EP12: Web3, AI and Bitcoin with Nadja Bester Co-founder of AdLunam Inc

Join the vanguard of digital transformation as Nadja Bester, co-founder of AdLunam, walks us through the AI-driven evolution of Web3. We're not just talking about the future; we're living it, as Nadja recounts her exhilarating experiences from the Token 2049 event in Dubai, a city that mirrored the unpredictable climate of technology with its own surprise rainstorms. As we navigate through the bustling corridors of business development, we can't help but marvel at the powerful tide of AI tools such as ChatGPT. Yet, blockchain remains a mysterious treasure chest, waiting for its moment to truly shine in mainstream society. This episode is a masterclass on the societal shifts ushered in by these titans of tech, with AI leading the charge.

Amidst the fervor of innovation, we tread carefully, analyzing the investment terrain of Web3 and AI. Heeding the lessons from historical tech bubbles, we remain buoyant with optimism, while conscientiously addressing the concerns surrounding AI centralization and self-sovereignty in our digital existence. With Nadja's insight, we dissect the state of decentralization in Web3, and why it's paramount to balance the power dynamics in the technological ecosystem. From the chilly crypto winter to a thaw of judicious investments, this episode unravels the peculiar fundraising paradox of Web3, and the speculative yet potentially fruitful trends of tokens like those on Solana.

The digital landscape is ever-evolving, and so is our identity within it. We probe the construction of our digital personas across social platforms, questioning the constraints of legacy networks and the burgeoning promise of decentralized futures. With Nadja's expertise, we delve into the challenges faced by platforms like Facebook's Threads and the vibrant potential of digital sovereignty through decentralized identities. It's not just about managing multiple online selves; it's about embracing the right to do so with autonomy and security. Education is the beacon guiding us towards a unified understanding of Web3, with diverse "aha" moments illuminating the path. This episode is a clarion call for a connected, yet independent digital existence where our sovereignty is not just a concept, but a lived reality.


About Nadja Bester:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/nadjabester/

AdLunam
https://www.linkedin.com/company/adlunaminc/

Chapters

• 0:00 Exploring AI Impact on Web3
• 15:04 Investment Outlook in Web3 and AI
• 27:50 Digital Identity and Social Media Evolution
• 34:21 Digital Self-Sovereignty and Education

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Yeah, I mean, I think this is such a beautiful question and such a beautiful topic because you can go so deep with this. However, for the sake of time, I'm going to try and keep it as superficial as possible, while I mean still touching on very core themes. So you know, I often think about this. I'm a student of psychology, I'm a student of sociology. That's also my educational background and it's also the lens at which I look at the world. So there's so many examples of how freedoms have been taken away from us. You know, it's like the frog that slowly gets boiled.

Speaker 2: 0:41

Welcome to Tech Travels hosted by the seasoned tech enthusiast and industry expert, steve Woodard. With over 25 years of experience and a track record of collaborating with the brightest minds in technology, steve is your seasoned guide through the ever-evolving world of innovation. Join us as we embark on an insightful journey, exploring the past, present and future of tech under Steve's expert guidance.

Speaker 3: 1:10

Welcome back, fellow travelers. In today's episode we're talking about the influence of AI on Web3 and blockchain technology. We're also going to explore the topic around the ethical implications on society. Today we have the honor of hosting a true industry pioneer in Web3 and blockchain Nadia Bester. She is the co-founder of AdLunum. She's a pioneer in the Web3 investment world that offers the first gamified ecosystem for blockchain investments. She's also award-winning entrepreneur, investor, international speaker, and her talents also extend into authoring and also the host of a successful podcast, the Future of NFTs. She's also exploring an anticipated Netflix documentary on the evolution of the digital self and the future of the internet. Please join us as we welcome Nadia to the show. Nadia, we're thrilled to have you. Welcome to the show.

Speaker 1: 2:00

Thank you, steve. And yeah, just as I was saying to you before we got started, I love the name of the podcast, so it feels like a badge of honor to be here today, to be combining the two great loves of my life.

Speaker 3: 2:14

Wonderful. We're so very happy to have you here, so catch us up on your travels here. I know the audience is very eager to hear a word, that he's eager to dive into topics here, but I want to kind of dive into. You were just recently at Token 2049 in Dubai. It's basically the premier crypto event, drawing upon some of the most prominent leaders and founders from across the global Web3 ecosystem. So tell us a little bit about this conference and really kind of what were some of the highlights of the talk?

