Forum rules
The more people that are involved, the more interesting this AMA series will be for everyone.
Please help spread the word of this amazing AMA series on your own social media. (YES, EVEN YOURS!)
Short URL: AMA.Bitcoin.com
Hashtag: #BTCAMA
When the AMAs are finished, all the answers will be compiled into a free E-book!
User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

I'm Allen Byron Penner, Sr Dev at Coinigy, former owner of Atomic Trade / Cryptomic AMA

Sun Jan 10, 2016 6:59 pm

I'm Allen Byron Penner, most know me as ByronP. I have been serving as the Sr. Dev at Coinigy Inc. for over a year now and the creator of the former Atomic Trade exchange platform. I have been involved with bitcoin since inception and haven't stopped since.

***************************************************************************************************************
***************************************************OUTDATED***************************************************
I created Atomic-Trade after seeing the need for a safe and transparent place to trade. The project became my main focus after being scammed on the former MCXNOW. After a fairly successful first year I sold Atomic-Trade to Banx Capital where it became Banx.io. I had stayed on working as the admin and developer to ensure that the core values remained the same. After the demise of Banx Capital I regained control of the code and started Cryptomic. To this day the site remains secure and is probably the only exchange where all of the wallets are hosted in a private datacenter and do not actually talk to the exchange site. I am always making changes and upgrades to Cryptomic, on the table is an assortment of mobile and desktop trading apps for the platform.

On any given day I am working on a dozen projects. One of the latest being Remittio, a global remittance service. More information about Remittio will be released soon. The project has already spurred much interest and is the proud winner of an Angel Award at Web Summit. I am also the creator of capfeed.com.

I am now 36 years old and have been interested in electronics since I was a mere 6 years old creating robots by tearing apart stuff around the house. Yes, I got in a lot of trouble. I am fluent in over a dozen programming languages as well as hardware design. With the SOC chips we have available now my hardware skills are somewhat obsolete but I love that the door is now open for everyone to create hardware and software without tons of effort. I love the Intel Edison boards but being x86 is both a gift and a curse. Arduinos are one of my favorites because they allow easy entry for beginners and can provide a bit of power when needed for more advanced projects. For example I use an array of Arduino boards to monitor and control the Banx.io wallet servers and environment.

I have a son named Atom, named after the exchange. He is the best behaved kid I have ever seen and smart too. He has a great interest already in electronics however I try and limit his exposure so that he can be balanced. I can't stand watching kids who can't go 5 minutes without some form of electronic entertainment.

I have been into cars since I was a teenager and have my own personal full fledged shop under my house (I live on the water so my house is on piles). The favorites in my car collection is 3 Mitsubishi Eclipses; a 98 GS, a 98 GST Spyder and a 95 GSX. When I am not at my desk, I am working on one of the cars. They have all been completely rebuilt and customized from the ground up. Oddly enough the past month has not seen anything good in my garage since I have been doing some body work and upgrades to my kid carrier, an 07 Dodge Grand Caravan.

Well this is me any questions ask away.

You can also get me on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/byron.penner
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CryptomicEx
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/byron-allen-penner-23637055
SKYPE: info@atomic-trade.com (i think) or byronp@cryptomic.com
Last edited by ByronP on Mon Aug 07, 2017 11:29 pm, edited 4 times in total.

kingscrown
Bronze Bitcoiner
Bronze Bitcoiner
Posts: 392
Joined: Tue Oct 27, 2015 3:50 am

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Sun Jan 10, 2016 8:08 pm

Welcome to the AMA, glad i made you post :)
Financial Underground KIngdom - Best Cryptocurrency Blog with Private Mailing List

GIVE ME A BEER 1HC58noBPD7fmyNZKP7qf7thjb6ZSVN7fK

User avatar
The_Void
Nickel Bitcoiner
Nickel Bitcoiner
Posts: 51
Joined: Fri Oct 02, 2015 1:25 pm
Location: Switzerland
Contact: Website

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Mon Jan 11, 2016 10:32 am

Hi Allen,

Can you please drop some secrets of your successful startup engineering? What should anybody do in the first place to ensure that the project will hit its targets?

