April 28, 2024 • 46 mins
Join the vanguard of digital transformation as Nadja Bester, co-founder of AdLunam, walks us through the AI-driven evolution of Web3. We're not just talking about the future; we're living it, as Nadja recounts her exhilarating experiences from the Token 2049 event in Dubai, a city that mirrored the unpredictable climate of technology with its own surprise rainstorms. As we navigate through the bustling corridors of business development, we can't help but marvel at the powerful tide of AI tools such as ChatGPT. Yet, blockchain remains a mysterious treasure chest, waiting for its moment to truly shine in mainstream society. This episode is a masterclass on the societal shifts ushered in by these titans of tech, with AI leading the charge.
Amidst the fervor of innovation, we tread carefully, analyzing the investment terrain of Web3 and AI. Heeding the lessons from historical tech bubbles, we remain buoyant with optimism, while conscientiously addressing the concerns surrounding AI centralization and self-sovereignty in our digital existence. With Nadja's insight, we dissect the state of decentralization in Web3, and why it's paramount to balance the power dynamics in the technological ecosystem. From the chilly crypto winter to a thaw of judicious investments, this episode unravels the peculiar fundraising paradox of Web3, and the speculative yet potentially fruitful trends of tokens like those on Solana.
The digital landscape is ever-evolving, and so is our identity within it. We probe the construction of our digital personas across social platforms, questioning the constraints of legacy networks and the burgeoning promise of decentralized futures. With Nadja's expertise, we delve into the challenges faced by platforms like Facebook's Threads and the vibrant potential of digital sovereignty through decentralized identities. It's not just about managing multiple online selves; it's about embracing the right to do so with autonomy and security. Education is the beacon guiding us towards a unified understanding of Web3, with diverse "aha" moments illuminating the path. This episode is a clarion call for a connected, yet independent digital existence where our sovereignty is not just a concept, but a lived reality.
About Nadja Bester:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/nadjabester/
AdLunam
https://www.linkedin.com/company/adlunaminc/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Yeah, I mean, I think this is such a beautiful
question and such a beautifultopic because you can go so deep
with this.
However, for the sake of time,I'm going to try and keep it as
superficial as possible, while Imean still touching on very
core themes.
So you know, I often thinkabout this.
I'm a student of psychology,I'm a student of sociology.
(00:22):
That's also my educationalbackground and it's also the
lens at which I look at theworld.
So there's so many examples ofhow freedoms have been taken
away from us.
You know, it's like the frogthat slowly gets boiled.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Welcome to Tech Travels hosted by the seasoned
tech enthusiast and industryexpert, steve Woodard.
With over 25 years ofexperience and a track record of
collaborating with thebrightest minds in technology,
steve is your seasoned guidethrough the ever-evolving world
of innovation.
Join us as we embark on aninsightful journey, exploring
(01:03):
the past, present and future oftech under Steve's expert
guidance.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Welcome back, fellow travelers.
In today's episode we'retalking about the influence of
AI on Web3 and blockchaintechnology.
We're also going to explore thetopic around the ethical
implications on society.
Today we have the honor ofhosting a true industry pioneer
in Web3 and blockchain NadiaBester.
She is the co-founder ofAdLunum.
She's a pioneer in the Web3investment world that offers the
(01:31):
first gamified ecosystem forblockchain investments.
She's also award-winningentrepreneur, investor,
international speaker, and hertalents also extend into
authoring and also the host of asuccessful podcast, the Future
of NFTs.
She's also exploring ananticipated Netflix documentary
on the evolution of the digitalself and the future of the
(01:52):
internet.
Please join us as we welcomeNadia to the show.
Nadia, we're thrilled to haveyou.
Welcome to the show.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Thank you, steve.
And yeah, just as I was sayingto you before we got started, I
love the name of the podcast, soit feels like a badge of honor
to be here today, to becombining the two great loves of
my life.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Wonderful.
We're so very happy to have youhere, so catch us up on your
travels here.
I know the audience is veryeager to hear a word, that he's
eager to dive into topics here,but I want to kind of dive into.
You were just recently at Token2049 in Dubai.
It's basically the premiercrypto event, drawing upon some
of the most prominent leadersand founders from across the
global Web3 ecosystem.
So tell us a little bit aboutthis conference and really kind
(02:37):
of what were some of thehighlights of the talk?
Speaker 1 (02:41):
So, honestly, the highlights had nothing to do
with the actual conference.
There were a lot of side events.
I think there were over, if I'mnot mistaken, 300 side events
listed, and this is always thecase with these kind of events.
You know, token 2049 inSingapore is the same thing it
draws the crowd to the actualconference, but then there's all
these side effects happening inthe periphery.
(03:03):
Unfortunately, when Token 2049came to Dubai for the first time
this year, it also may bebrought with it or maybe it
happened to coincide the biggestrainfall in the history of the
United Arab Emirates, so I didnot get to experience Token 2049
, so I could not comment on theactual talks.
I can, however, tell you allabout my escapades being
(03:27):
stranded at my hotel that becamean island with a moat around it
.
So, yeah, it was veryinteresting, and how business
development got done in thelobbies of hotels, when people
were sheltering from the raintogether and, you know, walking
knee deep streets, and so it wasa very interesting experience
and I think this will probablygo down as one of those
historical events.
And walking knee-deep streets.
So it was a very interestingexperience and I think this will
probably go down as one ofthose historical events.
(03:49):
The fact is, even people whoreleased an NFT collection the
token 2049 survivor badge inyour wallet.
So there you go.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
It's incredible.
So tell us a little bit.
So it sounds like there is alot happening in this space
Again, you know we see Token2049, there was AI Summit 2024,
you gave a talk on beyondalgorithms, the deeper impacts
of AI in a global society.
Let's start there.
Let's start with the influenceand kind of what we're seeing in
terms of the deeper impacts ofAI in the global society.
(04:22):
So what are we kind of nowstarting to see across this
landscape?
Speaker 1 (04:26):
deeper impacts of AI in the global society.
So what are we kind of nowstarting to see across this
landscape?
You know so I have been inblockchain since 2017.
And in that time, the adoptionrate I'm talking the average
person, my cab driver, my aunt,my friend who is a nursery
school teacher that adoptionrate really hasn't grown.
(04:46):
It hasn't extended to theaverage person.
What has extended is peoplekind of now accept that Bitcoin
is an asset class and that'shere to stay and you know they
might dip a toe and buy someBitcoin, and that's kind of the
extent.
Ai, on the other hand, since therelease of Chajubiti, I mean it
(05:07):
has seen the most explosivegrowth of anything that I have
experienced in my lifetime.
Now, again, I'm referring to mycab driver, my aunt, you know,
my nursery school friend,teacher friend.
So these people, if you askthem what is the impact of Web3
on society, I mean either theywill have no idea what you're
(05:29):
talking about or they will verylikely be not very complimentary
, because you know the conceptof Web3, blockchain has become
crypto and crypto is this crazyspace of wild gains and insane
losses.
Crazy space of wild gains andinsane losses.
However, those same people arethe ones using ChagPT or any of
(05:50):
the AI suite of products thathave come up, even just being
built on the same model asOpenAI or using the OpenAI model
.
So certainly in terms ofimmediate impact, in terms of
immediate impact, there's amassive, massive difference
between the two.
However, I think what we areseeing and this is something
(06:11):
that makes me very positive Icame into the blockchain space
for the concept ofself-sovereignty and for data
ownership and data privacy, butyou realize very quickly that
most people, the average person,they don't really care about it
.
If you try to explain tosomeone that whatever you post
(06:36):
on Facebook underopen-to-the-world settings,
they'll say well, I've gotnothing to hide.
Now I don't have anything tohide either.
However, I don't want to becomeany more of a social media
product than I already am.
So I think, with differentlevels of understanding, it's
very, very tricky to explain tosomeone what the use case is for
(06:58):
blockchain beyond the 100xgains that you can see from
whatever shitcoin is pumping atthe moment.
But we can very easily haveconversations with the average
person about AI the positiveaspects of AI, of course, but
also the risks, the challenges,so deepfakes.
(07:20):
It's a very pertinent exampleIf there's a hack on the
blockchain, let's say, acompany's funds, their wallet
was drained.
It's not something that affectsthe average person.
They really don't care about it.
However, when a president of acountry, the video is
circulating on social media andit turns out to not be true,
(07:42):
everyone gets chilled in theirbones.
So I think the thing that'shappening right now is, whereas
blockchain has been steadilygrowing all these years I can't
speak for pre-2017, butcertainly since the time that
I've been full-time in thisindustry there are scores of
people working really, reallyhard to make sure that this is a
(08:04):
safe space.
You know that it's asself-regulated as can be.
Of course, you have theopposite as well.
You have the actors reallymaking use of the fact that it
isn't, but I think at some point, these two conversations need
to start merging, because nowyou talk about deep fakes.
Okay, how can you prove thatthis is not a deep fake?
And that's really whereblockchain comes in, because
(08:25):
with blockchain, I can prove theprovenance of something, and I
think never before has it beenmore pertinent to prove
information to be true, but tostart from the assumption that
it's false, and so I think thisis a massive shift in human
consciousness, even where wecome from a history of
(08:46):
illiteracy, and the only peoplewho knew anything because they
were the only ones who couldread were the priests in the
Middle Ages in Europe, forexample.
And now fast forward to today,where there's never been more
access to information ever.
However, with great power comesgreat responsibility.
Information ever.
However, you know, with greatpower comes great responsibility
(09:08):
.
And so now, if you look at anynumber of information and
content pieces out there some ofthem we already know okay, if
you're on social media, it meansyou are the product.
If you are buying a book, itmeans they want to or, let's say
, a course, they want to sellyou a book.
If you want to buy a book, youwant to sell you a course.
There's always a price to pay.
