The Irish Tech News Podcast

What makes a community? And what comes to mind when you see the word, community? A common bond, perhaps — around our mutual love for technology, and a conviction to bring inclusive finance to more in our society. Or perhaps a love of music, craft beer, and human connection. In this episode of One Vision, Theo chats with Lisa Moyle, Chief Strategy Officer and Co-founder VC Innovations / Fintech Talents on the fintech community, and the trends we expect to see in what’s shaping up to be a very busy 2022 in the financial services industry and beyond. There is never a dull moment in the land of fintech.

Alex Mashinsky, the serial US entrepreneur well known for installing broadband on the US subway, once famously declared Bitcoin the slowest database on the planet. It wasn’t until he understood it solved the issue of the digital double spend, that he got interested and when Mashinsky gets interested, he moves fast. The result is a Celsius Network, a crypto platform that has grown 20x in one year. Coupled with his interest in crypto was a singular dislike of how the banking system served its customers, or rather it didn’t. “I’m not alone in this opinion,” he says. “There was a recent survey where people said they’d rather visit the dentist than go sit with their bankers. We all have this visceral reaction.” Right now the banking system is particularly broken. As he points out, people work hard, get paid a salary, lose half it in taxes and then people can’t earn any interest on their remaining money. Indeed in this zero/negative interest climate, their money is devalued on top of which they get charged all sorts of bank and credit card fees. “The system is rigged. For most unaccredited investors you cannot participate in different investments, and you are excluded from value creation. That’s what we set up to change in Celsius. We are the opposite of Wall Street – where insiders get to call retail investors the plankton because they feed on them. For more please tune in Your host is Jillian Godsil, award winning journalist, broadcaster and author. Her latest book can be found at https://persons-of-interest.io/

Caolán is CMO and Head of Community at Waivlength, an Irish startup creating a decentralised social media platform releasing later this year. While still studying Marketing, Innovation & Technology in DCU, he has previous startup experience with Merlin Mask - a project designing a better, cheaper, more sustainable face mask during the COVID-19 pandemic which placed in the top 5 out of 1000 entrants in the XPRIZE Next-Gen Mask Competition. Currently, Caolán is managing the current Waivlength community, all social outreach, and wider strategy surrounding their equity fundraise and Beta sign-up. Technology to Transform Social Networking Through seamless blockchain and cryptocurrency integration, Waivlength adds many features which set it apart from current mainstream channels. There’s a lot of buzz around the Web 3.0 movement and the changes it will bring to the industry, but few people actually know why it began and what it will bring. To understand this, let’s take a look back at its predecessors - Web 1.0 and 2.0. Web 1.0 or ‘World Wide Web’ as it was known, was just a set of static websites with lots of information and no interactive content. Slow dial-up connections for chat rooms and MSN messenger, AltaVista and Ask Jeeves. Then came 2.0. Faster internet speeds paved the way for interactive content. The web wasn’t about observing anymore, it was about participating. New platforms provided users with faster, more reliable, and feature-rich services. The global sharing of information spawned the age of ‘Social Media’. Youtube, Wikipedia, Twitter and Facebook gave voices to the voiceless and a means for like-minded communities to thrive. With the vast increase in internet users and volume of data floating around, big digital corporations soon realized how valuable of an asset personal information is. So began the mass stockpiling of data in centralized servers, with Amazon, Facebook and Twitter the biggest custodians. People sacrificed privacy for the convenience of these services; whether they knew it or not, their identities, browsing habits, searches and online shopping information was sold to the highest bidder. While the Web 2.0 democratized many power structures and created new opportunities, the economic engine is largely privatized and monopolized. Almost all online services are hosted on hardware owned by the “big three” cloud providers, which consist of Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google. Facebook now boasts 2.9 billion users worldwide. Uber and AirBnB have created private networks for public infrastructure which they dominate. The Web 3.0 is the antithesis of this, it’s about multiple profit centers sharing value across an open network. The primary purpose of the Web 3.0 movement isn’t focused on expanding the functionality of the internet. Instead, Web 3.0 is focused on restructuring the way in which the internet is accessed and interacted with. We now have the development of what is described as a human-centred internet.

Refurbished devices such as smartphones are becoming more popular for various reasons. These include buying a smartphone that is as good as new, less CO2 is generated and the money you can save when buying a refurbished smartphone. Ronan talks to Padraig Power, refurbed Market Managing Lead for Ireland about this and more. Padraig talks about his background, what refurbed does, refurbed long term goal, their average customer age, and their biggest selling smartphone last year. Padraig also talks about what’s important to phone users, and where they plant their trees. More about refurbed: Refurbed launched in Ireland in March 2021 and the company has already managed to get a refurbished device into 1% of Irish households. The company’s long-term vision is to get at least one refurbished device into every household in Ireland. Each device undergoes a rigorous 40-step refurbishment process to ensure products are brand new when the customer receives them and refurbed offers a wide range of products from household brands such as Apple, Microsoft, Sony, and Samsung just to name a few. In addition to generating 70% less CO2 compared to the manufacturing of a new device, for every product sold the company plants a tree to offset carbon emissions created during the refurbishing process. On that point, since launching in Ireland, Irish consumers have managed to help plant 20,000 trees.