Thanks!
The beatings will continue until morale improves.

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Wed Jan 13, 2016 4:09 pm

I guess the best thing you can do is expect that you will not hit your targets and plan ahead for such an event. If you do make it then you have no worries if not then you are already prepared. One thing I do find is that people hype there stuff then release crap and wonder why it fails. So don't hype anything until you have something to really show and hope for the best but prepare for the worst.

I'm also a huge security first person and if you think your stuff is secure look again and again and again and never assume it is because there is always a flaw somewhere you just have to find it. It is a never ending task and should always be on ones mind.

As per actual system design I believe that modularity is the key and design systems for expansion. Each piece should be written a few dozen times and each time taking the best parts and tossing the junk. This ensures you wind up not just with working code but code that has gone through multiple revisions before even seeing a release. This method also forces you to rethink everything and often times you find better ways of doing things. Then continue this process even after a release has been made.

Also over the years I have struggled with being overly picky and delaying projects because I personally was not happy. This is both good and bad just don't over do it because you will never see a release if you do. Fear is also a huge factor when you first release as you are always afraid of failure but this needs to be suppressed and every hiccup taken in a calm stride. You will never please everybody but always be open to taking the advise of everyone. Some ideas that may seem small or stupid could be just the thing that pushes you forward or helps you make a breakthrough.

User avatar
Skin_in_the_game
Nickel Bitcoiner
Nickel Bitcoiner
Posts: 54
Joined: Thu Nov 19, 2015 6:51 pm

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Wed Jan 13, 2016 5:53 pm

Hello,


my usual question:

I was re-reading Antifragile by iconoclast thinker Nassim Taleb recently. He writes
"Never ask anyone for their opinion [...] Just ask them what they have -or don't have- in their portfolio"
I have come to think it's a very relevant question and you can better weight people's opinions having an idea of how many Bitcoins they hold (or do not hold.) So Instead of asking their opinion on bitcoin, I'm now asking every participants the same question:

- Do you mind to tell us which percentage of your personal net worth and/or liquid assets you hold in Bitcoins ?

User avatar
arnoudk
Bronze Bitcoiner
Bronze Bitcoiner
Posts: 631
Joined: Wed Oct 21, 2015 4:04 am
Location: Belize

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Wed Jan 13, 2016 6:20 pm

Hello Allen. I feel it is my moral duty to share my opinion on the block size limit issue that is threatening bitcoin, and to ask all bitcoin industry leaders to publicly voice their own opinion on this matter.

I strongly feel that, if bitcoin blocks get filled up to capacity with real-world non-spam transactions, that the foundation of bitcoin will change. Bitcoin is meant to be a network where everyone can join (permissionless), where the free market can decide what services to offer on top of the bitcoin protocol. This fundamental freedom is challenged if you are required, not by choice but by necessity, to use solutions built on top of bitcoin. Even if they seem benign, if they limit choice by decree, they limit freedom. Currently, core developers are limiting, by decree, a peaceful resolution and obvious resolution to the issue: a simple block size increase. I strongly feel that they must not be ones to make market decisions - the free market should do that. They should not have the power to change the economics of bitcoin. They should not get to dictate that a fee market must exist - the free market should decide that.

Like the minimum wage laws, where people who do not provide enough value to their employer to warrant the minimum wage go unemployed, a fee market in bitcoin will result in the unbanked to not be able to afford bitcoin transactions.

They are increasing the barrier to entry to a system that could be the solution to so much inequality in the world, and by raising this barrier, they are contributing to the problem. It is a tragedy if that were to happen, as it can so easily be avoided. And we, right now, have the power to steer history in the right direction. All it takes, at the moment, is to send the one or few persons who refuse to click merge get back in line. They are not a dictator, they are a service provider, and they should start to act like it.