The problem now is that AI isquestioning what reality means,
(09:30):
and so now seeing is no longerbelieving.
So, really, what AI is sayingis okay, reality is now up for
grabs.
Anyone can define what realityis, because a picture of a
thousand words is now.
You know which I generate,created that picture, whereas
blockchain really continues tobe this very fastidious
(09:52):
technology.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
That, okay, yes, this information originates there
and this is the movement thatit's taken since that origin,
whenever that was it'sinteresting that you mentioned
that kind of the average persondoesn't really you know and you
talk about the concept around.
You know digitalself-sovereignty and things like
that.
And then you mentioned you know, to hardcore techies and for
people who really kind ofunderstand the Web3 and AI and
(10:14):
blockchain, they get it, theyunderstand that it's a
fundamental shift, kind ofshifting the power back to the
individual user and kind ofdigital self-sovereignty over
their own data.
When you say the average persondoesn't really care about that,
is it just simply they just areokay with the big tech
companies kind of having theirdata, or is it they just kind of
just lack the insight as tokind of really what digital
(10:36):
self-sovereignty means?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Yeah, I mean, I think this is such a beautiful
question and such a beautifultopic because you can go so deep
with this.
However, for the sake of time,I'm going to try and keep it as
superficial as possible, while Imean still touching on very
core themes.
So, you know, I often thinkabout this.
I'm a student of psychology,I'm a student of sociology.
(11:02):
That's also my educationalbackground and it's also the
lens at which I look at theworld.
So there's so many examples ofhow freedoms have been taken
away from us.
You know, it's like the frogthat slowly gets boiled from
cold water all the way to okay.
Now can't even jump out anymore, I'm just dead.
(11:23):
And there's so many of oursystems that have become that.
So, for example, education, theeducation system.
I worked in education.
I ended up homeschooling andthen unschooling and world
schooling my son because Ididn't agree with what those
systems were.
Teaching childhood I wasresponsible.
(11:47):
Now, in the same vein, I had toreally understand the education
system.
By working in the educationsystem, I was a great student,
even though I didn't like school.
I had no issues with it.
But only when my son hadlearning disabilities and I was
already working in the systemthat I realized oh my God,
there's no way you know.
It's in or out, and if we're in, we're not going to get the
support we need.
And so I think it's the same way, or the same thing, at least,
(12:09):
with these very high levelconcepts, the average person
doesn't have the ability toworry about data privacy.
If they're trying to make endsmeet, right Like so, that's
where the primary focus is forthem.
Now, you know, there's this,there's this saying it's a rich
man's problem.
So not to say that only peoplewith money have the ability or
(12:32):
the freedom to worry about theirprivacy.
But you do, in many cases, haveto free up a certain amount of
mental space in order to say youknow, it's like Maslow's
hierarchy of needs.
If I'm focused on basic needs,okay, it's probably not going to
matter what Facebook does to mydata.
However, when I get to thepoint where I have time to sit
back and go, hey man, why am Itelling you my whole life?
(12:54):
What are you giving me inreturn?
So I think for most people,they don't have to think about
it.
I work in this field.
I think about it professionally, every single day of my life,
whenever I pick up the phone.
I'm super aware of my actions,even though I can't stop myself
because I'm as addicted asanybody else, but I keep on
reinforcing to myself over andover again that this is
(13:18):
something that, yes, I amwillingly doing.
However, I'm giving up so muchof the values that otherwise I
hold, but in order toparticipate on these platforms,
I have to temporarily suspendhow much value I give those or
importance I give those values.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
Yeah, I completely agree, and you know the concept
of you know, look, I'm trying to, I'm trying to work on my basic
needs and basic survival.
I can't, I can't think outsideof that, outside of that prism.
It's very difficult.
But if we were to kind of maybekind of take our listeners on
this journey, kind of helpingthem kind of understand and help
them kind of expand theirhorizons a little bit, what does
(13:57):
it look like when we say youknow digital self-sovereignty
and the power of the users andshifting this back to the users
and you know users being able toretain control over their, over
their uh, kind of a digitalidentity?
It seems like that's verycontrarian to kind of how the
tech companies right now arekind of set up.
It seems like when we talk aboutblockchain, the fundamental
(14:18):
philosophy is blockchain is adecentralized technology.
Ai seems to become more andmore centralized every single
day in the hands of you knowvery few.
You start to see more adoptionand incorporation into the large
language models, into thebigger companies like the
Amazons, the Googles, theFacebooks, the Microsofts, and
it seems like there's less andless of that becoming, and I was
(14:39):
recently kind of talking withsomebody on this topic and they
said well, none of that reallymatters, because really the
thing that does that they won'tbe able to capture is the
ability to reason, and I didn'treally understand that From
where you're seeing, from youradventures, and what you're
seeing across the technologylandscape here is do you see
your concerns around this aswell, around decentralization
(15:00):
and then AI being moreconsolidated or centralized?
Speaker 1 (15:04):
Yeah.
So first let me start off bysaying so mostly what I see in a
professional context is at theinvestment level.
So that means it's reallyreally early.
You know, seed funding round,when I mean there's no
institutional investors on boardyet, all the way up to the
retail, but again, web3 retail,which is a very different
(15:26):
funding environment from, youknow, the traditional tech or
even traditional businessfunding landscape.
So I think what we are seeingis a lot of people being very
excited about the possibilities,of what's possible.
But we could have said the samething about the dot-com bubble
(15:48):
and we could have said you know,it's the same is true in Web3
and the same is true in AI andthe same will be true in, I
don't know, special computing orwhatever comes next.
So investment is a superoptimistic part of any industry,
and especially tech investmentand especially Web3 investment,
which is the riskiest.
(16:09):
So I can say from that aspect,there is a lot of confidence
that these two technologies aregoing to be able to, you know,
really facilitate each other inbringing out the best in one
another.
That, from an investmentperspective.
(16:30):
As a human, I am very concerned,in the sense that I've been
concerned for a long time thatpeople don't take the concept of
self-sovereignty seriously,which is a big thing for me.
And now, with AI, there's awhole list of things that need
to be taken seriously.
Well, I mean, if we've toldpeople so many times before that
(16:54):
you know, watch out for thisand don't do that and don't go
in that dark corner, at somepoint they stop listening.
And I think the sensationalismof the media on pretty much any
topic in existence, we burnt outfrom anything.
That's a warning sign or adanger or we just don't want to
listen anymore.
(17:15):
And so the decentralized ordecentralization spirit of Web3,
it's also important to realizethat what decentralization means
theoretically is quitedifferent from how it looks in
Web3.
Currently, bitcoin is truedecentralization.
(17:35):
There's not much else in Web3that's as decentralized.
So, yes, it's moredecentralized, but it still, in
many cases, goes through thehands of very few people who may
or may not be qualified to makethose decisions.
And I think, similarly, ai we'dlike to believe that these big
companies, because I mean, it'seasier to compete in a Web3
(17:58):
context, it's very easy forthere to be market competition.
It's not as easy with AIbecause of the cost, the massive
cost involved.
And so, yes, clearly, ai isgoing to be very decentralized.
Ai is going to be verydecentralized.
Now the question is, if Web3 isthis, you know light in the
(18:25):
darkness again, how much do weself-regulate to ensure that we
stay as decentralized aspossible to balance out the AI?
I mean, that depends if theglass is half full or half empty
for you, how you look at it,because you know it is an open
question.
So let's see.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Yeah, a friend of mine once put it.
He says it's not that the glassis half empty or half empty for
you how you look at it, becauseyou know it is an open question
.
So let's see, yeah, a friend ofmine once put it, he says it's
not that the glass is half emptyor half full, it's that the
glass is the wrong size.
And I thought that was reallyinteresting because I have used
that for probably I don't knowhow many years.
But again, uh, I you know it'sit's funny because you know
you're right, it's like it'shalf empty or half full.
You know, talk to me a littlebit about kind of what you're
seeing kind of from again, fromthe kind of the crypto aspect of
(19:03):
it here I know you mentionedabout six months ago you were on
the ABC Conclave and that youmentioned.
We're kind of in the cryptowinter and we started to kind of
see kind of the halving momentcoming up or kind of already
past having moment.
You know, it seems like bitcoinis right down right around 64
000 today or whatever.
Are we still in a crypto winter?
What's your outlook so far?
Speaker 1 (19:22):
uh.
So again, I'm going to give anoutlook based on the investment
side of things.
Um, we are certainly no longerin a winter.
We are not quite in as in aspring just yet.
Uh, and I think the next fewmonths are going to be really
crucial in determining kind ofwhich direction the wind is
going to blow, both in terms ofhow much things are going to
(19:42):
pick up as well as whatnarrative we are going to leave
with 2021.
It was nfts, for example, Ithink before that it was d5, so
let's see what this newnarrative is.
That's going to DeFi, so let'ssee what this new narrative is
that's going to really bring, toquote that song bring all the
(20:04):
boys to the yard.
Let's see.
That's going to be quiteinteresting.
However, I think what I findvery noticeable this time around
is there's a lot of investmentready to be deployed.
There's a lot of investmentready to be deployed, but VCs
certainly are a lot more careful.
Again, I'm generalizing.
I always make the distinctionthe less utility your project
(20:25):
has and the more anonymous youare, the easier it will be to
raise money.
However, the top end projects,who are doxed to show their real
identities they are the oneswho have to jump through the
hoops.
It's just one of thoseparadoxes in Web3.
But so certainly with theSolana meme coin trend that
(20:47):
we've been seeing, I meanthere's been a lot of movement,
but that's obviously purelyspeculative.
Now there are VCs who investinto speculative tokens and make
their quick gains and what Ithink will happen is a lot of
these gains will then getredeployed into more serious,
more long term projects Because,keep in mind, everyone kind of
(21:10):
got really crushed and burned atthe end of the last cycle.
