WEBVTT - Critical Thinking and Tech Evangelists 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:11.800 --> 0:00:14.280 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.480 --> 0:00:17.520 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio 0:00:17.560 --> 0:00:21.480 and How the Tech Are You? Yesterday? Which was October four, 0:00:21.720 --> 0:00:24.680 two thousand twenty two, for those of you listening from 0:00:24.680 --> 0:00:28.960 the future, I finally got around to watching the Folding 0:00:29.000 --> 0:00:33.760 Ideas YouTube video titled line goes up the problem with 0:00:34.000 --> 0:00:38.120 n f t S and I cannot recommend that video enough. 0:00:38.360 --> 0:00:43.159 It is a phenomenal piece of work, and it's substantial. 0:00:43.320 --> 0:00:45.800 It is longer than two hours. I think it's like 0:00:45.840 --> 0:00:48.839 two hours and eighteen minutes of information about n f 0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:52.760 t S, cryptocurrency, blockchain, There's a bit about Web three 0:00:52.840 --> 0:00:57.840 in there, and more. Host Dan Olson presents a meticulously 0:00:58.000 --> 0:01:01.560 researched and well thought out take down of all of 0:01:01.560 --> 0:01:05.920 these things. And I imagine he could and maybe will 0:01:06.000 --> 0:01:10.240 do something similar with metaverse concepts, which tie in into 0:01:10.280 --> 0:01:12.840 a lot of these concepts as well. And I think 0:01:12.840 --> 0:01:15.640 it's really darn amazing when you consider that his challenge. 0:01:15.760 --> 0:01:18.360 His channel is supposed to be about quote deconstructing the 0:01:18.440 --> 0:01:20.840 craft of visual narrative end quote, and a lot of 0:01:20.840 --> 0:01:23.960 His videos are about things like how editing can make 0:01:24.040 --> 0:01:29.000 or break a movie, and how certain narratives become hopelessly 0:01:29.920 --> 0:01:32.480 muddled because of bad editing, and that sort of stuff. 0:01:33.120 --> 0:01:36.160 UM really interesting to see him branch out into this. 0:01:36.319 --> 0:01:42.560 He's using his incredible ability to put together substantial arguments 0:01:43.120 --> 0:01:49.960 to focus on things beyond narrative storytelling and those those videos, 0:01:50.000 --> 0:01:52.000 by the way, are also great. I've learned a lot 0:01:52.160 --> 0:01:56.240 by watching his videos. Anyway, Dan, I would say, is 0:01:56.280 --> 0:01:59.880 even more opposed to cryptocurrencies and n f t s 0:02:00.320 --> 0:02:03.560 than I am. And if you are a frequent listener 0:02:03.600 --> 0:02:06.760 of tech stuff, you already know that I'm not exactly 0:02:07.440 --> 0:02:11.359 a hype man for n f t S and cryptocurrency. Now, 0:02:11.400 --> 0:02:16.600 I couldn't possibly cover the material more thoroughly than he has, 0:02:16.639 --> 0:02:19.400 so I'm not gonna I'm not gonna go through and 0:02:19.560 --> 0:02:22.880 regurgitate the points he made. He makes them very well, 0:02:22.919 --> 0:02:25.600 and like I said, the video is fantastic. If you 0:02:25.639 --> 0:02:30.720 are at all interested in learning more about cryptocurrencies, blockchain, 0:02:31.120 --> 0:02:33.239 n f t s, all that kind of stuff, it's 0:02:33.240 --> 0:02:35.440 well worth a watch. Line goes up the problem with 0:02:35.560 --> 0:02:37.840 n f t s. So instead, what I want to 0:02:37.840 --> 0:02:41.239 talk about is related, and it's something that he touches 0:02:41.280 --> 0:02:44.880 on in the video, which is critical thinking within the 0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:51.160 context of tech evangelism in general. So let's start off 0:02:51.200 --> 0:02:54.880 with the origin of the word evangelism, because that's the 0:02:54.919 --> 0:02:59.440 tricky one already. It's rooted in religion. Specifically, it's rooted 0:02:59.520 --> 0:03:03.639 in christ Yanity. The concept of evangelism is to spread 0:03:03.840 --> 0:03:06.760 the Gospel, with the end goal of this effort being 0:03:06.800 --> 0:03:11.120 to bring more people into the fold of the religion. Now, 0:03:11.120 --> 0:03:14.720 in more recent times, some folks use the word evangelist 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:19.040 