Bankless - Why Crypto Needs Boys Club with Natasha & Deana | Layer Zero

Episode Date: September 29, 2022

The Boys, Natasha Hoskins, and Deana Burke, co-founders of Boys Club are back for their second appearance on Bankless and first in-person inaugural Bankless Studio interview! If you missed the first episode, Boys Club is a social DAO that is made up of women and non-binary individuals who are a perfect mixture of crypto-curious and fully crypto-pilled individuals. If you haven’t checked out what Boys Club is building, you really should anon. The vibes are immaculate and they are a force to be reckoned with. ------ 📣 Swell | Liquid Staking for the People https://bankless.cc/swelldiscord  ------ 🚀 SUBSCRIBE TO NEWSLETTER: https://newsletter.banklesshq.com/  🎙️ SUBSCRIBE TO PODCAST: http://podcast.banklesshq.com/  ------ BANKLESS SPONSOR TOOLS: 🌱 LENS | WEB3 SOCIAL PROTOCOL https://bankless.cc/Lens  🚀 ROCKET POOL | ETH STAKING https://bankless.cc/RocketPool  ⚖️ ARBITRUM | SCALING ETHEREUM https://bankless.cc/Arbitrum  🦁 BRAVE | THE BROWSER NATIVE WALLET https://bankless.cc/Brave  🌉 JUNO | BRIDGE FIAT TO LAYER 2 https://bankless.cc/Juno  ⚡️ ZKSYNC | THE LAYER 2 SCALING ENDGAME https://bankless.cc/zkSync  ----- Topics Covered 0:00 Intro 6:39 What is Boys Club? 11:00 Boys Club Evolution 15:05 Why People Join Boys Club 19:47 Nation Builders 22:12 Boys Club DAO 26:10 Infrastructure Template/Playbook 33:07 Building in Public & Authenticity 41:41 Will Boys Club Raise Capital? 44:50 Boys Club Roadmap 47:54 Boys Club Global 51:51 What Boys Club Needs the Most 55:58 Why Join & Why the Name? 58:10 Resources & Closing ------ Resources: Boys Club Podcast https://availableon.com/boysclub  Boys Club on Twitter https://twitter.com/BoysClubCrypto  BoysClub.vip https://boysclub.vip/  Natasha on Twitter https://twitter.com/natashaghoskins  Deana on Twitter https://twitter.com/medeana  1st Bankes Boys Club Interview https://youtu.be/Gtn8DOxEoqw  ----- Not financial or tax advice. This channel is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. This video is not tax advice. Talk to your accountant. Do your own research. 

Welcome to Layer Zero. Layer Zero is a podcast of unscripted conversations with the people that make up the Ethereum community. Crypto is built by code, but is composed by people. And each individual member of the crypto community has their own story to tell. The cypherpunks understood that the code they write impacts the people that use it. And Layer Zero focuses on the people behind the code. Because Ethereum is people all the way down and it always has been. Today on Layer Zero, we are once again talking with Natasha Hoskinson and Dina Burke from Boys Club. I've had them on before, but I didn't really know them as well as I do now. And I didn't really know the boys as well as I do now. And also, I didn't have this fantastic studio behind me as I do now.

And so this is the first ever episode in the bankless studio TM in my apartment in Williamsburg. And in-person shows are just so much better. You know, you get all the quality and scope of conversations by doing shows on the internet, but nothing beats the in-person vibes of a in-person face-to-face conversation. So it was a real treat having Natasha and Dina from the Boys Club in the studio on the podcast once again. And like I was referring to, with a lot more familiarity with what they're doing at the Boys Club and what the Boys Club really is. And personally, I really want the Boys Club experiment to work. First, what is the Boys Club? Let's define this.

The Boys Club is a social doubt, a social organization, focusing on women, non-binary, transgender communities. You know, the communities that, like, aren't in crypto. That should be. You know, crypto is typically, I mean, the meme is like, you know, basement dwelling libertarian types, right? And like, that's where we started with in 2010 to 2015. We've slowly expanded the pie of who is in crypto, but it's generally like white dudes. And at the very least, dudes. And so Boys Club is, in my mind, focusing on the rest of society and figuring out ways to get them represented and having a voice in crypto.

And one of the reasons why I feel so strongly about why I want Voice Club to be successful is because I consider myself a crypto citizen. I'm in crypto society. And personally, for my own selfish benefit, I would like it if crypto society looked like the rest of society. And that is really how we're going to onboard the world, on board the rest of society, is when what crypto is starts to look like and emulate more what the rest of society also looks like. So we need these less advocated for populations to come into the crypto industry so it can look a little bit like normal society. Because again, this is where I'm spending my time. And so the Boys Club mission and my mission for crypto are deeply aligned, which is why I care so much about Boys Club.

And that's not all, actually. It's the other cool thing about Boys Club is that it is a community first, and they're still soul searching for their product. But the community is the hard part, actually. Usually communities form around things that already exist. Boys Club is taking the, we're going to make a Dow, but they inverted it. They don't have a token. So, like, they can't really call themselves a Dow.

