Ep: 234 - Boys Club Live: Show Me Your Stack Launch, AI Psychosis Summit, Elon vs. Altman Trial, Rich Auntie, Shake Social App, Co-hosts Quasimatt and Julia Rosenberg, special guest Tiago Sada (Tools For Humanity, World)

[00:29] Here's this week's show. [00:31] you [00:33] Quasi-quasi-matte. [00:36] Yes. Famous on the internet. All of the above. I always say famous on the internet because to me, that's who you are. You've really been into the neighborhood of nomad. [00:43] Oh, yeah. Recently. Yeah, I've been loving Flatiron and Nomad, which I like to refer to as Flatiron slash Nomad. Yes. And I've been going there a lot. I've been noticing a lot of interesting activity around Madison Square Park. I've been eating at a Jewish deli called S&P as well. Okay. And just exploring what it has to offer, you know, just taking a stroll down Broadway and stuff like that.

And I recommend it to anyone. New York is always consistently revealing itself in new ways and fashions. Literally. I've been loving the updates from you. [01:13] - It's a slatter and bath house. [01:16] I have never actually been there. I know. I don't see you as a bathhouse person. Yeah. This is like a cultural reference point though. I think it could be good for you. True. Yeah. [01:25] yeah and like that's i feel like that's a lot of people's intro to flat iron maybe or perhaps like the flat iron building as well i think probably that no i know i feel like tech people like that really is they have this fixation like i feel like i know people who are at the intersection of like tech and raving and for some reason they're like also obsessed with going to the bath house like i don't know this is um i have i'm so consistently invited to [01:47] Hangouts.

[01:49] professional hangouts at bathhouses. - Oh, thank you. Yeah. - And it's... - I'm allergic to those. - I know that you are. - I'm morally opposed to those. I'm like 50/50. It really depends on who, whomst is. [02:01] homestead inviting right could you like maybe describe the type of person that you really wouldn't want to be invited by i think that could be interesting um i just feel like um it's there's like no i'm not gonna say it because all the people who i've you get a party full from quasi no i often go i i like a bathhouse moment um but it definitely like i'm checking the [02:28] - RSVPs before attending to that type of thing.

- Oh, totally. Okay, then Julia Rosenberg is here, also known as Jules. - Jules. - Like Cher, a one-word name. - It really doesn't flow the same. It's Julia Rosenberg. [02:41] or jewels. [02:42] Yeah, Jules Rosenberg, you said the other day, and I said, don't do that. I don't know. In my head, I didn't say chocolate. Thank you so much for raising the service today. Oh, but she has been a friend of the pod, friend of the boys, a boy at this point, and is launching... [02:58] Show me your stack.

And we're going to talk about that today. A Boys Club Network show brought to you by Vercel. And we're going to get into like what that is. And you can watch today. And there's a little bit of a watch party for it as well. So stay tuned. [03:11] because it's going to happen at the end of the episode. [03:14] if all goes well technically. - Yeah. No, technically, we're feeling very confident about it. Yeah, totally. Always. And also, it's just gonna be fun to hang no matter what. Okay. So, I would like to thank [03:26] the lovely partners that allowed this show to exist in the world.

Octant, Polygon, and Vercel all are wonderful companies that are partners here with Boys Club. I'm going to talk about Octant. And what I love about having both of you here today is that you guys do the other. [03:45] ad reads yeah that's why we're here ultimately ultimately that's what's going on um and i but the weight of the world is being alleviated off it really is one one like uh ad read at a time but i do love octon and i'm excited to tell the world about them today um our supporting sponsor octon is well known in ethereum circles for its tireless contributions to the ethereum ecosystem through research and millions of dollars in grants and publics [04:11] public good funding.

In 2026, they are in their product era. Octant previously launched DeFi Vaults, which enables orgs and communities to build sustainable funding systems through their yield generating products. They're also opened up funding participation to the wider Ethereum community. [04:30] Help decide which impactful projects in Ethereum should get funded through using your ETH to help allocate a big pool of matching funds by participating in their EPOC-12 projects. [04:41] uh next month yield funding impactful projects is a good sustainable model for our industry [04:47] Be sure to check out at Octon app to help.