to describe an enthusiast who speaks about or writes about 0:03:19.120 --> 0:03:22.280 or you know whatever. They communicate in some way they're 0:03:22.400 --> 0:03:25.600 chosen focus of devotion and an effort to get more 0:03:25.639 --> 0:03:28.320 people to get into it. So you could be an 0:03:28.320 --> 0:03:32.080 evangelist for lots of different stuff, not just religion, although 0:03:32.120 --> 0:03:35.120 that again is where the word has its origin. You 0:03:35.160 --> 0:03:38.760 could be an evangelist for a sports team and try 0:03:38.760 --> 0:03:42.440 and get more people into watching a sport you like. Now, 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:46.119 to be clear, being an evangelist isn't necessarily a bad thing. 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:51.200 I'm not trying to suggest that being enthusiastic and communicative 0:03:51.240 --> 0:03:53.400 about stuff is a bad thing. If it were I 0:03:53.440 --> 0:03:56.040 wouldn't be a host of a podcast, because that's essentially 0:03:56.040 --> 0:04:00.520 what podcasting is. You could be an evangelist for a cause. 0:04:00.840 --> 0:04:03.000 For example, you could be spending time and effort to 0:04:03.040 --> 0:04:06.440 get more support for a worthy cause, and you might 0:04:06.480 --> 0:04:10.160 believe wholeheartedly in it, and any support you help build 0:04:10.200 --> 0:04:15.040 contributes to that cause. That's a good one. But an 0:04:15.080 --> 0:04:20.839 evangelist can be a bad thing too. But it definitely 0:04:21.040 --> 0:04:25.080 can be a bad thing as well. The tools that 0:04:25.160 --> 0:04:28.400 someone uses to attract people to support a good cause 0:04:28.920 --> 0:04:31.240 are the same tools that can be used to attract 0:04:31.320 --> 0:04:36.840 people to supporting something less altruistic or predatory. Scam artists 0:04:37.000 --> 0:04:42.159 depend upon this. They use an evangelical approach pretty regularly, 0:04:42.240 --> 0:04:46.240 although they frequently target things like people's greed or fear 0:04:46.279 --> 0:04:49.440 in order to do it. And even folks who are 0:04:49.520 --> 0:04:55.520 not scam artists, who might actually believe in something because 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:58.039 of their own investment, may use these tools to get 0:04:58.040 --> 0:05:02.200 other people on board, probably because they've already invested so 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:07.400 much into this particular technology. So crypto is a good 0:05:07.440 --> 0:05:10.600 example of this. Now, I will not go so far 0:05:10.600 --> 0:05:14.320 as to say that crypto is a scam. Dan Olson 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:17.400 might go that far, um and you know, he makes 0:05:17.400 --> 0:05:21.479 a very strong argument, but I would say that cryptocurrency 0:05:21.640 --> 0:05:24.840 is just not a very good system. It's definitely not 0:05:24.960 --> 0:05:29.400 a good system for replacing currency. It does not do 0:05:29.480 --> 0:05:31.880 a good job of that. I think that's pretty clear. 0:05:32.800 --> 0:05:35.320 It's really not that good of a system for building 0:05:35.360 --> 0:05:38.320 wealth unless you were wealthy to begin with, or you 0:05:38.480 --> 0:05:42.320 just happen to get in on the ground floor and 0:05:42.520 --> 0:05:45.839 when there was no expectation for it to go crazy, 0:05:45.960 --> 0:05:47.680 and you just happen to make a ton of money 0:05:47.720 --> 0:05:50.880 that way. But for most people, it's not a good 0:05:50.920 --> 0:05:55.760 way to build wealth. But if you wander into crypto forums, 0:05:56.160 --> 0:05:59.200 you're gonna see a lot of folks championing the philosophy 0:05:59.240 --> 0:06:02.680 of cryptocurrency in general and then debating with one another 0:06:02.760 --> 0:06:05.960 which cryptocurrencies are great and which ones are garbage, And 0:06:06.200 --> 0:06:10.239 boy howdy, there's an awful lot of disagreement on that topic. 