nolim1t.co :: thoughts become things

Latest updates

2024-06-11T00:00:00+00:00

I haven’t been updating this lately as there’s a lot of craziness out there.

But if you do use nostr, please check out my pubkey npub1z34a5nkxjv5rq5p7unuw3d3xh4an54uyyv4cys96zhyvhlu6qlxs4qnh9r or profile nprofile1qqspg676fmrfx2ps2qlwf78gkcnt67e627zzx2uzgzaptjxtl7dq0ngpzfmhxue69uhhqatjwpkx2urpvuhx2ucpp4mhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mqr3dlw2 on the following links (1) (2)

Also as of lately I have been making an appearance on X (not as much), but if you want to reach out for anything, try my SimpleX.chat account too.

Or you can check out the following SimpleX groups

Not tweeting since March 2023

2023-05-26T00:00:00+00:00

It’s been a while since the last update, but just letting you know that since March 2023 or block 780443 that I’m not tweeting anymore.

My reasons for liking it is similar to the reasons here

They are

Dislikes

Ads
Feed algorithms rather than recent chronological posts

Likes

Censorship resistance. Post whatever you like
Monetizeable posts without permission (Anyone can partake and earn money)

Summary

Check out this link if you’re not onboard yet.

But my favorite apps are

(iOS) Damus
(iOS) Nostur
(Android) Nostros
(Web) Primal

My Nostr QR code

Starting 2022 on the right footing

2022-01-19T00:00:00+00:00

Seems that I’m on the right track with 2022.

So far

Weening usage of 1Password.com and using VaultWarden (Rust version for Bitwarden)
Running m0re full nodes (This time trying the Bitcoin Knots implementation.)
Continueing to promote the Sovereignty Meetup

Focus

Get off Dropbox and cloud documents
Run more full nodes (bitcoin and otherwise non monetary. I hope to also use C-Lightning’s implementation too for doing lightning nodes. I dig the plugin system a lot.)
Focus on profitability (Running a business which self supports itself, and get back into the green) and sustainability (extra cash into long term things)

Far fetched

Get another passport. Likely St Kitts & Nevins because of residency requirements, but Portugal sounds cool for the EU.

2021 Year in Review

2021-12-31T00:00:00+00:00

Definitely an interesting year.

Started off with the eventual rise of DOGE (made my year, because I mined it in 2014 and kept most of it).

Also kicked off the year with a nice UNIswap airdrop, which was basically free money. That was used to immediately purchase a lot of bitcoin and also the ZMT token which eventually rose in prise.

The ZMT token, eventually ended up closing to the same price as it was at the top. It’s been a good inflation hedge and nice little passive income earner.

Have also kicked off a meetup called the Sovereignty meetup to teach people there are ways to exist outside of Big Tech which seems to be overstepping their power/control over others. With great power comes responsibility, as the movie Spiderman has said. These guys seem not to be holding out on.

Anyway some accomoplishments of the year:

Revival of a lightning network almost circular economy (set up two F&B type businesses in replace of my guesthouse business which got destroyed by inbound travel)
Restoration of my basic income again thanks to some investments starting to pay off.
Exploring new opportunities for lightning network (I think a delivery service might prove interesting. Maybe do cash and lightning with incentives.
Reading more on the BOLT12 Spec for lightning. Seems theres a lot of interesting use cases
Became messaging sovereign, with my own matrix instance.

Focus for 2022:

Growth. Looking to expand and increase my income in a more sustainable way. Restaurants seems more consistent type growth in these trying times. People need to eat. And exploring CBD type products due to numerous health benefits (1) (2)
Learning rust programming language
Continue to run the Sovereingty Meetup for Soveignty fans in Chiang Mai. And promote the concepts of sovereignty a lot more as a lot of people could use this.

Bitcoin client diversity matters

2021-11-27T00:00:00+00:00

One thing I can appreciate about Bitcoin is the concept of not being forced to opt-in to anything (no hard forks), and many different implementations of the reference client (even layer 2).

Also being open source, anyone can contribute to projects. It’s all done on merit.

But, back to the main point of this post. I’ve now set up a new docker container for Bitcoin Knots (you can learn more about its implementation via links on the repo).

This container follows the same building and archiving regime as the bitcoind docker project which is used throughout many implementations.

Umbrel being the biggest, as I am also one of the OG contributors for that project. However, I do recommend using Citadel node over this now as they are fully open source and also use this.

Citadel will also support alternative bitcoin implementations going forward. Which was one of the main drivers of the containers.

I’ll also be running a bitcoin knots node for better network diversity too. I already have 3 bitcoin core nodes, but would like to use an alternative implementation too.

In future, I’d also like to support the btcd implementation for docker containers too, however it looks like someone has got this.

Sovereignty for chat applications

2021-10-12T00:00:00+00:00

Finally, I’ve gotten around to being a little more sovereign when it comes to chat applications and now have my own matrix instance!

You may now message me at @nolim1t:matrix.nolim1t.co on matrix. I’m keeping this instance as a trial for now.

