LIfe in SEC (06-07)
I joined SEC-06 and SEC-07 back-to-back from March to April. It was a pretty transformative experience, so I want to write things down while my memory is still warm and fresh. It shifted my career direction—I left my fiat job to focus on Bitcoin, and now I’m broadening that goal toward building freedom tech software.
We’re all builders
Demo on Friday
I was put off by the strict demo requirements at first. My friend Victor encouraged me—he didn’t know Nostr that well when he first joined, but he always get some ideas from talking to the people through varies chances from Monday to Wednesday.
Also with the help of agentic AI, creating demos has become so easy.
Usually starting Monday, the very common conversation starters are something like: “What are you planning to demo on Friday?” and “Are you ready for your demo?” If you didn’t have anything yet—which happened to me a lot—the veterans would usually throw you a bone.
Now that the cohort is over, I realize that I really like the setup. If there were no public demo, I would not have pushed myself that hard, I would not have the demos presented, which some of them I do think are useful and intent do keep working on. I stayed up very late on a few Thursdays, it is worth it.
Also, there are quite some good Nostr Apps came out of demo day, it says something.
Build in the spirit of Bitcoin
Bitcoin is a given. Almost everyone in the cohort is a Bitcoiner. We were there to build permissionless freedom tech software, the ones that empowers individuals, censorship resistant, and promote self-soveignty.
Most people were building on Nostr, which I didn’t realize the potentials and opportunities on Nostr beforehand, it’s like eye-opening to me. Making money from the products are usually less of priority, but we do often bitter about it.
No time to sleep (or eat sometimes)
I once heard about the academic triangle: good grades, social life, and sleep. You only get to pick two. At SEC, it was coding, social life, and sleep. Same rule.
Since presenting demo is not optional, most people really like to hangout, so sleep is less prioritized. Most people were sleep-deprived most days, if not every day. That part was rough.
There were so much going on everyday, so much energy, so much FOMO. And it was a short stint, so we kind of accepted it. Like Laurie said, paraphrasing: back in Finland, I am just a crazy person by myself enjoying all those stuff, but heere, we got a group of like-minded people and build something interesting.
Other Activities
Monday: captain handover, setting the theme, then a hike and barbecue in the mountains. The weather could be rough, but it rarely stopped us. We often talk to different people along the way and spark lots of ideas. One guy even got hit in the head and bled on the trail, so yes, some caution is still advised.
Tuesday talks: slides, ideas, values. I enjoyed learning about all those “crazy” ideas, also practice of online-privacy, self-soveignty etc.
Wednesday: workshops. We get our hands dirty. A lot of people shamelessly promoted their own products, which was totally fine as long as they were freedom-tech related.
PS: Most people used Linux and GrapheneOS phones. As a Mac and iPhone user, I was definitely in the minority.
photo credit to florian
What about daily life
Accommodation
Most people rented an Airbnb or a flat within walking distance of the station. I initially rented a room in a shared house 3 km away and planned to bike to the station. I found out that is a bad idea on day one. The hills in Madeira are no joke. I later moved to a place lower down and closer to the group.
PS: There were lots of spontaneous activities, so if you stayed far away, you might miss them. I really enjoyed hanging out with people in SEC. We often talked late into the night, until shop owners kicked us out.
Good views and good people
Madeira is beautiful. A lot of the views are genuinely stunning. It felt like living inside Instagram photos every day.
Quite a few shops accepted Bitcoin, still not as many as I would like, but enough to get around. I also finally started using Ecash there, it is quite convenient, I did not know I could melt a Cashu token and pay over Lightning whenever I wanted.
There was also a Bitcoin walk every Saturday morning, there are quite some legit Bitcoiners on the island, enjoy nature
Some other notes
Gigi mentioned a few times that Madeira is one of the hardest islands to reach, and that is partly by design. Once you get there, you do not leave that easily, so you stick with the group, haha. It filters out some of the more drive-by participation attempts.
The program and structure at SEC are also constantly evolving. A bit of chaos is expected. With the right people, that actually makes it more fun.
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