Bankless - 147 - Why Mainstream Media Sucks & How to Fix It with Saagar Enjeti

Starting point is 00:00:06 Welcome to bankless, where we explore the frontier of internet money and internet finance. This is how to get started, how to get better, how to front run the opportunity. This is Ryan Sean Adams. I'm here with David Hoffman, and we're here to help you become more bankless. Guys, we had Sager from Breaking Points podcast on the episode today. We talk about why mainstream media sucks and how to fix it. Not just a problem, but a solution. The end of that problem. A few takeaways for you today.

Starting point is 00:00:32 Number one, we talk about mainstream media, why it's broken. and the prescription of how to fix it. Number two, we talk about advice Saga has for crypto media. How do we make sure we don't become them? You know who I mean by them. Number three, we talk politics because we had to. Saugers into politics. And we asked him about the candidates.

Starting point is 00:00:53 His guess on the likely candidate for the 2024 U.S. election. And is all of this going to lead to civil war? There's a question on our minds. Number four, what does Sager think of the whole FTCS thing? He lost money in BlockFi, it turns out. He watched the SBF Plus 4thys debate. He's been in crypto since Blaji introduced him to crypto in 2017. But after this, has he written it all off?

Starting point is 00:01:17 That was a question for him today. And it was good to get Saugher's perspective, who is a talented, I think, content creator outside of crypto. But share some of our core values, David. What are your thoughts going into this episode? Yeah, after just talking to Saugher, I'm just so proud of him, man. Yeah. He and Crystal went up against, like, teeth and nails, which is mainstream media.

Starting point is 00:01:39 He went up against the system, the composed network of incentives that keeps the elites in power, keeps the mainstream media companies in power, keeps the Democrats and the Republicans in power. And him and Crystal just said, F it, you guys are just a bunch of acting charades, and we need real media, a new, real, honest, authentic media institution out there. And so they made breakpoints. And I couldn't be more proud of Sager and Crystal. Even though I don't, I just talked to Sager for an hour and half. I haven't talked to Crystal at all.

Starting point is 00:02:09 She's great too. But just like, we need people like that in the world to make sure that we don't go backwards as a society. So that's really just the impression I've been left with after this episode. Yeah, it's definitely a kindred spirit. And the work they're doing over there is pretty cool. And we felt some of the shared values and kinship with bankless. I think it's also good to get sort of somebody on the outside of the crypto bubble their perspective on this whole crazy space. So there's a lot of that conversation too.

Starting point is 00:02:35 Of course, premium subscribers. Make sure you stick around because David and I are about to have an epic debrief conversation about what we really think about soccer. It's all good things. I think. I really enjoyed him, David. But if you want to tune in to get our raw and filtered thoughts, make sure you click the link in the show notes if you're a premium subscriber.

Starting point is 00:02:54 If you're not, consider becoming a premium subscriber. You get all of this content and a slew of other features when you upgrade, including the private premium RSS fee. With no ads. Yeah, no ads. All right, speaking of which, we will go right to our conversation with Sager. But before we do,

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Starting point is 00:05:23 speeds with significantly lower gas fees. With Arbitrum's recent migration to Arbiton Nitro, it's also now 10 times faster than before. Visit arbitram.io, where you can join the community, dive into the developer docs, bridge your assets, and start building your first app. With Arbitrum, experience Web3 development the way it was meant to be. Secure, fast, cheap, and friction-free. Bankless Nation, we are super excited to introduce you to Sager and Jetty. He is the co-host of a fantastic podcast I go to for All Things Politics. It's called Breaking Points. Crystal Ball is his co-host.

Starting point is 00:05:55 It's kind of an anti-establishment political news sort of podcast. I think there's some kindred spirit with what we're doing over here at Bankless. They launched in June 2001. Breaking Points right now has 850,000 subscribers. Let's just round that up to a million subscribers, which is pretty hard to do. I must say, Sager, welcome Bankless. Hey, thanks for having me, guys. I appreciate it.

Starting point is 00:06:18 Hey, we're excited to talk to you because there's a number of things we want to pick your brain about. But one thing that I think you have in common with probably people in crypto is you guys see that some of the machines, that run our society. Some of the institutions that's called them are kind of broken right now. And so we want to talk about a few of those. We want to talk about media, that institution. I want to talk about politics. We want to talk about the economy. But before we get there, David and I are about to get on a, doing an interview with a politician, Senator Pat Toomey, is coming in the podcast. He's got like 30 minutes. You know, he's rescheduled a couple times, but we're going to do it. We don't talk to many politicians, but I know you're in that world

Starting point is 00:06:58 and you do what like what's your advice what should we talk about yeah so number one don't let the handlers handle anything they're going to try and say he's late they're going to try and say he's got a hard cut off let the senator go when the senator needs to go okay that's number one so they always give you a short and a fake time frame and they always reschedule and they always want to try and keep you off your okay number two these people do this for a living they're filibuster so and they have scripts they're perfect they know how to launch exactly they're better than podcasters at this oh they're good at this. They are the kings of saying nothing with as much time as possible. The way that you get this job is by being an arch narcissist and also being boring. And so this is their turf. So I would

Starting point is 00:07:39 really just try, throw them off their game, ask them something interesting, try to get to the value almost as soon as possible. I find it useful to let them get their script out within about five minutes and then start to dive in a little bit because they feel like they don't have to revert back to. But it's a real dance. It's a real dance. Oh, so he's going to come in, with something to say then or Hearst thing. He's got an agenda, right? Yeah, I mean, in my opinion, they're not going to agree to do an interview with you unless they have something that they want to.

Starting point is 00:08:06 And we don't have to get into the circumstance. I'm assuming it's like some legislation. He's like the only crypto-friendly senator on the banking committee. Everyone else hates crypto. And, you know, this is like, you know, the FDX aftermath. I'm sure you guys talked about a little bit. This is after that. So I don't know what, I mean, I think we're going to talk to him as if, you know,

Starting point is 00:08:25 he is one of the few crypto-friendly senators who's come out and been. I'm like, crypto's great, and here's why. We want to talk about that. But you might have some other ideas of why he's coming on. Yeah, I would just try to drill down into him. I'm like, why are you? You know, a fun question would be, why are you here? Why did you come up here today?

Starting point is 00:08:40 Yeah, yeah. Why are you here? Just making it super meta. I'm always a fan of making it meta because it makes people step back on their heels. Is there any politician that doesn't fit that mold or are they all universally like this? I think once you get elected, before they get elected, some of them can be fun. And I know some people before they get elected. And they'll talk a little bit more off the cuff, but, you know, there's so many constituencies and internal.

Starting point is 00:09:01 So, you know, what we were talking, you were referencing systems, institutions, like, the risk is so high. If you say the wrong thing, you will just get killed here in Washington, even if you say the truth. So it can cause you some serious problems. I would just, in general, like, that's why I really despise and generally don't talk to a lot of politicians whenever they're asking to come on. You know, people will come on, but I want to talk about this one thing. I'm like, yeah, but you don't get to decide. And in general, the way that it works is that cable news is very accommodating because they have very short periods of time where you can come on and hawk your stupid bill or get the attention that you deserve. The system is really not designed to get into anything nitty gritty.

Starting point is 00:09:40 And unfortunately, like really really talk to these people, you're like, you don't know anything. Like a long-form podcast, I think would be way more interesting. Yeah, is it the time constraint that makes that meta-reality? I think that they love the time constraint. The time constraint works on both ends, right? So cable, by definition, is short bursts in between advertising. That's their true market. They need to serve that.

Starting point is 00:10:00 Their job is to fill time in between ad breaks. Politician's job is to say something as inoffensive as possible while also advancing X, Y, or Z agenda. So it's really a match made in heaven. Like the format is born for each other. The people who actually listen, though, and are, like, affected by this, it's not really to their benefit at all. So does this our format of media where we have like 90 minute long podcasts and, you know, we don't have like this cable news high production thing?

Starting point is 00:10:29 Like is this format of media like this has to be difficult for them. This is like almost hostile territory for them. You know what it is? It's uncertainty. Most of them these people are old. They're really old. And they don't understand what's going on here. Most of their staff tells them to do it because they know it's cool.

Starting point is 00:10:44 Like they know it's a thing. But then they don't really understand what it is. They don't consume it. And the real issue is that people. in Washington, they really don't consume, especially our type of podcasts. If you really ask people around here, like, what podcasts are you listen to? It's either going to be pop culture or pods save America, God forbid. And so it really is like unidirectional in terms of the media that they consume and are

Starting point is 00:11:05 familiar with. They think a five-minute spot on Morning Joe is like, you made it. Really? That's still it? That's still pinnacle. Oh, yeah. Not like Joe Rogan or anything like that? That hasn't figured.

Starting point is 00:11:17 When I went on Rogan afterwards, I, only had one person who worked on Capitol Hill who reached out who was like, hey, that was really interesting. When I used to do Fox News, it was endless. I mean, endless. Because like, what do you say Rogan is way more influential than like Morning Joe? Well, I mean, it's on who? You know, and this is the most important thing. Voters. Okay. They don't care about voters. No, they care about the system. Yeah. They care about talking to each other. So everything has a function. Like everyone's always like, why does, how can X, Y, and Z paper still exist? And I'm like, because the 500 people who read it are, you know, all work in the Pentagon.