My request to you, and everyone in the bitcoin world, is to make a choice, and make that choice publicly and loudly known. I cannot tell you what to choose (then I would be no better than a dictator!), but I trust you will choose what is in your own best interest. Please contact the main decision makers in this situation - probably the miners, and strongly urge them to act in a manner that serves your interest. If only more companies spoke out, like Coinbase and BitPay have done, and if only miners realize that they serve the end users - then a dictator of a repository has no power.
Excited about the potential of Bitcoin Cash in the beautiful country of Belize.
Developer of the RegisterDocuments.com Document Registration Service (using the Bitcoin Cash blockchain).

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Wed Jan 13, 2016 10:28 pm

I hold about 6% of my net worth in virtual currencies, sorry I will not post an exact amount.

As per the bitcoin blockchain this is a mixed bag so to speak. While I believe it is up to the people to make the final decisions they also need to be informed of the impact these changes have from a technical standpoint.

To put it bluntly from a technical standpoint piggybacking on the bitcoin blockchain is a horrible idea and so is increasing the size. Reason being is that the size of the current chain is already way to large and is creating problems with loading and scanning all of it. Opdata was not meant for this purpose. Even at the current rate the size of the chain and our ability to efficiently parse it is outpacing our technology.

iFixBTCmemoryIssues
Gold Bitcoiner
Gold Bitcoiner
Posts: 2682
Joined: Tue Nov 24, 2015 9:03 pm

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Wed Jan 13, 2016 11:09 pm

I have a son named Atom, named after the exchange. He is the best behaved kid I have ever seen and smart too. He has a great interest already in electronics however I try and limit his exposure so that he can be balanced. I can't stand watching kids who can't go 5 minutes without some form of electronic entertainment.
Very cool, naming a bank after your kid! A good story to explain to him later on in life :)
Image

If you are running a version of Bitcoin Core, stop using it. Upgrade to Bitcoin Unlimited or Classic immediately.

Fix Your Unconfirmed Transaction.

Vote for the future of our Bitcoin network!

User avatar
arnoudk
Bronze Bitcoiner
Bronze Bitcoiner
Posts: 631
Joined: Wed Oct 21, 2015 4:04 am
Location: Belize

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Wed Jan 13, 2016 11:36 pm

To put it bluntly from a technical standpoint piggybacking on the bitcoin blockchain is a horrible idea and so is increasing the size. Reason being is that the size of the current chain is already way to large and is creating problems with loading and scanning all of it. Opdata was not meant for this purpose. Even at the current rate the size of the chain and our ability to efficiently parse it is outpacing our technology.
Thanks for your response. It is interesting to see that you believe that a currency that was founded on the principles set forth in the Satoshi Nakamoto whitepaper, should deviate from this vision. It was clearly Satoshi's intent that the bitcoin blockchain would process all the transactions.

Can you elaborate on how the chain size and current growth rate is outpacing technology? My Raspberry Pi can currently process the block chain with capacity to spare. Therefore, it can run on a $30 device. It could grow many orders of magnitude before my desktop PC cannot cope. Can you elaborate on what issues you are having with parsing the blockchain?

Why not leave the scanning of the blockchain to the free market? Those with inefficient processes would get weeded out, and efficient businesses would thrive. That is all part of operating in a free market.
Excited about the potential of Bitcoin Cash in the beautiful country of Belize.
Developer of the RegisterDocuments.com Document Registration Service (using the Bitcoin Cash blockchain).

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Thu Jan 14, 2016 1:31 am

To put it bluntly from a technical standpoint piggybacking on the bitcoin blockchain is a horrible idea and so is increasing the size. Reason being is that the size of the current chain is already way to large and is creating problems with loading and scanning all of it. Opdata was not meant for this purpose. Even at the current rate the size of the chain and our ability to efficiently parse it is outpacing our technology.
Thanks for your response. It is interesting to see that you believe that a currency that was founded on the principles set forth in the Satoshi Nakamoto whitepaper, should deviate from this vision. It was clearly Satoshi's intent that the bitcoin blockchain would process all the transactions.

Can you elaborate on how the chain size and current growth rate is outpacing technology? My Raspberry Pi can currently process the block chain with capacity to spare. Therefore, it can run on a $30 device. It could grow many orders of magnitude before my desktop PC cannot cope. Can you elaborate on what issues you are having with parsing the blockchain?

