00:00hi everyone welcome to the a 6nz podcast
00:04today's episode is on crypto and the
00:06evolution of open-source and in
00:08particular the idea of libraries as in
00:10traditional open-source versus services
00:12as with smart contracts and blockchain
00:13which are open permissionless and more
00:16importantly may address asymmetries
00:17between nights and weekends developers
00:19and entities with disproportionate
00:21resources what are the implications for
00:23developers for creatives for identity
00:25for crypto finance and more Devens oogle
00:28guest hosts this conversation with
00:29dennis nazarov and jesse walden the
00:31cofounders of media chain Labs which is
00:33acquired by Spotify in 2017 they draw on
00:36this past experience leading open-source
00:38development of a decentralized media
00:39attribution protocol for connecting
00:41creators to their audiences and consider
00:43what could be different as crypto
00:44evolves but Dennis and Jesse are now
00:47with a 6mc crypto speaking of please
00:49note that a 6nz crypto is an independent
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00:58horowitz family of funds the content
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01:32finally you can find this episode as a
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01:37and Z's YouTube channel hi my name is
01:39Devon and I'm a software engineer and
01:41writer based out of San Francisco today
01:43I'm talking to Dennis and Jesse about
01:45the evolution of open source and the
01:49evolution of crypto networks as well
01:51Dennis you've written quite a bit about
01:53the dichotomy between libraries and
01:57services can you expand a little bit on
01:59that distinction for us well in crypto
02:02you know crypto has been kind of
02:03described as the natural evolution of
02:05the open source movement that open
02:08source started by kind of an ideology
02:10you know a community with certain values
02:13that believed in software that should be
02:15openly licensed Frieda used by anyone
02:18and kind of the idea that anyone should
02:21be able to collaborate on it people
02:23would have identified some problems with
02:24that work you know mostly around
02:26financial incentives and tragedy of the
02:27Commons of this common resource ends up
02:30being used by companies in commercial
02:33settings but there's sort of no
02:34incentive structures to maintain it long
02:36term and crypto with the introduction of
02:39these tokenized networks kind of changes
02:41the power dynamics and I think it's
02:43important to kind of dig in to that and
02:45talk about the nuance the github model
02:47is a really good way of thinking about
02:50it is a github repo is basically a
02:52collection of text you know it's a
02:54collection of code and github allows
02:57multiple parties to collaborate on it
03:02submit pull requests open issues so it's
03:05sort of beautiful when it works you know
03:07code base can evolve with the help of
03:10the community but there's some systemic
03:12asymmetries where while code is you know
03:16it's a useful collection of a program is
03:20a useful collection of you know
03:21different pieces of code and modules etc
03:24code becomes powerful and useful when
03:27it's instantiated so something you know
03:29like my sequel is an open-source
03:30database it is used by big companies but
03:33it's also used by weekend developers you
03:36know when they're doing the tutorial to
03:37build a web application over the weekend
03:39and kind of the asymmetry comes in you
03:42know the deployment of that library so
03:45when when Facebook or some or large
03:47entity like that you know uses a
03:49database it has millions or billions of
03:51users it has tons of data that
03:54deployment becomes much more valuable
03:56and you know in the case of we can
03:59developer they're starting from scratch
04:00they need a computer a virtual machine
04:02or some AWS service where they run some
04:07server on it and they deploy the
04:08database but they have no users they
04:10start from scratch it's also just like
04:12raw engineering power like Facebook has
04:14hundreds of engineers to deploy
04:16something like my sequel you know and
04:18and then the weekend hacker has to do it
04:20themselves and it's just like there's an
04:22asymmetry in terms of like
04:23you leverage the open-source libraries
04:25yeah so I think great point is that a
04:28developer has to reinvent kind of all
04:31the base functionality of an application
04:34I think I go great a useful analogy is
04:36that you know an industrial production
04:39that you know in order to make any
04:41product you need a factory like all
04:43factories require you know a brick
04:45building they require some power source
04:47tons of employees and assembly line sort
04:49of like there's 90 percent of that stack
04:51is redundant between all production and
04:53everyone is trying to do this unique 10%
04:56thing and the costs of spinning up
04:58production is very expensive so I think
05:01you know while open-source is this kind
05:04of great community at iteration process
