In addition to digital assets, stablecoins, and metanet, digital wallets are grabbing people’s attention, especially the youth. In this article, we will talk about a conversation between the Women of BSV and Centbee’s Founder Lorien Gamaroff, who shared the story behind Centbee as well as his thoughts on BSV versus other blockchains, inflation, and more.
Gamaroff’s entry into the Bitcoin world began with creating and offering a solution for the long-existent prepaid electricity system.
“I wanted to build smart grid systems, trying to find ways for Africans who don’t necessarily have banks or credit cards to be able to easily buy electricity once they run out of their prepaid power wattage and want to get more,” he told Women of BSV.
He then heard of Bitcoin, which was not linked to any banks, and came across a gentleman at a Blockchain Energy Consortium who was going to the MIT, Boston, to deliver a talk about blockchain. Gamaroff then decided to build a wallet based on Bitcoin [BSV], which was launched in South Africa, but is now operational in several countries, including the United Kingdom, the United States, the United Arab Emirates, the Philippines and more.
“Our roots are in Africa, but we are everywhere. We are international. I wanted to enable people to replace their physical wallet with a digital wallet. And buying electricity was just one thing; Centbee as a wallet has more functions,” he stated.
Centbee is closing the loops in ways focusing on the actual use of social digital cash, which most digital wallets are not doing at the moment.
Heasman said Centbee could prove to be a handy wallet for Americans since the country doesn’t have such a great option at the moment compared to England, which has Michael Hudson’s Gravity.
Speaking of Centbee’s expansion across many countries, Gamaroff said: “It is like joining the dots, but there are speed bumps along the way.” The biggest one, he noted, is that Bitcoin is lumped together with “crypto” to date and most brands don’t want to be associated with “crypto.”
“We are able to get grants, but it doesn’t lead our business to success because companies back out from supporting us when they find out our business is based on Bitcoin, aka crypto according to them,” Gamaroff said.
However, nothing could really be done about it as long as people don’t understand Bitcoin.
“The problem is that voices from within the BSV ecosystem are minority voices and the other big voices shut us down. I am concerned about those voices as they are loud and are on platforms like CNBC. I feel pessimistic on that front, but I realized that the only way out is making my business run well, and hope for regulatory certainty to happen soon, which several governments are likely to implement in future,” Gamaroff said.
According to Gamaroff, BSV will and should last after the regulations are implemented because BSV operates only within the original protocol. “I don’t know how long its gonna take, but regulators are starting to come along, and unfortunately, we are suffering for it,” he added.
Exchanges like Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN) are also struggling at the moment because their regulators are breathing down their necks right now. He stated that all digital currency companies are currently under investigation, whether they know it or not.
When asked if people are using Centbee for cold storage, Gamaroff responded, saying, “If they want to; I am all about cash, but it depends on what the user wants to do. It is very easy to make a cold wallet with Centbee. We are also non-custodial, and we offer the option to shop at multiple stores in different countries on our wallet.”
Confirming this is Heasman, who told the group that she recently downloaded the Centbee wallet and was “completely blown away” by the massive number of stores in the U.K. where she could use the Centbee wallet.
When asked if Centbee would launch a debit card or anything attached to it, Gamaroff denied it, indicating “not at this time, but maybe one day.”
All praises for the CoinGeek conferences, Gamaroff told the Women of BSV that the thing he likes the most about these events is that they are conducted in an absolutely professional manner, solely focusing on building and promoting the products that create real value to people’s lives.
“Those events do not spend any energy and time on the price/speculative aspect of BSV,” he said, adding that IPV6 and Blockchain, Elas, sCrypt, are some of his favorites from the recently held BSV Global Blockchain Convention in Dubai.
Gamaroff is allegedly not much of a social network person. Still, you can reach him on Twitter, or as he says, “Get a Centbee wallet, encounter a problem, and email at [email protected], and probably he will be the one responding to your email.”
Gamaroff will also be speaking at the first Enterprise Blockchain Summit India on August 5-6 in Bangalore. Get your tickets here before they’re gone!
Watch: The BSV Global Blockchain Convention panel, Blockchain in Africa
New to Bitcoin? Check out CoinGeek’s Bitcoin for Beginners section, the ultimate resource guide to learn more about Bitcoin—as originally envisioned by Satoshi Nakamoto—and blockchain.
Read More:Centbee’s roots are in Africa, but we are everywhere: Lorien Gamaroff joins Women of BSV