Why not leave the scanning of the blockchain to the free market? Those with inefficient processes would get weeded out, and efficient businesses would thrive. That is all part of operating in a free market.

First of all carrying extra data in the chain is NOT processing a transaction. If the core wallet was able to process this extra data then it would be considered a bitcoin blockchain transaction. Instead what we have is extra data being stuffed where it was never intended to be. If this data was meant to be there then the bitcoin wallet would do more for it than just carry it, hence it is data that is just piggybacked. We can refute any issue of this by the fact that it has to have a carrier transaction to piggyback on.

I stand by the paper but it's intent is misconstrued and at the time the idea of chain bloat and piggybacking was not a concern. If the general consensus is to increase the size then I stand by that decision. As it stands right now a full chain is over 60gb which is more than double what it was less than a year ago (https://blockchain.info/charts/blocks-s ... 0&address=).

This rate of grown is not sustainable. In a couple years it will take massive machines with tons of fast storage to run a full node. This is what is meant by bloat. If you try to sync a new machine without a bootstrap it will soon take months. This escalation will eventually lead to a point where it is virtually impossible to sync without a huge bootstrap thus the chain is outpacing technology.

This, as you pointed out, shakes out the people who don't have access to this level of hardware. However, I believe every effort should be made to ensure the full chain is available to as many devices as possible for as long as possible. Without this as a core goal we run the risk of centralization. A core principal of the original draft was decentralization and inclusion of as many people as possible (or so is my interpretation).

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Thu Jan 14, 2016 2:10 am

Now as a side note I think the future lies in using multiple chains interacting with each other. As an example

Chain A: Service Request Data From Consumers (thing needs a tech, customer is available between whenever and part blahh blahh is needed)
Chain B: Thing Data From Manufacturers (thing serial number, warranty info, prior repairs, etc)
Chain C: Bidding Data From Service Techs
Chain D: Payment Chain (perhaps such as BTC)

A consumer device sends a request for repair on chain A which in turn creates a bid request on chain C.
Service companies then look at chain C and B, if they have the part and can service the request (say the thing is under warranty so some can not service it or they don't have an open matching time slot) they offer a bid on Chain C. Chain C then processes all of the bids to find the best match and then this data is sent to chain A as a confirmation of request.

The tech then goes out at the given time and repairs the thing. He then sends a message on chain C saying the job is complete and gives the final cost. The manufacturer than approves the job completion and then chain C sends a message to chain B with the details of what was done and by whom for future reference and diagnostics by the manufacturer.
Then lets say chain c sees the finished job and it's approved for payment and then sends a message to chain D which sends the payment to the service tech.

So while many will initially see this as overly complicated it actually is very simple and robust in comparison of what is in place today. Using the multiple chain approach each chain is optimized and avoids bloating itself with information it doesn't really need. The manufacturers don't need to care about or keep chain A they would be mainly interested in chain B and there payment department only concerned about chain C and D. The end user only needs to care about chain A.

Please remember this is just an example I made up off the top of my head. Don't expect it to be technically correct or something you should do.

User avatar
coinsdirect
Posts: 5
Joined: Thu Jan 14, 2016 3:09 am

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Thu Jan 14, 2016 3:23 am

I'm Allen Byron Penner, most know me as ByronP. I am the creator of the Atomic-Trade exchange platform which is now Banx.io. I have been involved with bitcoin since inception and haven't stopped since.

I created Atomic-Trade after seeing the need for a safe and transparent place to trade. The project became my main focus after being scammed on the former MCXNOW. After a fairly successful first year I sold Atomic-Trade to Banx Capital where it became Banx.io. I have stayed on working as the admin and developer to ensure that the core values remain the same. To this day the site remains secure and is probably the only exchange where all of the wallets are hosted in a private datacenter and do not actually talk to the exchange site. I am always making changes and upgrades to Banx.io, on the table is an assortment of mobile and desktop trading apps for the platform.

On any given day I am working on a dozen projects. One of the latest being Remittio, a global remittance service. More information about Remittio will be released soon. The project has already spurred much interest and is the proud winner of an Angel Award at Web Summit. I am also the creator of capfeed.com.

