Unchained

Latest Episodes:

Vitalik Buterin on Whether or Not Ethereum Is 'Blowing It' - Ep.112 Mar 26, 2019

Show notes

At the first Unchained Live, Vitalik explained why he thought it was "inevitable" Ethereum would lose some of its lead, when he would be upset if Ethereum were overtaken by a competitor, and whether the Ethereum 2.0 road map was too long. We also discussed why a strain of Ethereum maximalism is emerging, how the foundation sets its funding priorities, whether or not the community should adopt inflation funding for development of the blockchain and why he thinks the MolochDAO experiment likely won't garner much investment. For the full summary, go to http://www.forbes.com/sites/laurashin/2019/03/26/vitalik-buterin-on-why-ethereum-has-lost-some-of-its-lead/.

Thank you to our sponsors!

Quantstamp, the venue sponsor for Unchained Live: http://quantstamp.com/unchained

Columbia School of Professional Studies, the networking sponsor: http://sps.columbia.edu/podcast

CipherTrace: http://ciphertrace.com/unchained

Episode links:

Previous Unchained interview with Vitalik Buterin: https://unchainedpodcast.com/vitalik-buterin-creator-of-ethereum-on-the-big-guy-vs-the-little-guy/

Unchained episode about MolochDAO: https://unchainedpodcast.com/molochdao-could-this-decentralized-autonomous-organization-help-ethereum-scale-faster/

Zcash interview: https://unchainedpodcast.com/zcashs-zooko-wilcox-on-why-he-believes-privacy-coins-will-be-used-more-for-good-than-bad/

Unchained interview with Glen Weyl and Santiago Siri referencing radical markets: https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-blockchains-can-help-create-little-democracies-everywhere/

0x interview: https://unchainedpodcast.com/will-warren-of-0x-on-why-decentralized-exchanges-are-the-future/

Augur interview: https://unchainedpodcast.com/joey-krug-on-how-augur-is-like-any-other-tool-ep-79/

Dharma interview: https://unchainedpodcast.com/nadav-hollander-on-how-dharma-could-create-new-forms-of-debt-ep-80/

Compound interview: https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-youll-earn-interest-on-your-crypto-with-compound-ep-82/

dYdX interview: https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-dydx-allows-you-to-take-a-short-position-in-one-token-ep-86/

Unchained episode on MakerDAO, part 1: https://unchainedpodcast.com/rune-christensen-of-makerdao-part-1-how-to-keep-a-crypto-collateralized-stablecoin-afloat/

Part 2: https://unchainedpodcast.com/rune-christensen-of-makerdao-part-2-how-dai-stayed-at-1-while-eth-crashed-from-1400-to-85/

Unconfirmed episode about superfluid collateral and echoes of the 2008 financial crisis: https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-to-earn-money-on-collateral-in-defi-and-why-thats-risky/

Unconfirmed episode about Uniswap: https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-uniswap-quickly-became-one-of-the-most-popular-dexes/

Dfinity interview: https://unchainedpodcast.com/dfinitys-dominic-williams-on-how-its-blockchain-nervous-system-is-not-an-ai-ep-78/

100th episode of Unchained featuring a poem about crypto and the podcast: https://unchainedpodcast.com/100th-episode-past-guests-and-listeners-take-over-the-show-ep-100/

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MolochDAO: Could This Decentralized Autonomous Organization Help Ethereum Scale Faster? - Ep.111 Mar 19, 2019

Show notes

Ameen Soleimani, CEO of Spankchain, comes on the show to discuss his latest effort to fund Ethereum development through the decentralized autonomous organization MolochDAO. He describes how it works, plus we cover competition in the smart contract space and whether we're seeing the emergence of Ethereum maximalism.

Full show notes are back on Forbes.com! See the full recap of this week's recap of the episode at http://www.forbes.com/sites/laurashin/2019/03/18/how-could-ethereum-development-be-funded-perhaps-through-this-decentralized-autonomous-organization/.

Thank you to our sponsor!