Yeah, they call themselves a proto-Dow. But they have this super-engaged, super-committed community. They have this core team that is all doing sweat equity. no one's being paid a dime, but everyone believes in this mission, yet they're still working on defining what that mission is and defining how the doubt works. So I think this is a fantastic experiment is what can you build when you have a community, but you don't have a product. And so they are currently pioneering that frontier. And if the boys, the boys club can do it, then it sets a template. It sets a model for so many other people, organizations, Dow's movements

to follow in their footsteps. I see a lot of alignment, between the bankless movement and the Boys Club movement. And overall, just super happy to see this experiment unfold and happy to support it as best I can. I'll stop rambling here and we'll get right into the show with Natasha and Dina from Boys Club. But first a moment to talk about some of these fantastic sponsors that make this show possible.

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not your keys, not your profile. With Lens, your followers go with you to whatever social media application you want to use. And instead of being trapped by an algorithm chosen by that app, Lens lets you choose the way you want to experience your social media. Lens is a lot. is the last social media handle that you'll ever need to create. So in order to get started, there is a secret code word in the show notes. Enter that code word in the Google Forum linked, and you'll be well on your way to entering the world of Web3 Social. Natasha, Dina, what's going on?

Hi. How's it going? We're doing good. Well, loving the setup you've gotten here. Yeah, thanks for helping me inaugurate this whole entire video. Wow, so honored. Very honored. So deeply honored.

So you guys start off your podcast, which you guys are also podcasters. Yes, sir. With the same question every single time, which I thoroughly enjoy. It's a little bit of a bit. And you guys ask your, you guys take turns asking each other, what is Boys Club? Yeah. Why do you do this? We are constantly evolving.

It's a moving feast. It's a movable feast. It's a movable feast. And honestly, we're not really sure. I think that's part of it is that we're like trying to figure it out. I feel like every week we're like putting something out there, trying something new. And that's sort of evolving what Boys Club is, what it can be. But what is it? Do you know what's Boys Club?

As of this week, it is a social Dow, a media company, and a product studio. And it changes every single week. The answer changes. Yes. We might stick with this for a couple weeks and see how it feels. Yeah, yeah. This feels good. This feels really good. And also, like, it is a combination of a lot of the same topics each week. But, like, trying to find the through line is really what we're getting at. Like, there are some things that are definitely set in stone around Boys Club. but then how you package that is evolving. And also how you talk about it to people who aren't in the community and people who are not only coming into Boys Club Fresh,

but maybe coming into Web 3 or CryptoFresh. And it's like, where are the proxies that we can find in the real world that people will understand? And so that people have like a framework for thinking about like what Boys Club is. So that's sort of the work of it. So what actually is Boyce Club? And why is it so hard to define? I would say the like core of Voice Club is a community.

and that can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people, and it can also mean a lot of things in Web3. And so when you have a community that's sort of bridging the gap between Web 2 and Web 3 or just getting into it, what their perception of what community is outside of Crypto or Web 3 and what it is in it can look very different. So the core of Boys Club is like really smart people coming together and thinking about Web 3.

Yeah, I think we're a community. I think we are for people who are building in or interested in or curious about Web 3 or crypto, we center the voices of women. We center the voices of non-binary people, but we're really open to everyone. And I think one of the reasons why it can be so hard to define it, also sort of people's understanding of what community is for sure. But it's Dow, and the Dow, like, is at least in how it's taking shape in Boys Club, is like sort of this amorphous thing. that is more sort of like world building or like nation state building than it is like a startup with a one product or one service that we're like really narrowly focused on. So because it is like this sort of nebulous thing where like different people come in and energize different sort of

verticals, whether it's content and media or whether it's a product studio or whether it's an investment syndicate like it's like starting to get really wide. And so I think that that's like. Yeah. One thing I would add is that it's a brand. That feels like the truest problem. a statement around Boys Club. And that feels very distinct in Web3 when brand is sort of in the backseat for most companies that you see in this space. And for us, it's definitely the driver. And I first met you guys. We were introduced by our mutual friend Evan. As I learned about it, I was like, oh, this is quite interesting because it's a little bit inverted of a model as to what crypto's used to seeing. Initially, there's like a startup and then they need to create a community

around them. And then a community might arrive if there is like upside potential. But this is a bit different in that the community came first and now there's question marks remaining. So like, you know, what's next? And when we, I first had you guys on, what was it, six months or so ago. So how has that journey of exploration gone? Like, can you update us on the roadmap? First of all, I just want to say, you want to know why that's happened? Why we started with the community first? Because we both had failed startups. And we both like had like products that didn't work. And so we're like, we're never doing that again. Now we're doing that again. So honestly, that's like the true reason why.