I am now 36 years old and have been interested in electronics since I was a mere 6 years old creating robots by tearing apart stuff around the house. Yes, I got in a lot of trouble. I am fluent in over a dozen programming languages as well as hardware design. With the SOC chips we have available now my hardware skills are somewhat obsolete but I love that the door is now open for everyone to create hardware and software without tons of effort. I love the Intel Edison boards but being x86 is both a gift and a curse. Arduinos are one of my favorites because they allow easy entry for beginners and can provide a bit of power when needed for more advanced projects. For example I use an array of Arduino boards to monitor and control the Banx.io wallet servers and environment.

I have a son named Atom, named after the exchange. He is the best behaved kid I have ever seen and smart too. He has a great interest already in electronics however I try and limit his exposure so that he can be balanced. I can't stand watching kids who can't go 5 minutes without some form of electronic entertainment.

I have been into cars since I was a teenager and have my own personal full fledged shop under my house (I live on the water so my house is on piles). The favorites in my car collection is 3 Mitsubishi Eclipses; a 98 GS, a 98 GST Spyder and a 95 GSX. When I am not at my desk, I am working on one of the cars. They have all been completely rebuilt and customized from the ground up. Oddly enough the past month has not seen anything good in my garage since I have been doing some body work and upgrades to my kid carrier, an 07 Dodge Grand Caravan.

Well this is me any questions ask away.

You can also get me on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/byron.penner
Twitter: https://twitter.com/BanxExchange
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/byron-allen-penner-23637055
SKYPE: info@atomic-trade.com (i think) or byronp@banx.io
How long did it take you to build your exchange?

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Thu Jan 14, 2016 6:06 pm

How long did it take you to build your exchange?
It took about 2 months before I opened the first version to the public. Since then it has been an ongoing cycle of change. The system is modular so I may at any given time be working on a module and swap it in. No one really notices these changes since the site usually stays online during an upgrade. I try and do 2 major updates each month.

I have been working on slimming down the codebase yet it still comprises about 1gb, 62482 lines of code (not including dep libraries and web files, html, js, css, etc...), in 53 modules. This does not include external applications, API samples, documentation, images, etc... It is written in C, C++, C# and of course a bunch of web technologies like JavaScript. The project also has an average maintainability index of 82.
Last edited by ByronP on Mon May 09, 2016 12:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Thu Jan 14, 2016 6:41 pm

I have a son named Atom, named after the exchange. He is the best behaved kid I have ever seen and smart too. He has a great interest already in electronics however I try and limit his exposure so that he can be balanced. I can't stand watching kids who can't go 5 minutes without some form of electronic entertainment.
Very cool, naming a bank after your kid! A good story to explain to him later on in life :)
Other way around lol Atom came after I started building Atomic, so some day that is going to be an odd conversation Heeheee

kingscrown
Bronze Bitcoiner
Bronze Bitcoiner
Posts: 392
Joined: Tue Oct 27, 2015 3:50 am

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Fri Jan 15, 2016 1:30 am

Would you tell a little about your past as enterepeneur before BTC?
Financial Underground KIngdom - Best Cryptocurrency Blog with Private Mailing List

GIVE ME A BEER 1HC58noBPD7fmyNZKP7qf7thjb6ZSVN7fK

iFixBTCmemoryIssues
Gold Bitcoiner
Gold Bitcoiner
Posts: 2682
Joined: Tue Nov 24, 2015 9:03 pm

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Fri Jan 15, 2016 9:59 pm

I have a son named Atom, named after the exchange. He is the best behaved kid I have ever seen and smart too. He has a great interest already in electronics however I try and limit his exposure so that he can be balanced. I can't stand watching kids who can't go 5 minutes without some form of electronic entertainment.
Very cool, naming a bank after your kid! A good story to explain to him later on in life :)
Other way around lol Atom came after I started building Atomic, so some day that is going to be an odd conversation Heeheee
He has the best story for the playground, "I am, ATOMIC" :)
Image

If you are running a version of Bitcoin Core, stop using it. Upgrade to Bitcoin Unlimited or Classic immediately.

