Tech Learning Collective

Technology education for radical organizers and revolutionary communities.

  • October 19, 2025 5:00 PM – October 19, 2025 7:30 PM
  • 87 3rd Avenue, 4th Floor Brooklyn NY 11217 United States
  • Status: CONFIRMED

Tickets are no longer available for this event.

View upcoming events or subscribe to our events calendar to make sure you catch the next one.

Event description

Learn how you can go “to the moon” in one, giant leap for humankind! This workshop assumes you know nothing about cryptocurrency and quickly familiarizes you with the basics of blockchain technology, cryptocurrenct wallet apps, and the larger economic system in which it all fits. By the end, you’ll have a working, privacy-centric, self-custody wallet app installed and maybe even some funds in it ready to transact with, privately and discreetly, just like cash!

Workshop Description

When cryptocurrency was first popularized by the emergence of Bitcoin, it promised to disintermediate economic transactions from entrenched middlemen like central banks or credit card companies who have long been pushing for a “cashless” future. In contrast, “cash is king” for most ordinary people, who still prefer exchanging paper banknotes or metal coins to transact with each other.

Electronic services like Venmo and CashApp have come to fill this desire, but using them comes with the same risks as relying on the big players: a lack of privacy and a dependence on centralized actors that might betray and de-bank you, punish you for chargebacks, or charge monopolistically unfair fees to use. Of course, there are benefits to electronic transactions, like being able to transact remotely. For example, using a credit or debit card enables online shopping, automated bill pay schedules, highly secure escrow and deposit systems, and much more.

What if it were possible to have the best of both worlds? As both a buyer and a seller, the ideal would be a way to transact remotely, but with the privacy, reliability, and simplicity of physical cash.

In this cryptocurrency primer, we’ll get straight at the heart of the issue: learning how to acquire, swap, and spend digital currencies that cannot be traced and that no one can prevent you from using in the future.

You’ll be introduced to a special class of cryptocurrency options called privacy coins—specifically Zcash and Monero—whose opaque ledger systems differ from Bitcoin’s transparent ledger to protect your financial data, and why that is the key distinction allowing you to transact privately and discreetly. You’ll also learn the lay of the land when it comes to the broader cryptocurrency ecosystem, including methods for storing your funds safely, evaluating custodial and self-custody “wallet apps,” getting a feel for Know-Your-Customer (KYC) techniques, and becoming familiar with which cryptocurrency exchanges you can use more privately than others, preparing you for navigating the world of “crypto” better than HODL gang Bitcoin bros.

When you leave, you’ll have a self-custody wallet app such as Cake Wallet, Edge Wallet, or Zashi, and enough knowledge to transact safely by protecting both your “coinflow” and your netflow data. After all, if money is speech, and you care about the ability to speak both publicly and privately, you should be able to transact in both those ways, too!

As with all Tech Learning Collective events, racism, queerphobia, transphobia, sexism, “brogrammer,” “manarchist,” or any kind of similarly awful behavior will result in immediate removal from class without a refund. Please refer to our lightweight social rules for details on our strictly enforced no-tolerance policy against bigotry of any kind.

About Tech Learning Collective

Tech Learning Collective is an apprenticeship-based technology school that trains politically self-motivated individuals in the arts of hypermedia, Information Technology, and radical political practice. We offer unparalleled free, by-donation, and low-cost computer classes on topics ranging from fundamental computer literacy to the same offensive computer hacking techniques used by national intelligence agencies and military powers (cyber armies). For more information and to enroll, visit TechLearningCollective.com.

Performances by

Presented by