0:06:10.279 --> 0:06:14.640 I bet you can guess what the the defining factor is. 0:06:15.560 --> 0:06:19.760 Whichever cryptocurrency you've invested in, that one, gosh darn better 0:06:19.800 --> 0:06:23.279 will be a great one. And that's the thing, right, 0:06:23.320 --> 0:06:29.320 Like a big driver of cryptocurrency value is demand for 0:06:29.400 --> 0:06:33.240 that cryptocurrency. If there's a greater demand for the currency, 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:36.640 then you typically see the currencies price go up. And 0:06:37.240 --> 0:06:40.880 it's a little more complicated and sophisticated than that, but 0:06:41.360 --> 0:06:43.120 that's kind of at the heart of things, at least 0:06:43.120 --> 0:06:48.599 for cryptocurrencies that are not directly tied to some fiat currency. 0:06:48.640 --> 0:06:53.880 So if folks get scared about a cryptocurrency, demand typically 0:06:53.880 --> 0:06:56.240 goes down and the value will go down too, And 0:06:56.279 --> 0:06:57.960 the more scared they get, the more it goes down. 0:06:58.040 --> 0:07:00.440 It becomes kind of a self fulfilling prophecy does this 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:03.200 in both directions, not just when it goes down. So 0:07:04.320 --> 0:07:08.200 let's take a scenario. Okay, let's say that you have 0:07:08.320 --> 0:07:13.400 sunk tens of thousands of dollars your life's savings into 0:07:13.480 --> 0:07:17.280 a particular cryptocurrency. And let's say that you bought into 0:07:17.320 --> 0:07:20.440 this cryptocurrency when each unit of the currency was like 0:07:20.760 --> 0:07:24.720 five bucks, so five real world dollars to one of 0:07:24.760 --> 0:07:29.080 these cryptocurrency units. Now, when this unit first launched, before 0:07:29.120 --> 0:07:32.160 you got into it, its value was that fractions of 0:07:32.160 --> 0:07:37.800 a penny per unit, So if someone got into it initially, 0:07:38.480 --> 0:07:43.080 then they would have seen their investment grow to incredible 0:07:43.120 --> 0:07:45.360 amounts by the time it gets to five dollars. So 0:07:45.400 --> 0:07:48.760 if you had bought it when it first launched, you 0:07:48.800 --> 0:07:52.840 would be wealthy beyond measure, but you didn't. You're in 0:07:52.920 --> 0:07:55.320 now when it got to five dollars, and in fact, 0:07:55.600 --> 0:07:57.800 that was when you bought in. Now we're a little 0:07:57.800 --> 0:08:02.200 further along, and let's say that right now that value 0:08:02.200 --> 0:08:05.400 has actually dropped down to three dollars. Now you hope 0:08:05.440 --> 0:08:08.280 this is just a momentary depth and that the cryptocurrency 0:08:08.320 --> 0:08:11.680 is going to increase in value again, maybe increasing at 0:08:11.720 --> 0:08:15.320 that exponential speed it did when it first got huge, 0:08:15.880 --> 0:08:17.760 but there's no way to really know if that's going 0:08:17.800 --> 0:08:20.640 to happen. Well, you would have a pretty strong incentive 0:08:21.200 --> 0:08:26.360 two talk positively about your investment. For one thing, there's 0:08:26.400 --> 0:08:31.120 the dreaded sunk cost fallacy. This is a tendency to 0:08:31.360 --> 0:08:36.160 stick with a strategy because you've already heavily invested into 0:08:36.360 --> 0:08:39.320 that strategy, and you stick with it even if it 0:08:39.360 --> 0:08:42.839 becomes obvious that if you jump ship you would be 0:08:42.840 --> 0:08:45.960 better off. By the way, while we talk about sunk 0:08:46.080 --> 0:08:50.240 costs a lot in financial matters, I argue that the 0:08:50.280 --> 0:08:53.839 same thing is true with like emotional investment. If you've 0:08:53.880 --> 0:08:57.680 ever been in a relationship, whether it's a romantic relationship 0:08:57.760 --> 0:09:01.760 or a friendship, but you knew, you kind of knew 0:09:01.800 --> 0:09:03.720 you would both be better off if you kind of 0:09:03.760 --> 0:09:07.240 split up. But you've already invested so much emotional capital 0:09:07.280 --> 0:09:09.920 into this relationship that you can't bring yourself to to 0:09:10.160 --> 0:09:15.640 do that. That's very similar. That's essentially the sunk cost fallacy. 