"caltrain depot" Discussed on Business Wars
"22% stake in bid instant. But they're not stopping there. Bitcoin reminds them of Facebook's beginnings. They saw how the more people joined Facebook, the more other people got sucked into its gravitational pull. They believe Bitcoin could do the same. The more people use Bitcoin, the more popular it will get, and the more its value will rise. So, as well as investing in bid instant, they start buying bitcoins. Fall 2012, the flat iron district, Manhattan. In the empty office of winklevoss capital, Tyler looks at the computer equipment laid out on the large sheet of tarp covering the floor. He's wearing a smock in thick gloves and holding a sledgehammer, a pair of plastic goggles are strapped onto his forehead. Cameron walks towards the tarp carrying a printer. He's also wearing a smock. Tyler Cox and eyebrow is Cameron dumps the printer onto the tarp. The printer seriously, printers have memory chips, and everything's got to go. Fine. That it yep. The brothers have spent weeks buying tens of thousands of bitcoins in a multi-million dollar bet on the digital currency's future. Now, they're out to protect their bitcoins from hackers. And in an online world, the best defense is to go offline. They printed out the private keys needed to access their bitcoins. They're going to dice up these codes and deposit the pieces in safe deposit boxes in banks across America. But before making those deposits, they have to cover their digital tracks. And that means destroying every electronic device they've used to buy bitcoins. Tighter pulls his goggles over his eyes and swings the sledgehammer over his head. He brings it down on the printer's shattering the plastic casing. Tyler heaves the sledgehammer into the air and back down over and over. Keyboard smash screens explode, hard drive, splinter. As he slams the hammer down, he imagines the unblinking face of their multi-billion dollar nemesis, Mark Zuckerberg. The winklevoss brothers are back. And this time, they're out to win. But on the West Coast, the Silicon Valley elite is ready to pick its own Bitcoin champion. Did you know that it can now take up to 11 weeks on average to hire for an open position? That's almost two and a half months. Now, I don't know who's got that kind of time to spin their wheels, especially when you're hiring for a growing business. So why not stop waiting and start using zip recruiter? Zip recruiter can help you find qualified candidates for all your roles fast and right now you can try it for free. At zip recruiter dot com slash BW. How is zip recruiter so efficient at helping you hire? Well, they use powerful matching technology to quickly find and send you the most qualified people for your roles, so speed up your hiring process. With zip recruiter, see why 3.8 million businesses have come to zip recruiter for their hiring needs. Head to this exclusive web address to try out zip recruiter for free. Zip recruiter dot com slash BW. Again, that's zip recruiter dot com slash BW. Zip recruiter, the smartest way to hire. Fall 2013, San Francisco. Fred ehrsam exits the caltrain depot at fourth and king, and heads to the creamery, a squat, wooden eatery selling coffee and sandwiches. A few months ago, air some quick Goldman Sachs and headed west, convinced that the future of finance lay in Bitcoin, not the button down, Wall Street said. He enters the creamery, and looks for the guy he's here to meet. Brian Armstrong. A bald pale man waves at him. Brian? Yeah, you must be Fred. The two men connected on Reddit after Armstrong posted about needing a cofounder for his Bitcoin startup coinbase. There are some like the sound of Armstrong's plan to make coinbase, the simplest place to buy, sell, store, and sand Bitcoin. Armstrong liked the sound of versam. The former Wall Street trader turned Bitcoin believer. Armstrong briefs ursa on coinbase's progress so far. The big break came this summer when I got accepted by Y Combinator. Y Combinator is the Silicon Valley startup school where companies like Dropbox and Airbnb began. Y Combinator helped me attract $600,000 of seed funding. Wait a minute. I thought Y Combinator insists on cofounders. It doesn't take single founder operations. Yes, yes, but my cofounder didn't work out. We disagreed about how to manage customers private keys. It was a fundamental disagreement and cofounding like getting married. Why combinator understood? I see. So what was the disagreement? Well, I wanted coinbase to hold the private keys for customers bitcoins. It's ridiculous that people who lose their private keys can never recover their bitcoins. And my cofounder disagreed. He felt holding private keys ran counter to the Bitcoin ethos of empowering people to control their own finances. I'm with you. Normal people don't want to deal with private keys and encrypted software wallets. That's what's wrong with Bitcoin right now. It's full of people on political crusades to tear down the financial system. I don't want to tear the system down. I want to bring it into the 21st century. Armstrong smiles. He's found his man. Ursula and Armstrong rent an apartment near the creamery and turn it into an office. They pull 16 hour days to get coinbase up and running. In October 2012, coinbase launches, offering a simple website where Bitcoin can be bought and sold with a single click. Simplicity proves to be a compelling proposition. Within weeks, coinbase is struggling to stop its sight buckling from the growing number of users. Come January 2013, it's got 40,000 users who are buying and selling a $1 million of Bitcoin a month. And coinbase earns a 1% cut on every transaction. Then in March, an island 7000 miles away, plunges into a financial crisis. There's growing anger in Cyprus. Most ATMs are out of money and the banks are closed. People are trying to pull their money after the government announced a proposal to tax everyone's accounts up to 10%. The money would be taken from citizens to help bail out the country's troubled financial system. The grim news from Cyprus is a gift for Bitcoin. For Bitcoin advocates, Cyprus bank raid is proof of why it's better to stash your wealth in bitcoins that no government can touch. Interest in Bitcoin soars. For the first time, the value of all bitcoins, tops the $1 billion mark. Coinbase's rush of users becomes a stampede. By April, it has more than 100,000 users. But it's still bit instant out in front. Bit instant now handles 35% of all Bitcoin purchases. Its CEO Charlie shrem is now the toast of the Bitcoin world. He's swapped his parents Brooklyn basement for the bright lights of Manhattan. He's even touring the world as an in demand public speaker, spreading the gospel of cryptocurrency far and