05:06there's so some systemic problems you
05:08know with the power distribution so if
05:10you're established a company open
05:13sources way more valuable to you does
05:15way more to you and I think what's
05:16interesting in box chains
05:17you know aetherium is described as the
05:19world computer there's this the idea
05:22that we share a computational substrate
05:25we share a data structure eight-and like
05:28a filesystem substrate so any service
05:31that it's deployed to this network
05:33becomes this instantiation it becomes a
05:37service versus a library so I think
05:39that's that's the big analogy we want to
05:42talk about today is that sort of open
05:44source code as libraries developers have
05:46to copy the code and Riaan Stan she ate
05:48it kind of deploy from scratch put in
05:50tons of resources but in blockchains
05:52kind of the metaphor is these services a
05:54service provides some utility it shares
05:59state it's like the singleton deployment
06:02it's like one logical thing so I Kathy
06:04reom as a single database so any smart
06:06contract deployed on aetherium lives in
06:08this kind of shared universe where if a
06:12smart contract provides something a
06:13utility like identity for example and
06:15there's a good identity deployment any
06:18new developer building on aetherium
06:19they're not they're not thinking about
06:21redeploying identity from scratch so
06:23like in a web application you need login
06:25you know everyone has to RiRi redeploy
06:28log in but in theory it's a totally
06:30different metaphor anything that becomes
06:31useful can be reused by anyone else and
06:34it's the participants are incentivized
06:37prove an already-existing service versus
06:39trying to compete one thing you talked
06:40about was how in conventional open
06:44source there are these libraries that
06:46everyone can reuse building blocks but
06:48they still have to re-implement them
06:49they have to redeploy them themselves
06:50can you talk a little bit about the
06:53difference between using the crypto
06:55building blocks and using these library
06:57building blocks the way that I think
06:59about it is on block chains when you
07:03deploy an application or service you're
07:06deploying one logical thing there's like
07:09a canonical instance of it and it has an
07:11address on the chain that anyone can
07:13discover and it's actually you know if
07:17this thing that's been deployed is
07:19useful it's easier for everyone to
07:21converge on it like as we could call it
07:25a showing point people discover this
07:27thing and they start to use it because
07:29it's easier to do that than it is to
07:32redeploy which require it would require
07:34you to copy the thing you know redeploy
07:36it and create a second instantiation of
07:38it so you know on Balkans you could say
07:41it's easier to sort of like follow the
07:43rules that already exist and those rules
07:45are open for anyone to see to ensure you
07:47know that you can trust them and and
07:49accordingly you can you know you you
07:52find the thing and you just start
07:54building on it and that's the easiest
07:55thing to do as a default setting and
07:58that diverges from open source because
08:01again with open source you know database
08:03like MongoDB is something I can download
08:05but I then have to like spin it up and
08:07redeploy it and my instance is
08:09completely different from Dennis's and
08:11completely different from the one you're
08:12using and so you know this is just the
08:15the fundamental divergence on baktuns we
08:17get one canonical thing that multiple
08:20parties converge on and you know in
08:22traditional open source you know
08:24everything is fractured into its own
08:26silo they may be connecting it to our
08:29previous discussion about cities as
08:31analogies to to blockchain networks I
08:34think you can think of you know
08:35libraries or code as blueprints and you
08:38know that describe how to do something
08:40so blueprints are obviously very helpful
08:42you know if I have a blueprint that
08:44tells me how to build a road system in a
08:46city that's very useful a blueprint that
08:47describes how to build a power grid is
08:50but you know to run with the open source
08:52analogy open source requires we need to
08:55take the blueprint for roads and you
08:57know build my own city from scratch I
08:58have to implement the road system have
09:00to implement the power grid I have to
09:01implement shipping services I have to
09:04get actual people in there and for kind
09:07of emergent properties of like you know
09:09a vibrant and city emerging but I think
09:11and block chains are more like the road
09:13system already exists you don't have to
09:15worry about it so that a road a road
09:17system as a service has been deployed by
09:20now there's cars flowing through it you
09:23know there's gas stations are starting
09:25to build their storefronts so you know
09:27anyone that wants to participate in the
09:29economy and kind of the infrastructure
09:31of the city just gets to build on top of
09:33the roads build on top of the power grid
09:35and I think we know with the same open
