How Crypto Became Corporate and How We Take It Back- Josh Davila aka The Blockchain Socialist

Hi, my name is Joshua Davila, also known as the Blockchain Socialist, name of my podcast and blog. I'm the co-founder of Bread Cooperative and the author of Blockchain Radicals, which is this book that came out in 2023.

Hi, George.

Hi. Thanks for coming. Um today just for the context we are in Berlin uh at DPCON and we are doing this interview uh on the second day of the conference. Uh for people who don't know you can you tell a bit of your like backstory like how do you end up here where you are at this moment just like a few minutes of your background.

Sure. I guess it depends on how far you want me to go back. [laughter]

Okay. So you have few minutes at least. So

yeah, [laughter] um maybe I'll start from Yeah, I mean in I got into crypto starting in 2017, a bit after I or maybe 2016 when I was like graduating um college and at the time I got into crypto because I was really broke. I was uh the first job I got out of college was just very poorly paid. I was doing Uber on the side as a driver to try to make extra cash to pay off the loan for the car that I bought to go to work. Um, and yeah, I was uh a graduate in neuroscience and I thought that I could use my neuroscience degree as a way to make money off of biotech stocks um since they are quite volatile. And um turns out I was really bad at trying to trade stocks.

never actually did it that much, but uh I did this like stock trading game to try to get better at it. And I was just not not liking it at all. But in my, you know, explorations of ways to make enough money to be able to pay my rent and my upcoming student loan debt, um I came across cryptocurrency. Again, it was, you know, uh Ethereum was still quite new at the time. And I was also, you know, 2016, I was going through this political radicalization process where Trump was elected the first time, uh, I witnessed the Democrats just kind of completely, um, bulldoze Hillary Clinton forward as their as their primary, uh, or in the primaries to to win that election against uh, Bernie Sanders, who was all intents and purposes, I think, significantly more popular and significantly more able to to defeat Trump at the time.

And um yeah, so I I gravitated towards cryptocurrency, was reading a bunch of literature, political literature. I was really I mean, the first time I had ever kind of felt that I read something that finally explained a lot of the issues that I found in the world um was by reading socialist literature, was reading Marx, and it was the best explanation I could come across as to why the world was the way that it was. And at the same time, I'm, you know, learning very early solidity um in my free time. So I was thinking that smart contracts and Dows are this incredible new technology that could facilitate a type of um politics and a type of like collectivity using real value in some way that was not possible before. Um and that could be useful for a socialist politics.

Um and so I pursued that for a long time. time. I eventually got a job, a corporate job um doing blockchain consulting. I started doing that and you know being in a corporate position for long enough you kind of go crazy. It's hard to express

become socialist very [laughter] easy. you become socialist very fast when you go when you start working corporate [laughter]

um and uh yeah so it was just like frustrated I couldn't express the views that I had there and I could not find any outlet that was also exploring and analyzing the crypto space from a leftwing point of view that I thought was like reflective of um the way crypto actually existed and what was interesting about it and so I made the unfortunate decision to create the blockchain socialist um name on Twitter and then start a blogging a podcast. I said, "This is what I'm going to do now. I'm going to talk about this because if I can't keep screaming at my roommates about it because they don't understand these things." [laughter]

Um and so yeah, I started doing that for a couple of years. I was asked to write a book. Um uh and then I also started um bread cooperative which is a project that I that I co-founded with others who are working in the crypto space to try and build applications also from our um political point of view. So from a postc capitalist point of view is the idea um and yeah so now and now I'm here.

Yeah, beautiful journey. uh a lot of questions but also like briefly could you talk about Brett like how you tackled it a bit but like um how did you end up like doing exactly this idea and executing this idea and um yeah and why bread actually I love the name but why? [laughter] So bread bread is a reference to the conquest of bread by Peter Kupatkin anarchist writer

where he just write the conquest of bread is like our ability to conquer our basic needs that the basic needs of everyone are met. It's a conquering of that. Um and that is when we can finally be human. Like only by having these basic needs mets can we actually um relate to each other in a way that is actually like non- hierarchical non um whatever else. Um but so yeah, the project basically came out of talking to a bunch of people who are in the Discord server that I started called Cryptoleftists and started getting people who were working in the crypto space and were kind of like tired of only doing DeFi speculation stuff and wanted to build something more meaningful and uh and so like the first kind of problem that you come across when you start when you want to start some sort of organization like that is how do you fund yourself?