Speaker 1: 2:41

So, honestly, the highlights had nothing to do with the actual conference. There were a lot of side events. I think there were over, if I'm not mistaken, 300 side events listed, and this is always the case with these kind of events. You know, token 2049 in Singapore is the same thing it draws the crowd to the actual conference, but then there's all these side effects happening in the periphery.

Speaker 1: 3:03

Unfortunately, when Token 2049 came to Dubai for the first time this year, it also may be brought with it or maybe it happened to coincide the biggest rainfall in the history of the United Arab Emirates, so I did not get to experience Token 2049, so I could not comment on the actual talks. I can, however, tell you all about my escapades being stranded at my hotel that became an island with a moat around it. So, yeah, it was very interesting, and how business development got done in the lobbies of hotels, when people were sheltering from the rain together and, you know, walking knee deep streets, and so it was a very interesting experience and I think this will probably go down as one of those historical events. And walking knee-deep streets. So it was a very interesting experience and I think this will probably go down as one of those historical events. The fact is, even people who released an NFT collection the token 2049 survivor badge in your wallet. So there you go.

Speaker 3: 3:59

It's incredible. So tell us a little bit. So it sounds like there is a lot happening in this space Again, you know we see Token 2049, there was AI Summit 2024, you gave a talk on beyond algorithms, the deeper impacts of AI in a global society. Let's start there. Let's start with the influence and kind of what we're seeing in terms of the deeper impacts of AI in the global society. So what are we kind of now starting to see across this landscape?

Speaker 1: 4:26

deeper impacts of AI in the global society. So what are we kind of now starting to see across this landscape? You know so I have been in blockchain since 2017. And in that time, the adoption rate I'm talking the average person, my cab driver, my aunt, my friend who is a nursery school teacher that adoption rate really hasn't grown. It hasn't extended to the average person. What has extended is people kind of now accept that Bitcoin is an asset class and that's here to stay and you know they might dip a toe and buy some Bitcoin, and that's kind of the extent.

Speaker 1: 5:02

Ai, on the other hand, since the release of Chajubiti, I mean it has seen the most explosive growth of anything that I have experienced in my lifetime. Now, again, I'm referring to my cab driver, my aunt, you know, my nursery school friend, teacher friend. So these people, if you ask them what is the impact of Web3 on society, I mean either they will have no idea what you're talking about or they will very likely be not very complimentary, because you know the concept of Web3, blockchain has become crypto and crypto is this crazy space of wild gains and insane losses. Crazy space of wild gains and insane losses. However, those same people are the ones using ChagPT or any of the AI suite of products that have come up, even just being built on the same model as OpenAI or using the OpenAI model. So certainly in terms of immediate impact, in terms of immediate impact, there's a massive, massive difference between the two. However, I think what we are seeing and this is something that makes me very positive I came into the blockchain space for the concept of self-sovereignty and for data ownership and data privacy, but you realize very quickly that most people, the average person, they don't really care about it. If you try to explain to someone that whatever you post on Facebook under open-to-the-world settings, they'll say well, I've got nothing to hide. Now I don't have anything to hide either. However, I don't want to become any more of a social media product than I already am. So I think, with different levels of understanding, it's very, very tricky to explain to someone what the use case is for blockchain beyond the 100x gains that you can see from whatever shitcoin is pumping at the moment. But we can very easily have conversations with the average person about AI the positive aspects of AI, of course, but also the risks, the challenges, so deepfakes. It's a very pertinent example If there's a hack on the blockchain, let's say, a company's funds, their wallet was drained. It's not something that affects the average person. They really don't care about it. However, when a president of a country, the video is circulating on social media and it turns out to not be true, everyone gets chilled in their bones.

Speaker 1: 7:45

So I think the thing that's happening right now is, whereas blockchain has been steadily growing all these years I can't speak for pre-2017, but certainly since the time that I've been full-time in this industry there are scores of people working really, really hard to make sure that this is a safe space. You know that it's as self-regulated as can be. Of course, you have the opposite as well. You have the actors really making use of the fact that it isn't, but I think at some point, these two conversations need to start merging, because now you talk about deep fakes. Okay, how can you prove that this is not a deep fake? And that's really where blockchain comes in, because with blockchain, I can prove the provenance of something, and I think never before has it been more pertinent to prove information to be true, but to start from the assumption that it's false, and so I think this is a massive shift in human consciousness, even where we come from a history of illiteracy, and the only people who knew anything because they were the only ones who could read were the priests in the Middle Ages in Europe, for example.

