Jay Addison Technical and Media advisor interviews Josh Garza at Inside Bitcoins Las Vegas. Josh is a serial-entrepreneur with a focus on technology startups that are community-focused and force the industry to evolve and grow with integrity. In 2004, Josh founded the Great Auk Wireless High-Speed Internet Inc (where GAW originally got its name) which was dedicated to providing fast and affordable internet access to both urban and rural areas that were traditionally under-served by the competition.
Transcript
Transcript generated by YouTube auto-captions. May contain errors.
this is jay addison from Krypto biz magazine we're live on the inside bitcoins convention in Las Vegas with the CEO of G aw minors Josh Garza Josh how are you doing today good are you doing I'm doing great thank you tell us about your company what you all do there so we do a number of things but I guess the main thing that we're most well known for is we sell digital cloud miners so we essentially allow people to get into the cloud mining business low cost of entry and kind of learn about it and then as they learn they could scale from there okay so I know mining is complicated but can you briefly explain what mining is the people that are non texture so that's I'd say that's our niche is to simplify it so we have taken out all like the pool configuration so essentially in a sense what how mine is is the same thing as regular mining but just scaled across lots and lots of computers you know regular money essentially it's the act of confirming transactions and then won a contract transactions confirm by all these various monitors are rewarded with the currency itself so cloud mining is the same thing but scaled across lots and lots and lots of miners and that you essentially on a portion of so so we do is that we take that portion and take out all the configuration and the complication of knowing you know what's the best this or that or and just really make it simple presented an easy way and allow someone to use their credit card in by whenever they want it's fantastic what is it about the company that makes you guys so successful um I think because from the beginning we so I think there was there's two really important things I think the first is that we're very transparent as a company like myself and the other guys who run it we have hide behind pseudo names or never even heard of that till I came in this industry and used to asking the same like this is who I am here's my LinkedIn here's this is that you gotta be able to do Google me yes the inner track come from so we were very successful because we're very open with what we did and then as time went on we looked at the market said well one path is we could sell to the same people over and over and over and over again like lot of companies in the industry you are in other path is that we can try to broaden this thing and put some zeros behind it and so at the general population which allows us to have a lot more zeros behind things so we were successful because you know despite the market pressure to continue to keep things in very a very technical way we departed from that and said you know we're going to make things simple and colorful make things drag and drop and make you know so we we are very focused on making things open and accessible to new miners that know nothing about it and enabled and we our goal is to make you be able to do it in West in a minute look if we can't do our job in less than a minute then we revise and revamp so you're really just making things really easy for the audience I mean one of the things that we're trying to do is bridge the gap between the older financial audience and the crypto people and that's really what you guys are doing you're making it so easy that anybody can come along hit a button put their card in or whatever and get going and we've we've done a lot to kind of gamma phi the experience some you know we allow we have like these boost in these amps that people can apply on their miners and they have fun and they talk to each other about it and very cool they can actually vote for each other and then that gives them point i mean so it's very social like a cloud mining community operated early and so that battle that has allowed us to expand exponentially because that's what i think most normal people want sure and then they're also sharing the word and you know it's it word of mouth helps a huge amount right now how has bitcoins price dropping in the last little bit here affected mining um it hasn't I mean obviously it's like anything that when a currency that you heavily rely on drops then it doesn't help you know obviously our sales have dropped a little bit but it's it's also interesting because when prices go down like this a lot of times it'll shake out the folks that are in it for real sure trim games and so and sometimes and while we welcome all miners sometimes that that group might be a little harder to serve because you know they're kind of you know on this idea of you know I'm gonna get a 12 day roi or yay roi so it's kind of nice because that kind of goes away for a little bit and and you know and you get kind of more the long-term i'm in this for a long haul help long haul type of folks in so so that you know has its advantages disadvantages so what do you think is holding bitcoin back from the men mainstream adoption for sure no question I mean the problem is that bitcoin is presented in this way of its it's usually always presented in the wrong way so so one way people think of bitcoins is like this investment vehicle where you know go buy it at like two hundred hours and one day I'll be like ten thousand dollars no currency works that way that's for sure and so that's so that's a the total wrong perception of going into it the other thing is that it's I think I would summarize it as commitment you know because you get multi-million dollar companies 100 million dollar companies you know quote unquote committing to Bitcoin and all that really means is that they have a wallet address on their website and its home pays them a big yes they just cashed it out back to USD that doesn't help that doesn't help are you know and that's the problem is it companies don't keep them in yet we have lots and lots of big coins and we've lost millions and millions of dollars with this change but like we understand that's like part of the business that you can't ride just on the Waverider in both directions and to this day we still mean I'm not joking i made a rule that we would never sell our Vic whatever for USD and for the last week every account i have is like man just josh is going lower selling selling all i know but i look at and say now like it like like how do i have faith in the business that I'm in if i'm sewing it out when it when it's convenient you i don't agree with that so if he goes down it goes down you know but i don't think it will i think if more companies commit to it the same way it'll go up so i think it's really sure it has to right i mean with i mean with everything we've seen with the adoption with you know paypal square Expedia or look I mean everybody's I mean this adoptions gotta help right it helps but again a lot of companies I think it's more like marketing and trying to be trendy and things like that than it is a row because when you invested in this industry in a real way I mean again it could mean that you know what you're holding onto becomes worth half as much than yes certainly it means that you have to figure out how to get your vendors to accept it right yeah I mean again it doesn't help turn into USD and then pay or vintage get your vendors to accept so it's it's a commitment it takes a lot of worked in order to do it so the easy way out is just to say yeah I'm helping quote unquote you know it's almost I liken it to like Wi-Fi you know it's like like you know member ali for a long time there was a Wi-Fi and then all of a sudden you know hotels were like I offer Wi-Fi yes a bunch of hotels didn't offer and really at the other day was about green connectivity maybe but it was also because if you offered Wi-Fi more people would come to your hotel sure and so I think for a lot of people companies accepting bitcoins what it is it's more like hey I offer Wi-Fi off for bitcoins you but it's not that's not that's different than making a commitment it certainly is yes I think it has I mean it certainly must help a bit in that you know when you see the average personal there that's not technical that's not into this sector at all and they hear that you know PayPal and Expedia all these guys are accepting bitcoins it's got to give them some co yet it certainly combats like this perception this persona that being bad but again I'm of the belief that that the currency will do that itself like it will become more like as more people use it as more people accept it they pay their vendors in it that that adoption I mean it's again it's not it's not a it's not like a marketing you know scheme type it get outs if it's just used normally that normal people will start using it yes and you know so you know I mean doesn't need like I know it's right here yeah it's just any more adoption it really needs me simpler solutions like yours what you guys have done to make it so that your average person off the street can go to your site and in two minutes or in a minute as you mentioned can sign up another in the mining business that thing right so like Sam Amaya yeah they're just proud to be able to say it yeah that's exactly as you guys have done it right Josh Garza CEO of GA w miners it's been fantastic talking to you today I've got one more question sir the price of Bitcoin january first 2015 i think personally we're going to end up back in the 6 270 a wrench that's a sounds good to me josh thanks kindly for your time a problem magazine live from Meckler media's inside bitcoins conference in Las Vegas remember to subscribe to crypto biz magazine at crypto biz mag com follow us on twitter at crypto biz mag thanks for joining us and learn more at crypto biz magazine com