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Is Rolling Your Own Entropy The New Standard? (Coldcard Q&A P1)

By Guy Swann

Aired Sep 3, 2026 · 22m · Last boosted 18d ago

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Show Notes

In this Guy's Take, I walk through listener questions and comments on the Coldcard random number generation failure and what it really means for Bitcoin self-custody. We dig into why the RNG bug went unnoticed for years, the difference between source-available and truly open source hardware, and how dice rolls and strong passphrases change your threat model. I also share how I’m thinking about safer setups going forward. Chapters (00:00:00) - Why Coldcard Questions Remain (00:01:18) - Features vs Core Failure (00:03:19) - Speed Over Security Risk (00:04:54) - Car Without An En...

Nostr Boost Stats

sats
300
boosts
3
boosters
3

Nostr Community

Everyone who has boosted Is Rolling Your Own Entropy The New Standard? (Coldcard Q&A P1) on Nostr, ranked by sats sent, all time.

  1. armstrys 100 sats
  2. jespada 100 sats
  3. Cykros 100 sats
Other Episodes This Community Boosts Other shows' episodes boosted by people who boosted this episode
Nostr Boosts:25k
npub1eq94yj8…Dec 4, 2024
25k
Congrats on 1,000! Here’s to many more! 🎉🎊
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Jul 15, 2024
Nostr Boosts:10k
npub1eq94yj8…Jul 20, 2024
10k
Just catching up on this weeks podcasts... Awesome show! Was awesome to chat with someone about this in person and hope we can do it again soon!
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Aug 18, 2026
Nostr Boosts:1.6k
CykrosAug 18, 2026
1.6k
A million times yes. Thank you for addressing this in the right way. You're one of the only podcasts that hasn't responded to Coinkite with yet more bad options. Very much excited that Learning Bitcoin From The Command Line is getting a new edition too -- long overdue.
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Jul 22, 2026
Nostr Boosts:1k
CykrosJul 22, 2026
1k
Re:other nodes and making news, you're clearly not watching Eric Voskuil on Twitter. Libbitcoin 4 just did IBD in 14 minutes on a consumer connection (with assumevalid height of 950k) and 55 min for full validation. Older than Knots, and older than Core being called, well, Core. They slept for a good few years but are waking up with a vengeance.
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Nostr Boosts:1k
npub1eq94yj8…Jan 14, 2026
1k
lol of course Michael Saylor is unhinged… are we surprised?
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Nostr Boosts:1k
CykrosMay 19, 2025
1k
Thanks for removing the friction from consuming Mises.
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Nostr Boosts:600
CykrosSep 22, 2026
100
Ben, if you see bears in the future, give them something they'd want instead of grapes. Picnic baskets.
CykrosSep 22, 2026
500
Ben's the Boy who cried Bear. Haha.
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Aug 24, 2026
Nostr Boosts:580
CykrosAug 24, 2026
580
Welcome back Walker, congrats on the bigger family Also, xpubs will only give unhardened addresses. That said, I expect a Venn diagram of people who didn't roll dice and people using hardened addresses is probably two separate circles.
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Jul 9, 2026
Nostr Boosts:580
CykrosJul 9, 2026
580
Welcome back
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Nostr Boosts:500
CykrosSep 21, 2026
500
People would hit me with things suggesting Slackware to a Linux beginner, but you seem keen on appropriately following documentation, and it's got some of the best documentation, and very vanilla software which makes using upstream documentation easy to use too. Some key audio thoughts too. https://web.archive.org/web/20260426090835/https://blog.sla… Doing your work you may want more than the standard pulseaudio back end.
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Sep 17, 2026
Nostr Boosts:500
CykrosSep 18, 2026
500
Robinhood's 'tokenization' sounds more like an Exchange Traded Note (ETN) that is just a liability of Robinhood and traded on chain. These aren't new, but putting them on chain is. The SEC is talking more about trading actual stock ownership using the chain as a ledger. Very different despite the similar performance in ideal circumstances. If the stock goes up but robinhood goes under, you are out, while with the shares the SEC is talking about, you're good. Maybe a little market downtime, but you'd just get regular shares with SIPC coverage.
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Sep 10, 2026
Nostr Boosts:500
CykrosSep 10, 2026
500
'Rear admiral' 😅 Tom Luongo calls him Big Gay Patton. Still amused Trump brought us the highest ranking gay man in American history.
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Nostr Boosts:500
CykrosAug 26, 2026
500
Hope this counts as a replacement for lost sponsor revenue per this listener.
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Nostr Boosts:500
CykrosAug 4, 2026
500
The cloak and dagger shit with Switck is heating up. People were already looking for a reason for this to be inside. Still not totally convinced but it looks sketchy as fuck. Never been more glad I had fun playing dice games with my bitcoin.
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Nostr Boosts:500
CykrosJul 23, 2026
500
Boston Bitdevs is coming up on July 30 at MIT Building 4. Be sure to RSVP through bostonbitdevs.org (or with the link if David wants to put it in notes). https://app.evento.so/e/evt_3M48gmwDKdbzNc63 Come with questions!
