Key Takeaways

Alex Shetski frames AI as an overhyped but useful tool with broken unit economics; each new user adds inference cost, funded by a “circular” VC pipeline that routes money back to Amazon, Google, and Nvidia. LLM progress has plateaued, pushing the market toward an oligopoly while open-source lags at scale. He argues the real opportunity is a new six-layer internet stack that adds native payments (Bitcoin) and identity/social graph (Nostr) to the web, with AI as an effort multiplier: small teams can now ship global, low-fee, payment-embedded products fast. Reflecting digital burnout and content “slop,” his startup Satlantis is pivoting from social feeds to a Bitcoin-native events app, solving real meet-space problems (global payouts, low fees, portable identity, discovery via social graph) instead of competing for attention.

Best Quotes

“AI isn’t a second coming of God, it’s a tool, like the tractor or the PC.”

“Every new AI user actually costs you.”

“The money going to startups ends up back with the same LPs, Amazon, Google, Nvidia.”

“Bitcoin dying would be catastrophic for civilization. Nostr dying wouldn’t matter much.”

“We’re not a Bitcoin company. We’re an events company that happens to use Bitcoin and Nostr.”

“The next 20 years will be a renaissance in consumer apps.”

“We don’t need another social app. We need tools that get people off their screens.”

Conclusion

The episode marks a pragmatic turn: skip AI grandiosity and Web2 clone wars, and instead build real products on an open stack where Bitcoin handles global payments, Nostr provides portable identity, and AI multiplies effort. As users tire of algorithmic outrage and infinite content, the winning apps will re-humanize tech, creating markets that didn’t exist (like Bitcoin-native events) and channeling digital networks into physical community, sovereignty, and durable value.

Timestamps

0:00 - Intro
0:37 - Musings on AI
6:20 - The AI business model
14:33 - Broad application on AI
20:52 - Bitkey & Obscura
22:36 - Importance of Nostr, Satlantis
34:16 - Carving a new market
43:15 - Crowdhealth & Unchained
45:03 - The Cold Start Problem
53:13 - New layers in the design space
59:00 - Improvments to meetups
1:04:00 - Everything app
1:07:14 - Unplugging and passing the torch
1:19:54 - Head down and build

