In this episode, we talk with Thomas France - the founder of Ledger Wallet, which has quickly become one of the most popular hardware wallets in the world.

Thomas is an entrepreneur who has focused all of his time and attention the past few years on Ledger, including issues of security and user experience.

In today’s episode, we discuss:

* Thomas’s early forays into cryptocurrency.

* Why security is inherently tough in cryptocurrency.

* What you should be thinking about, no matter how you store your crypto.

* Ease-of-use and how to make storage and security simpler for everyone.

* The current state of the cryptocurrency world in terms of adoption and growth.

In this episode, we chat with Brad Mills - currently an advisor to the ICO portfolio team at Alphabit, an actively managed cryptocurrency fund.

Brad is an entrepreneur who’s been a bitcoin evangelist and algorithmic trader since 2011, and today, he talks a lot about how he sees cryptocurrency evolving and what that means for smart investing:

How to think about cryptocurrency investing short-term versus long-term.

ICOs and how to judge them.

The sometimes ugly politics of cryptocurrency.

Staying centered in a sea of uncertainty, volatility, and hype.

Wver the past couple episodes, we’ve spoken with people like Spencer Bogart and Jack Gavigan, both of whom are deep in the world of cryptocurrency - in tech, investment, and otherwise. Today, we wanted to get outside that bubble just a bit, so we decided to talk to Teddy Wayne.

Teddy is a very successful author.

He’s published 3 novels, one of which garnered him a Whiting Award (prestigiously awarded each year to just 10 emerging writers).

He’s a regular columnist for the New York Times, has been published in GQ, The New Yorker, and many others, and is an all-around star.

And Teddy often writes about the intersection of technology and culture, which is one of the reason that he recently wrote an article on cryptocurrency - something he’s been into and interested in for a while, but not in the same ways as many of our guests so far.

On today’s episode, Teddy talks about:

1. His own experience getting to know cryptocurrency and starting to invest;

2. The experiences of people around him - both friends and folks that he’s interviewed;

3. Why people are so interested - what’s driving both the hype and paranoia;

4. What he thinks the potential perils are and how you should be careful; and

5. Why he’s so excited by cryptocurrency.

A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough to have an awesome conversation with Jack Gavigan, who is the COO of Z-Cash and someone who’s been at the intersection of tech and finance for a long time (he’s worked at Credit Suisse, Morgan Stanley, & Lloyds, to name just a few places he’s landed during his career).

We talked about the intersection of cryptocurrency with the financial industry, the financial industry’s ability to innovate, and some of the factors that have hindered innovation.

In the second half of the conversation, we discuss Zcash and the importance of privacy when using cryptocurrency, including why this is significant for the banking industry.

Lastly - and perhaps most interestingly, Jack shares some tips for how he thinks about approaching cryptocurrency from an investment standpoint.

We’re joined by Spencer Bogart of Blockchain Capital to discuss the enthusiasm that has engulfed cryptocurrency, particularly the meteoric rise in value of cryptocurrency - a rise that many argue is not yet justified by the practical uses.

In this episode:

* The importance of multi-sided network effects in cryptocurrency

* The Honey-Bader of Cryptocurrencies

* Biggest value propositions of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

* The obstacles Bitcoin might face in the coming years.

* Fat Protocols and where most value will lie in cryptocurrency investments.

* How Blockchain Capital approaches investing in both companies and ICOs.

* Good token use cases and those that will likely fail.

We tend to think that when something is mathematical, that it's automatically “objective". It’s not true, of course, and this is a discussion we must have about cryptocurrency - its inputs, what constitutes success, and also the tradeoffs - which are always present.

In this episode, I chat with Dmitry Buterin - a friend, successful tech entrepreneur, and someone who has put a ton of thought into these issues.

He’s got his hands in several new ventures directly related to educating and growing the blockchain community as well as incubating and guiding early-stage cryptocurrency companies. And it’s this desire to educate and empower others that really characterizes Dmitry’s philosophy when it comes to Blockchain, and tech in general.

In this episode, we get out of the weeds and get a bit more philosophical, including Dmitry’s perspective on everything from the types of problems he thinks need to be solved with blockchain-based businesses, to the way he leverages content marketing, and , of course - his beliefs on the future of Blockchain development.

On Monday, September 15th, 2008, tourists and locals stood outside and watched as employees of Lehman Brothers left the New York City headquarters on news that the bank would need to liquidate or file bankruptcy.

46 Days later, Satoshi Nakamoto posted the first white paper outlining Bitcoin.

Less than 3 months later, the first Bitcoin code was released and implemented.

How Did Cryptocurrency Get to Where We Are, and Why Now?