Like we started with me first. Yeah, I would say like the biggest evolution over the last six months is when we started Boys Club in November, the motivator was really, we see a ton of smart, capable women sitting on the sidelines of what's happening. This whole new economy is being built and they're sort of just watching. And we felt a lot of conviction around making a change and designing for a space where women and people who didn't feel known and seen in Web3 could learn and grow and do things together. And what's been amazing is we started with that premise and then we got a bunch of

women in a room and they were all like, yeah, we're in. Like, what are we building together? And so that's really been the journey that we've been on is, okay, now what are we building as more and more people who didn't feel excited about this space or known in this space are coming into it and feeling really energized by what's happening. Yeah, we're all here and we're like, okay, what's next? Let's like do something together. And I think that that's been such a fun thing to do in like a community. And the Dow like format, the Dow like foundations has allowed us to do that really seamlessly,

right? Like bringing people in and working with people and collaborating with people and having contributors come in and out of the Dow. That to me, I think is like actually the true innovation of Boys Club, where we're were able to like harness this collective like human collaboration and in a way that like in web two would have been impossible. And now with Boys Club, like we have like 40 people like around the world that are like sort of aligning around this sort of shared vision and worldview. And I think that like that's actually what's really special about like doubt was I think

generally is that like it really allows for that. And I think that's just been so fun to do. One distinction that I want to make based on what you said is like the way that we think about. So there's about 40 people in what we would call our DAO, which is like the main, the founders, founding team, core team contributors. And then that's sort of the center of boys club. And then around that is our community, which is anybody who's in our discord, anybody who's going to our events consistently. Those are individuals who are really invested in Boys Club and engaged in the actual like work of community building but aren't contributing. And then the larger sort of reach of Boys Club is audience. And we've started to make those distinctions because we have seen that it's really important to have a distinction between your community and your audience because those two types of engagements with the brand are very, very different.

So anyway, you said, yeah. And we want to keep the community intentionally small. Like their audience is unbounded, right? Like that can grow to whatever. But like there's an intimacy in the community right now that like is really special that we want to preserve. and maintain that experience for existing members and for people who are coming in. And I think that that's why we're sort of like community does have a ceiling, but that's appropriate, I think, at least for us.

And then the DAO is sort of this, what we call like a contribution gated DAO. So it's not like token. I mean, maybe token at some point, but like one token. But in order to be in the DAO, you have to be contributor. So that's like sort of the nucleus of Boy Scopes. A lot of other DAWs, other projects, they have this like, massive carrot for people to join them. And it's usually because the token price is going to go up.

Yes. Boy's Club doesn't have that yet, not yet, but people have joined the Dow anyways. And it's seen great success in producing a community without all of the other carrots that other orgs typically do have. Yeah. So what is the carrot? Like, why do people join Boys Club? Why do they commit their energies to contributing to this thing that doesn't have like

VC investment or like a protocol or any of these typical things? I think it's because we have a genuine belief that everything in Web3, like what is most powerful is using this technology to enable more meaningful and engaged human connection. Like that is what we're truly after. It's about connecting with people. It's about doing interesting things together, building meaningfully together in this space. And truly that's what we're after. Yeah.

I think people are drawn to that and people are excited by that and have found genuine friendship and connection. And like when we talk about community, it's not just like we're hanging out online. We are doing that. But it's about feeling known and feeling seen and having that drive your work in a meaningful way and having that drive your interests in a meaningful way. And so I think people are drawn to that and people talk about like the vibes and the energy and that's all true. But it's because of this like the heart of feeling a deeper connection to other. people around you. Yeah, I think that something that we've seen is that like the team and the contributors and to a certain degree, the community, like there's intrinsic motivation there for them

to be involved in Ports Club. And like that is so rare and so special. And like it's not lost on us that like that's like magic and like lightning in a bottle. And I think that that's a product of like, yeah, some brand that resonates, a shared vision certainly that resonates. And like people sort of being, feeling that they can show up with their full selves in this community in ways that like maybe at their day job in Web 3 or Web 2 or whatever like that may or may not be the case. And I think that also there's a lot of people see opportunity in the West Club as well. Like I know you guys do a shout out to the Bankless Job Board, but we have one too. And like there's a lot of women have found new jobs, better jobs, have recruited for their

startups. And so there's a powerful network in that too. I also think one of the things that has. pulled me into Web3 and got me excited about it last summer was this idea that this world is unfinished. It's in its design phase. Whatever it's going to be, it's not crystallized yet. And that presents a really exciting opportunity to be a part of designing what Web3 is going to be. And I think a lot of people in our community see us as an entry point and a launchpad into that world and into designing what the internet is going to look like, what human coordination is going like how like value is distributed through Boys Club. And I think that's attractive to a lot of people.

And I think that's a great articulation as to like what minimum viable Boys Club is, is that it is a platform for people that come into Web 3 and feel intimidated or skittish or scared. When they join Boys Club, they no longer feel those emotions. And it's very, very empowered. And so, like, in the most bearish future of Boys Club possible, all it is is a tribe of people that are grateful for the people that help support them in their early days. And maybe they go off and do other things, but they feel that loyalty and alignment and they bring back some reward, some treasure, some bounty that they earned out in the broader scope of Web 3 back to Boys Club. Yeah. To me, that's like the most bearish version of Boys Club. Yeah, I think you're right. I think that there's like a confidence building. I mean, like truly, like at its simplest form, like I think the value. that people get is like they come in and and there's like just yeah some confidence that they then