How do you um yeah because we live in a capitalist world, we can't really change a lot of these basic facts. Where do we make money? And so the first application we met, we we created was called the bread crowdstaking application where basically you have a smart contract uh app where you give XI onosis chain and however much XI you get or you give is how much bread tokens you receive. So five XI is five bread. So it's pegged to the dollar because XI is pegged to the dollar.

X DI gets converted to S DI which is the die savings rate. So it's earning a yield for the cooperative. Then as a bread holder you can vote on which projects you want to distribute the yield to.

So it's always overcolateralized. It's always you know uh safe from any type of bank run or something like that. Um, and it's a way to fund something without going to venture capital or to receive investment necessarily or that you need to uh ask for donations. Um, so it was meant to be this kind of like some kind of middle way that we were able to find uh that had an alternative logic to it. Um, and so yeah, you can um you can take part of that uh um that application if you have XI.

You can you can get bred and and begin helping to fund the projects that you want to support. Um probably because you're part of one of those communities or you just like the the overall objectives of trying to create some sort of alternative. The scope of the project, however, has expanded quite a lot to where we're kind of like a venture studio at the same time. So we have also products that we're creating that are just kind of purely technical like um products to scale Ethereum. So one of them is called Gas Killer.

Um it's just an AVS on IGEN layer at the moment where you can save on gas by sending your running your function through the AVS. Mhm.

Um and so yeah, basically what we found is that by uh offering an alternative to people who really are motivated to build things not because of profits, they're willing to like bring things to the cooperative to help fund a larger purpose than just themselves. Um

yeah, it's very beautiful purpose and we as web3 privacy we kind of very aligned in this terms of like

values. Um can you please explain to people the concept concept of cooperative and um like probably in the original mean uh like 100 years ago one uh and it's uh implementation in crypto nowadays and and if there are any change and I believe there is 100 years have passed at least so

uh yeah

yeah so a cooperative is essent it's it's you can view it as many I mean the usual way you kind of view it is as a legal entity right it's just like an alternative to uh an LLC or something like that it's um essentially where those uh if we're talking about specifically worker cooperatives it's simply a legal entity where workers are also owners of the business uh or the organization itself and they each of them have uh an equal vote and an equal share and say into how the business is run. Of course, you can have governance mechanisms inside of that and different ways you want to to govern it to where maybe people who have more experience have more say in some way, but they have as far as a economic share or right. It's um everyone has an equal amount. Um but yeah, you have other types of uh cooperatives like producer cooperatives or consumer cooperatives um basically that are run either by producers or consumers. is a way of just kind of collectivizing resources in a way so that um things are kind of collectively owned.

Uh this is a very old uh type of entity and organization um that's been around for yeah a really long time. Um, and it was the original like originally a socialist um was someone who was in a cooperative working in cooperatives in like England in the 1800s or maybe early, I forget, but um so yeah, this um you may be listening to this and being like, "Oh, that sounds a lot like Dows." And that's um that's kind of true. Um it's also a little bit more complicated because Dows uh in the crypto space often have token governance or the amount of tokens that you have is the amount of say that you have. Um but a lot of people in the way in the imaginary of what Dows are or should be or could become.

They often look similar to cooperatives. It looks like you know um people coming together and equally sharing in the fruits of their labor and also mutualizing the risk. So rather than an LLC in which maybe stockholders of a elite group of people who hold the economic rights to extract profits from what is produced by the business um in a cooperative or uh you're able to um share those profits and in a DAO that kind of depends on you know the token holders it depends on various things for me originally when I heard the term DAO it was explained to me as imagine Uber but without the Uber company. So

um but at the at that time it was libertarians telling you that it was like people who are really into free markets really into like um the sovereign individual as being the like uh reason as to why anything is productive right and but they were kind of like sharing these very socialistic ideas. I don't necessarily think that they viewed it in that way or saw it that way. Um so yeah so a lot of my work has been around how we compare Dows with cooperatives and how do they um how do how can they mimic each other more so because I think the reason why many people are kind of maybe disillusioned by Dows is that they actually didn't mimic cooperatives enough

what's missing what's missing

um I think knowledge on how to run like a cooperative

so I think part of the issue is that a lot of people came to Dows came from startup

environments or like maybe management consulting or very corporate environments which I did too right um and but those comes with like specific practices in how you work and how you resolve conflict and in a cooperative it's quite different whenever you're all kind of like in this equal footing um type of place in Dows it kind of became people had to adhere to um those who had a lot of tokens more or less because proposals could be passed by those who had a lot of tokens.