So this winter has been reallylong, it's been really difficult
.
However, on the other hand, youknow, on the other hand, for us
, for example, as a company,whether or not we're in a winter
or a spring or a summer doesn'treally matter, because we keep
on keeping on, we keep onbuilding.
(21:32):
And what I think also is verynoticeable is, uh, when vcs now
look at the criteria, I meanthese criteria always influx, uh
, and it also it always is in astate of ever more sophisticated
slash, mature, because, keep inmind, web 3 investment when it
(21:52):
started was insanely unregulatedand more and more best
practices from the traditionalfinance world are being brought
into web three.
So, these criteria, aspectsthat VCs look at.
One of them in this cycle iscertainly where were these
founders during the bear market?
(22:13):
What were they doing?
Were they building, even ifthey weren't receiving
investment?
Did they just pop out out ofnowhere, which of course, we
know is going to happen more andmore?
And in fact, that's anothermeasuring stick of seeing, kind
of how healthy the market is.
You know the and greed index,uh is how many new projects just
(22:36):
appear out of nowhere.
But certainly I think vcs thistime around are more careful.
Uh, instead of you giving thema sketch on a napkin and saying,
hey, here's my great idea, andthen they offer you, you know, a
million dollars, and I meanthis is like completely normal
in web 3 during a bull market.
Right, that is the most normalbehavior.
(22:58):
However, I'm not sure we'regonna carry as much of that
normality into the cycle,because I think people have now
started to understand uh,there's a there, there's a cost
analysis.
Uh, up until now, the potentialgains outweighed the risks in
(23:20):
terms of these guys can just runoff with the money.
They can fail and genuinelyeven attempt to build what they
promised they would when theyraised that money.
I think it's very, very, veryproportionately in favor of
(23:41):
founders who just gave money andthen end up doing anything.
So I really think that VCs havelearned their lesson.
So I do think we'll see aslightly more measured industry,
but I say slightly because thecraziness always kicks in when
we see those charts going skyhigh and suddenly Bitcoin is at
100K and then everyone wants tobuy, and then it drops to 90 and
(24:05):
then everyone sells, you know.
So that's unfortunately thenature of the beast.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
The real winners in the game is basically people who
kind of ride out the wintersand even through the bear
markets, is that they still kindof like hold on for dear life,
right?
So the concept of HODL From aretail investment perspective, I
think and maybe you kind ofconfirm this, as you know, I
think if they were to look at it, I think, from a Web3
perspective, they've got to lookat it from an infrastructure
(24:31):
and protocol perspective.
Right, those two have got to bethere to really kind of
increase that adoption curve youmentioned.
Vcs are much more cautious nowin looking in terms of where
they're going to invest theirmoney.
Are they looking into these twoparticular aspects of
infrastructure and protocols andsaying, hey, listen, if you
don't have these, you're notgoing to get the VC money?
How are you seeing thisprogressing?
Speaker 1 (24:54):
So, certainly over the bear market, I think there
was a lot more investment intoinfra than you would see in a
bull market, in the sense thatin a bull, whatever is sexy is
what gets chased.
And you know, infra protocolsare typically protocols maybe
not so much, because I meancreating a layer one or a layer
two.
I mean there's big money in it.
So people tend to be seen tohave their eyes and ears open,
(25:18):
but I think infrastructureprojects there have been
investment into them.
But I think bear markets arealways a time to get as many
retail investors on board aspossible.
This is, you know, just howthis whole thing has been set up
.
In order for us to change it,we would basically have to
(25:41):
redefine what the entire thingmeans, and so it's something
where, if you don't like it, youlearn to live with it, and if
you like it, well, I guessyou're doing it already, so you
don't need to have any wordsfrom me.
But in a bear market, becausethere's so much retail money
that is eager to be deployed,vcs tend to skew in favor of
(26:02):
what's going to be hot and sexyand give them the most gains
possible, because keep in mind aWeb2 VC or traditional VC, the
amount of time before they see areturn on investment is many,
many years, more than in Web3,where you start seeing returns
after only a couple of months.
(26:23):
So clearly, if you deploy moneyto a project, you want that
project to pump as much aspossible, and pumping means
liquidity, which means retailinvestors.
So I think, think, yes, uh, wewill continue to see this, uh,
this investment into infra.
But also, I think that isanother thing that might
differentiate one vc fromanother pc, because not all vcs
(26:47):
are operated equally.
Uh, so some vcs would not touchinfra projects because, I mean,
that's not where the shortermoney is for them.
But then there are other VCswho have a different vision and
understand that in order tobuild those hot projects, we
need to have, you know, thefoundation of the house,
otherwise it's a glass housebuilt on nothing.
Speaker 3 (27:09):
I'd love to get your take on these.
What are one or two things thatyou're really keeping an eye
out for as you continue to moveinto this space?
Speaker 1 (27:20):
So I think the two things that definitely stand out
for me is socialify, on the onehand, and the reason for this
is we all know that web2 socialis broken and if you think that
I'm making that statementbecause I'm generalizing, think
about the platform that you usethe most and think on a scale of
(27:42):
one to 10, are you closer to 10?
I love it, or are you closer toone?
I absolutely hate it?
Why the hell am I still here?
So I think that's for most ofus, we have this experience
where we get extract certainthings from these platforms,
whether this is to connect withfamily on Facebook, friends on
(28:03):
Instagram, colleagues onLinkedIn, twitter with you know
people who like cats and I don'tknow agriculture or whatever.
So we have these differentidentities for different
platforms.
However and this is where thedata privacy and the data
ownership also comes in becauseTwitter might decide one day
(28:28):
that they will now delete youraccount because you said
something that, according tothem, you know you shouldn't
have said.
Now, this might be true or itmight not be true, because,
guess what, when Twitter or anyof these platforms decide that
it's the end of your account,there's nothing you can do,
whether or not.
They are accurate or not.
So I mean, that's the firstthing.
You have content creators whoseentire businesses and careers
(28:50):
are built on these social mediaplatforms, but that can all
disappear with one fell swoop.
So I think that social media isreally, really ripe for an
overall and has been for a longtime.
However, the reason that wedon't have an alternative is,
again, we don't know what we'remissing, I guess, but also
(29:10):
because there's no greatsolutions just yet.
You have Forkasted, for example,which is quite a popular Web3
social network, but then, I mean, it's really tiny amount of
users on there still and it'sreally complex.
If you don't understand Web3,there's no way you would ever
find yourself there.
You have Threads from.
(29:31):
Facebook had a great strategyto migrate all Instagram users
to Threads, so suddenly you haveall these followers on Threads.
The question is, is anybody onthere?
Who's on there?
I still can't figure out whatmy.
I know what my LinkedIn is for,I know what my well, in fact,
all my social media are prettymuch the same, but I can't
(29:53):
figure out what to use threads.
So that's facebook's product.
I mean, it should have been themost popular product out there
because, well, facebook,instagram, whatsapp, uh, you
have blue sky twitteralternative, so you have all
these examples of platforms thatcan be but isn't uh, and so I
think this is an area for Web3to kind of come into its own,
(30:17):
although I think we're veryearly days and I'm not sure
we're going to see analternative competitor come out
just yet.
And then the other thing, whichis larger and encompasses social
high, is decentralized identity, and I think this is probably
going to be one of the hottesttopics Again, in the sense now
(30:37):
you're talking about dataownership, data privacy, but
what is data?
So if you download my Facebookprofile data, you're going to be
an accurate reflection of me,but it's a reflection of my
identity on that platform andthis is the identity that I
(30:59):
wanted to shape on that platform, which is why it represents me
in a certain way.
However, maybe I want to takethat person with me, maybe I
want to take the Facebook me toLinkedIn.
I can't do that because I needto create a new persona on
LinkedIn.
Maybe it's the samecharacteristics and whatnot as
the Facebook me, but it's a newpersona altogether and keep in
(31:23):
mind that can take it away fromme at any given moment.
Now, with decentralized identity, let's say, my identity in the
form of an NFT, the NFT gatingmechanism so I enter, as a
website or a platform based onthe fact that my wallet has this
NFT, and then I can be anynumber of identities linked to
(31:45):
any number of NFTs.
Now, this is actually somethingthat we at Adluna are working
on, so it's a topic that'sabsolutely fascinating, because
you start looking at why doesidentity exist?
And it exists for differentthings, for different people.
So, for example, if I want toexpress myself, I want to
(32:08):
express myself because of who Iam, or I might express myself
because I want others to think Iam, or I want to express myself
so that I can be the personthat I want people to think I am
, or the person that peoplethink I should.
There's so many combinationshere and Web2 platforms.
(32:30):
Whether this is anyservice-level website, I don't
know.
I go to a website to downloadgraphics and I sign in with
Google right now.
Web2 platforms whether this isany service level website, I
don't know.
I go to a website to downloadgraphics and I sign in with
Google right now.
Or whether it's a social mediaplatform all of these different
platforms.
I am the same me, but currently,I have to split the same me
(32:53):
into several verylogistics-based identities
passwords, emails, blah, blah,blah.
What if I am the same me but Ican split me off into different
NFTs, for example?
So there's the LinkedIn NFT me,who is super professional and
everything that is linked to myname is out there in public.
And there's the LinkedIn NFT me, who is super professional and
everything that is linked to myname, you know, is out there in
(33:14):
public.
And there's the plant lady me,which my son just came in the
room earlier and says it lookslike a jungle in here, and I
think he meant it as a criticismand I was like I know, isn't it
wonderful?
So there's that lady, and maybeI don't want that lady to be
public, right, but I want to beout there.
Maybe I don't want that lady tobe public, right, but I want to
be out there.
I want to create and build andexpress my crazy plant lady
(33:35):
identity, but not link to myLinkedIn me.
So people should have theability to grow different
identities and then for thoseidentities to be interoperable
between different platforms.
