VDAO Ep.2 Digital Tools for Antifragile Network States with Simon Brown

Transcript

Welcome back to Val's Antifragile Network states miniseries on the Greenpo podcast. Last week, we set the scene for the next super cycle, a period of accelerating change that exposes the fragility of our centralized systems. Our path to resilience, both local and global, is through antifragility. This means building decentralized systems that don't just survive stress, but grow stronger because of it. moving self-s sovereignty beyond finance to food, water, energy, housing and more. Out of this period of crisis, FIA is facilitating the emergence of antifragile network states, global communities of local hubs. But how do we bridge the global community to the local

hubs? The answer lies in the digital tools that power them. And in this episode, we'll be learning more about some of these tools from Simon Brown. Simon Brown is building the the consensus network state. He's a veteran of the consensus and Ethereum ecosystem and he's going to talk us through how we can leverage digital tools like MetaMask Infura and Dows to connect communities, create a cohesive network of builders and essentially build the operational software for a decentralized network state. Together, we'll be exploring how digital coordination, online community alignment, and key web 3 tools have a vital role to play in transforming a

network of people into a sovereign antifragile society. Let's welcome Simon Brown. So, hey, hey, Simon. It's uh it's great to see you, man. >> You too. I'm uh I'm really interested for this conversation on network states and I guess to to kick things off for people that are unfamiliar with with the term maybe you could just like talk us through what is a network state and also in addition to that if you could tell us a bit about like what motivates you as a builder in the in the network state space.

>> Okay cool. Um, it's funny how everyone seems to begin with the question, uh, what what is a network state? I I think that's sort of telling in and of itself. Is it the first thing that everybody asks? And the answer, as far as I'm concerned, is um, nobody knows. No one knows what a network state is. And everyone's trying to define it. And I mean, there's even the network state name is like network state, network society, you know, like cipher state. there's all these different names and everyone is kind of having these conversations about like what applies to them and what the definition is for this or for that and so it's it's sort of interesting that that conversation is ongoing I think it is starting to kind of settle into maybe different camps so

I think the like network state even though the concept has been around for a while and I I don't even know but I would I had it a guess as you know maybe the the whole network state concept has been around for at least a couple of decades but it it may even go back further to like Martian McLaren and the global village and all those ideas but but now I think since Balaji wrote his network state book he's sort of maybe owned the network state phrase a little bit and it's definitely I think now like a balaging school um which is a school of thinking and also an actual school right a network state school and so I think probably if you were to like force me to answer the question I would say a

network state the network state as opposed to a network societ society or or any other term is um as Balagi defines it and so as Balagi defines it it's if I can remember correctly it's like clouds first land last um it's an online community that starts with um a specific purpose a one singular specific uh purpose that coheres and unites people what he calls like the one commandment um a recognized founder so obviously Balaji is a a very recognizable founder um and yeah like an online community that kind of crowdsources their wealth to purchase land and create this uh physical archipelago of land. Um there are

probably some other elements to it but but that basically is is a very good definition for what a network state is. Um but beyond that you could probably argue till the cows come on. >> Very interesting. I'm really curious about what you said about the global village piece because this is like the first time I'm coming across this. I wonder if we could just double click on that a bit like that seems like a much that's that's like a concept that predates Baji's book basically by some time >> by quite some time. I I don't know when did Martian start talking about that. I have no idea. It may even be in in the 60s. Um, I could quickly hack it by looking it up in Wikipedia and coming back and and being all authoritative and

going, "Oh, yeah, it's actually really good." But I don't know. It's >> or ch maybe will just look it up on Wikipedia. So um but I mean what these guys were looking forward into the future when like technology would would afford people to be able to communicate across across great distances and across great divides whether those are um you know social demographics or your nation state that you were born into or c cultural or ethnic backgrounds and you know what that would mean for society and and I think to a large degree they were really bang on the money And actually one of the other great thinkers that's quoted a lot um in the the common discourse

around network states is the the is um oh what's his name? Jacob Reese William Reese Mog Jacob Ree Smog I can't remember which one was which and um the sovereign individual um and that was like back in the 80s. So like people have been kind of seeing at least I thinkers um have been seeing the writing on the wall for quite some time. Um and I think you know the limit of a nation state has been reached but I think it's only now that people have have started realizing that that has actually been underway for quite some time. Um and so a lot of these thoughts aren't aren't actually that new but they're maybe that they're it's fair to say that they're crystallizing now you know in very in

very real and material ways. Even in uh if you look into permaculture and the kind of this whole this whole discipline around you know uh energy, water, food sovereignty uh they even have a the founder of permaculture I guess Bill Morrison uh has a chapter in his book called I think alternative nation states which in other terms if you read it kind of means network states. uh so even from that perspective uh you know lots of people from even like non- tech backgrounds were even thinking about these things.

>> Yeah. And so I think the common pattern between what's happening inside of crypto and outside of crypto and actually interestingly a lot of the actually all of the non-fiction books I've read this year have been non-cryptoreated which is also something to happen. Um so outside of crypto I think there are many movements that have a common theme which is people realizing that there is a a limit to what how nation states can provide for their needs that they're starting to question everything that we've been taking for granted in terms of being born into this like nation state sort of you know institution. Um and they're really seeking ways to to meet their needs in different ways and and most of it is focused around

community. Um and so that's it's a it's a very fairly interesting trend and a sub of that trend is this whole idea around network states which is a very technological driven um sort of uh you know manifestation of that trend. >> Yeah. I love that you framed it in in its historical context. Uh and it it it's like it's not a new thing, right? It's just a new it's a new framing or like it's the technologies matured to a point where things are starting to accelerate but the the actual movement or the the interest in this uh predates Baji's book. Um I'm curious to just move on to think a little bit about you like as a builder in this space like in

crypto in the network state space like what's what's your why like what what motivates you to to build here? >> What motivates me? So there's two things. One is what attracted me first and and then the other thing is what makes me stay and they're two very different things and what attracted me first was that I was always a bit of a geek and really liked computers and technology was always a bit of a kind of a hacker type head. Um and Ethereum just captured my my imagination so thoroughly. Um when I discovered it in 2017, it enthrolled me that like the prospect that you could launch an entire like financial company on chain with nothing but a keyboard. Um I mean in retrospect that's a little bit naive but

but but still that's the way I saw it at the time and I think many others as well. and and that's what led people to, you know, build a lot of the DeFi primitives that we we use today was was the potential that they saw into Ethereum as a technology and it continued to capture my imagination for quite some time. I think what what makes me stay is the fact that um crypto and web 3 has become this sort of nexus that has captured the imagination of people from all different backgrounds and fields and and so they meet in this sort of meeting place called Ethereum and and so like working in this space means you're constantly exposed to ideas um that that maybe you wouldn't be necessarily from you know um people who

know so much about economics and and mechanism design to a technologists. Um whether it's like protocol engineers, distributed systems, cryptography, um but all the way up to like a legal professionals, political philosophers, people who are um very wellversed in political science, um like product people just like you know it's such a a meeting place of minds. Um and I think anyone who who works in this space has that that privilege and it's it's what keeps me going.

