Just over a week ago in the post Damn You CrowdStrike!, I shared the saga about the missing bitcoin I'd bought at a crypto ATM. After having finally found a machine without onerous KYC, I had the bad luck to buy it as CrowdStrike was working its way through system after system online.

This was a test purchase intended to be converted BTC>LTC>HIVE in order to increase my Hive Power and to help bolster my account over time.

After waiting until this week to see if things have worked their way through the CrowdStrike mayhem, I contacted the customer service for the crypto ATM.

"503 Service Unavailable"

They could see that my missing bitcoin had made it to its destination on the blockchain, but unfortunately whenever I checked the site, nothing was there. Now when I check it, I can't even log into the website, now greeted with a blank white page and the message:

"503 Service Unavailable
No server is available to handle this request"

That site was ionomy.com which I'd been using for years without issue. Luckily the lost BTC was only for a test amount (under $100) just to see how things would work with this new crypto ATM.

What I would do is buy BTC, send it to ionomy, use that to buy Litecoin and then send that to hive-engine to be swapped for $HIVE.

(I used to buy LTC directly on Coinbase, and then send that to ionomy, then do the rest from there. Until one day I saw that Coinbase were "upgrading" to that creepy Plaid service that wants your online banking login and tracks your bank account, which I couldn't use even if I wanted to as my bank isn't supported).

After speaking with CS, I did a search for missing crypto on ionomy and found a number of reports concerning late or just plain lost crypto using that service. I had no idea that some Hivians were having trouble transacting with them.

I'd never had a problem with them in the years that I'd used them...

This is what is known as 'A teachable moment' and now I'm looking at other ways of turning BTC into $HIVE (I really wish we had some nearby Litecoin ATMs, as the fees are much lower than using BTC.)

There are two ways that you can grow on Hive. You can do it organically and grind through it slowly over time, or you can do what some of the wise whales did, and "prime the pump" and seed you account to grow even faster.

I plan on doing both of these as I really enjoy the freedom that having an 'Owners Mindset' brings me as a creator on Hive. Stay positive and Keep Growing! :)