Transcript

(00:00) that a lot of the money was actually coming through Amazon or Google or Nvidia or something like that. That was sort of like either the LPS or behind the LPS. It was kind of like the wrong kind of circular economy. It was like laundering money. But the concept of general intelligence is just infinite.
(00:18) Now we're at a new stage and now you have small startups again can now do payments at scale with Bitcoin. Hopefully do a social graph at scale with something like Nostra and can build faster, better, quicker and go to market faster, better, quicker with AI tools. The cost of Bitcoin dying and failing is catastrophic. [Music] Stand at the precipice. Gold running to 4,000.
(00:43) Bitcoin cooling off after hitting a new all-time high. The debasement trade is on. AI is taking over the world. Or is it? Sitting down with Alex Gretzky to solve all the world's problems again. It's been a while, dude. Yeah, we we solved the world problems like what was it a year ago, 18 months ago. Now we got new problems to deal with. So here we are again.
(01:07) Yeah, a lot has changed and we were just riffing on AI. Is it hype, overhype? Is there something there? Is the way it's being applied, the way it will ultimately be applied um in terms of bringing the most utility and productivity to the world. Where are we in the cycle as somebody who has been toying around with it for quite a long time now? Yeah, I think I don't think my opinion's changed since we we finished up and open sourced the spiritual stuff.
(01:38) Um, my opinion remains that it's a tool. Uh, it's very much like the tractor or uh, you know, the the PC, the laptop, whatever. It's um I think where I've always diverged with a lot of the overhype um or hype in general is that it's some sort of you know second coming of God or um some sort of sentient being that's going to take over the world and all this sort of stuff.
(02:02) I've always felt like that was, you know, the nerd's wet dream, you know, and like overblown uh kind of like esqueologgical um desire to see the circuits take over the world and to prove all the um the religious people wrong, that you know, God can be created in the in the circuit.
(02:29) So, I've always felt like there was a there was a strange um sort of desire for that that was completely logical. And we we might have discussed this last time. It's been so long, but um I know I've rifted with someone about the fact that intelligence or the the concept of general intelligence is just infinite. And what we have with the breakthrough with LLMs has been specialized intelligence around the reproduction of patterns um linguistically first and now uh in applications like video but by no means um is this anywhere near a general intelligence nor is it anywhere near
(03:02) sentience which is you know further down the track. So there was um I shared a tweet with you now from um from Devon Ericson and a couple other people who sort of like pointing at this which is hey this is a a great tool uh it can be used effectively. Um although as with all tools it's quite hard to be used effectively. Most people just use it poorly and they just get slop.
(03:27) And as we're seeing the whole world is sort of or the whole online world is just being filled with more and more and more slop. Um, but if used effectively, um, you can create quite cool things with it. Um, I know, for example, I'm I'm a father now to a newborn and, uh, the little guy was, um, was sneezing the other day and the first thing we did was we just asked Chip, hey, you know, what should we do? Should we get like some saline solution or anything like that? What like what do we do? And we got some good feedback.
(03:58) So, so for like for that kind of stuff, it's a super breakthrough. Um, also for things like the video that you guys did for um for the opportunity cost calculator or the opportunity cost app, like that was [ __ ] brilliant, man. Um, so so for that stuff fundamentally it's it's great.
(04:17) But does that mean that this is um going to end all the jobs and replace all the human beings and give us some sort of sentient being? [ __ ] no. like that is just and I think people have sort of slowly come to that conclusion themselves instinctively cuz you know you had GPT3 GPT4 and people like oh yeah by the time we get to GPT5 this thing's going to be like [ __ ] god and GPT6 it's going to be running the world and here we are GPT5 is not really any different than four um you know we we sort of had that jump between three and four but since then you know
(04:48) everything's kind of tapered off um and all of the different models are kind of you know the same the big guys whether it's Grock GPT Gemini they all sort of like function the same so I feel like we've hit a ceiling there um so yeah that's my that's sort of my thoughts off the cuff yeah the I completely agree cuz it's funny making these videos it's people and we've had a bunch of people come to us like how are you doing this like it like what what is the secret sauce it's like there is no secret sauce like it actually does take hard work like the amount of iterations you have to run through with the
(05:27) generations because you understand that the LLM are actually not smart and do not they're not intelligent. You have to literally handhold them and format things in a certain way. You have to bring the context of a cinematographer and a director and understand how to prompt that. Like it's not easy.
(05:47) We have a bunch of people in our circle saying a we're going to go do this and it's we're going to create similar memes and short films, whatever you want to call them. And it's like, all right, good luck. Cuz it takes us like a week. The last one we just did took 55 hours of work from storyboarding, scripting, and then iterating on generations.
(06:10) And it is simply just a tool that allows us and enables us to do things that would have cost us tens of thousands of dollars and now they cost $5,000. um in labor and minimal cost of credits right now, which they're good. I mean, you pulled up another tweet from from Zoomer. It's like, how sustainable, yes, is the business model for these large language models with how much they're charging customers right now? I think we're probably in a very uh unique and anomalous point in the cost curve for the end customer right now where they're just essentially
(06:46) um trying to subsidize this with loss leading by making tokens super cheap when that we know that the power that uh the cost of the power it takes to actually produce the outputs is far exceeds and hacking the hardware as well far exceeds the what they're charging us. This is this is such a good point.
(07:08) So, actually I um around around the time when we were sort of trying to commercialize Spirit Satoshi 2 years ago now, um this hit me like a ton of bricks as a business owner because we had spent all of this time um training and building and refining and fine-tuning this the the spiritual associ we had finally got to a good enough model that we thought we could charge for it.
(07:36) And when we went to uh some Bitcoin companies to kind of sell it as a assistant, but an assistant that actually understands Bitcoin, um they were only willing to pay like 20 bucks a month or something or maybe 50 bucks a month for it. And when we did the cost analysis on the back end, the inference cost to provide that was in the thousands so that these guys could have it.
(07:55) And I was like, what the [ __ ] is going on here? There's um you know, the the the economics don't make any sense. whatsoever. And and that was when it first hit me that in the AI space what you've got is a situation where actually in traditional software your marginal cost per new customer is effectively zero. Doesn't cost you anything else for another person to download the app and use the app.
(08:19) Whereas in the AI space each new user actually costs you. So there is a there is a marginal cost. There is a real marginal cost for every single new person that you add. Now, the bet is that you can you have users who don't use it that much and hopefully pay a subscription to subsidize the users that do use it.
(08:42) Obviously, you know, as with all of these things and, you know, at large scales, maybe there's some sort of model that works. But what I realized um kind of into it when we when we were trying to raise money from some uh sort of more AI um centric venture capitalist, I did some digging, you know, some research and everything, who they are, who their LPs are and everything.
(09:05) And what I found like if I traced the chain back was that a lot of the money was actually coming somehow some way through Amazon or Google or Nvidia or something like that. There was sort of like either the LPS or behind the LPS. So what I found was that the it was kind of like a the wrong kind of circular economy. It was like laundering money, but the you got the money going to the startups and the startups spending all of their money on uh inference and training.
(09:29) Um and you know obviously getting a little bit of money in the front end from customers if they you know found some sort of success but it became like u the money would end up being invested in the startups to be spent back with the same uh ultimate LPs who were investing in the startups.
(09:46) So it was kind of this uh kind of circular logic and I was like what the [ __ ] And I remember writing a tweet about that 2 years ago. And anyway I sent you a tweet from some guy who kind of like outlined that about four or five weeks ago. He'd actually done some research and and outlined it. It's a it's a really interesting um somewhat false economy. Um and what that's led me to believe where 18 months ago or 2 years ago, this is maybe the one opinion I've changed is I thought there was going to be like a total proliferation of models. I've actually changed my mind on that. I think it's a
(10:15) it's kind of like an oligopoly situation just by virtue of um the fact that this only really works at scale. Like I thought there was going to be many many many models. That was my whole premise when I had uh previously launched Spirit Satoshi. Um but I actually think we're probably going to end up in a world where we have like the fang of language models. Um and the long tail is just like pointless. You know, hugging face these days is really struggling.
(10:44) You know, at the remember if you remember like 18 months ago, Hugging Face was booming. Everyone was using models on there. No one gives a [ __ ] anymore. Everyone just uses chat GPT or if they have Google credits they're using that. Um some people use Claude and that's about it. I don't think there's anything else really that people use. Keep muting that cuz I'm moving my stuff.
(11:03) I said we're using Claude and Gemini predominantly here at TFTC. it. Um, okay. And that scares me like we're using them because they're the most useful. And I guess the idealist in me would like the open source models to be able to compete and to take market share from the closed source models.
(11:28) At the end of the day, they're just not capable yet of doing exactly what these other models can do. It's partly not capable and it's also partly, you know, I've kind of become less and less and less of an idealist myself. Um, and I guess somewhat more of a realist. Uh, maybe the older I get, but I just sort of realized that, you know, people just don't give a [ __ ] man.
(11:56) you know, they they sort of they they build a habit around I mean, I think that the I haven't seen usage statistics, but my guess would be that Chat GPT has like the absolute lion's share of usage when it comes to these models. I think Gemini and stuff like that are still like a a fraction and they're more used by more enterprise or more, you know, customers like yourself who are trying to do something more unique. But in terms of like general mass market, Chacht is one.
(12:20) Like people don't give a [ __ ] about um open source or you know having their own model running on their own computer unless you're like sort of a techie. Um but beyond that I just don't think there's a there's a significant business in there. It's it's kind of like Google search and duck.go right? Duck.
(12:39) Go has a space but it's like what is it a.1% of the fraction of um what Google search is like? Yeah, definitely. I'm a duck. Go user. Going to move to KG Kaggi. I'll ref it soon. I think Duck Duck Go's experience has deprecated, but Mhm. comes. Yeah, I guess you have to hope for Mo's law to come into place um really aggressively.
