Ill Conceived

Balaji Srinivasan & Network Natalism

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Natalcon 2025 featured a number of high profile speakers whose speeches weren't recorded. One of these speakers was Balaji Srinivasan, a technologist who made his fortune in pre-pregnancy genetic testing and now preaches the gospel of cryptocurrency and decentralized "Network States" to anyone who will listen. This week, Josh and June discover what Balaji's whole deal is and end up deeply confused and repulsed by it.

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EPISODE ART: Balaji Srinavasan at TechCrunch Disrupt. After graduating from Stanford and co-founding genetic testing company Counsyl, Srinivasan joined the venture capital firm Andreesen Horowitz and later worked at Coinbase. In 2024 he founded Network School, an incubator in Malaysia that seeks to develop applications for his concept of the Network State.

AUDIO CLIPS:

  • 48:23 – Balaji Srinivasan's "Ultimate Exit" talk at Y Combinator Startup School in 2013
  • 51:56 – ibid.
  • 1:04:11 – Balaji Srinivasan's talk at Natal Conference 2023
  • 1:10:45 – Balaji Srinivasan at Token2049 in Dubai, 2025
  • 1:20:29 – ibid.
  • 1:22:17 – ibid.

    • SOURCES:

    • SAAWA 2013 Honorees profile of Dr. Bhavani Srinivasan
    • "NY Physician is Fellow of Royal College of Physicians in London" (The Indian Panorama, July 23, 2016)
    • PDF of the March 2006 issue of State Magazine
    • Balaji Srinivasan's LinkedIn profile
    • Crunchbase profile of Counsyl
    • MIT Technology Review Innovators Under 35 profile of Balaji Srinivasan
    • "The Blockchain is the Internet of Money" by Tunku Varadarajan (The Wall Street Journal, September 22, 2017)
    • "The Turnaround" by Balaji Srinivasan (Medium, April 16, 2018)
    • Network School website
    • Praxis Nation website

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            Ill ConceivedBy Josh Boerman & June Sternbach
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