09:38and collaborative properties of
09:40open-source you know the fact that we
09:42don't have to read rebuild cities from
09:44scratch to do some new thing we can just
09:46you know join an already vibrant city
09:48it's again these compounding effects
09:51where it just becomes much easier to
09:52deploy services I also think the kinds
09:55of you know applications you you think
09:57of building becomes fundamentally
09:58different because it becomes you think
10:00about how how is what I'm contributing
10:03you know going to impact the ecology
10:05this symbiotic system one of the
10:08infamous examples of people building on
10:10other other folks data caches is the
10:13LinkedIn API I know a lot of companies
10:16built services on top of the recruiting
10:19API and retrieving people's profiles and
10:21so on and so when LinkedIn shut down
10:23that service just lots of businesses
10:26literally went out of business they
10:28could not function anymore because they
10:29were based on that can you talk a little
10:31bit about why someone would want to add
10:35data and add maintenance support to a
10:39network like this if they don't have
10:41that proprietary control like LinkedIn
10:43currently does I think here it's
10:45fundamentally different like the value
10:47the reason this the service sees
10:49third-party applications as its
10:51customers like its survival is dependent
10:53on being symbiotic and kind of enabling
10:57of services on top of it and I think the
11:01and another argument is that if a token
11:04access and use of a service that there's
11:10huge incentives to build a very great
11:11service because if more and more
11:13ecosystem participants rely new the more
11:16valuable you will be there's huge
11:18incentives for entrepreneurs and you
11:20know ecosystem members to support that
11:22service but also it's predicated on
11:26openness and participation of other
11:28parties in ways that it has not been in
11:30web 2 and previous generations yeah but
11:33I would I mean I keep coming back to
11:35this example of cities but maybe you
11:37like one one thing that's driving the
11:39incentives are aligning the incentives I
11:41should say for for people to collaborate
11:42on unboxing networks as maybe akin to
11:46like city governments you know like
11:48there's the city provides this
11:50infrastructure and then hopefully you
11:53know people use them for structure to
11:55start deploying businesses that make the
11:57city more valuable and as you know the
11:59city is able to collect taxes on that
12:01the analogy would be in box hands that
12:03the more people are using the network
12:05like the more valuable the currency
12:08because the currency is what powers all
12:09the commerce and that that's sort of
12:11like the tax and and that goes you know
12:13to the value of all the city's
12:15inhabitants so there's this there's this
12:19alignment for everyone to grow the whole
12:22ecosystem together it's an it's like a
12:23tide to raise all boats because you know
12:26you can just people can converge on
12:28these canonical instances you get there
12:31and there's a there's attribution built
12:33into the system like you can look at the
12:36smart contract and figure out who
12:38deployed it and so the result is that as
12:41this like thing that I've built spreads
12:44and becomes more and more popular
12:46there's sort of a direct correlation
12:48between you know the the the its
12:51popularity and its use and the value its
12:54able to generate if the incentives are
12:56set up properly so one one interesting
13:01like way to think about this and is like
13:05the the in media there's this concept of
13:07the arts as this concept of derivative
13:09works where you know like I'll make a
13:11song for example and then you know let's
13:14say it becomes it becomes popular
13:16there's lots of people out there who
13:18or maybe inspired by the song and want
13:20to remix it and today it's like it's
13:22very hard to coordinate this process of
13:24like you know re mixing the song how do
13:26I share realties with the original
13:28creator with walkins you can have the
13:32song be this canonical thing that's
13:33deployed to the shared network and you
13:35can have the rules for how this thing
13:37can be reused encoded in the thing
13:39itself and again it's easier to follow
13:41the rules than to break them because the
13:43rules are legible to software to break
13:45them I have to literally copy the thing
13:47change the rules and like redeploy it so
13:49that's like that's harder to do the more
13:52like reuse there is the more remixes
13:55that are made of this song the more
13:57value can drive back to the original
13:59creator and that's like a fundamentally
14:02new thing where like in the open source
14:04the old you know old open source
14:05metaphor the song gets copied a million
14:07times like and that you know like it
14:09goes viral on the internet but none of
14:11that value drives back to the Creator
14:13and and so that's like you know another
14:16metaphor I think and this applies to
14:17anything that can be deployed on a ball
