in our project. I’ve said a couple of times, I think we’ll see change in the world moving forward where it’s no longer the CEO who’s at the top of the C-suite executive will be the CBO. The amount of reference I have with Patrick each day is more than anyone else within the organization. Patrick’s had a lot to do with how we’ve onboarded and what we’ve done. So maybe he can be a best speaker to this one, Pat. [12:41] Pleb: Yeah. Awesome. Thank you, Steve, and thanks to Bitcoin magazine for having us. I would say the reactions in the beginning locally was one of absolute intrigue. I think we’re past the point where there’s confusion in the general public about Bitcoin. Obviously, they’ve probably been touched by one or two times and they were just looking for an excuse to look deeper down the rabbit hole or to even start to stumble down the rabbit hole. Locally, in terms of government, we’ve seen nothing but support. As they start through meetings with them, they start to understand and realize how they can leverage everything that is happening at the Bitcoin part essentially, how they can use this in their own ways to advance their own agendas locally.The public has been responsive in what it’s going to mean for the team, what it’s going to mean for the players, the organization, our ability to continue to provide positive influence in the community. There’s been questions, but the questions haven’t been around, is it a Ponzi scheme? The questions have been around tell us exactly how it works? How is it going to integrate? How do you run a team on a Bitcoin standard? You mentioned other sports teams. Teams saying, coming out, and trying to leverage off of announcements saying, “We’re going to accept Bitcoin for tickets,” and that’s fantastic. There’s athletes coming out saying, “We’re going to convert some of our salaries into Bitcoin.” Again, a positive step in the right direction.
The Bitcoin baseball team is entirely different. Everything that we are doing here is different because it’s coming from the top down. This is a change from the organization, from the inside out. Essentially, we’re going to do everything that Bitcoin users have always desired. We’re going to do that. We’re going to try to represent the best of Bitcoin to our best ability. So that’s we’re going to pay players in Bitcoin. That’s we’re going to accept all the sponsorship from Bitcoin. You’ll be able to buy everything at the ballpark in Bitcoin. There’s going to be a number of different ways that fans can interact with Bitcoin and get education components in Bitcoin. We’re going to put Bitcoin on the balance sheet, we’re only going to put Bitcoin on the balance sheet. All of these things, everything that Bitcoiners have ever wanted is what we’re doing now.
Is it early in a lot of those areas? Yes, absolutely. But we knew that making the announcement, we knew that in the months leading up to it, was it going to be possible to seamlessly integrate all areas of the business straight out the gate? No, but we wanted to take on that challenge because if not us then, who? Someone has to do it, someone has to be the first to do all of these things. We think that sports can have a major impact on the general public. It’s one thing to sit around in the Twitter world and communicate back and forth, argue over the merits of one theory over another theory. It’s another two to reach out to the general public and sort of Trojan horse, the education of exactly what is happening with the money and sports is a fantastic way to do that.
It’s been proven over the last hundred years through fiat marketers, that a good way to get your message out there is to go through sports. We’re trying to do the exact same thing, but the opposite and try it towards some [inaudible] people into understanding, even in the community. We have a proof of work of 30 some odd years of being up the impact in the community. We think sports can be the vehicle that everyone involved with the team is going to be better off because of it. Therefore, the community is going to be better off for it. All of the questions that have come from the community, from the players, from the staff as we started to make this change, there has been very little, if any negative feedback, it’s all been “Okay, how does this help? How can we use this to become a better baseball player, to become a better community member, to become a better organization?”
So far, it has been a real pleasure in dealing with everybody because the openness is there because people sense like a splinter in their mind, they sense that something is not right. Hopefully, the Bitcoin baseball team can be there. If it’s not their initial point of contact for what the solution might be, we can just be another support system to show people that yes, this isn’t something that your crazy uncle is investing in. This is something that an entire organization, an extremely successful sporting organization can run off of. It’s been really, really positive all the feedback and excited about the future and the season and the jersey.
I would just reiterate what Steve said. One of the beautiful things about the open-source nature of Bitcoin is that we can leverage talent from all over the world. When we made the announcement, there was a bunch of groups, companies, individuals that reached out and said, “I’m not a coder. I don’t know how to do technical things, but I have other skills, but I can’t find a Bitcoin job where I can’t get involved.” Well, this is an opportunity to graphic designers or just normal pledges around the world to hopefully be able to create a cultural icon that we can say, “This represents Bitcoin. This represents what we think is a Bitcoiner, and people can wear it and be proud that it represents the network.” That’s exactly what we’re going through, so it’s an exciting announcement. We’re looking forward to hearing the feedback and hearing which direction the network wants to go going.
[ads] [20:06] Q: I love that. It’s very exciting to hear how the reception internally, both with your own players and with the community itself, has been open and collaborative. How have you felt the impact or support of Bitcoiners from abroad has been for you guys and your efforts all the way out, all the way down under? [20:30] Pleb: The individual Bitcoiners when we’re around the world have been nothing but positive. We had the exact reaction that we anticipated from the corners around the world. I think everyone has been positive. Everyone that has reached out had ideas to make us better. Every time that Steve or I do any sort of media, whether that’s legacy media here in Australia or around the world, or whether that is doing stuff like this or different podcasts, it has always been that we’re trying to harness the best of Bitcoin and show that off and be a showcase for people that are new to the idea and for salty veterans. They have come up with amazing ideas that we’ve actually integrated into the business itself.So I would reiterate that if you are a Bitcoiner and you wanted to see a Bitcoin company, do something, please reach out and let us know because we don’t have all the ideas. We are trying to leverage the open-source nature of it. Everybody has these things that they can contribute and they can make an immediate impact. The story of the Bitcoin baseball team locally, nationally, and internationally has gained so much traction that oftentimes this will be the first dip of the toe in the water for most people that are hearing about this. We like those ideas from individuals around the world. I think on the company side of things, as it gets bigger and bigger, Bitcoin it may seem really, really big from the inside looking around it, seeing all the companies, but it’s still at an extremely nascent stage of development.
Companies now are only just starting to realize there’s a world outside of Twitter and podcasts that we can reach and sports can be a great way to do that, but it’s also about educating them on not being a Fiat Sponsorship Organization opportunity. We don’t want to partner up with companies that just want to put a patch on a Jersey. This is about creating the future. This is about stumbling forward together and making a better world for the people that follow the team, enjoy the team, and just for the network in general. It has been a learning experience and it has been constantly evolving, but every time we sit down for chats with individuals or companies, everyone is getting smarter by the day because of the education that’s out there. It just seems like we are moving at a mile a minute, everything’s happening so quickly, and the landscape is changing so rapidly that it makes for extremely exciting times.
[23:09] Q: It really is exciting. The first call to action is for anyone and everyone to submit a jersey design. I’m curious, when is the deadline for this or when is the cutoff? I’m assuming it has to be well before the season. [23:25] Perth: No deadline. We got a couple of weeks to run through this, so 27th of June. So the end of this month is when we’ll close it. A few weeks after people get started on putting the jersey together. We’ve got to obviously finalize design files with new balance, then produce, and also ship them. The advice is get started ASAP. [23:56] Q: Got it. that’s just about three weeks guys to actually get this design into them and have them sort of start to decide what they want. I’m curious, Patrick, you kind of brought up a very interesting point about how there are some resources that the community still needs build-out. I haven’t been to Australia in almost a decade. Now, I’m curious of what is available technologically on the Bitcoin network for you guys? What is it that you guys feel you could use more support or help with? Is it getting more wallet options? Is it getting more exchange options or places to buy Bitcoin, or is it getting more lightning node set up? What is it you’re finding that Australia or at least Perth needs more of? [24:49] Pleb: Yeah, I don’t know. Here in Perth, the world is so easily connected now. It’s like we can get access to all of those things. It’s more from an organizational standpoint because what we are trying to do, as I mentioned before, is we are trying to not send people down a path that is questionable when they are just making their inroads into Bitcoin. We are trying to, just like you would orange peel your mom or your dad, and you would not send them down this path, just faulty decisions or decisions that could end up to hurt them. We are trying to construct a path forward for everyone that is coming in the Bitcoin world because we know that we have lots of fans, both locally, nationally, and internationally, we’re trying to set the easiest path forward for them that is going to give them the most secure access to the best form of money that they’ve ever had. That means partnering up with organizations, with companies that have this in mind.Obviously, it doesn’t take long on Bitcoin, Twitter, or it doesn’t take long in the Bitcoin space to find those companies that have a reputation. That is why we’re looking to partner with those companies so that we can have a clear pathway that we can be proud of. As Bitcoiners ourselves, what would we have our mom or dad do? How would we bring them into the space? Where would we send them? The people listening to this probably know all those answers, but now, how do we take that and how do we get organizations excited about it? Because we can sense the team. We have sponsors. They have embraced the idea of Bitcoin, but we can do so much more. This is an opportunity we spoke of when we first made the announcement that we are, whether we like it or not, this is a representation of Bitcoin, making this whole song and dance about being the first team on a Bitcoin standard.
We have done on purpose because we think we can do a great job of it. We think that we are in the position with the flexibility that we have, the way that the league is structured here, the way that the team itself is structured, there are really no rules that we have to abide by. That means that we can operate on Bitcoin standard in every way. It’s just about getting the resources that we think like this is a once-in-a-generation, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to put our best foot forward as a community and finding organizations that understand the opportunity. This is no longer just an Australian baseball team. This isn’t just an Australian baseball team playing in Australia and trying to win a championship. This is a representation of, can a Bitcoin standard work in a company that isn’t a giant S&P 500 company that has all the resources? We are a fairly smallish business that’s under a hundred employees. So can we make this work? If so, can we do it in a way that we can be proud of?
We don’t have to say, “Well, we don’t have to caveat things with yes. Go to this place, but look out for X, Y, Z, or look out for this game, or you have to do this.” No, it’s just like, “Let’s set up a path that is representative of what we think the best that Bitcoin can offer.” Can we be proud of that? Can we sleep at night and go, we’re sending people the way that we would send our mom and dad. We were exposing them to just how powerful the network can be. So I think it’s less about getting our hands on the actual hardware and the structures. All of those things that we have in place now are completely possible, completely doable. The hard part is because we’re the first, and because these companies in the industry just in general is so nascent, it’s like there hasn’t been the opportunity to move past the interior circles that have built up over time.
The first 10 years have been a really hard fight and the network, the participants have done a fantastic job of making it as secure as it has been, and as successful as it has been. The next step is, “Okay, how do we build on that strength? What do we show the people? How do we show them? How do we convey to them that there is strength in this network and there is essentially limitless upside to adoption of the network and how much better the world is going to be?” We think we can do that through sport. we think being the first that this is going to offer in international story, international appeal to say, “Hey, we can be a beacon for hope, both in sports and just in Bitcoin in general, as a success story. This is how you can run a company like this, and this is how it can be successful. These are the exact ways, and these are the people that you can partner up with to ensure that it’s a success and nobody gets rug pulled or some shit.”
[29:25] Q: I’m curious generally from a sports fan perspective here. Talk to us about the league, the dynamics, how does it work? Is there a playoff structure? Is it more set up like a league champion? Is the champion of the season? How would the Perth Heat consider themselves champion at the end of the year? [29:48] Perth: Yeah, that’s a good question. It’s an international competition Australian Baseball League. It’s one of the best baseball league in the world. There’s six teams from Australia, Perth, Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne, and Sydney. There’s a team from Auckland in New Zealand, and there’s another international team from Korea who actually base themselves in Australia for the entire season. A Korean team jets into Victoria and is based there for four to five months of the year, which is quite incredible. But in international competition, eight teams broken up into two divisions of four teams. You play 40 games in the regular season, and then the top two teams from each division go through to the playoffs, which are semi-final series, best of three with the two winners going into the championship series over three games as well.So to be crowned ABL champions and to win the [inaudible] insured, which we’re aiming to do for the 16th time. You’d need to win a championship series, similar to the world series. The difference being three games as opposed to seven. We’re in the process of putting that championship roster together at the moment. We’ve got another meeting, which will continue to assess a lot of the talent from around the world, especially from the United States. There’s a fair bit of pressure on us now as the Bitcoin baseball team as we say, Bitcoin always wins. So we can’t be the Bitcoin baseball team and finish second, put it that way, Q.