Yeah.

Um so yeah, I think there was there was things missing around like how thing the governance mechanisms in which um they were using inside of their dows. A lot of it being kind of plutoaucratic

and as well probably conflict resolution strategies when you're in a more collective environment because it's not the same way you're in a corporate one. And then there goes another question. How do you shift yourself from this individual perspective because it's kind of a norm, right? Especially here we are like in Western Europe.

Yeah.

Uh how can you kind of switch to this more collectivism form of like perception of the reality? Um is there any I don't know tool practice habit you can kind of try on you know like

like to try it like now first just to understand the context is like like you said it's not normal uh it's not the norm to understand how to act in a collective and you know and it it differs per culture I think there's some some some who are a little bit better because it's more natural um maybe in the way that they relate to one another just because of cultural norms. But yeah, generally like the the corporate environment is hierarchical and has specific roles that people play and um domains that they take on in which they have like specific interests in that don't necessarily work well in a more collective environment. So I'm a practitioner of something that's called micro solidarity. So it is kind of like a working uh practice group where we work on how to do decentralized organizing or horizontal organizing. And yeah, basically it's a muscle to to practice.

It's really like um not something that necessarily comes naturally to everyone. And it involves being a bit more um being able to express emotion in like a healthy way and to be able to and and to also receive feedback in in a healthy way. But I think the the main thing is actually against the norms in crypto actually is that you need to have fairly high levels of trust within a working group. And that is what helps you make the foundation for how you can resolve conflict. If if I know that others within my group are wi in it with me that they like are also committed to to this thing and they you know um are not being facitious and playing like these types of mind games or power games with me because we're all in this together then that completely changes the way in which I relate to them right like if I know that like you know this other guy my um manager this guy I'm competing with for a promotion or something like that that's going to um dictate how I uh you know my economic success then I'm more willing to commit like to not act pro-socially because um

it's intentionally competitive internally in a corporate environment. And so in a in a more cooperative one it means taking a more cooperative stance in how how you talk to people, how you resolve conflict and also how it's really like in part it is a lot of talking. Um it it is a lot about like developing trust with one another so that if there is a conflict um it's not something that kind of explodes or leads to you know um types of outcomes that that that don't benefit the collective. Um so I know that's like a little bit vague but I'd recommend checking out Micro Solidarity and they have a lot of like more practical there's a whole list of different things. I mean, it's really, you know, just having ways that you structure a conversation can make a huge difference in how you resolve a conflict.

Hm. Wow. That's actually very interesting because for me uh what you've said it sounds more like being very empathetical, being very self-conscious, being very aware and um very uh yeah on some some level of so for me it sounds like being like a lot into therapy and being conscious which is interesting because therapy is very individualistic and it teaches you like to kind of

take care more about yourself, your needs. kids and the others. And it's interesting how like the same thing is kind of like very interconnected but with different purpose.

Mhm.

Do you see that therapy might help here or it's something that might lead you away on this path of like self-consciousness? [laughter] um that I mean I mean I say this I mean I'm a I don't know if I'm the best person to answer this question because I have not gone to therapy okay

for things but I have you know I have done a lot of like you know types of therapeutic uh exercises um in order to like get over certain things about myself and whatever else but I mean clearly for some people therapy works Um, for others it doesn't work as much. I think for me like I get a therapeutic relief being in a group of people that I trust.

Um, and being able to be honest and truthful truthful with them. Um, so I really I think that it's a case by case basis. is really uh I don't I don't want to be someone to be like everyone should have therapy or take therapy but um at least in terms of like a institutionalized practice of therapy. I think you can um I think there are ways to yeah also take an approach that you go yourself that doesn't work for everyone though. So I think it's it's a very individualized thing.

