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Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ had a great conversation with David Ogiga⁠ (Founder of Sote Hub) on various topics revolve around his passion for social impact, Climate change, Agriculture, Kenyan Startup Ecosystem, Blue Economy Innovation and his intriguing journey of Sote Hub Project as a co-founder.

Duke Mtambo

Duke Mtambo talks

Duke Mtambo talks

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ had a great conversation with Juraj Bednar (Founder of Parallel Polis) on his ideas on Post-Covid Economic Recovery, Parallel Societies, Lunar Punk and why states need to be pro-tech and pro-crypto to attract global talent in the post-Covid world of remote work and Starlink.

Duke Mtambo talks

Duke Mtambo talks

Daily Balajisms

Duke Mtambo talks

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Blue Checks are the New Blue Collars". The AI summer has flipped our assumptions about its impact, and Balaji discussed with Amjad Massad of Replit how traditional journalism and downstream media are more prone to AI takeover than blue-collar jobs. Balaji envisions a better information supply chain and new media business models using Web3 and crypto-instruments, and believes that centralized AI is inherently unethical because it cannot make up for the true diversity of global tech and media talent.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Anarcho-tyranny". In this article, Balaji Srinivasan discusses the concept of anarcho-tyranny and its impact on San Francisco, where regular people are excessively punished while criminals walk free. He also talks about the decline of liberal democracies and the rise of crypto-anarchy and crypto-civilization, with Bitcoin being seen as a lifeboat in times of chaos. Balaji suggests that a smart regulator, like Uber or Bolt, is better than analog regulators, and the US establishment needs to be better at perceiving weak signals and capital allocation.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Venture Journalist and Angel Influencer". Balaji Srinivasan introduces a new media business model he calls "venture journalism" or "angel influencer," where a person writes for an audience of one and can inspire or discover the next Mark Zuckerberg or Palmer Luckey and invest in them, creating a new type of public intellectual called an "Overton whale." He also discusses the concept of going short on one idea and long on a related idea, the importance of weak signals, and the need for a fusion between a public intellectual and a scientist to create the third culture.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Computable Communities". Crypto can make communities computable and composable, according to Balaji Srinivasan, who believes this is the next frontier after DeFi and DeSci. This new space aims to make communities computable using cryptography, with network states and their prior stages focusing on building solutions for startup societies and positioning themselves as DeGov.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "America is the new Argentina". In this article, Balaji Srinivasan warns that the US is facing a central bank and fiat crisis, and could become like Argentina or Venezuela. He suggests that crypto is the new frontier and possibility to exit, and urges people to buy bitcoin, move it off exchanges, and move to a crypto-friendly jurisdiction.