Starting point is 00:11:56 And so, like, if you want to influence Ukraine policy, are you better off on breaking points or are you better off on the New York Times editorial page? Obviously, on the New York Times editorial page. Why? Because the Secretary of Defense will read it. I could have a segment with, let's say, a million views, something like that, of critiquing Ukraine. Nobody here is going to watch it. So, you know, average show might watch it, but like, what realistic power do they have over the State Department and the Defense Department? And unfortunately, message to all of you who are listening, you basically have zero.

Starting point is 00:12:26 I have zero. So you have less than me. Wow. Is it literally just a delineation between just like the many and the elites, as in like New York Times is like the elite media institution that's read by elites to talk about elite things? And then there's podcasts, which is like, you know, the many. Right. Is that delineation here? Call them plebcast.

Starting point is 00:12:43 Absolutely. Look at this. podcast. It has a huge audience. It's very influential. You know, I was talking Ryan right before you came on. I think it's actually crazy that you guys are not getting the do in kind of the SBF TikTok write-up. A TikTok in journalism is like the step-by-step-by-step because it's very clear that it all really began in the Eric Forheese SBF confrontation. Oh, you saw that. Of course I did. That happened on your show. And I'm like, okay, that precipitated this, precipitated this, which precipitated the crash. Have you read a New York Times article?

Starting point is 00:13:15 that referenced it? No. But I'm aware of it because, you know, I exist online. And I think it is actually criminal to not include that interview because it takes it back to, like, the genesis of how it all started. So it's complicated. I mean, what I really think about it is, and you guys are familiar, CNBC, you know, CNBC, nobody watches CNBC. But the 100,000 people who do, they're all multimillionaires, traders, and billionaires. So, like, if you do a one, we call it a hit, you know, in cable news, like you do a hit.

Starting point is 00:13:45 which is like an appearance on cable television. One appearance on CNBC, it can move markets, it can set the, you know, the discourse on fire. And that was tremendous effect on federal reserve policy. You know, something that a lot of people don't take notice of was that story that Jerome Powell has a secret Twitter. He has like a sleeper Twitter. He does. Like Jerome Powell. He has an Annon account?

Starting point is 00:14:09 Yeah. He's in an non-account. Oh, God. Jerome Powell is on econ Twitter. So we have what? 15, 25, let's say 25 people who are like really, really big on econ Twitter. Those people have massive influence, right, on literally on the thoughts of the Federal Reserve chairman.

Starting point is 00:14:27 So understanding like who the people in power and what they listen to and what they watch. This is why I spend a lot of time critiquing the mainstream media, even though on some metrics, like we may be bigger than them is I understand where power actually lies. I'm just like picturing in my brain power like chip posting memes. He probably has. Let's be honest. Oh man, that must be a crazy place to live if you're Powell, though. Well, yeah, I mean, we've had a few conversations with politicians.

Starting point is 00:14:56 You know who's been okay, though? I think you guys have had him on, Andrew Yang. Yeah, he's in the lead of his own, right? Yeah, it's a little bit different than the sound butt. You actually get to hear what he thinks. But, okay, let's talk about media for a minute. I do want to come back to your thoughts on SBF because we're super curious to hear about, we're trying to make the documentary at least.

Starting point is 00:15:13 Oh, you have to. Depends on who makes it, apparently. Anyway, one of the documentaries. But before we get there, let's talk a little bit about mainstream media as one of the three heads of this hydra that's kind of an institution that's failing. But I think in order to talk about that story,

Starting point is 00:15:28 folks at Bankless should get a little familiar with what you guys are doing at breaking points because this sort of breaks the mold and is maybe part of the antidote. So could you tell us the Genesis story of breaking points? Sure. Yeah, how'd you get there and what is it? Yeah, so what happened is that,

Starting point is 00:15:42 I guess we had to go farther back. So it's about the careers of Crystal and I. So Crystal, you know, ran for Congress unsuccessfully, but started doing some cable news, got picked up by MSNBC, had her own show with three other people, which eventually got canceled in 2015. Now, the reason why that's important is that Crystal had a cable news background, hated being on cable news, was actively push out of MSNBC for being critical of Hillary Clinton and her corruption. She literally did a straight-to-camera monologue in 2014. saying Hillary, please don't run because of corruption and ties to the Clinton Foundation. Anyway, we can go on to that. And she was eventually called into the head of NBC News's office. And they said that if you ever talk about Hillary again, you have to clear it with the head of the network. Because the Clinton campaign called them and we're like, if you ever do anything like this again, we'll cut your access off to Hillary and presumably the future president. Yeah, this is real stuff, right?

Starting point is 00:16:37 So are you kidding? No, yeah, this is all real. It's totally real. So that's on one end. So Crystal was fired by MSNBC effectively because of that. Second was like my career. I was a White House correspondent. You know, I kind of like reached, I'd like made it.

Starting point is 00:16:52 And what I mean by that is like in town, if you're a guy, you can get called on by the president. I had four interviews with President Trump. The press team and I had an adversarial but good relationship as in they like trusted me. They're like he's not one of these guys. He's going to talk about Mueller. I had my pick of jobs in terms of being another White House correspondent. somewhere else. I could have been like a regime player like for my whole life. I would have been fine. But I hated it because I just I hated the job. I really hated. Why? What sucked about it?

Starting point is 00:17:20 Well, I mean, being in the press briefing room, like you're amongst the top people in your field. And one of the best advice I ever got from someone was what you really need to do is check yourself in a career is look at somebody who's 10 years ahead of you and be like, do I want that job? And I was looking at Jim Acosta and all these other clowns in the briefing room just clowning themselves. for some extra minutes on cable TV. And I was like, this is fake. I was like, can I curse here? Is that okay?

Starting point is 00:17:45 Yes. All right. I was like, this is all bullshit. This is bullshit, you know? And so I'm like, what about people who like actually want to know what's going on? Because I'm like, this is all a play. It's an internal drama. It was all just a massive charade.

Starting point is 00:18:00 It was just like. It's a charade for each other, which is what makes it worse, right? Yes. It's like everyone is playing for their friends and for their own jobs. It's like political theater. It's theater at the, it's theater at the, worst level. And I'm like, well, what about all these people? I grew up. I love the news. I've always loved the news. I'm politically active because it was against the Iraq war,

Starting point is 00:18:18 hated George W. Bush. And I was like, I want to understand, like, what is happening here? Like, how can such a horrific event like the Iraq war happen? And then the financial crisis, I'm like, I don't know what the fuck is going on anymore. I'm like, what is happening? You know, it's like, and so like I, I, because I'm a millennial, you know, I'm 30 years old. And I was like, I have no trust in institutions. And I'm looking around and I don't feel like anybody is really speaking as to like why Trump is even in the president in the first. first place, it's the right wing media is kissing his ass. I was getting a lot of appearances on Fox, and I was like, I just, I hate this. And what really broke me was I had to do this panel

Starting point is 00:18:50 about nationalism in the United States. There were three people on the panel, and it lasted five minutes. And I was like, you know, I have a lot to say about this. I was like, I've read a lot of books. I've thought really deeply about like the American character, like who we are, like why Trump is president, what this unique moment. And I got like maybe 35, 40, 40, seconds. And at this whole time, like, I'm a podcast guy. Like, since I'm like 22 years old, like I've just been binging podcasts. And so I know an alternative exists. So that's the pretext. Then what happens is that Crystal was doing a show with another guy named Buck Sexton, who's actually very successful right now. But it was more traditional, like, left, right.

Starting point is 00:19:28 The initial inception was like cable news on television. And they were on to something, clearly, as the success of our show shows. But, and it was at The Hill, The Hill.com. But he was leaving and him and I knew each other And he was like, hey man, why don't you come sub in for me? And I met Crystal and it just really clicked. Like we were really both interested in deeper problems going on in America. And yeah, look, we paired up, got very lucky, started posting on YouTube. And honestly, like, I'm still shocked.

Starting point is 00:19:55 It was an overnight success. Like within three months, we went from basically zero YouTube subscribers on the hill to like 100,000. Within six months, it was like six, seven hundred thousand, something like. that. It just, it went, you know, sky high. And then we went on Rogan. When did you guys start this? 2019. Okay. It was June of 2019. And by 2020, I think we had like six or 700,000 in a year, we went on Rogan and that put us up to like 1.3 million, something like that. Amazing. On the Hill's YouTube channel. But the problem was is we were still working for corporate media, like a DC-based institution. And the fact is, like we became too big, like the ethos that we

Starting point is 00:20:36 wanted to live by just were not ones that I and her felt comfortable with. Did you have to censor yourself or couldn't say certain things? Or was it style? So none of it is direct. It's all a product of their business. So I've told these two stories before, but these are just the ones that involve me. There's many more like this. One was Maxine Waters, who you're probably familiar with.

Starting point is 00:20:56 So here's what I said on the hill when I was there. I was like, Maxine Waters will be chairwoman of the financial services committee till the day she dies. That's all I said. Because I said in reference to the seniority system, and it was about why I think the seniority system is bad for committee chairmanships and why the Democrats should do away with that. Her press secretary called like my boss's boss at the hill and said that I was threatening Maxine Waters' life by saying that. What? Yeah, it effectively threatened them and told them that if I did not apologize that they were going to pull out of an event with the Hill.