14:19chain so whether it's a song or a piece
14:21of software you know it enables reuse it
14:24enables sort of new innovations on top
14:26in a way that drives about value back to
14:28the original creator and so I think the
14:30real point here is that there's huge
14:32incentives to create original works and
14:34then there's you know it's easier than
14:36ever to be inspired and iterate on that
14:39in a way that you know benefits all the
14:41participants in the ecosystem yeah a lot
14:43of the conversation around copyright
14:45over the last few decades has been
14:47around trying to prohibit uses that
14:49because the the value doesn't currently
14:51accrue back to the Creator usually this
14:55is something I run into on Twitter where
14:57I first when I first started tweeting I
14:59wanted to always credit any images that
15:01I included which you know it's a nice
15:03thought but over time it becomes really
15:05hard to do and so you know I'll admit I
15:08just sort of stopped crediting all the
15:09images that I used which maybe I
15:11shouldn't do that but it shows that my
15:15desire to credit the the artist is there
15:18it just it's really hard to track down
15:20if it was built directly into the image
15:22it would happen naturally right and so
15:24this is actually something that we we
15:26tried to build ourselves back in 2014
15:28with the with the project that we
15:29started called media channel was
15:30literally trying to solve that exact
15:32problem and and the way that we always
15:35talked about media chain was a canonical
15:37content or industry that was like the
15:39internal code name for it and and so the
15:42idea was yeah you'd have a canonical ID
15:44for every creative work and as this work
15:47propagated the net you know the Internet
15:50you'd be able to append all the
15:53information it picked up along the way
15:54like you know people's comments and and
15:57you know retweets and whatnot and it
15:59would lead to this really rich history
16:01and and it would also serve as a channel
16:05through which value can flow back to the
16:06Creator and so I think you know we were
16:09too early on this idea like there was
16:10there was no sort of we didn't have the
16:13incentives figured out and that was
16:15because you know at the time smart
16:17contract platforms like aetherium didn't
16:18exist like the idea of creating your own
16:20programmable incentives was like not a
16:22widely distributed idea but but now that
16:26we have that now that we're in the sort
16:27of smart contract era we're starting to
16:30see a lot of these ideas you know
16:33surface and I think so like NFT is non
16:36fungible tokens are an embodiment of the
16:38same idea where you have a canonical
16:40identifier for a thing it could be an
16:43image a song you know a you know
16:46anything literally anything and hook to
16:49it is metadata and the metadata is
16:51arbitrary and it can be application
16:53specific it can be who made it it could
16:55be you know it could be all the retweets
16:59like you can start appending and
17:01expanding the universe of what metadata
17:03is captured by an NF TM by this
17:06canonical identifier and that and that
17:08enables sort of all kinds of interesting
17:11like reuse all kinds of way to sort of
17:13surface this information and new
17:14contexts and so that that's you know a
17:17direction that's that's generally very
17:19exciting it's like you know we'll have
17:21just way more creativity and sort of
17:24reuse of works and and again like I keep
17:27coming back to the media examples but I
17:29think this applies more generally to
17:30software and composability this is
17:33something that was explored a little bit
17:35in in the pre-internet days I don't know
17:38if you guys are familiar with Xanadu and
17:39Ted Nelson's work you guys have an idea
17:42of why that didn't take
17:44then and sort of y-you see it might be
17:47might be able to work now yeah I think
17:50we looked at as Anna do a lot and it was
17:52a huge inspiration to kind of the early
17:55thinking and kind of block block chains
17:58being the reincarnation of their that
18:00architecture in many ways I mean I think
18:02you know the reason it didn't happen is
18:03because you know HTML and kind of the
18:07architecture was the unidirectional
18:10links that you were just embedded you
18:12know I think it was just a can
18:13architectural problem the easiest you
18:15know this like stateless kind of
18:16documents linking to each other
18:19it just works one way you have a link
18:21that would go in one direction and kind
18:23of the Sina directional back pinging
18:25propagation that you know Xanadu talked
18:27about where every time you know an image
18:30like the division was that if you quote
18:34you are literally embedding a snippet of
18:37that document like the canonical
18:38document and you should be able to
18:40expand it and see read more and kind of
18:43just I think it's an incredible vision
18:44but like the architecture just was not
18:47there at the time and then blockchains
18:49with you know just who's talking about
