I flew out to Chicago to interview Brett Harrison, who is the former President of FTX US President and founder of Architect.

In his first longform interview since the fall of FTX, he speak in great detail about his entire tenure there and about SBF’s dysfunctional leadership. He talks about how the inner circle of Gary Wang, Nishad Singh, and SBF mismanaged the company, controlled the codebase, got distracted by media, and even threatened him for his letter of resignation.

In what was my favorite part of the interview, we also discuss his insights about the financial system from his decades of experience in the world's largest HFT firms.

And we talk about Brett's new startup, Architect, as well as the general state of crypto post-FTX.

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Read the full transcript here. Follow me on Twitter for updates on future episodes.

Timestamps

(0:00:00) - Passive investing & HFT hacks

(0:08:30) - Is Finance Zero-Sum?

(0:18:38) - Interstellar Markets & Periodic Auctions

(0:23:10) - Hiring & Programming at Jane Street

(0:32:09) - Quant Culture

(0:42:10) - FTX - Meeting Sam, Joining FTX US

(0:58:20) - FTX - Accomplishments, Beginnings of Trouble

(1:08:11) - FTX - SBF's Dysfunctional Leadership

(1:26:53) - FTX - Alameda

(1:33:50) - FTX - Leaving FTX, SBF"s Threats

(1:45:45) - FTX - Collapse

(1:53:10) - FTX - Lessons

(2:04:34) - FTX - Regulators, & FTX Mafia

(2:15:42) - Architect.xyz

(2:30:10) - Institutional Interest & Uses of Crypto

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My podcast with the brilliant Marc Andreessen is out!

We discuss:

* how AI will revolutionize software

* whether NFTs are useless, & whether he should be funding flying cars instead

* a16z's biggest vulnerabilities

* the future of fusion, education, Twitter, venture, managerialism, & big tech

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Read the full transcript here. Follow me on Twitter for updates on future episodes.

Timestamps

(0:00:17) - Chewing glass

(0:04:21) - AI

(0:06:42) - Regrets

(0:08:51) - Managerial capitalism

(0:18:43) - 100 year fund

(0:22:15) - Basic research

(0:27:07) - $100b fund?

(0:30:32) - Crypto debate

(0:43:29) - Future of VC

(0:50:20) - Founders

(0:56:42) - a16z vulnerabilities

(1:01:28) - Monetizing Twitter

(1:07:09) - Future of big tech

(1:14:07) - Is VC Overstaffed?

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Garett Jones is an economist at George Mason University and the author of The Cultural Transplant, Hive Mind, and 10% Less Democracy.

This episode was fun and interesting throughout!

He explains:

* Why national IQ matters

* How migrants bring their values to their new countries

* Why we should have less democracy

* How the Chinese are an unstoppable global force for free markets

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform.

Timestamps

(00:00:00) - Intro

(00:01:08) - Migrants Change Countries with Culture or Votes?

(00:09:15) - Impact of Immigrants on Markets & Corruption

(00:12:02) - 50% Open Borders?

(00:16:54) - Chinese are Unstoppable Capitalists 

(00:21:39) - Innovation & Immigrants 

(00:24:53) - Open Borders for Migrants Equivalent to Americans?

(00:28:54) - Let's Ignore Side Effects?

(00:30:25) - Are Poor Countries Stuck?

(00:32:26) - How Can Effective Altruists Increase National IQ

(00:39:13) - Clone a million John von Neumann?

(00:44:39) - Genetic Selection for IQ

(00:47:02) - Democracy, Fed, FDA, & Presidential Power

(00:49:42) - EU is a force for good?

(00:55:12) - Why is America More Libertarian Than Median Voter?

(00:56:19) - Is Ethnic Conflict a Short Run Problem?

(00:59:38) - Bond Holder Democracy

(01:04:57) - Mormonism

(01:08:52) - Garett Jones's Immigration System

(01:10:12) - Interviewing SBF

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One of my best episodes ever. Lars Doucet is the author of Land is a Big Deal, a book about Georgism which has been praised by Vitalik Buterin, Scott Alexander, and Noah Smith. Sam Altman is the lead investor in his new startup, ValueBase.