bring out into the world and their web three or whatever journey and yeah it's been so fun to see truly and you guys use the word nation building a lot can you go into like what does that word mean to you and why are you doing that why are you nation builders because that's a big term yeah the statement I think it's because it's really hard to boil down what boys club is because there are so many sort of tentacles of what we're doing, what we're launching, because of the nature of the Dow and like the flywheel effect of that. And so talking about it as sort of world building is, I think, a clearer way for people to start to understand, oh, okay, they're like doing these events, they're doing this media stuff, they're building these products, they're doing consulting,

like all of this is still under the umbrella of sort of the world that they want to see and the work that they're doing as a community of people to build. the future together. And that language really has come quite organically around some of the stuff that we're doing. Well, we also ripped off Belaji. And there you are. We also often rip off of Bellagie on Bagelisk. So that's what he's for. So shout out to Bellagie. When are you come on the podcast? Totally. I don't know. Would you add anything? Yeah, I would. I think that that's totally true. And I think also like there's a lot of different plate spinning. One plate is like, where is the revenue. What's the money coming into the treasury? How does that work? What does the business look like?

So we're like working on our GDP figure, right? We're working on like what it is, foundations of the economy. And then also we are like, what's the governance? Like how do we just the Dow form? Like what's the voting? I mean, shout out to Parker who's like designing the like you submit a proposal and that the whole Dow governance piece. So we're creating also like a government, right? And then also at the same time, we're creating an economy, like the tokenomics of like what the future boys token looks like, how that gets distributed. So it's revenue business, it's government and its economy that we're trying to build all the same time. And all of a sudden, that looks like world building. So I think that that's like an extension of sort of why that's come about.

A part of what I see in the Boys Club Dow, the only other Dow that I see like it is actually the bankless Dow. Yeah. And a lot of that came from the fact that when, me and Ryan made the bankless Dow, we issued a token, we gave it to our community that we knew were aligned with us. We didn't spread it far and wide. We were like, this population of people have provably showed their alignment to like the bankless vision. Here's a Dow. And also me and Ryan are busy with bankless. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so we've like left this like void to them to like figure it out. Yeah. And as a result of that, you're starting to see not any sort of like top down leadership, which is actually something that it does differentiate boys club and bankless Dow. But what I, I

I do see as alignment is like there's these different like appendages growing in different parts of the Dow that are for now like unconnected or uncorrelated with each other. Like we have like bankless consulting over here. We have bankless academy over there. There's the rug somewhere else. The rug is like the onion of crypto hysterious. And all the only real alignment here is that it's under the bankless umbrella. It's under the bankless brand. It's under the bankless value systems. And one of the things we've been impressed by this is that without too much curation beyond the initial distribution, that community has done a bang-up job, staying aligned and using the brand appropriately. And the other thing is that each one of these things makes some sort of revenue.

They pay most of that revenue to the contributors and then a small kickback to the treasury to the greater org. But the cool thing is, is that it's not the greater org coming down with a top-down vision of what needs to be done. Yeah. It's you go and do that vision under the bankless brand and make your money, you know, pay yourself first, make sure you can keep on doing this. Give us the kickback of whatever you can. But it goes right into the conversation of a GDP of an org is like go do something that is inside of this country, inside of this nation. Get yourself paid. Get yourself a job.

Do it under the bankless brand. And then also, you know, pay like stone soup kind of model or, you know, pay back to the org. And like these are the only two. Dow's I see really like pioneering this model. I mean, I think for us, the thing of it is we want this to be a business where we love all the things about Boys Club. But I mean, my conviction, I think your conviction is that like we have a belief that DAWS are going to be the future of what organizations look like. And to be able to prove that out, this needs to be a sustainable thing for people. And it needs to have revenue. It needs to pay people. And we need to be

looking for those opportunities consistently so that that continues to grow the larger pot, the opportunities that are available. It is sort of the cycle that if you can unlock it, starts to feed itself. But for me, it's like I'm interested in building a big business and doing that through a Dow structure where incentives are aligned and people feel like they're getting value out of their work they're doing besides just getting a salary. And that's what's most exciting to me. So I think that drives a lot of our decision making around it.

Yeah, totally. We're experimenting. That's really what the phase that we're in right now is like, let's just like throw a bunch of stuff at the wall. This seems to be a structure that could possibly work with like, yeah, feeding back a percentage into the treasury and allowing for as much like permissionless innovation as like the brand allows for in the phase that it's in. And I think like, well, see, I mean, bullish. We're very much like in the design phase right now, which honestly is why it's exciting. Yeah, it's a blank slate of opportunity, of course. And one of the reasons why I give so many fucks about Boys Club is that first, the hard part is the

community. If you have the community, that's what so many companies, like other entities, people that raise money wish that they had. And Boys Club has that. They don't have the other half of the thing. Like they don't have like the product. They don't have the protocol. It's not a protocol. But like getting people to like believe in your community is the hard part. And there's so much thesis and like infrastructure and investment going into infrastructure. around this idea, like Variant Fund, for example, and the creator economies, like, they fund anything that can support this kind of ideas. Like, if you have a community, let's build tools and things for you to use to make sure that

this is viable. And so part of, like, the Web3 ethos is that if you have the community, you can have a world, you can have a nation. And, like, Boys Club, to me, seems like one of the most promising organizations out there that has a very engaged and committed community. and if Boys Club can pioneer and carve this path, if we're going to use bankless terminology and go into the frontier of we don't have a business model,

we have a community, but that's all we need. And if you guys, and if the Boys Club figure that out, a thousand other DAWs can follow in the Boys Club footsteps. Have you guys thought about this at all? Totally. I mean, I would love if and when we have that playbook or that roadmap and there's like some infrastructure that we can point back to, I'd love for there to be a countless number of forks of Boys Club, right? Where people are like taking the model of the community first, whatever comes next.

