Silk Road prices in 2012 - 2.95BTC for one gram of weed

https://imgur.com/a/5YOJqzs

It was a wild time. This new “digital currency” called bitcoin was the only way you could buy drugs on the site. In addition to downloading a TOR browser and having a basic understanding of PGP encryption (which, to a Luddite like me, was a daunting process with a steep learning curve).

People would also “tumble” their coins by sending them through different wallets to ensure anonymity. And, after a month of figuring shit out, I made my first order of hash from Spain. It cost me 10BTC for 4 grams. What a deal!

It was really a crazy time. I’d meet people from Craigslist to buy BTC off them while we sat in a Tim Hortons parking lot and waited half hour making small talk while the transaction cleared. There was no pretence - if you were buying bitcoin you were using it on the darknet.

Looking back at the prices is a trip. 3BTC for a gram of weed. That was probably $10 at the time. I paid 50BTC for a sheet of acid. Sure, it was the first time acid was widely available since the early 90s. But to think back on all those BTC. I wouldn’t have held. I know this. I’ve had purchased more acid or Hulu subscriptions or some other random shit.