Fix Your Unconfirmed Transaction.

Vote for the future of our Bitcoin network!

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Wed Jan 20, 2016 1:03 pm

Would you tell a little about your past as enterepeneur before BTC?
I started in the corporate world at 16 and in my early to mid 20's the large corporation I was working for got bought out and Black Box took over operations. I then had plenty of time to mess around so I tried a ton of different things just for the fun of it. It was a great and hilarious time in my life. I was a waiter at an upscale Greek restaurant, I can't even type that without laughing. I was so horrible. I just didn't care and spent the entire time just stuffing my face with free food and making a mess. I was a landscaper for the ensuing summer which was a ton of fun. They called me the "mowing munk" , I didn't wear shoes, shaved my head and spent almost every day doing this in the nice summer heat and breeze of the ocean with the owners wife (cute little blond from the UK). I also was a mechanic, tried working at a Jewish deli, being a cook (I can catch mac n chz on fire), construction (horrible), unemployment (boring), and on and on.

I always had offers coming in but didn't really feel like doing anything intense during that time. However after a bit I did start taking some of the contracts to do custom jobs that I felt were unique and could be challenging such as an airline integration system and a security system for a massive new casino using bio metrics. I then took a position with a small local company that did immigration, tax and other legal services.

One day my father called me up with an idea for a communications company that he wanted me to do with him so after a bit of leg pulling I agreed and started spending my days a few hours north of my home at the time working with him. We started just contracting for a contractor that had a contract with DirecTv. This was the foot in the door of the communications industry that I needed since most of my contacts were in nuclear energy and IP technology.

I then took over as a partner in the contracting company that we were contracting for. This increased my leverage and ability to get closer with the contacts I needed (golf is where business gets done). I kept on this path and eventually had my own company with contracts with DirecTv, Comcast, DishNetwork, Fordstar, Wild Blue and Verizon. Things were good and the money was just pouring in. Keep in mind that I openly admit that a lot of the money was dirty but that is how business at that level is done. So this was and is just like every other large corporate industry where you have to be liked in order to get the cash and the contracts.

I was working my ass off trying to keep up with everything and eventually broke down and starting having sever anxiety and panic attacks. I handed the reigns over to my (at the time) wife who had been working along side me for a while (grooming). I then decided to do something that I had always wanted to do which was have my own hobby shop. So I opened a hobby shop called The Hobby Shop, pretty creative right. This was a lot of fun and while I didn't make money the shop did break even each month. I was ok with this since it was mainly for me. I built a big track for racing rc cars and 2 rock climbing walls. We also had a 3/4 Olympic size pool that was indoors next to the shop. Life was good again but I was struggling internally with anxiety and depression.

My former wife and I always had problems. Which to be honest we never should have been married. You can't make a person faithful just by putting a ring on there finger (her). So I had the hobby shop and she had the communications company and things were fairly peaceful. Until the figurative shit started hitting the fan. It was then I found out that she had been, for lack of a nicer term, fucking around with all of our technicians. Were not just talking 1 or 2 were talking tens of guys aged 16 to 60. One woman was pregnant and caught my x with her husband in there own driveway, that made for an horrible Christmas party a few weeks later.

So things were going south for me pretty fast. My health issues were increasing and I couldn't even bring myself to open the hobby shop every day. I shortly after closed down the shop and we moved to a smaller parcel in a neighboring town to try and start over. This was a pointless endeavor and my health was a mess. I started to realize that I knew and had always known what had to be done. So on New Years she took off for a day or 2 and then came home and lied to me about where and what she was doing. She stupidly had taken her phone with her with the gps on and took a picture of her and a guy together.

This was the last straw as this was the second time in as many weeks that I had caught her with another guy. I told her to leave and she did. We tried to work it out but that failed miserably when I found out she was using our money to rent an apartment so she had a place to take men. So in the end I wound up on my sisters doorstep with a bag of clothes and a dog (literally). She took everything we had and sold it, I was so tired of it all I really didn't even care. Penneyless, homeless, jobless, and heartbroken.