Yeah. So it sounds like for you Ethereum and the network state are like they're they were linked in some way like that was your you were root in here to to the network state space was through through Ethereum itself. >> Yes. And through a very securitous way. I think the the person who who made me start really thinking about network space was Joe Leven. Um and he he was talking about it this time last year and at the time I was the e ecosystem adviser in consensus. So my job was to to understand like emerging trends that would have imp implications and opportunities for the company. And so network states be you know was kind of very early on in in terms of a trend. It probably still is and and um but

something that Joe was very interested and passionate about. But I I you know this time last year I turned around to him and said like I'm utterly confused. I don't know what this is. What are network states? This is just baffling. I can't get my head around it. and you know and he worked with me a little bit and and then just killed me and I you know I started to see things that I'd never really questioned before. The fact that like nation states are like a lot of things in crypto actually that mostly narrative you know um and you just kind of have this blind faith in in the nation state and its ability to police and govern and protect its borders and all the people within it. Um, I started to realize that that's not entirely true. Um, and that there

were other forces at work and that people were starting to form connections and communities and networks that that went beyond the the borders and started talking to those people and realized there's so much happening that I didn't know about. So, um, it's a really fascinating space. It is somewhat hard to define, hard to pin down, very incurial, and quite amorphous, which is sort of its appeal as well. Um but there's definitely a lot of energy in the in the uh the kind of broader network state space. Um so that's sort of why um I got so interested in it and then sort of Joe like almost a year ago went on stage in Devcon started talking about progressively decentralizing consensus

to create a network state and the time he asked me to um you know lead a an initiative uh researching and and coming up with a strategy for how we could guide it in that direction. And so that allowed me to to dig in a little bit deeper. And since then I've started to see more of the kind of idea and concept around a network state enter the sort of more kind of common vernacular in crypto. So you have like a AJ AJ Warner talking about it in terms of like arbitrum and how arbitum could become a you know I think he used the word like a more like a sovereign nation.

you know, more recently you've got the Zan from um Bass talking about how Bass is on its way to becoming a network state. Um and then you have a lot of the previously pit villages that sort of kind of spun out of the Zuzalu movement and now they're putting down permanent hubs. So like Zuittland, um Prosper obviously you've got Esmeralda, um Zoo Grammar, and so these things have happened in like like the past 12 months. So there's definitely like a lot of energy um occurring behind it and even like the the network state conference was like double the amount of participants year on year um since last year. Um so that will tell you something as well. So there's definitely something

building what what how it crystal crystallizes and what forms it takes is it's going to be interesting to see. >> It sounds like you've seen like a big growth in the space over in that in that span over the last year. I'm curious like do you think that this sense of like looking for something better or something different from the nation state is a big motivator for a lot of builders in the space like are a lot of people searching for what comes next after the nation state? >> No, I wouldn't say so. I I think it's still pretty niche people people who frame things in that way. um this in in the sort of like postnation state exploration space.

Um and it's it's a fantastic Cambrian explosion of networks. Um and they're all very different as well. And and I think there you're starting to see kind of like different schools and camps and different ways of doing things. Um and there's amazing things emerging from from those networks, but for the time being, it's still somewhat niche. I wouldn't say that it's what builders are looking for. um builders have other things to worry about quite frankly. Um and you know I think the the whole network state idea is still somewhat academic um which is fine you know um ironically enough I think you know even though uh I started researching it in depth um like 10 11

months ago and came up with a whole strategy around it. that I've been so busy trying to build myself that I don't get a time to even write like research it or read half of the articles that I want to read um let alone go to like the network state conference and so that's kind of the irony is that that experience is probably the experience of most builders right um and so I think what's what's interesting to me now more is is kind of getting to the root of what's driving the the network state question which is more concrete practical material like how does it actually have a real um real implications for real people in in the in the real world. Um and it's in the spirit of what a people

a lot of people exploring network states are exploring. But um you know I I think what's going to come out of hopefully what will come out of a network state like movement is ideas that will be applicable to people and um will be relevant to people in their everyday lives and they don't necessarily need to know about the a network state in order to benefit from those ideas if that makes sense. And I'm yeah >> it doesn't I agree. I think like a lot of people don't necessarily want to think too much about the collapse of nation states and and kind of dwell on that that potential outcome. But at the same time there's a lot of uh innovation

and creative energy going into just innovating and maybe that process in itself that iterative process is what's going to lead to the emergence of of something like that aligns with Balaji's concept as you said earlier like starting off with cloud then moving into to the real world over time. Um I'm curious uh like in terms of this space um what excites you the most about it? Is there one area that you're like most excited about?

Yeah, I think what so what excites me the most is so this is going to be I in answering this question I'll probably start babbling and meandering so forgive me but I think in terms of like Ethereum what uh captured my nation about it originally was the technological aspect of it and the potential for like using it as a tool and then uh uncovering and learning more about it I start to realize that it's more nuanced than that that it's Ethereum isn't so much a technology as it is a sociote technology. Uh and more recently um you know consensus have coined the tame the the term trustwware.

Um and I think that that's actually a pretty good uh phrase because it reminds you that it is in fact a technology. Um and there's a whole bunch of technologies that are absolutely incredible and like Ethereum is mind-boggingly incredible but so is like you know the internet. So it's like search engines, you know, search for like billions of records within a split second. Like it's incredible, but we never think about it. And I'm I'm sort of at that stage with Ethereum. It's like thinking about like how I can actually leverage this, right? And but leverage it to do what? And and I think, you know, a lot of people have moved to to that point where they're like, how how do I put this technology and leverage it to do things that will um that are of interest to me? And so in

network states, I think they're kind of almost leading that way because they're really thinking about the practical applications um not just today, but tomorrow and 10 years from now and and like how it will impact society and the speculation part of it is incredibly interesting and like very easy to be nerd sniped, but the real power of it is the actual networks, the human networks. So getting past the like going from the technological aspect and even past the socio techn technological aspect to the actual social aspect of how humans are coordinating the the relationships they form through shared experiences and permanent hubs or pop-up villages and how those endure the economic alignment

from you know this the the the projects that they found that gained traction um and you know how they maybe share equity with each other or you you know, share tokens with each other and like how how that like what sort of structures that forms. It is really really powerful and I I think we should like not underestimate the fact that like I as far as I'm concerned the the DAPs we're building today will become the institutions of tomorrow. Um, and you know, even yesterday I was on Twitter having a conversation saying, you know, someday you'll be able to get your mortgage on chain and someone tweeted at me saying, "Hey, you know, you can get your mortgage on chain." And, uh, I I really want to hook up with a guy that

they're called, um, Dan Finance, like get your mortgage now or something. But, um, incredibly interesting and it, you know, it just kind of validates my perspective as far as I'm concerned. health insurance, um education, getting your mortgage on chain, dispute resolution, choice of law, a more efficient um you know, incorporation and and set up and not having to spend tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees, more efficient and less toxic capital formation and like at a huge scale. These are the things that are really going to have a massive impact in society over the next 10 years. Not that I'd think that anyone can predict exactly what shape it's going to take.

And maybe it's more likely that instead of having like a few network states, you will have hundreds or maybe thousands of network states and people will be part of multiple different ones in order to serve their needs perhaps. Um but that's the scale at which we're talking and I think the groundwork is most definitely being laid at the moment um in in the sort of like um proto network states that we're seeing um today. It's very very interesting, Simon. Um I have so many follow-up questions. My mind is running in uh in [clears throat] in a couple of different loops right now. So let me see where to start. Um let's start with a simple one. Have you seen or could you give some examples of like successful uh applications right of

those kind of network state uh you know quote unquote tools or uh uh you know solutions or protocols. Um, obviously I'm not talking about like crazy exponential success like even in the context of like small experiment or pilot. Uh, yeah. Would you would you curious to kind of hear your thoughts on that? >> I'm not sure that I can. I think you know they've been an amazing amount of experimentation innovation very very interesting tools that has emerged. Um, I think some of the things that have impressed me recently are stuff like the the permanent hubs that are being established. I'm very impressed by what they're doing at Sue Switzerland. Very impressed by like Frontier Tower in um in San Francisco

are doing incredible stuff not just in terms of like um real estate in order to create these permanent hubs for innovation but in terms of like thinking about how to create a digital economic zone with its own legal frameworks. the the sort of like bring your own regulation system that they have in uh Prospera is an incredible innovation with incredible applications and especially when you you know think about the sort of like challenges that are faced um by the pharmaceutical industry and the hedgemony of the the global pharmaceutical industry and how um we don't know how many projects have just been buried because of uh you know because of the level of control and bureaucracy. So you know those are the sort of p practical applications for the

