VDAO Ep.5 Building Local Anti-Fragility Bitcoin, Permaculture & Community Resilience w Steph Curdy

New @greenpillnet pod out today! 🌐

In this episode of the VDAO × Greenpill Anti-Fragile Network States mini-series, host Kris Miller talks with Steph Curdy — Bitcoin early adopter, Wolfram researcher, and real-world resilience builder who traded city life for a hands-in-the-soil permaculture experiment.

Steph shares how Bitcoin shaped his understanding of asymmetry, how COVID exposed the fragility of urban systems, and why he decided to buy land, build food and energy resilience, and grow a local community around it. They explore anti-fragility, decentralized systems, gradients, permaculture design, skepticism, community trust, and why people — not tomatoes — are the real value in any resilient ecosystem.

A grounded, practical and inspiring look at how digital builders can become real-world resilience builders.

🌱 greenpill.network 🌐 vdao.org 🐦 https://x.com/JoinVDAO 🐦 https://x.com/Steph_Curdy 🐦 https://x.com/greenpillnet

⏱️ Timestamps

00:00 – Cold open: "The real value is community, not tomatoes." 01:24 – Welcome to the VDAO Anti-Fragile Network State season 02:19 – Steph Curdy joins the show 02:44 – Steph's "why" as a builder 03:50 – Bitcoin, energy & curiosity 05:48 – What anti-fragility means to Steph 07:30 – Bitcoin as asymmetric exposure 08:55 – COVID revealing urban fragility 09:38 – Searching for land & building resilience 11:35 – Bitcoin as a "Cambrian explosion" of economic primitives 13:32 – Returning to foundational systems: food & nature 15:46 – Steph's background: Tesla → finance → Wolfram 17:31 – Discovering permaculture 19:11 – Emergence: crypto, permaculture & meta-crisis spaces 20:56 – Sensemaking through energy gradients 22:52 – History & first-principles thinking 25:05 – Using gradients to understand Bitcoin 26:55 – How Steph thinks about skeptics 28:51 – Money as information & coordination 30:27 – Listening as a core civic skill 32:25 – Crypto insecurity & ecosystem overwhelm 34:44 – Quality-of-life benefits of resilience 36:24 – Buying land: the practical journey 38:46 – Turning a junk site into regenerative opportunity 41:10 – Building trust with neighbors 42:58 – Year-by-year development of the land 45:02 – Insight: community is the real value 47:29 – Mushroom systems, events & collaborative building 49:28 – Crypto × permaculture: bridging the worlds 51:51 – Polarization & public perception 54:30 – Digital + physical sovereignty 57:03 – What Steph learned building in real life 59:49 – Closing thoughts 01:00:32 – Outro