The Blockchain Socialist

For this interview I spoke to Julio Linares (@Julio_Linares_) an Economic Anthropologist studied under David Graeber at the LSE, Social Outreach at the Basic Income Org, and Research & Community for CirclesUBI (@CirclesUBI). CirclesUBI is a project seeking to provide people a universal basic income using the xDAI ethereum sidechain based on mutual credit. You may have heard about CirclesUBI a while back when they first came out and everyone in cryptocurrency social media spaces was spamming their CirclesUBI profile to be trusted by three people in order to get access to their UBI.During the interview we talk about Julio's ideas around how we can implement democratic money, how it relates to other anti-capitalist and anti-state movements like the Kurdish movement in Syria, and how a lot of influential European  thinkers were inspired by Indigenous cultures suffering under colonialism. We also talk about his experience working at CirclesUBI, what it was like to see the project go viral with most people misunderstanding how it was supposed to work, and the lessons he suggests future "left-wing" blockchain projects.SourcesJulio's work on Ecology of CareJulio's work on Degrowth MoneyIf you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.

For this episode I spoke to Chris D'Costa (@cjdcosta), the founder of Totem Live Accounting (@totem_live_). Totem is building a real-time global accounting ledger built on the Polkadot blockchain to compete against traditional accounting and ERP software. I thought it was interesting to hear how blockchain could potentially be used to develop alternatives to the bureaucratic free market world of ERP systems that run global flows of information and consequently commodities.During the episode, I first talk about how ERP technology companies are centralized planners abusing their position, how I think ERP systems are related to the infamous socialist calculation debate, and why the idea that our economy is not planned today is false. Afterwards I speak to Chris on how Totem works, why they chose Polkadot for the blockchain, and how it could be used to build cooperatives.If you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.

***This is just a teaser. Check out the full episode on Patreon***The patreon democratic economic planning council has spoken. With a choice between discussing NFTs and the left’s reaction against centralization vs decentralizataion, the former has won. Some have speculated that the topic of centralization was too spicy for the council as they didn’t want to butt heads with the anarchists. It seems they’d rather suffer through another my hot take on NFTs. What could I possibly say that hasn’t already been said in the deluge of hot takes that have polluted our social media feeds? Well frankly I don’t know but I’m gonna try.In this episode I go through some of the hot takes from the left I've seen and heard, explain what I think they're getting wrong on the issue, and provide a couple alternative potential uses of NFTs. The work of previous guests on the show, Jon Beller of ECSA and Ruth Catlow of Furtherfield make appearances as well to support my arguments.More on NFTsJon Beller Article - "Fascism on the Blockchain? The Work of Art in the Age of NFTs"Interdependence episode: NFTs for n00bsMy interview with Ruth CatlowSome of the TweetsChelsea Manning tweet Lee Carter tweet Yanis Varoufakis tweet Everest Pipkin ArticleIf you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.

This week's episode is dedicated to the crypto influencers. For the first half I give a crash course on the history and some of the more well known influencers and for the second half I have an interview with Tom Gillespie (@TomPeterGill), former currency trader on the Perth stock exchange turned TV investigator and filmmaker for the upcoming documentary "The Fakefluencer" coming out in April 2021. The movie investigates a crypto influencer by the name of BitMan360 and creator of the ScooterCoin cryptocurrency which rewards people for doing scooter tricks. Sound ridiculous and unbelievable? Well than I highly recommend getting in on the conspiracy. During the interview I give a Marxist take on Bitconnect and one of the brief crypto influencers of the project during the two years it existed, Carlos Matos (yes, the BIITTCONNNNEEEEEEEEEECTT guy), I mention some of the currently existing crypto influencers out there and the classes they fit in, and I talk to Tom about his new documentary, "The Fakefluencer," and question whether this is something unique to crypto, but instead a symptom of capitalism.More about the Fakefluencer movieFree ticket: https://www.thefakefluencer.com/freeticket Website: https://www.thefakefluencer.com/ Discord: https://discord.gg/xPuXV3Bitjoin Studios: https://www.bitjoinstudios.com/ Follow the crew on social media: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thefakefluencerfilm/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thefakefluencerfilm/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/thefakefluencerIf you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.

For this week's episode I spoke to Dr. Emaline Friedman (@emalinus4). She is  a network activist for the Commons Engine, part of Holochain, a social critic and theorist, has a PhD in psychology, a writer for Mad In America, a researcher at GCAS, and author of the recent book Internet Addiction: A Critical Psychology of Users. During the interview we talk about her research for her new book around moral panic about the internet, how that is closely linked to data sovereignty, and how it all brought her to working with Holochain and the Commons Engine. Emaline believes that we can remedy issues in mental health through participatory, p2p, and commons-oriented technologies and end up addressing a lot of the left/progressive agenda at the same time.SourcesEmaline's SiteSolidarity ClubCommons EngineHolochainIf you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.