legal frameworks that have been worked in these sort of digital economic zones. Yeah those are some really really interesting things. Um claros uh which isn't arguably doesn't have anything to do with network states but has huge application within the network state movement. Um I think is a very underrated project. But a lot of the, as I said, like a lot of the stuff that's really interested me this this year has been had nothing to do with um crypto and it's where I'm drawing most of my inspiration these days. Um hang on, let me see. I recently tweeted about this. I've got a book that I really really enjoy recently. Um, this one here, I remember tweeting about it and really inspiring because they they

talk about um different legal structures that are being used in the United States for um workerowned um companies uh and conglomerates of companies and they're doing incredible stuff um making things much more equitable for people, protecting people from from sort of like very exploitive uh exploitative um third party uh like I call them butcher funds and they're doing it all with just traditional legal contracts which uh as we all know are incredibly inefficient. You could do so much more with the the powerful technology that Ethereum offers. Um but the point is that those are the people

who are doing it and they're having a real measurable impact um in real communities and they're doing it with legacy tools and I just find that incredibly inspiring. Yeah, that's super interesting and I agree. I think there are many things happening outside of crypto and even outside of tech uh that uh that are somehow related or even are like essential to the network state you know mission or like you know let's call it movement or or I guess ethos. Um so you you spoke about nation states uh I spent a lot of time thinking about nation states uh in my early uh uh days just out of a personal uh you know curiosity.

Um I think um like basically the question I was so interested in was how are nations formed right or like what what makes up a nation state and u there's a lot of literature about that I didn't really reinvent the wheel there but uh it's quite interesting right like there's a geographic element and geographic proximity and uh to some extent the fact that you know you would have a territory somehow uh separated by some geographic boundaries from other territories whether it's a desert or you know a sea or a forest or a mountain or something like that. Obviously language is a big one. It's not an essential one.

Uh you do have nation state with multiple languages but you know it definitely plays a part. Religion in some cases is a big one. shared history sometimes just like imposed you know authority top down right so all these things even as I talk about them right they seem foreign to us right like the techsavvy generation in in a lot of ways right like we don't we connect with people online like if you think really about like when Facebook started right it started this thing about let's connect with our friends you know friends we even have not seen in a while online and then it moved from you know the Facebook thing to let's meet strangers online and you know gaming was a big kind of driver of that and you have people in gaming who are very close

friends and they never met and then with the crypto layer now you can like still you can now meet strangers become friends pulling capital do something with it you know govern coordinate so you can see that trend of like community building is changing right where before it was done through geographic proximity or shared history or religion it's now done through very kind of digital you know digitally native uh kind of you know in a digital native meme and and I think this is probably at the core of the of the kind of network state you know or at least one of the drivers of the network state uh thesis balachi talks about this idea of a moral or like one commandment right and you know he talks about the fact that you

need something that keeps that digital community together because because of how like easy it is to start an online community and switch between communities it's so easy for communities to live to like you know emerge and die. So how do you keep it alive right? How do you make it permanent so that it can move on to the next stage? And he basically anchors on this idea of like there needs to be like one kind of you know moral commandment thing. Um it's one perspective obviously. Um what's what's your take on that?

>> I personally agree with on on that point. Um, I think he's put a lot of people off by calling it the one commandant, but but I I honestly I I understand exactly what what he means. There is a lot of things that I kind of disagree with Felag on. I will say that, but that is one thing that I think is very important because at the start of what you were describing, you were describing nation states and the characteristics of how they're formed. And really what you were describing was nations, not nation states because a nation can exist without a state. And um but more of more often than not like when you think of a nation and what gives it um like persherence it's it's some sort of shared value system, shared culture of identity. Um and

I think that our generation has started to forge that cultural identity beyond national borders and beyond social demographics even. Um you know I I'm lived in Ireland most of my life. I don't I feel more digital than I do feel Irish. And that sounds strange, but I think a lot of people will uh understand what when I what I mean by when I say that because people have told me the same thing. They're like, "Oh, I feel more like digital than I do Ukrainian, you know, and I've heard that from people and and you know, multiple people have commented on it." I can jump in a little bit here. I I I saw like some some study that was done I think by Arc Invest some time ago maybe two years ago

and they were saying that today we spend like around 30 40% of our free time online and the rest uh offline like in the real world and like in in at least 5 to 10 years like this is going to flip. So we're going to be spending the majority of our free time online right and obviously work-wise we probably spend like 90% of our work online also. So think about the generation that is going to be born in that context, right? Like 90% of their lives are defined through digital interactions. >> But that's still just one way of looking at things. And like I'm reminded of a post that um an essay that Vitalik wrote um saying that the only real currency is legitimacy. Um and he's dead right. you

know, it's, you know, what gives coherence and legitimacy to a a community, whether that's a a large scale digital nation, um, or a real world community, it's people who, um, it's the narrative, right? It's it's it's something that that coheres everybody around a central idea. Um and and you know when it comes to like people feeling that their survival depends on being part of this community and that they associate maybe on a subconscious level they associate exile with like you know not being able to access food and shelter and security right then it doesn't really matter what the the idea is right people will just latch on to that idea and will defend it

tooth and nail even if they really believe that don't believe it or not it doesn't matter but it serves a point it serves a purpose of cohering the community and so you know at the center of every community you have this sort of maximalism um without which it sort of like falls apart and so when Vagi talks about the one commandment um there is there has to be a central idea but people kind of you know center around um and so he's dead right um the question is whether you know that idea is like a huge big idea that you know defines um a nation and and and and everything in that nation or is it something that like people have like allegiances to multiple different ideas and they're part of multiple different network states or

network nations and that's an interesting question and what does it mean to you know again like the whole rabbit hole of like being able to exit uh a network nation network society network state um again you could write a PhD on on that subject but it's it is at the core of it as well so I've kind of forgotten what the original question was but I think it has something to do with blight is one one commander >> yeah it it was about it It was about the moral commandment and it was about also like are there other ways to uh ensure that those communities online communities become permanent right other than just one moral commandment thing but just just to comment briefly on what you said about the moral commandment I I I fully agree with you there and and I think we've seen some examples already

like uh if you if you look at Vitalia for example it's basically you know the abolish death or like don't die or maybe like live forever you know type of moral commitment which is about longevity which is you know similar to Brian on since uh don't die movement um not to promote ourselves but like at VA our moral commandment is uh you know uh be antifragile in the sense that you know we rely on so many centralized very fragile systems uh from like digital systems to physical systems. So let's you know build and embrace uh uh you know circular antifragile decentralized systems uh you know whether it's energy, food, water, you know finance, data etc.

Um and and then I've seen some others that are have like more kind of a lighter more commandment, right? Like if you look if you think about edge city, it's more about like let's you know uh I guess enable human connection and flourishing, right? And like get people to coordinate and innovate and all of that. Uh so so it's quite interesting the way it's shaping up. >> Yeah. I think what's what's interesting as well is if that if we stick our head outside of our little bubble which you shouldn't do too often because it's quite scary out there. you'll see that there is like you know an almost opposite uh but similar movement back to like nationalism and a lot of communities that are centering themselves around this one commandment of whatever their flag is you know um and it's yeah it seems very unless I'm

uneducated but it seems very associated with xenophobia as well and protectionism and all you know as sort of like closing closing ranks >> and and you're 100% right like it it can go it can go both ways, right? And this is the thing that I uh that I tell people sometimes. The network state thing can be a positive thing, right? It could be, you know, decentralized, could be focused on kind of the positive attributes of what makes kind of the human experience better. It could also be centralized. It could also be uh you know very kind of negative and destructive and like uh focus on attributes that make us you know I I guess less than you know human, right?

And not to be too dramatic there, but like you could also think about like I guess Tesla as a network state, a very centralized network state or maybe the the start of a network state. It's not there yet, but it could get there. Um, and I guess this is where you get into the land of this could ultimately lead to technofudalism, right? Uh, in a lot of ways. And this is one of the reasons I'm very passionate and very invested in crypto because I think crypto tools are really the the only way to fight against those types of like structures that I don't think anyone of us wants.

