Bitcoin Takeover Podcast Celebrates 5 Years of Existence!

On February 6th 2019, I published the first 11 episodes of the Bitcoin Takeover podcast. At the time, it was my most ambitious project: the idea of recording a series of interviews and publishing them all at once (as I liked to call it at the time, “Netflix-style to enable binge-listening) was pretty new to Bitcoin and seemed to resonate with the audience. For context, 2019 was the year when every major influencer and company was launching a new podcast – so I knew that I had to stand out with a different concept, and I knew that I had to carry on for a long time if I want my work to stand out.

Five years later, I’m just as excited about the project and feel like I’m only getting started. Most podcasters begin their journey thinking that interviewing people from a specific industry will help them make connections in order to get a better job – this is largely true, but it wasn’t the reason why I started podcasting. After doing interviews for Crypto Globe and Crypto Insider, I wanted to have a project of my own. Something that I can grow by myself, something that I can create by my own rules, and something that helps me learn from people who are much smarter than me.

As a matter of fact, the reason why the Bitcoin Takeover podcast carries on after 5 years is that I haven’t finished learning. I still enjoy it, I still find new projects for which I develop obsessions, and I still find joy in discovering new people who aren’t vocal on social media but build something extraordinary.

Conceptually speaking, the Bitcoin Takeover podcast started out as an attempt to put my master degree in political science in practice. I thought that talking geopolitics, international relations, and other related topics in relation to Bitcoin would be a great idea. The first name that I wanted to give to the project was Bitcoin in Politics (BIP). But a guy named Bitcoinpasada suggested a much better name: Bitcoin Takeover… and do this day, I’m very grateful to him. Furthermore, I soon realized that it’s not politics that influences Bitcoin, but it’s the other way around: Bitcoin is a force that makes the powers that be change, adjust, and accept that they can’t stop it. So I decided to focus on learning about Bitcoin instead.

Over the last 60 months, I’ve published 198 interviews which span across 15 seasons. Most of these interviews were recorded remotely, from my bedroom in Romania. But for some of them, I’ve had to travel to Istanbul, Prague, Riga, Budapest, Zurich, Buenos Aires, Mallorca, and Warsaw. It’s been an honor and a privilege to travel he world for the purpose of working on this project, it’s been amazing to make friends from all around the world. and I look forward to even more collaborations!

I would also like to thank the sponsors that supported the show, as they covered my travel and production costs. In chronological order, they are: LXMI, Bottle Pay, Phemex, Vaultoro, Trezor, Wasabi Wallet, Bitcoin Reserve, Cryptosteel, Bumbee, Satochip, and IVPN.

And last but not least, I would like to thank everyone who’s listened to the show, gave feedback, and engaged with the content. It’s been a long journey, we’ve been through two cold bear markets and one very hot bull run, and we are only getting started!

Here are some stats about the Bitcoin Takeover podcast, after 5 years of existence

Season 1: 1111 minutes, 11 episodes

Season 2: 1268 minutes, 12 episodes

Season 3: 1096 minutes, 11 episodes

Season 4: 908 minutes, 11 episodes

Season 5: 840 minutes, 10 episodes

Season 6: 1018 minutes, 11 episodes

Season 7:  1259 minutes, 12 episodes

Season 8: 1272 minutes, 13 episodes

Season 9: 1499 minutes, 11 episodes

Season 10: 1408 minutes, 11 episodes 

Season 11: 690 minutes, 12 episodes 

Season 12: 1270 minutes, 17 episodes

Season 13: 1436 minutes, 17 episodes

Season 14: 1778 minutes, 21 episodes

Season 15: 1501 minutes, 18 episodes

Total: 18.354 minutes, 305,9 hours, 12.745 days

Total episodes: 198

Number of episodes that cross the 2-hour mark: 34

Number of episodes that cross the 3-hour mark: 4

Number of episodes that cross the 5-hour mark: 1

Longest episode: S15 E13, Paul Sztorc Reacts to Drivechains Reactions, 5:16:54

Second longest episode: S9 E1, Chris DeRose on the Philosophy of Demoralisation, 3:34:10

Third longest episode: S15 E16, Paul Sztorc Talks Bitcoin Scaling, But Can’t Say “Drivechains”, 3:32:41

Fourth longest episode: S13 E3, Casey Rodarmor on Ordinals, Inscriptions & Bitcoin Culture, 3:21:31

Shortest episode: S11 E4, Adam on the Bitcoin Bar in Budapest, 16:53

Most featured guest: Max Hillebrand, 6 appearances

Second most featured guest: Paul Sztorc, 5 appearances

Third most featured guest: Peter Todd, 4 appearances

Guests who appeared 3 times: John Carvalho, Giacomo Zucco, Nicholas Gregory, Lixin Liu, Ben Arc, Chris DeRose

Voices heard in these first 5 years: 196