For this week's interview I spoke with Mike Watson (@_leftaesthetics),  co-host of The Acid Left and author of “Towards a Conceptual Militancy” and “Can the Left Learn to Meme: Lessons for the cultural left, from cat memes to gaming, to Stranger Things, and more.” with an upcoming book “The Memeing of Mark Fisher: How the Frankfurt School Foresaw Capitalist Realism and What to do About It” coming out this September.During the episode we discuss Mike's research on the history of memes in art, his thoughts on how the Left can improve their memeing over the internet,  and the memetic strategies used in crypto that essentially function to hide what is actually happening with crypto investments. At the end we discuss a couple of specific memes which you can find on the page for this episode on the TBS site.SourcesMike Watson's siteArticle on commodity fetishism: "Commodity Fetishism, Feet Pics, and Ideology" Towards a Conceptual Militancy Can the Left Learn to Meme: Lessons for the cultural left, from cat memes to gaming, to Stranger Things, and more.If you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.

This is a teaser of a patreon exclusive episode. As a patron you have the ability to vote on the topic / question of a monthly patreon exclusive podcast. For this month the question most voted on was "What is the relationship of blockchain and the evolution of capitalism?".Get the full version on Patreon.If you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.

For this week's interview I spoke with Ruth Catlow,  Artistic Director at Furtherfield (@furtherfield), a not-for-profit international community hub for arts, technology and social change founded with Marc Garrett in London, in 1996. Co-editor of Artists Re:Thinking the Blockchain ,Director of DECAL (Decentralised Arts Lab), a Furtherfield initiative which exists to mobilise research and development by leading artists, using blockchain and web 3.0 technologies for fairer, more dynamic and connected cultural ecologies and economies. During the interview we spoke about  how art has evolved with technology over the previous decades especially with the rise of the internet,  Furtherfield's history with digital art in the early internet,  their recent artistic experiments with blockchain, and Ruth's thoughts on the rise of NFTs. SourcesFurtherfield SiteDAOWO (Decentralised Autonomous Organisation With Others)- The blockchain laboratory and debate series for reinventing the arts DECAL - The Decentralised Arts Lab Culture StakeIf you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.

For this week's interview I spoke with Matt Cropp (@MattCropp), a Co-Director of the Vermont Employee Ownership Center, where he works on public education, outreach, and the conversion of businesses to employee ownership for ownership succession. Matt has a really interesting profile in that he was involved in bitcoin during the early years and actually used it during the Occupy Wall Street protests for mutual aid.During the interview we spoke about his involvement with earning and using bitcoin during Occupy Wall Street, his explanation of the political makeup of the bitcoin community during those days, and how he imagines coops could benefit from the use of blockchain / crypto in the future.SourcesSocial.coop Mastodon InstanceMatt Cropp's MastodonThe Blockchain Socialist MastodonMatt Cropp's Credit Union History Blog with some musings on early bitcoin Grassroots Economic Organizing CoopIf you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.

For this week's interview I spoke with Jay Smith (@jaynemesis) one of the top earning traders on eToro, a social trading platform where people can “copy” the trades of traders and a percentage of the money they earn goes to them. What’s interesting about Jay is that while doing this he’s also openly left wing as he’s a Green Party voter in the UK, a social democrat, a vegan, and owes a bit of his success to trading cryptocurrencies since 2013. During the interview we spoke about how he became a trader given his political beliefs and working class background, his thoughts on how the cryptocurrency space has evolved since he first started trading them, and whether there is anything that he thinks the left can learn from his experience. I feel like I don’t even have to tell you all what’s going since you probably all know, but it looks like people across the political spectrum are banding together to buy GameStop stock to make a hedge fund go bankrupt as revenge for the financial crash of 2008. Unfortunately the interview was recorded before all the craziness started so I didn’t get to ask Jay’s thoughts, but you can find some his thoughts on his twitter here.If you’re joining in on the fun, keep in mind what’s going on is not some sort of revolution and is largely a battle between different segments of the bourgeoisie with some lucky working class people sprinkled throughout. However, if you really believe that buying stock in GameStop, AMC, etc. is some sort of signal for the distaste of Wall Street, then you can’t say that buying cryptocurrencies isn’t either. (Not investment advice.)If you liked the podcast be sure to give it a review on your preferred podcast platform. If you want to see more content like this, please consider donating to my Patreon starting at just $3 per month. At the moment I’ve spent more on this project than I’ve ever made so any amount helps. Also, sign up for the Newsletter, follow me on Twitter (@TBSocialist), and join the r/CryptoLeftists subreddit to continue the discussion and give your thoughts.Send me your questions or comments about the show and I'll read them out sometime. Support the showICYMI I've written a book about, no surprise, blockchains through a left political framework! The title is Blockchain Radicals: How Capitalism Ruined Crypto and How to Fix It and is being published through Repeater Books, the publishing house started by Mark Fisher who’s work influenced me a lot in my thinking. The book is officially published and you use this linktree to find where you can purchase the book based on your region / country.