>> So I kind of agree and I kind of disagree, but I'm really glad that you mentioned Tesla because I always think of Google as a network state um or a manifestation of this trend toward postnation states. And so like I think Google is very powerful and I think Microsoft and and Meta are very powerful. Lest we forget, Meta allowed their technology to be used to sway elections in um well, I won't say the obvious one because I'm might get me in trouble, but like there's well doumented uh um uh you know, cases in um in African nations where the results of election have been swayed using the power of Meta's platform and they were

totally happy with it because you know why not? That's just their customers. Um what does that mean? So it it means that there is a limit to the power of the nation state and it means that in some instances um you know these large tech companies are more powerful and have more control on the ground in a very material sense than the actual uh nation state has. And I think if you start like peeling back that idea and peeling back the layers you'll see that in a lot of even like western countries and EU countries that you know the power of these like massive tech companies is actually quite significant. So in a certain sense you could say that they're like network states already. Um but certainly you know in the context of the

post postnation state era were already there. Um now using like Ethereum or like using crypto um as a tool to to fix it. It depends how you use it quite frankly. Um, so I am I really want to kind of like just I want to re-emphasize that um as sophisticated and wonderful a technology as um crypto is and Ethereum is, it is just a technology, right? It's it's all about how you use it and that's a very human problem and it it is perfectly plausible that we will rebuild the traditional power structures on Ethereum.

>> Yeah, I I I I fully agree. Yeah, I I I said it in a maybe not not the best way, but I think absolutely Ethereum and and other crypto networks uh allow people to move from being, you know, reactive and receptive and exploited to being sovereign, right? And and proactive and and owners. But this only happens if they want that, right? Like if they don't want that, it will not happen. And so uh at the end of the day yes it is it is really a human decision and you know we can talk about how could this happen right in some cases it happens through a big crisis in

some cases it happens through you know I guess maturity or awakening or or something like that and that's kind of the maybe golden question like how how will this actually ultimately happen I do believe like and this is just my personal belief at the kind of meta layer um you know this is a technology that is definitely better than you know uh obviously if used the right way is definitely better than you know what was before it and so uh just purely from a meta historical and megapolitical you know kind of trend projection you know it's I deeply believe we will get there right one way or the other uh because just like you know historical

cycles and natural cycles will somehow like you know correct and adjust for us to realize oh like we have to use this there's no other otherwise we're going to keep going back or like we're going to destroy ourselves. Um but that's just kind of me my personal belief. Uh but but yeah absolutely it's a human decision at at the end of the day just like anything actually. >> I mean it it just makes things more efficient and it makes coordination much easier and it lowers the barriers to entry. Um it's it's powerful and I mean and that's not to be understated. It's a great thing. Um, but just the way, you know, in the legal professional, the the photocopier was incredible innovation cuz you went from these like having to like either write out things or like

type them out. It was slow. You put them in the post, whatever. And then you had like photocopier instant just like, you know, the facts you could just, you know, the coordination um was like 10xed overnight. Did that change everything? Not really. I think, you know, the way Ethereum is going right now is that we're celebrating adoption by celebrating like Wall Street is adopting Ethereum and all the all of these huge institutions like Black Rockck and Vanguard and Fidelity are like, you know, embracing Ethereum and it's great. We've made it. We haven't really made it. We nothing has actually changed. We've just made things, you know, the current traditional power structures in the world more efficient.

And like then maybe that's just me. Well, it is just me. I have this is like my I'm speaking from my own personal kind of like bias, but I think we can do better than that. And so using this power to level the playing field so that people with ideas um can more efficiently get those ideas off the ground in collaboration with other people to make their environment and community more equitable and to grow the wealth within their community. to do that without being dependent on intermediaries, without being you know mired in bureaucracy, without having this friction that that creates this sort of artificial ceiling. I think that would be a huge win. Um, and then out of that people will build whatever they will

build. And some of them some of those communities you might not vibe with. And there's there's definitely network states out there that are ostensibly very successful uh have amassed a huge amount of uh people and wealth that I don't vibe with. I'm not going to call them out. But, you know, but that's fine, you know, because there's other communities that will be um, you know, that that will align more with your values. But I think if we can like disintermediate the the current hedgemony of like even things like the legal profession profession or like how how capital is distributed into the ecosystem um you know if we can build better governance tools um I think then

then it would be hugely successful. I I agree with you and I also agree on your take on kind of you know the crypto convergence with you know fintech and and Wall Street and and all of that. I mean it's helpful right to get more distribution and more adoption and all of that but fundamentally I think crypto is not and should not be be viewed as like an evolution of fintech. It's uh in my opinion it's like it's a completely new technology. It's it's a it's it's actually you know in my opinion it's meant to replace uh the the existing financial infrastructure uh and and I think what I strongly believe that I'm

also not so worried like I I think there's a hype right now around stable coins and you know they're centralized steel rates are high so everyone is making money you know so like these things will change ultimately uh but you know Ethereum as this kind of permissionless you know open source decentralized backend infrastructure is is going to stay. Um, and ultimately we'll see more and more kind of cryptonative use cases. And I think maybe the first one will be kind of more like DeFi native use cases. So, um, that that's just my my take on it, but I fully agree with you like crypto is not fintech. It's it's sovereignty. It's it's financial sovereignty. Uh, basically.

>> Yeah. And I mean, you're right like you know the institutional adoption that we're seeing at the moment is is necessary. Um and I think going back like two years there was a lot of conversation around like you know Ethereum has to make it because the alternative is that someone else will make it and Ethereum is the the really most decentralized um you know infrastructure that's out there. I fully agree I fully agree someone who has like studied how you know studied the ecosystem from multiple different angles as part of my role for the three years that I was in that role in consensus.

Um, I can honestly say that I think Ethereum is like the really the only decent like properly decentralized um blockchain that's out there and and loads of people are queuing up to probably like, you know, throw things at me as I when they hear me say this and I'm I'm sure I've probably made some enemies saying that, but that's what I believe honestly. And so when it comes to like people saying, you know, this is why Ethereum should make it and then I fully understand that. And if institutional adoption is part of that, absolutely. But let's not lose sight of the goal. And the the goal is that this is a technology for disintermediation to level the playing field so that everyone has a chance to to build what they want to build whether it's a product or a community or whatever.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Uh all right. Uh going back to network state uh topic. Uh so you know the other dimension that you know balagi uses to define network state is the crypto kind of economy you know element I I won't go I won't go into that right now. I think Chris will want to cover kind of you know the concessor network state uh uh you know tooling and and kind of mission and all of that. Uh so I I'm going to skip that one and then move to the next one which is uh the physical land right or like the kind of transition from this kind of you know online community with a with one commandment to having like permanent uh you know locations uh probably

distributed right across the across the globe. So same question here like what's your take on that is that an essential part of a network state um and yeah how important is the physical kind of in real life element here whether it is human connection but also like the building of like physical infrastructure right like the energy water food because to some extent right like you cannot really talk about exit from a nation state while you know in some way you still heavily depend on you know nation state centralized you grid systems, right, for water energy or even food systems and and so on and so on. So, how yeah, how deep does this go, right? Like is it about rethinking the whole thing

uh from a systems design perspective or is it more about like you know it's it's a it's an online community it's governance through crypto tools. because it has like a way to coordinate using crypto tools and you know it has a you know crypton native assets and all of that but it still lives in somehow somehow in some existing structure within the real world. >> It's hugely important. It's not critical. I would say it's not critical but it's hugely important and it's hugely important for two different angles. one is human relationships and like the relationships that are forged when when people cohabit in a space even for a short time you know um and I think that's hugely important and those relationships last and endure um and when those people leave you know it it