Because like not everyone feels seen by Boys Club, right? Like there's an infinite number of other communities and people who like, it's not their vibe, which is like, of course. Yeah, we'd love for people to like take this model and fork it. And then there's also, we sort of have half a mind that like there could be, does that look like sort of a Dowdow, where we have like a lot of these community first. brands that like take the sort of playbook that we've built and then do it themselves and then like does that feed into sort of a larger universe of like this I don't know so that's sort of like

half baked but that's something that we're starting to think about as well and for us sort of the trajectory that we're on is okay we've built this community that's been very validated to us especially in a bear market we felt like wow this is real like this is not just a hype cycle and And from there, it's how we have all these sort of evangelists for Boys Club, which presents an amazing opportunity to grow your audience and to have these media experiments of having a podcast, having a newsletter, like thinking about like a zine and doing these things that aggregate a zine. A little magazine. A mini magazine.

Okay. We can talk about that more. But like essentially having these media outlets that continue to grow your audience, which is really powerful. And then those channels present revenue streams. and those revenue streams feed into the treasury that give your treasury enough of a starting point, your seed funding, to launch products and do R&D and have all these experiments that you're launching. So that's really like the model is like, okay, you have all these evangelists within your community,

you build up your media properties to be able to bring in revenue. And then that revenue is building a ton and incubating small product studio type tests that then like a few of them click. And that's when like you have 100x margins. and that's when you like that model really starts to take off. So that's like the trajectory that we're on right now. Subject to change if it doesn't work. Who knows?

But that's how we're thinking about it at least. And then your audience like what's I think really smart about this is as you're building products, you have an audience that you're launching them into. You're not starting from. That's incentive aligned as well, which is like the really crucial part. It's not like just some random newsletter. It's like no people who like really care about like the success of whatever product is coming out of Boise Club and probably have been involved along the way.

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pretty interesting. And it's also just a very core part of the ethos of Boys Club. Yeah. By probably the product of the fact that... Almost to a fault. Almost to a fault. Yeah. Go into that a little bit more. Was it an intentional choice?

And how has it kind of impacted how Boys Club has unfolded? So if you don't listen to the podcast, you should start. It's called Boys Club. Not the Boys Club. Not the Boys Club podcast. We have a segment called The Feelings Check In where every week, well, two segments. We talk about what's happening in our Dow and then we do a feelings check in. And it is unbelievably transparent.

And I think. part of that was a lot of the feedback we had gotten from our community was like or from people in boys club were just like we want to be flies on the wall like how are we guys thinking about this what are the decisions that are being made the calls that dina and i have endlessly throughout the day what are we talking about and so we're like okay let's turn on a mic and see if people will listen and it's been really amazing the sort of response to that and people feeling really invested and really again feeling really seen in saying like these are the things we're thinking about every week These are the questions we're asking. These are things that did not work. These are the things that I have feelings about. And I think a lot of people do that behind closed doors. And you don't have an affinity as deep an affinity to the brand because you're not journeying along every step of the way with them. So that makes it sound more architected than I think it was.

Oh, it's not architected. I think I would have not done it this way. Dina was like, we should just do it. I'm always like, we've got to protect the brand. We've got to protect the brand. And Dina's like, no. No, I guess what I mean by that is like, that's just how we are naturally as people. Part of it was like, I don't really know how else to be.

Also, like, we're creating the world that we want to live in. And the world that we want to live in in Boers Club is like radically like feelings first. Transparent. Because that's who we are. And that's especially the core team that we sort of attracted to this. And it's just like anything else would feel in authentic. And so it's just like we're beholden to no one at Boers Club. We don't have any investors.

Like the only people that we were responsible to is the community. Because that, it's like, man, it's a community of people who, I don't know. want to hear about all these things that we're thinking about. I think another piece of it is like, which is like an added benefit is that DAWS are wildly inefficient as someone who is running one. Like just the most inefficient thing, right? And like there's so many challenges and so many problems and like could do a whole five podcasts on that.

But part of why they're so inefficient is because it's like all these disparate people who are distributed, whatever. And there's just like so much context sharing that needs to happen all the time in order to get people up to speed so that people can be making decisions that are like aligned and like we're just like constantly blah blah blah and part of like the benefit of us being so transparent on the podcast and being so transparent about our feelings is like there's context sharing in that where it's like here's where we're at this thing is moving and changing all the time like we might as well just share with everyone and so that we're all on the ride together and there's no like surprises I think yeah i think

you've taught me how to do that i think i would have felt more guarded to be that transparent and then there's two other things. One is that when people talk about like human coordination, there's so much of that in our experience of a doubt is having people feel like they can be transparent about the stuff that is coming up for them and designing for a culture where that is encouraged and appropriate because the fact of the matter is up until now, there's been zero dollars that anybody has paid themselves. So we're dealing with like sweat equity in every aspect of what we're doing with Boys Club.