Pradeep Goel is the Chief Executive Officer of Solve.Care, a global healthcare and blockchain-focused company that redefines care coordination, improves access to care, empowers consumers with information, reduces benefit administration costs, and helps reduce fraud and waste in healthcare around the world. Pradeep has more than 25 years of healthcare experience, developing groundbreaking software for the insurance industry, and co-founding four healthcare IT businesses where he has served in a number of management roles. Jamil Hasan is a crypto and blockchain focused podcast host at the Irish Tech News and spearheads our weekend content “The Crypto Corner” where he interviews founders, entrepreneurs and global thought leaders. Prior to his endeavors into the crypto-verse in July 2017, Jamil built an impressive career as a data, operations, financial, technology and business analyst and manager in Corporate America, including twelve years at American International Group and its related companies. Since entering the crypto universe, Jamil has been an advisor, entrepreneur, investor and author. His books “Blockchain Ethics: A Bridge to Abundance” (2018) and “Re-Generation X” (2020) not only discuss the benefits of blockchain technology, but also capture Jamil’s experience on how he has transitioned from being a loyal yet downsized former corporate employee to a self sovereign individual. With over one hundred podcasts under his belt since he joined our team in February 2021, and with four years of experience both managing his own crypto portfolio and providing crypto guidance and counsel to select clients, Jamil continues to seek opportunities to help others navigate this still nascent industry. Jamil’s primary focus outside of podcast hosting is helping former corporate employees gain the necessary skills and vision to build their own crypto portfolios and create wealth for the long-term.

Unique in its intersection of Indian and global art, culture and technology, EyeMyth Festival explores present and future cases of immersive storytelling and new media. It brings together young creative professionals, artists and performers from India, South Asia & the Global Media Arts space. The 2022 edition of the festival brings together creative professionals from around the world to create an environment of learning, skill building and showcasing with prime examples from Indie gaming and media arts industries. This year brings back the second edition of the Massive Mixer Conference, the centerpiece of the festival programming. With support from various institutional partners, the festival will feature a delegation of experts from the U.K., Switzerland, Russia, China, Sri Lanka and India addressing themes of creative practice, processes, and challenges for media artists through free workshops, talks and showcases. Tejas Nair, co curator and producer of this unique festival explains its origins and how this year it has gone fully viral on the Lemonade.social platform.  Find out more here https://eyemyth.in/ and here  Your host is Jillian Godsil, award wining journalist, broadcaster and author. Her latest book can be found here. 

Richard Carthon is Managing Member of Acacia Digital and Host of Crypto Current. He is on a journey to learn as much as possible about cryptocurrency while educating everyday people so they can have confidence in cryptocurrency investment opportunities. Maybe you invested in one of the various ICOs, mining or other scams that were going on during late 2017/early 2018. Let’s address the elephant in the room: cryptocurrency and blockchain technology is new and unfamiliar to most. How to Identify Early Crypto Opportunities and Build Conviction to Make Life-Changing Profits Several people invested in cryptocurrency without knowing much about the technology that is supporting the various crypto projects that are going on in the space. Knowing this, he began to research and create content, Crypto Current, to educate himself and inform others so that they could begin to make more educated investment decisions in cryptocurrency and blockchain. If you are curious in the space, he welcomes you to connect. Jamil Hasan is a crypto and blockchain focused podcast host at the Irish Tech News and spearheads our weekend content “The Crypto Corner” where he interviews founders, entrepreneurs and global thought leaders. Prior to his endeavors into the crypto-verse in July 2017, Jamil built an impressive career as a data, operations, financial, technology and business analyst and manager in Corporate America, including twelve years at American International Group and its related companies. Since entering the crypto universe, Jamil has been an advisor, entrepreneur, investor and author. His books “Blockchain Ethics: A Bridge to Abundance” (2018) and “Re-Generation X” (2020) not only discuss the benefits of blockchain technology, but also capture Jamil’s experience on how he has transitioned from being a loyal yet downsized former corporate employee to a self sovereign individual. With over one hundred podcasts under his belt since he joined our team in February 2021, and with four years of experience both managing his own crypto portfolio and providing crypto guidance and counsel to select clients, Jamil continues to seek opportunities to help others navigate this still nascent industry. Jamil’s primary focus outside of podcast hosting is helping former corporate employees gain the necessary skills and vision to build their own crypto portfolios and create wealth for the long-term.