18:51with these canonical identifiers is that
18:53once something is incarnated on a
18:55blockchain you have this one ID and
18:58whenever whenever is anything else
18:59references to it you reference to the
19:01original that kind of this just a
19:05byproduct of like this ledger
19:06architecture is you have these very very
19:08strong links that are immutable that
19:11don't die so was it and so it's it's
19:14shared state that was missing from
19:16Xanadu there was no shared state and so
19:18it was harder the default setting was
19:20not to point back the default setting
19:22was to copy and to re you know reproduce
19:25and and then the the pointing back thing
19:27became like an excessive thing that you
19:28had to do it was annoying with block
19:31chains the default setting is to
19:32reference the canonical because it's
19:33harder not to it's harder to break the
19:35rules than to follow them I think that's
19:37the yeah even like embedding an image
19:41you know if I want to post an image on I
19:44found that the found image on Twitter I
19:46want to post it on Instagram I have to
19:48like re upload it just like
19:50architectural II you take the bits put
19:53them on your phone and then you upload
19:55the bits to Instagram just because like
19:58there's one CDN which is siloed from the
20:00other CDN so you have to re-up load
20:03things and then put like the vision of
20:04like ipfs is that you its content and
20:08address right you the the idea of the
20:10thing gets an address and of itself but
20:13so I think yeah I think the content
20:16analogies are super interesting and I
20:17think maybe just pulling back to just
20:20the web to metaphors I think what we're
20:23really describing is very similar to
20:24api's I think what you mentioned before
20:27you know so I think like even going back
20:30further we take what something we take
20:31for granted is like credit cards that
20:33this Universal payment system Visa
20:37MasterCard that becomes this Digital
20:40payment rails that could be abstracted
20:41to interact with basically any merchant
20:45if you have a credit card you can use
20:47you can the Internet becomes a global
20:49storefront you know for a human they can
20:52find products and everything and and the
20:54service of payment makes them all
20:55interoperable I think we take that for
20:57granted but you know even though we have
20:59these competing services they're all
21:01united by a payment layer and I think
21:03blockchain services will look similar to
21:05that and I think you know there's
21:07services like Twilio you can think of
21:09like some machine learning service where
21:11you submit you upload an image and it
21:13tells you you know it's 30% cat 40% dog
21:18whatever so machine learning API but the
21:21problem there is in the web to model
21:23api's or black boxes and you know you
21:26you know you have an interface that you
21:28can integrate it into your application
21:29as a developer but you don't know what
21:32happens behind the scenes and I think
21:34what's different about Shane there's all
21:35these services the interface is open but
21:38also the implementation is open so you
21:40know it's not only can you like benefit
21:43from its utility you can like pull back
21:45the covers and see how it's working in
21:47real time and it's not even that you
21:49know that what the blueprint looks like
21:51you know what I mean it's like one it's
21:53like one thing if I knew if Twilio of
21:56Tulio's code with open source I know I
21:58can inspect the actual running instance
22:00of Twilio you know if it was like a
22:02machine learning model I could know like
22:04what exactly it's learned and like tweak
22:07the parameters in real time I think
22:08that's also fundamentally different and
22:10the the this openness in terms of both
22:14data and the code itself and the ability
22:17for anyone to contribute improvements to
22:19it and also just reuse it it's again you
22:22know it's we'll be compounding
22:24innovation that is unprecedented you
22:25know in the open-source movement for
22:27them can you give some examples of prime
22:30candidates of types of services that
22:32could be provided in this way well yeah
22:35so I think in it on this there's there's
22:38two examples I'll give like there's
22:40there I mentioned some media stuff
22:42earlier but I think what's happening
22:44right now that's really fascinating is
22:45more on the software side so one one
22:48area that you know is today a risky area
22:51of is what we call crypto finance and so
22:55you have all these emerging protocols
23:00like decentralized exchange for example
23:03there's a set of smart contracts on a
23:06blockchain that enable people to trade
23:07tokens this is a great like an early
23:11primitive and it fits with all the
23:12speculation going on in the market and
23:14it's got some early adoption but what's
23:16really cool is now that you have these
23:18exchange contracts very quickly we've
23:21seen developers start to build on top of
23:23them so they're referencing the
23:25canonical thing and they're already