(13:08) the cost to come down and making it dead simple to download a model, run it locally, and reap the same benefits that you would from open AI or um clawed or anthropic. And I I just don't think that's going to happen anytime soon. I hope I'm wrong. Maybe these Chinese the the arms race between the Chinese and the West is so aggressive that the Chinese come out with some open source model that blows everything out of the water. But I think that's wishful thinking.
(13:39) I mean maybe the only time that works is if um the models actually hit an actual ceiling and no amount of extra compute can break that ceiling. Uh at which point what you get is Mo law forces the smaller models to catch up and everyone is at the same ceiling and in that case then you have an opportunity but still what I then wonder is like what is the business model for these um and and I'm not sure what it is.
(14:08) So, so at least like if I put my business hat on, um, you know, like I don't know if there's a business case there, but if I put my consumer hat on, yeah, maybe there's a there's a um upside for me as a consumer when these things sort of hit a local maxima at least for a period uh at which they're all sort of producing the same output in which case, yeah, maybe it makes sense for me to drop chat GBT and start using something else. Yeah.
(14:34) Well, with that in mind, I mean, what does the future look like? I guess throwing specific models and open source verse closurce AI aside. Right now I'm thinking about just broad applications of people how they're using these things whether it's via NAM flows to create these sort of agentic workflows or um using Claude's MPC or anthropics MPC looks like chatbt is about to release uh an agent sort of devkit where you can connect things.
(15:12) Um it seems like based off of um what you've been writing about and sort of what you're working on as Atlantis and your view of sort of a new web emerging with AI Noster and Bitcoin that there's another way to do these things. So here here's if I had to boil down my position is that I think we are at the point of a renaissance again of cool new consumer products basically so sort of like what we had about 10 years ago when we had the rise of like Shopify and Uber and um Airbnb and all this sort of stuff like for the last decade there hasn't really been a lot of um uh new consumer apps like consumers been dead for a
(15:51) little while and if I look at the the technical landscape, you know, sort of AI, if I put that in a bucket, uh you've got these new tools and frameworks and and whether that's like vibe coding stuff to produce like little quick MVPs, whether it's the video generation stuff to maybe do some more intelligent marketing and stuff like that so you can lower your cost of producing um outreach uh or communications or whether it's some of these agentic frameworks. Although I'm I'm a little bit skeptical around the agentic stuff because you know maybe
(16:26) there is some things you can really uh turn into a process because that's that's effectively what these agentic frameworks are for. It's like to take a a dumb process that you might hire you know an outsourced person in the Philippines for and just like do it with that for 10% or 20% of the cost. You wouldn't do anything uh really critical uh as a function in the business with that.
(16:51) you know, may maybe you were previously hiring someone to write um technical tests to make sure that your code passes a certain standard. You know, for that you might be able to build an agentic framework and you save yourself x amount of hours per person in code review or you save yourself one higher or something like that.
(17:10) So, so AI is sort of a a um an effort multiplier uh as a business. But you've got these two other tools which I find really interesting. One is obviously Bitcoin for payments and the ability to uh make to to embed payments into any application you build. And then number three is something like Nostra. And I say something like Nostra because whether Nostra succeeds or fails doesn't really matter.
(17:34) What matters is the idea of a um of an identity layer to the web where the identity is actually owned by the user. that creates a bit of a new design space for having a um a a profile that can move across different applications. So that's the interesting thing um about Nostra in my opinion. I know a lot of people talk about the censorship resistance element and all of this, but in my opinion, I think I think that ship has sailed.
(18:09) Um, a a lot of Bitcoiners probably will be annoyed at me for saying that or maybe even Nostra people will be annoyed at me for saying that. But I think the the the the mind space for censorship resistance is now basically taken up in most people's minds by X, Substack, and Rumble. Um I I don't think you know maybe maybe a couple of years ago there was a there was an opportunity there for Nostra really to claim mind share but I think that ship has sailed and and until even though Nostra is more censorship resistant um like getting that through people's heads is a very very very very hard job at least in my opinion. I think that's it's it's too high a bar to
(18:46) climb. Um whereas the idea of a of a web where you have a portable identity and you can use the one identity across multiple applications and you um each application can enhance the experience by virtue of the fact that you have connections underlying that that to me is quite interesting.
(19:11) So for me as a startup guy, as a business owner and stuff like that, I look at this and I'm like, "Okay, [ __ ] we have a bunch of new tools here that we could build an application that may have taken a massive [ __ ] team or, you know, tens of millions or hundreds of millions of dollars to do before. We can now do it as a startup again.
(19:31) " And to me that is almost like the beginning of the app boom when Apple rolled out applications and you could build apps and you could build these massive startups with a small team and you had a basically a renaissance in consumer applications and that sort of died off because all the consumer apps that were successful became incumbents and they kind of blocked off the space etc.
(19:53) But now we're at a new stage and now you have small startups again, can now do payments at scale with Bitcoin, can hopefully do uh a social graph at scale with something like Nostra and can build faster, better, quicker and go to market faster, better, quicker with AI tools. So that's kind of how I uh envision this. You know, we can talk about how I'm trying to implement that with with our product.
(20:17) We've had a bunch of significant uh sort of refinements of what we're doing with Atlantis and I can give an example of that. But that's my answer to your question. It's like these are tools and I'm I'm really excited over the next 5 years and 10 years ideally to see how completely new uh startups that were either impossible before or very expensive to build before are going to come to fruition by virtue of the fact that there's a new toolkit or series of tools that um that entrepreneurs and small startups can use to let them compete with prior incumbents. Sup
(20:53) freaks. This rip of TFTC was brought to you by our good friends at BitKey. Bit Key makes Bitcoin easy to use and hard to lose. It is a hardware wallet that natively embeds into a two or three multisig. You have one key on the hardware wallet, one key on your mobile device and block stores a key in the cloud for you.
(21:16) This is an incredible hardware device for your friends and family or maybe yourself who have Bitcoin on exchanges and have for a long time but haven't taken a step to self-custody because they're worried about the complications of setting up a private public key pair. Securing that seed phrase, setting up a PIN, setting up a passphrase. Again, Bit Key makes it easy to use, hard to lose.
(21:33) It's the easiest 0ero to one step, your first step to self-custody. If you have friends and family on the exchanges who haven't moved it off, tell them to pick up a bit key. Go to bit.world. Use the key TFTC20 at checkout for 20% off your order. That's bit.world, code TFTC20. Sup freaks. This was brought to you by our good friends at Obscura.
(21:53) If you've been listening to the show long enough, you know we care deeply about privacy, particularly as you peruse the web. It is important to be using a VPN and Obscura is our VPN of choice. That is because it is a VPN built by a Bitcoiner for Bitcoiners. It is the first VPN that can't log your activity and outsmarts internet censorship.
(22:10) ObscureVPN works even in the most restrictive Wi-Fi networks where other VPNs simply fail to connect with server locations across America and the globe. Obscura keeps your internet access unrestricted wherever you are. I've been using it since it launched. I see no problems with speed. I can get on YouTube TV without any problems. It simply works. They can't log. You can pay in Bitcoin. Go to obscura.net. Use the code TFTC25 for 25% off an annual subscription.
(22:29) It's already a good deal. Their annual deal. The TFTC2 code gets you 25% more off. Go check it out. obscure.net. Use the code TFTC25. I really agree with you on the point that like focusing on censorship resistance for two reasons probably doesn't make sense. Number one, people don't care about.
(22:49) Number two, you're competing with X Substack and Rumble, which have for at least a temporary period of time brought back what seems to be uh more free speech oriented sort of policies. Um, but yeah, the the bootstrapping a network effect via the social graph has always been the killer feature of Noster in my my opinion. Just being able to if you're a company, just put an app into the ether, have people sign up and have connectivity and accessibility to everybody that they've already connected with on the protocol.
(23:25) Well, let's let's dig into that. So, I've I've evolved my thinking a step further on that side of things. So, I and this may be an unpopular opinion of some sort, but um Nostraster is a protocol. Well, actually, let let me start with this. Um I think there's been a bit of a um a conflation in the Nostra space and the Bitcoin space um related to the importance of Nostra and the importance of Bitcoin.
(23:58) So, the way I like to think about it, and I I was going to write a smaller article on this, but I haven't got around to it yet, but basically, Bitcoin the implementation is more important than Bitcoin the idea. Um, and that's evident by Bitcoin the idea is every other [ __ ] 50,000 shitcoins out there, right? Like people have taken the concept and created a shitcoin and everything like that.
(24:26) But what's what's important is actually the implementation. It's the it's the longest chain. It's the, you know, the the chain that runs the genesis block. It's the node uh software that we all run. It's the fact that we're all in sync. It's the actual implementation of Bitcoin that matters. That's why Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV and all this sort of stuff doesn't matter.
(24:45) On the flip side though, um with Noster, it's actually not the implementation that matters, it's the idea that matters. And I kind of alluded to that 5 minutes ago when I said the the you know the the premise of a identity layer on the web is something that was always kind of wanted for the last 20 30 years of the web right there was always this idea to have hey let's have identity baked into a protocol on the web not the identity being a feature inside an application on top of the web.
(25:13) Um and it's always been something that uh was wanted but we never got around to it. And I think, you know, partly that's because people were never used to having a bearer instrument um on, you know, like in a digital capacity. You know, Bitcoin probably opened the doorway to something like Nostra to be successful.
(25:32) But if we sort of look at this objectively, um if Bitcoin fails tomorrow, the implementation, I think the world's up [ __ ] Creek without a paddle. Like that's a [ __ ] disaster. And it would be really, really, really, really bad for the world. It'll be bad for the future. It'll be bad for our kids. It'll be bad for civilization. It'll be bad for everything.
(25:49) Um, but if Nostra fails tomorrow, like what have we lost? Some content. Content is worth nothing in a in a world of infinite content, you know. Sure, maybe we've lost some sort of, you know, social relationships, but because social relationships are uh sort of derived from us as physical human beings, we can always rebuild those.
(26:09) That's why if you get banned on Twitter, um you can create a new account and you can rebuild your profile, right? Like I got banned 10 times, so you know, I rebuilt my profile. So I've sort of been there, done that. So like the the cost of losing or the cost of Nostra dying is very low. Um whereas the cost of Bitcoin dying and failing is catastrophic.