Speaker 1: 8:56

And now fast forward to today, where there's never been more access to information ever. However, with great power comes great responsibility. Information ever. However, you know, with great power comes great responsibility. And so now, if you look at any number of information and content pieces out there some of them we already know okay, if you're on social media, it means you are the product. If you are buying a book, it means they want to or, let's say, a course, they want to sell you a book. If you want to buy a book, you want to sell you a course. There's always a price to pay. The problem now is that AI is questioning what reality means, and so now seeing is no longer believing. So, really, what AI is saying is okay, reality is now up for grabs. Anyone can define what reality is, because a picture of a thousand words is now. You know which I generate, created that picture, whereas blockchain really continues to be this very fastidious technology.

Speaker 3: 9:53

That, okay, yes, this information originates there and this is the movement that it's taken since that origin, whenever that was it's interesting that you mentioned that kind of the average person doesn't really you know and you talk about the concept around. You know digital self-sovereignty and things like that. And then you mentioned you know, to hardcore techies and for people who really kind of understand the Web3 and AI and blockchain, they get it, they understand that it's a fundamental shift, kind of shifting the power back to the individual user and kind of digital self-sovereignty over their own data. When you say the average person doesn't really care about that, is it just simply they just are okay with the big tech companies kind of having their data, or is it they just kind of just lack the insight as to kind of really what digital self-sovereignty means?

Speaker 1: 10:39

Yeah, I mean, I think this is such a beautiful question and such a beautiful topic because you can go so deep with this. However, for the sake of time, I'm going to try and keep it as superficial as possible, while I mean still touching on very core themes. So, you know, I often think about this. I'm a student of psychology, I'm a student of sociology. That's also my educational background and it's also the lens at which I look at the world. So there's so many examples of how freedoms have been taken away from us. You know, it's like the frog that slowly gets boiled from cold water all the way to okay. Now can't even jump out anymore, I'm just dead.

Speaker 1: 11:23

And there's so many of our systems that have become that. So, for example, education, the education system. I worked in education. I ended up homeschooling and then unschooling and world schooling my son because I didn't agree with what those systems were. Teaching childhood I was responsible. Now, in the same vein, I had to really understand the education system. By working in the education system, I was a great student, even though I didn't like school. I had no issues with it. But only when my son had learning disabilities and I was already working in the system that I realized oh my God, there's no way you know. It's in or out, and if we're in, we're not going to get the support we need.

Speaker 1: 12:05

And so I think it's the same way, or the same thing, at least, with these very high level concepts, the average person doesn't have the ability to worry about data privacy. If they're trying to make ends meet, right Like so, that's where the primary focus is for them. Now, you know, there's this, there's this saying it's a rich man's problem. So not to say that only people with money have the ability or the freedom to worry about their privacy. But you do, in many cases, have to free up a certain amount of mental space in order to say you know, it's like Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

Speaker 1: 12:44

If I'm focused on basic needs, okay, it's probably not going to matter what Facebook does to my data. However, when I get to the point where I have time to sit back and go, hey man, why am I telling you my whole life? What are you giving me in return? So I think for most people, they don't have to think about it. I work in this field. I think about it professionally, every single day of my life, whenever I pick up the phone. I'm super aware of my actions, even though I can't stop myself because I'm as addicted as anybody else, but I keep on reinforcing to myself over and over again that this is something that, yes, I am willingly doing. However, I'm giving up so much of the values that otherwise I hold, but in order to participate on these platforms, I have to temporarily suspend how much value I give those or importance I give those values.

Speaker 3: 13:36

Yeah, I completely agree, and you know the concept of you know, look, I'm trying to, I'm trying to work on my basic needs and basic survival. I can't, I can't think outside of that, outside of that prism. It's very difficult. But if we were to kind of maybe kind of take our listeners on this journey, kind of helping them kind of understand and help them kind of expand their horizons a little bit, what does it look like when we say you know digital self-sovereignty and the power of the users and shifting this back to the users and you know users being able to retain control over their, over their uh, kind of a digital identity? It seems like that's very contrarian to kind of how the tech companies right now are kind of set up.

Speaker 3: 14:15

It seems like when we talk about blockchain, the fundamental philosophy is blockchain is a decentralized technology. Ai seems to become more and more centralized every single day in the hands of you know very few. You start to see more adoption and incorporation into the large language models, into the bigger companies like the Amazons, the Googles, the Facebooks, the Microsofts, and it seems like there's less and less of that becoming, and I was recently kind of talking with somebody on this topic and they said well, none of that really matters, because really the thing that does that they won't be able to capture is the ability to reason, and I didn't really understand that From where you're seeing, from your adventures, and what you're seeing across the technology landscape here is do you see your concerns around this as well, around decentralization and then AI being more consolidated or centralized?