creates this network that spans the globe even though the the physical location where those network those relationships are first forged might only have a small physical footprint um but it is a hugely important part of it but you know not critical either but I I think that, you know, you're going to see pop-up villages and permanent hubs and they will be in time become syndicated. Um, and you know, I think that's that's really valuable. Um the other thing is the other really important reason that physical spaces um uh are so valuable is because when a network state or syndicate of network states acquires um a lot of like real estate or physical spaces, it gives them

more to bargain with with the host nation states. All right. And maybe host is the wrong word, but you know the nation states that they would need to interact with. And so you mentioned like like food, water, infrastructure, all of that kind of stuff. And so you have a lot more to kind of bargain with in terms of like you know demanding a certain amount of like negotiating autonomy for example. Um and I think that's important but again not totally essential. Um there will be some network states that aren't initially interested in physical real estate state at all. I think the consensus network state is a pretty good example. It it I think regards its its territory as being its

you know like its layer 2 network and it has this like sovereign autonomy for its community over this digital space. Um similarly I think probably I don't want to speak for like AJ but I think arbitrum probably take the same perspective and um I know that like logos are kind of more aligned but they I think have started referring to themselves more as a cipher state than a network state. Um but in essence it's kind of the same thing. So it's not critical. And like one of the the interesting examples um that illustrates this very well is from is from the farewell to West failure book. I don't know if you have you guys had a chance to read that. I think I got that. There

we go. It's from Jared Hope and Peter Lllo. If you can get a copy, I'd strongly recommend it if you're um this will pull you on network states. >> Okay. Nice. >> Yeah. So there's a plug. You're welcome, Jared. Um, but anyway, there's there's a great example in there and it's the amount of US citizens that live in Mexico as like basically permanently. I'm probably wrong, but I think it's like 1.8 1.9 million. It's quite a lot of people. They depend on Mexico as a a nation state for um, you know, security um, like policing, you know, like water and infrastructure, all that kind of stuff.

But you know they also depend on the United States for a lot of things like health insurance and social security, finance, banking, their passport, all of those kind of things. And you know Jared and Peter's point was that it they don't really care about the physical territory of the United States. If this physical territory of the United States if we can as a thought experiment if it just disappeared overnight but all the kind of wealth and everything just remained like it wouldn't really make any difference to those people you know their dependency on the United States is is irrespective of the physical land mass right it's more the institution and the the structures of power and wealth that have have been built so you can imagine you know people being part of

like a network state that doesn't have a physical um footprint but it still caters to a lot of their needs and so I think we're going see the emergence of those kind of network states and for a lot of the physical material um needs you know I think that a lot of nation states have started um have started um uh what's it outsourcing to private actors and and started in like the 1980s especially in like the United States where other countries have privatized way too much there's like a lot of like private firms that look after all of the physical needs right like water, electricity, all all of that kind of stuff. Um, and so there's nothing to stop a network states bargaining with

those private actors and just outsourcing it the same way nation states do, you know. Um, so yeah, I don't think the physical is is is critical to, you know, the it's necessarily critical to uh the existence of the network state. >> Yeah, I I I kind of agree on from that perspective. There's another perspective here which is you know kind of the fact that uh even like actually in light of the AWS outage right that happened like two days ago right like you could argue that we've been building a lot of our crypto uh solutions on other people's you know clouds right and uh and and infrastructure and so shouldn't we at some point have our own infrastructure

uh for this to be really kind of you sovereign and and uh and unstoppable. >> Yeah. I I mean I couldn't have said it better myself. Yeah. Um but what form that takes I mean there's there's there's got to be economies of scale and I think you know going to be like this whole notion of shared services and negotiation and collective bargaining. So I I I couldn't speculate as to exactly what form it will take but um yeah no I do I do agree completely. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cool. All right, last question on on this topic and I I'll pass it back to Chris. Uh, so you know the last kind of u I guess element or dimension of Balaj's definition is the diplomatic recognition, right? Um, and

you know this gets into kind of the political sovereignty uh aspect of it. Same question here, right? Like is that important? Is that critical uh or is it more of a nice to have? What's your kind of personal take on on this one? No, it's it's um it's just like irrelevant as far as I'm concerned. You don't need political or like you shouldn't need polit like diplomatic recognition if you're successful in your endeavors. Like why would you need diplomatic recognition? And do you need like formal diplomatic recognition from the who the United Nations or something? Like you can you can still negotiate with um with a country, right? you can still

negotiate with a country as if you were negotiating with a private enterprise um on on behalf of your citizens. Large companies do that, right? Like companies with with over 100,000 employees, right? You know, it's just called collective bargaining. Um but like I think you know if you think of like Google, Google as we discussed earlier um could be regarded as a sort of a network state. It's certainly very powerful and and challenges the power and sovereignty of nation states in many instances, but does it have diplomatic recognition as a network state? No. Does it mute it? No, not in the slightest. So, yeah, I I wouldn't go chasing that. Um, and maybe it'll be useful to some degree in the

future. I don't know. >> Yeah, it's interesting. It's I just realized as we're as we're answering the question actually there's a little bit of a contradiction here in the sense that in Balaji statements or like definition in the sense that on one hand it's kind of uh the exit from the nation states right the way it's positioned but on the other hand you know one of the elements is getting recognized diplomatically by those nation states you know what I mean so like there's a little bit of a of a tension in there like if you're exiting that whole concept why do you like why is it essential for you to still be recognized by those kind of old structures Uh so yeah, what what we said makes sense.

>> I mean I think in fairness to Balagi, I think the way like we talk about for example the one commandment and like when you dig a little deeper there's more to it and and potentially there's more there's more to it and his rationale is is on a deeper level and potentially like I suppose diplomatic recognition could be used as a means to an end. I think it's unclear to me at least what that end would be um and whether or not you would need diplomatic recognition to essentially um get to that stage. I mean for us I don't think we'll be going to the United Nations anytime soon. So >> yeah. Yeah. I I think maybe yeah to be fair with Baji I think the other maybe implication of of the diplomatic

recognition or like uh dimension is that you know if you want to create a state right which is you know it's part of being a network state you also need to have ways to defend it right and so the diplomatic thing is also like not just for recognition but also for you to be uh to have like ways to defend yourself by building kind of diplomatic relationships with other structures and all of that. And I think he talks about that in in the book. But but yeah, it's it's um I I I kind of agree. It's it's more of a nice to have if it's if it's needed, not really critical or or essential uh to to have a network.

>> What about you guys? Are you uh going to see to seek diplomatic recognition? >> No. No. So, we actually have a very similar That's a good question. We actually have a very similar take on this. we uh are not we don't really care about political sovereignty like we're focusing on bridging the crypto uh sovereignty with the physical sovereignty and we think the communities who are going to be formed you know under this structure uh for them political sovereignty is irrelevant right like they have everything they need they're financially sovereign they're you know they have their own energy food water they're innovating they're building politics at that in our opinion doesn't really matter and then it becomes more of a decision that

the community will make if they want to pursue it or not basically. >> So so yeah we we align on that. Yeah, as as with many things um you know narrative is everything and and that applies to nation states as well you know the brand um and legitimacy through this brand is actually more important than you know in many cases even like your police force right um and yeah I think so yeah there's a whole rabbit hole that we could dive down on that but um yeah >> but isn't isn't that true Simon is I think that's that's probably one of the main differences between the people who kind of subscribe to society versus state uh which is this element of like you know exit or uh you know political

sovereignty or diplomatic recognition and and so on. Uh so it's it's a hot topic in in the community I feel like. >> Yeah, it is a hot topic. I think you know I had started gravitating more toward the the the concept of like a network state and and aligning more with that because I felt that you know what defines what sets apart a network state as opposed to a network nation or network society or network sovereignty is the fact that it builds like institutions. you know, it builds these large-scale institutions from the ground up um that are governed in a very transparent way, but you know, that that meet real needs for the people in that network state. Um I think though, like I