(26:27) Um so if Nostra was to fail that there, you know, I'm sure someone else will come up with a another instantiation of a identity protocol where the identity is a bear instrument and there's a public private key pair and we go and create a new one. So, that's sort of how I start and that's how I look at this and that's like purely objective.
(26:46) Yes, I know it's going to piss some people off, probably piss Odell off. Um, but that's like, you know, I think that's the um the the the detached objective way to to sort of understand this. So then from there I asked the the next question that sort of flows into my mind is okay well if Nostra is this protocol protocols actually especially if they've gained some level of critical mass which Nostra has um the plus side is protocols are very hard to kill they they can live on so long as there is like a core set of users there um you know Nostra can last 5 10 years and and who knows maybe in 5 or 10 years uh you know the the web
(27:28) starts to become come more um censorshipful and all this sort of stuff and then people start being like okay [ __ ] we need to jump on something else you know you get that kind of the next push the next wave. The the trouble is Nostra can operate at one speed whereas businesses have to operate at a much like they they work on a much shorter horizon right like as a company you can come and sort of make a bet on Nostra and be like okay well um we're going to build another social app and build a contentcentric app um and you know bootstrap the network with Nostra but if
(28:06) you know Nostra is not growing that fast you're not going get much of a benefit actually from doing that. In fact, you probably bring more of a benefit to the protocol than the other way around. Um whereas you know and your goal as a company or as a product is to try and find um product market fit as soon as possible.
(28:29) But maybe uh you don't get there in time because the um you know the speed of nostrral development or the speed of protocol uh hardening is much longer like the time frame is longer than than than the business. So, that makes me start to wonder, and this is part of the big shift we've had in Atlantis in the last um in the last probably two months, is maybe there's something other than competing for content and attention that we can do to build the foundations or to build the number of end pubs on this network.
(29:04) And for us, we've found two things. And and honestly, right now it's like one thing that we're really focusing on, which is events. I I don't know for the [ __ ] life of me why I didn't think of this earlier. Like when we first started Atlantis, we were thinking of building more like a Trip Advisor meets um Instagram meets Eventbrite, right? Like it was kind of a a travel nomad sovereign individual super app.
(29:29) And the idea was that we could take that social graph um you know build a beautiful feed and then embed things into the feed like places and reviews and events and all this sort of [ __ ] Um I look back on myself now uh 12 months ago or whatever it was when we started this and I was like I was on [ __ ] crack.
(29:48) I should have just picked one of these things and done it really well. And the the big aha moment that we had a couple of months ago when we were in um when we were in Prague was we rolled out the first version of the app and it had places, it had the the social feed, it had all of that but also had the events piece and the biggest uptick of users we had was people RSVPing for events.
(30:13) And we've designed the app in such a way that you might not even care about Nost or any of that sort of stuff. So you can log in with an email or Google single sign on or Apple single sign on but it creates an npub for you. So it's a it is it is an actual Nostra identity which you can later when you give a [ __ ] you can just extract your private key but otherwise we just manage it for you there. But that created a whole bunch of new Nostra users.
(30:33) And what we did with Primal during the event was people signed up for satellite events around the conference with our app. And then we told them, hey, take your Kina and you can put it into Primal and you can experience Zaps and the social thing because Primal has by far in the Nostra space, it has by far the best feed.
(30:51) Um, you know, you've got Damos and Amethyst and all this sort of stuff. You've even got the Atlantis feed. Um, but I don't see why you would use another app when you're following the same people and you're going to see the same content. So, I think, you know, even Nostra from a feed perspective, I think converges to one winner.
(31:09) And that's, in my opinion, primal. Um, which is, you know, for us, we're actually going to get rid of our feed from the app. Like, we're going to dep prioritize the feed as a as a feature. And what we're going to take from the social graph is when you're finding an event, what's important? Well, [ __ ] I'm going to go to an event and I'm going to see that Marty Ben's going to this event because we're connected.
(31:33) That gives me instant insight into maybe I should go to that event or maybe I want to go to the event discovery page on the app. And the kind of events that come up on my um discovery sort of feed, which looks a little bit like Spotify now. instead of a vertical feed, we've got like these carousels. Um, is influenced by my social graph and people that I'm close to that I share interests with and stuff like that.
(31:56) That starts to become really interesting because you can't do that on Eventbrite, can't do that on Luma. Um, you know, there's there's no sort of social glue that ties these apps together. Um, and if we can build a really, really, really good events app that hosts can create events on in like 60 seconds. Um, where every time someone RSVPs to their event, they grow their follower, um, they grow their audience, but then those event uh, attendees also actually become Nostra users and they don't even know um, where later they can use Primal. we actually start to build like imagine you host you know you have a thousand hosts
(32:34) hosting 10 events a year with 100 people per event like that's a that's a 10 million people or 10 million signins that's just grown the Nostra um base massively maybe that you know they're unlikely to all be posting content so you're not going to see a huge boost in like nost activity in terms of kind one events but you've got a a larger foundation for when the time comes they would just take their account and log into Primal or something like that and start to use it. So, that's kind of the big switch I've had in my mind is
(33:03) we're kind of taking we we've been trying to be this social app for sovereign individuals and we're going to kind of kill the social element. We're just going to become the best [ __ ] events app in the world that has a social layer built in. And what I forgot to mention is um Bitcoin payments.
(33:25) Like I can't believe there is no actual uh Bitcoin native events app on the planet. like imagine an Eventbrite with just Bitcoin payments doesn't exist. I was like this was staring me in the face the whole time and I didn't notice it. So anyway, that's a long way of explaining like um I definitely agree with you that the being able to sort of somewhat bootstrap your social app with Nostra is somewhat of a good idea, but I I feel like that's that's a big lift and there's probably one winner in that space and that's in my opinion clearly primal. Um, but I think there's another approach where you can use Nostra just purely as a tool. It's hidden. The
(33:59) average consumer doesn't know, but this is a tool that people use because it solves a particular problem, which is I want to host an event, get paid, and grow an audience very quickly. And here's the tool for that. And that inadvertently grows Noster and it creates uh Bitcoin adoption. That to me is really compelling. Yeah. No, I love this train of thought.
(34:20) This is interesting, right? You have to Atlantis, you're building a startup, a company that's leveraging this protocol. This protocol has a problem where it's been leaning into the social aspect, which is good and all. And the ability to have somewhat censorship resistant content and social profiles, the social web, a web of trust, and payments embedded is cool. But I forget who it was. I think it was Peter Teal.
(34:53) But I mean obviously Peter Teal had that famous uh talk at Stamford where he said you want to fight a monopoly. You don't want to you don't want competitors. And I think leaning into the social side of Nostra the like leaning into the social side of things via the Nostra protocol is like all right you're competing with a highly saturated and competitive landscape already.
(35:12) What is the area that doesn't exist? What what's the market you can go create? Like that should be your goal. It's interesting because Nostra is a protocol. It's not really a company, but as a company building, it's like, okay, what can we do with this protocol to go create a market to bring people to it? I think spot on.
(35:31) I'm glad you said that because um this was another realization that we had. Um this has become a podcast on like entrepreneur mistakes. Um we after the Prague conference, we went to another conference which was the the largest nomad conference in uh in the world in Bulgaria. And we went there and we pitched the product as a um you know a a social network for nomads and people were like ah this is cool you know they downloaded it they posted a little bit of content on the first day and then they didn't post again and we we sort of like tried to convince them like look just post the
(36:05) same kind of content you're doing on Instagram but you can post it here and you get to own your audience blah blah blah blah blah you know we did all this pitching and man it was so [ __ ] hard to get them to stop posting on Instagram or even just post alongside the posting on Instagram. It felt like we didn't solve a problem.
(36:21) We actually gave them a new problem which was another place to post and and sort of that hit me really hard. I was like I I I walked out of that conference and spent like um you know a week or two kind of digesting and thinking competing on social like you're competing for attention and attention is like the the most expensive uh currency on the planet today.
(36:45) Like it's so [ __ ] expensive. like and you're competing with Tik Tok, Instagram, Twitter, who which are literally designed to hijack your [ __ ] brain and turn you into a, you know, zombie that is triggered by everything. Um, that's that's a really that's a really high bar. It's a very difficult thing to do.
(37:08) and and I sort of found Satan is kind of sandwiched between trying to get people to drop these mainstream social apps on the one hand but also sandwiched between as I said earlier um you know we we had a feed or we have a feed still we haven't completely deprecated or changed it but we're competing also with Amethyst Primal Damos and you know the other apps and we're like okay what's the differentiator here you know sure we've you know you can on our feed you can see events and you can see places and you can see some other stuff, but it's not really that compelling. Um, it's not really that differentiated. And
(37:43) quite honestly, like I'll say this myself, Primal Primal's feed is functionally 10 times better than our feed. Like our feed looks nice, but it's not that [ __ ] great. Um, and we we never we also never got around to building Zaps because we wanted to try and figure out a way to make our feed more unique without Zaps.
(38:01) Um, and then we're going to sort of add Zaps as a as a icing on the cake. But yeah, like I ended up sort of stuck between these two and I was like, man, I'm playing the wrong game here. Like, let me go pick myself up out of here and go over here. And then I realized in the event space, you've got basically meetup.
(38:19) com and Eventbrite, who everyone like universally [ __ ] hates. They haven't changed for 20 years. Um, Eventbrite is like by the time you like first of all you can only host an event and get paid if you're a Westerner. So like you know if if you if you're from Brazil or if you're from Latin America, if you're from Africa, if you're from most of Asia, if you're from Eastern Europe, you can't use Eventbrite as a host.
(38:44) Like sure as an attendee you can attend, but as a host you can't get paid out. So that throws that out the window. Um, but even if you're a host in one of the western countries, Eventbrite takes almost 10% after payment processing fees. Like, so it's a [ __ ] highway robbery. Like, it's insane. So, you got Eventbrite on one side. Um, on the other side, you got meetup.