Okay. Okay. Uh so I really believe in this importance. of like people or your tribe who shared values uh where you can practice solidarity where you can practice like cooperative thing but how do you find those people

that's the question maybe you have an answer [laughter]

or maybe at least how you did find your crowd for that

yeah I think I mean for me it was because I found a bunch of other nerds who are also really interested in the weird niche things that I'm interested in yeah Um so yeah you know it's kind of it for me I think I was lucky that the thing that I was interested in also involved in part but not solely um an interest in how to uh embody decentralization like how to do the practice with others to do it. Um so [snorts] yeah I mean for me [laughter] it was just being very open and honest about what I wanted what I believed in and then I you know it was a big filter for bringing in people who also thought that as well. So, you know, I didn't attract people who were, you know, wanted to make a ton of money and extract as much as they can because I was, you know, vehematly kind of um making fun of that stance of like, you know, going against it in many ways. Um yeah, but there I think there there there are many ways to find them. I think, you know, I think this is also true.

Um I think we we see this even in like religious associations that you know I'm not a religious person but it's clear that like a lot of people find community in religion and things like that. So it's something to what I'm interested in is how how do we take a lot of the good things that we see out of these maybe more traditional um religious uh organizations but maybe leave leave the things that we don't want and bring the things that that we do want.

Okay. Okay. Um okay uh another question uh how do you deal with different cultures because like uh we all when we come together it doesn't matter if we do something or we make a cooperative or union or whatever

uh people are really different and especially they come from different cultures they have like very very different approaches to things. So, uh, culturally like is there a way to bring like really different people together in like with the solidarity tools um that have that may have like a very very different perspective on things. So, is there an answer in um here I mean I'm a you know I'm a socialist so I do believe in international solidarity. Um it is and then and that requires like yeah dealing with the very um practical times of types of conflicts that may arise just from misunderstandings due to cultural differences. I mean for me I generally I think I'm fairly lucky in this in that I grew up I there's this term called third culture kid.

So I you know I I grew up in a country but my parents are from a different country. Um and then I'm have moved to other countries. I mean, I've I've had a lot of exposure to different cultures and different cultural norms that at least for me made it more normal um to experience different cultures and different ways of thinking. But I think for me the the approach is really to stay open-minded

to like what people are saying. Like I think there there's some very practical tips for conflict resolution that can also be useful in terms of ways that cultural differences are. Um I think having a the biggest thing is like having a curiosity about like maybe something feels strange to you and the way that they're presenting something is to like ask them about it. It's to try to suppress maybe the immediate emotional response that you may have because that seemed really offensive what they said or whatever else, but instead and try to like ask them about it to see to try to learn more about where they're coming from. Um, but at least that's in like a specific action space in a specific moment.

but broadly as a way to mitigate cultural differences. It's also to um like have curiosity in their culture. I mean it's like to ask them what is the history that they that they're coming from like were they like [clears throat] different different countries have different associations with particular words with particular like organizational groups because of their history that for them seems totally normal because they were you know colonized by this and that country and they did this and that when they were colonized or whatever else. Um so yeah so a type of cultural curiosity can really help in um in mitigating that. So just having the context of where your um teammates are coming from.

Okay, great. U but I had now a question like what what is what's like for you to be a socialist and what what is socialism?

And it might seem simple for like people but the thing is like we all kind of talk about the same terms but like we all put very different meanings and that like if you ask like 10 people what is decentralization

10 different answers. And so the same like what's your perspective of that like? [snorts]

Yeah. So I mean for me in in the shortest terms as possible the socialism is bringing democracy into the economy. It's bringing well we already have democracy in the political sphere but by and large we don't have it in the economic sphere right. We largely go to work for um a bigger like corporation that is like very hierarchical in which very few people at the top make the vast majority of of the profits and then sprinkle a little bit down to everyone else who have effectively no political or economic rights within the organization. So in many ways we may be able to vote for our leaders every four five years or whatever

but we have zero uh voice, democratic voice in the places where we actually work in the places that we are like um very intimately economically tied up with. We have no say in in by and large what we do with our national resources that we have available to us, right? There's like very few elite people that get to make the choices on how economic resources are um used and how they're divied up amongst the population, right? And I'm not saying that like so so socialism does not mean like give everything to everyone and then like whatever. It's um it's about having power and control for the masses who actually produce the value with the resources that are um around us.

Uh and so for me like in relation to decentralization because you mentioned it for me capitalism is a giant centralization machine

like capitalism is uh defined by private accumulation of profits right so if you are a shareholder in a company you have the right to privately accumulate the the the profits that you're being that are being produced by your workers right who are working for a wage. So no matter uh there may be sure certain bonuses I give them more or less of a wage depending how well they do but by and large a lot of people don't. They simply get uh a wage based on the amount of hours they work or whatever else.

