Interview: Daniel Alexiuc, The Living Room of Satoshi
How a Brisbane firm is playing a role in the digital currency landscape
09 April, 2015 13:10
The world has moved into online spending with the
use of new payment platforms like ‘tap and pay.’ Despite this, we are
still largely using cash and credit cards to pay our bills.
But
digital currency is borderless and it’s shaping to be the next platform
in the payments war. Bitcoin and other crypto currencies threaten to
provide the lowest cost and fastest platform.
Australians
are now using this digital currency through companies like Brisbane
firm, The Living Room of Satoshi, which offers free BPay facilities in
Bitcoin for consumers.
CIO contributor,
David Gee asked The Living Room of Satoshi’s founder, Daniel Alexiuc,
about the small part his company is playing in the digital currency
landscape.
The Living Room of Satoshi founder, Daniel Alexiuc
CIO: The Living Room of Satoshi is a great name. What was the inspiration behind it?
Alexiuc: The story of Satoshi Nakamoto
is an inspiring and romantic one, and has surely contributed to
Bitcoin’s success so far. He’s a mysterious and reclusive genius, who
had the forethought to create something brilliant, release it to the
world, and disappear completely and accomplish it anonymously – no small
feat in the internet age.
But I like to imagine
that Satoshi still kicks back in his living room at the end of the day
and pays his electricity bill just like the rest of us – hence “Living
Room of Satoshi”.
CIO: Your platform permits people to pay their bills and day-to-day items with Bitcoin. What has attracted them to your service?
Alexiuc: All of our customers find Bitcoin a fast, secure and convenient way to pay bills. You can see from our graphs page
that our customers are paying all sorts of everyday bills, from toll
road charges to tax bills.
Many use Living Room of Satoshi to pay off their credit cards with
Bitcoin, which opens up an even greater range of places to spend
Bitcoin.
What this means is that I can pay my
utilities invoice with Bitcoin through this facility, even though that
is not an officially supported mechanism of this organisation. This all
happens within our interchange. Some of our customers are also paid in
Bitcoin, so our service allows them to live without ever using
Australian currency.
CIO: Your business
was recently suspended for a few months due to regulatory uncertainty
but now you’re back. What lessons have you learned in the short history
of this company?
Alexiuc: Don’t let fears about regulation stop you from developing innovative solutions because the regulations might change anyway.
Bitcoin
is a nascent and unprecedented technology that regulators are still
struggling to comprehend. The software developers in Australia need to
continue to innovate and demonstrate the utility of Bitcoin, which will
in turn shape regulation.
CIO: What will
prevent Bitcoin from expanding more broadly in the future? What do you
see as the biggest barriers right now to the success of crypto
currencies?
Alexiuc: In Australia, by
far the biggest impediment to the adoption of Bitcoin is the recent GST
ruling on Bitcoin. This was also identified by international expert
Andreas Antonopoulos at the Australian Bitcoin Senate hearing.
The
GST ruling means it is very difficult for any Australian-based company
to embrace Bitcoin, and this is hindering adoption. Our own Satoshi Pay
biller solution, a competitor to BPAY, cannot be launched until we
either relocate overseas, or the ruling is changed.
CIO: Every hour, Coinmap is updated with new players embracing Bitcoin and Blockchain. In your opinion, what’s going to be the tipping point?
Alexiuc: I think the tipping point will come when it is easy for
workers to be paid in Bitcoin – again this is something being hindered
by the GST ruling.
There are lots of places now
to spend Bitcoin, and you can pay all your bills with Living Room of
Satoshi, but to have a healthy ecosystem, it needs to be easy for
businesses to transact completely in Bitcoin - to sell products in
Bitcoin, pay their staff in Bitcoin and purchase supplies in Bitcoin.
CIO: In which country is Bitcoin most accepted? Do you know why?
Alexiuc:
Bitcoin is accepted everywhere the internet is accepted – it’s one of
those pervasive technologies that is available everywhere and to
everybody, and why it is such a revolution in payments.
In
terms of supporting business though, I think that the traditional
FinTech hubs of London, Hong Kong and Singapore seem to be attracting
the most innovators away from Australia right now. They have so far
adopted a more sensible wait-and-see approach to regulation and have
avoided stifling innovators.
CIO: What APIs are you seeking to establish to allow further development and growth?
Alexiuc: Actually our API is built on the open and widespread
REST standard, and isn’t tied to any particular company. We simply use
Apiary for our documentation, something akin to a Wikipedia for software
developers.
Our API allows other programs and
websites to pay bills using Bitcoin – no humans required. For example,
you could set up a system that pays your health insurance with Bitcoin
automatically each month.
CIO: As a
startup, it is a hard road with many bumps. What's the one piece of
advice you would give to new entrants into this space?
Alexiuc: I agree with Shark Tank rhetoric ‘ideas are nothing, execution is everything’.
Don’t
get wedded to your idea, it probably isn’t that great. Always be
prepared to pivot – this is my sixth start-up, some raging successes,
and some dramatic failures. But Bitcoin is in my opinion the most
innovative technology since the internet, and there is still heaps of
work to be done in this space.
CIO: If you could actually meet the fabled Satoshi or Bitcoin’s inventor, what would you ask him or her?
Alexiuc: Can I buy you a beer?
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