[31:22] Q: I like that. Is it like a hard cap? Or can you guys just go out and spend as much as you see? What I’m thinking is, do we sit on the Bitcoin Stash until we get to like a half-million coin and then go convince one of these 40-year-old MLB players? We have our approvals in that point, right? [31:42] Perth: Yeah. You can always be creative, but we made a huge announcement about four weeks ago with the announcement Josh Reddick is coming to the Perth Heat. Josh won the world series with the Houston Astros in 2017, 13 hundreds, five major [inaudible]. [32:00] Q: That doesn’t count. 2017 Houston Astros don’t count, I’m sorry. [32:07] Perth: If you look at Josh, he was probably the least compliant. There’s some really nice articles on his leadership throughout that 2017 world series. But Josh’s coming is going to be an incredible side and an outfield for us. Since his announcement, the phone has been ringing hot with players wanting to come and join the team. Also, players want to be part of something bigger than just a baseball team, and they want to be part of a Bitcoin baseball team because they want to be paid in BTC. What we’re building and the roster we’re developing is exciting. Our mindset is really, really simple, it is “Championship, championship, championships.” So there are weekly meetings on how we put this team together and the roster and making sure we get the balance right. We’re in a championship mindset as we should be as the Bitcoin baseball team. [33:06] Q: That’s super exciting. You stole essentially the answer to the question I was going to ask of had players reach out to you guys to get paid or to come at least to play for you so that they can be paid in Bitcoin? Talk to us about those conversations because that must be really exciting. [33:23] Perth: Well, it’s exactly what the reaction we want. So we have, as Patrick said, the reaction internally from our local players was first class and second to none. Really, really simple when people say, “Was it a hard conversation?” Actually, the opposite, but have players now reached out because they would like to be part of the Bitcoin baseball team? Yeah, absolutely. Unfortunately, we’ve only got 30 odd spaces on our roster. We can only accommodate so many imports that we need to strike the balance up. We’re at the Bitcoin Conference when we listened to the sports panel that was put on by CashApp and listening to Aaron Rogers who spoke so well about where Bitcoin is placed within the NFL.He spoke about probably being five years that we’ll see players take their actual value of their contract in Bitcoin. I don’t think it’s going to be five years at all. The way we’re tracking, I think it’s going to be in five months’ time. I’d be surprised if Perth Heat don’t have a player that takes the value of his contract in Bitcoin in the season coming. That’s how advanced some of our discussions are with certain individuals about wanting the contract paid out to the value of Bitcoin and not in fiat.
[34:52] Q: Okay. You didn’t realize that by coming onto this space with me, you’re actually kind of on like a TMZ ASX version of this. I’m sure you know in America we love to share every athlete’s salary. I’m genuinely curious more, what’s the general range of a player in the league, not necessarily one of your players, but what’s the league average salary for baseball players? [35:19] Perth: Yeah. It’s a good question. I can’t give the amount and probably part of that is that they come to us, our team gets formed in a whole heap of different ways. We’ve got Aussie pros who have signed their professional contracts and are working their way up through the minor leagues, and then just come back to Perth to continue playing in the off-season to make sure they’re ready for spring training. Then, we’ve got players like Josh Reddick who have just finished the MLB last year, will come out and play with us. Clearly, salary’s not the reason why he’s coming to Perth. We’ve got an association with the Tampa Bay Rays and they send us out their best prospects each summer. There’s up to 10 players. That’s almost a third of our squad who come from the Tampa Bay Rays, but that’s part of the affiliation program.Again, it’s the player’s contract value there is part of what they’re doing over a 12-month period. You’re really looking at a salary, which is almost just 10 weeks of a year. Again, we’re not certainly not talking millions of dollars or even hundreds of thousands of dollars in that instance. On a scale of where world salaries are in a lot of sports, it would be on the low end of that, but it’s also proportionate to the year and the different types of players’ contracts on what they’re already receiving for baseball, for the rest of the season, and in other parts of the world as well.
[36:50] Q: No, that makes sense to me. You’re talking about in this league, at least where they pay way too much money for boys to play with balls and sticks, they play 162 games. It’s like five now, six months out of the year, somehow way too many months, but talk them a little bit more with Perth with this league being such a small section of the season, is there maybe conversations to explore playing or traveling the team to maybe play a series of games with some minor league teams here in America and do an American Bitcoin team tour? [37:33] Perth: Absolutely. That’s what we think is the evolution of this. If you look at the Globetrotters, they became an amazing marketing arm for basketball. They didn’t start with that in mind. But what the Globetrotters did for basketball was quite powerful. Perth Heat, the Bitcoin baseball team can do something similar for Bitcoin, but baseball is huge in different parts of the world. There’s a league in France says, “Now, imagine the Bitcoin baseball team landing in Paris to play a game in that city. Suddenly, you can see [inaudible] newspaper having an interest in this story and the global adoption of Bitcoin continuing, why is a baseball team or the Bitcoin baseball team? What are they doing in Paris? What’s this all about?”We had a conversation with another team which has got its own fan token. I think we could call it a shitcoin and they asked us to play games. Are we going to see the first rivalry in world sport between the Bitcoin baseball team and shitcoin’s sports team? That’d be pretty cool. That’s in a country not too far away from the US. Would I love to see bring the team over and maybe play like in the Texas Longhorns, the best college team in the US, or a couple of spring training games against our sister team, the Tampa Bay Rays, and play that throughout Miami or align that with the Bitcoin conference in years coming, if it remains in Miami or different parts of the United States. There’s a heap of opportunities to explore, to do with the team.
As Patrick said, with some of those adventures, it certainly needs some support from the network and from some of the organizations within that. We’re open to becoming a team that can play 12 months a year anywhere in the world. I think that’d be incredibly powerful for Bitcoin and for the marketing in terms of global adoption and taking it to different parts of the world with a different storyline. It’s great that we have these Twitter spaces and we’ve got such a strong community on Twitter, but we also need to break out of that. If we’re going to challenge the Fiat media, then we need to go into areas that we can explore in different ways and help the global adoption.
[40:16] Q: I’m excited. Honestly, sitting here just getting ready to watch you guys play at a future Bitcoin conference. I cannot confirm or say anything about the location, although I did see my boss left this room, so maybe I can. Who knows? [40:35] Perth: Don’t get CK in trouble. [40:37] Q: CK would kill me. I mean, that would be incredible. Obviously, there are a lot of steps before we get to that point. The first step being this jersey design, I’m curious when then does your guys’ season start your winter season? I’m assuming that it’s going to be sometime in July or August. [40:59] Perth: Yeah, we’ll start late October. We will have a Spring Training Program from September with an international series, which we’re just finalizing now for October going into the season. We also looking to host the All-Star Contest in Perth as well, which will have stars and stripes team USA versus the rest of the world at our ballpark we’ve got some exciting announcements and Patrick may be able to just touch on this in regards to our Bitcoin market that we’re putting together at the ballpark. Next week, we’ll have something pretty revolutionary in terms of the lightning and what we’re doing with the team in terms of how that will integrate with gameplay. But Pleb, maybe it’s just handy to mention how the Bitcoin markets will also integrate into game day. [41:54] Pleb: Yeah, sure. Essentially, as I touched on before, we are trying to do everything that we can with Bitcoin, everywhere that we can, and try and get our fingers into as many pies as we can with allowing the best of that work to be visible to every individual. The Bitcoiners that are very experienced and brand new people in one of those is this idea that as the Bitcoin baseball team, when we actually have home series games and we get attendance at the ballpark, there is a Bitcoin circular economy that will be able to walk individuals through both experienced Bitcoiners and people that are brand new from getting their first Bitcoin to storing their Bitcoin, to understanding the Bitcoin, to spending the Bitcoin. Basically, a circular economy of Bitcoin. Like Steve said, there’s a number of announcements, hopefully, that are coming up in the near future with the people that are making this all possible.But the idea is, again, to show people just how easy it is because it’s really hard to wrap your head around it in a theoretical way. If you’re just sitting back, reading a newspaper article, or you’re hearing Steve on the local news program, it’s kind of hard to wrap your head around just how easy it is to use it and how far the infrastructure has come. Now, it’s becoming so easy that really, it’s just about making people aware that it is simpler, faster, quicker, all of these things over the legacy system, and the BTC markets is our opportunity to do that. The idea is again, to get companies who have products that are going to make it easy to do that and to make it secure, to make it like we said before, sort of the best that is out there, and then walk people through the entire experience and let them see exactly what secures the network, let them see how they can interact with it, and how easy it is to change over, to see how they can exchange it peer-to-peer, how they can use it to buy things at the ballpark, and how it is essentially we’ve got into the point where there isn’t a difference now, or at least there will not be at the Bitcoin ballpark.
There won’t be a difference between getting out the Visa card to pay for the beer versus using lightning pit to pay for the beer. The idea is to showcase not only the people at the ballpark, but obviously, this is going to be a large story. At least, in the national scene for Australia, just the interest that we had for media outlets already as world has started to leap that there is this community that is building up, and there’s this idea of a circular economy at the ballpark that we think it’s going to be really impactful just to hear those success stories of people that have never heard of Bitcoin before coming to the ballpark with the family, to enjoy a night out, watching, as you said, grown men play with balls and sticks. All of a sudden, they are halfway orange peeled to understanding that they never knew what money was. No one ever taught them. It was probably a reason that no one ever taught them and giving them the power. Basically, giving the power back to the people to say, “This is a better way of transacting, not only a better way of storing the energy that you’ve transformed but a better way of transacting and sharing it with each other.”
Oftentimes, people forget that money is a tool, especially if you never know what money is in the first place. You forget that money is a tool and it’s got a very specific purpose and a very specific goal. It is more efficient than any other system at doing those things. If it’s more efficient at doing those things, it is going to make the users of that system better. It’s going to make their life better. It’s going to make their access to energy reserves better, and those positive impacts quickly add up. It’s a moment that you don’t forget, at least to the people that we have spoken to when you see that first lightning transaction happen. When you first see all the light switches on, “Oh, I see. Now, I just paid for that. That’s gone.” No one was in between, no one had the ability to stop it. No one had the ability to intermediate in between us. I wanted the beer, I gave you. I gave you the Bitcoin for the beer. No one thought it’s a powerful thing versus just sitting down and talking about it.
The Bitcoin market is this idea of getting as close to you can as hands-on with digital energy. We’re trying to get people into that experience in a positive environment where they can ask questions to people that will have the answers and will not lead them astray because we are going to be around. This is not a short-term play. We’re not, as Steve mentioned, the fan token thing. Obviously, the easiest money grab that we possibly could have done was, “Let’s go whole hog on a fan token.” Let’s try and rug pull every supporter that we’ve built up over the last 30 years, we can make a quick cash grab, and then we can buy Bitcoin with it, not tell anybody. All of a sudden, the organization is quickly better off, or we could say, “We could play to fight.” And say that we are going to try to win trust by being as honest as we can about what we think the most powerful technology in the world that has the ability to empower humans to be better versions of themselves and better versions collectively.