I'm kind of at the stage where I've kind of given up trying to find the right term because it's shifting all the time and and so many different people have so many different ideas about what it really means to be a network state. Um I do think that like institutions and recognizable institutions within the the network are one part of it but other people will say that like having a physical presence or physical archipelago is like most definitely another part of it whereas other people will say well we'll just you know um align completely with the balagian school of thinking which is fine you know. Yeah, I I agree. I I think one thing uh um I guess we we struggle with a little bit in the crypto space or like

within our crypto community is that we sometimes get stuck on definitions a lot >> uh versus like let's just let's just you know you know act and build and uh does it really matter what you call it? Like we're just like at this stage debating ideas. >> Yeah. 100% 100%. Yeah. And that's why I'm so inspired now by people who are doing like I'm building amazing things um that are having like huge impact and they're not even using crypto. they're just using ink on paper old legal contracts which are incredibly inefficient and burdensome and slow and costly and difficult to navigate um and have all the sort of like regulatory risks and stuff and yet they're doing it you know so I think at a certain stage you just need to go do it um you know

what I mean but I think yeah if if we can bring and as we said earlier if we can bring the power as Ethereum the power it has for establishing trust between people and for disintermediation then hopefully we can um learn from the people who are doing it and help them to just do it better. >> Super interesting. I I think we've uh been getting right into the spicy topics in the network state space, right? Like exit and sovereignty and political sovereignty and diplomatic recognition and so forth. Um but I think for me the thread of the conversation um it it seems to link to this idea of disintermediation which is at the core

of the crypto ethos even going back to Bitcoin and personally I see that as being very linked to exit because originally the Bitcoin white paper was an exit from the traditional finance system. That's the foundational value base. That's the foundational value set of the entire crypto ecosystem from my perspective. And I I see it in a way as just like going further up the stack like okay the financial system is being disintermediated. What's next? uh and there's th this concept of self- sovereignty, self- custody can be applied to different systems like food systems, water systems, energy systems and so on all the way up to and I think

that's kind of what Baji was doing for my perspective was like to the nation state itself what would happen if that was all dis intermediated as well and perhaps even is it necessary anymore if all the other systems are being have been disintermediated does it need to exist the banks need to exist. So, I think um I think we're in a really interesting point in history, but I fully agree like we just need to build stuff cuz that's ultimately what Satoshi did as well. Like he didn't just produce the white paper and then go to conferences and talk about it. Like he built something that people then used and they took that and they went with it and and here we are. So,

>> yeah. And we've got a lot of work to do. Um because as we've realized uh it's not that simple. So I mean I can go and I can write a smart contract and just like publish it and just go on Twitter and start like getting people to interact with it and I can build a business, right? I can build a financial institution. Um but eventually I need to start worrying about things like oh where is it doiciled? Do I owe tax? Um am I applying like complying with local regulations? Am I gonna go to jail? Right? Like all of these things and like practical things you need to consider.

And so, you know, yeah, you've got a smart contract and it's incredible and you can do stuff with it. And and I'm not like understating how awesome that is, but you still need to go to a lawyer and you still need to go through the legal system. You still need to figure out like the regulatory hurdles and how to navigate it, which requires expert expertise. then you know you need capital and capital right now in crypto is really broken. It's really really broken. Um it's synonymous with control.

Um and you know you could like I don't have to spell it out. We've seen like a huge amount of toxicity around like the capital and how it's provided the terms under which it's provided. You know the strings that are attached you know stuff like short-term investing and and um quick unlocks getting dumped on on retail. we had the whole kind of like me before I think the ecosystem slowly recalibrated. um we have uh like even with like market makers and how liquidity is managed and like there's a lot wrong with this system and it's because we've inherited the structures of like non-crypto because we haven't built the new structures yet and so like this whole idea of disintermediation

that started with you know arguably with um Satoshi's uh you know Bitcoin paper it's a it's a work in progress um and we're we're realizing as we venture forward that we have to keep going further and further up the stack as you point as you said like eventually to the the nation state level perhaps um but at that stage if we've done our job properly we won't we won't need a network state but right now there's just like so much that happens so much coordination that happens offchain using traditional structures of power and control that um we have a lot of work to do I think you know um the only thing now there's that the silver lining is that we have the tools to think about it whereas before

you probably didn't even think about it. Um, so yeah, that's that's that's positive. You know, >> I'm wondering like where does consensus and the consensus network state and also linear like you mentioned L2s and and Lineia as like this sovereign digital territory like where where does linean consensus fit into this >> particularly sorry just to say like to particularly that bit you said about like capital allocation because I think that like I've heard a couple of uh times on linear podcast there's some talk about like launch pads and capital allocation and I I guess linear like often might be there's like some focus

on DeFi and other stuff but like where does the network state fit into to this and what's the relationship between the network state linear consensus and and so forth as we as we move forward into the future. >> Where do I start? I mean let's start with linear. I think like linear is Ethereum. Um, and it was built to be as closely aligned with the the vision of Ethereum as possible, right down to the the the zero knowledge proofs that that power the engine of Linear. I think it's probably the technologically closest to to um Ethereum and and hopefully will be an enshrined ZK EVM um before Ton. And I think that, you know, that's carried

through all the way even into their tokconomics where, you know, they they burn a certain amount of ETH um to, you know, to benefit like ETH the asset and and that comes from this like very close alignment with the original vision of Ethereum, which is no surprise, right? I mean, it's like Joe Luben helped co-ound Ethereum and like arguably built half the ecosystem through consensus in the early days as an incubator. Um, so I think yeah, like Lineia is still a very young ecosystem with that holds great promise, especially if you look at what they've accomplished and the how much the ecosystem has grown. Um I think we'll continue to grow and we'll we'll see um

a lot of innovation and a lot of capital um being deployed on Lineia um to the extent where you can start to think about as a burgeoning digital economic network um which if you like could be synonymous with network state and you could swap that network state with digital economic network and um you're you know you could be talking about the same thing and you know when you mix in a sort of valued alignment as well you you get a little bit closer to those sort of balagian school of thinking as well. Um, and then beyond that, I think Joe has a a broader grander vision for what the consensus network state is and it's intrinsically linked to the original vision of Ethereum um, as a technology that is uh, you know, a powerful form of disintermediation that

again just lowers the barriers of entry to people who want to build things. Um, and that's what it's that's what it's about at its very essence. And I can go on to answer the part of your question about like capital and capital formation and and what the future looks like in that regard. But um at the most fundamental level I think that's where consensus the network state idea and linear in particular sort of cohhere together. >> Is there uh one kind of moral commandment for the consensus network state?

>> I wish I could say there was and and actually you know I don't think that um I am the authority. I'm a consensus network state. I think it's very different from the Bellagian um definition of a network state where you have this recognized founder. Arguably, you could say Joe Ster Lugan is a recognized founder, but I don't know honestly if any one party has the authority to define what the network state is. I think it's a little bit more porous than that. And I think it it uh it allows anyone to participate to any degree and form it in the way they want to. Um which which is remarkable. I think it's it's a beautiful vision. Um, so in that if I was to sum it up in one word, it might be inclusivity.

>> Okay, cool. I thought you were going to say decentralize everything, which is something that Joe keeps saying, but uh inclusivity is also good. >> Yeah, I think decentralizing everything, I think there's, you know, the future is going to be decentralized and the future is going to be tokenized and we're going to see like tokens everywhere. Tokens will lead the world. It's funny just just briefly on that point uh because we we did the we did an interview with Joe a couple weeks ago and I had a question to him about uh like how will people move from you know the current financial system to the you know new you know crypto uh you know systems and I I thought his answer was going to be

something like you know there's you know I don't know like there's going to be a financial crisis or like there's a huge sovereign debt crisis and you know that type of Uh but he he surprised me with his answer. His answer was pretty simple in the sense that he basically said it's going to be about incentives and gamification. Uh which actually uh if this happens that would be a fun a fun journey if we're able to bring people in just because it's fun and uh you know you're going to be incentivized. Um so yeah anyway just a quick side note on on that point.