Talking with Lars completely changed how I think about who creates value in the world and who leeches off it.

We go deep into the weeds on Georgism:

* Why do even the wealthiest places in the world have poverty and homelessness, and why do rents increase as fast as wages?

* Why are land-owners able to extract the profits that rightly belong to labor and capital?

* How would taxing the value of land alleviate speculation, NIMBYism, and income and sales taxes?

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Read the full transcript here.

Follow Lars on Twitter. Follow me on Twitter.

Timestamps

(00:00:00) - Intro

(00:01:11) - Georgism

(00:03:16) - Metaverse Housing Crises

(00:07:10) - Tax Leisure?

(00:13:53) - Speculation & Frontiers

(00:24:33) - Social Value of Search 

(00:33:13) - Will Georgism Destroy The Economy?

(00:38:51) - The Economics of San Francisco

(00:43:31) - Transfer from Landowners to Google?

(00:46:47) - Asian Tigers and Land Reform

(00:51:19) - Libertarian Georgism

(00:55:42) - Crypto

(00:57:16) - Transitioning to Georgism

(01:02:56) - Lars's Startup & Land Assessment 

(01:15:12) - Big Tech

(01:20:50) - Space

(01:23:05) - Copyright

(01:25:02) - Politics of Georgism

(01:33:10) - Someone Is Always Collecting Rents

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Holden Karnofsky is the co-CEO of Open Philanthropy and co-founder of GiveWell. He is also the author of one of the most interesting blogs on the internet, Cold Takes.

We discuss:

* Are we living in the most important century?

* Does he regret OpenPhil’s 30 million dollar grant to OpenAI in 2016?

* How does he think about AI, progress, digital people, & ethics?

Highly recommend!

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Read the full transcript here.

Timestamps

(0:00:00) - Intro

(0:00:58) - The Most Important Century

(0:06:44) - The Weirdness of Our Time

(0:21:20) - The Industrial Revolution 

(0:35:40) - AI Success Scenario

(0:52:36) - Competition, Innovation , & AGI Bottlenecks

(1:00:14) - Lock-in & Weak Points

(1:06:04) - Predicting the Future

(1:20:40) - Choosing Which Problem To Solve

(1:26:56) - $30M OpenAI Investment

(1:30:22) - Future Proof Ethics

(1:37:28) - Integrity vs Utilitarianism

(1:40:46) - Bayesian Mindset & Governance

(1:46:56) - Career Advice

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This was one of my favorite episodes ever.

Bethany McLean was the first reporter to question Enron’s earnings, and she has written some of the best finance books out there.

We discuss:

* The astounding similarities between Enron & FTX,

* How visionaries are just frauds who succeed (and which category describes Elon Musk),

* What caused 2008, and whether we are headed for a new crisis,

* Why there’s too many venture capitalists and not enough short sellers,

* And why history keeps repeating itself.

McLean is a contributing editor at Vanity Fair (see her articles here) and the author of The Smartest Guys in the Room, All the Devils Are Here, Saudi America, and Shaky Ground.

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or your favorite podcast platform.

Follow McLean on Twitter. Follow me on Twitter for updates on future episodes.

Timestamps

(0:04:37) - Is Fraud Over?

(0:11:22) - Shortage of Shortsellers

(0:19:03) - Elon Musk - Fraud or Visionary?

(0:23:00) - Intelligence, Fake Deals, & Culture

(0:33:40) - Rewarding Leaders for Long Term Thinking

(0:37:00) - FTX Mafia?

(0:40:17) - Is Finance Too Big?

(0:44:09) - 2008 Collapse, Fannie & Freddie

(0:49:25) - The Big Picture

(1:00:12) - Frackers Vindicated?

(1:03:40) - Rating Agencies

(1:07:05) - Lawyers Getting Rich Off Fraud

(1:15:09) - Are Some People Fundamentally Deceptive?

(1:19:25) - Advice for Big Picture Thinkers

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Nadia Asparouhova is currently researching what the new tech elite will look like at nadia.xyz. She is also the author of Working in Public: The Making and Maintenance of Open Source Software.