0:09:15.760 --> 0:09:19.160 So if you invested tens of thousands of dollars into 0:09:19.200 --> 0:09:23.199 this cryptocurrency and then this cryptocurrency drops in value by 0:09:23.240 --> 0:09:27.480 forty percent, well that means you lost your investment, right, 0:09:27.520 --> 0:09:31.920 Your investment is down, And while you could get out 0:09:32.280 --> 0:09:37.440 with the sixty percent remaining minus any transaction fees, that 0:09:37.520 --> 0:09:39.640 doesn't really feel good, right, It doesn't feel good to 0:09:39.679 --> 0:09:42.679 get out of the system was significantly less money than 0:09:42.720 --> 0:09:46.080 when you went into it, especially when you know that 0:09:46.120 --> 0:09:50.360 folks who jumped into this cryptocurrency wagon before you did 0:09:50.960 --> 0:09:53.160 had made up like bandits. People who bought it when 0:09:53.160 --> 0:09:55.600 it was fractions of a penne per unit, they made 0:09:56.000 --> 0:09:59.480 hundreds of thousands of dollars. Don't you deserve that money too? 0:09:59.480 --> 0:10:02.640 Don't you just served to be a bandit? Huh? Smoky? 0:10:03.760 --> 0:10:08.200 So that's one incentive that you know you have invested 0:10:08.200 --> 0:10:10.880 this money, so you you have an incentive for you 0:10:11.000 --> 0:10:13.200 to stick with it and try and get it to 0:10:13.240 --> 0:10:17.000 turn around. Maybe you actually really believe in this cryptocurrency. 0:10:17.440 --> 0:10:20.640 Maybe it's not just a here's an opportunity, I'm going 0:10:20.679 --> 0:10:22.920 to jump on it, but that you actually believe in 0:10:22.960 --> 0:10:25.520 whatever the cryptocurrency stands for. There are people who do 0:10:25.600 --> 0:10:28.679 that um, but there are a lot more who are 0:10:28.760 --> 0:10:33.400 just kind of opportunistic. So you might start to feel 0:10:33.400 --> 0:10:36.960 sick because you've lost so much money in your investment. 0:10:38.040 --> 0:10:40.560 Maybe you go into the crypto forums and you're really 0:10:40.640 --> 0:10:43.600 cheerleading the currency. You're trying to get other people excited 0:10:43.640 --> 0:10:46.800 about it, and if others do, they might buy into 0:10:46.800 --> 0:10:49.240 the currency, and maybe that will drive out the value, 0:10:49.320 --> 0:10:53.640 which means those lost investment dollars would start to filter back. 0:10:54.320 --> 0:10:57.000 If you could build enough momentum, you might push the 0:10:57.080 --> 0:11:00.160 value further than the five bucks it was at when 0:11:00.160 --> 0:11:02.680 you bought it, and then it's to the moon. Baby, 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:05.520 You'll be rich in no time. But here's the thing. 0:11:06.240 --> 0:11:10.079 This kind of operation is frightening lee similar to scams 0:11:10.080 --> 0:11:14.439 like pyramid schemes or multi level marketing schemes. Now I 0:11:14.800 --> 0:11:17.240 use the word scams, and I use the word schemes, 0:11:17.240 --> 0:11:19.320 because in my mind, that's kind of what they are. 0:11:19.440 --> 0:11:25.520 But MLM businesses, technically, if they're actually selling a real thing, 0:11:26.520 --> 0:11:29.360 are viewed as a legitimate form of business. I just 0:11:29.640 --> 0:11:34.440 find it really similar to scams to the point where 0:11:35.160 --> 0:11:38.199 I'm very uncomfortable by them. Now, if you aren't familiar 0:11:38.240 --> 0:11:41.920 with what mL M schemes are, I'll fill you in. 0:11:42.280 --> 0:11:45.319 So essentially, you make money in one of two ways, 0:11:45.440 --> 0:11:48.160 or in both ways. So one is that you get 0:11:48.200 --> 0:11:52.640 recruited into an mL M. Someone convinces you that you 0:11:52.640 --> 0:11:55.760 should join this business, and then it becomes your job 0:11:55.840 --> 0:11:59.880 to sell something to people. Let's say it's cosmetics, because 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:03.200 a lot of MLM companies are in the cosmetics business. 