Caroline Bowler is CEO of BTC Markets, where 325,000 Australians have traded more than $21bn dollars since 2013.  Formerly Director, Asia-Pacific for Red Flag Consulting. Caroline was the founder of Bowlah PR, the first FinTech PR agency in Asia with offices in Singapore and Melbourne. She has worked in Financial Services since 2004, both in Europe and Asia Pacific. Over her career, Caroline has worked with a variety of financial institutions. These include investment banks, hedge funds, financial technology companies, and financial advisors. This has extended to blockchain and digital asset companies since 2015. Caroline is a board member with Blockchain Australia, representing digital currency exchanges. Follow her tweets at @CaroBowler. Jamil Hasan is a crypto and blockchain focused podcast host at the Irish Tech News and spearheads our weekend content “The Crypto Corner” where he interviews founders, entrepreneurs and global thought leaders. Prior to his endeavors into the crypto-verse in July 2017, Jamil built an impressive career as a data, operations, financial, technology and business analyst and manager in Corporate America, including twelve years at American International Group and its related companies. Since entering the crypto universe, Jamil has been an advisor, entrepreneur, investor and author. His books “Blockchain Ethics: A Bridge to Abundance” (2018) and “Re-Generation X” (2020) not only discuss the benefits of blockchain technology, but also capture Jamil’s experience on how he has transitioned from being a loyal yet downsized former corporate employee to a self sovereign individual. With over one hundred podcasts under his belt since he joined our team in February 2021, and with four years of experience both managing his own crypto portfolio and providing crypto guidance and counsel to select clients, Jamil continues to seek opportunities to help others navigate this still nascent industry. Jamil’s primary focus outside of podcast hosting is helping former corporate employees gain the necessary skills and vision to build their own crypto portfolios and create wealth for the long-term.

Closing the Poverty Gap by Repurposing Blockchain for Good to Help People Participate in the 4th Industrial Revolution Helen Hai Helen is the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) Goodwill Ambassador for Industrialization in Africa. She is heading the Binance Blockchain Charity Foundation with the mandate to use Blockchain for Social Good. Ambassador Hai was named a 2015 Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum, and she is the co-chair of the Global Future Council on the Future of Consumption for the World Economic Forum. Ambassador Hai was named 2017 Wu Fellow by UC Berkeley, Global Visionary by UBS, and she was also featured on the "Ones to Watch" for Bloomberg's 50 People Who Shaped 2018 in Unexpected Ways list. Jamil Hasan is a crypto and blockchain focused podcast host at the Irish Tech News and spearheads our weekend content “The Crypto Corner” where he interviews founders, entrepreneurs and global thought leaders. Prior to his endeavors into the crypto-verse in July 2017, Jamil built an impressive career as a data, operations, financial, technology and business analyst and manager in Corporate America, including twelve years at American International Group and its related companies. Since entering the crypto universe, Jamil has been an advisor, entrepreneur, investor and author. His books “Blockchain Ethics: A Bridge to Abundance” (2018) and “Re-Generation X” (2020) not only discuss the benefits of blockchain technology, but also capture Jamil’s experience on how he has transitioned from being a loyal yet downsized former corporate employee to a self sovereign individual. With over one hundred podcasts under his belt since he joined our team in February 2021, and with four years of experience both managing his own crypto portfolio and providing crypto guidance and counsel to select clients, Jamil continues to seek opportunities to help others navigate this still nascent industry. Jamil’s primary focus outside of podcast hosting is helping former corporate employees gain the necessary skills and vision to build their own crypto portfolios and create wealth for the long-term.

Rene Stefancic is Partnerships Lead at Enjin, where he oversees ecosystem adoption and partnerships. A results-driven professional who thrives at the intersection of product, marketing, IT, and growth, Rene enjoys finding pragmatic and scalable solutions to tough problems and creating long-lasting, fruitful business relationships. His mottos are “swim or drown” and “AB test everything.” Building the Infrastructure for Decentralized Identity within the Metaverse,  Enjin Rene Stefancic Jamil Hasan is a crypto and blockchain focused podcast host at the Irish Tech News and spearheads our weekend content “The Crypto Corner” where he interviews founders, entrepreneurs and global thought leaders. Prior to his endeavors into the crypto-verse in July 2017, Jamil built an impressive career as a data, operations, financial, technology and business analyst and manager in Corporate America, including twelve years at American International Group and its related companies. Since entering the crypto universe, Jamil has been an advisor, entrepreneur, investor and author. His books “Blockchain Ethics: A Bridge to Abundance” (2018) and “Re-Generation X” (2020) not only discuss the benefits of blockchain technology, but also capture Jamil’s experience on how he has transitioned from being a loyal yet downsized former corporate employee to a self sovereign individual. With over one hundred podcasts under his belt since he joined our team in February 2021, and with four years of experience both managing his own crypto portfolio and providing crypto guidance and counsel to select clients, Jamil continues to seek opportunities to help others navigate this still nascent industry. Jamil’s primary focus outside of podcast hosting is helping former corporate employees gain the necessary skills and vision to build their own crypto portfolios and create wealth for the long-term.