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "TradFi Winter". Balaji Srinivasan, entrepreneur and investor, argues that after artificial intelligence has eaten everything digital, only three things remain scarce: community, cryptography, and commodity. Technology can make previously unviable solutions or ideologies viable, shrinking populations needed for viable civilizations, and making sovereign collectives more self-sufficient. Additionally, the legacy finance industry might be heading towards a "TradFi Winter", and in his opinion, the next gray swan could be the digital death of legacy automakers who are being squeezed out of the Chinese market.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Orange coin is the new blue jeans". Balaji Srinivasan believes that amidst the Fiat Crisis and TradFi Winter, everyone is becoming a Bitcoin maximalist. With the current central bank crisis, people sense crypto as an exit towards financial freedom and prosperity, and Bitcoin serves as a Schelling point for the whole freedom-loving crypto movement.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Community, Cryptography & Commodity". Balaji Srinivasan believes that AI has "eaten" software, leaving only community, cryptography, and commodity as scarce resources. He suggests that decentralized AI, social networks, and crypto must be promoted to preserve liberty in the face of digital authoritarianism. Balaji also argues that technology can make previously unviable solutions or ideologies viable, and that small teams can beat big corporations with the help of these technologies.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Uncle Sam Bankman-Fried". The US banking system is in crisis due to accounting tricks, mismanagement, and outright fraud, exposed when deposits began leaving banks and the value of long-term US treasuries fell. Balaji Srinivasan warns that this consumer-facing crisis cannot be easily solved, and advises people to buy bitcoin and move to a crypto-friendly jurisdiction to avoid the impending financial disaster.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Crypto is for Power Users and the Powerless". Balaji Srinivasan proposes using crypto and decentralized tech to create an off-ramp for the powerless and counter-elites to exit the old world and accelerate both technological and moral progress. By introducing concepts like moral innovations and network states, he aims to make actual exit possible and provide a new frontier for power-users and the powerless, similar to what America was to Europe.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Digital Death". The internet has transformed the banking industry and legacy banks must adapt to keep up with the innovations in fintech and crypto, or face a "digital death" as even venerable institutions like Silicon Valley Bank can be subject to a digital bank run and perish within a day. Regulators must also be proactive and embrace competition to avoid being left behind in a rapidly evolving digital world, while individuals must choose between getting into digital gold or facing the risk of digital death.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "BitSignal". Balaji Srinivasan through his BitSignal warns of a systemic problem with insolvent banks and the fall of the US dollar, calling people to exit fiat for bitcoin. He proposes a technical defense in the current financial crisis, and encourages people to move to bitcoin-friendly and crypto-friendly jurisdictions, while also challenging people to create memes that illustrate the current predicament of the financial system.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about the current developments on the ongoing 2023 Financial Crisis, The fall of US Dollar, Balaji Srinivasan's BitSignal, Balaji's 1 million dollars bet, Bitcoin to 1 Million dollars in 90 days and Machankura spearheading Africa's Bitcoin mass adoption through USSD inovation.