Starting point is 00:21:32 Now, why does that matter? the way that the Hill and the Washington Post and all these people make their money is they do events with politicians, which are sponsored by like Bank of America, like some major bank, right? So this is like major catastrophe. Now, I didn't apologize. I said, fuck you. I'm not going to apologize. Nice. And it, like, was smoothed over.

Starting point is 00:21:54 I would be lying if that was not up in my head every single time I talk about Maxine Waters. And then another one happened with TikTok. I did a whole thing about all these former U.S. government officials based on publicly available data working for TikTok. And I was like, this is bullshit. You know, these people are working for the cybersecurity head under Obama. And now they're TikTok's head of trust and safety, whatever. I was like, this is ludicrous.

Starting point is 00:22:16 It's a mockery. And again, TikTok, I call my bosses. They said that I was doxing them, that I was threatening them, that I need to apologize, all this stuff. And like, you know, the pressure gets turned up. Again, I did the same thing. I was like, again, fuck you. Like, I will say nothing.

Starting point is 00:22:32 And it just, it was getting tense. It's a tense environment. So that's why we decided to leave. And we were like, we can't stay true to ourselves. And thanks to the internet, I mean, you know, the core question was, I was like, are people here because of the hill or are they here because of Crystal and I? And I'm like, I think I know the answer to that. And as time went on, I was like, it was clear, like, it's about us. And look, it doesn't hurt.

Starting point is 00:22:53 Rogan said that he would have us on and he would help us launch. So it's like, it's a pretty good guarantee of at least like moderate success out of the game. Amazing. That's a great story. So one of the questions that we had was, how did breaking points have like hundreds of thousands of subscribers on day one? And I think the summary here that I'm hearing is that you, cigar, a person who's intrinsically interested in politics and society and just the milieu of the state of culture and things. And the current world, the world of politics, is just not conducive to like true expression. And like knowing that you've been a podcaster for like a decade now, that means that you are a person who likes to.

Starting point is 00:23:32 express themselves. I can speak from experience here. And you need long formats and not to have any top-down control as to what you say in order to fully express yourself. And so you slowly just like exited from that. It's like being in the world of politics, you need to fit inside of a certain mold in order to exist there for any certain like a long amount of time. And you were just like resistant to that mold. Like F your mold, get out of here. Me and this other person, Crystal, who I'm probably super resonant with are going to F off and do our own media institution, one that promotes raw authenticity and unfiltered thoughts that are like interesting and true about the world. And like it just reminds me of just like so much of the demand there was for like Donald Trump

Starting point is 00:24:17 and Bernie Sanders who I think are two very authentic people, whether you disagree with them or not. But the reason why they had so much support was because of their raw authenticity. And like why did breaking points have so much success in day one is like, everyone is tired of the goddamn charade in politics. And we just want some real humans to have long form elaborate thoughts into our ears. And so we can actually move forward as a society. That's like my summary for why the breaking points did so well. Thank you, man.

Starting point is 00:24:45 It's very kind. I think you're right. And, you know, there are a lot of costs like when you are here, right? As in you don't get invited to this stuff anymore. Like, if you want to be a company, man, you're going to have a job your whole life. Like if you want to be a traditional right-wing commentator or left-wing commentator, you will never be unemployed. It's impossible. Like, you will always get these fake fellowships and you get to invite it to these fake parties, you know, and these gala's and black tie and all this stuff.

Starting point is 00:25:11 And, you know, inevitably, every single one of those invites dries up. And that's part of the problem is that it's a self-reinforcing system. They employ each other, the friends with each other. And to say even one dissident thing has great social cost to you. And that's one of those things. You have to be willing to just let go of it. You just have to say, I don't care anymore. I just one of those areas where you can't care

Starting point is 00:25:34 and you really have to accept, like you're just not going to have friends because so much of the system is built on teams. And when you're independent by definition, like you're not playing for a team. You have to say what you're actually thinking. It feels like 1984 where like you have to always have your guns out being prepared for the next person who's going to ask you

Starting point is 00:25:52 and turn you in for saying the wrong thing. Yeah. That's a good point. You know, I really faced this during the Trump thing, during Stop the Steel. I got so much pressure from the right to validate this. And I was like, guys, this is bullshit. Like, I'm sorry. Where does that pressure come from?

Starting point is 00:26:06 Like, are you talking about when you were at the Hill? No, no. This is like friends. Like people who are in the right wing kind of commentator system, they were like, I thought you were one of us. Like he's a cuck now. You know, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, yeah, I'm not a cuck.

Starting point is 00:26:18 I'm a cuck because I think the election wasn't stolen. It's like, maybe you are. Like, maybe you're the cuck. You're the guy who literally is taking their cues from Trump and is so afraid of pissing off your cultivated, like right-wing-only audience that you're not willing to say what you actually think. Like put two drinks in any one of these guys.

Starting point is 00:26:38 And like, they all know it's bullshit. And we're lucky because we have right-left audience. So I was like, look, if you really don't want to listen to me because I'm not going to validate this, I'm like, fuck off. I'm like, I don't care. Do you what? Okay, so two things I want to test you about. This is just like, you know, creator-to-creator kind of

Starting point is 00:26:53 independent. Like, that's what we're doing at bankless, but it's like, okay, so there's one line of question I have, which is like, how do you deal with all of that backlash? Like, how do you deal with all of the just dickheads on Twitter? Like, how do you deal with all of the negativity and hate that seems surface? And honestly, it doesn't really matter what you do. So you're like, you're going to get it. Yes, you want to get it at bankless.

Starting point is 00:27:16 I bet. And people blame us for things we think are unfair. You know, like, you want to be as a creator open to the feedback. from your community. So you can't completely shut it out. And yet, if you, like, let your mind be completely open to that, it can really taint how you see yourself in the world. You can get captured by that. It will ruin you. You can get captured by that, too. So that is a different form of pressure. It's not the, you know, your boss at the cable news company saying, hey, you can't say this and this because Hillary Clinton called. But it is like, I don't know, the social media pressure.

Starting point is 00:27:47 So like, so that's my first question. It's like, how do you deal in that world? Because I'm having trouble. You know, I actually, I consider myself lucky from coming from the realm of politics is it's a blood sport. Like, so for me, it's like, this is the game. Yeah. Like I, I, oh, you know, I knew what I was getting. You signed up for it? Yeah, exactly. Like, by definitely, what is the one thing they always say never to talk about? Religion and politics, right? And so I did that from the beginning. Like, for me, it was built in that no matter what you say, half the people are going to be extremely pissed off at it. And that has just been the case for me, like from the beginning. That said, I mean, look, you're right.

Starting point is 00:28:21 The advice I would give is to try. Well, so there's a lot of different schools of thought. Rogan is of the thought. Don't even read the good stuff because the good stuff is just as poisonous to you as the bad. And by that- You just don't read any of it? Right. Because, look, you guys have a successful podcast and you have an audience.

Starting point is 00:28:37 Like, the real question you need to ask is, like, of what utility am I getting out of this, especially relative to the type of content that I'm producing? I would like to split the difference. And I'm lucky, actually, because we have paying subscribers. And so those are the people that I actually pay attention to way more so than the casual. So one guy drops in for one YouTube video. Like, look, no offense. I appreciate the view.

Starting point is 00:28:59 But if you leave a negative comment, like, I don't care. But if you're one of our $10 a month, like, paying subscribers and you have like a long critique of something that you used to like and you haven't seen in a while and would like to see more because you want the show to succeed, yeah, I'll read that. I would consider that. And also if you tell me something that you really, really liked about the show, X, Y, and Z, I'll be like, oh, that's useful. And you can try and aggregate it. You know what my real advice is? Try and meet people in person as much as possible.

Starting point is 00:29:30 Because the online stuff is all bullshit. It's all bullshit, dude. How much I have learned from meeting my fans in person, like walking down the street. And somebody says, hey, you know, I'll tell you about rising and breaking points. something I didn't even realize, production value. So many people have told me in person, never in the comments. I love your show because I feel like I can send it to my dad and it's not a guy in the basement who is articulating my thoughts.

Starting point is 00:30:00 So it's like somebody that my parents might feel like they could respect and will understand, but understand my politics, like the frustration I feel with the system, the fact that you guys are trained, you know, from the mainstream media perspective, you know, you're educated, to use diction, you know, speak well. all the little things, which shouldn't matter, but obviously matter. You know, here, you know, it's crypto, so I'm wearing my hoodie. But when I do my show, like, you put on a tie. I wear a suit.

Starting point is 00:30:26 Like, I wear a full suit. I'm very proud of the way that I dress because I think that it conveys that I'm taking this job very seriously. Like, I'm taking it, it's a serious endeavor of which I prepare a lot for in order to convey this message in a format that they appreciate, but more importantly, they feel appreciated to share. And I was actually really validated, you know, the day that you and I were filming, the Spotify rap thing just came out.

Starting point is 00:30:50 And it turns out we were one of the top, like in the top 1% globally of shared podcasts. Wow. So people really felt like to share. I mean, that's the ultimate validation of your content, right? To not only consume, but to say, you have to listen to this. So that's something that I take really seriously. And again, I really only learned it from meeting people in person. So I would encourage you guys to do like live events, not even online.