0:12:03.240 --> 0:12:07.200 So you start to sell cosmetics to folks, maybe mostly 0:12:07.200 --> 0:12:09.240 through word of mouth and like selling it to friends 0:12:09.280 --> 0:12:12.600 and family, and you get a portion of each sale 0:12:12.640 --> 0:12:15.160 you make. Now you might actually have to spend your 0:12:15.160 --> 0:12:19.160 own money to get your supply, though obviously you know 0:12:19.200 --> 0:12:21.520 you're buying supplies at a lower cost than what you 0:12:21.600 --> 0:12:24.920 sell them to to other folks. So that's method number 0:12:24.960 --> 0:12:27.920 one of how to make money. Method number two is 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:31.800 that you recruit other people to join the company. You 0:12:31.960 --> 0:12:36.640 essentially become their sponsor. So you are now sitting upstream 0:12:36.720 --> 0:12:40.680 of those recruits who are downstream from you, and now 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:44.400 you get a little piece of every sale they make. 0:12:44.800 --> 0:12:46.520 When they make a sale to someone else, you get 0:12:46.520 --> 0:12:50.800 a little You get a little portion of that sale. 0:12:51.520 --> 0:12:55.040 Upstream from you is your sponsor, the person who recruited 0:12:55.080 --> 0:12:57.120 you into the MLM. They get a little piece of 0:12:57.160 --> 0:13:00.520 every sale you make. And you do this so on 0:13:00.559 --> 0:13:02.240 and so forth until you get to the very top 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:05.760 of the chain, where a precious few are reaping in 0:13:05.880 --> 0:13:08.240 lots of these little slices of pie from all the 0:13:08.280 --> 0:13:10.760 recruits who are downstream. These are the people who are 0:13:10.760 --> 0:13:13.720 actually getting wealthy off this, because they're getting a cut 0:13:13.760 --> 0:13:18.079 off every transaction, and even if that cut is teeny tiny, 0:13:18.120 --> 0:13:21.720 it adds up as the organization grows, and that means 0:13:21.760 --> 0:13:23.880 for the folks at the very top, there's this huge 0:13:23.880 --> 0:13:27.679 incentive to push for more recruits. Now, you do still 0:13:27.760 --> 0:13:30.720 need to sell stuff, or at least have recruits buying 0:13:30.800 --> 0:13:34.360 supplies from you, otherwise you don't have revenue coming in. 0:13:34.800 --> 0:13:38.199 But the more active people you have in the system, 0:13:38.320 --> 0:13:41.000 the more money you can make. So a huge part 0:13:41.000 --> 0:13:45.160 of your business strategy comes in the form of recruitment strategies. Similarly, 0:13:45.200 --> 0:13:48.079 with crypto folks who have large holdings in the currency 0:13:48.360 --> 0:13:50.920 would love more people to come on board because it 0:13:50.960 --> 0:13:53.400 can boost the value of the individual unit and it 0:13:53.480 --> 0:13:58.560 can make their own substantial investment grow significantly. It's also 0:13:58.720 --> 0:14:04.040 not nearly as easy to extract yourself from a cryptocurrency 0:14:04.120 --> 0:14:07.520 market as you might think. That means that once you 0:14:07.600 --> 0:14:11.040 bought in, you might not feel like getting out is 0:14:11.280 --> 0:14:14.840 a good risk. You might feel like if I get 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:18.000 out now, I'm gonna lose out on future growth. Or 0:14:18.760 --> 0:14:21.960 I might have to spend so much in transaction fees 0:14:22.000 --> 0:14:25.240 that I'm really cutting into whatever profit I made. Or 0:14:26.000 --> 0:14:30.000 with certain cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, the transaction process takes long 0:14:30.160 --> 0:14:34.200 enough that it's possible you'll actually see a significant loss 0:14:34.240 --> 0:14:37.360 of wealth from the moment you start a transaction to 0:14:37.440 --> 0:14:43.040 the moment it finally concludes. Okay, we've got some more 0:14:43.200 --> 0:14:45.440 to talk about when it comes to critical thinking and 0:14:45.440 --> 0:14:58.080 tech evangelism, but first let's take a quick break. All right, 0:14:58.120 --> 0:15:00.280 we're back now. One of the things that you'll here 0:15:00.400 --> 0:15:04.520 in cryptocurrency forums whenever a given cryptocurrency is having a 0:15:04.600 --> 0:15:07.040 rough go of it is you'll have a group of 0:15:07.080 --> 0:15:10.200 folks telling everyone to hoddle or h o d l 0:15:10.360 --> 0:15:14.440 or hold on for dear life. Essentially, what they are 0:15:14.440 --> 0:15:19.120 saying is, hey, don't dump your coins now, just hunker down. 0:15:19.720 --> 0:15:23.240 You can wait this out. Things will be fine, they'll 0:15:23.240 --> 0:15:26.840 get better and then to the moon. And that sounds 0:15:26.840 --> 0:15:30.640 like good advice, right, but it's really reinforcing that sunk 0:15:30.760 --> 0:15:34.520 cost fallacy. There's no guarantee that things will get better. 