Duke Mtambo⁠⁠ talks with Alexander Bard (a Swedish Philosopher) on his bold vision for Digital Monasteries, Ecotopia & Cosmopolis and how Artificial Intelligence (AI) could impact the future of Syntheism.

Duke Mtambo⁠ talks with Jakub Simek about the current developments on the; Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) Crash, Jur Startup Society Awards, Solana Hackathon (Grizzlython), Open AI/ Chat GPT-4, Bitcoin 26K + Bull Run and The Network States Updates.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "The Network State". Balaji Srinivasan argues that starting new countries is now possible, preferable, and profitable, and he explains his approach of "cloud-first, land-last, but not land never." In his book, "The Network State," Srinivasan defines a network state as a social network with a moral innovation, national consciousness, collective action, and an integrated cryptocurrency, among other features, and outlines a gradualist bottom-up approach to creating new digitally-first countries that can be launched by anyone with a laptop.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Network Archipelago". Balaji Srinivasan's vision of a "network archipelago" is a physically-connected community that crowdfunds properties globally through collective action in the digital world. This concept is the third step in his vision of "network states," where individuals can create startup societies with clear moral innovations, form network unions capable of collective action, and eventually achieve diplomatic recognition as a network archipelago.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Network Union". Balaji Srinivasan outlines the concept of a network union as a highly-aligned community organized in a tree-like structure with a leader, a purpose, a crypto-based financial and messaging system, and a daily call-to-action. The ultimate goal is to build a digitally-native form of bottom-up nation building, with network unions being the second step towards achieving this.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Bundling, Unbundling and Re-bundling". Balaji Srinivasan explores the concept of bundling, unbundling, and rebundling in business and applies it to centralization, decentralization, and recentralization in technology. He predicts that the West will experience significant unbundling and decentralization, while the East will continue to centralize, leading to a future scenario of American Anarchy versus Chinese Control or Decentralized West versus Centralized East. Srinivasan sees a role for tech and moral innovations in building highly-aligned communities and high-trust societies.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Flat Coin".  Balaji Srinivasan proposes a "flat coin" that remains stable against a basket of goods tracked on-chain, making every asset instantly liquid and tradeable against each other in a giant matrix of assets. He suggests a demurrage as a solution to make the trade-off between crypto and fiat explicit and to make various flat coin managers compete against each other.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Privacy Over KYC".  Balaji Srinivasan warns that governments are a combination of surveillance state and Keystone Kops, hoovering up private information but incompetent at securing data, leading to constant hacking and threats to offline security. He believes crypto solves this issue, allowing for provably encrypted peer-to-peer communication and creating a pseudonymous economy that advances AI and helps both the powerless and power users.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Purpose of Tech is Longevity". Balaji Srinivasan argues that the ultimate purpose of technology is to end mortality, and advocates for a tech-driven decentralized media ecosystem and the creation of network states to unlock innovation in longevity. Technology reduces scarcity, reconciles trade-offs, and is both the cause and solution to life's problems, including existential risks and climate change.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "User-aligned Content". Balaji Srinivasan argues that "the news you can use" is like a healthy salad compared to the junk food of infotainment and clickbait in today's downstream media. He envisions a future where decentralized social media and web3 technology enable people to track their progress based on their information diet and stimuli, allowing the creation of user-aligned and community-owned media.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Moral Stack". Balaji Srinivasan argues that in the new web3 era, it is important to have a strong moral stack to operate, a tech stack to scale, and a global stack of supportive jurisdictions. He says that value-signaling will replace virtue/vice signaling in the new era, and "learning, burning, and earning" will become the new motto.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Mobile Telescope". Balaji Srinivasan explores the potential of a "mobile telescope" to search for "dark talent" worldwide. He suggests that with billions of people now having access to mobile phones, they can work pseudonymously and earn crypto, being a part of the emerging pseudonymous economy.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Founding vs Inheriting". Balaji Srinivasan uses the mental model of founding versus inheriting to compare the ability of legacy institutions to innovate and maintain operations with founder-led organizations. He argues that while founders can create and adjust operations quickly, inheritors often lack the capacity to do so and are often criticized by downstream media due to the difference between being born-rich and built-rich.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Cryptohistory". Balaji Srinivasan advocates for the creation of a "cryptohistory," which is a cryptographically verifiable macrohistory that is near impossible to doctor and serves as a reliable record of history. He believes that decentralized social networks and crypto oracles will allow for the permanent recording of all kinds of data feeds, including proof of location and proofs of various actions, which will eventually replace traditional media as the source of truth.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "The Social War". Balaji Srinivasan explores how online conflict, or the "social war," is influenced by the memetic tribes people belong to on social media. He explains that cancelation and de-platforming are tactics used in this war, with the goal of invading people's minds or turning off an enemy node in the social network.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "The Ledger of Record". Balaji Srinivasan presents the idea of the ledger of record as a better alternative to the paper of record, with blockchain technology and crypto oracles replacing traditional sources of information. The ledger of record promises to provide decentralized, immutable information and replaces the argument from authority with the argument from cryptography.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Longevity as The $100T Unlock". Jakub Simek shares the impact of Deng Xiaoping's "profit is good" philosophy on modern China, which has led to a wealth creation of roughly $100T in China. Balaji Srinivasan, argues that a similar wealth creation could be unlocked in the world today with the creation of special innovation zones for longevity and extension of healthspan.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Reverse Diaspora". Balaji Srinivasan's 2013 article "Software is reorganizing the world" envisions the emergence of a reverse diaspora, where people who share values and interests can find each other online and build their community in the cloud. 