Starting point is 00:31:16 I'm talking in person, like face to face. That is the key. David is a conference king. He's been to like 15 and I haven't been, but like live events is sort of interesting. Okay, so thank you for that, Saga. I think that's really good advice. And I do think that crypto can be every bit as blood sporty as politics these days and super sometimes worse because we have tokens involved.

Starting point is 00:31:36 We have tokens and we have like scammers and we have real wealth. Yeah. Okay. And then it also blends religion as well. like some of these, you know, crypto communities are like quasi-religious. All right. The other piece I was curious about because when we were talking about like the problems with mainstream media, and you're sort of describing some like personal experience,

Starting point is 00:31:54 I want to see if we can extrapolate that. But it just feels like if I were to sum that up in one word, it would be capture. Yes. Captured. Like mainstream media, institutional media seems like it's captured. I mean, if Hillary Clinton could call somebody from their staff and just get them to not say a certain thing that is capture. And so it's great that you and Crystal are able to escape that. I think like, look, financial media is also captured. Very much so. Big hedge fund, CNBC. Who do you think watches those

Starting point is 00:32:23 shows, right? CNBC finance? Same thing. That's why they don't talk about crypto. They don't give it good coverage. That's why bankless has found its niche. But I guess a question for you is like, how do you and Crystal prevent getting captured yourselves? Great question. All right? Because like you were talking about business model piece here. But like, that could still come in. I mean, you could still, like, we know how this works. In order to get the person in interview, you might have to say some things, for instance, right?

Starting point is 00:32:52 So there's guest capture. There's also, like, if you have any sponsorship revenue, there's sponsorship capture, and do they have anything to do with what you say? You can also get, like, Sam Harris talks about this, captured by your community, too. Oh, yeah. So sometimes that can be like,

Starting point is 00:33:06 you can't say anything. You've built this community that believes one thing, and then Saga comes out and he's, like, saying something contrary to the faith, and then like the faithful are like wait you can't say that i'm quitting like no more subscription for me so what are your thoughts on this topic of capture it's a great question and actually that's another thing i'm so proud of is that we thought about this from top to but before it was launched like we conceived of it specifically to not fall into this so for example you talked about

Starting point is 00:33:32 sponsorships we don't do any host red ads all the ads on our podcast are dynamically inserted by megaphone so it's basically like a youtube ad but in podcast podcast form. Do we make one-tenth the amount of money? Correct. Is it worth it to not have somebody call me and say, I didn't like what you said about Balenciaga? Yeah, it is. And that's also why we are able to pitch to say, hey, $10 a month, like pay for the premium subscription. On that front, this is another benefit of doing a genuine right-left show is part of what you're signing up for is by definition to hear something that you don't necessarily agree with half of the time when Crystal is speaking or when I'm speaking. So we've kind of cultivated an environment and an

Starting point is 00:34:15 audience itself, which doesn't cancel because of something that you say about, you know, one-off. Look, some people have, you know, in the past, I remember during Afghanistan, a lot of people wanted us to criticize Biden. And I was like, no, I was like, I support this policy. And we can get into that if you want. And I was like, I'm sorry. I was like, I've been waiting my whole life to get out of Afghanistan. And I was like, I've never seen a war end in a good way. And while, yeah, I think it's shameful, like certain things weren't tactically done. I was like, it's better than the alternative, which is spending $300 million a year for nothing to get guys get blown up in IEDs and just stay there for the next 15 years for a fake cause and a fake military and a fake government. And that was very controversial.

Starting point is 00:34:56 That was, you really weren't going to hear that. And a lot of people were pissed off. And the same thing. It was built in from the ground up of if a certain segment cancels, so be it. And also, we have three-legged stool of revenue. We got podcast revenue, YouTube revenue, and premium revenue, all three of which kind of reinforce each other. So I thought about it from the business perspective, but it's also a baked in kind of like

Starting point is 00:35:17 I said, ideologically, of look, you're not always going to agree. That's fine. The whole core tenant of the show is you can disagree and you can also still arrive at some very basic starting points and conclusions, which are good for you and they'll make you a happier person. So when you talk to Crystal and you're on the show, do you ever get like meta about this as in like the construction of the business and the business model because like all the time right now like bankless we have like a lot of the similar business models revenue sources that you do sponsor revenue which

Starting point is 00:35:48 is synonymous with podcasts and the YouTube they're the same sponsors right we also have like our inner circle where you can get like the ad free premium feed and you get to be in the inner circle and that's when you were talking about like receiving advice from people that you know are paying you 10 dollars a month or whatever then like we kind of have that same thing do you ever like talk about the philosophy of your own business while on breaking points. You have to get meta about it? Yeah, it actually just happened. One of our shows was blocked manually by FIFA.

Starting point is 00:36:16 We've been doing a lot of criticism of FIFA and the Qatari government. And this is just amazing to me. They pulled off our video, which was about the Iranian team refusing to sing the national anthem, which was an act of great courage. And they manually hit us with copyright to block our entire video. And look, wait, wait. Is this on YouTube? Yeah, it was on YouTube.

Starting point is 00:36:38 Oh, wow. And not only that, they actually, we have an unlisted feed that goes to our premium subs, a video link. They've blocked that too, which is kind of amazing. And, I mean, look, it's a blatant violation of the fair use doctrine, which, you know, for a basic explanation is that you are allowed to use copyrighted material as long as it is not the core tenant of your video. It has news value and you're using it to talk and convey about something else within

Starting point is 00:37:03 two minutes of content. It was 10 seconds, clearly, clearly within the bounds of fair use. And it was, you know, it was abused by FIFA because they don't want people to talk about that, probably covering for the Iranian regime. And anyway, we did a whole segment about that. And we were explaining to the audience, we're like, look, this is why we built our business this way. I mean, I tell people that all the time. I'm like, our videos get demonetized.

Starting point is 00:37:26 We know we're getting screwed with algorithmically for things that we're talking about. And this isn't even a censorship argument. YouTube is a business. The economy is in the shitter right now. They have ad CPMs. They have to hit. So how do you do that? You recommend anodyne bullshit content about giving $15,000 away to a homeless guy.

Starting point is 00:37:47 And then you serve a ton of ads on top of that. Like, you don't serve videos about Russia and Putin and nuclear war or a deep dive into, I don't know, like Chinese protests because that's controversial. And this is a fight that I've had with them. so many times, even in person. I've told YouTube this in person. I'm like, look, you guys claim you want to be a place for news? Sometimes the news is bad.

Starting point is 00:38:12 Sometimes the news is really fucking bad. It's sad. People get raped. People get killed. Children, you know, exploited. Like, but we are in a society, look, you have to talk about that. And so for us, like, our business is built such that we can talk about that, even when we know we're going to take a hit. Like, there's one version of breaking points, which is only,

Starting point is 00:38:33 YouTube ads supported. That's a nightmare. I know what that looks like. That's just chasing clicks, chasing clout, stupid-ass reaction videos. And then there's the version that we have right now.

Starting point is 00:38:44 You know, sometimes we'll do like 25, 30-minute deep dives into Russian nuclear doctrine. You just can't do that anywhere else. And that's what I love about it. Yeah, I love it too. Honestly, I think this form of media is going to eat some of the,

Starting point is 00:38:54 like, kind of, I mean, people see sort of the corruption. They see the capture. They're not stupid. They know. They sign up for the in-depth conversation. But let me ask you. So you are a creature like us

Starting point is 00:39:03 of social media and like digital media, right? And that's kind of a double-edged sword, right? So like, I guess a few thoughts to prompt this conversation because I want to get your perspective on like, you know, social media good or bad, media good or bad. One thing that's cool about like podcast and YouTube is like podcast, we have an RSS feed. Yeah. We control that RSS feed.

Starting point is 00:39:23 It's ours. It's like a nice protocol that we can use to distribute. I love the RSS. Decentralized technology. It's decentralized technology, right? And so like we can put it out on Spotify, but we're not dependent on Spotify. If I can put it out on Apple, we're not dependent on them. If you don't like those products, if they somehow delisted us,

Starting point is 00:39:39 then you go spin up another podcast player and you can get our podcast. YouTube is not like that, right? Like there's no RSS feed for YouTube. We're kind of, and we've been to platform before, I think like 24 hours or something. We just pulled all of our crypto content. Yeah. And, you know, the CEO of YouTube reached out. They apologized, that sort of thing, but it's like an Algo flagged us and they're talking

Starting point is 00:39:59 about crypto, no good. So we have that piece of it, right? It's not as decentralized as we'd like it to be, of course. And then the other piece we have is, and social media can be a place where, I mean, David and I met on social media, right? Like, we get so much information. I get so much enrichment from, like, sources like Twitter, for example.

Starting point is 00:40:19 I do think it's the base layer, like, you're talking about Powell. He logs in, he gets like, that's how he decides when to move the rates. I mean, this is a wealth of information sits at the bottom of society, but it's also this place of outrage. It's also this, like all of this, you know, it's hard to verify things, this kind of disinformation that goes on as well. And so people have different answers to that. It's like, let's censor it. What's your take on social media in general?