23:27building on top new things like sample
23:29lending protocols or derivative
23:31protocols and these lending and
23:33derivative protocols use the exchange
23:36functionality in order to to build this
23:39new financial application or this new
23:41financial product and again this is all
23:43decentralized because at the root the
23:45the base protocols are decentralized
23:49stable coins are another example so you
23:52know the goal is to maintain a currency
23:55that's pegged to something like the US
23:57dollar in order to do that you need to
23:59in some cases manage collateral that
24:02underpins the value of the dollar and to
24:05do that sometimes you have to sell off
24:06collateral when it goes up in price and
24:08when it goes down you need to buy more
24:09and so again like you can have a stable
24:12coin because we have decentralized
24:13exchange so these are all there's this
24:15whole like suite of new financial
24:17products very risky new financial
24:19products that are being deployed and
24:22super fast like all of this is
24:24happened in the last year just by virtue
24:27of want you know starting with the
24:28primitive of decentralized exchange so
24:30we're starting to see these like this
24:32compounding effect take place and it's
24:34it's finance that's the most natural
24:35application but I think it will extend
24:37to other stuff so to come bring it back
24:39to the media side of things we were
24:40talking earlier about you know about
24:42songs and having a canonical ID for a
24:44song and then making it possible to you
24:48know much more easy to remix that song
24:50and the you know that what you end up
24:52with is something like you know again
24:55like a universal library or universal
24:57you know you you could end up with every
25:00song ever and the benefit to consumers
25:02or you know is that now developers can
25:06compete to to build the best listening
25:09experience you know instead of having to
25:11redeploy something like Spotify or
25:13iTunes you know where everyone has to
25:16build their own library up from scratch
25:18you just have the library and you know I
25:20compete for better recommendations like
25:23better playlists you know I don't better
25:25like visual experiences of the music and
25:27so like it'll just lead to sort of more
25:31you know more creativity on the part of
25:33developers more creativity on the part
25:34of creative creators who are making the
25:37content and then better experiences for
25:39them users what's the incentive for
25:41someone to put a song into into this
25:43chain well I think in you know the
25:46theory is that the more the song is
25:50listened to the more the song is remixed
25:51and reused and and sort of propagating
25:54in the network the more value drives
25:56back to the Kanaan the original or the
25:58canonical exactly like you could have a
26:01royalty and and you know like if you set
26:04the royalty too high like chances are
26:06your songs not going to get reused so I
26:07think though they'll be market forces
26:09that you know that that that can just
26:12make the price converge on the right one
26:14but this is I think fundamentally better
26:16for creators and the way things work
26:18today where it's like this very clunky
26:20manual process where you have to
26:22coordinate all these relationships and
26:24in contracts and there's tons of
26:25middlemen and lawyer fees and like
26:27basically the creator ends up with
26:29nothing here it's like this free flow of
26:31ideas with like market pricing that goes
26:34directly back to the creator and
26:37so I think yeah it's better for
26:38consumers better for creators better for
26:40developers that want to build a new
26:41experience and now the creators would be
26:43aligned to try to encourage further uses
26:45of it as well as opposed to trying to
26:46block off access exactly like the you
26:49know that what that strategy never
26:51worked like the strategy of trying to
26:53lock down content on the Internet
26:54like forget about it because bits are
26:56infinitely reproducible like just by
26:58virtue of copy and paste and so you know
27:01the the key thing is it needs to be
27:03convenient and Spotify and company you
27:06know streaming companies like Spotify
27:07have realized that and they sort of
27:10aggregated the library and just made it
27:11super convenient to listen to the songs
27:14this in a certain sense they created the
27:16canonical song by just aggregating and
27:19make it making it easily accessible here
27:23the opportunity is to do that but and
27:25that same thing but in an open way where
27:27there's no sort of middlemen brokering
27:29access right because right now if you
27:32wanted to build a spotify competitor
27:34good luck really you're building from a
27:37library of zero and you have to build up
27:39this hole right and so yeah so in that
27:42that's a good point which is to say that
27:44I'm not I wouldn't encourage you know
27:46blockchain projects that want to go and
27:48compete with Spotify directly but
27:50there's this new territory that's opened
27:52up to figure out you sort of modes of