This is like a digital humanright, according to me.
Again, I realize that noteveryone feels the same, but
(33:56):
that's why I'm here championingfor decentralized digital
identity.
Speaker 3 (34:04):
And it's incredible I love this idea and I want to
call you a technology virtuosothe way that you're able to
paint this picture and I thinkwe begin the conversation with
kind of like what is AI'simplication on?
You know the ethical and kind ofthe society impacts?
I think you just basically, Ithink you just drove this home.
It is the ability forindividuals to maintain
sovereignty over their self, tobe able to share different parts
(34:26):
of themselves in different wayswhile maintaining uniformity
and centralization of their owndigital self.
It's like it's your own digitalidentity that has got a secure
digital encryption, encryptedsignature that you don't have to
share with anyone else.
Like, no one else has thatability Facebook and all the
other platforms.
They can kind of take your data, download it.
Maybe they create some sort ofdeep fake around it and maybe
(34:51):
this is kind of the next thingwhere people kind of get that
next aha moment is I want to beable to protect myself in the
next iteration of the Web3evolution by first being able to
have digital sovereign rightsover my own identity, and maybe
that's kind of where it beginsfor everyone is kind of a wow
moment, right.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
I wish that everyone would have that aha moment and
have that be their entry.
And I've come to terms with thefact because I'm a very I'm
someone who takes a veryphilosophical approach and you
know that can sometimes be anAchilles heel, because then I go
.
Well, I mean, I don'tunderstand why people are making
this decision.
That's clearly not in line withyou know, the way that the
things are supposed to happen inorder to affect this big change
(35:31):
, but then again, everyonedoesn't get my memo.
So I think people come intothis for different reasons and I
think a lot of that again hasto do with, like a Maslow's
hierarchy.
I think I might have lost you.
I think a lot of this again hasto do with a bit of Maslow's
hierarchy of needs approach, inthe sense that a lot of people,
(35:54):
and specifically in countrieswhere the economy is not as
strong, the average person'sorigin story, why they came into
this technology, would beprofit driven.
My friend invested in X and Isaw they made money and I wanted
to give it a go as well.
And you know however manyiterations of the story later,
(36:15):
here I am I'm building somethingin web3, um, or investing in
web3, uh.
And then you get people who, asI said earlier, might have you
know an hour to sit on an eameslounge chair and smoke a cigar
and think about the meaning oflife, and then those people
might say, well, hey, this isnot how I like things to go.
(36:35):
Like you know, I have my ownrights, and why should I?
So I think there's so manydifferent people on the spectrum
.
I don't think that the by theway, the cigar smoking games
last year person is going to beas libertarian as I just made
that out to be, um.
So you know, there's so manydifferent entry points into this
and I think it clicksdifferently for everybody, and I
(36:59):
really wish that it would clickwith self-sovereignty.
I'm like the person at thedoorstep going like ding dong,
do you still remember me?
But it's fine if people don't,because I think at some point
there's some aspect of this thatclicks for somebody, um, and
what it clicks for me is notnecessarily what's going to
(37:20):
click for you and vice versa.
So I think the most importantthing is the conversations
around it, and that's somethingthat during the bear market I
mean.
So at luna, we were heavilyfocused on education and we
didn't feel education in thesense that, yes, all these
retail investors are out therehungry to learn more.
They just crashed and burned.
(37:41):
They want nothing to do withWeb3.
And to start theseconversations because we have to
be out there going guys,there's more to this technology
than just you making a bunch ofmoney and losing a bunch of
money, and so what I've seenover the last few years is, even
(38:02):
just with the educationalaspect you can talk about.
So on my show, the Future ofNFTs, I mean we cover NFTs, but
from the perspective of what canthis technology be in future?
So it's a very long rangingvision for the technology.
And I mean, if you look at thecomments of different people,
different audience members, someof it, I wouldn't have expected
(38:26):
that that's something thatwould click for this person or
for people in general, becausefor me it might be something
that's so obvious that I mightnot even consider it like an
entry point at all.
And then you listen to someoneand that's their aha moment.
So I think the more we talkabout it and the more we talk
about why it's important to us,because maybe you don't feel
(38:48):
like me, but by me telling youhow I feel about it and why I
feel about it.
That feel about it and why Ifeel about it, the way it's
going to spark conversations inyour mind and that might lead
conversations with others.
And I think you know this slowroll out of waking upness that
we have to do, um, it's not veryscalable.
(39:09):
It feels like.
So you know, if I had my way, Iwould be like okay, guys, we're
going to have like a five-yearplan and this is what we're
going to do, but butunfortunately, it's all organic
and we have to.
You know, people have to gothrough the journey and the
cycle of life and understandthat certain points that they
are alternatives to what theythink is out there.
Speaker 3 (39:28):
It seems like everyone's going to have kind of
that moment where they're goingto eventually kind of we're all
going to come to the same place, maybe some earlier than others
, but at some point in time theoutlook is very optimistic.
We all will eventually start tokind of get on the direction of
being able to look at this allwith the same perspective and
the same prescriptive lens.
So this is kind of the positivekind of aspect of one that kind
(39:51):
of I want to start a curve isinto kind of a closure is is
that this is a positive moment.
So, from from a technologistperspective, it seems like
continual conversations,learning and education around
this particular space, helpingilluminate folks around this
technology and what it means forthem, from the advanced levels
(40:12):
all the way down to, you know,the normal day, every person
looking to say, look, I justwant to get online and just do
my thing.
There needs to be kind of acontinual push in this space for
conversations and education tokind of get everyone there right
.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
Yeah, and I would add , get your hands dirty.
You cannot learn, you know.
I want to tell you a story, uh,because it's actually super
funny.
When I started working in thisindustry, um, I had just, uh,
finished the stint in thepharmaceutical industry.
Well, digital marketing, so itwas at least the cool side of
pharma, but I mean it's pharma,so that was the only cool side.
(40:51):
And so I started traveling andthen got this opportunity to
become a journalist, which waslike a non-career goal, so I
jumped on the charts only tofind out oh, it's about
blockchain, and I have no ideawhat blockchain is, so I started
learning about it.
I mean, I come across Bitcoinin 2012, but I remember thinking
(41:12):
, once it becomes idiot proof tosomeone like me, I will get
into it.
So, clearly, it took a longtime.
So you can imagine, here I amin 2017 reading about all these
aspects decentralization whatthe heck is this?
I mean, I don't even understandwhat this means.
Yeah, I understand the conceptof owning yourself.
(41:33):
I feel the same, but I didn'tknow there was a technology that
supported it.
But now I have to startlearning about the technology
and I have zero idea what any ofthis stuff is, and I remember I
was actually on an island inThailand and I had a notepad.
It was like cool digital nomadview overlooking the ocean and I
have my notepad.
It was like cool digital nomadview overlooking the ocean and I
have my notepad and I'm likewhat is blockchain?
(41:54):
And I'm making notes.
I don't understand a singlething.
I'm reading.
And then the job was to become ajournalist and so now I'm
researching for the articlesthat I'm writing and so now I'm
not researching what is ablockchain.
I kind of have an idea, maybenot super quite, but I mean kind
(42:14):
of get it.
But the more I research forwork because it was very real to
me, very pertinent to me, verydirectly relevant to me, the
more I understood it.
So I always think back to thatme sitting by the books like a
student, going like I'm going toget this.
Don't ever try to learnanything that way unless you're
(42:34):
in school.
Like really, I mean and this iswhy I don't even support the
education system so if you wantto learn about AI, if you want
to learn about blockchain, ifyou want to learn about any sort
of technology, get your handsdirty.
Don't see it as a big scarything, because the only thing
that it's going to become, ifyou see it that way, is a big
(42:56):
scary thing.
So it's treated, you know, howkids?
Uh, you give a two-year-old theremote, they're gonna figure
out how to turn on and off thetv probably more on than off.
Uh, if you give a 60 year oldthe remote, they probably won't
even attempt to turn off or onthe TV, right?
(43:16):
So try and recapture.
If you've lost it and I thinkmost of us have lost it so this
is a great opportunity to regainit, recapture that childhood
sense of play and wonder and,you know, have fun.
Experiment.
I mean, if you have the moneyto.
I'm going to use NFTs as anexample.
If you want to understand NFTs,if you have the funds to create
(43:40):
an NFT collection for no otherreason than to create the
collection, do it.
You will understand NFTs in away you've never understood them
or never would have before.
If you don't have the funds todo these things, get involved.
There are so many places to getinvolved, so many people are
dying for people to help them.
So really don't learn here.
(44:03):
Here happens when here happens.
So really, just that's the onlypiece of advice I can give you.
The more daunting something is,the more it's likely that you
need to get started with it,like yesterday.
Speaker 3 (44:16):
Yeah, and that's incredible.
I love that analogy and I thinkfor most of our listeners
listening on the podcast, Ithink Nadia was saying learn
with your hands, by gettinghands-on dirty, versus just kind
of thinking through the thingsright.
So it's continually likehands-on practice.
Become a practitioner, learnand evolve your knowledge and
awareness into the technology.
Wow, incredible insights.
(44:37):
Nadia, I can't thank you enoughfor this opportunity.
Thank you for joining us on thepodcast today.
Where can we follow you to getmore information and where can
we follow you in your amazingjourney yet to come?
Speaker 1 (44:49):
yeah, first of all, steve, thank you so much.
It's been just so lovelyspeaking to you.
It's the end of my day here,but it was definitely a
highlight of the day.
So I am most typically onLinkedIn.
I'm definitely just a boringB2B person, but if you like the
kind of things that I wastalking about now, this is
(45:09):
typically the thing that I wouldpost about on LinkedIn.
I'm also on Twitter, onInstagram, but really there's
not too much happening there.
I try to maintain somewhat of abalance between social media
and real life.