[04:50] to keep up with all of the latest funding announcements. And don't forget to lock ETH to help allocate over 300 ETH to projects such as Protocol Guild, Tor Project, and Revoke to name a few. So Octant app is where you can follow them. Lots of great stuff coming through there. We've talked a lot about them and they're doing some really cool stuff. And the team is really awesome. So there is a... [05:13] link in the chat and you can learn more there. Okay. So, um, what are we going to do next here?

I think that what we should do next, I really wanted to talk about the Elon and Sam Altman trial that started on Tuesday. A lot of juicy stuff happening there. Um, but I can just say, I'm disappointed that you're not. [05:33] out there live reporting as you were with us honestly huge miss huge mess i do think it's a close it's not a it's not a criminal trial okay no one's going to jail yeah immediately jail unfortunately that's not happening to either of them that would be really well then who what are why are we talking about it if no one's going to be lower at this point um so you're saying the only way to get in the room is to have [05:53] made an offense.

[05:55] Um, no, I think it's a civil trial. I do think, uh, press is in the house, in the room, certain press, approved press, but it's not like the one here at the Southern district of New York for SPF was open. So you could, anybody could go, you could have gone and hung out with me there if you wanted. Um, but I do think maybe a press pass could have been acquired for the Sam Altman and, uh, [06:20] Elon Musk won. And man, would I have thrived. Thrived. Daily updates. Oh my gosh.

I would have done little sketches. Little sketches too. She's an artist. Anyway, I don't really have enough time to talk about it, unfortunately. Maybe later in the app. We are going to talk about Show Me Your Stack because... [06:37] that's a little bit of a big topic today. So Jules, [06:43] Let me tell, let me tell what my experience of showing your sack was. So Jules and I are very good friends and we both work in tech, uh, [06:55] Unfortunately. - - Um, and... Anyway, you called me a few months ago, and you were like, "I've really been thinking about this show concept, where I interview cool people about their technical stack."

I remember where I was. I was outside my dry cleaner, and it was kind of raining, but I really wanted to talk to you anyway, so I stayed out there, and I was just like, "I really need to go in." But I can't be on the phone. [07:15] In a public place. Wildly inappropriate. Yeah. In the dry cleaner. Yeah, absolutely not. That's so rude. That's a sacred space. Exactly. So I was just like waiting it out. Anyway, you told me about the show concept and you were talking about it just like, [07:26] in idea and like sort of like putting some of the pieces together.

And I was like, well, what if you do it with Boys Club? And you were like, I didn't even know that was an option. And I was like, now it is. Now it is. [07:37] And that was the origin story. But tell us about what's going on with Show Me Your Stack. I'm so excited. [07:42] um it's been the opportunity of a lifetime to work with the boys hard hands [07:48] Um, [07:51] But basically the show concept started where I was, I recently moved to San Francisco. [07:56] become even more tech by the day.

I did go on my first cycling ride recently. So we're losing the plot officially. Wow. We got a wow. But you're gaining a new one. So it's aligning, I would say. Exactly. So I've just decided to triple down on this persona. Perfect. [08:12] And [08:13] fortunately we are tech girls um but i would hang out with my tech friends uh in the fall and i'm like very used to hanging out with the developers like very technical personas like i came from the world of crypto i'm not technical by trade but i very much understand you can hang yeah for sure like i founded a startup and we eventually pivoted into developer tooling so like [08:40] I feel that I can talk about the command line interface.

Can I get [08:44] - In the CLI? - In the CLI? I don't know, TBD. [08:47] I was hanging out with some tech friends, my new tech friends in SF. And every time I would go and have coffee with them, they would open their computers up and start like showing me things that they were working on. [08:57] And I would just like peer over their shoulder and... [08:59] Every single time my reaction was, [09:01] what the fuck are you doing on your computer? Yeah. Like genuinely, if you passed me your computer, I don't know if I could use that.