(39:07) com, which charges now 45 bucks a month so that you can have the privilege of running a meetup. Um, but everyone hates meetup.com. Um, and it's outdated. It hasn't changed. It's been bought by private equity, so it's tired as hell. Um, which is why in my opinion, you've got these kind of like new um I don't know if you've ever used Luma or Partifil.
(39:23) Have you used that? I've used Luma before. Yeah. So, Luma I I'm I'll again credit where credit's due that in my opinion is the best uh events app in the world today. It's so [ __ ] good. Unfortunately, it's run by Salana dudes and it's like [ __ ] winners. Um but like again, credit where credit's due. It's so much better than Eventbrite. so much better than meetup.
(39:47) com and they've really cornered the market particularly for tech events and for sort of like up and cominging meetups and all this sort of stuff. So, what we realized is, hey, there's there's actually no Bitcoin native equivalent for Luma. Um, and if we can build that and just like build Bitcoin payments into it naturally, cuz even with Luma, like they do have Stripe and they do have ticketing, but after their fees and Stripes fees, you're paying about 7 8% per ticket on Luma. So, it's still [ __ ] hyper expensive.
(40:14) Like, it's a little bit cheaper than Eventbrite, but it's super super expensive. Um, you could do Bitcoin ticketing like in a Luma sort of like experience and you could do that for 1%. And and not only can you do it cheaper so for everybody, but you can actually unlock the entire [ __ ] world. It would be the first global events app on the planet, which doesn't exist.
(40:38) So for me, that starts to get really interesting. It's like, okay, now Bitcoin actually unlocks something. So we're not we're not I said this to um to the team the other week. I was like, "Hey, we're not a Bitcoin company. We're not an Austria company. We're an events app that happens to be using Bitcoin in Austria.
(40:59) " And this is this makes me think actually about an article that I wrote a couple years ago called Three Generations Theory where I kind of said that the first generation of Bitcoin apps were all going to be about um something to do with the financial element of Bitcoin.
(41:17) So, exchanges, wallets, mining, and you know, you've got this kind of like latestage fiat um treasury company [ __ ] going on, right? So, which we can talk about, but like the the first generation of Bitcoin, like the first 20 years is going to be about like the nature of Bitcoin emerging against the US dollar.
(41:36) But the second generation of Bitcoin, so let's just say the first generation is 2010 to 2030. the next generation 2030 to 2050 you're going to have like young business owners and entrepreneurs who were born after Bitcoin was launched like you know they were born in 2010 onwards they're not going to know of a world like that they will perceive Bitcoin completely differently to you and I like you and I were born with one foot in the fiat world one foot in Bitcoin so we fundamentally even though we're a little bit different like we think already in terms of Bitcoin but the large majority
(42:04) of the world like sort of still views Bitcoin as this speculative investment or this like instrument for making more fiat, right, for making more US dollars. These kids will see Bitcoin completely different. And for them, it's like they they'll build what I call second generation Bitcoin companies, which is they'll build events apps, they'll build travel apps, they'll build, you know, Ubers, they'll build like actual applications, but Bitcoin's just it's part of the stack. like the same like they'll look at it exactly like they you know modern
(42:33) developers look at JavaScript you know NodeJS like it's just okay we're going to use this for payments we're going to use you know Nostra to you know add a social glue to it we're going to use you know AI to do this and that's it like it's part of the stack that to me is when Bitcoin really starts to embed itself in the world in technology and that's like you know somewhat unconsciously I've started like making Slantis a um a an attempt at a second generation Bitcoin company. It's like we're not a Bitcoin company. We're an events app, but we just happen to use Bitcoin in the in the
(43:10) stack. And that to me starts to get interesting. Anyway, I'll shut up. I kind of went off on a bunch of tangents, but here's what's up freaks. It's that time of year again. The healthcare enrollment window is open. It'll be open between now and the end of January. And we're here to advocate for our good partners at Crowd Health.
(43:28) I and my family have been using Crowd Health for 4 and a half years now. and it's been incredible. I was on Cobra, paying $1,800 a month at the time for my wife, myself, and our young child back in 2020. We switched to Crowd Health because it's cheaper. We've since added two children to our life. Both were born while we're using Crowd Health.
(43:47) And our monthly payment for the family of five now adding two more children is $695 a month. And better yet, if we ever have a health event, we only pay $500. There's no deductible minimum that we have to hit. The rest will be crowdfunded by the Crowd Health community. It's been a game changer. I'm sure you're aware that healthcare premiums across the board are going up this year in some cases 40 50%.
(44:02) Healthcare has gotten completely insanely expensive and I highly recommend that you consider moving to Crowd Health. It is cheaper. You get more one-on-one time with your healthcare advocate at Crowd Health. You get treated well and negotiate bills lower for you. It is not health insurance. It is crowdfunded medical care and it works better for me and my family at least. So, go to joincrowalth.
(44:21) com/TFTC during this enrollment period. If you sign up using the code TFTC or sign up via the link joincrowalth.com/TFTC, you'll get a reduced membership fee of $99 per month for the first 3 months. So, go check it out. What's up, freaks? Bitcoin's market cycles tend to follow the same old pattern. Parabolic spikes, brutal crashes.
(44:37) This time is measurably different. The Bitcoin check from Unchained and Check onChain shows how the 2023 to 2025 cycle has permanently reshaped Bitcoin's market structure. Inside you'll find why volatility has collapsed, why ETFs have anchored new five and six figure price floors, and why long-term hodlers remain firmly in control.
(44:54) Download now and you'll also get access to the online event featuring James Czech. Bitcoin has crossed the Rubicon. Get the report at unchained.com/tc. That's unchained.com/tc. I don't want to I don't think this is a digression but like really sort of an elaboration because I think it's important to bring up because you have it in the article and I think it's something that everybody particularly in should be thinking about but you referenced Andrew Chen's uh cold start problem um in his book and he was at Uber when they had this cold start problem and I think I'm really happy we're having this conversation as it
(45:25) pertains to Noster specifically. I think we really need to rethink how we solve this cold start problem and why should people really take the lessons from this book and begin applying them to what they're doing in terms of building businesses on them. Totally. I mean, do you want to should we dive into that a little bit? Yeah.
(45:48) Yeah. Um, so cold star problem maybe as like a for people who don't know what that means is when you're trying to build a kind of like a marketplace application or something that has a network effect which has two sides to the market like Uber as an example. you have drivers and riders. Like if there's no drivers, you can't get riders. And if there's no riders, you can't get drivers.
(46:08) So it's like the chicken and egg problem. So how do you solve that? Um you know, there's Andrew Chen kind of outlines four ways to solve it. You've got um uh what do you call it? Come for the tool, stay for the network. And he uses some examples like Dropbox, um you know, or Google Drive.
(46:30) So you you came for the tool so you could store your stuff online but then when you share it people get more utility by also creating a Dropbox or Google Drive account, right? Um Instagram was actually one of these as well is uh originally Instagram was a competitor to an app called Hipmatic which was just a photo filtering app. Um, but the difference was that with Hipsteratic, you had to download the photo to your phone after you put the filters on and then you could separately upload it to Facebook or one of the social networks.
(46:59) Instagram flipped the script there was they allowed you to instantly post to the socials but also post to your own feed. So what ended up happening was people came for the tool but slowly by slowly they stayed for the network. Um, the the other mechanism is invite only. So they Andrew 10 points at um LinkedIn as someone who did this really well was by making it invite only.
(47:24) It's sort of like a club and what you do is you get you get network density and what network density does is it increases the quality of the network effect. It's it's smaller in the beginning but you get um more connections and with more connections you get more sticking power. Um Tinder did that as well.
(47:48) Uh probably the best app in the world that ever ever ever ever ever did this is uh is that Rya um app which is like Tinder for celebrities. They [ __ ] killed it with this. Like they are completely locked down and they have a wait list that is months long. Um and it's completely paid.
(48:06) Um so they basically tell you to [ __ ] off, you can't join, but people are sort of jumping over themselves so they can be a part of that network. So they keep it super super high quality, uh super narrow, super niche. Um but they have such a good network effect and they have such a good product like that that the dude who built that is like a masterclass in building uh powerful network effects. So that's sort of the the second um mechanism.
(48:25) And I I will say and I said this in the article, I think Noster to some degree accidentally uh did that as a mechanism to build the first level of network effect because if you sort of think about um network effects happening in like uh in surges or in waves um like Nostra had its initial network effect and it's got this kind of critical mass of Bitcoiners who all know each other.
(48:51) So, it's got quite like it's almost got an invite only feel. Um, and even though it's not invite only, even though it's open, um, the fact that it's just like a bunch of Bitcoiners on there telling each other GM and tapping each other and all that sort of stuff, it like attracts a particular crowd. Um, which has made the the network quite dense.
(49:08) Like, we are all connected on there. We all know each other. And it's basically become Bitcoin Twitter, right? To to some to some degree. Um, and and a much better Bitcoin Twitter because Bitcoin Twitter now [ __ ] sucks. It's full of just morons talking about treasury companies. It's so bad. Um, so it's done that, but at the same time now it's almost like a, if you remember from chemistry, you had like you have electrons in a certain veilance, right? So it's kind of like stuck in this veilance. It's it hasn't it's it's not
(49:37) able to move to the next one, which is in my opinion sort of why the nostril growth has tapered off even though the products have gotten way better. Like if you I mean like Primal is 10 times better than it was a year ago. It's so [ __ ] good now. Um but the the usage like is is maybe incrementally a little bit better, but the the ratio between the improvement in the product versus the number of users is just not there, right? And I think that's because the the the current network effect is um is very good for the current club, but it
(50:12) hasn't allowed for a new club. So in my mind there there needs to be an unlock. So anyway that was invite only. Um the come for the tool state for the network. The third mechanism Andrew Chen talks about is um what he calls hard side. Yeah the the hard side but then also flint stoning.
(50:34) So the hard side he talks about um if you if you have a product and like Uber you got drivers and riders focus on the hard side first. So you buy the hard side um whatever that takes. So, it's like what they did at Uber, for example, in the beginning, they walked around and they like they paid drivers 30 bucks an hour just to drive around the um for during conferences.
(50:58) Whether they made money or not didn't matter, but what that created was available drivers. And then they went around to um to train stations and stuff like that and gave v gave vouchers out to potential riders and said, "Here's a $30 voucher. You can ride with Uber for the first time." So they kind of like they they invested in creating that and they built the first atomic network in San Francisco. I think it it was I think the second was New York etc.