So I'm looking forward for webthree social media so I can
again be on social media 24seven and I'm just kidding like
this little bit of work-lifebalance I got going.
(45:30):
So if you want to be in touch,definitely LinkedIn would be the
best place.
Yeah, linkedin endorsement.
Speaker 3 (45:41):
Wonderful Again.
Thank you so very much, Nadia,for sharing your insights.
You are a true luminary, andthank you so very much for
sharing your passion andinsights with us.
Our audience is sowell-informed because of this
conversation.
Thank you so very much and forthose listening, thanks for
tuning in.
I appreciate it.
Nadia, You're wonderful.
Thank you so much.
We hope to have you on again.
Speaker 1 (46:00):
Have an amazing week everybody.
Steve, thank you, it's been aprivilege Speak to you soon.
Cheers.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
Thanks so much for listening to the Tech Travels
Podcast with Steve Woodard.
Please tune in next time and besure to follow us and subscribe
on the Apple Podcast andSpotify platforms.
We'll see you next time.
Yeah, I mean, I think this is such a beautiful
question and such a beautifultopic because you can go so deep
with this.
However, for the sake of time,I'm going to try and keep it as
superficial as possible, while Imean still touching on very
core themes.
So you know, I often thinkabout this.
I'm a student of psychology,I'm a student of sociology.
(00:22):
That's also my educationalbackground and it's also the
lens at which I look at theworld.
So there's so many examples ofhow freedoms have been taken
away from us.
You know, it's like the frogthat slowly gets boiled.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Welcome to Tech Travels hosted by the seasoned
tech enthusiast and industryexpert, steve Woodard.
With over 25 years ofexperience and a track record of
collaborating with thebrightest minds in technology,
steve is your seasoned guidethrough the ever-evolving world
of innovation.
Join us as we embark on aninsightful journey, exploring
(01:03):
the past, present and future oftech under Steve's expert
guidance.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Welcome back, fellow travelers.
In today's episode we'retalking about the influence of
AI on Web3 and blockchaintechnology.
We're also going to explore thetopic around the ethical
implications on society.
Today we have the honor ofhosting a true industry pioneer
in Web3 and blockchain NadiaBester.
She is the co-founder ofAdLunum.
She's a pioneer in the Web3investment world that offers the
(01:31):
first gamified ecosystem forblockchain investments.
She's also award-winningentrepreneur, investor,
international speaker, and hertalents also extend into
authoring and also the host of asuccessful podcast, the Future
of NFTs.
She's also exploring ananticipated Netflix documentary
on the evolution of the digitalself and the future of the
(01:52):
internet.
Please join us as we welcomeNadia to the show.
Nadia, we're thrilled to haveyou.
Welcome to the show.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Thank you, steve.
And yeah, just as I was sayingto you before we got started, I
love the name of the podcast, soit feels like a badge of honor
to be here today, to becombining the two great loves of
my life.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Wonderful.
We're so very happy to have youhere, so catch us up on your
travels here.
I know the audience is veryeager to hear a word, that he's
eager to dive into topics here,but I want to kind of dive into.
You were just recently at Token2049 in Dubai.
It's basically the premiercrypto event, drawing upon some
of the most prominent leadersand founders from across the
global Web3 ecosystem.
So tell us a little bit aboutthis conference and really kind
(02:37):
of what were some of thehighlights of the talk?
Speaker 1 (02:41):
So, honestly, the highlights had nothing to do
with the actual conference.
There were a lot of side events.
I think there were over, if I'mnot mistaken, 300 side events
listed, and this is always thecase with these kind of events.
You know, token 2049 inSingapore is the same thing it
draws the crowd to the actualconference, but then there's all
these side effects happening inthe periphery.
(03:03):
Unfortunately, when Token 2049came to Dubai for the first time
this year, it also may bebrought with it or maybe it
happened to coincide the biggestrainfall in the history of the
United Arab Emirates, so I didnot get to experience Token 2049
, so I could not comment on theactual talks.
I can, however, tell you allabout my escapades being
(03:27):
stranded at my hotel that becamean island with a moat around it
.
So, yeah, it was veryinteresting, and how business
development got done in thelobbies of hotels, when people
were sheltering from the raintogether and, you know, walking
knee deep streets, and so it wasa very interesting experience
and I think this will probablygo down as one of those
historical events.
And walking knee-deep streets.
So it was a very interestingexperience and I think this will
probably go down as one ofthose historical events.
(03:49):
The fact is, even people whoreleased an NFT collection the
token 2049 survivor badge inyour wallet.
So there you go.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
It's incredible.
So tell us a little bit.
So it sounds like there is alot happening in this space
Again, you know we see Token2049, there was AI Summit 2024,
you gave a talk on beyondalgorithms, the deeper impacts
of AI in a global society.
Let's start there.
Let's start with the influenceand kind of what we're seeing in
terms of the deeper impacts ofAI in the global society.
(04:22):
So what are we kind of nowstarting to see across this
landscape?
Speaker 1 (04:26):
deeper impacts of AI in the global society.
So what are we kind of nowstarting to see across this
landscape?
You know so I have been inblockchain since 2017.
And in that time, the adoptionrate I'm talking the average
person, my cab driver, my aunt,my friend who is a nursery
school teacher that adoptionrate really hasn't grown.
(04:46):
It hasn't extended to theaverage person.
What has extended is peoplekind of now accept that Bitcoin
is an asset class and that'shere to stay and you know they
might dip a toe and buy someBitcoin, and that's kind of the
extent.
Ai, on the other hand, since therelease of Chajubiti, I mean it
(05:07):
has seen the most explosivegrowth of anything that I have
experienced in my lifetime.
Now, again, I'm referring to mycab driver, my aunt, you know,
my nursery school friend,teacher friend.
So these people, if you askthem what is the impact of Web3
on society, I mean either theywill have no idea what you're
(05:29):
talking about or they will verylikely be not very complimentary
, because you know the conceptof Web3, blockchain has become
crypto and crypto is this crazyspace of wild gains and insane
losses.
Crazy space of wild gains andinsane losses.
However, those same people arethe ones using ChagPT or any of
(05:50):
the AI suite of products thathave come up, even just being
built on the same model asOpenAI or using the OpenAI model
.
So certainly in terms ofimmediate impact, in terms of
immediate impact, there's amassive, massive difference
between the two.
However, I think what we areseeing and this is something
(06:11):
that makes me very positive Icame into the blockchain space
for the concept ofself-sovereignty and for data
ownership and data privacy, butyou realize very quickly that
most people, the average person,they don't really care about it
.
If you try to explain tosomeone that whatever you post
(06:36):
on Facebook underopen-to-the-world settings,
they'll say well, I've gotnothing to hide.
Now I don't have anything tohide either.
However, I don't want to becomeany more of a social media
product than I already am.
So I think, with differentlevels of understanding, it's
very, very tricky to explain tosomeone what the use case is for
(06:58):
blockchain beyond the 100xgains that you can see from
whatever shitcoin is pumping atthe moment.
But we can very easily haveconversations with the average
person about AI the positiveaspects of AI, of course, but
also the risks, the challenges,so deepfakes.
(07:20):
It's a very pertinent exampleIf there's a hack on the
blockchain, let's say, acompany's funds, their wallet
was drained.
It's not something that affectsthe average person.
They really don't care about it.
However, when a president of acountry, the video is
circulating on social media andit turns out to not be true,
(07:42):
everyone gets chilled in theirbones.
So I think the thing that'shappening right now is, whereas
blockchain has been steadilygrowing all these years I can't
speak for pre-2017, butcertainly since the time that
I've been full-time in thisindustry there are scores of
people working really, reallyhard to make sure that this is a
(08:04):
safe space.
You know that it's asself-regulated as can be.
Of course, you have theopposite as well.
You have the actors reallymaking use of the fact that it
isn't, but I think at some point, these two conversations need
to start merging, because nowyou talk about deep fakes.
Okay, how can you prove thatthis is not a deep fake?
And that's really whereblockchain comes in, because
(08:25):
with blockchain, I can prove theprovenance of something, and I
think never before has it beenmore pertinent to prove
information to be true, but tostart from the assumption that
it's false, and so I think thisis a massive shift in human
consciousness, even where wecome from a history of
(08:46):
illiteracy, and the only peoplewho knew anything because they
were the only ones who couldread were the priests in the
Middle Ages in Europe, forexample.
And now fast forward to today,where there's never been more
access to information ever.
However, with great power comesgreat responsibility.
Information ever.
However, you know, with greatpower comes great responsibility
(09:08):
.
And so now, if you look at anynumber of information and
content pieces out there some ofthem we already know okay, if
you're on social media, it meansyou are the product.
If you are buying a book, itmeans they want to or, let's say
, a course, they want to sellyou a book.
If you want to buy a book, youwant to sell you a course.
There's always a price to pay.
The problem now is that AI isquestioning what reality means,
(09:30):
and so now seeing is no longerbelieving.
So, really, what AI is sayingis okay, reality is now up for
grabs.
Anyone can define what realityis, because a picture of a
thousand words is now.
You know which I generate,created that picture, whereas
blockchain really continues tobe this very fastidious
(09:52):
technology.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
That, okay, yes, this information originates there
and this is the movement thatit's taken since that origin,
whenever that was it'sinteresting that you mentioned
that kind of the average persondoesn't really you know and you
talk about the concept around.
You know digitalself-sovereignty and things like
that.
And then you mentioned you know, to hardcore techies and for
people who really kind ofunderstand the Web3 and AI and
(10:14):
blockchain, they get it, theyunderstand that it's a
fundamental shift, kind ofshifting the power back to the
individual user and kind ofdigital self-sovereignty over
their own data.