Speaker 1: 15:04

Yeah. So first let me start off by saying so mostly what I see in a professional context is at the investment level. So that means it's really really early. You know, seed funding round, when I mean there's no institutional investors on board yet, all the way up to the retail, but again, web3 retail, which is a very different funding environment from, you know, the traditional tech or even traditional business funding landscape. So I think what we are seeing is a lot of people being very excited about the possibilities, of what's possible. But we could have said the same thing about the dot-com bubble and we could have said you know, it's the same is true in Web3 and the same is true in AI and the same will be true in, I don't know, special computing or whatever comes next. So investment is a super optimistic part of any industry, and especially tech investment and especially Web3 investment, which is the riskiest. So I can say from that aspect, there is a lot of confidence that these two technologies are going to be able to, you know, really facilitate each other in bringing out the best in one another. That, from an investment perspective.

Speaker 1: 16:30

As a human, I am very concerned, in the sense that I've been concerned for a long time that people don't take the concept of self-sovereignty seriously, which is a big thing for me. And now, with AI, there's a whole list of things that need to be taken seriously. Well, I mean, if we've told people so many times before that you know, watch out for this and don't do that and don't go in that dark corner, at some point they stop listening. And I think the sensationalism of the media on pretty much any topic in existence, we burnt out from anything. That's a warning sign or a danger or we just don't want to listen anymore.

Speaker 1: 17:15

And so the decentralized or decentralization spirit of Web3, it's also important to realize that what decentralization means theoretically is quite different from how it looks in Web3. Currently, bitcoin is true decentralization. There's not much else in Web3 that's as decentralized. So, yes, it's more decentralized, but it still, in many cases, goes through the hands of very few people who may or may not be qualified to make those decisions.

Speaker 1: 17:50

And I think, similarly, ai we'd like to believe that these big companies, because I mean, it's easier to compete in a Web3 context, it's very easy for there to be market competition. It's not as easy with AI because of the cost, the massive cost involved. And so, yes, clearly, ai is going to be very decentralized. Ai is going to be very decentralized. Now the question is, if Web3 is this, you know light in the darkness again, how much do we self-regulate to ensure that we stay as decentralized as possible to balance out the AI? I mean, that depends if the glass is half full or half empty for you, how you look at it, because you know it is an open question. So let's see.

Speaker 3: 18:41

Yeah, a friend of mine once put it. He says it's not that the glass is half empty or half empty for you how you look at it, because you know it is an open question. So let's see, yeah, a friend of mine once put it, he says it's not that the glass is half empty or half full, it's that the glass is the wrong size. And I thought that was really interesting because I have used that for probably I don't know how many years. But again, uh, I you know it's it's funny because you know you're right, it's like it's half empty or half full.

Speaker 3: 18:57

You know, talk to me a little bit about kind of what you're seeing kind of from again, from the kind of the crypto aspect of it here I know you mentioned about six months ago you were on the ABC Conclave and that you mentioned. We're kind of in the crypto winter and we started to kind of see kind of the halving moment coming up or kind of already past having moment. You know, it seems like bitcoin is right down right around 64 000 today or whatever. Are we still in a crypto winter? What's your outlook so far?

Speaker 1: 19:22

uh. So again, I'm going to give an outlook based on the investment side of things. Um, we are certainly no longer in a winter. We are not quite in as in a spring just yet. Uh, and I think the next few months are going to be really crucial in determining kind of which direction the wind is going to blow, both in terms of how much things are going to pick up as well as what narrative we are going to leave with 2021. It was nfts, for example, I think before that it was d5, so let's see what this new narrative is. That's going to DeFi, so let's see what this new narrative is that's going to really bring, to quote that song bring all the boys to the yard. Let's see. That's going to be quite interesting.

Speaker 1: 20:06

However, I think what I find very noticeable this time around is there's a lot of investment ready to be deployed. There's a lot of investment ready to be deployed, but VCs certainly are a lot more careful. Again, I'm generalizing. I always make the distinction the less utility your project has and the more anonymous you are, the easier it will be to raise money. However, the top end projects, who are doxed to show their real identities they are the ones who have to jump through the hoops. It's just one of those paradoxes in Web3. But so certainly with the Solana meme coin trend that we've been seeing, I mean there's been a lot of movement, but that's obviously purely speculative. Now there are VCs who invest into speculative tokens and make their quick gains and what I think will happen is a lot of these gains will then get redeployed into more serious, more long term projects Because, keep in mind, everyone kind of got really crushed and burned at the end of the last cycle.

