In this episode of The People’s AI, presented by Vana, we dive into one of the most compelling intersections in tech today: AI agents and crypto infrastructure. Our guest is Bryan Pellegrino, co-founder and CEO of LayerZero Labs. His journey is anything but ordinary—former top-ranked professional poker player, model builder for MLB teams alongside Billy Beane, and now a key architect of decentralized AI infrastructure.
We explore the deep mechanics of decentralized agents: How will they live on-chain? Will they need wallets? How will reputation systems work for non-human actors? And most critically—what does it mean for blockchains when agents, not humans, drive the majority of transactions?
Bryan unpacks why micro-payments are broken in legacy systems and how crypto rails solve that. He discusses why LayerZero should be thought of as the TCP/IP of the decentralized internet—abstracting cross-chain operations for AI agents and making assets truly fungible across blockchains.
We also tackle big-picture topics like:
- [06:10] The problem with overhyping LLMs and the limits of scaling compute
- [14:45] What LayerZero actually does and why it matters
- [17:40] AI agents as blockchain-native actors—and why payments come first
- [27:30] The challenge of AI hallucination vs. blockchain immutability
- [31:20] Wallets, security, and reputation for AI agents
- [37:10] Use cases for decentralized AI people are sleeping on
- [44:45] How to build infrastructure that can outlast rapid AI evolution
- [46:00] Bryan’s grounded, long-view predictions for AI, AGI, and agent proliferation
Bryan brings rare insight—and skepticism—to the table, showing where hype diverges from real engineering, and where massive opportunity still lies. If you care about decentralized AI, agentic systems, or the future of crypto infrastructure, this one’s not to be missed.
For more: Layer Zero Labs
Presented by Vana, the open protocol for user-owned AI through user-owned data. Vana's vision is for user-owned AI through user owned-data. Its mission is to be the world's first open protocol for data sovereignty.
Vana on Twitter/X:
Vana ecosystem: vana.com
Vana at MIT Decentralized AI Summit, Builders Workshop
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