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Collector since February 25, 2025

Favorite Podcasts

"Ethereum is Power to the People" with Jason Chaskin from the Ethereum Foundation | ZEROPOD S3 E1

Jason Chaskin is the newly minted head of app relations at the Ethereum Foundation, and he joins ZEROPOD as our first guest of season 3!In this conversation, host Toady Hawk chats with Jason about his journey from the halls of high finance to the trenches of ETH hackathons, his new EF role helping apps survive and thrive, and why he believes that Ethereum is uniquely positioned to bring power back to the people. If you enjoy this episode, you can collect an onchain version right here and support our ongoing work. --- Timestamps: 00:00 Why Ethereum? Open networks vs Big Tech servers 02:00 Introducing Jason + his background 02:44 Growing up in Connecticut, sports & early life 03:29 College years at Illinois, studying finance 07:00 First exposure to crypto during the ICO era 08:54 Corporate banking and investment banking disillusionment 11:30 Discovering crypto podcasts & influences 13:01 COVID money-printing → aha moment for Bitcoin & Ethereum 14:13 Entering NFTs and first onchain experiences 15:05 Learning to code + ETH Global hackathons 16:33 How Jason taught himself (CS50, Patrick Collins course) 17:22 Pivot point: job applications & rejection at Privy 18:18 Blogging, Farcaster channels, and breaking into EF 21:59 Landing a role with the Ethereum Foundation 22:42 Announcing his new role: Apps Relations & Research 24:59 What the new EF focus means for apps & use cases 27:03 Why stablecoins on Tron succeeded & lessons for ETH 30:03 Should Ethereum fight for stablecoin market share? 32:11 The bull case for apps on Ethereum 34:43 Vitalik’s vision, decentralization, and values 39:23 Are stablecoins bullish or bearish for Ethereum? 40:29 Favorite Vitalik blog posts + public goods funding 46:01 Why Ethereum is a counterbalance to centralization 49:41 Competition with Solana & L1 debates 53:10 Are L2s parasitic to Ethereum? 57:12 EF’s L1 vs L2 scaling roadmap explained 59:59 What new blockspace should be used for (apps, experiments) 1:01:21 Bull case for Farcaster & community building 1:03:50 Thoughts on Nouns DAO and funding public goods 1:09:37 Ethereum’s biggest challenges ahead 1:12:49 EF restructuring and adapting to regulation 1:16:28 Why EF is leaning into ecosystem support & comms 1:18:54 Reflections on FTX, regulation, and industry reputation 1:19:41 Looking ahead to 2025: apps, stablecoins, institutions 1:21:49 Lightning Round Q&A (food, music, hobbies, books, travel, inspirations) 1:28:06 Closing thoughts --- Podcast produced, edited and hosted by Toady Hawk. Zero Rights Reserved and Open Source (Just like Ethereum)Cover art commissioned from the talented @0xAprilia Funding provided by The Yellow Collective on Base, an onchain culture club for curious creators and artists. Find out more at yellowcollective.xyz.

Context S4: The Metropolitan Museum of Art - The Most Visited Museum in America Dives into NFTs

Blake speaks with The Metropolitan Museum of Art team who recently released Art Links, marking The Met’s first foray onto the blockchain. Art Links is a 12-week game that invites you to connect the dots between seeming disparate art works (whether centuries apart, completely different mediums, etc.) according to different themes, rewarding you in the form of NFT badges and IRL prizes. Blake has played religiously every week, and has learned a tonne! 3 of the project leads are here to talk about the game: Destinee Filmore, Assistant Curator in the Department of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Met, Brett Renfer, The Met's Senior Project Manager for Emerging Technologies and Audrey Ou, co-founder and CEO of TRLab. They dive deep into the project, from how long it took to plan and launch, to the intended audience, to why they chose Base, to the art they included. Blake also couldn’t resist asking Destinee about if (and when) the Met will collect their first crypto art works. If you want to get a read on the traditional art world and how they are engaging with NFTs…you can’t really get bigger than this. The Met is the most visited museum in America, and one of the most important cultural institutions in the world. Art Links: https://artlinks.metmuseum.org/about TRLab: https://x.com/trlab_ Blake Finucane: https://x.com/blakefinucane Boys Club Newsletter: https://tooonline.beehiiv.com/

"Building for People, Not Wallets" with Privy cofounder Henri Stern | ZEROPOD S2 E16

What if crypto products weren’t built for wallets, but for people? In this episode of ZEROPOD, Privy.io founder Henri Stern joins host Toady Hawk to talk about building user-first infra, why account abstraction matters, and what it’ll take to onboard the next billion. From his Parisian roots to Protocol Labs and now Privy, Henri shares sharp takes on fragmentation, EIP-7702, and why most crypto apps still miss the point. Come for the insights, stay for the travel tips and Italian bread slander. TIMESTAMPS:00:00 - Intro: Meet Henri Stern, founder of Privy01:44 - Henri’s backstory: Growing up in Paris, moving to NYC03:55 - Adjusting to life in New York and early education04:32 - Choosing Stanford over the French education system06:00 - Discovering computer science and why it stuck07:54 - Founding Shout: a peer-to-peer marketplace experiment10:01 - What went wrong with hyperlocal marketplaces12:20 - Filecoin and Protocol Labs: Henri’s next chapter13:49 - What Filecoin taught Henri about zk, consensus, and infra19:00 - Falling in love with crypto, then falling out of it for a bit20:06 - The origin of Privy: starting with privacy, landing on onboarding24:00 - What Privy does today: abstracting onboarding, not just accounts26:10 - The nuance of account abstraction vs. 4337/770228:30 - Privy’s internal values: focus, experimentation, ownership33:00 - Wallet sprawl and the identity fragmentation dilemma36:00 - Wallets as identity tools, not just money holders39:00 - Why crypto infra must be built now, not later41:00 - Notable partnerships: Farcaster, Pump.fun, Hyperliquid & more45:10 - Privy's current roadmap: chains, funding UX, identity UX47:02 - EIP-7702: What it is and why it matters50:00 - Speculation vs stability: the real bifurcation in crypto52:40 - Henri’s vision for 2025 and hiring at Privy54:08 - Rapid-fire round: food, music, tech, travel, and more1:04:28 - Where to find out more about Privy and wrap-up--- Podcast recorded by Toady Hawk, edited by Toady Hawk. Hosted by Toady Hawk. Produced by Zero Rights Media. This content is zero rights reserved (cc0), please remix and reuse it in any way you like! #base #onchain #ethereum #privy #crypto #stripe