Speaker 1: 21:15

So this winter has been really long, it's been really difficult. However, on the other hand, you know, on the other hand, for us, for example, as a company, whether or not we're in a winter or a spring or a summer doesn't really matter, because we keep on keeping on, we keep on building. And what I think also is very noticeable is, uh, when vcs now look at the criteria, I mean these criteria always influx, uh, and it also it always is in a state of ever more sophisticated slash, mature, because, keep in mind, web 3 investment when it started was insanely unregulated and more and more best practices from the traditional finance world are being brought into web three. So, these criteria, aspects that VCs look at. One of them in this cycle is certainly where were these founders during the bear market? What were they doing? Were they building, even if they weren't receiving investment? Did they just pop out out of nowhere, which of course, we know is going to happen more and more? And in fact, that's another measuring stick of seeing, kind of how healthy the market is. You know the and greed index, uh is how many new projects just appear out of nowhere.

Speaker 1: 22:38

But certainly I think vcs this time around are more careful. Uh, instead of you giving them a sketch on a napkin and saying, hey, here's my great idea, and then they offer you, you know, a million dollars, and I mean this is like completely normal in web 3 during a bull market. Right, that is the most normal behavior. However, I'm not sure we're gonna carry as much of that normality into the cycle, because I think people have now started to understand uh, there's a there, there's a cost analysis.

Speaker 1: 23:15

Uh, up until now, the potential gains outweighed the risks in terms of these guys can just run off with the money. They can fail and genuinely even attempt to build what they promised they would when they raised that money. I think it's very, very, very proportionately in favor of founders who just gave money and then end up doing anything. So I really think that VCs have learned their lesson. So I do think we'll see a slightly more measured industry, but I say slightly because the craziness always kicks in when we see those charts going sky high and suddenly Bitcoin is at 100K and then everyone wants to buy, and then it drops to 90 and then everyone sells, you know. So that's unfortunately the nature of the beast.

Speaker 3: 24:10

The real winners in the game is basically people who kind of ride out the winters and even through the bear markets, is that they still kind of like hold on for dear life, right? So the concept of HODL From a retail investment perspective, I think and maybe you kind of confirm this, as you know, I think if they were to look at it, I think, from a Web3 perspective, they've got to look at it from an infrastructure and protocol perspective. Right, those two have got to be there to really kind of increase that adoption curve you mentioned. Vcs are much more cautious now in looking in terms of where they're going to invest their money. Are they looking into these two particular aspects of infrastructure and protocols and saying, hey, listen, if you don't have these, you're not going to get the VC money? How are you seeing this progressing?

Speaker 1: 24:54

So, certainly over the bear market, I think there was a lot more investment into infra than you would see in a bull market, in the sense that in a bull, whatever is sexy is what gets chased. And you know, infra protocols are typically protocols maybe not so much, because I mean creating a layer one or a layer two. I mean there's big money in it. So people tend to be seen to have their eyes and ears open, but I think infrastructure projects there have been investment into them. But I think bear markets are always a time to get as many retail investors on board as possible. This is, you know, just how this whole thing has been set up. In order for us to change it, we would basically have to redefine what the entire thing means, and so it's something where, if you don't like it, you learn to live with it, and if you like it, well, I guess you're doing it already, so you don't need to have any words from me.

Speaker 1: 25:52

But in a bear market, because there's so much retail money that is eager to be deployed, vcs tend to skew in favor of what's going to be hot and sexy and give them the most gains possible, because keep in mind a Web2 VC or traditional VC, the amount of time before they see a return on investment is many, many years, more than in Web3, where you start seeing returns after only a couple of months.

Speaker 1: 26:23

So clearly, if you deploy money to a project, you want that project to pump as much as possible, and pumping means liquidity, which means retail investors. So I think, think, yes, uh, we will continue to see this, uh, this investment into infra. But also, I think that is another thing that might differentiate one vc from another pc, because not all vcs are operated equally. Uh, so some vcs would not touch infra projects because, I mean, that's not where the shorter money is for them. But then there are other VCs who have a different vision and understand that in order to build those hot projects, we need to have, you know, the foundation of the house, otherwise it's a glass house built on nothing.

Speaker 3: 27:09

I'd love to get your take on these. What are one or two things that you're really keeping an eye out for as you continue to move into this space?