Um and so capitalism is a giant centralization machine then that that pushes capital up to the top to fewer and fewer hands because they begin to win in the markets. The more you win in the market, the easier it is to continue winning in the market. um getting, you know, you even hear it in like the way people talk about like how to become a millionaire, how to become a billionaire, whatever. It's like once you get your first million, then you're good, right? Because then once you get your first million, you can make way more millions after that because it's a it's like a snowball effect uh type of game.

And so that's the type of thing that I think destroys actual democracy. destroys like the reason why people are maybe feeling nihilistic about political institutions is by and large because even though we have this semblance of democracy where we vote every four or five years but it doesn't actually matter right the same people um are in power because they have the capital and you you like capital is basically um it's essentially a governance token over where our resources get to go right if a billionaire wants to build a factory here to build widgets. Then he just spends the capital in order to do it. And all of a sudden all these people, all these resources start moving at their command, right? Like it is a um in many ways uh it is command and control via capital.

It's kind of what

Yeah. Uh can you tell me more about the examples of like the use of crypto like to help people in need when it's kind of complicated to do that? So you had this example with Gaza. Can you expand on that?

Yeah, so I mean I've I've done a lot of work with sending crypto to those in Gaza right now. Um so it's, you know, obviously it's an incredibly intense situation over there. There is um at the moment basically no aid or food that are coming through the the borders right now because they're being blockaded. Um, so there's very little food that is actually left and that food is only food that you can buy on the market. So there's not not very much if any kind of food that's being or aid that's being dished out for free to people.

Um, but there's always been this market of food also um there. And the kind of um thing that's happening is that you know Palestinians have always in Gaza hardly had much access to financial services and it's always very difficult to send money into Gaza because of the amount of financial um yeah obstacles that Israel has placed on their banking system. And so with the start of uh this war and genocide like uh it's people it's it's very difficult to get money through to the bank accounts. And so crypto has become kind of one of the big ways that people receive money. And the way that it largely goes is that um these are people who are not cryptonative.

Obviously a lot of them they're simply trying to survive like the next day. And so they are effectively creating accounts on Binance and they're receiving um Tether on Tron. So that's the main currency that they use, USDT on Tron chain. This has been the norm in the Middle East for several years now. Um is a bit of a you know it kind of sucks as someone who's like you know I'm more Ethereum aligned than Tron of course.

Um, but that's I think it was a this is an artifact of Tron being significantly cheaper to use than Ethereum many years ago. Uh, so they have OTC desks where people can go and give USDT to receive cash that they can purchase food in the market. And yeah, of course, there's a very high commission at the moment, especially in these times are quite extreme. Um, but that's the the the main way that they're able to to get food. Um, usually for me it involves receiving some sort of IBAN or payments uh through euros perhaps or or other ways and then just using crypto that I have and swapping it um from whatever chain it is.

I don't hold anything on Tron and just swapping it to USDT on Tron to go to to their accounts um on Binance and then they go ahead and and use it. Um so yeah, so that's kind of like the main thing the when when you're doing work like this, of course, we're you know very confident in who owns who is on the other side of of that payment because it's someone they've been in contact with for quite some time. Mhm.

Um and yeah, so uh we get you know updates from the various people and families that we're sponsoring. So part of this larger collective in group also locally based in Berlin that have done fundraisers um selling various things and then they collect the cash uh and then we have a a funnel for um getting the crypto to um the person in Gaza in the end. So, it involves a lot of, you know, I'm interacting with a lot of people who know nothing about crypto, but they're using it because they have a specific need that they want to to get, which is to uh send money to those that they're sponsoring in Gaza. And so, many of those people have taken a larger interest in crypto because of that. Uhhuh.

Uhhuh. Uh and yeah maybe let's do on solidarity primitives but like really short one and then we'll really attach a link to your like big talk around that.

So yeah can you explain like super briefly uh solidarity primitives and like if you want to explain more and then dive deeper we will put a link downstairs uh on your talk

here. Yep. Yeah. So it was uh yeah could be a link to Joshu talk in lapcon about that. Um yeah butch.

Yeah sure. So uh solidarity primitives are just the technoc conceptual framework that I use for talking about how we build applications at bread cooperative. Um it's essentially taking the idea of financial primitives or DeFi primitives or these building blocks for creating um more complex financial products using DeFi. Um and instead of uh using these building blocks for creating and facilitating relationships of finance between people um so like individual like profit maximization. It's instead for facilitating relationships of solidarity um which is essentially the um ability for people to create alternative mechanisms that don't rely on capitalistic uh relationships per se.