(51:20) And then they sort of expanded from there and obviously Uber is a is a great use case. And then the final method Flint Stoning which is basically fake it till you make it. So this is what uh Reddit did as an example and Door Dash did a funny one but basically you um you like Reddit did it with [ __ ] bots.
(51:40) So it looked like there was real activity on there and real fake activity created some real activity and that sort of started a snowball. Um Door Dash did it with um they just listed restaurants on there. People ordered um from Door Dash and then Door Dash paid Uber drivers and [ __ ] like that to come and actually pick it up from the restaurant without the restaurant actually listed which is [ __ ] hilarious. So you know there there's these four mechanisms.
(52:00) Um, for us it's come for the tool, stay for the network. That is, I think, the unlock um that we're looking at now really, really seriously, which is, hey, here's a tool that you can use to host beautiful events, get paid in Bitcoin instantly. We'll add stable coin soon as well.
(52:18) Um, and we'll add fiat, we'll add Stripe, so that way there's like the whole buffet for for you as an event host. So come create an awesome event, get paid instantly, low fees, you get to build an audience while you're doing it, and in the process, we're building this network effect underneath.
(52:39) And hopefully people realize that they can stick around on Nostra more broadly and find other applications where they can actually communicate and build relationships and do stuff. Yeah, I love it. Go build the market that doesn't exist yet. I didn't realize the event space was that sort of confined. and constricted geographically. Didn't hit me either, man. It didn't hit me either. Like that's why Southeast Asia, for example, has its own like Eventbrite or has its own meetup.com.
(53:03) Like everyone is like it's super super super fragmented. The more I dug into that, the more I was like, "Holy crap." Like this is like this is the market. Like what was I doing? Yeah, now my mind's running through like what are other markets that don't exist yet that could be built on the stack with using this tool and these set of tools and my mind immediately wanders to something like data vending machines which I was sort of drawn to when they originally dropped but as we discussed earlier it doesn't seem like the LLM are there yet but kind of these marketplaces that don't
(53:37) exist that are uniquely suited to be built on this open stack of open protocols with Nostra and Bitcoin. Yep. Yep. Yep. Dude, if anyone is listening to this and they've got like ideas, there's your there's your toolkit. AI nostr Bitcoin. Like you you have a whole new design space. I I have this um let me see if I've got this diagram here.
(54:04) Um it's like it's it's a really good way to visualize um the the new design space that we have with um with Nostra and Bitcoin. Hold on. I'm looking through my stuff. All right. I'm going to I'm going to send this to you on signal so you can see it and maybe you can share it with um people listening. It'll like the the the initial four layer stack opened up um the opportunity for the world to get everything from Amazon to uh Google to Uber to every single application that we have uh in the world today. And now we have a two extra layers on the stack. We have a whole new
(54:46) design space which I think is going to create a renaissance for new products and like the people building in this space and the people investing in this space and all this sort of [ __ ] Man, the next 10 20 years are going to be crazy crazy crazy good.
(55:05) I really I really am loving this conversation because I I agree and I've talked to many people building a master million and I think many people are beginning to recognize this like all right what are the new hot sort of applications that don't exist that could be novel to Noster and I love the like ditching the idealist approach and being like we're not going to be like Nub uh Nseack only like if you want to sign in via email via Google, via Apple, whatever.
(55:34) Just sign up and we'll spin up a key for you. Yep. You'll always have it here. You probably don't even know that you have it, but it's here. Totally. Once you recognize that you created them pub when you sign up for this app, like you can go use it. Totally. Totally. Cuz then then we're using the the time in our favor.
(55:49) We get users now. We get product market fit. We succeed as a business. And over the next 3, five, 10 years, we can educate people. It's like, hey, you you know, you actually own your identity and you can like make it portable. They're like, "Oh, that's [ __ ] cool." So then they do it as opposed to putting the barrier up front. They're like, "Oh, what's a key? How do I do it? Where do I store it?" Like that. So yeah.
(56:10) So that's the new design space. Um whereas the old design space was just full layers. So this is the old Yeah. This is this is this is basically this stack is so powerful. It gave us everything that we have today. It's given us Riverside that we're talking on. It's given us Figma that we're designing on. It's given us Google.
(56:28) It's given us everything. It's [ __ ] incredible. But now imagine if you add identity and payments like baked into the stack, not as apps because to date we've had this like weird situation where payments is kind of an application on top of this protocol stack and you know payments lives inside [ __ ] like Stripe and PayPal and you know all that junk um and shitty banks and identity has been a complete mess because it you have a million and one identities in every single application as a feature. like throw that [ __ ] out and let's move
(57:01) on to this new stack. You have six layers, two new protocols. This is like a massive massive massive upgrade to the the digital experience um for the world. And I think it's Yeah. Anyway, I I said it before, I'll say it again. The renaissance in consumer applications and at some point business applications again because I think consumer apps usually kick off first.
(57:25) That's the that's the initial wave and then later on like you know maybe 5 10 years from now we'll get like new version of Slack, new version of um you know Jira and Linear and whatever else sort of like more business SAS type products that you know maybe won't even be SAS at that point.
(57:43) They will be pay because you've got the ability to do microp payments with Bitcoin. So it's like the the the whole the whole thing changes. That's like really really really really exciting as an entrepreneur. Yeah. And I think by framing it this way, by just adding two layers to the stack instead of saying, "Oh, you have to throw out everything else and build on this new stack." Um, is much more approachable, too.
(58:07) It's like, hey, you've been handed two more stack layers and tools, if you will, to build your applications. Just view them as additive. I think it's much more approachable for the layman. Way more approachable. Yeah, for sure. Actually, I um I didn't think of that explicitly, but when I when I have shared this with people in the in sort of normland outside of Bitcoin, cuz I've done a bunch of um talks and travel and discussions with people in that space, this this comparison clicks for people. They're like, "Oh, that's interesting."
(58:40) Like, they don't sort of see Bitcoin as this thing that they have to entirely switch to. Um, and I think this is actually more powerful than pitching web 3, you know, because all the web 3 dorks are like, oh, you know, the internet is dead and come over here.
(58:58) It's like, well, no, it's just the internet was missing this and now we can actually make the internet so much better. Yeah. And since you've sort of shifted and realized, I got to go make this market. We're going to make a social events app that's global. Um, that's what Satlantis is going to be.
(59:19) What have you, what have you noticed in terms of user behaviors? and you touched on some earlier, but what are sort of the most popular events that people are spinning up type of events? What um the the first thing I'll say is that it just like makes sense to people like you know when I was when I was I used to struggle like explaining all the things that Santis can do and everything like that and like oh that sounds really cool like so what do I do? It's like well you could start here and you can post some content.
(59:48) It's like way too much [ __ ] Um whereas now it's just like hey you're using Meetup and you're paying for a crappy product come and move your um Meetup across to Santis. You can set it up quicker. You can even do things like you know one of the uh the things that Meetup organizers hate is let's say you have a maximum capacity of 50 people and then you just get people just click register just because they click register but they don't have any intention of coming.
(1:00:10) So, it kind of like uses up the wait list or uses up your RSVP list and then you had like room for 50 and then only 10 or 15 people turn up because the other 30 [ __ ] um just click the register button because there's no cost in doing that. Um with Bitcoin, you could put like a free ticket but just make it 100 sats or something or make it 1,000 sats and then you know people sort of might even just think twice and at the very least if they don't turn up then the uh event host you know got,000 sats out of it or something like that. So you can start doing interesting things like that. Um
(1:00:42) the other one is we're partnering with Bitcoin conferences now. Um obviously being the the lowhanging fruit, but we Luma actually does this really well. They have this calendar feature where you can associate um events around a calendar and people can subscribe to a calendar and that can be used both by communities but also by conferences.
(1:01:02) We're we're adding a little bit more flexibility to that. And then obviously there's the social layer in the calendar that makes it a little bit smarter. But um yeah, the one of the big features that we're fleshing out now will have ready this month for use in all the November conferences and December conferences are coming up.
(1:01:20) But you have like Bitcoin Amsterdam as your main calendar and then you can associate all the satellite events to it. And now when people come to that event, they can find where their friends are going, who they know, and all this sort of stuff.
(1:01:40) Cuz that's one thing when you go to these massive events, trying to coordinate and figure out where people are going, holy [ __ ] it's a pain in the ass, right? But if you can see instantly, it's like, okay, six of my friends are going to this event, one of them is going to that event, this and that. You can make a really quick assessment on which ones to go to, and then you can add the events to your profile so you can see which ones you're going to.
(1:01:57) You got your tickets in there. It's all sort of inbuilt. Um the other thing, and this is part of a legacy feature, we had collections, which is um which is places on a map. So, we're going to keep that feature, but we're going to subordinate it to events.
(1:02:16) So, instead, when you create an event, one of the biggest things that people have or biggest issues that they have when they're doing an event, particularly when they're traveling, is where do I go? What do I do? You know, what are the cool places to hang out at? Which restaurant, which cafe, this and that. So, as an event host, you can associate like a list of your favorite places, and it could be like here's the the 10 top 10 um Bitcoin places around the event or here's the top 10, you know, brunch places or here's the best gyms, whatever you want. Like, you create a list and you append it to the event. Um, and then you know
(1:02:42) people have their list there, they have their social graph there, they can pay in Bitcoin and they have their places and it's like a really beautiful sort of endto-end solution for anyone running a meetup, a small event or a conference that wants to run all of the other stuff around it. That would be powerful.
(1:02:59) There's a number of events I go to and you show up early, you're like, "All right, where do I hang out before this thing?" It's like, huh, here's the best cocktail bar an hour before the event if you want to go. Something like that. Exactly.
(1:03:18) And the social graph actually works there as well because places are discovered by people on Slantis and added and people can bookmark those places when they add them to the list. So you can see immediately, oh, you know, one of my friends bookmarked this place or added this place or whatever or it's recommended by the event host or, you know, 35 people that I know in my social circle, you know, mention this place.