Speaker 1: 27:20

So I think the two things that definitely stand out for me is socialify, on the one hand, and the reason for this is we all know that web2 social is broken and if you think that I'm making that statement because I'm generalizing, think about the platform that you use the most and think on a scale of one to 10, are you closer to 10? I love it, or are you closer to one? I absolutely hate it? Why the hell am I still here? So I think that's for most of us, we have this experience where we get extract certain things from these platforms, whether this is to connect with family on Facebook, friends on Instagram, colleagues on LinkedIn, twitter with you know people who like cats and I don't know agriculture or whatever. So we have these different identities for different platforms. However and this is where the data privacy and the data ownership also comes in because Twitter might decide one day that they will now delete your account because you said something that, according to them, you know you shouldn't have said. Now, this might be true or it might not be true, because, guess what, when Twitter or any of these platforms decide that it's the end of your account, there's nothing you can do, whether or not. They are accurate or not. So I mean, that's the first thing. You have content creators whose entire businesses and careers are built on these social media platforms, but that can all disappear with one fell swoop. So I think that social media is really, really ripe for an overall and has been for a long time. However, the reason that we don't have an alternative is, again, we don't know what we're missing, I guess, but also because there's no great solutions just yet.

Speaker 1: 29:13

You have Forkasted, for example, which is quite a popular Web3 social network, but then, I mean, it's really tiny amount of users on there still and it's really complex. If you don't understand Web3, there's no way you would ever find yourself there. You have Threads from. Facebook had a great strategy to migrate all Instagram users to Threads, so suddenly you have all these followers on Threads. The question is, is anybody on there? Who's on there? I still can't figure out what my. I know what my LinkedIn is for, I know what my well, in fact, all my social media are pretty much the same, but I can't figure out what to use threads. So that's facebook's product. I mean, it should have been the most popular product out there because, well, facebook, instagram, whatsapp, uh, you have blue sky twitter alternative, so you have all these examples of platforms that can be but isn't uh, and so I think this is an area for Web3 to kind of come into its own, although I think we're very early days and I'm not sure we're going to see an alternative competitor come out just yet.

Speaker 1: 30:24

And then the other thing, which is larger and encompasses social high, is decentralized identity, and I think this is probably going to be one of the hottest topics Again, in the sense now you're talking about data ownership, data privacy, but what is data? So if you download my Facebook profile data, you're going to be an accurate reflection of me, but it's a reflection of my identity on that platform and this is the identity that I wanted to shape on that platform, which is why it represents me in a certain way. However, maybe I want to take that person with me, maybe I want to take the Facebook me to LinkedIn. I can't do that because I need to create a new persona on LinkedIn. Maybe it's the same characteristics and whatnot as the Facebook me, but it's a new persona altogether and keep in mind that can take it away from me at any given moment.

Speaker 1: 31:26

Now, with decentralized identity, let's say, my identity in the form of an NFT, the NFT gating mechanism so I enter, as a website or a platform based on the fact that my wallet has this NFT, and then I can be any number of identities linked to any number of NFTs. Now, this is actually something that we at Adluna are working on, so it's a topic that's absolutely fascinating, because you start looking at why does identity exist? And it exists for different things, for different people. So, for example, if I want to express myself, I want to express myself because of who I am, or I might express myself because I want others to think I am, or I want to express myself so that I can be the person that I want people to think I am, or the person that people think I should. There's so many combinations here and Web2 platforms. Whether this is any service-level website, I don't know. I go to a website to download graphics and I sign in with Google right now. Web2 platforms whether this is any service level website, I don't know. I go to a website to download graphics and I sign in with Google right now. Or whether it's a social media platform all of these different platforms.

Speaker 1: 32:48

I am the same me, but currently, I have to split the same me into several very logistics-based identities passwords, emails, blah, blah, blah.

Speaker 1: 33:00

What if I am the same me but I can split me off into different NFTs, for example?

Speaker 1: 33:06

So there's the LinkedIn NFT me, who is super professional and everything that is linked to my name is out there in public. And there's the LinkedIn NFT me, who is super professional and everything that is linked to my name, you know, is out there in public. And there's the plant lady me, which my son just came in the room earlier and says it looks like a jungle in here, and I think he meant it as a criticism and I was like I know, isn't it wonderful? So there's that lady, and maybe I don't want that lady to be public, right, but I want to be out there. Maybe I don't want that lady to be public, right, but I want to be out there. I want to create and build and express my crazy plant lady identity, but not link to my LinkedIn me. So people should have the ability to grow different identities and then for those identities to be interoperable between different platforms. This is like a digital human right, according to me. Again, I realize that not everyone feels the same, but that's why I'm here championing for decentralized digital identity.

Speaker 3: 34:04

And it's incredible I love this idea and I want to call you a technology virtuoso the way that you're able to paint this picture and I think we begin the conversation with kind of like what is AI's implication on?