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Nostr Boosts:500
CykrosJun 27, 2026
500
One of the best WBD's yet. Dines' coverage of the Eurodollar mechanics here and the shift that happened with LIBOR to SOFR is something far too few people are talking about (Luongo notwithstanding).
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Nostr Boosts:500
CykrosMay 7, 2025
500
MOAR LUONGO
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Nostr Boosts:500
CykrosDec 30, 2024
500
One of the best podcasts on the technical sides of Bitcoin I've encountered. Helps explain why IBD is taking forever on my raspi 4.
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Nostr Boosts:200
jespadaFeb 22, 2025
100
#btc all the things
CykrosFeb 21, 2025
100
Bring on the helicopter sats!
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Nostr Boosts:430
CykrosSep 9, 2026
430
The thing about Bitcoin wallets is, you can have more than one. Soapminer? You're paying Lightning. Rent? Maybe a hot wallet, or single sig. Retirement savings? Multisig offsite. Generational wealth? You're adding miniscript. You don't keep are your fiat in your pocket. Don't do it with your Bitcoin either.
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Feb 18, 2025
Nostr Boosts:200
jespadaFeb 19, 2025
100
Pain is the way people will learn, shitcoins gonna shitcoin , so hdsp for them until they learn
jespadaFeb 19, 2025
100
Zap zap
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Jan 6, 2026
Nostr Boosts:400
CykrosJan 6, 2026
400
Welcome back! Your break sounds like it was good. Missed your updates.
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Nostr Boosts:210
Sep 22, 2026
Nostr Boosts:100
CykrosSep 22, 2026
100
Cutting out other forms of collateral is where stablecoins can drive up treasury demand. Currency swaps and other credit instruments are huge in repo markets, as is rehypothecation of the same underlying collateral. Stablecoins don't hold claims on treasuries, they hold treasuries. They don't hold gilts and forex swaps, they hold treasuries. There are problems that come with some of the solutions here, as there mist be as the whole game of fiat is a game of jenga. But short to moderate term they can seem to cannibalize demand for other collateral and chains of rehypothecation in order to reduce treasury yields.
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Nostr Boosts:100
CykrosSep 21, 2026
100
Infinite divisibility would be cool but floating point math is all sorts of problematic. Infinite divisibility is trivial on L2+ though as it is.
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Nostr Boosts:100
CykrosSep 14, 2026
100
He doesn't believe there was ever a major improvement to Bitcoin, but wants payment rails. Yea, tell me you don't understand Segwit without saying so, especially while touting Lightning's use. Not surprised here.
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Nostr Boosts:100
CykrosSep 10, 2026
100
ACK to more students coming out. Did you not hear @npub1fhmmgwe6f… say there's free food?😄 But seriously pushing the conversation back into classrooms and engaging other academics helps engage more valuable resources. Student engagement disporportionaly can help move the needle. Besides, the more you're into bitcoin when you're a student, the more you're retired when you're 45-50.
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Sep 9, 2026
Nostr Boosts:100
CykrosSep 9, 2026
100
OpenArena is still out there and the zoomers can get off my lawn if they think I'm giving it up. All the Q3 stuff is free on archive.org too, including team arena. Fortnite is very centralized and permissioned. But Minecraft would work. Java version anyway, Idk about bedrock version.
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Nostr Boosts:100
CykrosSep 8, 2026
100
'Nobody runs an electrum server' 🤡 Let's just pretend EPS and electrs don't run trivially on a raspberry pi alongside your full node.
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Aug 26, 2026
Nostr Boosts:100
CykrosAug 27, 2026
100
A hung jury isn't an acquittal, it's a mistrial. Jurors aren't voting, they're deliberating to arrive at consensus. If they can't, it's a do over. Double jeopardy only applies if a verdict is reached.
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Episode Boosts

Every boost sent to this episode, as published to Nostr, newest first.

  • 100 via Fountain
    You should talk to Keith from seed signer about entropy. He has been putting in the work including showing why dice rolls aren’t that “risky” I’m unconvinced anyone should ever use a passphrase - should never be compared to multisig. The single sig focused hardware marketing budgets will always try to convince you otherwise. I have no regrets in trusting level headed research from open source and DIY devs over corporate marketing.
  • 100 via Fountain
    I don't get why everyone says random generation was the most important task. It'd have been a better signer than any on the market if it didn't have an RNG at all. It was a task that if you're gonna do has to be done right though.
  • 100 via Fountain
    If anything after the entropy fuckup, they were /are lot of eyes on the coldcard code and other wallets . Coldcards force user entropy now (latest firmware) so I think they are now ok to use , even to generate the seed, hopefully they go fully open source not just src code available. So don't throw the device just yet