Jeremy Epstein, crypto economist and one of many main consultants on digital currencies, is my go-to particular person after I want to essentially perceive the place we’re with these applied sciences. Once I final had a LinkedIn Reside nearly three years in the past, I requested him the place we’re and he mentioned we had been within the very early phases. So with all that has occurred within the years since we final spoke (like NFTs, Web3, oh yeah and that pandemic factor) I wanted an replace from him. And happily, I caught up with Jeremy just lately for one other LinkedIn convo to see the place we are actually, and in addition to get his tackle a few of these newer applied sciences and the way they’re shaping the digital forex panorama.
All I can say is you probably have even the slightest curiosity on this space, do your self a favor and take a look at the edited transcript of a portion of our dialog. And in case you are actually on this, click on on the embedded SoundCloud participant and hearken to the entire dialog as we went manner deeper this time round than we did three years in the past. And there’s no manner I can let three extra years go in between convos with Mr. Epstein once more!
Nonetheless early innings with crypto
Brent Leary: So…. Is it nonetheless early days for crypto and blockchain?
Jeremy Epstein: I’m the chief advertising and marketing officer of an organization referred to as RDX Works, which is the corporate accountable for creating the Radix Public community, so XRD is our token image. The Radix Public community is deliberately constructed to help a decentralized international monetary economic system. The worldwide monetary economic system in the present day is $400 trillion. That doesn’t even embody all of the metaverse stuff that’s going to get created, all the expansion. I can’t even take myself severely after I say this, nevertheless it’s not unreasonable to suppose that the worldwide monetary economic system will at some point within the subsequent, say, decade be one quadrillion {dollars}, okay. That’s ridiculous, nevertheless it’s doable.
Brent Leary: I don’t know what meaning. Give me that in poor particular person’s phrases.
Jeremy Epstein: I suppose it will be it’s a one with 15 zeros after it. It’s lots of zeros. So in the present day it’s $400 trillion. The entire crypto market is $2 trillion, and the entire world of decentralized finance, which is lending and borrowing and all of the monetary stuff is $200 billion. It’s 2000 occasions smaller if that’s proper. When you concentrate on how small it’s in the present day and the way huge it’s going to be, you’re like, wow!
What we’ve accomplished is we mentioned, okay, think about a state of affairs the place $400 trillion in worth all takes place on a decentralized platform, what would that require? Then, work backward from that to construct that community, that’s what Radix is doing. Within the grand scheme of issues, I imply, the UIs on Web3 suck. The developer expertise completely sucks. There was a hack yesterday for $650 million as a result of the safety continues to be unhealthy for lots of those locations. I imply, it’s like CompuServe, Prodigy, when your mother simply knocked you off your modem by choosing up the telephone if you had been in highschool sort of factor. Okay, these are engineering issues. They’ll get solved, nevertheless it’s nonetheless too arduous. Anyway, that’s my reply.
Brent Leary: Wow. Three years later, we’re nonetheless very early days.
Jeremy Epstein: We’re. I imply, the tempo of innovation is ridiculous. The expansion is thrilling, all that. However, by way of the place the potential for this monetary revolution enabled by crypto know-how goes to take us… I imply, there are 2 billion folks on the planet with out a checking account. Once they get a checking account, then we’ll know we’re getting there.
Crypto and Ukraine
Brent Leary: Is their telephone sort of their checking account, their digital checking account?
Jeremy Epstein: Their telephone can be their pockets, nevertheless it’s not their digital checking account. There’s a narrative I noticed a few man who was escaping Ukraine, and all of the banks are shuttered. The ATMs aren’t working. Your bank card’s not working, however he walked out of Ukraine with a pair thousand {dollars} of Bitcoin on his telephone. He was in a position to restart. He took his household, received them began in no matter nation he was in. Think about that.
I’ve seen tales of individuals crying in Venezuela, that if it weren’t for Bitcoin and crypto belongings, we’d be useless. That’s superb, and we’re simply on the tip of the iceberg of that. That’s what motivates me now, man, is rather like you wish to discuss equality and inclusiveness and all that stuff. You understand how discriminatory our present monetary system is on so many ranges. It’s offensive. It’s downright offensive.
Look, this factor’s not going to be good. Web3 just isn’t going to be good. It’s going to have all types of issues with it. However, I feel it will probably, identical to the web… Web’s received all types of issues, too, however is it a internet optimistic? You and I wouldn’t be doing this with out it.
Brent Leary: For certain.
Jeremy Epstein: I feel it’s, and that’s how I really feel about crypto. However, hey man, I’m a radical.
Web3 meets Crypto
Brent Leary: Possibly you would tie some issues collectively. You talked about Web3.
