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a16z crypto show — Technology
a16z crypto show

The a16z crypto show explores how decentralized networks are reshaping money, ownership, and the architecture of the internet. We go beyond the hype to look at what’s actually working, what isn’t, and what comes next as crypto continues to go mainstream and blockchains become core infrastructure.

Each episode features conversations with founders, engineers, economists, policymakers, and researchers building at the frontier of finance, payments, AI, and distributed systems. We cover stablecoins and global payments, the tokenization of “real-world” assets, decentralized physical infrastructure, network design and governance, and the practical tradeoffs behind decentralization — along with lessons from past technology shifts.

Produced and hosted by the a16z crypto team, the show combines reporting, analysis, and first-principles thinking to explain how crypto intersects with the economy and society — and why it matters now.
Learn more at a16zcrypto.com.

***
Posts should not be considered investment advice or an advertisement for investment services. Reposts of third-party content are not attributable to a16z; see disclosures for more information: https://a16z.com/disclosures/.

Copyright: © a16z crypto / Andreessen Horowitz

Latest Episodes:

Designing Beloved Brands Dec 30, 2024

Show notes

Welcome to web3 with a16z. Today's episode is all about design, creativity, and taste-making.

Our special guest is Jason Mayden, the chief design officer of Jordan Brand at Nike — that's Jordan as in former NBA superstar Michael Jordan. In his role, Mayden is responsible for the look and feel of iconic products, like Air Jordan sneakers and related apparel.

In this episode, Mayden speaks with Chris Lyons, a16z crypto's president of web3 media, about the interdisciplinary nature of industrial design, the role of humans in an AI world, what makes fashion and food alike, and how to build a brand, whether you’re in crypto, sportswear, or another field.

This conversation originally took place at a16z crypto's Founders Summit in the fall of 2024. Be sure to subscribe to the a16z crypto Youtube channel where you can listen to more from that event, plus many more thought-provoking talks and other resources.

As a reminder, none of the content should be taken as investment, business, legal, or tax advice; please see a16z.com/disclosures for more important information, including a link to a list of our investments.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Trends for 2025 (part 2): AI x Crypto - From Agents in Games & DePIN to Proof of Personhood and More Dec 21, 2024

Show notes

with @carrawu @eddylazzarin @0xkarmacoma and @smc90 @rhhackett

Welcome to our special end-of-year episodes -- which also look ahead to 2025 -- covering our annual Big Ideas lists, where various a16z crypto team members share what they are personally excited about. (You can see the firmwide list, also including all the trends of the crypto team, here.)

This episode is part 2 of 2 -- but you don't have to listen to them in any particular order -- covering the intersection of crypto & AI:

agents that have their own crypto wallets -- and also AI agents in games; DePin/ decentralized physical infrastructure, like energy grids; and more;
proof of personhood, and why having a unique ID matters in a world of deepfakes, bots, scams and more is needed with proliferating AI;
decentralized, truly autonomous, chatbots (using TEEs or trusted execution environment).

Covering each of these -- and coming from the investing, engineering, and other teams -- are: Carra Wu, Eddy Lazzarin, and Karma (aka Daniel Reynaud); in conversation with hosts Sonal Chokshi and Robert Hackett, who also share some commentary at the top.

These are just a few of the 14 trends we shared; you can check out the full list at a16zcrypto.com/bigideas.

Also be sure to check out part 1, which covers the trends of stablecoins, app stores, infrastructure, and user experience.

As a reminder, none of the content is investment, business, legal, or tax advice; please see a16z.com/disclosures for more important information -- including a link to a list of our investments.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Trends for 2025 (part 1): Stablecoins, App Stores, UX, and More Dec 20, 2024

Show notes

with @sambroner @meigga @darenmatsuoka @jneu_net @chrislyons and @rhhackett @smc90

Welcome to our special end-of-year episodes -- which also look ahead to 2025 -- covering our annual Big Ideas lists, where various a16z crypto team members share what they are personally excited about. (You can see the firmwide list, also including all the trends of the crypto team, here.)