Hieroglyphics. Yeah. Like these... [09:11] like keyboard shortcuts into like these weird browser apps into [09:16] CLI agent commands, like all this crazy shit was happening. And I was like, whoa, [09:22] Firstly, I'm officially behind the times. Like, this is a dark... [09:27] reflection moment for myself you felt like what you were up to is like carving into caves first correct okay correct i'm in a word doc just typing that out yeah i feel like i'm using like out of the box stuff too yeah i literally do use pages like one time no one time i was like oh i can't like i don't have word and i don't really want to like go get it so i'm just going to use pages like i don't really want to go get it i'm probably gonna like generate a pdf anyway so it doesn't [09:57] famous meme of like the bell curve meme where in the middle midwit is basically like this person that has all these crazy productivity apps that connect like you're...

[10:08] note taking app connects to your calendar, connects to your reading app, which takes notes on your Kindle and then puts that into... -Notes on your Kindle? Like, I don't know. Crazy shit happening. And then on the other end of the bell curve are Apple Notes and Apple Notes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And like, that like the dumbest and the smartest people are doing like the simplest things. Yes. Right. And they're sort of like this midwit category that is making it more complicated for themselves than they need to. Uh huh.

So I think that's where it's sort of interesting is like, [10:36] in the age that we're in right now with this surplus of [10:40] AI and AI being like forced [10:43] fed to us on a daily basis. [10:45] And everyone's doing these like crazy automations on their stack. It's like, what are people actually implementing in their stack that is making a net difference that is not creating more work for them in that? And like, yeah, which is like a delicate balance. Very delicate balance. Okay. So that was the concept. That was the concept.

And Shiv was actually one of the people that I had this idea with who is our first episode. Shiv is one of my good friends from the, from the internet. Yeah. [11:11] and he is just one of the most talented builders i know he's an amazing design engineer and is constantly spinning up [11:17] a bunch of different side projects. Like he truly has an idea and like, [11:22] 24 hours later, he has a working prototype. [11:26] And... [11:27] Yeah, he was one of the people I sat down and coffee with where he started showing various things on his computer.

And I was like, oh, we got to... [11:34] we got to get a production team in here. And so that was kind of the birth of the concept. And then obviously, [11:42] Tasha's outside the dry cleaner talking with me. And I think it was just like a really energizing collab and moment where so much of Boys Club is about like, how can we break down tech into more accessible platforms? [11:54] means and formats. Um, [11:57] And I think that's like a lot of what the show represents, is how can we make the stack [12:02] which is this very scary like Devi term and tool.

[12:06] much more approachable, accessible, and something that we're all kind of like sharing in public. Yeah. [12:13] I love it. [12:14] Quasi can move off of pages. No, like literally when I was at, so I got a preview and I was like, oh, I need to adopt some of these things that I'm seeing here. Like I think that's what I'm most excited for the show is like getting some inspo because I need it because I have this aversion, like I call it tooling psychosis where people just get obsessed with tooling.

But now I'm going to start saying stack psychosis, which is when you get too obsessed with your stack and you forget what you're using it for. Yes, totally. [12:44] things like use pages or have like very little exposure. Like I'm not using keyboard shortcuts, which is like really crazy. Like, yeah, so I'm gonna get some inspo. I'm gonna boss up by watching it. Yeah, I think that's perfect, though. Like, I think that's the balance that we want is [12:59] Like, yes, yes. [13:00] pages is still welcome. Like we welcome and encourage in you.

