Today I'm talking with Martin Leskovjan.

Martin is a member of the subversive Czech art collective Ztohoven and co-founder of Paralelni Polis which is one of the collective’s better known projects, also the site of the world’s first bitcoin-only cafe.

This is a conversation about art and the power to influence.  Ztohoven are a band of merry pranksters with a desire to provoke emotion and open minds and I talk with Martin about many of their projects and whether it is possible to create parallel social structures that can liberate people.

Martin is a fascinating and inspiring individual, one of many good people I had the pleasure and privilege to meet in Prague for this series and I sincerely hope you enjoyed the discussions as much as I did. 

Enjoy the conversation:

A.I. generated summary:

00:10 - Introduction to this episode.

06:32 - Spreading awareness of Bitcoin.

13:14 - The Artistic side of the collective.

20:12 - The fetish of national and state symbols.

26:55 - How did the idea of the red underpants come about?

30:34 - Trolling on the internet vs. trolling on 4chan.

37:32 - What is Ztohoven's latest project?

41:56 - The beginnings of the art collective.

48:49 - What was the intention behind the creation of Paralelni Polis?

54:06 - Organising the Hackers congress.

1:01:36 - The price of being ungovernable.

1:09:57 - What is meme culture?

1:19:22 - Being compelled to be subversive.

1:23:58 - The tools of crypto-anarchy.

1:28:13 - The transition from centralized systems to decentralised systems.

1:33:47 - The fall of Rome.

1:37:44 - Awareness of cryptography tools.

1:44:37 - Problems with the current state of activism.

LINKS:

Liberty In Our Lifetime 2023: ⁠https://libertyinourlifetime.org/⁠

TWITTER:

Martin Leskovjan: ⁠https://twitter.com/LeskovjanMartin

Timothy Allen: ⁠https://twitter.com/MrTimothyAllen⁠

WEBSITES:

Ztohoven: http://www.ztohoven.com/⁠

Paralelni Polis: https://www.paralelnipolis.cz/

Free Cities Foundation: ⁠https://free-cities.org/

VIDEOS:

The official burning of the red boxer shorts: ⁠http://shorturl.at/mqrxU⁠

The Triggering of Shia | He Will Not Divide Us: ⁠https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_p4h3jwJob0