We can do that through just staying the course and being honest and true to the values that we think Bitcoin, where the values emerge from the use of Bitcoin. So the Bitcoin market physically is that spot where hopefully we can get new and old Bitcoiners to see just how this system might work in the future, just to give them a glimpse of how powerful it is going to be. Hopefully, not only gets traction in the media, but also in the people that come and enjoy the experience. Also, again, just an aside for companies in the space, we have been very forthright in saying, “We want to be on the front. We want to be leading from the front. We want your ideas.” If you have a product or an idea that you think, “Hmm, how can I get my experiment in the hands of 10,000 people in a weekend?” I know-how. Steve knows how. You contact us and you say, “This is what I have. This is what I’m thinking. This is the whole idea again, behind the jerseys.” It’s like know that [inaudible] but we can certainly recognize those ideas. We can certainly try and promote them in the hopes of creating a better team, a better community, and a better network, all at the same time.
[ads] [48:52] Q: Powerful, very powerful. Steve, I wanted to give you the opportunity, I think, to maybe share or touch on have any other teams in your league reached out to you guys about this? Have any of their players been like, “Yo, pay me a Bitcoin.” They’re like, “How do we do this?” [49:12] Perth: Yeah. We had an ABL, a conference with all the GMs probably about a month ago. And then there is no doubt. The question I was asked the most from all the other teams was about our Bitcoin journey. How does it work? What are you doing? Why? Etc. We’re intrigued by it. Certainly, the ABL have been supportive. We had their marketing team sit in on a meeting two weeks ago with us which we had with one of our partners in terms of looking to do something on one of the rounds that we have throughout the season. Definitely intrigued sitting back. The feeling I get is, our teams will sit back, they’ll watch how the season plays out, and then realized they should have got involved two years ago.Definitely interested continually asking questions. What we see from around Australia is even different teams from different codes make inquiry and asking what they need to do to take the first steps. So it’s not necessarily just the ABL teams who have reached out. We’ve had sports teams from different codes, but the Australian rules football, soccer, a basketball team, and also a rugby team. I think that is touch base. It’s been really good share of different teams from different sports leagues. I must say that the response we’ve had from the ABL from our head office has been fantastic. Showing that they want to be a progressive organization that they’re keen to learn, fully supportive of what we’re doing, and certainly have not provided any red tape. This is not the NFL. We’re not dealing with Jerry or the Craft family needing to get sign-off from 30 odd owners to do something. It gets quite the opposite. The ABL have said, “We’re fully supportive.” Let’s see where this leads us as a league.
[51:30] Q: Fuck, roger get down. Literally the worst. All right. I’ll admit I’m Red Sox fan. Also, I hate your Rays and I also absolutely despise the New York Yankees. Who is the Perth Heat’s rival in the ALB? [51:52] Perth: Right now, it’d have to be the Melbourne Aces. There were six, 15 championships been the premier, same Australian Baseball League. They’ve won the last two championships. Right now, that’s who we’re chasing, that’s who we need to stop to win the championship this year, and who beat us in the last championship series prior to COVID. So that was a one-off game at their ballpark. Certainly, no [inaudible] in the team that we need to catch. They’re maybe the Yankees of the Australian Baseball League right now. So that’s who’s in our sight. [52:29] Q: I love talking shit. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to offend. [52:33] Perth: No, that’s good. Our rivalries are a great sport. We need all Bitcoins rooting for the Perth Heat and supporting us throughout the summer to make sure that we bring the championship back to Bitcoin ballpark. [52:49] Q: I’m assuming you still accept forms of fiat, or if not, what do you do if someone tries to pull out fiat? [53:00] Perth: Oh, look, just by the nature of the city that we’re in and the amount of transactions in Bitcoin, we still accept fiat payments across the board. We need need to strike the balance, continue the education, and make sure we provide that option for all our fans that are coming to the ballpark. We accept Bitcoin payments to buy beer, to buy a hotdog, to buy merchandise, ticketing, except for sponsorships. We still have to have that balance amount with the fiat. It’s probably going to take a little bit more time before we can fully transition out of fiat. The more people we can orange peel and the more people we can have on the Bitcoin network, then the quicker we can transition away from fiat. [53:53] Q: Would you guys ever offer a discount for using Bitcoin to help onboard people quicker? [54:01] Perth: Yep, absolutely. On the table at moment, we just got to make some changes with our lightning payments and what we’re doing at space, and offering discounts for Bitcoin is certainly something that we’ll do in moving forward. [54:24] Q: You can tell me to piss off, but I’m curious how is Australia now? I know we had a lot of reports. It got a little lot testy at times. Is it loosening up a little bit? Is it tightening up? How is the sentiment in Perth at least? [54:43] Perth: I think anything from where we were would be loosening up. Yeah, it’s funny because we’re such a big country and I’ve got family. My brother lived in Sydney and I wasn’t able to see him for the best part of two years. In the states, while there was restrictions, you could at least move now within your own country and may not have been able to leave the United States, but we couldn’t leave our own city. I remember at one stage, I think we had two or three cases of COVID within Western Australia and there was like this bring a [inaudible] that you could an hour away from your home. That’s how strict the movement was throughout the city.But in saying that probably Perth had one of the lowest number of COVID cases anywhere in the world. So now, we’re back to normal now which is great. It’s beautiful being reunited with family, friends, and the rest of the globe. There’s no real restrictions anything with COVID now. We hope that it stays that way moving forward. It’s like it was for everyone around the globe a really, really tricky period. But now, personally, I’ve been able to come over the US for twice in the last two months, I think. You travel back in amongst all the Australian states is as per normal. No vaccination passports required to to do anything. So in some ways, we’ve moved forward, which is great.
[56:25] Q: Love to hear that. I don’t know if there’s anything else we want to touch on, or just remind everyone who is listening that the Perth Heat are opening up their doors to have everyone submit a jersey design for their Bitcoin jersey next season. Anything and everything is on the table. I am definitely going for the most absurd without being graphically grotesque jersey award if there is such an award. I honestly want to throw this in the back of people’s minds, so someone who’s far more artistic can actually design it. If you look at Neil Jacobs’ profile picture, it’s the golden Satoshi [inaudible] If you just did that, but lightly subtly, almost like a gray on gray or a color on color that doesn’t contrast too much, so it’s there. I’m thinking of the Iran World Cup jersey in 2014 that had a cheetah on it. [57:33] Perth: Yes. [57:33] Q: It was done very well where you can only see the cheetah at certain angles. [57:41] Perth: Yes. [57:41] Q: Do something like that. [57:42] Perth: Awesome. [57:43] Q: Someone who’s way more artistic than me, please do that. [57:48] Perth: Q, you do it sounds like you’ve got the idea down pat there just listening to that. Perfect. Love it. It can be subtle, but it can be loud in different ways. You’ll see when you got to be if you click on the link to download the template on our Bitcoin Perth Heat website. We’ve also got the data at the moment, just 20% off. The current jerseys that we’ve got and also the caps, so there’s a chance for people to purchase those jerseys at a discount at the moment as well, which is good. There’s also lightning payments through there as well. If people want to purchase with Bitcoin, you’ve just got to work through the steps to get through Shopify. Competitions open up until the 27th, so there’s three weeks ago. Send the designs through, we’ll share them, and then we’ll announce the winner. I think it’ll be really special to have someone from the Bitcoin community design the 22/23 jersey cup, well, let’s call it the championship jersey year because that’s the mindset that we’re in and strong believe that if you want something, we’ll achieve it. So design our Bitcoin championship jersey. [59:09] Q: Do you want to open it up to questions or do you guys have to head out? [59:15] Perth: No, I’m happy to stay online for a little bit longer. If there’s some questions, then I’m more than happy to take them. [59:19] Q: What is up Lucas? We’ll go with Lucas first. Lucas, you have a question? [59:26] Guest 1: Yeah. [inaudible] First of all, actually, I want to say this sounds like a real home run. No joke’s been done. I wanted to ask with tax time coming up in Australia, have you had to have any special conversations with your accountant or with the ATO in preparation for that? [59:55] Pleb: Yeah, I’m happy to take this one. Special conversations is a gross understatement for the monumental work that we have had to do on the back end to actually make this possibility. As 99% of the people listening here to this spaces will understand that the legacy system does not know exactly what is happening underneath the hood with Bitcoin. There are these steps that are essentially insurmountable to most organizations at the moment for just how backward Bitcoin is treated in attack sense. It’s still much like America here in Australia, the same way that it’s treated for tax purposes. So the pain of players in actual Bitcoin, the pain of staff, and yes, it has been a whirlwind of going on almost two years now that we have been finding ways to make it as efficient as possible and as easy as possible.But again, the beauty of that is that no one, well, at least no one in Australia, even it lessens the work internationally around the world to hear the stories that we have gone through and to hear the structures that we have set up with the teams that we have. That also only has to come once now that work is done and it will only get easier from here. Every team that adopts from here can easily reach out. Steve and I, have been on numerous countless Zoom calls and meetings with organizations and teams from around the world that are interested in these things. But yes, at the moment, that is something that is holding other organizations back, both within Australia and US for sure, from what we have heard.
So yes, the conversations have been large, but they can be overcome. As an organization, you have to see just how positive or how bad it is if you don’t do that work. Luckily for us, Steve, the board, the owners, have seen the light and they realize that it is actually worth the effort to go through all of this to not only be the first but to just be ahead of the curve. If Bitcoin plays out as the game theory suggests and where everyone thinks long-term this is going, the positives for that initial investment in finding a way to deal with this and making it at least for the moment usable and workable as long as everyone understands, that work is going to pay for itself a hundredfold.
So yes, at the time, it’s certainly challenging from a tax perspective, but there are ways to make it work, to make it possible, and still have a positive outcome for both the individuals inside of the organization and the organization itself. But yes, the challenges is not as easy as setting up that bank account and just pumping the money into somebody’s bank account. There’s certainly still challenges. Every time we encounter those impediments, the things, or the friction in the system, that’s just another opportunity for us to be able to converse with businesses in the space where individuals in the space are looking to contribute and make things easier and make adoption easier. We’re not going to get global adoption with these things in place as they are now. These things have to change. You’re seeing that in the US with the bills that are being introduced no matter how insufficient you think they are at the moment, it’s baby steps.
You look back at those baby steps over the course of 10 years, and you realize, well, now, we are on a serious trajectory upwards. The adoption is mind-bogglingly quick. We’re seeing that in the business space, even though it lags behind a little bit because there is so much red tape and there is so much more to worry about from a regulatory point of view. We are seeing those things get easier and easier over time. Someone has to be the one to basically trench to roll the shit and the red tape. At the moment, if somebody else isn’t going to do it, we’re going to do it.