Speaker 3: 34:15

You know the ethical and kind of the society impacts? I think you just basically, I think you just drove this home. It is the ability for individuals to maintain sovereignty over their self, to be able to share different parts of themselves in different ways while maintaining uniformity and centralization of their own digital self. It's like it's your own digital identity that has got a secure digital encryption, encrypted signature that you don't have to share with anyone else. Like, no one else has that ability Facebook and all the other platforms. They can kind of take your data, download it. Maybe they create some sort of deep fake around it and maybe this is kind of the next thing where people kind of get that next aha moment is I want to be able to protect myself in the next iteration of the Web3 evolution by first being able to have digital sovereign rights over my own identity, and maybe that's kind of where it begins for everyone is kind of a wow moment, right.

Speaker 1: 35:09

I wish that everyone would have that aha moment and have that be their entry. And I've come to terms with the fact because I'm a very I'm someone who takes a very philosophical approach and you know that can sometimes be an Achilles heel, because then I go. Well, I mean, I don't understand why people are making this decision. That's clearly not in line with you know, the way that the things are supposed to happen in order to affect this big change, but then again, everyone doesn't get my memo. So I think people come into this for different reasons and I think a lot of that again has to do with, like a Maslow's hierarchy. I think I might have lost you.

Speaker 1: 35:47

I think a lot of this again has to do with a bit of Maslow's hierarchy of needs approach, in the sense that a lot of people, and specifically in countries where the economy is not as strong, the average person's origin story, why they came into this technology, would be profit driven. My friend invested in X and I saw they made money and I wanted to give it a go as well. And you know however many iterations of the story later, here I am I'm building something in web3, um, or investing in web3, uh. And then you get people who, as I said earlier, might have you know an hour to sit on an eames lounge chair and smoke a cigar and think about the meaning of life, and then those people might say, well, hey, this is not how I like things to go. Like you know, I have my own rights, and why should I? So I think there's so many different people on the spectrum. I don't think that the by the way, the cigar smoking games last year person is going to be as libertarian as I just made that out to be, um. So you know, there's so many different entry points into this and I think it clicks differently for everybody, and I really wish that it would click with self-sovereignty. I'm like the person at the doorstep going like ding dong, do you still remember me? But it's fine if people don't, because I think at some point there's some aspect of this that clicks for somebody, um, and what it clicks for me is not necessarily what's going to click for you and vice versa. So I think the most important thing is the conversations around it, and that's something that during the bear market I mean.

Speaker 1: 37:28

So at luna, we were heavily focused on education and we didn't feel education in the sense that, yes, all these retail investors are out there hungry to learn more. They just crashed and burned. They want nothing to do with Web3. And to start these conversations because we have to be out there going guys, there's more to this technology than just you making a bunch of money and losing a bunch of money, and so what I've seen over the last few years is, even just with the educational aspect you can talk about.

Speaker 1: 38:05

So on my show, the Future of NFTs, I mean we cover NFTs, but from the perspective of what can this technology be in future? So it's a very long ranging vision for the technology. And I mean, if you look at the comments of different people, different audience members, some of it, I wouldn't have expected that that's something that would click for this person or for people in general, because for me it might be something that's so obvious that I might not even consider it like an entry point at all. And then you listen to someone and that's their aha moment. So I think the more we talk about it and the more we talk about why it's important to us, because maybe you don't feel like me, but by me telling you how I feel about it and why I feel about it.

Speaker 1: 38:51

That feel about it and why I feel about it, the way it's going to spark conversations in your mind and that might lead conversations with others. And I think you know this slow roll out of waking upness that we have to do, um, it's not very scalable. It feels like. So you know, if I had my way, I would be like okay, guys, we're going to have like a five-year plan and this is what we're going to do, but but unfortunately, it's all organic and we have to. You know, people have to go through the journey and the cycle of life and understand that certain points that they are alternatives to what they think is out there.

Speaker 3: 39:28

It seems like everyone's going to have kind of that moment where they're going to eventually kind of we're all going to come to the same place, maybe some earlier than others, but at some point in time the outlook is very optimistic. We all will eventually start to kind of get on the direction of being able to look at this all with the same perspective and the same prescriptive lens. So this is kind of the positive kind of aspect of one that kind of I want to start a curve is into kind of a closure is is that this is a positive moment. So, from from a technologist perspective, it seems like continual conversations, learning and education around this particular space, helping illuminate folks around this technology and what it means for them, from the advanced levels all the way down to, you know, the normal day, every person looking to say, look, I just want to get online and just do my thing. There needs to be kind of a continual push in this space for conversations and education to kind of get everyone there right.

Speaker 1: 40:27

Yeah, and I would add, get your hands dirty. You cannot learn, you know. I want to tell you a story, uh, because it's actually super funny. When I started working in this industry, um, I had just, uh, finished the stint in the pharmaceutical industry. Well, digital marketing, so it was at least the cool side of pharma, but I mean it's pharma, so that was the only cool side.