In a world of mediocre commentary about whether cryptocurrency is garbage or gold, about whether it will collapse or else disrupt every aspect of our lives, it’s the story of how we got here that’s so often missing. If we want to be smarter about it, to make better long-term decisions, we need a map showing us where we’ve come from so that we can see where we’re headed.

Really, there are 3 histories - 3 stories - that show us not only how cryptocurrency has come about - but more importantly where it’s likely headed.

I’m joined today by Arvind Narayanan, an assistant professor at Princeton University, who is an assistant professor at Princeton and an affiliate scholar at Stanford Law School’s Center for Internet and Society.

He’s well know for his work on privacy, security, and de-anonymization, and he’s one of the foremost scholars on privacy and security in cryptocurrency and the blockchain.

In this episode, we cover…

* What led Arvind to become so fascinated with privacy and de-anonymization.

* How the public - and even experts - dramatically underestimate the ability to take “anonymous” data and link it back to identities through relatively simple processes.

* The fragility of privacy.

* The vast amount of data leaks even in cryptocurrencies.

* The limitations of smart contracts.

* Current and potential future societal impacts of blockchain technology.

* Why some technology threats are vastly over-examined and others are ignored.

We can’t fully imagine all of the ways that cryptocurrency - or any other technology - might change our lives. Nonetheless, it’s a question worth asking, perhaps especially if it means that many aspects of finance and other areas of our life might be reinvented.

And in this episode, we discuss:

* Current and potential future use cases for blockchain and cryptocurrency;

* Ways it Cryptocurrency is impacting and will impact the world - particularly how that will vary according to location and circumstance;

* Blockchain applications outside of finance;

* The biggest ways cryptocurrency will affect a person’s day-to-day life;

* How one cryptocurrency is revolutionizing the way that micro-financing is apportioned and secured (FoxCon);

* The Gartner Technology Hype Curve and trough of despair as it relates to cryptocurrency;

* Potential barriers to wide-scale adoption of cryptocurrency.

In this episode, we dive a bit deeper into how Cryptocurrency TECHNICALLY works – from mining to hash functions to digital signatures.

And to do this I’ve got 2 awesome guests – you’ll hear parts of each conversation today, and then in the next few episodes, you’ll hear the rest of each conversation separately.

Today’s episode is itself a mashup of two conversations – one with Bernard Golden and one with Arvind Narayanan. I had long and interesting conversations with each guest, but as part of each conversation, we also discussed various technological aspects of how cryptocurrency and the blockchain works. Bernard and Arvind are both very knowledgeable about the technical side, but they’re also both very good at explaining complex concepts.

Bernard Golden and the Technology Underlying Blockchain Transactions

Bernard Golden has been named by Wired Magazine as one of the ten most influential people in cloud computing, he regularly keynotes at conferences around the world, and he’s led several Silicon Valley tech companies as CEO or executive for nearly 2 decades. But over the past couple years – he’s turned his attention largely to cryptocurrency and blockchain, which he describes as “the next innovation platform that will transform our society”.

Bernard and I discuss a range of topics:

* What’s the best way for explaining the technology and importance of bitcoin and blockchain?

* Mining – How does the blockchain securely record transactions without high risk of hacking or fraud?

* If I want to send one bitcoin to use, how does that technically happen and get encrypted?

Arvind Narayanan and What’s Most Important to Understand about Signatures, Hash Functions, and Ledgers

We’ve also got Arvind Narayanan on this episode to talk about some of the different technical aspects of cryptocurrency and the Blockchain.

Arvind is an assistant professor at Princeton and an affiliate scholar at Stanford Law School’s Center for Internet and Society. Much of his early work focused on “de-anonymizing” data – which basically means taking otherwise anonymous data – such as anonymized customer viewing data from Netflix – and finding ways to re-identify the data. And by the way, he did this with anonymous Netflix viewing data in 2006.

But more recently, Arvind has become one of the leading academic researchers into various aspects of cryptocurrency and the blockchain.

Arvind is a mathematician and computer scientist, so we focused on these issues:

* Is it important for more people to better understand the technical side of cryptocurrency?

* From a framework perspective, what are the main points that someone needs to understand to basically comprehend cryptocurrency?

* What are the biggest advantages to a global distributed ledger?

* What’s a good basic explanation of hash functions and hash pointers?

* How do digital signatures allow people to create valid transactions?

* In asymmetrical cryptography, how is anyone able to verify a digital signature without a private key?

* The basics and history of modern cryptography.

In the next couple episodes, we’ll talk separately with Bernard and Arvind about use cases, privacy, security, protection from censorship, and also why Arvind is skeptical about some of the tech and use cases that are being discussed for cryptocurrency.

Featured Guests:

Bernard Golden

Arvind Narayanan

Selected Links:

Bernard Golden

Bernard on Twitter

Bernard’s Article on Innovation

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