[63:46] Guest 1: Thank you for doing it. [63:48] Q: Awesome. Thank you, Lucas. We’re going to bring up someone else right now. [63:53] Guest 2: Hi, I have a question regarding the jerseys. [63:57] Q: What is that, Ben? [63:58] Guest 2: Hey, how you guys doing? Just want to say hey to everybody. I appreciate get you all as always. I got a couple ideas for jersey designs and I just wanted to throw it out there real quick. My question first of all is can I submit two designs? [64:15] Perth: As many as you like, Ben. You can submit 200 if you like. [64:18] Guest 2: Amazing. Okay, cool because I’ve got a couple different ideas that are kind of coming from different directions. The one is the classic guy box snack my variation with some cool cryptic Bitcoin stuff in there. We could put a Bitcoin B in there, but I know that’s kind of hard. I think Time Warner also actually copyrighted the image. I don’t know how that might work. I don’t know. So an image you want to be representing, of course, because it can be kind of controversial and not the softest entry, I guess, for newcomers. I’m going to submit a couple and then I’ve got some ideas for some that are a little softer. So that was my main question and this is really exciting. I saw the post, I liked it, and I’m going to share it. Thanks for the opportunity, guys. [65:05] Perth: Thank you. I look forward to seeing the designs coming through. [65:07] Guest 2: Thank you. And then if you have a second, I just made a tweet with a link to my website that’ll describe my design if you want to take a look at it a little more in-depth and then see the symbology and stuff behind it. [65:20] Perth: Love that. Thanks for the reference and look forward to seeing it. [65:23] Guest 2: Cool. Thank you so much. [65:25] Q: Awesome, Ben. Thank you. I’m going to be honest. Everyone else is too much shit coronary in them. All right. I think this is a friend though because both of you follow him. So I’ll invite D. Wolff up. [65:41] Perth: [inaudible] [65:41] Q: If you have XRP in your profile [crosstalk] by or you’re not coming up here. [65:47] Guest 3: Can you hear me? [65:47] Q: What’s up, man? [65:48] Guest 3: How you going, man? [65:49] Q: Yep. [65:49] Guest 3: Look, I’m from Adelaide. So I’m really good in touch with the Heaters. First of all, I’d just like to ask practically you’ve made Bitcoin legal tender in Australia, might not be directly, but you have made Bitcoin legal tender in Australia. Have you had any approach from government to either support that or go against that? Because essentially, we can pay for the Bitcoin for everything at your games, merchandise tickets, have you had any resistance or support with that? Thank you. [66:21] Pleb: I would say we have prepared. There has been only positive intrigue and a lot of the positive intrigue from government has been around the ideas that they have heard the announcement, they have heard some of the things that Steve has said in sort of the legacy media. Also, some of the podcasts we have done individually and have recognized that this is an emerging space with opportunities. It’s quite easy. Any Bitcoiner will know that you can make a lot of waves in the space by making really, really simple announcements. No one is better at that than politicians trying to capitalize on those things. The government has been very responsive to some of the announcements that will be coming out shortly about exactly what we’re doing with energy in the space and how they can capitalize on those things because this is part of the strategy has been there isn’t a mouthpiece. A positive mouthpiece for Bitcoin that isn’t associated with the company.It’s one thing for large Bitcoin miners to come into a space like Western Australia where there is abundant resources in very stranded places like out in the middle of nowhere, you have to imagine for people that are listening the size of Western Australia, the scope of the state, just how large it is and just what is out there. In terms of natural resources, to put it bluntly, it’s fucking enormous and there’s not a lot of people that live here. It’s most isolated campus city in the world. So governments are aware that for a long time, they have resources that they would like to take advantage of and make the state more prosperous for it. They have heard some of these things and we’ve actually had meetings with some of the ministers and advisors here on just exactly how that’s going to happen and how Bitcoin can be a help to it.
I would say there’s been no negative feedback as in you’re going outside the system, making legal tender. We are obviously, as an organization, acting well within the confines that the government has put us in, we’re looking to maximize that, and they’re able to recognize it and see that this is an opportunity and really a test bed. I can’t get that across enough just how everyone that we have interacted with that is either from the government or large businesses, both in Australia and abroad, even down to the owners themselves here of the business of the team itself. These are people who have significant amounts of wealth. They see this as a test bed of, number one, is this possible? Number one, what’s the reaction, the support going to be like from the community? What’s it going to be like from the rest of the world as well? What the feedback’s going to be like? And then just how successful it’s going to be.
It becomes a way for them to easily play in the space and see whether or not it’s going to be successful. So that can then translate it into their actual businesses, into their overall scope of things. We know from personal experience that we have a lot of eyes on us from the government, both locally and nationally, and they’re going to look to see just how successful this is as a test case, and then reach out to us because they don’t have another entrance. They’re not going to reach out to a riot. They’re not going to reach out to any of the large Bitcoin managers because they don’t have those contacts. They see the name of the paper. They hear the name on the television, and then they reach out because they’re their first entry. They’re like, “If we don’t have any other contacts, who should we get? Well, let’s get the team that is called the Bitcoin baseball team.” We are more than happy to take up that role because we think that we have the ability to guide them in a direction that is most positive for the network and the participants.
So absolutely, it’s a play to make as much noise as we can, so that their entrance into the space is as positive as it can be because, for a long time, the overwhelming narrative in the space has been negative.
Finally, we are able to get on the front foot. I don’t know if people on this call have listened to some of the Bitcoin Mining Councils, their reports that come out quarterly. But you’re talking about some of the most powerful people, powerful companies in the space in Bitcoin mining that have the largest revenues. The number one problem that I have identified, is from the heads of these companies themselves, the number one problem is the narrative, the first step for individuals coming into the space and we can make that positive with sports. We can make it positive, and that’s the aim is to alleviate some of that pressure. Now, rather than saying, “Oh, it’s something that you use to buy drugs, or it’s a Ponzi scheme or whatever it is.” Now, people are coming in and saying, “The default is this is good and this is good for X, Y, and Z.”
It’s becoming so easy for individuals to see the positive impacts now. Like you had to dig for it in 2016, you don’t have to dig for it now. You have to dig a hole to bury yourself in, to not see just how poorly the Fiat system is doing. So people are starting to wake up. Governments are not immune to that. What does the government accept a group of people that are making decrease over others? So they are more, they are hyper-aware of just how bad the problem is getting and looking for the exit doors and the exit doors just so happened to be the airplane lights that are on the ground. That is what the Bitcoin baseball team is trying to be. We’re trying to guide them to the exit. We’re trying to guide them to a way that it can be done safely and securely and with their best interests at heart. So far, those inroads have been nothing but positive.
[71:26] Q: Awesome. Thank you so much for the question. I’m only seeing DeFi Crypto, so I’m not going to bring up any more people at this point. Guys, I want to turn it over to you for one final comment about this jersey contest or anything else. I’ll give you each your opportunity to speak. [71:48] Perth: Thanks. We appreciate the support as always from Bitcoin Magazine, our media partner for the continued support we get from yourselves. Thanks for having us on this basis. I think we’ve outlined the competition really well this evening or depending on what part of the world you are, early morning in Australia to get creative. You can enter as many times as you like. We’ve got about three weeks to get the entries in. Unless I told the [inaudible] people can start designing, so we are thankful them. Once again, the community’s accepting us and being part of this competition. We’re really excited to see what comes into the office in the coming days and weeks. [72:33] Pleb: Yeah, I would just echo that. Thank you for hosting and for getting us on the spaces and for allowing us to share exactly what’s happening with the team. I would also, again, just urge everybody that is listening or that comes across the tweets where the announcement of the competition. Yes, a fancy design is fantastic, but in my mind, something like the Bitcoin wizard lives because of just how simple it is. Sometimes, we are just looking for an icon that can instantly be recognizable and that can represent what Bitcoin is and who knows what form that might come in. So it doesn’t matter how simple it is. It doesn’t matter how basic it is. Something will speak to the community. Something will speak, will resonate with the team and everyone. If you have the graphic design skills of a two-year-old, it’s worth just putting something in, if you have an idea because who knows how that takes off and who knows 10 years from now, this jersey hopefully, will represent a time in Bitcoin where we were able to show the world exactly what an open-source network could develop and how it could promote a better world. So thanks for having us and thanks to everyone that submits for the jersey. We think it’s going to be a good thing. [73:45] Q: Thank you, guys. Thank you guys for coming in and sharing this news with us and sharing with everyone. I hope you guys are inspired. I hope someone steals my jersey idea and makes it look super cool. Guys, this is going to be an exciting season for them, be a part of their championship journey. This is going to be the jersey, hopefully, they’re wearing in a championship series. So it’ll be cool. People all around the world will wear something you designed. I’ll leave it at that. Let your imaginations run loud, guys. Thank you guys so much for joining us. Have a great day or evening wherever you are. [74:19] Perth: Q, thank you. [END]This is a recording of a recent Twitter Spaces conversation about the Australian baseball team, Perth Heat, moving to a bitcoin standard.
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[0:06] Perth Heat: We had a great experience of credit to the whole organization that put the conference together. Scaling of that size after a few years I thought was quite phenomenal the way Bitcoin Magazine was able to run the event in a lot of ways, not knowing what sort of support you’d get globally after all the lockdowns and travel restrictions, et cetera. To see that many Bitcoiners to have those interactions was just a phenomenal three days. It’s hard not to get excited about 2023 and what’s to come. For those that didn’t attend in April this year, the opportunity to purchase those tickets at a discount rate, secure them as quickly as you can, because it’s an event you want to be at next year. No doubt. [1:01] Q: I see. I didn’t even have to tell you, guys. He’s not even paid to tell you guys, I’m paid to tell you guys that. [1:08] Perth: Well, you can’t buy experience, can you, Q? I was there this year with this at firsthand and it’s quite phenomenal, an amazing three days. On the back of putting that conference together, as I mentioned, in light of what’s happened, it’s pretty cool to see what Bitcoin Magazine will be able to do next year and in the coming years. If you’re a Bitcoiner or you’re thinking about becoming one, wanting to learn more about Bitcoin and the conference is a place to be, and probably what’s the best feature is just the atmosphere that you have amongst everyone who are willing to chat, which is gorgeous and really refreshing. Everyone there, in some ways, like-minded and willing to share opinions, stories, ideas, and knowledge. It’s fantastic. [2:08] Q: I know we’re still waiting for Patrick. I don’t want to tease or get ahead of anything, but I do want to maybe ask, it’s bright and early, you guys are getting ready for winter, how was the season for those that maybe didn’t stay up to date with Perth Heat’s baseball season? [2:28] Perth: Well, unfortunately, last year, it was a little tricky, so I can just say Patrick, he’s online now. If you may just want to put him on this or in the handle there it’s Pleb. We’ve got him online. We’ll just make him live if you’ve got him there. [2:48] Q: He should be coming up right now. [2:49] Pleb: Hello, hello! [2:50] Q: Patrick, how you doing? [2:51] Pleb: Yeah, I’m doing fantastic. [2:52] Q: How are you? [2:53] Pleb: How are you? [2:53] Q: Wonderful. Thank you for joining us. Thank you both for joining us. We’re really excited. Bitcoin Magazine is to help announce this very exciting announcement the Perth Heat have for the entire world to hear and participate and be a part of, and I’ll let you two take it away. [3:12] Perth: Ah, thanks. Well, there a couple of little things we’ll touch on in regards to some updates as to what we’ll do throughout the season, but today’s announcement is, we’ve always said that what we do with the team and with the slogan, the Bitcoin baseball team, we really want to be a great representation of the network. We want to hear from the community what would they like to see from the first team in world sport who are operating on a Bitcoin standard. What would they like us? How would they like us to operate? Is there some sort of edge to what we do, how we do it, or how we advance Bitcoin?So there are quite a few different parts to our operation. One of the smaller parts, but quite interesting ways we present ourselves is with our uniforms. This season we had two jerseys, which were Bitcoin baseball jerseys, the white and black one which had been incredibly popular worldwide in terms of people and fans who wanted to purchase those. For the coming season for 22/23, we thought it was important that we could put it out to the Bitcoin community to design our jersey. As of today, we’re running a competition, which as you said is global. We want you to design our Bitcoin baseball jersey and there’s really no rules or guidelines in terms of how this jersey needs to look or what it has to include.
The guidelines are simple. It can be any color, pattern tone, that you decide, and it can be as subtle or as loud as the individual wants to make it. Traditionally, Perth Heat, if you looked at our colors, they’re red, white, and black in terms of our jerseys, but that’s not to say that this one can’t be orange or it can’t be bright yellow, it can’t be a mixture of those colors or any of that. Be creative. This is a jersey for the Bitcoin community to design. We’re really excited by the combinations that we’re going to see come through.
We’ve just sent through a tweet which has got a link which can go to our website. There’s a template there, which you download, design the jersey, and then send it back to our office and we’ll start sharing those designs as they come through the next couple of weeks and then announce the winner. The other Jersey, which we judge to be the best will be the Bitcoin baseball jersey for 22/23, and that will be one in games on our global broadcast. It’s going to be pretty cool and that’s going to be someone from the Bitcoin community who’s in some ways helping the global adoption of Bitcoin by designing a jersey, which will proudly wear throughout the season, which we are planning on being a championship season.