That's also the Barry Boys Club. Barry Boys Club. All come on in. Put the website on Google Docs. Let's make it simple. Exactly. But also I think that there are some really cool things people are doing throughout the season. There was every single episode I was like, ooh, I got to tap in on that. Like there's really cool things that people are working on. [13:21] And [13:23] that actually feel like things I would genuinely want to implement into my day-to-day. So really quick, there are six episodes. They span from like, [13:32] creative technologists to founders to venture capitalists a lot of variety in terms of who you talk to and what stack they use um all super fun we brought the concept to Vercel and they were like we're in and we love them for that and so many other reasons and they're an incredible and very um apt partner for it because so many people are using the tools that um

[13:54] it was so naturally in many of these people's stacks. Such a perfect partner. They've been so amazing to work with. Very cool to work with. And they're like the original stock creator. Totally. It's like, how can you compress [14:05] the most complicated, [14:06] Like. [14:07] over the top. [14:08] components of your stack into really easy, simple tools. Yeah. [14:11] so happy we were working with them. And first episode is gonna uh preview today at the end of the stream and it will be on YouTube. Um we are as as the close boys know we have been slowly but surely [14:26] putting time into YouTube.

We have been... [14:29] um hesitant to do it over the course of the past four years no problem no problem it's a very male coded space yeah and so anytime i put up a video on youtube i was like this is i'm actually this is not for me yeah and then kate was like get over it and i was like okay so now we've gotten over it and this is our first like youtube native show uh which is exciting and so go to our youtube which is [14:54] subscribe, [14:56] Hit the likes.

[14:57] watch previous episodes of whatever is on there, but... [15:01] Play all of the Show Me Your Stack stuff, which we... New episodes every two weeks, over the next couple weeks, six episodes total. You'll see a lot of jewels. You'll see a lot of other fun stuff. Anything else to add? Kate, am I missing anything? Hit the bell. I really wanted to say that. Yeah. Hit the bell. So what you're going to do is you're going to click subscribe, but then you're not done. You're going to hit the bell so you get notified when new videos come out or maybe some other stuff.

Honestly, I don't really even know what hitting the bell does, but I know it's going to be good. [15:29] Oh yeah, that's why. Okay, I was right. I thought maybe there were other notifications involved, but no, there's no fluff. There's no spam. Just when the high quality Boys Club World content gets released. [15:40] You'll be the first to know. You'll be the first to know. Also give us some feedback too. [15:45] Um, maybe here's some alpha too, is that season two might already be, uh, [15:49] - In the works. - In the works.

Cooking. Some exciting guests already lined up. [15:54] redacted. But yeah, give us feedback if there's other things in the stack that you want to see that you feel like we're not tapping in on enough. One funny thing about yesterday was we were going live with... [16:08] some of the trailer content and [16:12] Let me just say, people don't understand what it takes to do a show like this. Oh, my God. People are... [16:18] delusional about what it takes i was delusional i know and all of us essentially were on a plane so all of us are dealing with the worst possible wi-fi you can imagine jules is texting me and saying none of the file i can't see anything i'm getting our notifications but i'm not seeing anything and we were like getting exciting dms once the trailer was live about people who are interested in season two and anyway it was just really funny [16:48] because it was a last minute trip.

And let me tell you, I had some feelings about it. I was like, this is a terrible, but the woman next to me was like, what is this girl doing? She's manic. She's got a iPad. She's got a computer. She's got her phone. She's crying, laughing and typing all at the same time. But anyway, it's up. It's exciting. Go ring the bell. Okay. I just want to say based on your plain behavior, I want to just do a callback to your aversion to the guy in the coffee [17:18] of hypocrisy going on.

We're going to circle back on that. A full of... [17:24] I'm an enigma. Okay. That's a really good way to put it. Wait, can I have one more question about the filming of the show? Okay, so I want a trend report. [17:33] on like, [17:34] who has the most reasonable stack for their purposes you know you're talking to developers and vcs and like all these different types of people is there anyone that [17:41] a class of people that stood out as really like slaying the [17:45] infra or slaying the stock that's a really good question that is a really good question [17:49] Um...