0:15:34.760 --> 0:15:37.440 Maybe they will, maybe they'll get better than they've ever 0:15:37.480 --> 0:15:40.080 been before. We've seen that with Bitcoin several times where 0:15:40.560 --> 0:15:45.400 the value grew too incredible heights crashed and then grew 0:15:45.400 --> 0:15:48.320 even more. Um if it does that again, then that 0:15:48.320 --> 0:15:51.960 means we're gonna see bitcoin go over sixty dollars per 0:15:52.080 --> 0:15:56.440 unit if it repeats that cycle. The problem is there's 0:15:56.440 --> 0:16:00.840 no guarantee that cycle will repeat. There's nothing inherent about 0:16:00.840 --> 0:16:06.040 cryptocurrency that makes it reliable for this sort of cycle. 0:16:06.600 --> 0:16:11.400 It could happen, but maybe it won't, and so that 0:16:11.560 --> 0:16:15.680 sunk cost fallacy really starts to weigh on you. A 0:16:15.680 --> 0:16:18.280 lot of people will give this advice because they have 0:16:18.400 --> 0:16:22.000 their own significant investment in that virtual coin, so they 0:16:22.000 --> 0:16:24.600 don't want to see people jumping ship, because every time 0:16:24.640 --> 0:16:28.120 that happens, there's the potential for the coin's value to 0:16:28.200 --> 0:16:32.400 decline even further that would hurt their own investment, So 0:16:32.680 --> 0:16:36.120 they have an incentive to keep people on that currency 0:16:36.200 --> 0:16:40.400 and try to convince more people to join in. They 0:16:41.040 --> 0:16:46.000 there's also the phrase by the depth, meaning when cryptocurrencies 0:16:46.080 --> 0:16:49.680 go low, that's when people should be buying more because 0:16:49.720 --> 0:16:52.400 that's when they're going to see the biggest return when 0:16:52.440 --> 0:16:57.360 the cryptocurrency recovers its value. If it recovers its value, 0:16:57.680 --> 0:17:01.240 then yeah, sure, if it covers its value, and it 0:17:01.280 --> 0:17:02.960 may be that you know, again, you bought it at 0:17:03.000 --> 0:17:06.919 five dollars, it's now at three dollars, so you're telling people, hey, 0:17:06.920 --> 0:17:09.560 by now because it's gonna go up. You're kind of 0:17:09.600 --> 0:17:12.360 trying to create a self fulfilling prophecy to make that happen. 0:17:13.240 --> 0:17:15.399 So my point here is it's always good advice to 0:17:15.440 --> 0:17:21.280 think critically about tech evangelist claims. And I know I've 0:17:21.280 --> 0:17:24.440 picked on cryptocurrency a lot so far in this episode, 0:17:24.440 --> 0:17:28.159 but it's really true for pretty much all technologies, particularly 0:17:28.200 --> 0:17:31.320 ones that are early on in the hype cycle. That 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:33.760 might be the metaverse. In fact, I would say the 0:17:33.800 --> 0:17:35.879 better verse is a really good one to think critically about. 0:17:36.840 --> 0:17:39.479 VR A R. Both of those are good to think 0:17:39.520 --> 0:17:42.679 critically about. I'm not saying they're bad technologies, but that 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:47.080 you have to critically evaluate claims about the technologies. The 0:17:47.160 --> 0:17:49.720 same is true for A I or really any given 0:17:49.800 --> 0:17:54.240 tech product. Now, I am not saying that tech is 0:17:54.280 --> 0:17:57.919 worthless or anything close to that. I'm saying that you 0:17:57.960 --> 0:18:03.320 need to examine the motivations of tech evangelists to understand 0:18:03.880 --> 0:18:09.000 where they're coming from, what is incentivizing them to evangelize 0:18:09.000 --> 0:18:12.600 this particular technology, and to keep that in mind when 0:18:12.600 --> 0:18:16.000 you start to evaluate their claims. It may turn out 0:18:16.040 --> 0:18:19.840 that their claims are perfectly valid, but it may turn 0:18:19.840 --> 0:18:25.000 out that they're somewhat biased or really biased. So if 0:18:25.040 --> 0:18:27.920 someone comes up to you