27:54creative expression that benefit from
27:56these properties and and hopefully we'll
27:58see some emergent new types of media
28:00develop as a result and and I think the
28:02key difference will be that this media
28:04will be collaborative and potentially
28:07derivative in nature so so on the threat
28:09of crypto finance I know something
28:11you've been thinking about is identity
28:14in the context of like credit scoring in
28:18decentralized networks if you talked a
28:19little bit about about that yeah for
28:21sure so in the world right now there's a
28:26lot of building blocks that people have
28:27to completely recreate redeploy
28:30something that the conventional web 2.0
28:35has made some progress on is ooofff
28:38as a tool that people can use as you're
28:41building a little side project you don't
28:43want to have to build a whole
28:44complicated login system you plug in
28:46OAuth this is a huge step forward but it
28:50not really sufficient for everything but
28:52it's centralized it's just kind of janky
28:55and it doesn't give you all the
28:59information that you could possibly want
29:00because it's dependent on Google and
29:02Facebook and Twitter and so on to give
29:06you information that they're willing to
29:08give which is pretty limited and as we
29:10discussed with LinkedIn earlier they
29:13could theoretically shut that off at any
29:15point they probably won't because that
29:17would be that would cause an uproar
29:19but it's theoretically possible so
29:22something I've been thinking a lot about
29:24is what if we had a canonical source of
29:28identity information that allowed people
29:31to do something sort of similar to OAuth
29:34but they would know that that data would
29:36always be there that they would always
29:38have access to it and that it wasn't
29:40controlled by some proprietary source
29:43that may or may not open it up in the
29:46future and better yet the developer
29:48using the system would have an incentive
29:50to improve it for their own sake if if
29:53they were building something and there
29:54was something about that this new Roth
29:56system or whatever we'd want to call it
29:58that could be implemented better for
30:00their uses they would have a reason to
30:02go in and add in that new feature create
30:05a new branch merge it and now the whole
30:08system is better for everybody and right
30:11and the first application or one
30:13application could be you know credit
30:15worthiness and then that in turn could
30:17enable lots of new crypto finance
30:20products right so there's exactly this
30:22compounding factor that's so exciting
30:24I think another lens to think about the
30:27benefits and the risks is through trade
30:30through transportation innovation
30:32through information innovation we've
30:34seen like a rise of globalization that
30:36global markets make trade way more
30:39efficient make communication more
30:42efficient you know electronic payment
30:43systems make it much easier for
30:46countries to trade with each other to
30:49transact with each other and you know
30:51there's obviously benefits through that
30:53that you know we can scale up production
30:55of iPhones for example and and you know
30:58ship them to anyone in the world that
31:00can afford them you know I have
31:01everyone can potentially afford a
31:04smartphone but there's also problems
31:07with globalization that you know certain
31:10countries that are kind of in a better
31:12economic position can kind of dominate
31:14the marketplace for example so I think a
31:16way to think about these blockchain
31:18services is that you know if this theory
31:21we're talking about is correct that
31:22blockchain services you know maybe like
31:25information wants to be free like
31:27blockchain services want to be like
31:28singular monopolies that dominate the
31:31entire network that there should be one
31:33service doing one thing and it'll be
31:37most efficient if it's just the only one
31:40that everyone uses but there's obviously
31:42problems with that that you know maybe
31:45it's not the best implementation maybe
31:46changing it and evolving it is difficult
31:48and expensive and it'd be good exerts a
31:53new kind of dominant control on the
31:54participants in the ecosystem so I think
31:56that's something that remains to be seen
31:58yeah to pop a few things off the stack
32:00earlier when you brought up the city's
32:01analogy it made me think of exactly this
32:04issue where there's a strong network
32:07effect effect in San Francisco which is
32:09where I live but also you know when you
32:12walk around the streets of San Francisco
32:13this place is falling apart our
32:16infrastructure is not very well designed
32:17our governance has a lot to be desired
32:22but I can't even really imagine leaving
32:25San Francisco this is where all the
32:27action is this is where the cool
32:28opportunities are people are building
32:30awesome stuff so I as an individual or
32:34really any developer is caught between
32:36this choice of well do you want to be
32:37where all the people are but do you also