[17:52] I actually think, so we interviewed Guillermo Rauch, who is the founder and CEO of Vercel. [17:57] He is a longtime developer himself. [18:00] And I was very impressed how simple his stack was. Like he really only interacts with like three applications at once. It's Chrome, it's Slack. [18:09] and his terminal. And he uses just like a pretty basic IDE, nothing crazy. And- What's an IDE for? Oh, sorry. Integrated Development Environment. So that's basically- Like terminal? Terminal. Okay. Yeah. [18:22] Um, [18:24] And he was accessing like most things through the CLI.

He had some like fun agents and automations built. [18:31] But it was all pretty simple. And I think like, [18:34] What I also really love about the show is it's not just, okay, what is your digital tech stack? But it [18:39] ends up sort of mimicking what people's cognitive [18:42] Like, [18:44] map is. Like how do they work? What is their cognitive process? [18:48] And Guillermo was just like very simple. Like he was like, I think of what I need to do in the day. And then I go and do those things.

Well, you know what they say. If you need something to get done, give it to. Usually it's give it to a busy woman. But we'll let him in on this. We will let you a busy person. And I feel like maybe the tech stack is the same thing. If you're a person, you don't got a lot of time to be overengineering the process. Totally. Yeah. That's why you're in notes. [19:13] Yeah, yeah, that's why. Wait, what is it? Notes? Pages. I use notes a lot too. I would say notes is my primary.

Yeah. Totally. I do think some of the engineers go like a little too hard on the paint. That checks out. Yeah. It's like performative at a certain point. We need to transition now to Kwasi's. [19:34] Breaking news. Topic. Oh, this is breaking. This is a cultural moment that has emerged online. And it is a 32-year-old rich auntie with no job, no kids, and no responsibilities. I think we just got to roll the clip for the context and then we'll get into the discourse. Okay, let's do it. Kate's going to pull it up here.

I'm a 32-year-old rich auntie with no kids, no job, no responsibilities, [20:04] I wake up to silence, skincare, and food I don't have to share. Y'all love to say, "Oh, I hear an auntie, but I don't see an auntie." Well, darling, the joke's on you. I'm not your emergency contact or community rideshare. I'm a rich auntie in mindset, not maternity. Auntie isn't about gender. It isn't age. It's a lifestyle. It's luxury with boundaries. A refusal to trade peace for proximity or strength to fit. I live by bougie economics 101, darling.

I don't split the bills with struggle. I don't entertain low-effort love. And I don't negotiate with broke behavior emotionally or financially. [20:34] I wear a ring in public not because I'm taken, but because I'm expensive. It's called preventative bullshit blocking and trust. It saves time and it works. I take myself on solo dates because no one curates luxury for me better than me. If I want flowers, I buy them. If I want dinner with a view, I book it. I am the treat. I don't reply to what you're doing text.

I respond to calendars, confirmations, and Apple Pay. If you don't elevate me, you don't get access to me. My circle is curated. My schedule is soft. My piece is non-refundable. I say no with grace and yes, only when it pays in peace, priorities, or price. [21:04] This isn't a phase, darling. It's a blueprint. Untie is autonomy, power, and pleasure. All funded by high standards and soft boundaries. So when I say I'm a rich untie, I'm not talking about titles. I'm talking about freedom, softness, and being completely unavailable to nonsense. And no, I don't want your opinion.

I want your Amex, your boundaries, and your intentions in writing. [21:23] - Well, thoughts? - Okay, I have-- I want to hear from you first. Yeah. Can you just give a little bit of context on what is happening [21:38] on the internet around this video specifically yeah yeah so people are really i actually saw this like months ago so it's it's a resurfaced situation but people on twitter like if you engage with this video one time you will start getting quotes tweets comments like everything like now my timeline's full of it which is really exciting and i'm living for it and i think for the most part people are being hypercritical and hateful of this person and being like okay i don't really understand like what they're going for or like they're a lot of people are saying oh they're not really saying anything like none of this means [22:07] anything and then people are getting really like taking their magnifying glass out and looking at like very specific things of the video like screenshotting [22:15] small clips and they have their criticism.