TO BE CONTINUED...
Last edited by ByronP on Thu May 05, 2016 3:57 am, edited 1 time in total.

kingscrown
Bronze Bitcoiner
Bronze Bitcoiner
Posts: 392
Joined: Tue Oct 27, 2015 3:50 am

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Wed Jan 20, 2016 6:16 pm

Amazing story - cant wait for the rest.

Btw if i even saw my girl TRYING to get a date with somebody else i would kick her out immidiately ;)
Financial Underground KIngdom - Best Cryptocurrency Blog with Private Mailing List

GIVE ME A BEER 1HC58noBPD7fmyNZKP7qf7thjb6ZSVN7fK

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Wed Jan 27, 2016 1:23 am

I was lucky enough to have been able to stay with my sister and after a few days I made arrangements to rent and live in a portable office trailer on the side of a friends house (no this was not legal). So i set up camp in this trailer and laid in bed for a bit wallowing. I was thinking about all of the steps that had led me to where I was and realized the truth of it all, which is women come and go but no one should let anyone else dictate the outcome of ones life.

I slowly started getting back into writing code and fiddling with toy projects. I was not ready for prime time but I was pushing ahead. My friend helped me to get help for myself by seeing a counselor and getting put on some medication to help with my anxiety. My friend had always been having problems with her (at the time) husband. He had very bad anger issues and was extremely lazy. One day she had enough and they split up. The back room was then free so I moved into the house. This was very nice and a big uplift compared to the trailer. The meds were helping and I was soon able to leave the house and started doing simple things on my own like driving myself to my therapist appointments.

After many months I went on my first date and started feeling like a person again. I proceeded to date a few women and it became obvious that I needed to continue on my self journey before committing to anyone. I borrowed $20 from my friend for a license and started developing an app for Android. Shortly after I ran into a woman I had dated briefly many years earlier and we began hanging out as friends. I continued pushing towards completing the application but I never felt it was ready. I would spend all day and all night only sleeping for bits here and there trying to get it to where I was happy and ready to release it.

After a few months I began dating the woman I had met back up with. This pushed me even further to complete my work. I soon realized that it wasn't the app that wasn't ready it was me. I was afraid of failure. Once I realized this I decided that I would release right away. I then worked around the clock adding in finishing details and at midnight I submitted the app to the store.

The first week saw a few hundred users and I was pleased and I had started sleeping over at my girlfriends from time to time. Things were starting to look up, every day I would work on adding new features and gorilla advertising. The user count kept growing exponentially and soon I was making enough money to get by.

My friend that I had been staying with and I were starting to have issues with one another and one day we decided it was time to go our own ways. So I discussed things with my girlfriend and we agreed for me to move in with her. Things were good and after a while we got engaged. She helped me a lot and motivated me to keep working and pushing forward. She invested in the future by funding some equipment that I wanted to start making signs, stickers and engravings; CNC router, vinyl plotter, large laser cutter/engraver. I had the equipment but how to capitalize on it?

TO BE CONTINUED...

kingscrown
Bronze Bitcoiner
Bronze Bitcoiner
Posts: 392
Joined: Tue Oct 27, 2015 3:50 am

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Banx.io, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Mon Feb 15, 2016 2:47 am

Ok but where between all that did you learn to code ?
Financial Underground KIngdom - Best Cryptocurrency Blog with Private Mailing List

GIVE ME A BEER 1HC58noBPD7fmyNZKP7qf7thjb6ZSVN7fK

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Cryptomic.com, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Thu May 05, 2016 3:44 am

I started writing code probably around the age of 8, I was using a Commodore if I recall. Those were some fun times. When I hit middle school the school worked it out so that I would do all my work for the day first thing in the morning and then I could do whatever I wanted to which was to play around with an Apple II (big shout out and thanks to Ruth Bligh for that). After high school I was recruited to Peco Energy (Exelon) as a Senior Swat Tech. I didn't have any formal training at this point but when they spoke to me I somehow surpassed all of the other candidates . So I went in for an interview and was hired on the spot. They gave me a decent salary and started me in college. I liked college it was fun for me so I kept at it for many years (only stopped a few years ago).