[6:18] Q: I love it. Very, very exciting. I love the fact that you guys are bringing in fans from all over it. I’m assuming that in the same way that last year’s jerseys were on sale, everyone in the world, these would also, whatever Jersey is selected, would also be the jersey marketed and sold to everyone. [6:38] Perth: Absolutely. This will be our Bitcoin baseball jersey. Not only will we wear it, but it’ll be online for Bitcoiners around the world to purchase and wear proudly. The Bitcoin community has got so many talented people in so many different sections, departments, areas, were very, very talented and creative group as well. Like I said, my ideas with our marketing team in new balance as to how to put Jersey together for this season, but what we’ll get from the community will be so much better. What excites us so much is that there’s many talented designers throughout the Bitcoin community. Let’s see what we can put together. As said, it doesn’t have to be necessarily loud and have a million Bitcoin logos all over the jersey. Something that’s going quite subtle. Maybe something that looks the sharpest but let’s get the designs coming through. We’ll post them, we’ll get reaction, we’ll get feedback from across the network and through Bitcoin Magazine and it’s got to be pretty powerful, the jersey that we get together and maybe the story that’s attached to it as well.Also, a really nice part of this exercise is that no doubt some of the jerseys that come back with the designs will also have a really nice story to it as well, which will be great to share. That story can be anything from here. Someone’s journey with Bitcoin, how they got started, who orange pilled, a whole heap of things. As I said, there are no rules with the design. I think that’s pretty important for people to understand. So in different shades of color, textures, patterns, let’s get as creative as we can.
[8:36] Q: This is going to be a lot of fun. I’m really excited to see some of the submissions. I already have a couple people that I’m going to DM and be like, “You should submit something to this.” I’m curious because I’m a loud guy. I like wearing loud clothes. If you saw me in Miami, I looked ridiculous most of the time. But in American sports, they love to make all these ridiculous extra jerseys sometimes that have nothing to do with the colors of the team, but maybe have something more to do with the city. In my mind, you brought up the fact that your colors are synonymous with that of the Miami HEAT, but this last year, I thought the freshest jerseys in the NBA were the Miami Vice jerseys. Obviously, there’s the tie into the show. Is there anything culturally relevant to Perth that maybe you’d love to see incorporated into this as well as Bitcoin? [9:27] Perth: That’s a really good question. Some from Perth that we could incorporate, probably the state colors. If you looked at that, they’re gold and black. So there’s that attachment to the city, we’re a coastal city. If the jersey was blue, naturally be very different to anything that we’d previously worn that would have a connection, huge mining, and resources, state. So up north, there’s a lot of the red dust coming through, but nothing specific. If it’s a complete contrast or anything we’ve had, we’ll give it more relevance in some ways stand out and people understand. So if this jersey was the most foreign jersey ever seen on a sporting team, well that could become a pretty good marketing play for Bitcoin as well because people around them will be going, “Have you seen that baseball jersey on Perth Heat?”It’s 27 different colors, become a talking point and how are the Bitcoin baseball team. And then suddenly, the orange peeling process with people that had nothing to do with sport or Bitcoin becomes relevant because they’re introduced to Bitcoin in a different way through what could possibly be the most horrendous jersey that anyone’s ever seen in world sports. As I’ve said, have some fun. I think going to be important, and being created.
[11:01] Q: I apologize in advance for the absurd submission that you’ll receive on my behalf. [11:08] Perth: No, no, that’s good. Keep it coming on. As I said, we’ll sharethem all and we’ll get feedback. I’ve got a feeling that something loud be well-liked.
[11:23] Q: I’d love to expand a little bit. You brought up something, I think that every Bitcoiner loved to discuss and love seeing when teams or people, especially in sports, start to take on Bitcoin. Perth Heat was one of the earliest adopters who’s taking on Bitcoin. We’ve since seen efforts by teams all over the world now, as well as athletes all over the world. I’m curious what the reception locally in Perth has been since your adoption of Bitcoin, what that conversation’s been like with fans as well as community members. [12:02] Perth: Yeah. Maybe I’ll get Patrick to come on here and speak to this as a Chief Bitcoin Officer who’s been instrumental in our project. I’ve said a couple of times, I think we’ll see change in the world moving forward where it’s no longer the CEO who’s at the top of the C-suite executive will be the CBO. The amount of reference I have with Patrick each day is more than anyone else within the organization. Patrick’s had a lot to do with how we’ve onboarded and what we’ve done. So maybe he can be a best speaker to this one, Pat. [12:41] Pleb: Yeah. Awesome. Thank you, Steve, and thanks to Bitcoin magazine for having us. I would say the reactions in the beginning locally was one of absolute intrigue. I think we’re past the point where there’s confusion in the general public about Bitcoin. Obviously, they’ve probably been touched by one or two times and they were just looking for an excuse to look deeper down the rabbit hole or to even start to stumble down the rabbit hole. Locally, in terms of government, we’ve seen nothing but support. As they start through meetings with them, they start to understand and realize how they can leverage everything that is happening at the Bitcoin part essentially, how they can use this in their own ways to advance their own agendas locally.The public has been responsive in what it’s going to mean for the team, what it’s going to mean for the players, the organization, our ability to continue to provide positive influence in the community. There’s been questions, but the questions haven’t been around, is it a Ponzi scheme? The questions have been around tell us exactly how it works? How is it going to integrate? How do you run a team on a Bitcoin standard? You mentioned other sports teams. Teams saying, coming out, and trying to leverage off of announcements saying, “We’re going to accept Bitcoin for tickets,” and that’s fantastic. There’s athletes coming out saying, “We’re going to convert some of our salaries into Bitcoin.” Again, a positive step in the right direction.
The Bitcoin baseball team is entirely different. Everything that we are doing here is different because it’s coming from the top down. This is a change from the organization, from the inside out. Essentially, we’re going to do everything that Bitcoin users have always desired. We’re going to do that. We’re going to try to represent the best of Bitcoin to our best ability. So that’s we’re going to pay players in Bitcoin. That’s we’re going to accept all the sponsorship from Bitcoin. You’ll be able to buy everything at the ballpark in Bitcoin. There’s going to be a number of different ways that fans can interact with Bitcoin and get education components in Bitcoin. We’re going to put Bitcoin on the balance sheet, we’re only going to put Bitcoin on the balance sheet. All of these things, everything that Bitcoiners have ever wanted is what we’re doing now.
Is it early in a lot of those areas? Yes, absolutely. But we knew that making the announcement, we knew that in the months leading up to it, was it going to be possible to seamlessly integrate all areas of the business straight out the gate? No, but we wanted to take on that challenge because if not us then, who? Someone has to do it, someone has to be the first to do all of these things. We think that sports can have a major impact on the general public. It’s one thing to sit around in the Twitter world and communicate back and forth, argue over the merits of one theory over another theory. It’s another two to reach out to the general public and sort of Trojan horse, the education of exactly what is happening with the money and sports is a fantastic way to do that.
It’s been proven over the last hundred years through fiat marketers, that a good way to get your message out there is to go through sports. We’re trying to do the exact same thing, but the opposite and try it towards some [inaudible] people into understanding, even in the community. We have a proof of work of 30 some odd years of being up the impact in the community. We think sports can be the vehicle that everyone involved with the team is going to be better off because of it. Therefore, the community is going to be better off for it. All of the questions that have come from the community, from the players, from the staff as we started to make this change, there has been very little, if any negative feedback, it’s all been “Okay, how does this help? How can we use this to become a better baseball player, to become a better community member, to become a better organization?”
So far, it has been a real pleasure in dealing with everybody because the openness is there because people sense like a splinter in their mind, they sense that something is not right. Hopefully, the Bitcoin baseball team can be there. If it’s not their initial point of contact for what the solution might be, we can just be another support system to show people that yes, this isn’t something that your crazy uncle is investing in. This is something that an entire organization, an extremely successful sporting organization can run off of. It’s been really, really positive all the feedback and excited about the future and the season and the jersey.
I would just reiterate what Steve said. One of the beautiful things about the open-source nature of Bitcoin is that we can leverage talent from all over the world. When we made the announcement, there was a bunch of groups, companies, individuals that reached out and said, “I’m not a coder. I don’t know how to do technical things, but I have other skills, but I can’t find a Bitcoin job where I can’t get involved.” Well, this is an opportunity to graphic designers or just normal pledges around the world to hopefully be able to create a cultural icon that we can say, “This represents Bitcoin. This represents what we think is a Bitcoiner, and people can wear it and be proud that it represents the network.” That’s exactly what we’re going through, so it’s an exciting announcement. We’re looking forward to hearing the feedback and hearing which direction the network wants to go going.
[ads] [20:06] Q: I love that. It’s very exciting to hear how the reception internally, both with your own players and with the community itself, has been open and collaborative. How have you felt the impact or support of Bitcoiners from abroad has been for you guys and your efforts all the way out, all the way down under? [20:30] Pleb: The individual Bitcoiners when we’re around the world have been nothing but positive. We had the exact reaction that we anticipated from the corners around the world. I think everyone has been positive. Everyone that has reached out had ideas to make us better. Every time that Steve or I do any sort of media, whether that’s legacy media here in Australia or around the world, or whether that is doing stuff like this or different podcasts, it has always been that we’re trying to harness the best of Bitcoin and show that off and be a showcase for people that are new to the idea and for salty veterans. They have come up with amazing ideas that we’ve actually integrated into the business itself.So I would reiterate that if you are a Bitcoiner and you wanted to see a Bitcoin company, do something, please reach out and let us know because we don’t have all the ideas. We are trying to leverage the open-source nature of it. Everybody has these things that they can contribute and they can make an immediate impact. The story of the Bitcoin baseball team locally, nationally, and internationally has gained so much traction that oftentimes this will be the first dip of the toe in the water for most people that are hearing about this. We like those ideas from individuals around the world. I think on the company side of things, as it gets bigger and bigger, Bitcoin it may seem really, really big from the inside looking around it, seeing all the companies, but it’s still at an extremely nascent stage of development.
Companies now are only just starting to realize there’s a world outside of Twitter and podcasts that we can reach and sports can be a great way to do that, but it’s also about educating them on not being a Fiat Sponsorship Organization opportunity. We don’t want to partner up with companies that just want to put a patch on a Jersey. This is about creating the future. This is about stumbling forward together and making a better world for the people that follow the team, enjoy the team, and just for the network in general. It has been a learning experience and it has been constantly evolving, but every time we sit down for chats with individuals or companies, everyone is getting smarter by the day because of the education that’s out there. It just seems like we are moving at a mile a minute, everything’s happening so quickly, and the landscape is changing so rapidly that it makes for extremely exciting times.