Jeremy Epstein: Yep.
Brent Leary: You’re speaking about crypto.
Jeremy Epstein: Yep. I threw lots of jargon on the market.
Brent Leary: NFTs are going to be in there. Tie all of it collectively. The place do all this stuff come collectively and finally have affect on common people who find themselves not on the bleeding fringe of this?
Jeremy Epstein: I feel it mainly comes all the way down to who has management and alternative. People ought to have extra management over their very own belongings, their wealth, their data, and have the ability to leverage these to create extra alternative, to entry alternatives freely with out different folks telling them what they’ll or can’t do. I imply, I’ll offer you one instance. Are you accustomed to accredited investor legal guidelines?
Brent Leary: No.
Legal guidelines are within the favor of maintaining the wealthy, wealthy
Jeremy Epstein: Accredited investor legal guidelines mainly say until you’ve gotten 1,000,000 {dollars} of belongings and make greater than $200,000 a yr for 2 years in a row, there’s sure alternatives like early stage corporations, you can not spend money on. It’s unlawful so that you can spend money on them. Now, in the event you’ve tracked the expansion of software program corporations, that the massive alternatives come early, however these are off limits to poor folks. Why? And even center earnings folks. Why? As a result of any person thinks, oh, poor and center earnings folks don’t know the best way to handle their cash. They don’t perceive threat. They’re mainly silly. We’ll allow you to purchase lottery tickets, however we’re not going to allow you to spend money on the subsequent Uber, the subsequent startup, the subsequent no matter as a result of it’s too dangerous.
We’re going to order that for wealthy folks, and that’s what occurs. That’s offensive. I’d reasonably stay in a world the place I say, look, it’s your cash, Brent. It’s your cash, Anand. It’s your cash, whoever. Make investments it the place you need. That’s with the ability to have management and with the ability to have alternative and have the ability to what you suppose is best for you and your loved ones and your group at anyplace on this planet at any time.
Leveling the monetary taking part in discipline
What Web3 is about is actually leveling the monetary taking part in discipline. Web leveled the data taking part in discipline. Now you might be as highly effective, if no more highly effective than CBS and NBC as a result of you may create one factor, and it will probably go viral. Everyone knows that, proper? It wasn’t apparent to everybody. I imply, it was apparent to the 2 of us 15 years in the past, however not everyone else. Now, it’s apparent to everyone else.
The monetary taking part in discipline just isn’t degree. The explanation why now we have a lot inflation now’s as a result of the federal reserve has been printing all this cash. However who received the cash first? The actually wealthy folks. Why? As a result of it drove up inventory costs, so actually wealthy folks made a ton of cash. Now there’s seven to eight p.c inflation for everyone. Why? As a result of the federal reserve printed… 40% of all new {dollars} ever created have been created within the final two years. That’s not acceptable, and it’s not going to create this skill and the alternatives for development that all of us want for us to prosper as a globe. Web3 is about taking the facility again from the folks and the establishments which have mainly captured it for themselves. See, now I sound like I’m completely off my rocker, and I sort of am.
Will the taking part in discipline ever be leveled?
Brent Leary: The primary, I don’t know, industrial revolution or first financial revolution was round farming and agriculture. We moved from that to the economic revolution, and a part of that was for individuals who needed to have extra alternative. If we’re shifting from a farm base to an industrial, that ought to present much more alternatives for normal people to make some cash. In fact the fellows who owned the crops and the means of producing, they received many of the cash. The employees received extra work and harmful work at that.
Then, years after, we had the pc revolution, and that was alleged to open up extra alternatives for extra folks to earn more money. That occurred to a sure extent, however principally the folks on the high received even richer. Now we’re speaking folks with a whole lot of billions of {dollars}, whereas the typical employee’s nonetheless sort of engaged on the identical wage scale.
With all that as a backdrop, now now we have this Web3 factor, and the promise of it’s to unfold the wealth, unfold the chance. However, will it… I don’t know what’s going to occur, however primarily based on the observe file, this simply looks as if one other alternative for the parents on the high to get much more of the wealth and get it quicker this time round than the common people. How will common people profit this time?
Jeremy Epstein: I adore it. I feel I problem your premise.
Brent Leary: Okay.
Jeremy Epstein: I’m not going to disagree that there are individuals who make some huge cash out of latest improvements and, frankly, that’s positive with me. I don’t actually care. However, I’d argue that the usual of residing and the standard of life for folks in the present day is considerably larger than it was once they had been engaged on the farms, serfs in Russia, sharecropping, no matter. We’ve higher schooling, higher meals, higher healthcare. You speak concerning the new applied sciences. Everyone and their mom now has a telephone. You will have the computing energy.