CipherTrace: http://ciphertrace.com/unchained

Episode links:

MolochDAO website: MolochDAO.com

MolochDAO on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MolochDAO

MolochDAO white paper: https://github.com/MolochVentures/Whitepaper/blob/master/Whitepaper.pdf

Moloch Github: https://github.com/molochventures/moloch

State of Ethereum 2.0 report: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PS0k9MaKPdPwEw3Uh9rq7USjq7LcSpT6ICQUXRij4YE/edit#heading=h.kdbgcss2wsc

Ameen's tweet storm on MolochDAO: https://twitter.com/ameensol/status/1084652403889065989?s=19

MolochDAO tweetstorm with update on members, etc.: https://twitter.com/MolochDAO/status/1100516720563806209?s=19

MolochDAO presentation at ETHDenver: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abTRJZcmPwI

Post by Dino Mark, Vlad Zamfir and Emin Gun Sirer, A Call for a Temporary Moratorium on the DAO: http://hackingdistributed.com/2016/05/27/dao-call-for-moratorium/

Ameen on the importance of ETH price: https://twitter.com/ameensol/status/1090319128810815489

Ryan Zurrer's position on ether fund recovery: https://medium.com/@rzurrer/evolution-dogma-a-proposed-path-towards-ether-fund-recovery-9810f213e8ee

r/Ethereum decision on moderators: https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/azyqdu/a_statement_call_for_discussion_from_some_of_the/

Ameen on the timeframe for developing Ethereum 2.0 relative to development on potentially competitive chains like Polkadot: https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/ajc9ip/ama_we_are_the_eth_20_research_team/eewscyf/

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How Binance Could Become the First Decentralized Autonomous Corporation - Ep.110 Mar 12, 2019

Show notes

Tushar Jain and Kyle Samani, managing partners of Multicoin Capital, discuss Binance, Binance Chain and BNB token, and why they believe Binance will become the first centralized company to successfully decentralize itself and migrate the value in itself to its token. We cover what Binance, the centralized company has so far achieved in terms of trading volume, fiat on-ramps, and regulatory arbitrage, and whether the company has any more regulatory risk than any other exchange. We also look at the features of Binance Chain, how they compare to other decentralized exchanges such as 0x, and why Multicoin believes that it will have more liquidity than previous dexes. We then explore BNB token — how it works now, the regulatory risk for BNB token, and how it will function on the dex. Finally, we touch on Binance's decentralization strategy overall and how it could fail.

Thank you to our sponsor!

CipherTrace: https://ciphertrace.com/unchained

Episode links:

Multicoin Capital: https://multicoin.capital

Kyle Samani: https://twitter.com/KyleSamani

Tushar Jain: https://twitter.com/TusharJain_

Multicoin Capital BNB report: https://multicoin.capital/2019/02/19/binance-coin-analysis-and-valuation/

Unchained episode with CZ: https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-binance-became-the-most-popular-crypto-exchange-in-5-months-ep-84/

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Venue Announcement for Unchained Live Mar 10, 2019

Show notes

Get your tickets now for Unchained Live with Vitalik Buterin! https://www.eventbrite.com/e/unchained-live-with-vitalik-buterin-tickets-56189456176 It will take place March 20th at 6pm at Columbia Journalism School in the Joseph D. Jamail Lecture Hall. Hope to see you there!

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How Melon Could Make Asset Management Easier - Ep.109 Mar 05, 2019

Show notes

Mona El-Isa, the cofounder and CEO of Melonport, explains how Melon, the asset management protocol which recently launched on Ethereum, makes launching a fund easier and less expensive, plus gives investors even more transparency into the manager's decisions. She describes who will be using Melon, how the funds using Melon access liquidity if the protocol only connects to decentralized exchanges, what happens if bugs are found in the protocol's smart contracts, and how know-your-customer processes are handled. Noting that the company Melonport will now be winding down, she talks about how the protocol will be managed going forward. Plus, we dive into the MLN token.