and says, hey, the mataverse 0:18:28.000 --> 0:18:30.960 is gonna be huge, look at how many companies are 0:18:31.040 --> 0:18:34.159 getting into the metaverse. Well, that's true. There are a 0:18:34.160 --> 0:18:37.600 ton of companies that are all trying to get into 0:18:38.119 --> 0:18:41.399 something related to the metaverse. But you might want to 0:18:41.400 --> 0:18:45.439 ask questions like, how is the person who's telling you this, 0:18:45.560 --> 0:18:48.960 how are they connected to the metaverse, what is their 0:18:49.119 --> 0:18:53.600 investment in it? Maybe they're just an enthusiast, so it's 0:18:53.600 --> 0:18:56.720 an emotional investment, it's not a financial investment. And it 0:18:56.800 --> 0:18:58.480 might just be that this is a person who's been 0:18:58.480 --> 0:19:01.359 swept up in a lot of height. Honestly, that's very 0:19:01.440 --> 0:19:04.159 easy to have happened. I've had it happened to me 0:19:04.560 --> 0:19:07.440 lots of times. I am not immune to it. I 0:19:07.800 --> 0:19:10.639 think I'm getting slightly better at recognizing it early on 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:15.280 and then adjusting expectations, but I'm not perfect by any means. 0:19:16.359 --> 0:19:20.040 Or maybe it's that this person runs a virtual real 0:19:20.160 --> 0:19:22.520 estate business and they're kind of hoping you're gonna PLoP 0:19:22.560 --> 0:19:26.360 down some real world cash to buy some virtual plots 0:19:26.400 --> 0:19:29.760 of land that may or may not ever be connected 0:19:29.760 --> 0:19:33.520 to a notable virtual landscape in the metaverse. Assuming we 0:19:33.800 --> 0:19:39.760 ever get something like that, then you know, maybe it 0:19:39.800 --> 0:19:42.600 would pay off in the long run, but there's no guarantee. 0:19:43.200 --> 0:19:47.000 And again, like we're still in a space where metaverse 0:19:47.000 --> 0:19:52.000 doesn't actually mean anything yet. There's too many conflicting ideas 0:19:52.040 --> 0:19:57.479 and definitions and approaches, so buying into something specific right 0:19:57.520 --> 0:20:02.960 now is really taking a long shot. Like, if you're 0:20:02.960 --> 0:20:06.240 gonna do that, you might as well just be ready 0:20:06.280 --> 0:20:09.120 to say goodbye to that money. Maybe it pays off, 0:20:09.280 --> 0:20:13.160 which would be fantastic, but there's a real good chance 0:20:13.240 --> 0:20:16.040 it won't. So just like if you go into a 0:20:16.119 --> 0:20:20.479 casino where the house always wins in the end, you 0:20:20.520 --> 0:20:22.159 need to just sit there and say, all right, this 0:20:22.200 --> 0:20:25.359 is money I am comfortable losing. I am not going 0:20:25.440 --> 0:20:28.919 to suffer if this money is gone forever. I might 0:20:28.960 --> 0:20:31.840 as well just assume that it is gone forever, and 0:20:32.200 --> 0:20:36.480 if it turns out otherwise, that will be a huge bonus. 0:20:38.080 --> 0:20:42.200 Or maybe a tech evangelist might out a particularly interesting 0:20:42.280 --> 0:20:45.840 aspect of a technology, but they might fail to mention 0:20:46.320 --> 0:20:49.040 the whole story, or maybe they don't even know the 0:20:49.040 --> 0:20:52.159 whole story. So for this I'm gonna touch on something 0:20:52.200 --> 0:20:54.960 that Dan Olsen talks about in that video I mentioned 0:20:54.960 --> 0:20:57.199 at the top of the episode. So with n f 0:20:57.240 --> 0:21:00.359 T S, one of the benefits you'll hear of. This 0:21:00.440 --> 0:21:04.000 is a benefit that's often marketed towards artists, is that 0:21:04.119 --> 0:21:07.359 the person who meants and n f T, which again 0:21:07.400 --> 0:21:10.480 stands for non fungible token, the person who ments a 0:21:10.560 --> 0:21:16.440 token can get a piece of every future transaction involving 0:21:16.480 --> 0:21:19.199 that n f T. So let's say you are an 0:21:19.280 --> 0:21:23.280 artist and you create a work of digital art, and 0:21:23.400 --> 0:21:26.879 you meant an n f T to represent this piece 0:21:27.040 --> 0:21:31.399 of art um which by the way, exists independently of 0:21:31.440 --> 0:21:34.399 the n f T. The n f T itself isn't 0:21:34.440 --> 0:21:38.320 the art. It's a