And so feeling good about the work, feeling excited about the brand is essential because you have to be so bullish on what we're doing. And I think designing for a space where people can say, hey, this is coming up for me is really important. And the only way you can do that, I think, is doing that by example and having hard conversations every single week that you blast to your whole community. And then the other thing for me is I think I really wanted to, what I've thought about a lot in sort of my career and as a founder is if I'm looking at the world, I want to see in my workplace and in the work that I do, I want to show up in my full self. And I think there has been an example of what a leader looks like and what it means to be a founder that is very polished and sterile and doesn't allow for a complexity of what a human being is. And I feel really strongly that if we're going to do something and if I want to be on this

journey, then I need to, I want to see a different kind of workplace and I want to see a different type of leadership. And that's what's convinced me and Dina being like, we should just talk about this on the podcast. It is alarming and frightening when people are like, wow, I can't, you guys are so like open about. You're so transparent. I was like, oh man, what do we say? What did we say? And I think a lot of this goes to the very ethos that I hope Web 3 brings to the world. One of my personal fascinations is that we have all these code things. You have the Bitcoin blockchain. We have the Ethereum blockchain. We have layer two protocols. But it's really about how these systems impact culture. That is what moves the needle for like to render a society.

Totally. And a lot of that comes down to like a need to be authentic because you could imagine like if Ethereum was created behind closed doors at IBM. Yeah. And it would be like IBM to us, not us to us. Yeah. And that's really the difference between building in public versus building private, reducing a product to sell to others, right? Totally. And so the story of like the Moloch, meditation on Moloch, which is something that's like this blog post that's ingrained in like deep Ethereum culture is that it's not the top versus the bottom.

It's not the 1% versus the 99%. It's not us versus them. It's us versus us. And when you lead with authenticity, you make the listeners feel like this is us, not this is them. and I'm not being talked to I am a part of this journey because I'm in the heads of the people that have more influence and control over the organization than I do. And it kind of like brings down the barrier of what does it mean to help boys club down to just like listening to the podcast.

Like that's the minimum viable contribution. And I think it's like we've talked about like what are the carrots for bringing somebody into the club? Feeling resonant with the leadership is got to be a big one. And I think that's, I also resonate with so much of what you guys said with why people like bankless is that when people meet like me and Ryan, Ryan's only been to one conference. So this has only happened once for him. But like when people meet us in real life, a frequent comment is like, oh, you're exactly the same on the podcast as you are in real life. And people feel that. The more that they listen to the podcast, they say, oh, Ryan and David don't actually have the capacity of being inauthentic. And that's why we tune in. And that's why we listen. And it goes back to a little. bit of how you guys have not raised any funding because then you're beholden to your community, not to your investors, which are absent. And so it just leads with authenticity. And that's part of the culture that we hope Web3 brings. If we stop having intermediaries, VCs being an intermediary between a product and the public, then you actually are beholden to the public, not the upside of

like a smaller minority of people. And it makes these things scale out broader. It starts to blur the lines between the leadership and the community. Yeah. And everyone can feel as if they can actually have influence and control and upside in this thing. Yeah. Yeah, totally. Would raising capital be on the menu? Great question.

I think that for discrete and specific projects. So for the Boys Club, like community or Dow where I'm sitting right now, I can't really see that. That could change. It's all subject to change. I mean, we're changing all the time. But like, I can't really see that in like the model as it exists right now just because, like, I think we have a sort of interesting revenue or business model that, like, we want to try. But I can see, like, yeah, there's a product that spins out.

Totally. Then, like, for software, like, it often makes sense to, like, scale up in that way. Maybe for a product to spin out, but. Yeah. We're really protective of our community. Yeah. And we're always thinking about how are we driving value back to this community. And there would have to be a really clear exchange between the VAL VERRILLI

change between the value that was coming in and how it would benefit the whole of our community for it to make sense. And right now I don't really see how that could work. Again, that could change. But I do see in that model that I was talking about where we're incubating and launching products, when something clicks, then it makes sense. And for a protocol or a product like that, that is a very clear value alignment because you know exactly what it's going to do for you.

Yeah, I think like our decision making framework is like, is this in benefit of the community? And so I think it's like if that type of opportunity would come up and like there was a structure that made sense and everyone was like, yeah, totally then like great, let's go. Yeah. We also had a we had a really interesting conversation with Amanda.Dath a couple nights ago. She's great. She's amazing. Amanda Cassat. Yeah.