Starting point is 00:40:44 Is it good? Is it bad? How have you leveraged it? What if you learned about it? And where do you think it should go? I have a complicated relationship like you guys. You think I'd be sitting here if it wasn't for social media? In 1990, I'm chasing a Fox News show, which I'm lucky to get in, you know, at 56 years old.

Starting point is 00:40:59 It's the best thing that ever happened to me. Yeah, look, I'm just going to look at the good. I think that, like you said, Ryan, you and I connected because of social media. That's how I know what you guys are. When the SBF thing happens, what do I do? I look into the deep dive. I read a good profile. I go back and I watch, you know, Eric Forhe's interview with you guys.

Starting point is 00:41:17 We're on the confrontation. I go, you know, I can look at 12, 15 different sources all at once. I can see aggregate and awesome Twitter threads. And yeah, look, I mean, I think it's just incumbent upon us as people. And look, I think it is what you make of it. And you can control your user experience if you want to. I think the biggest problem is self-control. And, you know, maybe that's a little bit too individualistic.

Starting point is 00:41:40 But some of the best health and fitness content that you can consume is on Instagram. And also some of the worst health and fitness content you can consume is on Instagram. Some of the best financial advice you will ever learn is on Twitter and some of the worst. Same with news. Same, you know, with every category. So it's really incumbent upon people to use these things in a way that benefit them. And for me, I have connected and met so many people on social media that I never would have met. Otherwise, I've learned so much random information and expanded my perspectives and just went deep and even met people, you know, in real life that I've literally only have connected with on Twitter.

Starting point is 00:42:21 So, look, I think it's a net positive. I think it's a net good. Does that mean that there aren't existential threats? around, you know, the policies of misinformation, all that? Yeah, absolutely. That's why I'm a big believer in just regulating social media, quote, unquote, with the base layer of First Amendment. If it's consistent, we have 200 years of case law with the First Amendment here in the United States. If it's consistent with the First Amendment and it's not illegal, let fly.

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Starting point is 00:45:29 go beyond the limitations of the EVM. If you want to learn more, there's a link in the show notes to see how you can get involved with a fuel network. So on this censorship debate, like the Twitter censorship debate must taking over, like do you have a side, do you pick a side? Or what would you say about this? I see this is another thing. Look, I love Elon, like from a just like a vibes perspective. Like, look, anybody who's ever been in a Tesla, you'll think differently. even. I actually think that that is an important fact is like a lot of people don't actually understand how revolutionary the car itself is. Like you basically turned a piece of mechanical hardware into a software, which is stunning. I mean, getting into a Tesla is like the first time

Starting point is 00:46:07 he saw an iPhone 4. You remember that? Yeah. You know the silver iPhone? And you're like, holy shit, this is a phone. That's what it's like getting into one. It's insane. So I respect him from a baseline entrepreneurial level. That said, I think he's making some mistakes. I think Twitter blue is a huge mistake. The reason why is I think what we were talking about, Jerome Powell, all of that. Veracity of elite information is probably the core value of Twitter. Everything I've read says that Twitter ads are bullshit and are actually not particularly good ROI, part of why the company never had major revenue like meta or like Google.

Starting point is 00:46:41 So I'm a fan of charging, like creating some sort of Twitter for enterprise product, basically tiered pricing based upon the number of followers that you have. and then the number of tweets that you may want to send out, paired especially with like a customer service function. You know, I've thought about that a lot. Like, if you have ever a problem with a company, what's the best way to get in touch with them? You tweet at them.

Starting point is 00:47:01 And then American Airlines or whatever tweets back at you. Why do they get to do that for free? Like, that's a great, that's the best real-time customer service software ever existed. It's like, you should charge them for it and then build them like a CRM customer relations thing on the back end that they can use. And they could pay a shitload of money for that.

Starting point is 00:47:18 I probably would put that aside. first good original take on Twitter that I've heard in a long time. Thanks, man. Yeah, I've really thought about that one. But the reason why I care is I want them to have recurring enterprise level revenue so that they're not impacted by the advertisers. Because Elon is really flailing around right now. He's got a couple of, you know, the Content Moderation Council, I thought it was a disaster.

Starting point is 00:47:40 That's exactly what Zuck did over at Facebook. We all know that it was a total cluster fuck. And then every time, when Zuck actually asked them about the whole Trump getting deep platform thing, Supreme Oversight Board was like, no, you decide. It's your company. So I'm like, look, like, this is all a farce. Second, he said freedom of speech is not freedom of reach, that we will downrank, quote, hateful or harmful tweets. Who decides? You know, and I don't want Elon decide. I don't want anyone to decide. That's why I said things should be consistent with the First Amendment, because then

Starting point is 00:48:12 you get algorithmic treatment of everything consistent with as long as it's not illegal, as long as it's not doxing. it's a free for all. So on those couple of fronts, like, I'm not a huge fan of Twitter Blue just because I don't think it will actually enhance the Twitter experience, as evidenced by a lot of the fake accounts that happened. I want him to set up proper recurring revenue at an enterprise level that doesn't impact the veracity of information. And two, I do not think different algorithmic treatment of tweets is a good idea because fundamentally

Starting point is 00:48:42 I don't trust human judgment as to what is harmful, what is misinformation, what is true information. Oh, that was another one, the community notes function. I'm totally against it. I'm totally against any fact check ability to dispute or anything. Arrangement of facts, as I know, and as you guys know, from doing editorial stuff, is by definition a fact checkable. Like, you can always say, you left this out. You didn't put in enough nuance.

Starting point is 00:49:07 Like, let everything float. If people want to correct it with replies or quote tweets or whatever, they can. I'm really just... You're kind of saying just like let the free market take it. Yes. I mean, it's worked for 200. years, it's been a good system. I think that like crypto people listening would have a lot of residents in terms of what you're saying, because what you're doing is you're going back to like

Starting point is 00:49:28 base principles and core protocols. We very much think of like the constitution as a core protocol that governs society. Now that was written in analog documents, but we also have protocols that guide the internet, right? We're just talking about RSS. Well, that's a self-sovereign protocol, isn't it? Like, we could take our RSS feed and go wherever we want. We don't have to distribute on Spotify or Apple we can distribute wherever. I think the problem with the internet right now is we have built so much in kind of the outside of the open internet and in kind of the application layer. This is very much where we see like crypto like playing a rule. So like part of our solution to that was like yes to the First Amendment, right, would be a crypto take. But then it's also yes

Starting point is 00:50:07 to you credibly neutral protocols that don't get to decide. Right. So like Twitter could just be a protocol, just like email, TCPIP, right? And you could have clients. And it doesn't judge. At the base level, what the text actually is, there's no human decision makers involved. There's no kind of like governance committee that's saying, this is bad and this is good, and this is information, this is not. But you can layer applications on top of that, and people get to choose their own experience. We've gotten away from that with the app store and with the Twitter and with Facebook and that sort of thing. And that's why we see part of crypto is like restoring some of those values in small ways of like back to the open internet as it was originally in

Starting point is 00:50:47 But it's very much base protocols type of thinking. I think everyone gets caught up in this, well, if our guy gets control of Twitter, it's all going to be great. And the other side's going, no, if our person is in charge of Twitter, it's going to be great. And it's like an endless fight. And we're not solving things at the protocol layer. I don't know if you see that too, but that's what we see. I absolutely see it.

Starting point is 00:51:08 And actually, my great fear is that they're coming after email, coming after Google Docs. My biggest fear is ISP level blocks, which I do think is coming. We are one step away. We are one crazy event away from an ISP, like, remember the parlor thing? That was a big event. And look, I'm not saying I like parlor. Like, I'm not saying I even like what was going on on parlor. But the app store level Amazon, AWS type de-platforming, all synchronous, despite the fact

Starting point is 00:51:38 they're all different companies. I think that set the stage for one day. We're only one crazy event like Jan 6, 9-11 or BLM, protests away, depending on who's in charge, from some craziness. Hang on, can we just take a moment and actually provide some clarity for people who don't know what the parlor event is? And this is as a result of parlor was like where a bunch of the alt-right went to this new app, Twitter-like app. It was a Twitter competitor. Yeah. Twitter competitor, right.

Starting point is 00:52:05 And a lot of the alt-right January 6th instruction movement coordination occurred there. It was like when Donald Trump got deplatform, the, right decided that mainstream social media platforms were not welcoming to them. So they went to this place called parlor. And then what you're saying is there was this coordinated effort to de-platform parlor, the platform from the app store, from just wherever you can access it. And what you're saying is that that was just like too close to the metal of like base layer internet protocol level censorship. Yes. Well, I don't know if you guys saw this, but this was what scared the shit out of me because I saw when that happened, the floodgates were open. The sensors in Washington

Starting point is 00:52:44 at the governmental level were floating a Department of Homeland Security Patriot Act 2.0 to go after Jan Sixers. And you know, under the guise, you're like, what was happening? Well, there was a New York Times piece, I think, written by Kevin Ruse, which set up the war on signal, on the signal protocol. And they were like, hey, some Jan 6, you know, alt-right figures signaled each other. So we need to go after, you know, to end encryption. That's scary. That's the end game. And it's like the end game is going after the protocol itself.

Starting point is 00:53:16 And so like, as you said, like, I am a major believer in the base layers in establishing them, keeping them neutral, keeping them out of the hands of the feds, even with the private companies, making it sure that they know it's like you cannot fuck with this. Because when you do, it opens up. Yes. It is the gates of hell. Like, and look at China right now. The protests.