[23:09] Q: It really is exciting. The first call to action is for anyone and everyone to submit a jersey design. I’m curious, when is the deadline for this or when is the cutoff? I’m assuming it has to be well before the season. [23:25] Perth: No deadline. We got a couple of weeks to run through this, so 27th of June. So the end of this month is when we’ll close it. A few weeks after people get started on putting the jersey together. We’ve got to obviously finalize design files with new balance, then produce, and also ship them. The advice is get started ASAP. [23:56] Q: Got it. that’s just about three weeks guys to actually get this design into them and have them sort of start to decide what they want. I’m curious, Patrick, you kind of brought up a very interesting point about how there are some resources that the community still needs build-out. I haven’t been to Australia in almost a decade. Now, I’m curious of what is available technologically on the Bitcoin network for you guys? What is it that you guys feel you could use more support or help with? Is it getting more wallet options? Is it getting more exchange options or places to buy Bitcoin, or is it getting more lightning node set up? What is it you’re finding that Australia or at least Perth needs more of? [24:49] Pleb: Yeah, I don’t know. Here in Perth, the world is so easily connected now. It’s like we can get access to all of those things. It’s more from an organizational standpoint because what we are trying to do, as I mentioned before, is we are trying to not send people down a path that is questionable when they are just making their inroads into Bitcoin. We are trying to, just like you would orange peel your mom or your dad, and you would not send them down this path, just faulty decisions or decisions that could end up to hurt them. We are trying to construct a path forward for everyone that is coming in the Bitcoin world because we know that we have lots of fans, both locally, nationally, and internationally, we’re trying to set the easiest path forward for them that is going to give them the most secure access to the best form of money that they’ve ever had. That means partnering up with organizations, with companies that have this in mind.Obviously, it doesn’t take long on Bitcoin, Twitter, or it doesn’t take long in the Bitcoin space to find those companies that have a reputation. That is why we’re looking to partner with those companies so that we can have a clear pathway that we can be proud of. As Bitcoiners ourselves, what would we have our mom or dad do? How would we bring them into the space? Where would we send them? The people listening to this probably know all those answers, but now, how do we take that and how do we get organizations excited about it? Because we can sense the team. We have sponsors. They have embraced the idea of Bitcoin, but we can do so much more. This is an opportunity we spoke of when we first made the announcement that we are, whether we like it or not, this is a representation of Bitcoin, making this whole song and dance about being the first team on a Bitcoin standard.
We have done on purpose because we think we can do a great job of it. We think that we are in the position with the flexibility that we have, the way that the league is structured here, the way that the team itself is structured, there are really no rules that we have to abide by. That means that we can operate on Bitcoin standard in every way. It’s just about getting the resources that we think like this is a once-in-a-generation, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to put our best foot forward as a community and finding organizations that understand the opportunity. This is no longer just an Australian baseball team. This isn’t just an Australian baseball team playing in Australia and trying to win a championship. This is a representation of, can a Bitcoin standard work in a company that isn’t a giant S&P 500 company that has all the resources? We are a fairly smallish business that’s under a hundred employees. So can we make this work? If so, can we do it in a way that we can be proud of?
We don’t have to say, “Well, we don’t have to caveat things with yes. Go to this place, but look out for X, Y, Z, or look out for this game, or you have to do this.” No, it’s just like, “Let’s set up a path that is representative of what we think the best that Bitcoin can offer.” Can we be proud of that? Can we sleep at night and go, we’re sending people the way that we would send our mom and dad. We were exposing them to just how powerful the network can be. So I think it’s less about getting our hands on the actual hardware and the structures. All of those things that we have in place now are completely possible, completely doable. The hard part is because we’re the first, and because these companies in the industry just in general is so nascent, it’s like there hasn’t been the opportunity to move past the interior circles that have built up over time.
The first 10 years have been a really hard fight and the network, the participants have done a fantastic job of making it as secure as it has been, and as successful as it has been. The next step is, “Okay, how do we build on that strength? What do we show the people? How do we show them? How do we convey to them that there is strength in this network and there is essentially limitless upside to adoption of the network and how much better the world is going to be?” We think we can do that through sport. we think being the first that this is going to offer in international story, international appeal to say, “Hey, we can be a beacon for hope, both in sports and just in Bitcoin in general, as a success story. This is how you can run a company like this, and this is how it can be successful. These are the exact ways, and these are the people that you can partner up with to ensure that it’s a success and nobody gets rug pulled or some shit.”
[29:25] Q: I’m curious generally from a sports fan perspective here. Talk to us about the league, the dynamics, how does it work? Is there a playoff structure? Is it more set up like a league champion? Is the champion of the season? How would the Perth Heat consider themselves champion at the end of the year? [29:48] Perth: Yeah, that’s a good question. It’s an international competition Australian Baseball League. It’s one of the best baseball league in the world. There’s six teams from Australia, Perth, Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne, and Sydney. There’s a team from Auckland in New Zealand, and there’s another international team from Korea who actually base themselves in Australia for the entire season. A Korean team jets into Victoria and is based there for four to five months of the year, which is quite incredible. But in international competition, eight teams broken up into two divisions of four teams. You play 40 games in the regular season, and then the top two teams from each division go through to the playoffs, which are semi-final series, best of three with the two winners going into the championship series over three games as well.So to be crowned ABL champions and to win the [inaudible] insured, which we’re aiming to do for the 16th time. You’d need to win a championship series, similar to the world series. The difference being three games as opposed to seven. We’re in the process of putting that championship roster together at the moment. We’ve got another meeting, which will continue to assess a lot of the talent from around the world, especially from the United States. There’s a fair bit of pressure on us now as the Bitcoin baseball team as we say, Bitcoin always wins. So we can’t be the Bitcoin baseball team and finish second, put it that way, Q.
[31:22] Q: I like that. Is it like a hard cap? Or can you guys just go out and spend as much as you see? What I’m thinking is, do we sit on the Bitcoin Stash until we get to like a half-million coin and then go convince one of these 40-year-old MLB players? We have our approvals in that point, right? [31:42] Perth: Yeah. You can always be creative, but we made a huge announcement about four weeks ago with the announcement Josh Reddick is coming to the Perth Heat. Josh won the world series with the Houston Astros in 2017, 13 hundreds, five major [inaudible]. [32:00] Q: That doesn’t count. 2017 Houston Astros don’t count, I’m sorry. [32:07] Perth: If you look at Josh, he was probably the least compliant. There’s some really nice articles on his leadership throughout that 2017 world series. But Josh’s coming is going to be an incredible side and an outfield for us. Since his announcement, the phone has been ringing hot with players wanting to come and join the team. Also, players want to be part of something bigger than just a baseball team, and they want to be part of a Bitcoin baseball team because they want to be paid in BTC. What we’re building and the roster we’re developing is exciting. Our mindset is really, really simple, it is “Championship, championship, championships.” So there are weekly meetings on how we put this team together and the roster and making sure we get the balance right. We’re in a championship mindset as we should be as the Bitcoin baseball team. [33:06] Q: That’s super exciting. You stole essentially the answer to the question I was going to ask of had players reach out to you guys to get paid or to come at least to play for you so that they can be paid in Bitcoin? Talk to us about those conversations because that must be really exciting. [33:23] Perth: Well, it’s exactly what the reaction we want. So we have, as Patrick said, the reaction internally from our local players was first class and second to none. Really, really simple when people say, “Was it a hard conversation?” Actually, the opposite, but have players now reached out because they would like to be part of the Bitcoin baseball team? Yeah, absolutely. Unfortunately, we’ve only got 30 odd spaces on our roster. We can only accommodate so many imports that we need to strike the balance up. We’re at the Bitcoin Conference when we listened to the sports panel that was put on by CashApp and listening to Aaron Rogers who spoke so well about where Bitcoin is placed within the NFL.He spoke about probably being five years that we’ll see players take their actual value of their contract in Bitcoin. I don’t think it’s going to be five years at all. The way we’re tracking, I think it’s going to be in five months’ time. I’d be surprised if Perth Heat don’t have a player that takes the value of his contract in Bitcoin in the season coming. That’s how advanced some of our discussions are with certain individuals about wanting the contract paid out to the value of Bitcoin and not in fiat.
[34:52] Q: Okay. You didn’t realize that by coming onto this space with me, you’re actually kind of on like a TMZ ASX version of this. I’m sure you know in America we love to share every athlete’s salary. I’m genuinely curious more, what’s the general range of a player in the league, not necessarily one of your players, but what’s the league average salary for baseball players? [35:19] Perth: Yeah. It’s a good question. I can’t give the amount and probably part of that is that they come to us, our team gets formed in a whole heap of different ways. We’ve got Aussie pros who have signed their professional contracts and are working their way up through the minor leagues, and then just come back to Perth to continue playing in the off-season to make sure they’re ready for spring training. Then, we’ve got players like Josh Reddick who have just finished the MLB last year, will come out and play with us. Clearly, salary’s not the reason why he’s coming to Perth. We’ve got an association with the Tampa Bay Rays and they send us out their best prospects each summer. There’s up to 10 players. That’s almost a third of our squad who come from the Tampa Bay Rays, but that’s part of the affiliation program.Again, it’s the player’s contract value there is part of what they’re doing over a 12-month period. You’re really looking at a salary, which is almost just 10 weeks of a year. Again, we’re not certainly not talking millions of dollars or even hundreds of thousands of dollars in that instance. On a scale of where world salaries are in a lot of sports, it would be on the low end of that, but it’s also proportionate to the year and the different types of players’ contracts on what they’re already receiving for baseball, for the rest of the season, and in other parts of the world as well.
[36:50] Q: No, that makes sense to me. You’re talking about in this league, at least where they pay way too much money for boys to play with balls and sticks, they play 162 games. It’s like five now, six months out of the year, somehow way too many months, but talk them a little bit more with Perth with this league being such a small section of the season, is there maybe conversations to explore playing or traveling the team to maybe play a series of games with some minor league teams here in America and do an American Bitcoin team tour? [37:33] Perth: Absolutely. That’s what we think is the evolution of this. If you look at the Globetrotters, they became an amazing marketing arm for basketball. They didn’t start with that in mind. But what the Globetrotters did for basketball was quite powerful. Perth Heat, the Bitcoin baseball team can do something similar for Bitcoin, but baseball is huge in different parts of the world. There’s a league in France says, “Now, imagine the Bitcoin baseball team landing in Paris to play a game in that city. Suddenly, you can see [inaudible] newspaper having an interest in this story and the global adoption of Bitcoin continuing, why is a baseball team or the Bitcoin baseball team? What are they doing in Paris? What’s this all about?”We had a conversation with another team which has got its own fan token. I think we could call it a shitcoin and they asked us to play games. Are we going to see the first rivalry in world sport between the Bitcoin baseball team and shitcoin’s sports team? That’d be pretty cool. That’s in a country not too far away from the US. Would I love to see bring the team over and maybe play like in the Texas Longhorns, the best college team in the US, or a couple of spring training games against our sister team, the Tampa Bay Rays, and play that throughout Miami or align that with the Bitcoin conference in years coming, if it remains in Miami or different parts of the United States. There’s a heap of opportunities to explore, to do with the team.
As Patrick said, with some of those adventures, it certainly needs some support from the network and from some of the organizations within that. We’re open to becoming a team that can play 12 months a year anywhere in the world. I think that’d be incredibly powerful for Bitcoin and for the marketing in terms of global adoption and taking it to different parts of the world with a different storyline. It’s great that we have these Twitter spaces and we’ve got such a strong community on Twitter, but we also need to break out of that. If we’re going to challenge the Fiat media, then we need to go into areas that we can explore in different ways and help the global adoption.