So I have some a list of people's fixations here like, Oh, excellent. So there's this moment where they walk down a hallway of what is allegedly their own apartment complex. But look, they look like really lost. [22:27] Like, they're just kind of, like, glancing around. There's, like, this performed nonchalance that comes across as, like, yeah, just being lost, I guess. I actually saw a tweet that was that screenshot. And the quote tweet was, when I get out of the subway at the wrong station or something, like, where you're just like, oh, shit, I'm not in the right place.

Like, I don't know where I am. Like, I thought I knew right. Yeah. The confidence that you have. [22:49] and not being in the right place. Right. Yeah, we need to fabricate some been here before energy. And then the other thing that people are really obsessed with is a critique of how they're holding like the silverware and the way that they pick up the wine glass. So obviously, they're sort of leaning into this I'm bougie thing. And then people are saying like, Well, are you because you're holding your silverware wrong, which Okay, I want to start here because I feel [23:17] this is a piece of discourse that I may have a nonstandard opinion on which is okay [23:22] Bougie.

Wealthy. [23:24] the point of money is that you don't have to follow the rules anymore like you're buying yourself freedom of culture or of the rich culture [23:33] Yeah, well, it's like, okay, if you're still on your grind, then sure, like, go ahead and follow the rules so that you can like solicit more interest and capital and appeal to the right person. But if you've really made it, made it, you're going to abandon the rules and you're going to grab your fork with your fist if you want to. And that's when you know you've really actually made it.

Okay, I think to be at that level of made it, you need to literally be Elon Musk or like Jeff Vesos. [24:03] At some point you have to say, I made it. I'm going to express myself. That's the point of being alive. I'm not going to... [24:08] Keep. [24:09] like chasing money all the time. Yeah. And I think this person has made it in that way, at least whether that is rooted in delusion or, you know, actual monetary success. [24:19] I don't know, but I think people might be jealous. - Okay.

- I'll say this. - What is like-- - For sure. [24:23] current state of manners. Like, remember how there was like etiquette classes when we were growing up? Yeah. Yeah. Do you ever participate in this? [24:30] So I didn't. In any like formal way. Like I didn't really like take any elocution courses or anything of that nature and sort. I will say I think I like can sort of use silverware right now. [24:43] Nice. And I think I'm like, polite, like communicatively polite, but certainly like there's a certain type of environment where I'm going to go, well, guys, like, [24:52] I got to lean into the fact that I don't know what's going on.

I don't know the rules. Yeah. Okay. I feel I was raised by a mother who was like, [25:00] really strict about that sort of stuff. She had opinions. She had very clear opinions and like when you're [25:07] eating something you are never, you're using your fork to, [25:11] put things on the... [25:13] Or your knife. You're pushing. You're never touching any food ever. No pig trough situation. No, no, no, no, no. And like fork on the... [25:24] What is it? Fork on the right? Whatever. All the rules, very much. Right.

And I don't know, like I can... [25:32] I feel like [25:33] Fair to buck the rules. If you know that you're bucking the rules, if you're doing it without intention, I don't love it. It's not, it's not my circus, not my monkey. Like you can do whatever you want, everybody everywhere. But I'm just saying like me personally, what I respect is like, you know, the rules, but you're going to, [25:51] subvert the rules because you want to be [25:54] different and cool and or free or yourself, whatever. But I feel like there needs to be a knowledge base.

There needs to be some sort of knowledge base. Okay, I have a few thoughts on this whole situation. [26:05] The... [26:06] Rich auntie, [26:08] thing that is like the the nomenclature for what this is i guess yeah [26:13] It's like, [26:14] Does this person actually have nieces and nephews? [26:18] Well, I think they have detached [26:20] on see from its literal meaning and i would say probably basically every sentence okay okay it's it's like it kind of feels just like a new dink status symbol yes it's not actual like it's no connection to the actual word [26:35] "auntie."