Speaker 1: 40:51

And so I started traveling and then got this opportunity to become a journalist, which was like a non-career goal, so I jumped on the charts only to find out oh, it's about blockchain, and I have no idea what blockchain is, so I started learning about it. I mean, I come across Bitcoin in 2012, but I remember thinking, once it becomes idiot proof to someone like me, I will get into it. So, clearly, it took a long time. So you can imagine, here I am in 2017 reading about all these aspects decentralization what the heck is this? I mean, I don't even understand what this means. Yeah, I understand the concept of owning yourself. I feel the same, but I didn't know there was a technology that supported it. But now I have to start learning about the technology and I have zero idea what any of this stuff is, and I remember I was actually on an island in Thailand and I had a notepad. It was like cool digital nomad view overlooking the ocean and I have my notepad. It was like cool digital nomad view overlooking the ocean and I have my notepad and I'm like what is blockchain? And I'm making notes. I don't understand a single thing. I'm reading.

Speaker 1: 41:59

And then the job was to become a journalist and so now I'm researching for the articles that I'm writing and so now I'm not researching what is a blockchain. I kind of have an idea, maybe not super quite, but I mean kind of get it. But the more I research for work because it was very real to me, very pertinent to me, very directly relevant to me, the more I understood it. So I always think back to that me sitting by the books like a student, going like I'm going to get this. Don't ever try to learn anything that way unless you're in school. Like really, I mean and this is why I don't even support the education system so if you want to learn about AI, if you want to learn about blockchain, if you want to learn about any sort of technology, get your hands dirty. Don't see it as a big scary thing, because the only thing that it's going to become, if you see it that way, is a big scary thing. So it's treated, you know, how kids? Uh, you give a two-year-old the remote, they're gonna figure out how to turn on and off the tv probably more on than off. Uh, if you give a 60 year old the remote, they probably won't even attempt to turn off or on the TV, right? So try and recapture. If you've lost it and I think most of us have lost it so this is a great opportunity to regain it, recapture that childhood sense of play and wonder and, you know, have fun. Experiment. I mean, if you have the money to.

Speaker 1: 43:34

I'm going to use NFTs as an example. If you want to understand NFTs, if you have the funds to create an NFT collection for no other reason than to create the collection, do it. You will understand NFTs in a way you've never understood them or never would have before. If you don't have the funds to do these things, get involved. There are so many places to get involved, so many people are dying for people to help them. So really don't learn here. Here happens when here happens. So really, just that's the only piece of advice I can give you. The more daunting something is, the more it's likely that you need to get started with it, like yesterday.

Speaker 3: 44:16

Yeah, and that's incredible. I love that analogy and I think for most of our listeners listening on the podcast, I think Nadia was saying learn with your hands, by getting hands-on dirty, versus just kind of thinking through the things right. So it's continually like hands-on practice. Become a practitioner, learn and evolve your knowledge and awareness into the technology. Wow, incredible insights. Nadia, I can't thank you enough for this opportunity. Thank you for joining us on the podcast today. Where can we follow you to get more information and where can we follow you in your amazing journey yet to come?

Speaker 1: 44:49

yeah, first of all, steve, thank you so much. It's been just so lovely speaking to you. It's the end of my day here, but it was definitely a highlight of the day. So I am most typically on LinkedIn. I'm definitely just a boring B2B person, but if you like the kind of things that I was talking about now, this is typically the thing that I would post about on LinkedIn. I'm also on Twitter, on Instagram, but really there's not too much happening there. I try to maintain somewhat of a balance between social media and real life. So I'm looking forward for web three social media so I can again be on social media 24 seven and I'm just kidding like this little bit of work-life balance I got going. So if you want to be in touch, definitely LinkedIn would be the best place. Yeah, linkedin endorsement.

Speaker 3: 45:41

Wonderful Again. Thank you so very much, Nadia, for sharing your insights. You are a true luminary, and thank you so very much for sharing your passion and insights with us. Our audience is so well-informed because of this conversation. Thank you so very much and for those listening, thanks for tuning in. I appreciate it. Nadia, You're wonderful. Thank you so much. We hope to have you on again.

Speaker 1: 46:00

Have an amazing week everybody. Steve, thank you, it's been a privilege Speak to you soon. Cheers.

Speaker 2: 46:08

Thanks so much for listening to the Tech Travels Podcast with Steve Woodard. Please tune in next time and be sure to follow us and subscribe on the Apple Podcast and Spotify platforms. We'll see you next time.