Um, and yeah, you can I I talked about it a whole lot more in the video, so [laughter] maybe I'll I'll stop it there. Um, so you can watch that.

Yep. Okay. And um maybe uh maybe you can name some cases of um that are happening or about to happen especially in crypto world uh being like a syndicate or cooperative or something that you really like and you feel that it's something that should be not a must but it should be more here

like implication of this like socialist idea but on chain

mm Mhm. I think there's Yeah, there's a lot of different threads to pull on. I think one of the um maybe technical spaces that are that need to be I mean there is a lot of research in it and I'm curious to see how it continues to develop but identity is kind of like a a big one. So, right in by default on a blockchain, you can make as many accounts as you want, right? You can just spin wallets up here and there.

And so, if you wanted to have a a kind of corporate a cooperative like structure of one member, one vote, it's really hard to do because you can just like spin up five wallets and now you have five votes and then how's anyone going to know? you have to build in certain structures inside of it to ensure um this association with your humanness and your vote. And this happens uh the the the state does this because you get an identity card. You just prove

that. Um, and so I'm really curious to see to see how identity develops because I mean, yeah, I do think that there's like a dystopian version of identity is like people are reasonably like worried about it. You can if everybody knows who everyone is on chain then you know you lose a lot of privacy. So you know this therefore like you know the usual suspect of zero knowledge proofs and how it's used in identity is going to be an interesting one. Um, and yeah, I guess but so while that's happening and there are various ways to kind of mitigate for that, if you want humanness as like a a variable into how you're calculating input for some sort of vote or something like that, there's that.

But also, I mean, the way that we do it at bread uh for the crowd staking application when you vote is you we we just have a 50/50 split where 50% is of the yield is determined by the votes and 50% is determined by an equal distribution. So, we're just kind of we're just kind of not putting identity into our solution quite yet because I mean in part just kind of waiting to see what comes out and and what's good and don't want to necessarily build our own uh solution and rather pick something else up. Um but also it's a way to embed solidarity within the the way that we are doing our vote because then we're we're going with the assumption that every project is doing something that's important. So every project is guaranteed some amount, but the there is this variable 50% that can maybe you get nothing because no one voted for you or you get everything because everyone voted for you. Um so that's kind of like how we're dealing with that problem.

And then maybe one there's and then there's like I think a ton of different just like voting mechanisms that I'm excited to see more experimentation with. So, um I mean quadratic voting is like the usual one that we've done a lot with in crypto and especially around funding with Gitcoin. Um conviction v voting is is very interesting where it's based on your the amount of time that you put your um votes at a particular spot. So the more the longer you leave it, the more it accumulates. Yeah.

And then things with liquid democracy I think are super interesting. All of these various experimentations are ones that I'm interesting in keeping interested in keeping up with and seeing how they they develop and think they would be interesting in some sort of uh post capitalist solution for how we manage shared resources.

Okay. And [snorts] um you've tackled it a bit um as privacy but uh if to focus more on that angle and that perspective the intersection between privacy and like future solidarity cooperative uh entities uh how important is that uh the privacy in general and like what is the intersection between let's say socialism chain uh and privacy. M

I mean yes it's super obviously super relevant. Um it's there is I mean the the kind of pitch that I usually give uh around the use of crypto in the first place for a lot of the like non-crypto people on the left that I talk to is that if you're actually going to challenge capitalist institutions like seriously then you need to you need a risk mitigation strategy to some degree right like the first thing that they're going to do is they're going to cut you off from your bank account. It's like we saw that with Wikileaks. We see that in in various cases um for those who were um doing a lot of activism around Palestine. Like

it's nothing for the government to say, "Yeah, sorry. Can you block their bank account for a bit and just like create these types of friction points that can be really difficult if you're, you know, living in a capitalist world where you have to pay rent and all these things and you're holding your money in a bank account because you don't want to hold it in your uh mattress. So crypto is a way to kind of um mitigate that risk to where at least if you hold some of that you can get around uh state actors. And then the next kind of also danger is that then state actors begin tracking everything that's on chain and they know where your identity is and then they can track um where the money that you're spending for maybe doing something that is uh you know legal gray zone um what you're doing with it. And so that's um for me why privacy is largely important in in that type of context.