[40:16] Q: I’m excited. Honestly, sitting here just getting ready to watch you guys play at a future Bitcoin conference. I cannot confirm or say anything about the location, although I did see my boss left this room, so maybe I can. Who knows? [40:35] Perth: Don’t get CK in trouble. [40:37] Q: CK would kill me. I mean, that would be incredible. Obviously, there are a lot of steps before we get to that point. The first step being this jersey design, I’m curious when then does your guys’ season start your winter season? I’m assuming that it’s going to be sometime in July or August. [40:59] Perth: Yeah, we’ll start late October. We will have a Spring Training Program from September with an international series, which we’re just finalizing now for October going into the season. We also looking to host the All-Star Contest in Perth as well, which will have stars and stripes team USA versus the rest of the world at our ballpark we’ve got some exciting announcements and Patrick may be able to just touch on this in regards to our Bitcoin market that we’re putting together at the ballpark. Next week, we’ll have something pretty revolutionary in terms of the lightning and what we’re doing with the team in terms of how that will integrate with gameplay. But Pleb, maybe it’s just handy to mention how the Bitcoin markets will also integrate into game day. [41:54] Pleb: Yeah, sure. Essentially, as I touched on before, we are trying to do everything that we can with Bitcoin, everywhere that we can, and try and get our fingers into as many pies as we can with allowing the best of that work to be visible to every individual. The Bitcoiners that are very experienced and brand new people in one of those is this idea that as the Bitcoin baseball team, when we actually have home series games and we get attendance at the ballpark, there is a Bitcoin circular economy that will be able to walk individuals through both experienced Bitcoiners and people that are brand new from getting their first Bitcoin to storing their Bitcoin, to understanding the Bitcoin, to spending the Bitcoin. Basically, a circular economy of Bitcoin. Like Steve said, there’s a number of announcements, hopefully, that are coming up in the near future with the people that are making this all possible.But the idea is, again, to show people just how easy it is because it’s really hard to wrap your head around it in a theoretical way. If you’re just sitting back, reading a newspaper article, or you’re hearing Steve on the local news program, it’s kind of hard to wrap your head around just how easy it is to use it and how far the infrastructure has come. Now, it’s becoming so easy that really, it’s just about making people aware that it is simpler, faster, quicker, all of these things over the legacy system, and the BTC markets is our opportunity to do that. The idea is again, to get companies who have products that are going to make it easy to do that and to make it secure, to make it like we said before, sort of the best that is out there, and then walk people through the entire experience and let them see exactly what secures the network, let them see how they can interact with it, and how easy it is to change over, to see how they can exchange it peer-to-peer, how they can use it to buy things at the ballpark, and how it is essentially we’ve got into the point where there isn’t a difference now, or at least there will not be at the Bitcoin ballpark.
There won’t be a difference between getting out the Visa card to pay for the beer versus using lightning pit to pay for the beer. The idea is to showcase not only the people at the ballpark, but obviously, this is going to be a large story. At least, in the national scene for Australia, just the interest that we had for media outlets already as world has started to leap that there is this community that is building up, and there’s this idea of a circular economy at the ballpark that we think it’s going to be really impactful just to hear those success stories of people that have never heard of Bitcoin before coming to the ballpark with the family, to enjoy a night out, watching, as you said, grown men play with balls and sticks. All of a sudden, they are halfway orange peeled to understanding that they never knew what money was. No one ever taught them. It was probably a reason that no one ever taught them and giving them the power. Basically, giving the power back to the people to say, “This is a better way of transacting, not only a better way of storing the energy that you’ve transformed but a better way of transacting and sharing it with each other.”
Oftentimes, people forget that money is a tool, especially if you never know what money is in the first place. You forget that money is a tool and it’s got a very specific purpose and a very specific goal. It is more efficient than any other system at doing those things. If it’s more efficient at doing those things, it is going to make the users of that system better. It’s going to make their life better. It’s going to make their access to energy reserves better, and those positive impacts quickly add up. It’s a moment that you don’t forget, at least to the people that we have spoken to when you see that first lightning transaction happen. When you first see all the light switches on, “Oh, I see. Now, I just paid for that. That’s gone.” No one was in between, no one had the ability to stop it. No one had the ability to intermediate in between us. I wanted the beer, I gave you. I gave you the Bitcoin for the beer. No one thought it’s a powerful thing versus just sitting down and talking about it.
The Bitcoin market is this idea of getting as close to you can as hands-on with digital energy. We’re trying to get people into that experience in a positive environment where they can ask questions to people that will have the answers and will not lead them astray because we are going to be around. This is not a short-term play. We’re not, as Steve mentioned, the fan token thing. Obviously, the easiest money grab that we possibly could have done was, “Let’s go whole hog on a fan token.” Let’s try and rug pull every supporter that we’ve built up over the last 30 years, we can make a quick cash grab, and then we can buy Bitcoin with it, not tell anybody. All of a sudden, the organization is quickly better off, or we could say, “We could play to fight.” And say that we are going to try to win trust by being as honest as we can about what we think the most powerful technology in the world that has the ability to empower humans to be better versions of themselves and better versions collectively.
We can do that through just staying the course and being honest and true to the values that we think Bitcoin, where the values emerge from the use of Bitcoin. So the Bitcoin market physically is that spot where hopefully we can get new and old Bitcoiners to see just how this system might work in the future, just to give them a glimpse of how powerful it is going to be. Hopefully, not only gets traction in the media, but also in the people that come and enjoy the experience. Also, again, just an aside for companies in the space, we have been very forthright in saying, “We want to be on the front. We want to be leading from the front. We want your ideas.” If you have a product or an idea that you think, “Hmm, how can I get my experiment in the hands of 10,000 people in a weekend?” I know-how. Steve knows how. You contact us and you say, “This is what I have. This is what I’m thinking. This is the whole idea again, behind the jerseys.” It’s like know that [inaudible] but we can certainly recognize those ideas. We can certainly try and promote them in the hopes of creating a better team, a better community, and a better network, all at the same time.
[ads] [48:52] Q: Powerful, very powerful. Steve, I wanted to give you the opportunity, I think, to maybe share or touch on have any other teams in your league reached out to you guys about this? Have any of their players been like, “Yo, pay me a Bitcoin.” They’re like, “How do we do this?” [49:12] Perth: Yeah. We had an ABL, a conference with all the GMs probably about a month ago. And then there is no doubt. The question I was asked the most from all the other teams was about our Bitcoin journey. How does it work? What are you doing? Why? Etc. We’re intrigued by it. Certainly, the ABL have been supportive. We had their marketing team sit in on a meeting two weeks ago with us which we had with one of our partners in terms of looking to do something on one of the rounds that we have throughout the season. Definitely intrigued sitting back. The feeling I get is, our teams will sit back, they’ll watch how the season plays out, and then realized they should have got involved two years ago.Definitely interested continually asking questions. What we see from around Australia is even different teams from different codes make inquiry and asking what they need to do to take the first steps. So it’s not necessarily just the ABL teams who have reached out. We’ve had sports teams from different codes, but the Australian rules football, soccer, a basketball team, and also a rugby team. I think that is touch base. It’s been really good share of different teams from different sports leagues. I must say that the response we’ve had from the ABL from our head office has been fantastic. Showing that they want to be a progressive organization that they’re keen to learn, fully supportive of what we’re doing, and certainly have not provided any red tape. This is not the NFL. We’re not dealing with Jerry or the Craft family needing to get sign-off from 30 odd owners to do something. It gets quite the opposite. The ABL have said, “We’re fully supportive.” Let’s see where this leads us as a league.
[51:30] Q: Fuck, roger get down. Literally the worst. All right. I’ll admit I’m Red Sox fan. Also, I hate your Rays and I also absolutely despise the New York Yankees. Who is the Perth Heat’s rival in the ALB? [51:52] Perth: Right now, it’d have to be the Melbourne Aces. There were six, 15 championships been the premier, same Australian Baseball League. They’ve won the last two championships. Right now, that’s who we’re chasing, that’s who we need to stop to win the championship this year, and who beat us in the last championship series prior to COVID. So that was a one-off game at their ballpark. Certainly, no [inaudible] in the team that we need to catch. They’re maybe the Yankees of the Australian Baseball League right now. So that’s who’s in our sight. [52:29] Q: I love talking shit. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to offend. [52:33] Perth: No, that’s good. Our rivalries are a great sport. We need all Bitcoins rooting for the Perth Heat and supporting us throughout the summer to make sure that we bring the championship back to Bitcoin ballpark. [52:49] Q: I’m assuming you still accept forms of fiat, or if not, what do you do if someone tries to pull out fiat? [53:00] Perth: Oh, look, just by the nature of the city that we’re in and the amount of transactions in Bitcoin, we still accept fiat payments across the board. We need need to strike the balance, continue the education, and make sure we provide that option for all our fans that are coming to the ballpark. We accept Bitcoin payments to buy beer, to buy a hotdog, to buy merchandise, ticketing, except for sponsorships. We still have to have that balance amount with the fiat. It’s probably going to take a little bit more time before we can fully transition out of fiat. The more people we can orange peel and the more people we can have on the Bitcoin network, then the quicker we can transition away from fiat. [53:53] Q: Would you guys ever offer a discount for using Bitcoin to help onboard people quicker? [54:01] Perth: Yep, absolutely. On the table at moment, we just got to make some changes with our lightning payments and what we’re doing at space, and offering discounts for Bitcoin is certainly something that we’ll do in moving forward. [54:24] Q: You can tell me to piss off, but I’m curious how is Australia now? I know we had a lot of reports. It got a little lot testy at times. Is it loosening up a little bit? Is it tightening up? How is the sentiment in Perth at least? [54:43] Perth: I think anything from where we were would be loosening up. Yeah, it’s funny because we’re such a big country and I’ve got family. My brother lived in Sydney and I wasn’t able to see him for the best part of two years. In the states, while there was restrictions, you could at least move now within your own country and may not have been able to leave the United States, but we couldn’t leave our own city. I remember at one stage, I think we had two or three cases of COVID within Western Australia and there was like this bring a [inaudible] that you could an hour away from your home. That’s how strict the movement was throughout the city.But in saying that probably Perth had one of the lowest number of COVID cases anywhere in the world. So now, we’re back to normal now which is great. It’s beautiful being reunited with family, friends, and the rest of the globe. There’s no real restrictions anything with COVID now. We hope that it stays that way moving forward. It’s like it was for everyone around the globe a really, really tricky period. But now, personally, I’ve been able to come over the US for twice in the last two months, I think. You travel back in amongst all the Australian states is as per normal. No vaccination passports required to to do anything. So in some ways, we’ve moved forward, which is great.
[56:25] Q: Love to hear that. I don’t know if there’s anything else we want to touch on, or just remind everyone who is listening that the Perth Heat are opening up their doors to have everyone submit a jersey design for their Bitcoin jersey next season. Anything and everything is on the table. I am definitely going for the most absurd without being graphically grotesque jersey award if there is such an award. I honestly want to throw this in the back of people’s minds, so someone who’s far more artistic can actually design it. If you look at Neil Jacobs’ profile picture, it’s the golden Satoshi [inaudible] If you just did that, but lightly subtly, almost like a gray on gray or a color on color that doesn’t contrast too much, so it’s there. I’m thinking of the Iran World Cup jersey in 2014 that had a cheetah on it. [57:33] Perth: Yes. [57:33] Q: It was done very well where you can only see the cheetah at certain angles. [57:41] Perth: Yes. [57:41] Q: Do something like that. [57:42] Perth: Awesome. [57:43] Q: Someone who’s way more artistic than me, please do that. [57:48] Perth: Q, you do it sounds like you’ve got the idea down pat there just listening to that. Perfect. Love it. It can be subtle, but it can be loud in different ways. You’ll see when you got to be if you click on the link to download the template on our Bitcoin Perth Heat website. We’ve also got the data at the moment, just 20% off. The current jerseys that we’ve got and also the caps, so there’s a chance for people to purchase those jerseys at a discount at the moment as well, which is good. There’s also lightning payments through there as well. If people want to purchase with Bitcoin, you’ve just got to work through the steps to get through Shopify. Competitions open up until the 27th, so there’s three weeks ago. Send the designs through, we’ll share them, and then we’ll announce the winner. I think it’ll be really special to have someone from the Bitcoin community design the 22/23 jersey cup, well, let’s call it the championship jersey year because that’s the mindset that we’re in and strong believe that if you want something, we’ll achieve it. So design our Bitcoin championship jersey. [59:09] Q: Do you want to open it up to questions or do you guys have to head out? [59:15] Perth: No, I’m happy to stay online for a little bit longer. If there’s some questions, then I’m more than happy to take them. [59:19] Q: What is up Lucas? We’ll go with Lucas first. Lucas, you have a question? [59:26] Guest 1: Yeah. [inaudible] First of all, actually, I want to say this sounds like a real home run. No joke’s been done. I wanted to ask with tax time coming up in Australia, have you had to have any special conversations with your accountant or with the ATO in preparation for that? [59:55] Pleb: Yeah, I’m happy to take this one. Special conversations is a gross understatement for the monumental work that we have had to do on the back end to actually make this possibility. As 99% of the people listening here to this spaces will understand that the legacy system does not know exactly what is happening underneath the hood with Bitcoin. There are these steps that are essentially insurmountable to most organizations at the moment for just how backward Bitcoin is treated in attack sense. It’s still much like America here in Australia, the same way that it’s treated for tax purposes. So the pain of players in actual Bitcoin, the pain of staff, and yes, it has been a whirlwind of going on almost two years now that we have been finding ways to make it as efficient as possible and as easy as possible.But again, the beauty of that is that no one, well, at least no one in Australia, even it lessens the work internationally around the world to hear the stories that we have gone through and to hear the structures that we have set up with the teams that we have. That also only has to come once now that work is done and it will only get easier from here. Every team that adopts from here can easily reach out. Steve and I, have been on numerous countless Zoom calls and meetings with organizations and teams from around the world that are interested in these things. But yes, at the moment, that is something that is holding other organizations back, both within Australia and US for sure, from what we have heard.
