
The Ownership Economy
Welcome to the Ownership Economy podcast, the podcast that explores the people and ideas that are utilizing technology, economics, and the law to reimagine how the economy can work for everyone. Here we connect with the entrepreneurs, investors, thought-leaders, academics, and politicians that are constructing a better economy, one based on broad-based ownership and democratic governance. Hosted by Martin Smith and Jahed Momand, two investors and operators that aim to use this platform to showcase the people and ideas that will shape more inclusive economies.
Latest episodes

Jan 27, 2023 • 1h 5min
Episode 048 - Nature-Based Solutions, Natural Assets and the Opportunities and Limits of Blockchain with Dr. Margot Clarvis
In episode 048, Martin and Jahed sit down with Dr. Margot Clarvis, PhD, an environmental scientist working in the field of nature-based solutions (NbS), interfacing with the growing natural asset and carbon markets. In the course of the episode, Margot speaks to the trends that are at work turning nature into an ownable asset class with revenue potential, who the various stakeholders in the NbS space are, and how they’re working to build scientific consensus on natural assets and their revenue streams. We also touch on recent controversies in the voluntary carbon market, opportunities for blockchains to potentially solve trust issues in the market, and the evolution of these market-based solutions toward addressing development goals.

16 snips
Jan 23, 2023 • 45min
Episode 047 - Virtual On-Chain Option Plans and Early Stage Venture Approaches to Ownership Allocations: A Conversation with Sascha Kellert from Ownco and Jessica Van Meir from Mintstars
In this episode of the Ownership Economy, we check back in with Sascha Kellert from Ownco and Jessica van Meir from Mintstars for an update on their progress. Sascha walks us his new model for Virtual On-Chain Option Plans and discusses how an initial ten organizations are using the plan in practice. We then dive into how both entrepreneurs are thinking about shared ownership and governance programs in their early stage start ups. We hope you enjoy the episode.

Jan 14, 2023 • 55min
Episode 46 - Fixing a Broken Refund and Resell Market for Property Bookings: TripsTrade, with Stephen Martin
In this episode of the Ownership Economy, we speak with Stephen Martin from TripsTrade. Steve comes from a background in the property rental market, a $2.3 trillion industry. Along with his co-founder Petro Sideris, Steve is working to build a new model for short-term property rentals, like vacations and hotel bookings. We all have at one point or another had to cancel a booking without a refund. TripsTrade aims to fix that entire market and in the meantime is building some interesting web2 to web3 tools that will help everyone more easily adopt blockchain technologies. We hope you enjoy the episode.

11 snips
Jan 14, 2023 • 1h 17min
Episode 45 - Multiscale Energy Coordination as a Global Public Good: The Plurigrid Project, with Amber Case
In this episode, we sit down with Amber Case of the Plurigrid project. In the conversation, we talk about the intersection of open source software economic models, cybernetics, anthropology, and how combining the three can open up new possibilities in distributed energy resources management and distributed, resilient, microgrids. We hope you enjoy the episode.

Dec 9, 2022 • 53min
Episode 044 - Breaking the Crypto Trilemma: How to Make Decentralization Work with Development Economist and Algorand Foundation CEO Staci Warden
In this episode of the Ownership Economy, we speak with Staci Warden, the CEO of the Algorand Foundation. Staci previously ran the Center for Financial Markets at the Milken Institute, and before that worked as an executive at JPMorgan and Nasdaq. She started her career as a development economist at the United States Department of the Treasury. In the episode, we discuss how Algorand works, it’s unique value proposition, and some real world applications of this blockchain. We hope you enjoy the episode.
Show Notes:
Algorand: A secure and efficient distributed ledger - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S030439751930091X
Nigeria is creating a digital marketplace to help creators sell their intellectual property rights - https://techcabal.com/2022/05/26/nigeria-intellectual-property-rights/
The Economics of Consensus in Algorand - https://www.mdpi.com/2674-1032/1/2/13
Are Blockchains Decentralized? Unintended Centralities in Distributed Ledgers - https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/citations/AD1172417
Algorand: Scaling Byzantine Agreements for Cryptocurrencies - https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/3132747.3132757
Algorand - https://arxiv.org/abs/1607.01341
Another Look at ALGORAND - https://arxiv.org/abs/1905.04463