(1:03:36) So, it's like there's there's a there's a social graph uh utility there that is surfaced not for content purposes, but for um uh what do you call it like validation purposes like that? That to me is a is a really interesting use case for a open social graph as opposed to hey post more content. Yeah, we're getting into something I've intuitively believed is like social it's been a a good first use case, great first use case. I've used it.
(1:04:15) It's fun to your point about attention being scarce valuable and having to crossost it. uh even I um forget to crossost every once in a while. What are these unique use cases that don't exist anywhere else that can be built on Noster to really draw people in and then ultimately feed people to the social side of things. Um maybe it'll be like a horseshoe that started with social, it really blows up because of a bunch of other things and then ends with this everything app where everything protocol everything protocol. Yeah.
(1:04:44) with social at its core. Totally. Totally. I I I really think that's going to happen, but I think it's going to take 10 years, right? I think to to some degree, you know, we all sort of drank the Kool-Aid a little bit too quickly uh last year, I think, and we were like, "Oh, yeah, your nostril is going to take over the world.
(1:05:02) " And all this sort of stuff. And we sort of underestimated how hard it really is to sustain the um the the the network effect cold start problem solution, right? that it's really really really really difficult to um to to keep turnurning. Um so yeah, we we'll get there in the end and who knows maybe 10 years from now X and Rumble and all that sort of stuff realized that hey we should actually make our applications nostra compatible um because it makes sense to plug into that open network in the same way as they use the freaking internet. you know
(1:05:40) what they'll realize hopefully is that this new internet stack with payments and with identity built in is of benefit to them. So then they come and move across in the same way as [ __ ] incumbents like in the past like you know IBM ended up building laptops you know thanks to Apple like so you know they came um this way so that's that's what great uh technological revolutions do is they they enable startups to come and do something new to create entirely new markets as you mentioned and then the incumbents follow that to me is
(1:06:13) really cool. No. And I and as you're explaining that too, I think that's one of the key breakthroughs that you've honed in on too. Like when I think of Primal specifically, like it is becoming an everything app. Like it's Substack X and now Twitch allin-one with their live streaming. Um, and it's incredible.
(1:06:33) As a content creator, we definitely make way more money publishing our stuff on Noster than we do on X or YouTube or anywhere else. Um but it's that going back to the cold start problem I think in the digital sphere highly competitive like really bringing it in the meat space v something like events um and adding value there uh I think is going to be critical because the digital landscape as we all know is hyper competitive and there are a ton of meat spaceoriented experiences that are they're severely lacking. Um, it's a wide open landscape for people to really tap into.
(1:07:14) Totally. You know, another thing that reminds me of, speaking of mespace, is um since since I last spoke to you um you know, I've sort of had this like onoff relationship with um with Twitter, with Substack, with all with all of my socials actually. And you know, I I'll get in there again and I'll say a bunch of things and I'll get excited and then some [ __ ] will send me into a tail spin rage. Like the last thing was this whole like Charlie Kirk and arena thing, man. That that [ __ ] me up. Like when I saw
(1:07:45) that poor girl get like stabbed. Holy [ __ ] man. I I couldn't sleep for a week. Like that shook me up. And I I I went on a rampage like [ __ ] yelling and saying like we should pick up arms and go to war and all this sort of stuff.
(1:08:04) And I kind of I had a chance to like step away from that for a little I was like, man, you know, I get that I'm a passionate guy, but you know, I'm 10,000 mi away. There's nothing I can do. And, you know, yelling on Twitter doesn't actually help the situation. And to some degree, I'm like I I'm impotent in that sense. Like I I can't do anything about it.
(1:08:24) And all I did was create a bunch of stress for myself um and not being able to sleep and being pissed off about everything. Um, so I've kind of made the decision, honestly, dude, to take a massive hiatus from the online world. Like, I don't give a [ __ ] about like I deleted the apps all from my phone. I'm not going to post anymore for a while, if ever.
(1:08:45) Um, and this this shift with becoming more an events app, it's made me rethink like what are we doing here and why are we doing it? And I've come to the conclusion that I actually want to build an app that does like gets people to do [ __ ] in the real world. Um, and get get the [ __ ] off your screen.
(1:09:07) Like get off social media, get off like your phone and go and do something in the real world. Um, and I sensed that in myself and I've sensed that in myself for a little while. Um, and maybe it's because I'm getting older. Maybe it's because I'm a dad now and like I'm more interested in actually hanging out with the baby than like scrolling Twitter or anything like that.
(1:09:25) Um, but I've spoken to a bunch of people who are all sort of kind of had this almost call it like a burnout, like a digital burnout. They're like [ __ ] done. Like, man, it's the same thing over and over again. There's a new hysteria every single week. Like, I'm over it. I want to go do some stuff in the real world.
(1:09:48) And um it's made me like I went and did some digging into the statistics and like what are the trends showing and I don't think a lot of people realize but events were like pumping before co and obviously with lockdowns and everything like that it crushed everything. Um but there's been a [ __ ] re massive rebound. there is almost double the number of events going on in the world um across everything from like you know the large end of town like music festivals and all that sort of [ __ ] all the way through to small meetups and everything there's almost double the number of events happening now than precoid it's insane like this
(1:10:23) massive like whiplash effect where people are like sort of craving meeting up in person I guess we we can probably sense it as a proxy from the Bitcoin space right imagine remember 2019 when we first met in um in uh Bitcoin uh The Bitcoin meetiscoco. No, in San Francisco. San Francisco. Yeah. 2019. Yeah. 2019, dude.
(1:10:42) Like we were all [ __ ] babies. We're all innocent and [ __ ] like that. And there was like what, three Bitcoin conferences that year. Now, how many is there? It's like 100. It's insane, right? So, it's like people want to meet in Meet Space. Um, so when you're saying sort of mespace before, it's like I'm kind of rethinking this product.
(1:11:00) It's like, okay, I want to build something for I'm I'm calling it I don't know if it's the right term, but like the experience economy. It's like okay what are things in the real world events obviously um that you know people are interested in doing. So it's like to me events and places is kind of like the the sweet spot.
(1:11:18) There's something there amongst those two things and that's why I decided to like keep the collections feature in because that that thing is still associated to places like you want to know where to go and what to do but in the real world. Um so anyway yeah when you said meet me space you reminded me of that.
(1:11:38) It's like I it it feels like a more fulfilling mission for me than um building another social app. It's like okay, get out there and meet people in the real world. build build actual networks again um and friendships and communities and like that's what people are craving and and I can I I think more people are going to wake up to that and we're going to see a massive especially even now as like AI this is the last I'll say on it is um as AI kind of turns a lot of the internet into kind of like slop like there's like infinite content now there's infinite things you can get on the web there's all this sort of
(1:12:08) stuff so you know as human beings what do Do we sort of we get overabundance here? So we look for what is the scarce thing and the thing that's becoming more scarce is actually like connection and like real curation, real community and that you you know as much as you can do something over a zoom call like real connection happens in person um and if we can facilitate that uh through through a good product that to me gets very exciting.
(1:12:42) It it gives me a mission again that is um that that I'm that I want to work at like 24/7. Yeah. As you're saying that, I'm just writing some things down. I've noticed in myself like I have somebody who I mean I wouldn't call myself like uh an avid or not an avid but uh I'm not wholly engaged in the culture wars but from time to time over the last 5 years specifically like I've definitely dove in gotten involved to a certain extent but I've to your point about like digital burnout like the culture war stuff is becoming abundantly clear that the algos the powers of be
(1:13:16) whatever you want to point and flame at and I don't care who it is, it's becoming very clear that the divide and conquer sort of strategy is definitely being deployed in the digital world and the best option is just like not participate and so I particularly the last going back to like Charlie Kirk and Irana I think those were the last two straws that broke the camel's back for me it's like I really want what I put out there uh and I haven't been perfect but what I put out there on X or whatever socials. Just like maniacally focus on Bitcoin and freedom tech and just like present
(1:13:53) solutions and don't get drugged into the the mud of the culture wars and focusing on the problems because it is soul sucking and it never nothing ever happens. It's like and it never ends as well. Yeah, it's it's and it's really hard when you're a passionate person. I I I the the distance between my brain and the [ __ ] keyboard is like very short.
(1:14:17) Like so I end up like saying a lot of things that are like, you know, wild. And you know, a lot of people think I'm just a [ __ ] [ __ ] Um but it's like it doesn't come from a place of um uh like being a bad person necessarily.
(1:14:34) It comes from a place of like I give a [ __ ] and when I see bad things I'm like [ __ ] hell, I got to say something. You know, I went through all the crap with like co and everything like that and yeah, I don't know. I'm too old for this [ __ ] bro. It's like, that's the thing. I I was joking about it. Uh we had uh it was at an event last week and we were It was Meet Space event.
(1:14:57) We're talking about everything going on from Charlie Kirk and like the theories around it. Like it's obvious that the FBI story doesn't make any sense. And I was like, you know what? I need to find a young Jenzer, tap him on the shoulder, be like, "This is you, brother. I don't have any You don't have any to do it anymore. Yeah, we we done our time in the trenches, dude.
(1:15:16) Honestly, man, it's like, especially when you have kids, it's like is is this is this time well spent? This is not the reason why we moved back to where we're from originally. But like I I've noticed we've been home in the Philadelphia area where my wife and I both grew up for 3 months, four months now.
(1:15:40) And it's just like we've got family around the corner, multiple um family members like within a half mile vicinity. They've got kids the boys age and Yeah, bro. We find ourselves like when they get home from school, it's like, "All right, what are we going to do? We're going to play with your cousins. We're going to go to the park." It's like much more fulfilling. Don't worry, I'm not turning into grill dad.
(1:15:58) I'm not going to I'm not going to be begin saying, "Did you see that game last night?" But it's like where where is time best spent? And I truly believe there is like this push as fiat to basement the censorship rises like the culture wars are the noise that they're trying to drag you into and like focus on the signal connection to me space Bitcoin Noster and sort of build around Yeah, bro. Yeah, bro.