So yes, the conversations have been large, but they can be overcome. As an organization, you have to see just how positive or how bad it is if you don’t do that work. Luckily for us, Steve, the board, the owners, have seen the light and they realize that it is actually worth the effort to go through all of this to not only be the first but to just be ahead of the curve. If Bitcoin plays out as the game theory suggests and where everyone thinks long-term this is going, the positives for that initial investment in finding a way to deal with this and making it at least for the moment usable and workable as long as everyone understands, that work is going to pay for itself a hundredfold.
So yes, at the time, it’s certainly challenging from a tax perspective, but there are ways to make it work, to make it possible, and still have a positive outcome for both the individuals inside of the organization and the organization itself. But yes, the challenges is not as easy as setting up that bank account and just pumping the money into somebody’s bank account. There’s certainly still challenges. Every time we encounter those impediments, the things, or the friction in the system, that’s just another opportunity for us to be able to converse with businesses in the space where individuals in the space are looking to contribute and make things easier and make adoption easier. We’re not going to get global adoption with these things in place as they are now. These things have to change. You’re seeing that in the US with the bills that are being introduced no matter how insufficient you think they are at the moment, it’s baby steps.
You look back at those baby steps over the course of 10 years, and you realize, well, now, we are on a serious trajectory upwards. The adoption is mind-bogglingly quick. We’re seeing that in the business space, even though it lags behind a little bit because there is so much red tape and there is so much more to worry about from a regulatory point of view. We are seeing those things get easier and easier over time. Someone has to be the one to basically trench to roll the shit and the red tape. At the moment, if somebody else isn’t going to do it, we’re going to do it.
[63:46] Guest 1: Thank you for doing it. [63:48] Q: Awesome. Thank you, Lucas. We’re going to bring up someone else right now. [63:53] Guest 2: Hi, I have a question regarding the jerseys. [63:57] Q: What is that, Ben? [63:58] Guest 2: Hey, how you guys doing? Just want to say hey to everybody. I appreciate get you all as always. I got a couple ideas for jersey designs and I just wanted to throw it out there real quick. My question first of all is can I submit two designs? [64:15] Perth: As many as you like, Ben. You can submit 200 if you like. [64:18] Guest 2: Amazing. Okay, cool because I’ve got a couple different ideas that are kind of coming from different directions. The one is the classic guy box snack my variation with some cool cryptic Bitcoin stuff in there. We could put a Bitcoin B in there, but I know that’s kind of hard. I think Time Warner also actually copyrighted the image. I don’t know how that might work. I don’t know. So an image you want to be representing, of course, because it can be kind of controversial and not the softest entry, I guess, for newcomers. I’m going to submit a couple and then I’ve got some ideas for some that are a little softer. So that was my main question and this is really exciting. I saw the post, I liked it, and I’m going to share it. Thanks for the opportunity, guys. [65:05] Perth: Thank you. I look forward to seeing the designs coming through. [65:07] Guest 2: Thank you. And then if you have a second, I just made a tweet with a link to my website that’ll describe my design if you want to take a look at it a little more in-depth and then see the symbology and stuff behind it. [65:20] Perth: Love that. Thanks for the reference and look forward to seeing it. [65:23] Guest 2: Cool. Thank you so much. [65:25] Q: Awesome, Ben. Thank you. I’m going to be honest. Everyone else is too much shit coronary in them. All right. I think this is a friend though because both of you follow him. So I’ll invite D. Wolff up. [65:41] Perth: [inaudible] [65:41] Q: If you have XRP in your profile [crosstalk] by or you’re not coming up here. [65:47] Guest 3: Can you hear me? [65:47] Q: What’s up, man? [65:48] Guest 3: How you going, man? [65:49] Q: Yep. [65:49] Guest 3: Look, I’m from Adelaide. So I’m really good in touch with the Heaters. First of all, I’d just like to ask practically you’ve made Bitcoin legal tender in Australia, might not be directly, but you have made Bitcoin legal tender in Australia. Have you had any approach from government to either support that or go against that? Because essentially, we can pay for the Bitcoin for everything at your games, merchandise tickets, have you had any resistance or support with that? Thank you. [66:21] Pleb: I would say we have prepared. There has been only positive intrigue and a lot of the positive intrigue from government has been around the ideas that they have heard the announcement, they have heard some of the things that Steve has said in sort of the legacy media. Also, some of the podcasts we have done individually and have recognized that this is an emerging space with opportunities. It’s quite easy. Any Bitcoiner will know that you can make a lot of waves in the space by making really, really simple announcements. No one is better at that than politicians trying to capitalize on those things. The government has been very responsive to some of the announcements that will be coming out shortly about exactly what we’re doing with energy in the space and how they can capitalize on those things because this is part of the strategy has been there isn’t a mouthpiece. A positive mouthpiece for Bitcoin that isn’t associated with the company.It’s one thing for large Bitcoin miners to come into a space like Western Australia where there is abundant resources in very stranded places like out in the middle of nowhere, you have to imagine for people that are listening the size of Western Australia, the scope of the state, just how large it is and just what is out there. In terms of natural resources, to put it bluntly, it’s fucking enormous and there’s not a lot of people that live here. It’s most isolated campus city in the world. So governments are aware that for a long time, they have resources that they would like to take advantage of and make the state more prosperous for it. They have heard some of these things and we’ve actually had meetings with some of the ministers and advisors here on just exactly how that’s going to happen and how Bitcoin can be a help to it.
I would say there’s been no negative feedback as in you’re going outside the system, making legal tender. We are obviously, as an organization, acting well within the confines that the government has put us in, we’re looking to maximize that, and they’re able to recognize it and see that this is an opportunity and really a test bed. I can’t get that across enough just how everyone that we have interacted with that is either from the government or large businesses, both in Australia and abroad, even down to the owners themselves here of the business of the team itself. These are people who have significant amounts of wealth. They see this as a test bed of, number one, is this possible? Number one, what’s the reaction, the support going to be like from the community? What’s it going to be like from the rest of the world as well? What the feedback’s going to be like? And then just how successful it’s going to be.
It becomes a way for them to easily play in the space and see whether or not it’s going to be successful. So that can then translate it into their actual businesses, into their overall scope of things. We know from personal experience that we have a lot of eyes on us from the government, both locally and nationally, and they’re going to look to see just how successful this is as a test case, and then reach out to us because they don’t have another entrance. They’re not going to reach out to a riot. They’re not going to reach out to any of the large Bitcoin managers because they don’t have those contacts. They see the name of the paper. They hear the name on the television, and then they reach out because they’re their first entry. They’re like, “If we don’t have any other contacts, who should we get? Well, let’s get the team that is called the Bitcoin baseball team.” We are more than happy to take up that role because we think that we have the ability to guide them in a direction that is most positive for the network and the participants.
So absolutely, it’s a play to make as much noise as we can, so that their entrance into the space is as positive as it can be because, for a long time, the overwhelming narrative in the space has been negative.
Finally, we are able to get on the front foot. I don’t know if people on this call have listened to some of the Bitcoin Mining Councils, their reports that come out quarterly. But you’re talking about some of the most powerful people, powerful companies in the space in Bitcoin mining that have the largest revenues. The number one problem that I have identified, is from the heads of these companies themselves, the number one problem is the narrative, the first step for individuals coming into the space and we can make that positive with sports. We can make it positive, and that’s the aim is to alleviate some of that pressure. Now, rather than saying, “Oh, it’s something that you use to buy drugs, or it’s a Ponzi scheme or whatever it is.” Now, people are coming in and saying, “The default is this is good and this is good for X, Y, and Z.”
It’s becoming so easy for individuals to see the positive impacts now. Like you had to dig for it in 2016, you don’t have to dig for it now. You have to dig a hole to bury yourself in, to not see just how poorly the Fiat system is doing. So people are starting to wake up. Governments are not immune to that. What does the government accept a group of people that are making decrease over others? So they are more, they are hyper-aware of just how bad the problem is getting and looking for the exit doors and the exit doors just so happened to be the airplane lights that are on the ground. That is what the Bitcoin baseball team is trying to be. We’re trying to guide them to the exit. We’re trying to guide them to a way that it can be done safely and securely and with their best interests at heart. So far, those inroads have been nothing but positive.
[71:26] Q: Awesome. Thank you so much for the question. I’m only seeing DeFi Crypto, so I’m not going to bring up any more people at this point. Guys, I want to turn it over to you for one final comment about this jersey contest or anything else. I’ll give you each your opportunity to speak. [71:48] Perth: Thanks. We appreciate the support as always from Bitcoin Magazine, our media partner for the continued support we get from yourselves. Thanks for having us on this basis. I think we’ve outlined the competition really well this evening or depending on what part of the world you are, early morning in Australia to get creative. You can enter as many times as you like. We’ve got about three weeks to get the entries in. Unless I told the [inaudible] people can start designing, so we are thankful them. Once again, the community’s accepting us and being part of this competition. We’re really excited to see what comes into the office in the coming days and weeks. [72:33] Pleb: Yeah, I would just echo that. Thank you for hosting and for getting us on the spaces and for allowing us to share exactly what’s happening with the team. I would also, again, just urge everybody that is listening or that comes across the tweets where the announcement of the competition. Yes, a fancy design is fantastic, but in my mind, something like the Bitcoin wizard lives because of just how simple it is. Sometimes, we are just looking for an icon that can instantly be recognizable and that can represent what Bitcoin is and who knows what form that might come in. So it doesn’t matter how simple it is. It doesn’t matter how basic it is. Something will speak to the community. Something will speak, will resonate with the team and everyone. If you have the graphic design skills of a two-year-old, it’s worth just putting something in, if you have an idea because who knows how that takes off and who knows 10 years from now, this jersey hopefully, will represent a time in Bitcoin where we were able to show the world exactly what an open-source network could develop and how it could promote a better world. So thanks for having us and thanks to everyone that submits for the jersey. We think it’s going to be a good thing. [73:45] Q: Thank you, guys. Thank you guys for coming in and sharing this news with us and sharing with everyone. I hope you guys are inspired. I hope someone steals my jersey idea and makes it look super cool. Guys, this is going to be an exciting season for them, be a part of their championship journey. This is going to be the jersey, hopefully, they’re wearing in a championship series. So it’ll be cool. People all around the world will wear something you designed. I’ll leave it at that. Let your imaginations run loud, guys. Thank you guys so much for joining us. Have a great day or evening wherever you are. [74:19] Perth: Q, thank you. [END]Feedzy
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