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Helical Theory of History". Balaji Srinivasan combines the theories of linear progress and cyclical history, positing that technology is what makes noble ideas and ideals feasible. He argues that history follows a helical pattern, with cycles being influenced by political ideologies, and that moral innovations and technological progress often go hand in hand.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "The DeFi Matrix". Balaji Srinivasan believes that the DeFi Matrix, a decentralized financial platform built on blockchain technology, will revolutionize finance in the same way that social networks disrupted communication. As governments around the world begin to embrace digital currencies, the DeFi matrix is poised to dissolve traditional financial monopolies and provide a more level playing field for all assets.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "AI, Crypto and Social". Balaji Srinivasan believes that AI, Crypto, and Social networks are the most crucial technologies shaping the world today, bringing us into "the age of a short phrase". AI can produce content with short prompts, crypto can be stored with a 12-word mnemonic phrase, and social networks can start global movements with a hashtag.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Crypto vs Big Tech". Balaji Srinivasan believes that decentralized finance (DeFi) and the rise of web3 technology will disrupt the Big Five tech companies, including Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Apple, and Facebook. He explains how crypto will revolutionize various industries including messaging, social networks, and operating systems, while empowering users with secure and provable end-to-end encryption.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Truly Reproducible Research". Balaji Srinivasan believes that the next step in open science and citizen science movements is truly reproducible research. He argues that science should be about independent replication, not prestigious citations, and that blockchain technology has the potential to establish universal truth and make scientific information supply chain fully traceable, auditable, and replicable.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Downstream Media". Balaji Srinivasan sees the recent Twitter Files revelations as an important step towards citizen journalism. He believes that traditional corporate media, like the New York Times, have become "downstream media" that are driven by search for popularity and not truth, and are increasingly just wrappers around tweets.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Stasi with a Stock Symbol". Balaji Srinivasan sees the recent Twitter Files revelations as an important step towards citizen journalism and away from corporate media that often use techniques such as Russell's conjugation and Lakoff's framing to put an emotive spin on contentious issues, and that have been losing public trust.   

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "The One Commandment". Balaji Srinivasan in his book "The Network State" introduced the concept of "The One Commandment" which allows startup societies to focus on one specific moral innovation and build a community around it. This concept makes it easier to compare startup societies focused on the same moral innovation, similar to how tech startups focus on one specific tech innovation. 

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Personal Runway". The concept of "personal runway" is an extension of the idea that a runway is cash in the bank, divided by a monthly burn-rate of a startup. It is a measure of an individual's ability to withstand various negative events, such as cancelation by an online mob, and is important for maintaining ideological independence.   

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Truth, Health and Wealth". Balaji Srinivasan proposes a new motto for the era of web3 and network states: Truth, Health, Wealth in that order. He argues that people need to include morality in their stack, as a fundamental layer-0 that enables all their endeavors, and that news should demonstrably boost your health and wealth, instead of providing infotainment.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article "True Charity is Investment". Balaji Srinivasan compares investing in founders, through a business plan competition in Nigeria, to running a race, where everyone gets a workout, while only few win the funding. It incentivizes people to present themselves as the most convincing victors, and promote their skills.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "AR Glasses as the Next Convergence Device". Balaji Srinivasan believes that AR glasses will be to this decade, what a smartphone was to the last decade. He predicts that the AR glasses will bridge the digital with physical, and people will be able to recognize building and members of their startup societies/network unions through glowing sigils that will be visible only to those communities.

Duke Mtambo talks to Jakub Simek about his article on "Longitudinal Arbitrage". Balaji suggests that Starlink will reprice the real estate around the world and enable longitudinal arbitrage, allowing individuals and collectives to launch new network archipelagos and build startup towns in remote areas. 

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on " Optimalism vs Maximalism". Balaji Srinivasan's idea of optimalism combines the optimism of tech-progressivism with the goal of optimizing an objective function. He sees optimalism as an alternative to trans-humanism and believes that startups with new technology can produce Pareto-improvements where others would make trade-offs.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "CCP vs NYT vs BTC". Balaji Srinivasan argues that there are three main powers today: Communist Capital, Woke Capital, and Crypto Capital. The Chinese Communist Party demands submission through their hard power of infrastructure and economic dominance, while the Wokes and Bitcoin Maxies push for submission through different forms of soft power. 

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "American Anarchy vs Chinese Control". Balaji Srinivasan presents two possible future scenarios, American Anarchy and Chinese Control, in his book "The Network State". He argues that while China is becoming more authoritarian, the US is moving towards decentralization, driven by forces such as woke capital, the New York Times, and crypto capital. 