(1:16:23) The distractions that they're putting in front of you. Yeah, bro. Totally, man. Totally. Totally. We're getting old, bro. So, we are. So, if there's any Generation Z Gen Zers out there listening to this and want the tap on the shoulder and sort of the playbook for how to engage, uh, DM me. Actually, don't you don't want this life. Uh, it's not worth it. Start a family.
(1:16:50) It It Yeah, that's true. I was I was going to say it builds character. May maybe in your um in your sort of like mid20s, go hard, but then as soon as possible, get yourself a wife. have family and step out of the noise. Like there's a time and a place for all of these things, you know? Everyone's got to sort of go and build up some scars and [ __ ] like that. Um, you got to move on.
(1:17:14) If you want to go build up the scars, you want to meet other like-minded individuals to do that, make sure you download SAT Landis and uh start an event. Yeah, absolutely. Meet up at the local pub. This is sweet. I really This conversation went uh in a really good direction. And I'm happy it did. Particularly as it pertains to again Noster and how we're thinking about growing that network specifically.
(1:17:35) I think really trying to focus on areas where a market doesn't exist yet and leveraging the unique tool stack that exists on the existing web. Now Bitcoin in Auster is how you grow that network effect. Appreciate it, Ben.
(1:17:56) Yeah, I was uh I wasn't sure where this conversation was going to go either, so I um appreciate you letting me rant and ramble. Um I'm uh yeah I'm in I'm in the process of rethinking how Sedsky shows up uh in the world and you know for for a while I you know I I' I've always been an entrepreneur first um but I think most people in the Bitcoin space actually know me as um as a as a writer um because I wrote a lot I guess um but that's always been more of a hobby than a than a real vocation And yeah, it's it's weird.
(1:18:32) Like I feel like I've come full circle where now the thing that gives me the most joy is um I mean I I still enjoy conversations like this cuz you know some of these conversations are really good but I I don't even necessarily want to be very public anymore.
(1:18:49) Like you know I'll I'll have like good conversations where I know if there's a good podcast host or something like that we can dig into something like we did today. But I don't I don't I I would much prefer to sit down with my team and build cool [ __ ] Like I I studied engineering when I was uh when I was young and that's like solving problems and building stuff like gives me a lot of juice.
(1:19:13) And then, you know, you get a bit of notoriety online and you think you're a [ __ ] celebrity and all this sort of stuff and then like, you know, that kind of sucks you into that world, but man, it's um it's a it's a tough life. Um it's you know everything comes with you know pros and cons obviously but you know this sort of new chapter of Shetski now like being a dad and like trying to build something for me to face um it feels like so much more peaceful and wholesome at least for this stage.
(1:19:44) Who knows maybe 5 years from now I decide to be a raging [ __ ] lunatic again and come people maybe I'll have my my next Nasim Talib arc or something like that. No, I mean I think similarly here obviously I run a podcast, write a newsletter, I'm very online to some extent, but uh I think the thing that has really driven me and given me the most fulfillment um obviously family moving closer to family, but here on like I've really been focused on the business side of TFTC working with Ed our head of growth to really just create like a a management framework of how we actually operate the business and sort
(1:20:23) of expand the opportunities that we go after that aren't podcast newsletter x focus like what else can we do to sort of uh support our key vision of highlighting signal and helping people become more sovereign um beyond what we're doing with the content and that's been really fundamental and exercise that we've been playing through for the last few months.
(1:20:46) No, I mean the opportunity cost app is [ __ ] brilliant, dude. Like I when I when I saw that I was like why hasn't anyone done this before? This is like so good. Like it's so like it's such a simple tool. Um yeah dude kudos to you guys. Like that's that's that's an example of people who actually, you know, are creative and solving something very clear because they have uh an information edge, which as Bitcoiners, we do.
(1:21:15) Like we're ahead of 99% of the world. Like people haven't even changed the paradigm yet of their method of thinking. As we said earlier, it's like they they still perceive Bitcoin as an investment for [ __ ] sake. um even though maybe they see it less speculative now, it is still in the in the mental category of an investment.
(1:21:32) Like, you know, we we we're sort of like 50 years ahead of them. We're sort of seeing Bitcoin as like not only just money, but now it's like it's a it's a tool like and it's that is completely different paradigm and that's where great products come from that are genuinely futuristic. Yeah.
(1:21:51) And I guess last point on that, thank you number one. But number two, for any Bitcoiners particularly like us who've been in it for a while, I think that's the most important thing is recognize obviously we have this information uh asymmetry with this arbitrage that we're taking advantage of obviously by stacking sacks and building around it.
(1:22:07) But I think patience recognizing it's a marathon and the market's going to come to us eventually, but at its own pace and staying sane while that process plays out is incredibly important. There's going to be a lot of burnout and all that, but I think it's happening. It's happening at its own pace and just yeah, you don't want to be like the the guy in the cave who gets close to the diamonds and then turns around. Like just stay the course. Try to touch grass.
(1:22:38) Make sure your your uh mental health, for lack of a better term, um your mental clarity is probably the better term, uh is where it needs to be. Totally. Totally. Um when when treasury company never it's a this is TFTC is a Bitcoin treasury company. We just have an operating business that we like to think provides value to people.
(1:23:04) You actually have an actual business that makes Bitcoin. That's it. Like it's it's it's so funny when um you know cuz I I I got asked by that when um when we were doing like a little uh fundraiser. Um oh actually we were about to start a fundraiser. I was in Prague and you know people started asking me so they're like so you going to go public? I was like, "What? For what?" And they're like, "You know, so you can put Bitcoin in the balance sheet.
(1:23:28) " I'm like, "Well, no, I think we're just going to try and get revenue and earn money in Bitcoin." And they're like sort of looking at me like, "What the [ __ ] wrong with you?" And I'm like looking at them like, "What the [ __ ] wrong with you?" Um, it's Yeah, it's hilarious to watch, man. What a what an interesting world.
(1:23:46) I mean, I've been saying it publicly for months, especially during paper Bitcoin summer, but caveman to me is like, it's too good to be true. Yeah. Yeah. It's just like nothing nothing in life is that easy. And not that it's easy to go through all the SEO, I mean relatively easy to go through the SEC paperwork and raise some capital, sell the vision, but um obviously that takes work, but um I think you can just get something to market and turn on a magic Bitcoin printing machine seems a bit naive to me. I think there will be some that do it successfully, but it's going to be a economy is a scale game
(1:24:19) that obviously a few players have. Yeah, 100% a massive head start on 100%. It it'll be like the AI space, man. Like there'll be like three four winners and like this idea that everyone, you know, everything there's going to be hundreds of Bitcoin treasury companies, all that sort of stuff. It's [ __ ] ludicrous.
(1:24:38) Um, and yeah, it's interesting. Yeah. Build a product or service that brings people value. they pay for it and uh you produce it cheaper than they pay for it and you sweep that excess into Bitcoin. Bitcoin economics 101. I was watching um the Count of Monte Cristo with my wife a couple weeks ago and um while they're digging in the um in the in the tunnel trying to get out of the prison, the the priest asks Dantes is like define economics and he sort of like says you know being able to create a surplus blah blah blah. And then he says in short uh
(1:25:11) dig now um eat later, you know. So it's like that's it. There's there's your economics like do something and produce surplus and that's it. Yeah, it's not complicated. It's not. No, but I think the uh would even call it greed. I think the uh I guess it's a FOMO to an extent like this idea like we need to stack as many sats now, which I get. I have that feeling personally as well.
(1:25:39) um the land grab, the gold rush, whatever you want to call it. That's what's driving a lot of this. And it's like, ah, I agree, but is this the best way to go about it? I don't know. I don't think so. Yeah. For for for the people, you know what? And just benefit of the doubt for like the people who know what they're doing there in capital markets and [ __ ] like that. Yeah, whatever.
(1:25:57) You know, they they know that game and there's probably like the few people, as you said, that'll be successful at that. Like, but man, like it's it's a it's a it's a weird um relic of the the fiat world that something like that can actually happen. Um it's a sort of like a strange period in history like people look back and be like that that actually happened. Yeah.
(1:26:23) And I I think the next 12 months will will um reveal a lot about the efficacy of of these strategies. Maybe maybe um we can we'll talk again uh at some point next year. Hopefully not a whole year. Maybe the first quarter, second quarter next year. Catch up on Sat Lannis and retrospective on the performance of the treasury companies. Totally. We should definitely do that.
(1:26:53) All right, we've got um Logan's got the links the satanis um where everybody can find it. We'll put that in the show notes particularly focus on Nostra and growing Nostra specifically. Take what we discussed here and really think about it. I think this is uh really important because again you have Nostra the protocol people are building businesses on top of it.
(1:27:16) Should we be replicating businesses that already exist in the web 2.0 no world for uh if that's what you want to refer to it as or should we just go create new markets. I think that's where the signal is and where the growth comes from. So, shout out to you for honing in on that and leaning into it. It's Atlantis. Appreciate it, man. I appreciate it.
(1:27:34) And then um I will throw one thing out there for people listening. If feel like uh if you're an event host, event organizer of any kind, if you're using Meetup or Luma or anything, would love you to come and give the app a try. Um, it's it's ready to rock and roll. You can create an event on there. It's super fast. Um, doesn't have Bitcoin ticketing yet.
(1:27:54) It'll have Bitcoin ticketing in a couple weeks. So, by the time you hear this, um, it's either just about to be released or very shortly. Um, but yeah, certainly by the end of October, you'll have Bitcoin ticketing. It's Nostra enabled. All of that sort of stuff. Um, would love some feedback. Uh, would mean a lot.
(1:28:13) really like our goal over the next 6 months is to have all of the Bitcoin conferences, meetups, communities, and all that sort of stuff beyond there. So, it's like a real vibrant sort of place like if you want to know anything that's going on in the meat space in Bitcoin, like this is wanted to be the place to be. So, would love anyone try it out. Check it out, freaks. Till next time. Appreciate it. Peace. Thank you for listening to this episode of TFTC.
(1:28:38) If you've made it this far, I imagine you got some value out of the episode. If so, please share it far and wide with your friends and family. We're looking to get the word out there. Also, wherever you're listening, whether that's YouTube, Apple, Spotify, make sure you like and subscribe to the show.
(1:28:58) And if you can leave a rating on the podcasting platforms, that goes a long way. Last but not least, if you want to get these episodes a day early and add free, make sure you download the Fountain podcasting app and go to fountain.fm to find that. $5 a month gets you every episode a day early ad free. Helps the show, gives you incredible value. So, please consider subscribing via fountain as well.
(1:29:22) Thank you for your time and until next time.

Spread the signal,
earn Bitcoin.

Get your unique referral link when you subscribe.

Learn more →