When you say the average persondoesn't really care about that,
is it just simply they just areokay with the big tech
companies kind of having theirdata, or is it they just kind of
just lack the insight as tokind of really what digital
(10:36):
self-sovereignty means?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Yeah, I mean, I think this is such a beautiful
question and such a beautifultopic because you can go so deep
with this.
However, for the sake of time,I'm going to try and keep it as
superficial as possible, while Imean still touching on very
core themes.
So, you know, I often thinkabout this.
I'm a student of psychology,I'm a student of sociology.
(11:02):
That's also my educationalbackground and it's also the
lens at which I look at theworld.
So there's so many examples ofhow freedoms have been taken
away from us.
You know, it's like the frogthat slowly gets boiled from
cold water all the way to okay.
Now can't even jump out anymore, I'm just dead.
(11:23):
And there's so many of oursystems that have become that.
So, for example, education, theeducation system.
I worked in education.
I ended up homeschooling andthen unschooling and world
schooling my son because Ididn't agree with what those
systems were.
Teaching childhood I wasresponsible.
(11:47):
Now, in the same vein, I had toreally understand the education
system.
By working in the educationsystem, I was a great student,
even though I didn't like school.
I had no issues with it.
But only when my son hadlearning disabilities and I was
already working in the systemthat I realized oh my God,
there's no way you know.
It's in or out, and if we're in, we're not going to get the
support we need.
And so I think it's the same way, or the same thing, at least,
(12:09):
with these very high levelconcepts, the average person
doesn't have the ability toworry about data privacy.
If they're trying to make endsmeet, right Like so, that's
where the primary focus is forthem.
Now, you know, there's this,there's this saying it's a rich
man's problem.
So not to say that only peoplewith money have the ability or
(12:32):
the freedom to worry about theirprivacy.
But you do, in many cases, haveto free up a certain amount of
mental space in order to say youknow, it's like Maslow's
hierarchy of needs.
If I'm focused on basic needs,okay, it's probably not going to
matter what Facebook does to mydata.
However, when I get to thepoint where I have time to sit
back and go, hey man, why am Itelling you my whole life?
(12:54):
What are you giving me inreturn?
So I think for most people,they don't have to think about
it.
I work in this field.
I think about it professionally, every single day of my life,
whenever I pick up the phone.
I'm super aware of my actions,even though I can't stop myself
because I'm as addicted asanybody else, but I keep on
reinforcing to myself over andover again that this is
(13:18):
something that, yes, I amwillingly doing.
However, I'm giving up so muchof the values that otherwise I
hold, but in order toparticipate on these platforms,
I have to temporarily suspendhow much value I give those or
importance I give those values.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
Yeah, I completely agree, and you know the concept
of you know, look, I'm trying to, I'm trying to work on my basic
needs and basic survival.
I can't, I can't think outsideof that, outside of that prism.
It's very difficult.
But if we were to kind of maybekind of take our listeners on
this journey, kind of helpingthem kind of understand and help
them kind of expand theirhorizons a little bit, what does
(13:57):
it look like when we say youknow digital self-sovereignty
and the power of the users andshifting this back to the users
and you know users being able toretain control over their, over
their uh, kind of a digitalidentity?
It seems like that's verycontrarian to kind of how the
tech companies right now arekind of set up.
It seems like when we talk aboutblockchain, the fundamental
(14:18):
philosophy is blockchain is adecentralized technology.
Ai seems to become more andmore centralized every single
day in the hands of you knowvery few.
You start to see more adoptionand incorporation into the large
language models, into thebigger companies like the
Amazons, the Googles, theFacebooks, the Microsofts, and
it seems like there's less andless of that becoming, and I was
(14:39):
recently kind of talking withsomebody on this topic and they
said well, none of that reallymatters, because really the
thing that does that they won'tbe able to capture is the
ability to reason, and I didn'treally understand that From
where you're seeing, from youradventures, and what you're
seeing across the technologylandscape here is do you see
your concerns around this aswell, around decentralization
(15:00):
and then AI being moreconsolidated or centralized?
Speaker 1 (15:04):
Yeah.
So first let me start off bysaying so mostly what I see in a
professional context is at theinvestment level.
So that means it's reallyreally early.
You know, seed funding round,when I mean there's no
institutional investors on boardyet, all the way up to the
retail, but again, web3 retail,which is a very different
(15:26):
funding environment from, youknow, the traditional tech or
even traditional businessfunding landscape.
So I think what we are seeingis a lot of people being very
excited about the possibilities,of what's possible.
But we could have said the samething about the dot-com bubble
(15:48):
and we could have said you know,it's the same is true in Web3
and the same is true in AI andthe same will be true in, I
don't know, special computing orwhatever comes next.
So investment is a superoptimistic part of any industry,
and especially tech investmentand especially Web3 investment,
which is the riskiest.
(16:09):
So I can say from that aspect,there is a lot of confidence
that these two technologies aregoing to be able to, you know,
really facilitate each other inbringing out the best in one
another.
That, from an investmentperspective.
(16:30):
As a human, I am very concerned,in the sense that I've been
concerned for a long time thatpeople don't take the concept of
self-sovereignty seriously,which is a big thing for me.
And now, with AI, there's awhole list of things that need
to be taken seriously.
Well, I mean, if we've toldpeople so many times before that
(16:54):
you know, watch out for thisand don't do that and don't go
in that dark corner, at somepoint they stop listening.
And I think the sensationalismof the media on pretty much any
topic in existence, we burnt outfrom anything.
That's a warning sign or adanger or we just don't want to
listen anymore.
(17:15):
And so the decentralized ordecentralization spirit of Web3,
it's also important to realizethat what decentralization means
theoretically is quitedifferent from how it looks in
Web3.
Currently, bitcoin is truedecentralization.
(17:35):
There's not much else in Web3that's as decentralized.
So, yes, it's moredecentralized, but it still, in
many cases, goes through thehands of very few people who may
or may not be qualified to makethose decisions.
And I think, similarly, ai we'dlike to believe that these big
companies, because I mean, it'seasier to compete in a Web3
(17:58):
context, it's very easy forthere to be market competition.
It's not as easy with AIbecause of the cost, the massive
cost involved.
And so, yes, clearly, ai isgoing to be very decentralized.
Ai is going to be verydecentralized.
Now the question is, if Web3 isthis, you know light in the
(18:25):
darkness again, how much do weself-regulate to ensure that we
stay as decentralized aspossible to balance out the AI?
I mean, that depends if theglass is half full or half empty
for you, how you look at it,because you know it is an open
question.
So let's see.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Yeah, a friend of mine once put it.
He says it's not that the glassis half empty or half empty for
you how you look at it, becauseyou know it is an open question
.
So let's see, yeah, a friend ofmine once put it, he says it's
not that the glass is half emptyor half full, it's that the
glass is the wrong size.
And I thought that was reallyinteresting because I have used
that for probably I don't knowhow many years.
But again, uh, I you know it'sit's funny because you know
you're right, it's like it'shalf empty or half full.
You know, talk to me a littlebit about kind of what you're
seeing kind of from again, fromthe kind of the crypto aspect of
(19:03):
it here I know you mentionedabout six months ago you were on
the ABC Conclave and that youmentioned.
We're kind of in the cryptowinter and we started to kind of
see kind of the halving momentcoming up or kind of already
past having moment.
You know, it seems like bitcoinis right down right around 64
000 today or whatever.
Are we still in a crypto winter?
What's your outlook so far?
Speaker 1 (19:22):
uh.
So again, I'm going to give anoutlook based on the investment
side of things.
Um, we are certainly no longerin a winter.
We are not quite in as in aspring just yet.
Uh, and I think the next fewmonths are going to be really
crucial in determining kind ofwhich direction the wind is
going to blow, both in terms ofhow much things are going to
(19:42):
pick up as well as whatnarrative we are going to leave
with 2021.
It was nfts, for example, Ithink before that it was d5, so
let's see what this newnarrative is.
That's going to DeFi, so let'ssee what this new narrative is
that's going to really bring, toquote that song bring all the
(20:04):
boys to the yard.
Let's see.
That's going to be quiteinteresting.
However, I think what I findvery noticeable this time around
is there's a lot of investmentready to be deployed.
There's a lot of investmentready to be deployed, but VCs
certainly are a lot more careful.
Again, I'm generalizing.
I always make the distinctionthe less utility your project
(20:25):
has and the more anonymous youare, the easier it will be to
raise money.
However, the top end projects,who are doxed to show their real
identities they are the oneswho have to jump through the
hoops.
It's just one of thoseparadoxes in Web3.
But so certainly with theSolana meme coin trend that
(20:47):
we've been seeing, I meanthere's been a lot of movement,
but that's obviously purelyspeculative.
Now there are VCs who investinto speculative tokens and make
their quick gains and what Ithink will happen is a lot of
these gains will then getredeployed into more serious,
more long term projects Because,keep in mind, everyone kind of
(21:10):
got really crushed and burned atthe end of the last cycle.
So this winter has been reallylong, it's been really difficult
.
However, on the other hand, youknow, on the other hand, for us
, for example, as a company,whether or not we're in a winter
or a spring or a summer doesn'treally matter, because we keep
on keeping on, we keep onbuilding.
(21:32):
And what I think also is verynoticeable is, uh, when vcs now
look at the criteria, I meanthese criteria always influx, uh
, and it also it always is in astate of ever more sophisticated
slash, mature, because, keep inmind, web 3 investment when it
(21:52):
started was insanely unregulatedand more and more best
practices from the traditionalfinance world are being brought
into web three.
So, these criteria, aspectsthat VCs look at.
One of them in this cycle iscertainly where were these
founders during the bear market?
(22:13):
What were they doing?
Were they building, even ifthey weren't receiving
investment?
Did they just pop out out ofnowhere, which of course, we
know is going to happen more andmore?
And in fact, that's anothermeasuring stick of seeing, kind
of how healthy the market is.