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Society as a Service". Balaji argues that startups societies are similar to SaaS (Society as a Service) in that they are communities instead of products, and can be evaluated using established SaaS metrics.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Pseudonymous Economy". Balaji Srinivasan's idea of a pseudonymous economy is a digitally-native form of work enabled by zero-knowledge blockchain technology and AI.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "HIMBY and the Building Man". Balaji Srinivasan suggests that the pro-housing YIMBY (Yes In My Backyard) movement should consider building horizontally, as it is faster and cheaper than building skyscrapers in dense cities.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about the Idea Maze concept, a tool that is designed to help founders think through the key aspects of their idea, including the problem they are trying to solve, the target market, and the potential competition.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about the "Bright Sun" vs "Black Mirror" metaphor. The "Bright Sun" and "Black Mirror" are described by Balaji Srinivasan as two contrasting visions of the future. The "Bright Sun" vision represents a tech-progressive and optimistic view of the world, where innovations like decentralized AI and web3 have the potential to unlock "longevity" and "practical miracles" such as curing blindness. 

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Money Rich vs Power Rich". Balaji Srinivasan challenges the idea that wealthy people are necessarily powerful, and discusses the concept of dynamic inequality. 

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "God, State & Network". Balaji Srinivasan discusses the concept of the "network state," a potential future where nation states are replaced by decentralized online communities.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek about his article on "Centralized AI is Unethical". Balaji Srinivasan believes that decentralized AI is the solution to ethical concerns surrounding the centralization of AI and the lack of diverse voices in the tech industry.

Duke Mtambo talks with Joel Dietz about the implications of Chat GPT and the general future of Open AI. OpenAI is a non-profit research company that aims to develop and direct artificial intelligence (AI) in ways that benefit humanity as a whole.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek  about Elon Musk's "Twitter Files" exposing Biden’s government. The “Twitter Files” tell an incredible story from inside one of the world’s largest and most influential social media platforms. What you’re about to hear in this podcast, is a conversation based upon thousands of internal documents obtained by sources at Twitter.

Duke Mtambo talks with Alexander Bard & Jakub Simek and they dicuss about Alexander Bard's ideas around global digital empire (in relation to bitcoin and AI), digital nomads (in relation to tribal mapping) and Attentionalism vs Capitalism.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek and they dicuss about the FTX collapse. FTX collapsed because of deeper collision issues between FTX (Sam Bankman-Fried) and Alameda (Caroline Ellison). The FTX exchange didn’t have its own bank account to accept wire transfers, so customers would send money to Alameda unknowingly, and FTX would credit their accounts. 

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek and they dicuss about the FTX and SBF Fiasco, Effective Altruism and Humanity.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek and they dicuss about the current state of global reccession and the rise of Bitcoin as the new monetary system of world.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek and they dicuss about Network State verses Fractal Localism as Jakub shares some ideas and concepts where Nassim Taleb and Balaji Srinivasan meet despite their differences in many areas. 

Bitcoin is a decentralised digital or virtual currency with a maximum supply of 21 million Bitcoins.  An easy way to think of it is like cash for the internet.  It was founded by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008 and first went live in 2009.   

In this episode, I discuss with Jakub Simek in depth on his article about "The Network State Review". According to Jakub's review, the Balaji's idea is to start with moral innovation in the form of One Commandment, launch a startup society, organize online around network unions with daily calls to action, and later crowdfund land and real-estate to form network archipelagos. Something like Indonesia, but connected by a digital ocean of the internet.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek and they dicuss about Balajis's idea of network state, startup cities, the network union. They also discuss why "truth, health & wealth" is a good motto for intentional communities of technological progressives.

Duke Mtambo talks with Jakub Simek and they dicuss about the importance of technological progress, inspired by Balaji Srinivasan and his 1729.com but also their overall plans with Wezesha and it's first competition.