32:40wanted to go with all of these problems
32:42that are inherent in the system and so
32:44how do you guys see krypton networks
32:48dealing with this problem where they
32:50mate agglomerate all of these benefits
32:52but then be headed in sort of a
32:55messed-up direction I think an argument
32:57the community bring is always using is
33:00the argument of a fork you know if you
33:02don't like it you can fork the network
33:04and start your own network I think this
33:05goes back to there the earlier argument
33:09about the symmetry of open-source to the
33:11you know established players and big
33:14companies with tons of users to like
33:16developers that start from scratch just
33:17because I can run my sequel doesn't mean
33:20I'm gonna get a billion users and all
33:22the data Facebook has in the same way
33:24that if you're saying if you want to
33:26leave San Francisco because you don't
33:28like it there's all this you know
33:29economic opportunity here there's you
33:31know nice restaurants culture etc if you
33:34if you start your own city it's gonna be
33:36like a pretty sad place to live so I
33:38think you know something you mind while
33:40work is technically possible there's
33:43kind of all these kind of social hurdles
33:46to get over to actually make it
33:48functional and to get a critical mess so
33:50something to think about yeah and then
33:52aside from working the other proposal is
33:54sort of formal governance or some you
33:56know on chain governance and that today
34:00is you know it's like a big aspiration
34:02for the space it would signal that the
34:04participants using the service could you
34:06know change it and evolve it but it
34:09remains to be seen whether you know the
34:11people can coordinate and avoid sort of
34:14the many attacks that you can have in
34:16voting systems so in practice the way
34:20that a lot of these services operate
34:22today is is more like I would say
34:26traditional companies with a
34:28decentralized open back-end there's
34:30still like a organization responsible
34:33for the smart contract but their
34:35back-end is open and transparent and
34:38that for now it seems to be like a
34:40sufficient level of trust where you you
34:43trust that the the code won't change it
34:45because you can audit it but you also
34:47are you have some degree of trust placed
34:51in the company that sort of deployed it
34:53in the first place and you you hope I
34:56mean I hope that you know they will
34:59continue to have evolved and rally the
35:01community towards a new showing point
35:03towards the new canonical thing and and
35:06that becomes a really interesting sort
35:07of signaling challenge that these
35:10companies will need to undertake so it
35:12is forking but it's it's it's not
35:16forking to a completely new universe
35:18it's just redirecting attention from
35:20what is today the canonical thing
35:22what should be the canonical thing
35:24tomorrow right and even if it doesn't
35:26totally solve this problem of recreating
35:28a whole new community it's certainly
35:30better than where we're at right now
35:31we're with open source all you have is
35:33that blueprint you don't have the grid
35:37you know some people are leaving San
35:39Francisco because of this critical mass
35:42so there's a point where I like the
35:44concentration of value and like the
35:46extreme conditions that it creates
35:48actually are forcing function for people
35:50to fork off and create their own Network
35:53because there's enough value in doing so
35:55so I leaving San Francisco for Austin or
35:58something like that you know there's
35:59enough like value in Austin to make it
36:01worthwhile and and sort of offset the
36:04cost of leaving the the mothership yeah
36:07it's interesting you come back to that
36:09analogy actually I live in a group house
36:10of ten soon to be 16 people and we've
36:14jokingly tossed around the idea of you
36:17know we we have enough income and
36:20individual people and cool people that
36:23we can hang out with why don't we just
36:24buy a house and in like Sonoma or
36:26something or even a little farther out
36:28for it can be cheaper and we could build
36:30our own little community that's totally
36:32separate which is not great because I
36:36think we want people to continue to
36:39contributing to San Francisco to
36:41continue contributing to this whole
36:44network that we've been building and to
36:46try to salt fix some of the problems
36:47that are there as opposed to escaping
36:49from them it may be may be the case that
36:51it is this classic pendulum where you
36:54know the pendulum swings in one
36:55direction and we get all of this forward
36:57progress and you know communal effort
37:00but then if the cent incentives aren't
37:02designed properly it swings back in the
37:04other direction towards fractured
37:05services and so the important thing is
37:07designing a service where all the
37:10incentives of the participants are truly
37:12aligned and that is a really difficult
37:14challenge in the space yeah awesome
37:16thanks guys thank you
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