We featured TonyStark in our September monthly live stream. Tony is a new member to the Horizen community, but that didn’t stop him from asking engaging questions on our Telegram channel that spark activity within the community.

About TonyStark

What drew you to blockchain technology?

Hello there! First things first, let me introduce myself to the community! My real name is Antonio, that’s why I like the Tony Stark nickname.

I’m an engineer, a nerdy guy with a background in IT and information security. So you might guess why I prefer to stay (almost) anonymous. I’m a libertarian and a follower of the Austrian School of Economics, these were the main drivers of my adventure in the cryptoverse! 🙂

Now on to your question, I really was looking after a way to boost my finances through Bitcoin, I wasn’t looking into the technology at first. I can’t say precisely when the first time I heard about bitcoin and cryptocurrencies was, but surely it was years before my initial involvement.

By January 2018, shortly after the BTC ATH, during the media frenzy about it, my wife and my mother-in-law told me “we want to invest in this Bitcoin thing” (seriously!!!). So, I set out to study it! As a nerd, I wouldn’t get involved into anything before a serious study, especially something involving money!

I was fascinated! If I had studied the crypto phenomenon before understanding the libertarian philosophy and the Austrian School principles, I probably would consider Bitcoin a mere nerd toy. Thankfully, it crossed my life after I was well equipped to understand it and give it the proper value and consideration it deserves.

Why did you choose Horizen?

I started studying cryptocurrencies by March 2018, when we were already in the middle of the bear market!

Although I do have technical analysis knowledge, my previous experience using it in the stock market didn’t play well. I didn’t have the emotional control needed to profit from it and figured it would consume too much of my time to do it properly.

Since then, I’m more a fundamental analyst/long term investor, and as such, I approached cryptocurrencies. I decided from day one that I wanted to accumulate BTC for the long run, and back in May/June 2018, I figured a good way to do it was to use masternode coins as a “money printing machine” and just convert it’s rewards to BTC. That was more easily said than done, as I had my share of “huge ROI chasing” and got rekt investing in some masternode shitcoins, whose sole use case was being a “masternode coin” in the first place.

While I was heavily invested in the masternode scene (both in terms of time and money) I came to learn of several coins which I considered more or less deserving of my attention and study. One of those was Horizen, but I didn’t give it proper attention as I considered it only a “Zcash clone” back then.

It took me almost a full year to learn that ZEN was so much more than that! I was a follower of Komodo’s community and had a high interest and respect for their multichain scaling solution, and when I found out that Horizen was working on it’s own multichain solution (actually, sidechain, in our case) and that it had turned into a platform like KMD, it was a no-brainer to delve deeper in this community.

On my very first day in Horizen’s Telegram group, I threw a series of technical questions trying to understand it’s technologies and it was unavoidable to make comparisons with the stuff I already knew, KMD, in this case. The open-mindedness that my questions received amazed me and improved my respect for Horizen’s community.

So I finally decided to turn into a Horizen investor, and I’ll soon be launching my first Horizen node! 🙂

Is there anything about yourself you’d like to share with the Horizen Community?

To sum it up: I’m not into crypto because of the technology (even though I’m a nerd)!!! I’m into crypto due to it’s cypherpunk, libertarian roots and I eagerly wait for the day we will see money separated from the State!

THANK YOU FOR THE SUPPORT, ANTONIO! WE ARE GLAD YOU CHOSE TO JOIN OUR COMMUNITY.

About Horizen Community Stars

The Horizen community is unique, colorful, and full of interesting people. Each month, we feature three individuals who help us improve various aspects of our project.

Do you know an outstanding Horizen community member? Nominate them for the next Monthly Live Stream! Contact Horusfeathers #0323 on our Discord channel with their name and contact information.