Dec 2, 2022 • 1h 8min
Episode 043 - Challenges in Structuring and Scaling Early Cooperatives: A Deep Drive on Seed-Stage Asset+Labor Cooperative Marketplace with Alissa Orlando
In this week’s episode of the Ownership Economy, we brought on Alissa Orlando, a co-founder of the Driver’s Cooperative, to discuss her experience in helping to build the company from the ground up. We go a bit deeper into Alissa’s motivations and expectations in setting up the cooperative and how things played out over the first 18 months. This episode will be highly relevant for entrepreneurs thinking through the benefits and pitfalls of the cooperative model. It will also be of interest to policymakers and innovators that are trying to hone in on where the cooperative model is challenging when the goal is to drive large scale wealth and value creation. We hope you enjoy the episode.

Nov 30, 2022 • 1h 3min
Episode 042 - Social and Economic Dynamics in DAOs: A Conversation with Reka Macy from Guild.xyz
In this episode of the Ownership Economy, Jahed and Martin speak with Reka Macy from Guild.xyz and Agora. The conversation discusses token gating, guilds, and other interesting aspects of DAOs and the future of work. We hope you enjoy the episode.

Nov 18, 2022 • 59min
Episode 041 - The Cosmos Network, Collaborative Finance (Co-Fi), and the Empowerment of Monetary Localism with Cosmos Co-Founder Ethan Buchman
In this episode of the Ownership Economy, Jahed and Martin connect with Ethan Buchman, Co-Founder of Cosmos and Tendermint and current CEO of Informal Systems, a worker-owned cooperative that develops software for Cosmos Network. Ethan walks us through how the architecture of Cosmos is powering a multi-chain, or multiple blockchain, future with interoperability as its core. The discussion then moves to why this architecture will empower a new generation of Collaborative Finance applications that allow communities to deepen relationships, increase internal trade, and remain resilient in global financial downturns through new applications of locally governed money. We hope you enjoy the episode.

Nov 11, 2022 • 53min
Episode 040 - Building a Better OnlyFans: Labor Rights, Empowerment, and the Mintstars Business Model with Jessica Van Meir
In this episode of the Ownership Economy, we speak with Jessica Van Meir, Co-Founder and COO of Mintstars. Mintstars aims to build a more sustainable creator economy that puts creators first. The team is building a platform to combine non-fungible token subscriptions with marketplace resales. Fans subscribe to receive content and the NFT model allows for value to accrue via restrictions on content supply and access. The company is an interesting new model that solves many of the problems with sites such as OnlyFans. Jessica brings her extensive work as a researcher and current doctoral student on labor rights to her viewpoints on product/market fit. We hope you enjoy the episode.
Show notes:
Walter Rodney - How Europe Underdeveloped Africa
SESTA / FOSTA
Emily Ratajkowski sell an NFT of herself
Amouranth abuse allegations
The New Bazaar: The power of glamour on Apple Podcasts

Nov 4, 2022 • 1h 10min
Episode 039 - Building a Stakeholder Co-Owned and Governed Pipeline of Novel Therapeutics: Tyler Golato on Molecule Protocol and Decentralized Science
In this episode of the Ownership Economy, we speak with Molecule Protocol’s Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer Tyler Golato. Molecule is creating collaborative ecosystems, where stakeholders in drug development can work together to expedite the process of bringing novel therapeutics to patients. The company is connecting leading researchers to funding by turning intellectual property and its development into a liquid and easily investable asset. We talk with Tyler about the model, how the company isapproaching progressive decentralization, and where algorithmic rules of governance intersect with the need for human decision making. We hope you enjoy the episode.
Show notes:
An Open Bazaar for Drug Development: Molecule Protocol | by Paul Kohlhaas
https://gov.vitadao.com/t/what-are-working-group-stewards/482
Robert Fine Columbia, cheapest possible cancer interventions
PsyDAO
Goldman Sachs asks in biotech research report: 'Is curing patients a sustainable business model?'
arXiv.org
Endurance : : Shackleton's incredible voyage /
VDP-54.1 Expression of Interest: Pfizer Ventures - Strategic Contributor Proposals - VitaDAO
Decentralized investor communities gain traction in biotech | Nature Biotechnology
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