>> Cool. Um conscious of time so I think we might move to the final section Mark unless there's anything else you want to add Simon about like the your plan around launchpads on Lineia or anything of that nature >> I think Chris uh I would spend more time here and then the conclusion we can just wrap it up quickly so I I'd be curious to know more about the softs project Ethereum values you know >> uh >> yeah so in that sense I guess yeah if there's anything else you want to add about the launchpads first and then um and capital formation as you describe it because I think that's really interesting and very relevant for builders of network states as well in

terms of like if they're building on linear they're building a network state how would they go about like fundraising on the chain and what kind of what might be available to network state builders on on Lineia in in the future >> I think there's already a lot of um thing powerful things available to people on linear. um it's a very burgeoning ecosystem and um you know it's a very thriving ecosystem from our perspective from CNS labs that uh that I'm currently working in um we are going to launch something in the next three weeks I think um I think like the week before dev connect um and what we're launching initially is a founder

network um and it's very much a peer support network for founders I think that founders um organically and naturally create these networks um by helping each other by realizing that they have to help each other in order to survive. Um and so we want to bring the power of Ethereum and and the technologies that we've built to bear on making it easier for them to do that in a very self-s sovereign way without gatekeepers. And that means you know whereby most founders will struggle to um access capital or even to get into like an accelerator to find the sort of support that they need. Um you know we would like to lower the barrier of entry there. Um make it as open as possible while also um you know cutting through

the noise so that people can establish trust with people with other people um very easily um can get the support that they need in a safe space very easily. um but without these sort of um centralized gatekeepers that we currently have. You know, most accelerators I've spoken to uh they would run a cohort and during the application process might get like 2,000 applications. Um there might only be 20 teams for that cohort, which shows you how difficult it is to kind of get into these accelerators. And it's the same with a lot of the the current founder networks that are out there for obvious reasons because they want to create the level of quality. They make it somewhat restrictive and that means a lot of founders kind of get left left out in

the cold and started try to create networks themselves. And we want to lean into that and create a founder network where um you know it's there's there's tools for coordination that make it um very robust, very safe um and very powerful so that founders can actually get the help and support they need that's currently gated and walled off. Uh and then beyond that get access to capital. Um and we realized that you know when we started thinking about the the the struggle the the burden and the penury that a lot of founders have to go through in order to get capital and when they finally do manage to get capital the terms under which they access that capital and the amount of control that they that they hand over that has very

negative externalities for the ecosystem in general and creates a lot of toxicity within um crypto. And so when we started thinking about like how you could do things slightly differently, we realized that it's a thread that once you start pulling it just keeps coming and coming. Um, and eventually we got to the realization that you need to start really rerouting the the entire playbook. Um, which is a journey we've been on for quite some time. And that's really sort of becoming our mission in in the midterm is to to rewrite the playbook for people who want to to seek an alternative to the traditional ways even in crypto of accessing capital. And so you make it community first, make it

accessible, make it transparent and make it constantly aligned to values uh that are you know based in like equitable equitable participation for people um and equitable distribution of governance, control and power. So I know that sounds very lofty and aspirational, but that that's what we've been focusing on and that's what we're going to continue to build. Um so the first part of that journey will be the founder network that we roll out in I think about three weeks and that will be on linear as well. >> That's that's awesome. Uh I can say that like the fundraising part specifically is something that is uh like really really tough in in the network state space. Uh like we we are you know going through it right now with Vow and some

of the you know network state deepen initiative we're we're trying to do and yeah it's uh it's not easy at all. So yeah really curious to see what you guys are are are doing and and and working on there. Um just just briefly uh you know we saw the the echo acquisition by Coinbase uh one or two days ago. Any thoughts there? >> Yeah, that raised some eyebrows on our side as well. I think it sort of validates um our strategy because I think a lot of people are starting to realize that capital formation is very important and I think Kobe did a great job with Echo and then later with with with Sonar. Um, I think we want to be even more aspirational and and open it up to even more participation beyond

accredited investors um in ways that are is very simple, straightforward, easy to understand based in transparency and informed consent so that you know people who do want to participate uh in supporting projects with capital can do it in a way that they feel confident and safe that they're not going to be rugged quite simply because that's what crypto is saying is for and for good reason. And like the traditional answer to that in traditional finance has been through regulation and through only allowing accredited investors to access um investment opportunities. And that just creates these awful rich get-richer dynamics. It's unfair. Um and um it it causes people to just kind of end up like it causes the sort of financial

nihilism that we've seen with the rise of like Beamcoin launchpads which are frankly not the answer. So there's got to be a middle way and that's what we've been exploring. >> Yeah, that's that's very interesting. Uh we did we did a lot of work at consensus uh like back in 2017 on like ICOs, token models. Uh we were trying to come at it from a very kind of uh you know educated uh sustainable robust perspective. I think the initiative was called token work actually and I think a lot of the so like what we were doing were just inviting people who are thinking about different types of token models to like just present their latest thinking. uh we had kind of uh Mike Golden talking about TCRs. We had some other people talking about edition markets and that type of thing. I think it's still

online. I can I can probably find the link and and share it. Uh but all this to say is just it's just great to see this. It feels like this is kind of what you guys are kind of, you know, the direction you're going in and it's just interesting. It's just actually quite cool to see it coming back because I think ICOs had a big promise and I think it just got completely sidetracked by speculation and unsustainable models and just basically uh extraction of value. >> Yeah, it did. And but like in fairness, I think like the the VC model um it did work and was very innovative and it was fair for for a long time, but at some at some point became corrupted and it bled into the crypto space and created a lot of toxicity. Um which is sad, but you

know, it's not the end of the world. It can be fixed. Um but for those who are open to exploring different ways to to to move forward um and but it's not it's not capital is at the heart of it. It's not just capital though. It's it's um you know incorporation legal structures um legal fees. It's the opaque processes that founders need to navigate um and the opaque process that presented to people in the community that want to participate in supporting projects. So there's a lot of work to do in in breaking down those walls. Um that work is well underway and we just have to keep chipping at it.

>> Super interesting. I love that, you know, you guys are coming at this from with an understanding of the network state space as well because I think a lot of people in crypto see that as the future, but like getting capital into those projects at an early stage can be quite tricky as Mark said cuz like what's the product, where's the revenue, what's the like and obviously those questions still will need to be answered. But I think it if it's part if you're part of a founder network and there's opportunities to access capital in a way that's kind of more aligned with the vision and less

about like just extracting uh because I guess fundamentally like with a network state it's something that's going to take a long time to build right it's not necessarily something that's going to be an exit in in three years right >> and as I said at the start of the this podcast that I've been so focused on on like building a lot of this stuff that I've I've kind of become a little bit detached from the narrative itself. Um but like when we started thinking about like well what's the first thing you do to try to build a network state? Well obviously you'll just try to build a network first. That makes sense. And so like well what sort of network and then like logically it led us to building a founder network because founders and builders are the people who build things

that people coales around. They build communities, right? And so if you can create a network that's you know comprised of really truly aligned um individuals then they will create communities and those communities will be aligned and and you know I don't know ABC state that's sort of the way we thought about it >> but honestly that's where the that's you know if you can crack the early stages the rest will follow that's what we think and that's the most important part and there's a a thin line between sort of like econ economic control through giving someone capital in exchange for equity and economic alignment between u people who are already aligned in terms of their values. And so we're

experimenting with actually doing a collaboration with polyentric soon using the agreement uh protocol that we developed to see how founders can start exchanging small amounts of equity in projects that they have an affinity toward much in the same way as a VC would manage a portfolio. but coming at it from a a non-extractive non just like purely ROI based more in terms of like how do you build anti-ragility and resilience into the community in general and but it's for the same purposes of like de-risking and hedging the various different uh ventures that are underway and so if we can get that in at a very distributed level on the ground and if we if we can get that to work um then I