[26:36] Right. Like they saw what there's like one, you can imagine there's one figure that represents the persona and they just so happen to be. [26:43] an aunt and then you abandon that part and you take the rest of it okay i see i'm i'm tracking and then [26:49] What I took away from all of it is that like there are... [26:55] individuals in this person's life. [26:57] who are supporting their lifestyle, [27:00] Is that correct? I mean, I don't honestly like I don't know. It seems like that's the image that they're trying to portray.

Yeah. [27:09] um so yeah like probably but i don't know like people love to lie on the internet of course oh i'm not saying that it's true i'm saying oh yeah yes okay and then the other thing that the the moment that was really impactful for me like a turning point i would say in the whole of it is when they say um i don't respond to what's up text i respond to calendar invites [27:31] And there's a few other things. And I was just like, this is... [27:34] Crazy. Like if I said that to either of you, like, oh, I would accept it.

If someone sent me a calendar, like didn't say hello. I literally do that to you all the time. No, but like, it seems like in a romantic way. [27:50] Yeah, setting. Yeah. Yeah. But but also like, I think it's [27:55] having such strict rules right like you because you're saying like oh you've done that before because you're open to whatever right like you just don't have all these like like you have to follow these 10 rules before you interact with me like of course in some context that's totally appropriate to have some sort of rules and restraint or whatever right but like to be like oh in order for me to communicate with you at all you have to follow my set of rules it's just kind of could it be further from me i feel like i think come my way instructions he was giving more these were [28:25] It's aspirational.

It's aspirational. It's a mindset. Okay. To be emboldened enough to... [28:31] send me a calendar and I like to phone him rightly. Like that, [28:36] that demands a certain type of respect and [28:39] way in which I'm going to interact with you. Yeah, I think that's I think that's what he's after. Okay. Yeah. I agree. I think that you there are maybe five people on earth who can truly live that lifestyle because they have so much leverage that they can do whatever they want. It requires that. When you try to LARP that, [28:55] you just end up pushing everyone away.

Because like when I think about, oh, what is this person or what is this like archetype aspiring to? It seems like they're aspiring to what? Eating dinner alone? Being really cold to everyone that wants to spend time with them. And [29:11] Like, I don't know. Honestly, it's kind of giving, like, age-old women's dating advice. Yeah. There's some book, I can't remember what the book is, of, like, [29:20] like how to engage with men, how to for women. And it's like all, it's like this type of energy. Oh, I think Shoshana reads that in Lena Dunham's Girls, actually.

That is, yeah, you're right. Actually, I'm doing a rewatch. I feel that I would love to see a full 30 minute episode. [29:38] If this person would like to reach out to Boys Club, the network has launched and we will take inquiries and pitches. That would be everything. Everything. I want to know... [29:48] who, what, when, where, why. You know what I mean? - Yeah. Yeah. So... - Like, how did we get here? How did we get here and where are we going? - Yeah. - It's Auntie Monologue's reality TV show.

Oh my gosh, sign me up. Or like, in the style of Sex and the City. You know? Like, that would be really, really quite great. - Yeah. - Okay. We're really gonna change. We're really shifting gears in like a tremendous left, right kind of way. - Let's go there. Okay. - Before we do, [30:10] Do you want to tell me about Polygon? [30:12] Oh, absolutely. Let me just scroll down to the script. [30:18] Our next sponsor is Polygon. [30:21] - [30:22] Every company moving money globally hits the same walls. Legacy rails are slow, expensive, and built for a pre-internet world.

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[31:00] Excellent. Also shout out to the new meta. [31:02] deal with Polygon. Yes. Yes. Can someone explain that to me? Okay, so Meta is doing creator payouts. [31:09] of some kind. I need to dig in a little bit more what that actually means like in practice. But [31:13] Yeah, they're like trying to pay creators on their platforms. And they are using Polygon Stablecoins as one of the partners. So huge, huge for them. Okay. [31:24] Switching from [31:27] Rich Auntie to Tiago Sada. [31:31] The chief product officer of world. This man has done enough screen time to have like, [31:37] a full portfolio.