And she was talking about how when you don't raise venture, it's sort of like you're riding in like a low rider car that doesn't have any suspension. and so you can feel every like stone and stick as you're driving. But like that that's, there's something in it where like you're really in touch with what you're doing. Versus when you raise venture, you're like, you're cushioned. You're like in a SUV, right? You have like a nice cushion, but that makes you a little bit removed from like the realities of like what's actually happening in the business. And of course, for some projects and for some circumstances, like it makes perfect sense to raise venture. But I think like that just like really resonated with us where we're like, man, okay, that's the game that we want to be in right now.

we want to be really close and really in touch with like everything that's happening in this business so that we're building it responsibly and like we're shepherding it in the way that like it should be and we're like turning over every stone yeah and it's hard to do that when you have the luxury of like cash cash does a road map of sorts or how far does that thing go if it does exist um yeah it's got a roadmap we've got in the two like media company and product studio so on media side. We're working on a zine, which is basically a lo-fi magazine for those who don't know, a cooler magazine. And working on what is a Web3 sort of native approach to that type of media and what's sort of an interesting experiment we can do around that, really thinking about the touchpoint of like culture and crypto, which is, I think, sort of the sweet spot for us. And then we're also... I think just to say a little bit more about that. Like right now, the way that the revenue from media is coming into Boys Club, it's Web 2, right? Like, there's no innovation

there. The only innovation is, I guess, sort of like the content and that we're talking about Web 3. But like, I think we're like really quickly wanting to transition to like what's actually the Web 3 native iteration of that from a media perspective. And are those margins more interesting than like Web 2 native media, which aren't really? And so those are the experiments that work. And how people seamlessly contribute in and out of those media properties. So we're also launching a second podcast. Yeah. Shout out for a second podcast number two.

Wow. Not us. Not us. Not more talking from us. Someone else coming in. But under the same RSS feed or a new RSS feed. Under the same. Nice.

So that's coming soon. For the record, there's very, very few podcasts that I listen to every single episode. Thank you. And Boyce Pub is one of those. David. So kind. Honor.

So kind. So that's the media roadmap. And then the product roadmap, we have one product that is almost done that will be launching soon and that is sort of an NFT portfolio tool and then two products that are in the works and very much with the like spiritual concept that these things are like we're throwing them out there like we will have many many products is the vision and a few of them will stick and it's not like this is the boys club product it's like this is one in a suite of things that were just like try some stuff yeah and like it out there yeah and like how quickly can

we get some people around it to build it and put it out in the world and see if there's traction. So that's the roadmap. And then obviously, I mean, we haven't talked about this at all, which is kind of funny, but like, we're big on in-person stuff. Lots of events. So we're doing some stuff at DevCon. We're doing some stuff at Arbazel. So that's just like all the time because we love it. It's the fun. And we have truly this belief that when people get in a room together, amazing things happen. And doing that with some natural wine is sort of the way to know. There's a meme about the crypto space that it's all dudes, right? like 90% dudes and it's probably true.

But also at the same time, every time somebody goes to a crypto event, whether it's a dude or a woman, they're always surprised as to how many more women there are than their expectations. And so like on the internet, on crypto in Discord, it's like maybe 90, 10, 85, 15 men to women. But in real life, it's like closer to 70, 30, sometimes 65, 35. Yeah. Like it actually starts to balance out pretty damn well in contrast. Yeah.

And so it makes sense that Boys Club is present in, in real life, where it actually matters. Yeah. Yeah. Culture only goes so far inside of Twitter. Crypto is here to change the whole full scope of the world. And so it has to show up in real life. And so this is why I'm always so bullish Boys Club is because, cool, we're doing the protocol stuff like on the Ethereum, like, whatever side. But in order for Ethereum's values to be expressed, it needs to show up in real life.

And Boyce Club is like one of the first things that's like our value prop is the real world, is real life. Totally. One of the things that we're experimenting with is something that we're calling Boys Club Local, which is like, first of all, there's this concept of like a headless brand, right? And like how does that grow and how does it sort of evolve? But while maintaining the integrity of the vision and the mission and the brand like identity and voice and vibe and all these things, that's showing up especially in this idea of Boys Club Local, which is like giving sort of the brand to people in different communities to sort of create their own little things. and their own little like network and to grow it.

So we're starting off with two experiments with Boys Club Local, one in Austin and one in Singapore. And basically these were both women who came to us and were like, hey, I think there might be sort of the seedlings, there might be the fertile soil for something that could look like another Boys Club outpost in Austin or in Singapore. And we want to like explore it. And so that's like what we're working through right now is like, okay, great, love it. but like how do we do it in a way that like doesn't dilute the brand that adds to it right and I think

that like that's totally possible but like we're really like at the very front edge of like how to execute on that because it's also something that is so integral to boys club is a sense of humor that is very contextual like we talk about things that are happening in pop culture and in New York and like all of those things are funny because there's something about it that you know because it's your world. And we want that to show up in these other offshoots of Boys Club locally and that are very context specific. And so we don't know what's funny in Singapore. I have no, literally no idea.

Not a clue. Not a clue. And so how do you give somebody the tools to show up like Boys Club, but with the context and the sense of humor and their sort of culture is a really, really interesting question that we're facing very actively right now. But I think that the only interesting, like, there's such a more interesting flywheel effect if we can figure out what that model looks like and do it a hundred times over. That's brand and community growth on a scale that, like, is really new and like really

compelling. So we're really motivated to figure it out despite there being many, many challenges and risks around it. What does Boys Club need the most? Ooh. We're just... One thing that's really cool about Boys Club is there is a lot of dev talent in the room, which feels very unique. But we're sort of looking for like a leader around that.