Starting point is 00:53:37 I mean, I don't think people understand. understand. They can track you when you're wearing a face mask and sunglasses in the nighttime. I don't want to live in that society, people. Like, I mean, we hard resonate with the points that you're making. Like, it is just like, and these attacks. It's almost exactly what we say when we talk about preserving the credible neutrality of the Ethereum protocol. These are the same words. Yes. It's cryptography, right? And the nightmare scenario is like a state level ban on encryption technology, right? Oh, my God. And to be. clear, these attacks can come from the right or the left. Anyone. Anyone. Exactly. Look, the Trump

Starting point is 00:54:15 administration took extraordinary actions through the Department of Justice to pursue emails of journalists and subpoenas. And that's, you know, that's another black box that all three of us, we have no idea. Like, the feds can access your information with basically nothing. And then on top of that, look, the point is, go read the Wired article that recently came out about the, Google Dragnet over January 6th. They used subpoenaed location data from thousands of people based on cell tower pings to find out exactly who was at a protest and geolocate them and then use that in court on top of using cell tower data to even pull the call logs of members of Congress and senators who were

Starting point is 00:55:07 inside the building on that event. Is all of this an apology for January 6th? No, but do I think that we should give up, like, our location data on our cell phones and normalize, like, AT&T, just willingly giving these stuff away just because the feds are doing an investigation? Like, absolutely not. Like, we have to preserve this. How about this, Saugert? So, like, AT&T, dolls that in with the Fed, and then disconnects your bank account, boom, basically, based in this. Canada, right. But, you know, it's funny. What happened? Remember, the Canada a protest. That was a big story in the country. The trucker in Ottawa, with the truckers, before Ukraine. They actually got kind of screwed because Russia invaded Ukraine and they felt wiped off

Starting point is 00:55:47 in terms of attention. But yeah, I mean, they were deleting your bank account. They're seizing crypto. I mean, what did you guys think of that in terms of from a crypto level? How do we get around that? How do we get around that? Yeah. This is why bankless, honestly, Saga, this is why trustless peer-to-peer money systems. And this is our great fears. All of those things you mentioned, these are hazards. These are externalities of entering the digital world that societies are creating. There's all of these digital fingerprints that can be tracked and can be captured. And so, like, one of the things we see is like cash is going away very obviously. I don't know. I don't use cash. It's so inconvenient. I never used. When I'm talking about cash, I'm talking

Starting point is 00:56:26 about like actual green in the US anyway, bills in your wallet. Like nobody does this anymore. And what was cash though? Well, that was like peer to peer. Yes. It was private. The government couldn't get involved, and it was a bare instrument so I could give it to you and you need to have it. Peer-to-peer transaction. In the digital world, we lose that, but we're not replacing that with anything in the traditional banking system.

Starting point is 00:56:48 U.S. dollars in your Wells Fargo account, very confiscatable, is not peer-to-peer. And so what crypto does is it preserves sort of access to value transmission networks for people in case maybe their nation state goes wrong. And it provides a banking layer to that too. But Ryan, do you remember when we were talking about the truckers who were getting debanked? Yes. We talked about this on like our weekly roll-up show, our new show where we cover the week in the events. We talked about this and we were like, this is bad. This is why we go bankless, blah, blah, blah. What's interesting from this, from the media perspective, we were talking about audience capture is like a decent number of our listeners came to us on Twitter

Starting point is 00:57:27 and we're like, well, have you guys seen some of the bullshit that the truckers are doing in Canada? A lot of Canadians. Yeah, yeah. And like, well, to some degree, like, no, I hadn't heard of every single thing that the truckers were doing. But like, we got blowback from our own community. It's like, well, I mean, like, we all want to go bankless, but you guys, they were effing up the roads. Yeah, they're like, are you on the side of the truckers? And we're like, no, we're on the side of base principles. All right. Like, when did we think seizing money is okay? I just went through this. I just went through this with the whole Andrew Tate thing. I don't know if you guys know. And I was like, look, I'm not saying I like Andrew Tate. But when you have a guy declared bad and then he's unpersoned from the internet in 48 hours, that's pretty scary. And everyone was like, well, is you saying Andrew Tate is okay? No, that's not what I'm saying. I know. How do you know who's next?

Starting point is 00:58:17 Who decides? I know who decides. It's Taylor Lorenz. It's Brandy, whatever her name is. Over at NBC News, Ben Collins, these like misinformation experts, Oliver Darcy, they can end you overnight. Like, do you want to live in that world? I don't want to live in that world. And yeah, I don't know why it is so difficult.

Starting point is 00:58:34 And I empathize with that because what they do is, of course, the point is it's always going to be an edge case, guys. Precedents are set in the edge cases. And then they creep in. First, it was Islamic terrorism. That's the funny thing. Everybody was cool when it was just Islamic terrorists. But, you know, it's funny.

Starting point is 00:58:52 My career, early career, was writing about terrorism. And I vividly remember this. You know, I was the typical, I didn't really think about it. I was like, yeah, fuck these guys. I hope they get arrested. I was reading an affidavit by an FBI agent about a guy. You wouldn't even know his name. Some 19-year-old who got arrested for trying to join ISIS.

Starting point is 00:59:13 FBI agent goes on Twitter, sees one guy who tweeted something crazy, makes contact. Now, after making contact, they chat for 12 hours a day for like nine months. And then the FBI agent is like, hey, you should go to Syria and fight for ISIS. And the guy's like, okay, buys a ticket to Syria. That's still not enough. And then he's like, all right, I'll. meet you at the airport at the gate. He shows up at the gate and they arrest him for material support to terrorism that's 25 years in prison. I mean, we're getting real close to entrapment there.

Starting point is 00:59:43 Wow. It's like, because it's that question of, well, would he have bought that ticket to Syria if you never asked him? I mean, it's up in the air, right? By the way, there are a lot of cases like this. There was this guy named the Harold Squarebomber. If you look into it, they basically told him to do it. They set the whole thing up. They were like, go buy it from this. guy, the bomb materials, all of this. And you know, now it's, it's a question of like, you know, we had the Grish and Whitmer kidnapping case. Like you had 14 people involved, 12 or FBI informants. It's like how many, there's more feds involved in this case than there are actual conspirators. It sounds like you support terrorism. Yeah, I know. So we've been talking about a lot about,

Starting point is 01:00:23 like censorship in the way that it relates to media. And I do want to zoom back out a little bit to dive down into a slightly different rabbit hole. One of the ethos, saga, about crypto is that we have this blank slate to do everything again from scratch. Right? Like we can rebuild this system and hopefully not F it up this time because our current systems are largely captured, corrupted, and broken. And so one of the new pillars out of this new industry that we call crypto is, of course, the new media, new media institutions.

Starting point is 01:00:50 And there's plenty of media institutions inside of crypto. We have like the journalists and the news desks like Coin desk and the block. We have like smaller, more indie reporting entities like the defiant and bank But since we have this blank new slate of media institutions, do you have any advice for us now that we have this new slate to not eff it up? Yeah. Like what lessons do you have from breaking points that we should apply in this crypto industry to make sure that this whole system can perpetuate into the future without corruption? Start with first principles. Start with building it so that you can't go awry in the way that they did.

Starting point is 01:01:28 And the way that everything went awry for them ultimately came down to centralization. I actually encourage you guys to read about the history of cable news. It's fascinating. There's a great biography and history of Ted Turner of CNN, what it was an originally conceived of, how everybody thought cable was so stupid, 24-hour coverage. Ultimately, it led to the partisan wars driven by a variety of things, from ratings to budgets from the rise of MSNBC, eventually to Roger Ailes, creating Fox News, and basically creating in 1996 the media environment that we all recognize today. which was set on fire by the Monica Lewinsky scandal. It's actually relatively recent, the world that we're all living in right now. It's a hopeful story because you can read that and say, oh, here's the exact time when everything went wrong. It was Lewinsky when everybody came obsessed with that. And then it was 9-11, a uniparty move of using this new form of communication to convince

Starting point is 01:02:23 the American people to go to war under false pretenses. And from that period, everything stems all of our politics today. So now we're living in this reimagining in the internet. And I still think we're very much in the infancy of the internet. Something AGM, Antonio Garcia-Martinez likes to talk about is, look, like, the internet is like the printing press. You know, it was chaos when the printing press was invented. There was a 30-year-s war. You know, the internet has barely been around.

Starting point is 01:02:51 Like the printing press, revolutions and religious... The Reformation, I mean... Yeah, the Reformation. Yeah, Protestant. Kings and Queens, the revolutions of 1700, then the glorious revolution. Like so many things happened as a result of the printing press. We are in our printing press moment. So many things can happen.

Starting point is 01:03:12 So to use that analogy from a media perspective, think about the incentives that were bad in finance. For financial media in particular, I think where it all went wrong was access. So what I'm reading right now is a biography of Warren Buffett. It's called Snowball. It's written in 2000. I highly recommend it. The reason why is Buffett's life and his wealth effectively tracks the U.S. financial sophistication from the day he began investing in like 1930s all the way up until he becomes the multi-billionaire, one of the richest men on the planet that it is today.