This episode is part 1 of 2 -- but you don't have to listen to them in any particular order -- covering the trends and themes of:

stablecoins, payments, and where the early adopters will come from;
app store distribution, curation, and discovery;
where the next crypto users will come from, turning passive holders into active users;
how builders improve, and better choose, infrastructure; and
simplifying user experience.

Covering each of these -- and coming from the investing, go-to-market, data science, research, and media teams are: Sam Broner, Maggie Hsu, Daren Matsuoka, Joachim Neu, and Chris Lyons; in conversation with hosts Sonal Chokshi and Robert Hackett. (Stay tuned until the end for some of our meta-commentary.)

These are just 5 of the 14 trends we shared; you can check out the full list at a16zcrypto.com/bigideas.

Also be sure to check out part 2, which covers all the trends at the intersection of crypto and AI.

As a reminder, none of the content is investment, business, legal, or tax advice; please see a16z.com/disclosures for more important information -- including a link to a list of our investments.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Prediction Markets and Beyond Nov 22, 2024

Show notes

with @atabarrok @skominers @smc90

We've heard a lot about the premise and the promise of prediction markets for a long time, but they finally hit the main stage with the most recent election. So what worked (and didn't) this time? Are they better than pollsters, journalists, domain experts, superforecasters?

So in this conversation, we tease apart the hype from the reality of prediction markets, from the recent election to market foundations... going more deeply into the how, why, and where these markets work. We also discuss the design challenges and opportunities, including implications for builders throughout. And we also cover other information aggregation mechanisms -- from peer prediction to others -- given that prediction markets are part of a broader category of information-elicitation and information-aggregation mechanisms.

Where do (and don't) blockchain and crypto technologies come in -- and what specific features (decentralization, transparency, real-time, open source, etc.) matter most, and in what contexts? Finally, we discuss applications for prediction and decision markets -- things we could do right away to in the near-to distant future -- touching on everything from corporate decisions and scientific replication to trends like AI, DeSci, futarchy/ governance, and more?

Our special expert guests are Alex Tabarrok, professor of economics at George Mason University and Chair in Economics at the Mercatus Center; and Scott Duke Kominers, research partner at a16z crypto, and professor at Harvard Business School -- both in conversation with Sonal Chokshi.

RESOURCES
(from links to research mentioned to more on the topics discussed)

The Use of Knowledge in Society by Friedrich Hayek (American Economic Review, 1945)
Everything is priced in by rsd99 (r/wallstreetbets, 2019)
Idea Futures (aka prediction markets, information markets) by Robin Hanson (1996)
Auctions: The Social Construction of Value by Charles Smith
Social value of public information by Stephen Morris and Hyun Song Shin (American Economic Review, December 2002)
Using prediction markets to estimate the reproducibility of scientific research by Anna Dreber, Thomas Pfeiffer, Johan Almenberg, Siri Isaksson, Brad Wilson, Yiling Chen, Brian Nosek, and Magnus Johannesson (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (November 2015)
A solution to the single-question crowd wisdom problem by Dražen Prelec, Sebastian Seung, and John McCoy (Nature, January 2017)
Targeting high ability entrepreneurs using community information: Mechanism design in the field by Reshmaan Hussam, Natalia Rigol, and Benjamin Roth (American Economic Review, March 2022)
Information aggregation mechanisms: concept, design, and implementation for a sales forecasting problem by Charles Plott and Kay-Yut Chen, Hewlett Packard Laboratories (March 2002)
If I had a million [on deciding to dump the CEO or not] by Robin Hanson (2008)
Futarchy: Vote values, but bet beliefs by Robin Hanson (2013)
From prediction markets to info finance by Vitalik Buterin (November 2024)
Composability is innovation by Linda Xie (June 2021)
Composability is to software as compounding interest is to finance by Chris Dixon (October 2021)
resources & research on DAOs, a16z crypto

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Government... By Lottery? Nov 02, 2024

Show notes

with @baileyflan @ahall_research @rhhackett

Today we’re dusting off an ancient practice that has become trendy once again: the old-but-new idea of “sortition,” or selecting representatives by lottery.

Sortition was used in ancient Athenian democracy to elect public officials. It’s also been lately revived by tech companies like Meta and AI startups like OpenAI and Anthropic to tackle some of their thorniest policymaking challenges.