Thank you to our sponsor!

http://ciphertrace.com/unchained

Episode links:

Melonport: https://melonport.com

Launch of Melon 1.0: https://medium.com/melonport-blog/melon-v1-0-zahreddino-60105f51988d

Front and back office functions in a traditional fund vs. a Melon-based fund: https://medium.com/melonport-blog/what-is-melon-2018-edition-3437f3d064d8

Management fees in Melon: https://medium.com/melonport-blog/management-and-performance-fees-in-a-melon-fund-f1df2a26abd9

Integration with Kyber: https://medium.com/melonport-blog/kyber-network-melon-3f6bcfa2d328

Melonport will not exist by DevCon V: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTLSnS4DTak&t=882s

Melon governance: https://medium.com/melonport-blog/introduction-to-the-melon-governance-system-f6ff73c70eb0

MLN token: https://medium.com/melonport-blog/everything-you-always-wanted-to-know-about-melon-but-were-too-afraid-to-ask-9ea3fda6d71f

Melonomics 1: https://medium.com/melonport-blog/melonomics-part-1-aligning-interests-through-token-unification-d0b98a02de46

Melonomics 2: https://medium.com/melonport-blog/melonomics-part-2-the-melon-engine-48bcb0dae65

Melonomics 3: https://medium.com/melonport-blog/melonomics-part-3-counting-melons-7632afad844c

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How Blockchains Can Help Create Little Democracies Everywhere - Ep.108 Feb 26, 2019

Show notes

Glen Weyl, a political economist and social technologist, the coauthor of Radical Markets and a principal researcher at Microsoft, and Santiago Siri, the founder of Democracy Earth, discuss how blockchains can be used to create borderless democracies that can reach any citizen on earth and can be used not just by nation-states but in all kinds of communities such as the workplace, church or a social network like Facebook. We cover concepts such as quadratic finance and quadratic voting, and look at how forcing voters to have a budget for their votes changes voting behavior. We also dive into what needs to be put in place for blockchain-based voting systems to work, why identity solutions are crucial but also so hard to get right, and how we can prevent token-based governance systems from becoming plutocracies. Plus, we surmise that blockchain-based governance might be the 21st century political experiment and that someday, we may all be citizens of multiple communities.

Thank you to our sponsors!

CipherTrace: http://ciphertrace.com/unchained

Microsoft: https://twitter.com/MSFTBlockchain and https://aka.ms/unchained

Episode links:

Democracy Earth: https://www.democracy.earth

Santiago Siri: https://twitter.com/santisiri

Radical Xchange: https://twitter.com/RadxChange

Glen Weyl: https://twitter.com/glenweyl

Radical Xchange conference in March: radicalxchange.org

Radical Markets: https://press.princeton.edu/titles/11222.html

Democracy Earth white paper: https://www.dropbox.com/s/sifogl4zimwkkei/Democracy%20Earth%20-%20Social%20Smart%20Contract%20-%20Paper%20v0.2.pdf?dl=0

Democracy Earth cofounder Pia Mancini on early work with digital democracy: https://www.ted.com/talks/pia_mancini_how_to_upgrade_democracy_for_the_internet_era?language=en

Santi on how blockchains could revolutionize democracy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UajbQTHnTfM

Wired article on Democracy Earth: https://www.wired.com/story/santiago-siri-radical-plan-for-blockchain-voting/

CoinDesk feature on Glen Weyl: https://www.coindesk.com/coindesk-most-influential-blockchain-2018-glen-weyl

Vitalik Buterin blog post on Radical Markets: https://vitalik.ca/general/2018/04/20/radical_markets.html

Paper by Vitalik, Zoe Hitzig and Glen on quadratic financing: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3243656

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Unchained Live With Vitalik Buterin Feb 20, 2019

Show notes

In case you haven’t heard, I’m doing a live podcast recording with Vitalik Buterin, the creator of Ethereum. What is a live podcast recording? It's a podcast performed by me and the guest on a stage, in front of an audience.

Vitalik and I will be discussing Ethereum 2.0, Polka Dot, Substrate, what happened with Afri this week and more. And you’ll have an opportunity to ask questions.

It’ll be in New York City the evening of March 20th, which is one month from today. The doors open at 6, the show starts at 7. We will be announcing the venue soon.