Starting point is 01:03:44 A lot of it was through centralization, through access, through manipulation. And so what I would encourage you guys to do is think about how you can continue to grow and kind of stay true to an audience, not just an audience, to stay true to yourselves, information, while growing your audience, without having to succumb to the inevitability when you do surpass them. Because you also have to plan for an environment in which you are the new mainstream. Nobody at CNN and all of them ever predicted that they would be where they are today. But there was a big mistake by doing so. So you kind of have to imagine and think about what it looks like whenever you are a big player.

Starting point is 01:04:24 Because that is when a lot – you know, it's easy for me to say, like all the things I'm saying, when it's going to be harder when, let's say breaking points, you know, 10 years from now, and the president of the United States calls me and says, I don't agree with what you said. No matter who you are, I can tell you. I've been on the side of that phone whenever people, very, very powerful people talk to you. It's scary. It's scary. It gets in your head.

Starting point is 01:04:45 And people over time, it eroded. They gave into that. So you have to plan and think about for that time, should it inevitably come. And then you've got to put the work in. That's the one thing we've tried to maximize for on the, I guess, sort of the freedom side, and the autonomy side is never to be beholden to anyone. Yes, so key. And so, like, never take venture capital.

Starting point is 01:05:05 Correct. Right? And because, hey, you don't have to. You could bootstrap this thing. I mean, we have the distribution technology now with the internet. Look at us. Look at us. And like, yeah, look at us.

Starting point is 01:05:15 Yeah. And like, I mean, then that gives you another master to serve. Somebody who wants their five, 10x, right? You go public. You have another set of shareholders. We don't want that. I mean, we want the content creators, is even myself to be like the people making the calls.

Starting point is 01:05:30 And then another aspect of that is like, we do have some sponsorship revenue, but like we have to be willing to fire any sponsor we have at any point in time. And so we can't have mouths to feed on our team that would cause us to have to make some kind of compromise type decision. So we don't want to grow too big. Do you know? Like we want to have enough margin in how we're building this thing.

Starting point is 01:05:53 Well, you want to scale sustainably. That's what you want to. Scale sustainably. And so that we always. have the ability to leverage to be like, this doesn't fit with our brand anymore. You did this, see you later, and we're not afraid to tell you that, like, you know, your product was shit. We thought it was good and it was shit. Like, we have to have that ability to fire our sponsor. So that's another piece that I guess we got to maximize. But do you think it's inevitable that

Starting point is 01:06:16 new media just like eats old media? Or do you think these like cable news, MSNBCs or like, because I could tell you people in my age group, I mean, I don't like consume any of that. All my media is, internet media basically it's podcasts it's like sources that i trust like i don't trust what's happening on fox news or cnn so like i don't i don't tune in there what i have done many monologues on is we're in the phase where they're waking up so now they know so previously it was you don't exist so if you ask people in washington before they'd be like oh he's wasting his time with youtube you know whatever that's how they love to denigrate you youtube as if youtube is it the most power is way more powerful than cable news.

Starting point is 01:06:56 Now it's, oh, he's an asshole. He's been saying this stuff on a show. So now they're at a point, they get it. They know it exists. But next is the war. And the war is where the danger comes, because that is when they start to pressure exactly what I was talking about. The ISPs, they start to pressure YouTube, they start to try and strike preferential deals.

Starting point is 01:07:20 They use their legacy brand and influence to effectively. guarantee them a place at the table that they don't deserve. So I don't think it's inevitable. I think it will be a massive war. You think it's a fight? You know, another way that they might fight the war is um... Fight to the death. Brib. Yeah. Well, a bribe. I'd be like, oh, breaking points. Okay, I'm CNN. This is a real thing now. Like, how about an acquisition? Yeah, I'd be like, fuck you. But again, like, how many people are going to say, fuck you? Right. Some people, listen, I mean, I've been there when a certain ball shaving company offered us a lot of money to read an ad. And I was like, no.

Starting point is 01:07:53 It's one of those things we're like, no. It's just, it's one of those things where, but it's a surreal moment. And, you know, you have to be, you have to think and you have to have that wherewithal to say, like, look, there's something much bigger at stake here than like the check that you're offering me. So it's one of those things where, unfortunately, like, we're going to have to pass on this. For a lot of people, though, that's a difficult decision to your make. You're right. I think that, but honestly, I don't think they will come to that because. By definition for all of us to succeed, we have had to do things which are just not capable of operating in that environment.

Starting point is 01:08:31 Like, I could not get hired by CNN. I have insulted and gone after almost every single major anchor on that network. Like, it's not possible for me to be congruent with their brand. Almost same with Fox. Same with MSNBC. So when I... I don't think banks would hire me or Ryan either. Right, exactly.

Starting point is 01:08:47 Like, you guys are done. That's a good thing, actually. No, that's... Well, but could you ever work for someone again, Sager? I'm probably not, right? I don't think so. You're broken for me. It's a blessing and a curse.

Starting point is 01:08:57 Yeah, true. Okay, okay, so we've got a few more things we want to cover with you. And I'm almost tempted, like, because there's a few things we want to ask is like just to blitz this next section. Be my guess. Can we just hit politics really quick, another broken institution? And I'm going to ask the real, because this is not a politics show. So, but I want to ask the real, maybe the dumb questions that are at top of mind for me

Starting point is 01:09:16 anyway when I look at politics. Okay. So the first is, what about 2024? Okay. Who's going to be running? who's going to win? Is this a Biden versus Trump thing again? Most likely. Do we have to do that again? Most likely, yes.

Starting point is 01:09:31 My God. I don't see a current way out of that predicament. There's a couple of ways. Front runners, both the front runners. I believe, like, status quo right now, Donald Trump and Joe Biden will be the nominees of their major parties and will be headed up against each other. Several things could happen. What are the odds that if Joe Biden is elected, that he dies in four years? Well, that's actuary tables. People doing that. I was going to say, Take a look at an extra rail table, my friend. Like, not good for him. Look, there are a couple of ways out of this.

Starting point is 01:10:00 One is either man dies. Possible. They're both eight. They're both like when Biden just turned 80. I think believe Trump is 78. So that's very possible. Distinct. Second, Trump is indicted and convicted.

Starting point is 01:10:12 Indictment does not preclude conviction. So that's possible. Conviction could be one way to take him out. Although it's not without precedent that you can run for president from prison. So that could set up an interesting... What? That would be interesting. Legal question. Yeah. A socialist candidate did it in like 1920 something.

Starting point is 01:10:30 And if you'd elected, they just bring it out. But it is possible. And legally, it's been declared. Self-pardon? Great question. No, they have to come to you. Yeah. I don't know.

Starting point is 01:10:39 I don't know what that would look like. So that's one. He could get invited. He could get convicted. The third and least likely possibility, in my opinion, is that he's defeated in a GOP primary by another candidate. And I don't see a viable path. for any prospective candidate that could make that happen.

Starting point is 01:10:54 Not even DeSantis, Florida. No, I don't think so. I mean, I could give you a long spiel. I've done it many times. But the most basic is this, which is that if you look at preference for the DeSantis hype, the truth is, is that it's almost all college-educated GOP voters who prefer him in an actual head-to-head matchup with Trump.

Starting point is 01:11:13 Trump, in terms of the base, has a deeply special relationship. He's the most popular Republican in the party since Ronald Reagan. and his level of support and enthusiasm, specifically amongst the primary base, is so intense. Second, in any world where DeSantis were to run against Trump, there would be several other candidates. So, for example, Mike Pence is thinking about running right now, Nikki Haley, Mike Pompeo, several senators, Asa Hutchinson, who's the governor of Arkansas. So by definition, the anti-Trump vote will then get diluted. So the only way that it might work if it was in a head-to-head matchup, but even in head-to-head,

Starting point is 01:11:49 I don't personally see it. I could be totally wrong, by the way. I've been wrong a lot, so I don't know. Yeah. Okay. All right. So how about this then? Because this dovetails the next question.

Starting point is 01:11:57 If that's the lineup, probability of a civil war, all right, of some actual conflict. Right. Right? Like, it was a zero probability for me like five years ago. It's no longer a zero probability event. What do you think about this? Is this a possibility? I, you know, it's funny.

Starting point is 01:12:12 I think if the GOP had done much better during the midterms, I actually would have said yes. Not war, but like violence. And the reason why is that would have set us up for like genuine constitutional crises. Like if a Doug Mastriano wins the gubernatorial election in Pennsylvania, like he's straight up said he wouldn't certify the election, you know, in 2020. And the governor of Pennsylvania selects the Secretary of State. But in all of the major battleground states, not only the state legislatures stay Democratic or go more Democratic, the Secretary of State candidates or the gubernatorial candidates in

Starting point is 01:12:44 charge all won their races. So that will set us up for a lot. less high-wire scenario that we've had in Georgia and Arizona last time around, which set the stage for stop the steel and the lack of election certification at the capital level. So I'm less worried about that, Ryan, than you are. Although, look, I mean, anything can happen. I don't know. Well, let's do a blitz through economic stuff.

Starting point is 01:13:08 It kind of feels like the American dream is dead, that old institution. So, I mean, two factors. One is inflation. The other is wealth inequality. Let's talk inflation first. Who's to blame for inflation? It's a multifaceted question. If I...