But also you know right now the internet is a giant surveillance machine. is just privately owned and people may not think of it as I think people kind of sometimes

uh underestimate the way that private entities are actually the ones that are doing the actual surveillance. um not necessar the NSA of course like Edward Snowden did reveal like crazy amounts of surveillance um via their programs but it was in partnership with a lot of private actors

um and so you know we've created an internet where that people you know better or worse they expect a lot of things for free what is the thing that you make money on when you are a VCbacked tech company that has all of these people's user data right you sell it I mean that's what else are you gonna So um that's the way that the the market has been structured and so yeah I mean to to destroy and just you know this has caused several side effects as to um you know because all these private actors have all of this data and and what they do with it. Um, and it's also like we've just kind of at the same time I mean it's been normalized even before the internet but we've normalized kind of like corporate gaslighting in the form of advertising you know um it is essentially a mechanism for behavioral change right like marketers are people trying to influence you to buy things they want to make you do a specific action around consumption and and purchasing. Um, and so the same tools that that that do that are also the same tools that um are encouraging, you know, genocides in in Myanmar, like there was that case with Facebook um not too long ago. Um, so yeah, I mean I think all these things just kind of point to a need for some sort of accountability from these large actors and um the only way we can hold them accountable in some ways to fight them economically and uh privacy and not giving them the thing that they actually sell is our that's our p that's our that's our chess piece that we play so that they don't um they can't continue to profit off of um off of our backs and to keep facilitating uh the system of surveillance that um you know uh people people forget is largely privately run. I just realized during this discussion with you that um it's interesting like we talk about it but I feel that all of us are in in a little bit in like this echo chamber or in a bubble of like being uh like politically active or conscious in this like activism political um narrative but then there is a question there are so many people who are on chain but they're very apolitical Let's say digence right probably they will never look at this interview unfortunately [laughter]

no judgment to digence I mean so many people who are really big in the space now they came through trading stuff right

maybe if we say something really offensive [laughter] crazy they'll come

yeah yeah I mean it's just the stage right you can't be like marks from what you know

just I I was not [laughter]

yeah so it took it takes some time but then there was a question how can we uh let's say transform indigents into more like politically conscious people and is there a way and is it possible?

You think

I mean it's not going to be possible for everyone. I think it's of course it really depends on

I mean from the individual perspective it depends on the the journey that they're on at that moment. what stage are they on it and whether they're open to hearing something new. But I think the way that it's been done historically by and large is by speaking to people's economic needs. So, you know, labor unions were like a big politicizing force in many societies um and countries. I mean, you know, uh, when you experience the feeling of being able to fight for your own interests with others collectively, it it is like a enlightening experience.

It's like, you know, like, wow, I'm a part of this like bigger thing and we're all like achieving something together. But by and large, you know, labor unions have been like either destroyed or hurt severely in a way that they don't hold nearly as much power as as they used to. Um, and there are of course like good unions and bad unions within within that whole story arc. But um yeah, I think DGens are probably many of them people who feel some sort of economic insecurity, some sort of economic anxiety because yeah, it is true that like um I mean plenty of people don't believe that they're going to be able to retire. Like we're looking at like an economic future where inequality is only going to increase.

Like your ability to be able to provide for you and your family is decreasing. Um, and there doesn't seem to be too many political actors and political forces that are wanting to reverse that change besides maybe some sort of like uh only through some sort of strongman politics or like um effectively fascism of I mean that's effectively what fascism often is is like the blaming of particular ethnic or minority groups to you kick them out or to to kill them in some way and to take the economic surplus from their disappearing, right? Um and so I think speaking to their economic needs and trying to share ways in which we can collectivize these efforts because I think if if given the choice, you know, if you had the choice of like do you want to solo trying to make as much money as you can screwing everybody else so that you ensure that you are going to be able to retire and have an economically safe life in the future or would you rather do that with others that you trust that are that can achieve that and together you will feel like economically safe and move towards some sort of collective goals. Most people would pick the second I think

right if they believe that we're a possibility.

So I think making I think the way to do it is to make that possibility feel real.

Uh so okay imagine uh it's a few 30 years from now and we won. So we have the internet that we all dream of. So full of cooperatives, it's like socialist, it's private, it's secure.