And maybe it's in our community and that's still ongoing. But I think somebody who would want to step into like, we're going to be like the ultimate CTO of Boys Club. Again, that is something we literally were talking about this morning. so it's like real fresh. And honestly, who knows, someone could be sitting in our Discord who's like, excuse me, that's me. But we do have like really great dev talent who like Angela did our NFT drop.

Like there is a lot of that in the room. And it's like amazing. And it's sort of how do you continue to like nurture that community? We're always looking for like sponsors. I think it's just like sharing voice club with like the people in your life who you think it would resonate with. I think that's the biggest gift that we could get. How many full time people work at Boys Club?

Zero. Full time? I mean, it's so funny because people are like, you guys aren't doing this full time. And I'm like, no, no, we're doing this full time. And then we also have full time. So that's sort of the world we're living in. Yeah, exactly. It's not when someone's like, oh, you're side hustle. I'm like, that's one way of putting it. But everybody has jobs. Like everybody's, you know, has jobs. And then they have voice club for now. But there's about 15 people on our core team. And then that like Dow nucleus, including contributors is about 40 people. And we've again, we've intentionally kept that very. small. So glad we did. So glad we did version one of the Dow as a small thing because honestly you're like you read all these Dow blogs and threads and you're like, okay, cool. Like, Dow's are awesome. But you don't know like what it's like to face a Dow proposal and vote. And you don't know sort of all the challenges and everything that comes around it. Like until you've and you've done one. And the first proposal that came there. The first team conversation was like, wow, I'm so glad we didn't roll this out to the 2,000 people in the Discord first.

I'm so, so glad. And so that would be like, actually my one piece of advice is that if you're considering starting a Dow, just like start with as small minimum viable community, minimum viable Dow is like as small as it can possibly be big enough so that it's like sort of statistically relevant. You're getting all the insights and all the learnings and everything, all the data back to like make decisions about what it grows into. But like, man, so glad we did that because that first proposal and like the feelings

check in post first proposal voting was like, they were raw. And it would have been like had we had done that with 2,000 people, yeah, would have been like maybe something that we wouldn't have been able to walk back. Yeah. And then there's about 2,000 people in our discord. And that's been also intentional to keep it gated at that. We have about 150 people who apply a week to be in the discord. And it's like, how do we balance an intimacy that we want to keep in, but also like like great talent in so that they can be a part of that nucleus. So that's another. And also like not even necessarily great talent. Like just people who what we're sort of look at.

for in the application when people are applying. So we're an application gated discord. We're not a token gate at discord yet. We're not like a pay gated discord. It's just like we need to have something there to protect the integrity of the community. And I think what we're looking for in the application is just like intention. Is like are your intentions good? Are you looking to pour value into the community as we are every single day and as the core team is and the contributors is like pouring value into or are you looking to extract from this community? Are you looking to like show your thing or to like whatever? And so that's just like really what we're vetting for in that application. It's more than anything else.

Why should somebody join the boys club? Man, I can think of so many reasons. I'm trying to think of like the one that would resonate with the bankless community the most. Honestly, for me, if you're in this space and you are really thinking about building something and you're wondering where to start if you're looking for interesting people to work with, for interesting people to talk with about what you're building. I think that's one great reason. Yeah.

I think also like if you're like interested in sort of this like culture and technology crossover or like culture and web three crossover, it's a really fun place to talk about it as in Boys Club. Because we're thinking about it and talking about it all the time. So I think that that is another great reason. And if you're funny, funny, if you're funny. It's very, very important. Yeah. Humor is a core tenant. Speaking of funny, why is it called Boys Club?

It's just a little bit like tongue and cheek middle finger type vibe to one, I think two, it's twofold. One, it's like, this is a boys club. Let's like take that back and make it fun and do it our own way. And then the other is a little bit of a middle finger to like the women's empowerment movement of like, I don't need people to tell me to be empowered. And what's a great way to signal to like minded people that were intentionally designing this space for women? but it's like not about being a woman. And that just came naturally. It's a hard needle of threat.

It's the hardest. It is the hardest. Extremely fine line to walk. Yeah. I think there's just like a little subversion in everything that we do and everything that we that's like where we have a lot of fun. And so I think that's just like what we wanted to come through in the name as well. Yeah.

How do people find the Dow? They go to an absolutely insane website that makes zero fucking sense. Boyce Club.V-V-I-P. Also, we're on Twitter. We're on Instagram. Boysclub.com. Yeah. Boysclub.Eath on Instagram. Those are the best places.

Send them to our newsletter. It's really fun. Rachel Lolles writes it. It's the most unhinged. Totally crazy. Newsletter you'll find in Web 3. That's a good. A fan of Rachel Lowe.

Yes. And then the podcast, Boys Club. Yeah. In my head, I call members of the Boys Club the boys. Yeah. Is that appropriate? That's appropriate. It works.

That's it. Well, boys, thank you for joining me on the inaugural episode of the Bank of the studio. Thank you so much, David. Thank you so much. Cheers.