think having a founder network as opposed to an accelerator or like a venture studio or VC in the traditional sense is going to be far more powerful and you know since we're on the Alo Capital podcast like you know hats off to what those guys are doing exploring with the various different mechanisms that they think could work and experimenting with them to try to prove it out. I think that that's going to um you know uncover some incredibly useful innovation in that space as well. So yeah, I'm very impressed with what they're doing. All right, Simon. Uh, I think we're going to start wrapping it up. Uh, I do have one more question about consensus. Uh, I, you know, I I was pretty excited to see the Saabs

project last Defcon announced by Joe. Uh, and then more recently, uh, the Ethereum values project with intuition. Um can you talk a bit more about this kind of you know I don't know to what extent you were involved in this but just even if you were not just kind of are you able to give us an overview of you know what was this about uh you know how did it go what were the learnings and where is this going it seems like this is part of some pattern here uh so yeah what's uh where are you trying to take this >> yeah those are all really cool projects actually um I think it started even before ths there was if I can remember it was like the was it the web three

bill of rights or something and it was like um is that right? Do I remember that? Yeah, >> I think so. I kind of remember that. >> It was like a kind of sort of manifesto for you know like basically spelling out the fact that like web 3 is an incredible technology but it there has to be equitable access to this technology and you you kind of sign it if you agreed with it sort of thing. And then um the then salsa XY Z was sort of like an iteration of that but it was a little bit more interactive whereby you there was a whole bunch of different values and you could you choose the ones that you vibed with the most that were most important to you and then you would create it like an attestation on uh the Fairaxistation registry and you're basically it's the same thing. It's like

you're signing it but you're signing it by saying like the these are the values that are really important to me. there's a little bit more odd expression involved. That was Kevin Rocky and his team that helped on that and they did a really good job. Um so like you know hats off to them and then that kind of inspired uh my team to take that even further and say okay well instead of like giving these values to people to kind of choose from like this static list of values um what if anyone could propose a value and it was around the same time that there was a lot of I guess you could say soularching within the Ethereum community like what what are we what are we doing what are we really about and so it came at a very timely um point. Um, and the results

were quite interesting. So, people could um express whatever values were important to to them. Um, you could say whatever you wanted and we had some kind of spicy ones in there if I remember correctly and they're still there. Um, but that was part of the fun, right? And we we built it with intuition protocol, which is an incredible technology. Um, and so we we used intuition protocol in such a way that not only could you propose a value, but you could stake on the value, right? And you could you if you really really really felt strongly you could like stake a thousand E or whatever. Um some people stake like one ETH. I think that was like the most we saw and other people could stake but they could stake for or against. So if they disagreed with you they could stake

against that. And then we kind of gified it a little bit so that um you know every time there was a deposit or withdrawal there was a tiny fee that that got associated with that taken and associated with that value and everyone who had previously staked would start getting the deposits and withdrawals from all of the other people. Um so we wanted to experiment with like mechanism design to see um you know if this would this would help people to express the values of the community. It was a really interesting experiment. Um, and I'm really grateful to Intuition for collaborating uh with us on it. And the whole point of it was to see like how a community can create its own values because as we we discussed previously,

that's very important whether it's a one commandment or whether it's a set of values. Um, and it's something that we'd like to revisit in the future if we can get a bit of a headsp space, but it's still up there and you can still interact with it. Um, I think we learned a lot from particularly the user interface and how the user interface itself you need to think about it very carefully because it can actually affect how people choose values or express values and stuff. So I think it's definitely worth another iteration something maybe a little bit more complex and sophisticated next time.

>> Yeah, that's very interesting. I I wasn't aware Kevin was involved in the soft swan. Uh, that's pretty cool. Um, yeah. Yeah, I mean honestly it was inspiring for us because now like the VA community today is very excited about doing something similar uh and kind of uh you know linking it to uh prediction markets in some way and making it it's kind of inspired by what you guys did and also by a project called commit or commit pool which is about like you know you know creating some challenge for yourself and like having you know stake to have skin in the game. Uh so we'll we'll share more about this and we can talk more about it later and I think maybe we should bring Kevin into this if he was you know involved in insults that could be quite uh quite cool but you

know just one more thing on this as as you were talking I realized you know that could be one of the ways to get to the moral commandment I think a lot of times we get biased into thinking the moral commandment should like be that should appear magically right uh but uh it could also be built bottom up right like just people can stake on the different things and the things that get the majority you know becomes the the one commandment that this community is about. >> Yeah, I agree. I think that we we with that experiment we proved that you can actually surface values from the ground up. I think we did, you know, we didn't get it perfect. Uh we learned a lot from the experiment. Um so there's definitely things to consider, but it's possible and I think that's really exciting space. I would love if like if Kevin was

interested and I'm pretty sure Billy from Intuition would be really interested as well and if you guys have a great idea, we'd love to support it and all the code we wrote for um you know the previous experiments open source on the CNS labs um GitHub. So yeah, I'd love to to give it like one more crank and and see what we could do. >> Awesome. Okay, we're currently kind of just writing it out a little bit more in detail and we we'll share it and talk more about it. Follow up to that, any thoughts or any work you guys are doing on TCRs or prediction markets as it relates to, you know, capital allocation or coordination in general?

>> No. Um, only because we've probably bitten off more than we consume in terms of like the amount of um stuff that we've cooked up for ourselves. Um, so we've developed like a community participation protocol or we published a white paper on that and we've been building some infrastructure around it. We built the um the the protocol for lightweight agreements called Signnet and built an entire standards body around that as well with support from the Linux Foundation. Um and then you know we've been building the founder network and then we've been exploring regard and so we've probably got our hands full. That being said there is some credible innovation on Linear and um I know that there are some really interesting prediction markets that are

going to be rolled out. I'm not sure I can spill the beans just yet. I don't know if I if I'm allowed to say that, but it's going to be really really interesting. And I think future key as a concept is starting to make its way even even into capital formation because there are a couple of like token launchpads for example that are out there um that are using future key for sort of um community surface due diligence. Um so that's kind of like an interesting application as well. So it would be interesting to see uh you know how effective that is. Um yeah, but we're not doing anything directly ourselves just yet, apart from what we did with Intuition that time.

>> Okay, last questions. Um if if people want to, you know, stay up to date on CNS labs and what you guys are doing, what's the best way to do that? >> Yeah, we've been so quiet. Um but we are planning to launch and come out of stealth in a few weeks. Um and at that stage we'll have all the trappings of like the website and the social media account and you know you can and a direct way to actually get involved and contribute and join the network. Um in the meantime I think um please just like follow me on Twitter um and you will be able to stay up to date unless you're already following Joe and hopefully he'll um you know share updates as well.

By the time this podcast goes out we might have launched or we'll maybe be a week away from launching. So please stay tuned. Um uh the last thing I want to say is that like what we aspire to do, we absolutely realize that we can't do it alone and that we ab we need help. Simple as that. And we really do need to work together um with other communities such as yours and with just like people who feel passionately about it. So I would encourage people to to to reach out in that context and even if it's just stay up to date and at some point in the future leave the door open for more meaningful level of contribution, please just do that because this is going to continue to grow and go into unexpected and exciting places, but

we all have to work together. So I'd leave it at that then. >> Absolutely agree. Uh Simon, this was a pleasure. It was a great conversation. Thank you for uh making it and uh >> absolutely. Thanks for having me guys. Yeah, great pleasure. >> Take care. Bye. Bye. >> Right. >> That was a detailed look into digital coordination with Simon Brown on the consensus network state. We can really see how web 3's foundational tools are essential for bridging a vast global community into a cohesive antifragile network. Next week, we're continuing the journey by getting into the practical building steps when it comes to antifragile systems. We'll be joined by

engineer and permaculture expert Rob Avis. Find the show notes and links in the comments below and be sure to follow us on X at join Val. Thanks for listening and until next time, keep building antifragile.