Starting point is 01:13:25 Well, what type of inflation? Do you mean in the past? Thank you. Thank you for asking that question, right? It's like the type of inflation that we talk about on bankless is like people mistake, they think inflation is just CPI. Yes. But there's also another piece of inflation, which is asset price inflation, which is like wealth.

Starting point is 01:13:40 Inflation, you have to take both those into account, but if you do when they talk about inflation. But yeah, I guess maybe past. the last, let's call it 10 to 15 years and then now kind of current in both forms, asset price inflation and CPI inflation. So asset inflation, obviously, has to do with Federal Reserve zero interest rate policy over the last like 15 years has just dramatically changed. I think our entire society is not grappled yet with what non-zero interest rate looks like.

Starting point is 01:14:08 That's why, like, we're all teetering on recession. You know, you see all of these major companies, Walmart and, you know, Google and all this other cutting or downsizing for the first time, Amazon, even downsizing slightly. A lot of that has to do with debt on their balance sheet that has just been zero for a long time that they have to start paying down. You know, it's interesting. Actually, it's having a big media place, Discovery, which is the new controller of CNN. They've got 67 billion in debt that they have to deliver on over the like a five to 10 year period, which is having them curtail jobs over at CNN, actually today in terms of layoffs. So asset price, like I definitely think.

Starting point is 01:14:46 that's mostly federal reserve. The secondary part on CPI, that's a much more multifaceted question. That has to do with demand, pandemic, supply chains, to be honest, maybe this is unpopular with crypto guys. I think a lot of it is supply chain right now, because it's a confluence of demand, both from government printing and spending and people cash in their pockets on top of, like, unprecedented demand combined with a supply crunch historically. both from the invasion of Ukraine and just general chaos shipping and all of that post-pandemic. So it's a tough one. There is no one-size-fits-all answer to that question.

Starting point is 01:15:27 I'm glad to hear you say like central bank and the Fed because I think the politicians don't often talk about that. And I don't know why. Maybe it's just different. They don't understand. They're smarter than they talk, I think. No? You know.

Starting point is 01:15:41 Some of them are smart. I mean, every once in a while. But I would say you're a replacement level member of Congress. No. Not at all. Well, that is a very bleak image of our leadership. It is. Let's talk crypto real quick. So can you give us the perspective, first of all, on FTX?

Starting point is 01:15:58 Like, we've been in the bubble. You mentioned the Vorhees and SBF debate, which had a role to play in some of this, of course. But we're very conscious of cryptos looking real bad to outsiders. That's not good. And it doesn't matter how much people like bankless say, but it was just another bank. What we trust with our private keys? This was not peer to peer. This was not real crypto.

Starting point is 01:16:19 Everyone outside's like, yeah, sure, guys. Another scammer in crypto. What else is new? How does this appear on the outside? What's your impression of it? What do you think that the media's impression of this is? Yeah, I'm not going to lie to you. It's not good.

Starting point is 01:16:34 People are not happy. I just did a video about how I lost several thousand dollars on BlockFi. So that happened to me. I'm sorry. That's all right. Look, it was greed. Here's the thing. They're paying 9% interest.

Starting point is 01:16:45 I should have known. You know, it turns out FDIC exists for a reason, especially whenever it's banks. Let's put that aside. I think, look, it's bad, but there's an opportunity. FTX is not even a story about crypto, to be honest. Like, that is a Theranos-level Enron tale of corruption, of fraud. There's so much to say and think about it. There's the political angle in terms of trying to buy influence and work with the SEC

Starting point is 01:17:11 or to try and get regulated and bring his quasi-regulatory framework through humongous amounts of political donations. There's that level. That's a story in its own. There's the media level of, and, you know, this is what I think the real blame is, is that the media has not done a good job of explaining, like, what crypto is. There's crypto, like, actual, like, peer-to-peer money. There is crypto companies, like the blockfis, the coinbases, the Gemini's of the world.

Starting point is 01:17:38 We call them crypto banks. Crypto banks, good. That's a good way of putting it. Yeah. There's crypto, like, banks. then there are like the charlatan like the crypto influencers so you know for sbf to be granted the quote crypto emperor you know in the new york times and clearly because he not only donated to their best ideology but like really believed or at least fronted that he believed in it i don't know it's a fascinating

Starting point is 01:18:03 kind of tale that said i do think it's an opportunity you know from the ashes rise of phoenix so maybe it's a good opportunity especially if jemini goes bust which i think is probably You can tell me it doesn't look good for them. Based on what I've seen right now, I think it's an opportunity to get back to first principles. So, like, for me, I got into crypto well before any of the explosion of all of this wealth. I met Balji Shrina Vosin in, like, 2017. No way. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:18:29 And so he was somebody who was explaining to me. From first principles. That's how he talks about this. Yes, from first principles. And also, this was in the age of Bitcoin maximalism, talking about, like, Bitcoin as like, Bitcoin and of Cryptos. as an alternative to the social forces and, you know, the monetary forces that were pushing us in a more centralized... I really vibed with that.

Starting point is 01:18:52 And I have not... Something along the way changed to let's all just get fucking rich. And I think this is a good opportunity. Let's get back to that. Because that was cool. I was a big believer in that. That's why I got into Bitcoin in the first place. How much of the Breaking Points community is, like, crypto people?

Starting point is 01:19:09 Like, how much of our community and your community overlap? up? I don't know. It's hard to say. I probably have a much less online audience. Does that make sense? There are a lot more like, I don't mean it's in a derogatory way. They're normies. Like they're living their lives. Like I'm probably the only news they really consume. They're aware of crypto. They probably heard somebody talk about it in terms of like personal assets invested, probably higher than the general population. And it typical for a millennial or Gen Z or Gen X type person who is willing to flirt with it, but generally doesn't know a whole lot. Yeah, that makes sense.

Starting point is 01:19:46 Sagar, do you have any advice in terms of how crypto can kind of repair? It sounds like you're saying go back to first principles, right? Go back to maybe the bankless thesis of like peer-to-peer money. Yes. Which is don't store your money in crypto banks and, you know, verify, don't trust, that sort of thing. Is it more than that? We do a better job communicating our message.

Starting point is 01:20:07 I mean, you said media isn't talking about this well. and they're certainly not, but like, how do we do better on this front? Probably the toughest element is going to have to be, and this is uncomfortable, is calling people out when they're doing really, really well. I mean, I think there was a big opportunity to call SBF and some of these guys, and you'd be like, this guy is a fucking fraud, and I know that's really uncomfortable. Like, I get it. Especially when they're on time.

Starting point is 01:20:31 Anyone can say it now. Seven months ago, this kid's a multi-billionaire. You know, like, who am I to say it? but let me tell you, there's currency in saying it. There's currency in challenging it. There's currency in calling out the charlatans. And there's currency in staying true to who you are. And as we have all learned through this time period, like for me, the only guys in crypto that I'm still really like bought, like the people who I know who are into it well before anybody was getting rich, well, well before, they're the guys that I'm sticking with.

Starting point is 01:21:03 You know, because we've ridden out the wave and most of them were calling out the NFT. and some of the other insanity that was happening. And they're still in the game. And so, like, again, it's an opportunity right now. Yeah. Like, it really is. There's a lot of disaffection, and that's okay, you know? I couldn't agree more.

Starting point is 01:21:20 Yeah. And it kind of goes back to that Forhees episode, really, who was like standing for base crypto protocols. And he's been in it since, like, 2013, right? He's been here for the right reason. And so... I remember reading about that. Yeah, very different.

Starting point is 01:21:32 Like, the class of the OG books. The OG, the class of Forhees, the class of Belagi, the class of the, you know, class of even Vitalik. So Sager, this has been a pleasure, man. I feel like we could go on another hour, but you're just really fun to talk to you. Thank you. Appreciate that, guys. And I think we found, like, our sibling political. In politics? Yeah, the bankless of politics in breaking points. So, hey, that means a lot. It's really cool to talk to you. I'm glad we could make this happen. Shout out to you guys. I'm a fan. You guys did a fantastic job with that SBF, Eric Borees thing.

Starting point is 01:22:00 I'm going to try and get you guys more credit for that because I think you really deserve it. You built like a genuine space and a platform where no bullshit and Eric. completely full of bullshit and you deserve a lot of applause for that. So I wish you guys nothing but success. Thanks a lot, man. We appreciate you. And some action items for the bankless community today. Number one, you got to go subscribe the Breaking Point podcast on YouTube and in RSS. This is my wife's favorite podcast above bankless by the way. Shout out to your wife. I also enjoy it. And also, Saga hosts another podcast, we'll include a link to. It's called the Relignment Podcast. There was a book mentioned, anytime a book gets mentioned, as is tradition.

Starting point is 01:22:41 We include it in the show notes. It's called Snowball. Go check that out if you're interested. And of course, got to end with this. Risk and disclaimers, we always let you know at this point in the show that none of this has been financial advice. Crypto is risky. Defi is risky. So is Eith and Bitcoin.

Starting point is 01:22:56 You could lose what you put in. We are headed west. This is the frontier. It's not for everyone. But we're glad you're with us on the bankless journey. Thanks a lot.

Bankless - 147 - Why Mainstream Media Sucks & How to Fix It with Saagar Enjeti

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