Steps involved

Set up a domain name. Ideally the root domain if its possible. Was unable to do this as nolim1t.co is hosted on gitlab pages for the static goodness, and migration and reconfiguring this wasn’t something I wanted to do.
Allocate a directory to store the data and configs. I’m using this setup right now. Some hints to improve it is needed. After all this is a learning experience for me right now.
For full internet access, open ports 443 and 8448 (this should ideally by secured by TLS/SSL)
Run the docker-compose
Set up certbot

certbot-auto certonly --email your@email.address -d your.domain.here

Set up nginx (Add a matrix.conf to /etc/nginx/conf.d)

Configuration contents

Notes

Replace your.domain.here with your domain
Add another listener at 8448 for federation with other servers

server {
    listen [::]:443 ssl; # managed by Certbot
    listen 443 ssl; # managed by Certbot

    listen [::]:8448 ssl default_server;
    listen 8448 ssl default_server;

    server_name your.domain.here;

    location ~* ^(\/_matrix|\/_synapse\/client) {
        proxy_pass http://localhost:8008;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
	    proxy_set_header Host $host;

        client_max_body_size 50M;
    }

    ssl_certificate /etc/letsencrypt/live/matrix.nolim1t.co/fullchain.pem; # managed by Certbot
    ssl_certificate_key /etc/letsencrypt/live/matrix.nolim1t.co/privkey.pem; # managed by Certbot
    include /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-nginx.conf; # managed by Certbot
    ssl_dhparam /etc/letsencrypt/ssl-dhparams.pem; # managed by Certbot

}
server {
    if ($host = your.domain.here) {
        return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
    } # managed by Certbot


    listen 80;
    listen [::]:80;
    server_name your.domain.here;
    return 404; # managed by Certbot


}

… and you’re done! You should be able to connect to your flashy matrix instance and join chats.

Oh and you might want to also do a /etc/init.d/nginx configtest before restarting it to make sure you don’t mess things up too badly.

Next steps

The default configuration seems to omit public registrations, but I think I’ll keep the instance private. Public requires more admining and care.

To register a user, use the register_new_matrix_user(1) command.

Final Crosscheck

Try to join your instance and then start chatting away. You may also find me on my own matrix channel which you can ask questions. I’ll keep it unmoderated (post whatever conspiracy theories about COVID / Vaccines / 9-11 / etc, I don’t care.). As long as you don’t post scams / HYIP / MLM / Shitcoins, will keep the post.

Lightning Networking

2021-10-08T00:00:00+00:00

Well its been a while since my last blog post. I’m still alive but been posting to telegram mostly (see my telegram microblog or if you’re part of the bitcoin community check out this page also.)

In case you’ve seen, I’ve been getting balls deep into lightning network (layer 2 for bitcoin).

It’s come a long way from its humble beginnings as a whitepaper in 2016, but started my journey hacking on various lightning network projects in 2018, much of it has become Umbrel.

I’ve taken a backseat / support role in keeping things patched while working on improving the payment flow for widescale adoption, as well as user testing.

While open for consultation for services who want to support this.

While supporting Monero which is the only non-bitcoin currency I like, I’m not a fan of others and want to support less of it.

All smart contract platforms seem to be concentrated to a pseudo anonymous account model, which is very bad for privacy.

While lightning network breaks the chain analysis, and hopefully layers above it do.

I’m also a fan of having a robust / simple / secure layer 1, equivalent of driving an armored truck around, while layer 2 and above are similar to day to day passenger commuter vehicles.

That aged well - Mastodon self-host retrospective

2021-03-16T00:00:00+00:00

Hey I’m still alive!

Well end of an era for my extremely short lived mastodon instance on social.nolim1t.co.

It was great to host and be self sovereign, however I hosted it on a accountless VPS called bitvps.

It was great until you ran into issues. Where then you couldn’t get any support (what a surprise).

The issue I had was there was no way of resetting this after I selected a payment method that I made a mistake with.

Anyway, I still have my warrant canary that you can easily verify. And for my actual mastodon accounts, you may find my social media listings on this site.

Luckily mastodon follows can be migrated. I’m over at bitcoinhackers.org again.

Hello Fediverse!

2021-01-22T00:00:00+00:00

As part of the decentralization effort I’ve moved off bitcoinhackers and onto my own instance, therefore taking the first step to owning my own content that I put out.

Also not having to self-censor is a good thing too. A plus is no ads.

To achieve this, I used a service called Bitvps which lets you rent out instances by the hour / day / week. Without an account, or doxxing yourself on a customer database. Its a risk that you might lose the server details, but I think its a good proof of life thing too. Should the profile disappear, it also acts as a dead mans switch too.

New Era has begun!

2021-01-11T00:00:00+00:00

As with the new year, out with the old and in with the new.

This year seems to be a general shift in conciousness. More and more people seem to be waking up to the issues going on in the world.

It has been an interesting first week in the tech space. It seems as planned, Big tech companies are starting to censor more and more. Even the president of the USA got censored out, and now even funding cut.

Anyway some things which I’ve noticed:

Bitcoins rise in price (as predicted)
Deplatforming of more public figures including Trump. Also on payment networks as well.
Deplatforming of some uncensorable social media networks
An attack on the Tor network (most likely state sponsored, because thats where people go to hide)
Another state attack on Bitcoin in the UK

This year I feel will be about mitigating attacks and being more resilient. So I’ll be promoting more decentralization.

I see things getting a lot worst. And if you thing COVID19 is bad, there will be other things in store.

Done so far

Made the switch from Twitter to Mastodon
Published my PGP fingerprint (f6287b82CC84bcbd) on Mastondon
Have a backup channel on Telegram
Set up a way for people to verify that I am who I say I am. You can see This(1), or this(2). I recommend that you learn about GPG which has been around for almost 30 years!

Doing so far

Build more passive income (liquidity sharing) solutions on top of bitcoin (LND Pool is one of them)
Keep accumulating more bitcoin
Get more people involved in the full node revolution (not your node, not your rules)
Assets + Income > Expenses. Long time preference.

Planned in future

Build the Specter DIY Hardware wallet to shield myself against supply chain attacks
Research on setting up a degoogled Android phone. My iPhone is great but it becomes a risk.
Minimize use of WhatsApp and Facebook. I wish I can get rid of these, but where I’m living it has been an excellent source of information.
Exercise more / Drink less
Eat more meat
Learn about growing food again.