How would it look like and how would life look like in this like techno paradise? [laughter] Um, that's a good question. You know, I mean, I think there's like I don't I can't tell you hyper specifically what what that necessarily looks like, but I have some feelings that um just generally technology in the internet is used in a way that benefits the masses rather than enriches a few. Like, you know, is Facebook designed in a way for our collective well-being? No, I mean like I think that's like that's an easy one, right?

And the reason is because we allow them to exist. Like we allow them to continue their practices. They don't get in trouble for anything that they do apparently. And so um I think the the internet looks like one that doesn't have these types of privatelyowned infrastructures that people associate with the internet right now. Like right now for a lot of people the internet is Google, Facebook, it is you know fang companies because that's the first thing that they interact with when when when going on the internet.

Um so for me I think it it involves significantly more um open APIs or standardizations within it to where um people are able to make at the very least like their own solutions or their own uh types of infrastructures that are catering to the needs of their community and like their people. And so, um, having a like like I, you know, social media right now is kind of a bad word or it's kind of like people generally dislike it and and so do I. I think I still have a a sliver of hope that social media can be done well actually that you can um that people do want to stay connected. There are reasons why people use social media. Um, and we can create it in a way to where uh it's something that is like enhancing our lives and like giving us something more to help us connect with other people that maybe we can't in in a specific way or it's simply you know a dashboard or a forum that we're using for collectively running our our community and finding and getting input deriving input from from others that are in our community.

Like I think that for me it's it's facilitating democracy to where it's completely normal completely normal to like take part in in institutions that are that are around you that I can go around and maybe like scan a thing on my phone and it's you know giving me a vote on what type of art that I would like to see on this wall because the community has been running a thing and they're going to commission some art piece or that like you know I can I can put a little bit of a complaint because in the park there was the bench is broken and no one fixed it yet. And like, you know, these types of things that allow for kind of collective intelligence. That's ultimately what I think um the internet should be used for is like collective intelligence for um benefiting the masses. Um yeah, I don't know if that's a beautiful. [laughter]

Yeah, why not? I mean,

nice. It sounds like a good future. I don't mind. Uh and um yeah, I think we can round up here and maybe the final question of me will be some u book maybe not a book just some cultural piece film podcast whatever that you would recommend besides your book. Let's start with your book.

So please please uh buy the book. How can I buy buy the book? Uh if I'm watching this interview like lately just look up blockchain radicals. It should be very more or less there. on uh I mean it's on you know not that I condone them but it's on Amazon it's on um most of the the repeater books is the name of the publishers you can also direct buy it directly from the publisher but they're based in the UK um so it depends on the country maybe if you go I have a linkree so linkree/blockchain radicals there are some for some of the countries that I know that have specific platforms I found some of the places where you can buy from as well

um so yeah should if you're also audio books, ebooks.

Yeah.

Yeah. So, if you're interested to explore more of Josh ideas, please buy a book. I haven't read it yet, but I believe it's quite cool. I would love to at least. Uh yeah.

And like your piece of recommendation, some something that would uh allow people to like uh for for someone who is not familiar with socialism

at all just like to get it like the basic understanding of that. But also um I would um I would avoid recommending classics because it's

too tough for entrance you know like startsing with Vakquin Kotkin Marks whatever it may be a bit too much but maybe something more

lightweight. Yeah. M

so not book 101 it can be anything any piece of culture that you seem might like

help people to like feel a bit like what's that why it's important um in like easy to digest way

yeah I mean okay if if you are if you are willing to read a classic I would say the classic for me when I was you know skeptical and trying to read more about it than um and try to understand what socialism actually is was Friedrich Engles um scientific versus utopian socialism. I think Engles is actually one of the easier writers of as far as the classics go.

Um but if you're someone who's more into like video content, maybe there is a channel called Democracy at Work. So um uh oh what's his name? Richard Wolf, I think, is like a pretty good uh starting point for people who want to learn more about what socialism is. He's a he's a um a professor. He's really good at at explaining lots of different concepts.

He's also a big advocate for cooperatives as like a practical a practical thing for people to pursue in order to build a type of socialism. I mean, you can think of cooperatives as effectively like an island of socialism within an ocean of of capitalism more or less. Um, so yeah, Democracy at Work is the name of this channel. Uh, the professor is called Richard Wolf, two Fs. Um, I recommend checking him out.

Okay. Thank you. So, thank you for this beautiful interview.

Mhm.

Yeah. Appreciate it.

Yeah. Um, thanks for watching it. Ciao.