New Tech and the digital self-starter
Two tales that blew me away just lately. Primary, I used to be in Mexico for a convention and the motive force of the automobile, his English was superb. I used to be like, “Oh, how’s your English get to be so good? Did you reside within the US sooner or later?” He’s like, “No, I simply watched lots of YouTube, and I taught myself.” I’m like, that’s superb.
Identical factor. There’s a man on my group at Radix who’s from Vietnam. Identical factor, and he’s speaking about that’s what folks do now. You possibly can educate your self, so that would by no means have occurred pre-internet. Now, he has alternatives that he didn’t have earlier than.
Sure, are there going to be people who find themselves adversely affected? In fact. However, take into consideration all these people who find themselves TikTok influencers, YouTube influencers. They’re making some huge cash. They weren’t on the high of the pyramid earlier than, however now they’ve this chance. You will have a possibility to construct what you are promoting on this platform, get your title on the market. I imply, your title’s already on the market, and it’s one of many nice all time names, after all, however proceed to advertise. I’m undecided I’d agree that we’re worse off than we had been 50, 100, 150 years in the past. These applied sciences have typically moved everyone ahead.
I imply, in India, everyone has a cellular phone. I imply, I feel 50 years in the past that will’ve been thoughts boggling, simply madness. Now it’s like everyone’s tremendous linked. I feel there’s lots of issues to have a look at, I imply, there’s all the time room for enchancment, I feel that see the identical factor, and I don’t thoughts if a couple of folks get actually wealthy. What I do thoughts is that when the alternatives aren’t out there to everyone.
I feel this can be a pattern in giving extra folks extra alternative, identical to the web gave extra alternative, identical to the economic revolution gave extra alternative, identical to the agrarian, alternative. Identical to going all the way in which again to Gutenberg and the printing press. It introduced literacy or alternative to learn to extra folks. Precisely. That’s precisely what I used to be attempting to say. At the very least now we have one particular person watching this.
Brent Leary: All proper. I agree with lots of what you mentioned.
Levis Strauss and the Gold Rush revisited?
The identical factor that occurred originally of the gold rush the place any person discovered gold, mentioned, Hey, man, I received we received gold over right here. Hundreds of thousands of individuals include tin pans. And the one folks at that made important cash had been Levi Strauss and the fellows promoting all of the picks and shovels to the wannabe wealthy dudes, which ended up not being wealthy in any respect, apart from the few people who had been good sufficient who had the ingenuity to promote the issues that everyone wanted.
I feel I see lots of that happening right here. And I could possibly be fallacious, however I’m simply questioning how can we make issues completely different this time round in WEB3?
Jeremy Epstein: I feel lots of it comes all the way down to who owns the community, proper? And who owns quote unquote means or manufacturing. in the event you take a look at our present system, the possession of all of our monetary system is proscribed to a handful of shareholders in a few banks and what have you ever in a decentralized community setting. It comes all the way down to how broad and the way distributed and the way huge your community is.
Everybody who’s a member of the community shares a chunk of possession. And you’ll take part in a number of networks. If one community just isn’t delivering you worth, you may simply depart it, simply be a part of one other one, and you’ve got the chance to take part and profit from the group like Fb. We’re all a part of the community however the worth solely accrues to a handful of individuals.
Revisiting the Internet Impact
Once you and I be a part of community, be a part of Fb, we add worth to Fb, proper? How a lot worth do you get from Fb economically for having elevated their share value? You get some marginal social worth since you join with your pals for certain. However the 2,000,000th particular person in Bangladesh who joins Fb doesn’t actually add lots of worth to your life.
In a Web3 setting, each single one who joins the community contributes in a useful manner and each single particular person advantages in a useful manner. When you have a toolkit, you probably have a token, which is the token behind the Radix Community, there are solely 2.4 billion tokens on the market.
It’s about who owns the community
So each single one who joins in will increase the worth of it, of the fairness for each single particular person And so I feel it’s the mannequin of possession. It’s we as an alternative of getting management and worth accrue to a handful within the heart. Management and worth are distributed and dispersed to each single member who’s a contributor, who’s a contributing worth creator.
And it could possibly be simply having a token, it could possibly be on staking my tokens, it could possibly be on constructing an app, it could possibly be utilizing it. There are a number of methods to take part but when you’ll maintain one of many tokens, you might be an proprietor of the community, there’s nothing you would do. Proper now we’re creating worth for LinkedIn however you’re not getting paid by LinkedIn for any of that worth. In an actual world, you’ll.
READ MORE:
That is a part of the One-on-One Interview collection with thought leaders. The transcript has been edited for publication. If it is an audio or video interview, click on on the embedded participant above, or subscribe by way of iTunes or by way of Stitcher.