We talk about how:

* American philanthropy has changed from Rockefeller to Effective Altruism

* SBF represented the Davos elite rather than the Silicon Valley elite,

* Open source software reveals the limitations of democratic participation,

* & much more.

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Read the full transcript here.

Timestamps

(0:00:00) - Intro

(0:00:26) - SBF was Davos elite

(0:09:38) - Gender sociology of philanthropy

(0:16:30) - Was Shakespeare an open source project?

(0:22:00) - Need for charismatic leaders

(0:33:55) - Political reform

(0:40:30) - Why didn’t previous wealth booms lead to new philanthropic movements?

(0:53:35) - Creating a 10,000 year endowment

(0:57:27) - Why do institutions become left wing?

(1:02:27) - Impact of billionaire intellectual funding

(1:04:12) - Value of intellectuals

(1:08:53) - Climate, AI, & Doomerism

(1:18:04) - Religious philanthropy

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Perhaps the most interesting episode so far.

Byrne Hobart writes at thediff.co, analyzing inflections in finance and tech.

He explains:

* What happened at FTX

* How drugs have induced past financial bubbles

* How to be long AI while hedging Taiwan invasion

* Whether Musk’s Twitter takeover will succeed

* Where to find the next Napoleon and LBJ

* & ultimately how society can deal with those who seek domination and recognition

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Read the full transcript here.

Follow me on Twitter for updates on future episodes.

Timestamps:

(0:00:50) - What the hell happened at FTX?

(0:07:03) - How SBF Faked Being a Genius: 

(0:12:23) - Drugs Explain Financial Bubbles

(0:17:12) - On Founder Physiognomy

(0:21:02) - Indexing Parental Involvement in Raising Talented Kids

(0:30:35) - Where are all the Caro-level Biographers?

(0:39:03) - Where are today's Great Founders? 

(0:48:29) - Micro Writing -> Macro Understanding

(0:51:48) - Elon's Twitter Takeover

(1:00:50) - Does Big Tech & West Have Great People?

(1:11:34) - Philosophical Fanatics and Effective Altruism 

(1:17:17) - What Great Founders Have In Common

(1:19:56) - Thinkers vs. Analyzers

(1:25:40) - Taiwan Invasion bets & AI Timelines

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Edward Glaeser is the chair of the Harvard department of economics, and the author of the best books and papers about cities (including Survival of the City and Triumph of the City).

He explains why:

* Cities are resilient to terrorism, remote work, & pandemics,

* Silicon Valley may collapse but the Sunbelt will prosper, 

* Opioids show UBI is not a solution to AI

* & much more!

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Read the full transcript here.

Follow me on Twitter for updates on future episodes.

Timestamps

(0:00:00) - Mars, Terrorism, & Capitals

(0:06:32) - Decline, Population Collapse, & Young Men

(0:14:44) - Urban Education

(0:18:35) - Georgism, Robert Moses, & Too Much Democracy?

(0:25:29) - Opioids, Automation, & UBI

(0:29:57) - Remote Work, Taxation, & Metaverse

(0:42:29) - Past & Future of Silicon Valley

(0:48:56) - Housing Reform

(0:52:32) - Europe’s Stagnation, Mumbai’s Safety, & Climate Change

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I had a fascinating discussion about Robert Moses and The Power Broker with Professor Kenneth T. Jackson.

He's the pre-eminent historian on NYC and author of Robert Moses and The Modern City: The Transformation of New York.

He answers:

* Why are we so much worse at building things today?

* Would NYC be like Detroit without the master builder?

* Does it take a tyrant to stop NIMBY?

Watch on YouTube. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Read the full transcript here.

Follow me on Twitter for updates on future episodes.

Timestamps

(0:00:00) Preview + Intro

(0:11:13) How Moses Gained Power

(0:18:22) Moses Saved NYC?

(0:27:31) Moses the Startup Founder?

(0:32:34) The Case Against Moses Highways

(0:50:30) NIMBYism

(1:02:44) Is Progress Cyclical

(1:11:13) Friendship with Caro

(1:19:50) Moses the Longtermist?

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