You know the and greed index,uh is how many new projects just
(22:36):
appear out of nowhere.
But certainly I think vcs thistime around are more careful.
Uh, instead of you giving thema sketch on a napkin and saying,
hey, here's my great idea, andthen they offer you, you know, a
million dollars, and I meanthis is like completely normal
in web 3 during a bull market.
Right, that is the most normalbehavior.
(22:58):
However, I'm not sure we'regonna carry as much of that
normality into the cycle,because I think people have now
started to understand uh,there's a there, there's a cost
analysis.
Uh, up until now, the potentialgains outweighed the risks in
(23:20):
terms of these guys can just runoff with the money.
They can fail and genuinelyeven attempt to build what they
promised they would when theyraised that money.
I think it's very, very, veryproportionately in favor of
(23:41):
founders who just gave money andthen end up doing anything.
So I really think that VCs havelearned their lesson.
So I do think we'll see aslightly more measured industry,
but I say slightly because thecraziness always kicks in when
we see those charts going skyhigh and suddenly Bitcoin is at
100K and then everyone wants tobuy, and then it drops to 90 and
(24:05):
then everyone sells, you know.
So that's unfortunately thenature of the beast.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
The real winners in the game is basically people who
kind of ride out the wintersand even through the bear
markets, is that they still kindof like hold on for dear life,
right?
So the concept of HODL From aretail investment perspective, I
think and maybe you kind ofconfirm this, as you know, I
think if they were to look at it, I think, from a Web3
perspective, they've got to lookat it from an infrastructure
(24:31):
and protocol perspective.
Right, those two have got to bethere to really kind of
increase that adoption curve youmentioned.
Vcs are much more cautious nowin looking in terms of where
they're going to invest theirmoney.
Are they looking into these twoparticular aspects of
infrastructure and protocols andsaying, hey, listen, if you
don't have these, you're notgoing to get the VC money?
How are you seeing thisprogressing?
Speaker 1 (24:54):
So, certainly over the bear market, I think there
was a lot more investment intoinfra than you would see in a
bull market, in the sense thatin a bull, whatever is sexy is
what gets chased.
And you know, infra protocolsare typically protocols maybe
not so much, because I meancreating a layer one or a layer
two.
I mean there's big money in it.
So people tend to be seen tohave their eyes and ears open,
(25:18):
but I think infrastructureprojects there have been
investment into them.
But I think bear markets arealways a time to get as many
retail investors on board aspossible.
This is, you know, just howthis whole thing has been set up
.
In order for us to change it,we would basically have to
(25:41):
redefine what the entire thingmeans, and so it's something
where, if you don't like it, youlearn to live with it, and if
you like it, well, I guessyou're doing it already, so you
don't need to have any wordsfrom me.
But in a bear market, becausethere's so much retail money
that is eager to be deployed,vcs tend to skew in favor of
(26:02):
what's going to be hot and sexyand give them the most gains
possible, because keep in mind aWeb2 VC or traditional VC, the
amount of time before they see areturn on investment is many,
many years, more than in Web3,where you start seeing returns
after only a couple of months.
(26:23):
So clearly, if you deploy moneyto a project, you want that
project to pump as much aspossible, and pumping means
liquidity, which means retailinvestors.
So I think, think, yes, uh, wewill continue to see this, uh,
this investment into infra.
But also, I think that isanother thing that might
differentiate one vc fromanother pc, because not all vcs
(26:47):
are operated equally.
Uh, so some vcs would not touchinfra projects because, I mean,
that's not where the shortermoney is for them.
But then there are other VCswho have a different vision and
understand that in order tobuild those hot projects, we
need to have, you know, thefoundation of the house,
otherwise it's a glass housebuilt on nothing.
Speaker 3 (27:09):
I'd love to get your take on these.
What are one or two things thatyou're really keeping an eye
out for as you continue to moveinto this space?
Speaker 1 (27:20):
So I think the two things that definitely stand out
for me is socialify, on the onehand, and the reason for this
is we all know that web2 socialis broken and if you think that
I'm making that statementbecause I'm generalizing, think
about the platform that you usethe most and think on a scale of
(27:42):
one to 10, are you closer to 10?
I love it, or are you closer toone?
I absolutely hate it?
Why the hell am I still here?
So I think that's for most ofus, we have this experience
where we get extract certainthings from these platforms,
whether this is to connect withfamily on Facebook, friends on
(28:03):
Instagram, colleagues onLinkedIn, twitter with you know
people who like cats and I don'tknow agriculture or whatever.
So we have these differentidentities for different
platforms.
However and this is where thedata privacy and the data
ownership also comes in becauseTwitter might decide one day
(28:28):
that they will now delete youraccount because you said
something that, according tothem, you know you shouldn't
have said.
Now, this might be true or itmight not be true, because,
guess what, when Twitter or anyof these platforms decide that
it's the end of your account,there's nothing you can do,
whether or not.
They are accurate or not.
So I mean, that's the firstthing.
You have content creators whoseentire businesses and careers
(28:50):
are built on these social mediaplatforms, but that can all
disappear with one fell swoop.
So I think that social media isreally, really ripe for an
overall and has been for a longtime.
However, the reason that wedon't have an alternative is,
again, we don't know what we'remissing, I guess, but also
(29:10):
because there's no greatsolutions just yet.
You have Forkasted, for example,which is quite a popular Web3
social network, but then, I mean, it's really tiny amount of
users on there still and it'sreally complex.
If you don't understand Web3,there's no way you would ever
find yourself there.
You have Threads from.
(29:31):
Facebook had a great strategyto migrate all Instagram users
to Threads, so suddenly you haveall these followers on Threads.
The question is, is anybody onthere?
Who's on there?
I still can't figure out whatmy.
I know what my LinkedIn is for,I know what my well, in fact,
all my social media are prettymuch the same, but I can't
(29:53):
figure out what to use threads.
So that's facebook's product.
I mean, it should have been themost popular product out there
because, well, facebook,instagram, whatsapp, uh, you
have blue sky twitteralternative, so you have all
these examples of platforms thatcan be but isn't uh, and so I
think this is an area for Web3to kind of come into its own,
(30:17):
although I think we're veryearly days and I'm not sure
we're going to see analternative competitor come out
just yet.
And then the other thing, whichis larger and encompasses social
high, is decentralized identity, and I think this is probably
going to be one of the hottesttopics Again, in the sense now
(30:37):
you're talking about dataownership, data privacy, but
what is data?
So if you download my Facebookprofile data, you're going to be
an accurate reflection of me,but it's a reflection of my
identity on that platform andthis is the identity that I
(30:59):
wanted to shape on that platform, which is why it represents me
in a certain way.
However, maybe I want to takethat person with me, maybe I
want to take the Facebook me toLinkedIn.
I can't do that because I needto create a new persona on
LinkedIn.
Maybe it's the samecharacteristics and whatnot as
the Facebook me, but it's a newpersona altogether and keep in
(31:23):
mind that can take it away fromme at any given moment.
Now, with decentralized identity, let's say, my identity in the
form of an NFT, the NFT gatingmechanism so I enter, as a
website or a platform based onthe fact that my wallet has this
NFT, and then I can be anynumber of identities linked to
(31:45):
any number of NFTs.
Now, this is actually somethingthat we at Adluna are working
on, so it's a topic that'sabsolutely fascinating, because
you start looking at why doesidentity exist?
And it exists for differentthings, for different people.
So, for example, if I want toexpress myself, I want to
(32:08):
express myself because of who Iam, or I might express myself
because I want others to think Iam, or I want to express myself
so that I can be the personthat I want people to think I am
, or the person that peoplethink I should.
There's so many combinationshere and Web2 platforms.
(32:30):
Whether this is anyservice-level website, I don't
know.
I go to a website to downloadgraphics and I sign in with
Google right now.
Web2 platforms whether this isany service level website, I
don't know.
I go to a website to downloadgraphics and I sign in with
Google right now.
Or whether it's a social mediaplatform all of these different
platforms.
I am the same me, but currently,I have to split the same me
(32:53):
into several verylogistics-based identities
passwords, emails, blah, blah,blah.
What if I am the same me but Ican split me off into different
NFTs, for example?
So there's the LinkedIn NFT me,who is super professional and
everything that is linked to myname is out there in public.
And there's the LinkedIn NFT me, who is super professional and
everything that is linked to myname, you know, is out there in
(33:14):
public.
And there's the plant lady me,which my son just came in the
room earlier and says it lookslike a jungle in here, and I
think he meant it as a criticismand I was like I know, isn't it
wonderful?
So there's that lady, and maybeI don't want that lady to be
public, right, but I want to beout there.
Maybe I don't want that lady tobe public, right, but I want to
be out there.
I want to create and build andexpress my crazy plant lady
(33:35):
identity, but not link to myLinkedIn me.
So people should have theability to grow different
identities and then for thoseidentities to be interoperable
between different platforms.
This is like a digital humanright, according to me.
Again, I realize that noteveryone feels the same, but
(33:56):
that's why I'm here championingfor decentralized digital
identity.
Speaker 3 (34:04):
And it's incredible I love this idea and I want to
call you a technology virtuosothe way that you're able to
paint this picture and I thinkwe begin the conversation with
kind of like what is AI'simplication on?
You know the ethical and kind ofthe society impacts?
I think you just basically, Ithink you just drove this home.
It is the ability forindividuals to maintain
sovereignty over their self, tobe able to share different parts
(34:26):
of themselves in different wayswhile maintaining uniformity
and centralization of their owndigital self.
It's like it's your own digitalidentity that has got a secure
digital encryption, encryptedsignature that you don't have to
share with anyone else.
Like, no one else has thatability Facebook and all the
other platforms.
They can kind of take your data, download it.