Get your tickets here! https://www.eventbrite.com/e/unchained-live-with-vitalik-buterin-tickets-56189456176

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Why Future Perfect Ventures Did Not Invest in ICOs - Ep.107 Feb 19, 2019

Show notes

Jalak Jobanputra, founder and managing partner of Future Perfect Ventures, talks about how, in 2014, her experience as an investment bank and VC, her global background, and her observation that new streams of data were becoming available led her to launch her first fund, which ended up being 70% invested in blockchain. She describes what it was like selling LPs on the nascent technology in 2014, how her latest fund, which will be more than $50 million, is different and how it's drawing LPs who thought they could make money through liquid hedge funds invested in tokens. She talks about why she thinks early-stage technologies can't be IPO'ed -- and why FPV shied away from ICOs -- but why her second fund is capable of investing in tokens. She also explains how the space is still lacking in early-stage VCs with knowledge of the blockchain sector, why New York launched the New York Blockchain Center and whether crypto is becoming more diverse.

Come See Unchained Live With Vitalik Buterin!

Wednesday, March 20th, doors at 6, show at 7, venue TBD

Get your tickets now!

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/unchained-live-with-vitalik-buterin-tickets-56189456176

Thank you to our sponsors!

CipherTrace: http://ciphertrace.com/unchained

Tokensoft: https://www.tokensoft.io

Microsoft: https://twitter.com/MSFTBlockchain and https://aka.ms/unchained

Episode links:

Future Perfect Ventures: Futureperfectventures.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/jalak

Blog: Thebarefootvc.com

Jalak op-ed on Bitcoin at $10,000 in Recode: https://www.recode.net/2017/11/29/16716014/bitcoin-price-10k-ethereum-blockchain-cryptocurrency-value-creation-global

Profile of Jalak in Breaker Mag: https://breakermag.com/why-one-of-blockchains-first-vcs-thinks-the-developing-world-will-lead-the-way/

Jalak on the 10th birthday of the Bitcoin white paper: https://breakermag.com/remembering-the-bitcoin-whitepaper-part-3-the-thinkers/

New York Blockchain Center: https://www.nycedc.com/press-release/nycedc-open-nyc-s-public-private-blockchain-center

Wired story on the Collective Future: https://www.wired.com/story/for-women-in-cryptocurrency-a-new-effort-to-grow-their-ranks/

Unconfirmed episode with Bill Barhydt of portfolio company Abra: https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-abra-enables-you-to-buy-5-of-an-etf-like-token-of-the-top-10-cryptos-ep-040/

Unchained episode with Elizabeth Rossiello of portfolio company Bitpesa: https://unchainedpodcast.com/bitpesas-elizabeth-rossiello-on-necker-island/

Unchained episode with Vinny Lingham of portfolio company Civic: https://unchainedpodcast.com/civics-vinny-lingham-on-when-crypto-demand-will-catch-up-with-the-technology/

Unchained episode with Josh Stein of portfolio company Harbor: https://unchainedpodcast.com/harbor-and-trusttoken-on-why-they-dont-mind-being-unsexy-ep-77/

Unchained episode with Riccardo Spagni of portfolio company Tari: https://unchainedpodcast.com/moneros-riccardo-spagni-aka-fluffypony-on-how-he-feels-about-monero-being-used-for-crime-ep-93/

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How Casa Makes It Harder for Someone to Steal Your Bitcoins - Ep.106 Feb 12, 2019

Show notes

Jeremy Welch of personal key security system Casa describes the company's various services and products, including its $10,000-a-year premium service for HODLers of at least $500,000 worth of cryptocurrency and the Casa node. He explains how he came to start Casa, why using seed phrases for managing security of crypto hardware devices is so problematic, and how customers should set up the keys in their possession for the company's multi-signature solution, in which any transaction requires the use of three of five keys. We go on at length at about potential ways in which an attacker could still force a target, say, at gunpoint, to move money to the hacker's wallet. We also discuss why the company doesn't offer a multi-sig solution for ether, why people choose to run Casa's Bitcoin/Lightning node and where people are using Lightning.

Unchained Live With Vitalik Buterin in New York City: Get your tickets here!

