With a focus on a circular economy and educational resources, a project aims to revolutionize business practices in Costa Rica while providing an efficient and merchant-friendly payment system using Bitcoin.
Journey of a Bitcoin pioneer in search of freedom
Francis Pouliot, a well-known figure in the Bitcoin community and originally from Montreal, chose to emigrate to Costa Rica to continue his commitment.
In 2013, he founded the Bitcoin Embassy in Montreal, a nerve center offering training and development services for Montreal companies and individuals interested in BTC.
Given the success of this initiative, In 2015, the team launched a payment service exclusively based on Bitcoin.
Despite initial enthusiasm, they decided to withdraw from the American market, hampered by increasingly restrictive regulations for the crypto industry.
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The pandemic accentuates his disenchantment with restrictions in Canada: after celebrating the Bitcoin halving with other enthusiasts in 2020, he is fined $1,500 for failing to comply with social distancing.
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Deeply shocked by the reaction of his loved ones and his community, Francis Pouliot decides to leave for Costa Rica, attracted by the culture of freedom and holistic way of life of this country.
“Respect nature and wild life”, the leitmotif of Costa Rica, a rare natural space on Earth
He explains that people in rural Costa Rica are very self-sufficient, often growing their own food resources and living independently.
In 2021, it is therefore moving to Bitcoin Jungle, one of the main Bitcoin citadels in Latin Americawhere he finds an environment in tune with his values of personal sovereignty and economic freedom.
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Bitcoin Jungle: when the freedom of the jungle meets the decentralized spirit of Bitcoin
Bitcoin Jungle is an open source community project built on the Bitcoin Lightning network, with the ambition of creating a true circular economy in BTC.
To achieve this goal, the community provides educational and technological resources, both for individuals and businesses.
Located in the Golden Triangle (which includes Dominical, Uvita, Ojochal, Platinillo and Tinamaste), the project benefits from a proximity effect which promotes a natural propagation of Bitcoin, explains Francis Pouliot.
Bitcoin Jungle Headquarters, Uvita, Costa Rica
According to him, “ diffusion must necessarily be from the base to the top », a fundamental principle of open source.
Initiatives in Bitcoin Jungle are therefore spontaneous and non-profit. Funding comes mainly from volunteers, although the project received financial support this year from OpenSats, making it possible to maintain the ecosystem in a sustainable manner.
Bitcoin Jungle “hunting table” allowing you to visualize the objectives to convert
For example, I pay for the office here. The guy who manages the application is the one who pays for the servers, so everyone pays our own costs.
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The primary objective of Bitcoin Jungle is to guarantee a functional and accessible payment system, in particular by distributing payment terminals to merchants to ensure an optimal user experience.
In addition, an interface connected to the exchange platform Bull Bitcoin allows them to easily convert the BTC received into columnsthe local currency, in order to cover their operational costs.
While Bitcoin Jungle allows the receipt and custody of bitcoins, Bull Bitcoin facilitates their purchase and sale.
Moreover, Francis Pouliot notes that traders adopt a conservation approach:
There, as time progresses, traders tend to sell them less and keep them. Because they see that the price of bitcoin has increased over time.
The source code of the Bitcoin Jungle application comes from the Blink application, developed for Bitcoin Beach in El Salvador, and today inspires Bitcoin Ekasi, an initiative of the foundation “ The Surfer Kids » in South Africa.
These different communities, although independent, help each other and share resources to develop collaborative and supportive content, without a spirit of competition, specifies Francis Pouliot.
Material made available by Bitcoin Jungle to facilitate the adoption of BTC
Finally, Bitcoin Jungle's mission is to promote meetings and learning for the curious. THE ” Ticos ”, as Costa Ricans are called, are particularly receptive to technological innovations and politically engaged, a trait facilitated by a high level of education.
The country has an illiteracy rate of just 2-3%, lower than many European countries, contributing to the growing enthusiasm around Bitcoin in the region.
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Source: Field survey
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