Our guests today are experts on sortition, including Bailey Flanigan, a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard who is joining MIT as an assistant professor next year, and who has helped develop selection algorithms for sortition that are in use today. Also joining is Andrew Hall, Stanford University poli sci professor, advisor to Meta, and consultant to a16z crypto research.

In this episode, we discuss why not to rely exclusively on expert authority, how the process of deliberation changes people’s minds, and how sortition can apply everywhere from the governance of countries to the governance of crypto projects, and more.

Related resources:

Algorithms for fair, manipulation-robust, and transparent sortition with Bailey Flanigan

As a reminder, none of the content should be taken as investment, business, legal, or tax advice. Please see a16z.com/disclosures for more important information, including a link to a list of our investments.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

AI Bots & Memecoins Oct 26, 2024

Show notes

with @pmarca @bhorowitz

Today we’re running a special episode featuring a16z cofounders Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz talking about AI bots and crypto. They discuss what happens when you mix postmodern theories and internet memes in an LLM. They also get into the sudden rise of a strange memecoin, the state of crypto regulation in the U.S., and more.

This episode is a crossover from the Ben & Marc Show, which you can follow on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.

See the original episode:

How An AI Bot Became a Crypto Millionaire

As always, none of the content should be taken as tax, business, legal or investment advice. See a16z.com/disclosures for more important information, including a link to a list of our investments.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

State of Crypto 2024: Builder Energy, U.S. Election, Stablecoins, AI, More Oct 18, 2024

Show notes

with @DarenMatsuoka @eddylazzarin @rhhackett

Welcome to web3 with a16z. Today we're taking you behind the scenes of our newly released, annual State of Crypto Report — a16z crypto's analysis of the latest data and trends that have defined the industry in 2024.

This year's report features some brand new insights, from estimating the number of real crypto users globally, to understanding how much interest in crypto swing states may have ahead of the U.S. election. We also dig into infrastructure improvements to blockchains and key applications — including stablecoins, AI, and so-called DePIN. Be sure to visit a16zcrypto.com for all this and more including a new “Builder Energy” dashboard, which we’ll discuss on the show.

Joining me to talk about the findings are lead data scientist and report author Daren Matsuoka and CTO Eddy Lazzarin. The first voice you'll hear after mine is Daren's, then Eddy's.

a16z crypto resources:

State of Crypto Report 2024
Builder Energy dashboard
Estimating the number of real crypto users by Daren Matsuoka and Eddy Lazzarin

As always, none of the content should be taken as tax, business, legal or investment advice. See a16z.com/disclosures for more important information, including a link to a list of our investments.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Bridges: Out of the Mess, Into the Meshnet (with LayerZero) Sep 28, 2024

Show notes

Welcome to web3 with a16z. Today we explore the messy secrets of blockchain bridges. These cross-chain connectors are the go-betweens in today's multichain world, but their short history has been a checkered one, with prominent projects succumbing to major hacks and other hijinks.

So we've brought on one of the builders who knows this world best to help disentangle the messiness. That’s Bryan Pellegrino, cofounder and CEO of LayerZero Labs, maker of a popular blockchain interoperability protocol. In this episode, Bryan delivers a crash course on the evolution of bridges, including the ups and downs of various approaches. You'll also learn about the technology's inner workings, its applications, and how it fits in with ongoing efforts to scale blockchains.

Joining is a16z crypto general partner Ali Yahya, who is also an expert in this area; plus me, your cohost, Robert Hackett. The first voice you'll hear after mine is Bryan's, then Ali's.

As always, none of the content should be taken as tax, business, legal or investment advice. See a16z.com/disclosures for more important information, including a link to a list of our investments.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Games as Reality (with EVE Online) Sep 13, 2024

Show notes

with @HilmarVeigar @eddylazzarin

Our featured guest today is Hilmar Pétursson, the CEO of CCP Games, maker of EVE Online, a massive multiplayer online role playing game. In this episode, Pétursson shares his unique world view and game-making philosophy, as well as a deep dive into the technology and economic design of his sci-fi simulation. He also touches on how niche cults can break into mainstream culture, how slow databases can make for fun gameplay, and what to expect from EVE Frontier, a new blockchain-based overhaul of the space survival game that is now inviting people to apply as playtesters.