Maybe they create some sort ofdeep fake around it and maybe
(34:51):
this is kind of the next thingwhere people kind of get that
next aha moment is I want to beable to protect myself in the
next iteration of the Web3evolution by first being able to
have digital sovereign rightsover my own identity, and maybe
that's kind of where it beginsfor everyone is kind of a wow
moment, right.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
I wish that everyone would have that aha moment and
have that be their entry.
And I've come to terms with thefact because I'm a very I'm
someone who takes a veryphilosophical approach and you
know that can sometimes be anAchilles heel, because then I go
.
Well, I mean, I don'tunderstand why people are making
this decision.
That's clearly not in line withyou know, the way that the
things are supposed to happen inorder to affect this big change
(35:31):
, but then again, everyonedoesn't get my memo.
So I think people come intothis for different reasons and I
think a lot of that again hasto do with, like a Maslow's
hierarchy.
I think I might have lost you.
I think a lot of this again hasto do with a bit of Maslow's
hierarchy of needs approach, inthe sense that a lot of people,
(35:54):
and specifically in countrieswhere the economy is not as
strong, the average person'sorigin story, why they came into
this technology, would beprofit driven.
My friend invested in X and Isaw they made money and I wanted
to give it a go as well.
And you know however manyiterations of the story later,
(36:15):
here I am I'm building somethingin web3, um, or investing in
web3, uh.
And then you get people who, asI said earlier, might have you
know an hour to sit on an eameslounge chair and smoke a cigar
and think about the meaning oflife, and then those people
might say, well, hey, this isnot how I like things to go.
(36:35):
Like you know, I have my ownrights, and why should I?
So I think there's so manydifferent people on the spectrum
.
I don't think that the by theway, the cigar smoking games
last year person is going to beas libertarian as I just made
that out to be, um.
So you know, there's so manydifferent entry points into this
and I think it clicksdifferently for everybody, and I
(36:59):
really wish that it would clickwith self-sovereignty.
I'm like the person at thedoorstep going like ding dong,
do you still remember me?
But it's fine if people don't,because I think at some point
there's some aspect of this thatclicks for somebody, um, and
what it clicks for me is notnecessarily what's going to
(37:20):
click for you and vice versa.
So I think the most importantthing is the conversations
around it, and that's somethingthat during the bear market I
mean.
So at luna, we were heavilyfocused on education and we
didn't feel education in thesense that, yes, all these
retail investors are out therehungry to learn more.
They just crashed and burned.
(37:41):
They want nothing to do withWeb3.
And to start theseconversations because we have to
be out there going guys,there's more to this technology
than just you making a bunch ofmoney and losing a bunch of
money, and so what I've seenover the last few years is, even
(38:02):
just with the educationalaspect you can talk about.
So on my show, the Future ofNFTs, I mean we cover NFTs, but
from the perspective of what canthis technology be in future?
So it's a very long rangingvision for the technology.
And I mean, if you look at thecomments of different people,
different audience members, someof it, I wouldn't have expected
(38:26):
that that's something thatwould click for this person or
for people in general, becausefor me it might be something
that's so obvious that I mightnot even consider it like an
entry point at all.
And then you listen to someoneand that's their aha moment.
So I think the more we talkabout it and the more we talk
about why it's important to us,because maybe you don't feel
(38:48):
like me, but by me telling youhow I feel about it and why I
feel about it.
That feel about it and why Ifeel about it, the way it's
going to spark conversations inyour mind and that might lead
conversations with others.
And I think you know this slowroll out of waking upness that
we have to do, um, it's not veryscalable.
(39:09):
It feels like.
So you know, if I had my way, Iwould be like okay, guys, we're
going to have like a five-yearplan and this is what we're
going to do, but butunfortunately, it's all organic
and we have to.
You know, people have to gothrough the journey and the
cycle of life and understandthat certain points that they
are alternatives to what theythink is out there.
Speaker 3 (39:28):
It seems like everyone's going to have kind of
that moment where they're goingto eventually kind of we're all
going to come to the same place, maybe some earlier than others
, but at some point in time theoutlook is very optimistic.
We all will eventually start tokind of get on the direction of
being able to look at this allwith the same perspective and
the same prescriptive lens.
So this is kind of the positivekind of aspect of one that kind
(39:51):
of I want to start a curve isinto kind of a closure is is
that this is a positive moment.
So, from from a technologistperspective, it seems like
continual conversations,learning and education around
this particular space, helpingilluminate folks around this
technology and what it means forthem, from the advanced levels
(40:12):
all the way down to, you know,the normal day, every person
looking to say, look, I justwant to get online and just do
my thing.
There needs to be kind of acontinual push in this space for
conversations and education tokind of get everyone there right
.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
Yeah, and I would add , get your hands dirty.
You cannot learn, you know.
I want to tell you a story, uh,because it's actually super
funny.
When I started working in thisindustry, um, I had just, uh,
finished the stint in thepharmaceutical industry.
Well, digital marketing, so itwas at least the cool side of
pharma, but I mean it's pharma,so that was the only cool side.
(40:51):
And so I started traveling andthen got this opportunity to
become a journalist, which waslike a non-career goal, so I
jumped on the charts only tofind out oh, it's about
blockchain, and I have no ideawhat blockchain is, so I started
learning about it.
I mean, I come across Bitcoinin 2012, but I remember thinking
(41:12):
, once it becomes idiot proof tosomeone like me, I will get
into it.
So, clearly, it took a longtime.
So you can imagine, here I amin 2017 reading about all these
aspects decentralization whatthe heck is this?
I mean, I don't even understandwhat this means.
Yeah, I understand the conceptof owning yourself.
(41:33):
I feel the same, but I didn'tknow there was a technology that
supported it.
But now I have to startlearning about the technology
and I have zero idea what any ofthis stuff is, and I remember I
was actually on an island inThailand and I had a notepad.
It was like cool digital nomadview overlooking the ocean and I
have my notepad.
It was like cool digital nomadview overlooking the ocean and I
have my notepad and I'm likewhat is blockchain?
(41:54):
And I'm making notes.
I don't understand a singlething.
I'm reading.
And then the job was to become ajournalist and so now I'm
researching for the articlesthat I'm writing and so now I'm
not researching what is ablockchain.
I kind of have an idea, maybenot super quite, but I mean kind
(42:14):
of get it.
But the more I research forwork because it was very real to
me, very pertinent to me, verydirectly relevant to me, the
more I understood it.
So I always think back to thatme sitting by the books like a
student, going like I'm going toget this.
Don't ever try to learnanything that way unless you're
(42:34):
in school.
Like really, I mean and this iswhy I don't even support the
education system so if you wantto learn about AI, if you want
to learn about blockchain, ifyou want to learn about any sort
of technology, get your handsdirty.
Don't see it as a big scarything, because the only thing
that it's going to become, ifyou see it that way, is a big
(42:56):
scary thing.
So it's treated, you know, howkids?
Uh, you give a two-year-old theremote, they're gonna figure
out how to turn on and off thetv probably more on than off.
Uh, if you give a 60 year oldthe remote, they probably won't
even attempt to turn off or onthe TV, right?
(43:16):
So try and recapture.
If you've lost it and I thinkmost of us have lost it so this
is a great opportunity to regainit, recapture that childhood
sense of play and wonder and,you know, have fun.
Experiment.
I mean, if you have the moneyto.
I'm going to use NFTs as anexample.
If you want to understand NFTs,if you have the funds to create
(43:40):
an NFT collection for no otherreason than to create the
collection, do it.
You will understand NFTs in away you've never understood them
or never would have before.
If you don't have the funds todo these things, get involved.
There are so many places to getinvolved, so many people are
dying for people to help them.
So really don't learn here.
(44:03):
Here happens when here happens.
So really, just that's the onlypiece of advice I can give you.
The more daunting something is,the more it's likely that you
need to get started with it,like yesterday.
Speaker 3 (44:16):
Yeah, and that's incredible.
I love that analogy and I thinkfor most of our listeners
listening on the podcast, Ithink Nadia was saying learn
with your hands, by gettinghands-on dirty, versus just kind
of thinking through the thingsright.
So it's continually likehands-on practice.
Become a practitioner, learnand evolve your knowledge and
awareness into the technology.
Wow, incredible insights.
(44:37):
Nadia, I can't thank you enoughfor this opportunity.
Thank you for joining us on thepodcast today.
Where can we follow you to getmore information and where can
we follow you in your amazingjourney yet to come?
Speaker 1 (44:49):
yeah, first of all, steve, thank you so much.
It's been just so lovelyspeaking to you.
It's the end of my day here,but it was definitely a
highlight of the day.
So I am most typically onLinkedIn.
I'm definitely just a boringB2B person, but if you like the
kind of things that I wastalking about now, this is
(45:09):
typically the thing that I wouldpost about on LinkedIn.
I'm also on Twitter, onInstagram, but really there's
not too much happening there.
I try to maintain somewhat of abalance between social media
and real life.
So I'm looking forward for webthree social media so I can
again be on social media 24seven and I'm just kidding like
this little bit of work-lifebalance I got going.
(45:30):
So if you want to be in touch,definitely LinkedIn would be the
best place.
Yeah, linkedin endorsement.
Speaker 3 (45:41):
Wonderful Again.
Thank you so very much, Nadia,for sharing your insights.
You are a true luminary, andthank you so very much for
sharing your passion andinsights with us.
Our audience is sowell-informed because of this
conversation.
Thank you so very much and forthose listening, thanks for
tuning in.
I appreciate it.
Nadia, You're wonderful.
Thank you so much.
We hope to have you on again.
Speaker 1 (46:00):
Have an amazing week everybody.
Steve, thank you, it's been aprivilege Speak to you soon.
Cheers.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
Thanks so much for listening to the Tech Travels
Podcast with Steve Woodard.
Please tune in next time and besure to follow us and subscribe
on the Apple Podcast andSpotify platforms.
We'll see you next time.
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