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/unchained-live-with-vitalik-buterin-tickets-56189456176

Thank you to our sponsors!

CipherTrace: https://ciphertrace.com/unchained

Microsoft: https://twitter.com/MSFTBlockchain and https://aka.ms/unchained

TokenSoft: https://www.tokensoft.io

Episode links:

Casa: https://keys.casa

Jeremy Welch: https://twitter.com/jeremyrwelch

The Cutting Room Floor: Jeremy Welch of Casa, in which Jeremy answers by email the remaining questions we didn't get to:

https://unchainedpodcast.com/the-cutting-room-floor-jeremy-welch-of-casa/

Casa blog post on the evolution of Bitcoin key management: https://blog.keys.casa/the-evolution-of-bitcoin-key-management/

Ways to store your crypto: https://blog.keys.casa/crypto-101-storing-your-cryptocurrency/

Forbes on Casa's $2 million seed funding: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffkauflin/2018/03/02/bitcoin-thieves-beware-super-secure-wallet-maker-casa-raises-2-million/#4c5b2e544230

Casa's seven guiding principles: https://medium.com/casa/seven-guiding-principles-at-casa-92f43e5e546a

Announced after we recorded: Casa's new browser extension: https://blog.keys.casa/casa-browser-extension/

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Rune Christensen of MakerDAO Part 2: How Dai Stayed at $1 While ETH Crashed From $1,400 to $85 - Ep.105 Feb 05, 2019

Show notes

Rune Christensen, CEO and cofounder of MakerDAO, explains how multicollateral Dai will work, what happens if one type of collateral fails, and what happens when someone's collateralized debt position with multicollateral Dai needs to be liquidated. He also discusses who gets to participate in the various levels of governance with the MKR token, who owns those tokens and what the purpose of the Maker Foundation is. We also cover whether the CFTC would consider collateralized debt positions to be derivatives and therefore under its purview, how Dai is being used and how much education is required for people to use the system.

Thank you to our sponsors!

CipherTrace: http://ciphertrace.com/unchained

Microsoft: https://twitter.com/MSFTBlockchain

Tokensoft: https://www.tokensoft.io

Episode links:

MakerDAO: https://makerdao.com/en/

Rune Christensen: https://twitter.com/RuneKek

Previous Unchained episode on stablecoins with Rune and Philip Rosedale of High Fidelity: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-its-so-hard-to-keep-stablecoins-stable/

Unconfirmed episode with Rune on Andreessen Horowitz’s $15 million investment: https://unchainedpodcast.com/rune-christensen-of-makerdao-on-its-15-million-from-andreessen-horowitz-ep-039/

Part 1 of my interview with Rune: https://unchainedpodcast.com/rune-christensen-of-makerdao-part-1-how-to-keep-a-crypto-collateralized-stablecoin-afloat/

Digital Asset Research report on MakerDAO: https://www.digitalassetresearch.com/our-products/#in-depth-research

CFTC smart contracts primer prohibiting derivatives contracts that are traded on exchanges that are supposed to be registered with the CFTC and are not. https://www.cftc.gov/sites/default/files/2018-11/LabCFTC_PrimerSmartContracts112718.pdf

Nice recap of how Dai has performed as ETH has dropped in price: https://medium.com/@mikeraymcdonald/single-collateral-dai-9-months-in-review-b9d9fbe45ab

MKR Tools website: https://mkr.tools/tokens/dai

Description of Maker Tools: https://medium.com/@mikeraymcdonald/announcing-the-new-mkr-tools-e32466f1c3db

Maintaining its peg as ETH dropped:

https://medium.com/makerdao/volatile-times-dai-as-a-safe-haven-2f017453e9f1

MakerDAO and Wyre partnership: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/makerdao-and-wyre-give-businesses-immediate-access-to-dai-stablecoin-in-over-thirty-countries-including-usa-300696400.html

ETH in DeFi projects: https://mikemcdonald.github.io/eth-defi/

Placeholder VC blog post: https://www.placeholder.vc/blog/2019/1/23/maker-investment-thesis

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