The other voice you'll hear is that of Eddy Lazzarin, a16z crypto’s Chief Technology Officer and an avid gamer himself. This conversation originally took place earlier this year at a16z crypto's CSX startup accelerator program in London, videos of which are posted on the a16z crypto YouTube channel. Be sure to subscribe for more thought-provoking conversations and other insightful content.

Related links:

"Crafting Virtual Worlds with Hilmar Pétursson, CEO of CCP Games" (a16z crypto Youtube)
Eve Online (eveonline.com)
Eve Frontier (evefrontier.com / projectawakening.io)
- Playtest signup

As a reminder, none of the content should be taken as investment, business, legal, or tax advice. Please see a16z.com/disclosures for more important information, including a link to a list of our investments.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

How Blockchain Tech Advances Benefit Other Industries Sep 09, 2024

Show notes

with Dan Boneh @tim_roughgarden @smc90

In this special 50th episode of the web3 with a16z podcast, we discuss how work in the blockchains/ crypto space has led to advances in several important technologies — which can be (and are being) used by many other industries beyond crypto.

Tim Roughgarden (a16z crypto Head of Research and professor at Columbia University) and Dan Boneh (a16z crypto Senior Research Advisor and professor at Stanford University) discuss these advances in conversation with Sonal Chokshi.

Topics covered include automated market makers; credible auctions, collusion, and mechanism design not possible before; as well as zero knowledge; trusted execution environments (TEEs) and fully homomorphic encryption (FHE); and much more. We also discuss the recurring theme of how web3 provides a laboratory not only for experiments in governance, but for macroeconomics and more. The two also offer many useful explanations for anyone new to these technologies or seeking to understand why they matter in the big picture.

It’s an innovation story we’ve seen over and over again, from the space program to other massive invention efforts: Technologies developed for one purpose often lead to benefits for humanity overall.

Pieces mentioned in this episode and other resources:

On some results and challenges in cryptoeconomics -- Tim Roughgarden, CESC 2022
8 reasons why blockchain mechanism design is hard -- Tim Roughgarden, a16zcrypto.com, 2024
The computer in the sky (short version) -- Tim Roughgarden, 2024
Zero knowledge canon -- with Justin Thaler's annotated bibliography, a16zcrypto,com 2022
Using zero-knowledge proofs to fight disinformation -- Trisha Datta and Dan Boneh, IACR 2023
VerITAS: Verifying Image Transformations at Scale -- Trisha Datta, Binyi Chen, Dan Boneh, 2024
Achieving crypto privacy and regulatory compliance [+pdf of full paper]-- Joseph Burleson, Michele Korver, Dan Boneh, 2022
Credible auctions: A trilemma -- Mohammad Akbarpour, Shengwu Li, Econometrica, 2020
Auction design for web3 [episode 3 of this podcast] -- Scott Duke Kominers, Tim Roughgarden, Sonal Chokshi, 2022
Building Cicada: Private on-chain voting using time-lock puzzles -- Michael Zhu, 2023
Transaction fee mechanism design for the Ethereum blockchain: An economic analysis of EIP-1559 -- Tim Roughgarden, 2020
Collusion-resilience in transaction fee mechanism design -- Hao Chung, Tim Roughgarden, Elaine Shi, 2024
Transaction fee mechanism design in a Post-MEV world -- Maryam Bahrani, Pranav Garimidi,Tim Roughgarden, 2024
Notes on Proposer-Builder Separation (PBS) -- Barnabé Monnot, 2022
Complexity-approximation trade-offs in exchange mechanisms: AMMs vs. LOBs -- Jason Milionis, Ciamac Moallemi, Tim Roughgarden, 2023
Trusted execution environments (TEEs) for blockchain applications -- Ari Juels, a16zcrypto.com, 2023

As a reminder, none of the following is investment, business, legal, or tax advice; please see a16z.com/disclosures for more important information including a link to a list of our investments.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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