smart contract that represents the ownership 0:21:38.560 --> 0:21:41.639 of that art, and by ownership I mean of that 0:21:41.760 --> 0:21:47.720 instance of that art. It gets really granular. So you 0:21:47.840 --> 0:21:51.040 sell this n f T to someone for ten whole dollars, 0:21:51.080 --> 0:21:53.880 they now have a token that says they own that 0:21:54.000 --> 0:21:59.480 instance of your digital art. Good. But then let's say 0:21:59.480 --> 0:22:02.440 that there is this this crazy n f T boom, Right, 0:22:02.560 --> 0:22:05.359 people just go nuts speculating on n f T s. 0:22:05.880 --> 0:22:08.280 You've already sold your n f T for ten dollars. 0:22:08.800 --> 0:22:12.240 The person you sold that too then goes on and 0:22:12.560 --> 0:22:15.080 resells that n f T, but they sell it for 0:22:15.160 --> 0:22:18.600 ten thousand dollars. In the real world, if this were 0:22:18.640 --> 0:22:20.399 to happen, if you were an artist and you sold 0:22:20.400 --> 0:22:22.760 your painting for ten bucks, and then later on the 0:22:22.800 --> 0:22:25.040 person you sold it to were was able to offload 0:22:25.040 --> 0:22:28.359 it for ten grand, you probably wouldn't see any of 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:31.480 that money, right, because you already sold the painting. You're 0:22:31.520 --> 0:22:33.240 you're out of luck. Now, the best you can hope 0:22:33.240 --> 0:22:35.720 for is that there would be a jump and interest 0:22:35.800 --> 0:22:38.720 in your work, and that future sales that you would 0:22:38.720 --> 0:22:42.520 make wouldn't met you more revenue. But with certain n 0:22:42.560 --> 0:22:47.080 f T market places, like whichever marketplace you initially meant 0:22:47.200 --> 0:22:51.200 the n f T n the creator can get a portion, 0:22:51.359 --> 0:22:54.760 a royalty, as it were, of each future sale of 0:22:54.880 --> 0:22:59.000 that token. So let's say you sell your n f 0:22:59.000 --> 0:23:02.920 T to buyer one. Buyer one sells to buyer two, 0:23:03.240 --> 0:23:06.879 and some of that sales price will actually go to you, 0:23:07.240 --> 0:23:09.399 the person who minted the token in the first place. 0:23:09.880 --> 0:23:12.720 Buyer two sells the same n f T to buyer three, 0:23:12.840 --> 0:23:16.800 and again you who minted the token, gets a little 0:23:16.880 --> 0:23:20.920 cut of that. It's ongoing passive revenue, which is the dream. 0:23:21.119 --> 0:23:25.080 You hear about that a lot online. Ways of creating 0:23:25.160 --> 0:23:28.800 ongoing passive revenue. That, by the way, that's a that's 0:23:28.800 --> 0:23:32.840 a phrase that should always raise red flags and prompt 0:23:32.880 --> 0:23:36.399 you to think critically about what is being sold to you. 0:23:36.880 --> 0:23:41.639 But that's another topic for another time. Here's the thing 0:23:41.680 --> 0:23:43.520 about the n f T model, because I mean that 0:23:43.640 --> 0:23:45.879 is true, Like if you if you have this in 0:23:45.960 --> 0:23:49.600 this marketplace, yeah, you can you can keep on getting 0:23:49.640 --> 0:23:53.760 little cuts of each sale, except it only applies to 0:23:53.800 --> 0:23:56.480 whichever n f T marketplace you minted the token in 0:23:57.520 --> 0:24:00.639 the royalty system isn't built into the n f T 0:24:00.840 --> 0:24:04.560 s themselves. It's built into the marketplaces where the n 0:24:04.600 --> 0:24:08.000 f T s are bought and sold. So nothing stops 0:24:08.119 --> 0:24:11.040 somewhere from taking an n f T out of one 0:24:11.080 --> 0:24:15.399 marketplace and then putting it up for sale into another marketplace. 0:24:15.520 --> 0:24:18.960 So if buyer one purchases the n f T for 0:24:19.040 --> 0:24:21.760 ten bucks from you, but then they move the n 0:24:21.800 --> 0:24:24.639 f T to a different marketplace and they sell it 0:24:24.680 --> 0:24:27.200 for ten thousan dollars, well then you're not getting any 0:24:27.240 --> 0:24:31.120 passive revenue because it's no longer on the marketplace where 0:24:31.119 --> 0:24:34.880 you minted it. And the royalty system doesn't work across 0:24:34.960 --> 0:24:39.040 marketplaces yet. I say yet, because it potentially could in 0:24:39.040 --> 0:24:44.480