However I always took issue with the curriculum offered in CISM classes because I never felt it actually prepared people for the real world or encouraged free thinking. I think coding is all about free thinking and problem solving. Which go hand in hand (I enjoy it). There is also the issue in my mind that you are either a coder or you are not, it is not something that can be taught in a traditional setting (IMHO). My brain is completely fried and I'm not all that good with other peoples company but if you ask me to solve a problem it's go time. I was born this way, maybe its a form of autism, I don't know. Electronics, software, mechanics, etc... It always just made sense to me, I could always just look at something and somehow just knew how it worked. Gift or Curse? I think both!

P.S. When Flash came out I thought it was the coolest thing and made so many fun games with it.

bobbyfischer
Posts: 3
Joined: Thu Feb 09, 2017 7:09 pm

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Cryptomic.com, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Thu Feb 09, 2017 7:24 pm

ByronP,

My name is Colin Doherty. I am currently programming a market maker and have been running into some problems with hanging websockets. I was wondering if you could help me out with this. I am trying to test a beta of the market maker on AWS ubuntu 16.04 instance. The code runs fine from my laptop, but when I run it on the image the websocket connections hang. I am trying to implement some exceptions to handle this, but am firstly trying to find good ways to benchmark my throughput and latency. I have been using the bench.sh script I found online and iperf. iperf has been giving me some trouble and the AWS team has been hard to work with. Any advice you could give me would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Colin Doherty

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Cryptomic.com, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Fri Feb 10, 2017 1:32 am

Sorry, I really can't say anything without any diagnostic information or knowing the code.

User avatar
algoStrategic
Nickel Bitcoiner
Nickel Bitcoiner
Posts: 10
Joined: Fri Feb 24, 2017 9:33 pm

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Cryptomic.com, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Sat Feb 25, 2017 9:58 pm

As a trading platform, what sets coinigy.com apart from your competitors?
Need More Customers And Increased Profits? Learn More About Internet Marketing - https://algostrategic.com/

We Accept Bitcoin and Altcoins

User avatar
ByronP
AMA
AMA
Posts: 15
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 9:13 pm
Contact: Website Twitter

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Cryptomic.com, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Sat Feb 25, 2017 10:06 pm

Coinigy is just getting started as an actual way to trade on different exchanges. There is not much by means of competition and no one can compare when it comes to the quantity of data, actionable insites and overall functionality of Coinigy.

Neoclassical
Banned
Banned
Posts: 314
Joined: Sun Jul 09, 2017 3:40 pm

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Creator/CTO/Dev of Atomic-Trade now Cryptomic.com, Remittio and various other projects. AMA

Mon Aug 07, 2017 5:50 pm

Where do you see BCH heading in the following years?

How do you see cryptospace evolving generally?
We don't need no centralisation. ImageImageImage

thunderbuns
Posts: 1
Joined: Tue Aug 22, 2017 8:50 am

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Sr Dev at Coinigy, former owner of Atomic Trade / Cryptomic AMA

Tue Aug 22, 2017 9:05 am

Hi, Allen, my name is Gabe I was wondering I am looking to start mining bitcoins and I am thinking about buying an Antminer S7. But I was wondering once I buy an Antminer S7 what do I do, do I attach it to a tower or do I only need a power supply.

CryptoToTrade
Nickel Bitcoiner
Nickel Bitcoiner
Posts: 10
Joined: Mon Feb 05, 2018 11:21 pm

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Sr Dev at Coinigy, former owner of Atomic Trade / Cryptomic AMA

Mon Feb 05, 2018 11:28 pm

Hi Allen thank you for this AMA


Marconi
Nickel Bitcoiner
Nickel Bitcoiner
Posts: 13
Joined: Thu Feb 08, 2018 5:13 pm

Re: I'm Allen Byron Penner, Sr Dev at Coinigy, former owner of Atomic Trade / Cryptomic AMA

Thu Feb 08, 2018 5:56 pm

Your project is so awesome.

Return to “AMA - Ask Me Anything”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 68 guests