Yes, we saw him really... [31:43] Like, I just want to give him his... [31:46] What's it called? Stars? No. Yeah. His laurels. [31:49] Flowers. Thank you. I want to give this man his flowers. We were in San Francisco a week, two weeks ago for the world event lift off and he ran the show and he did an unbelievable job. I'm not even just saying that because we're partnered with them. Like truly, I was like... [32:06] The stage presence, the organization, the confidence. And he had to go in and do that last minute because his boss, Alex, was in a bike accident.

So, which... [32:16] Like Godspeed, he's getting better. - To be thrown in the mix on that event, last minute, terrifying. It was a huge production. Only Tiago could rise to the occasion. And when he walked out on stage, you could tell that everybody likes to work for him because the crowd was so on his side. And I was like, if people didn't like him, no one would be like clapping his heart. One thing about Tosh, she loves an underdog. I love an underdog story. Anyway, he is a really nice guy.

He is doing some really interesting stuff with World and Dina interviewed him this week and... [32:45] we are going to play the interview. Kate, are we... [32:47] we're ready to go. And so the interview is going and we'll be back in a few after this. [32:53] interview. [32:54] We have with us here Tiago Sada. Tiago Sada is the Chief Product Officer at Tools for Humanity, which is a company building world. Perhaps the most ambitious proof of human play happening in tech right now, I think. The headline numbers, 18 million verified humans, 23 countries, a partnership network that now includes Match Group, Razor, Okta, and Visa.

And [33:19] Tiago is the guy running product on all of it. Welcome to Voice Club. [33:24] Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to be here. [33:26] Excited to chat. Okay, so you just wrapped up a... [33:30] The huge keynote packed room big event. What's your vibe after things like that? Like do you go into decompression mode or are you just still in full sprint shipping mode? [33:42] Well, definitely in shipping mode. I think like there's just nothing like a live keynote. I really miss companies doing that.

It doesn't scale very well, but it's just so much fun having a room and feeling the energy and announcing things and you sleep up and like it keeps going and doing live demos that are like real demos. And so Tim is super pumped. And it was really just the beginning. And now we get to ship all this stuff and then ship now even more stuff that's come up because of the event. So we're super excited about it. [34:08] That's awesome. Okay, I want to get into all that. But before we do, I'd love to get a little bit more [34:13] of your background like how you came to be in this role so our listeners can get some more context and get to know you a bit.

[34:20] For sure. So I grew up in Mexico, Mexico City all my life. My background is in robotics. It's with robots with my friends in middle school and high school. And through that, I got a scholarship to come to the US to study robotics engineering, computer science. [34:34] But as kids too nowadays, I dropped out halfway through to start a startup with the friends I used to build robots with in Mexico. So I went back home. We built a fintech up, a payments app. We were super lucky to go through YC in 2017.

That's originally how I met Sam. And then we went our own ways. We ended up selling that company, scaled our product throughout Latina, like Brazil and Colombia and a bunch of different countries. [34:57] And then years after that, I took a sabbatical where they had a bunch of random stuff. And I was about to start another company. And a friend told me about what Alex and Sam were doing with WorldCoin at the time, now World. And I joined to help for three months before I would start my next company. And then here I am five years later.

Nice. Okay. So World is very much built around this concept of proof of human. Can you explain that for listeners? Yeah. [35:22] For sure. So I think even just taking a step back, right, about six years ago Sam and Alex started this company. It's called Tools for Humanity and our mission as the name implies is basically to build the tools that we believe humans would need to thrive in the age of AI. Like back then that was kind of a hot take to say that AI was coming soon, that we needed new tools was like a very weird thing to say and we just believed that a bunch of things were going to be different in the world and one example of that is like how do you know who and what to trust online, right?

And we think that [35:50] um if the solution to a lot of these questions is to build a network of real humans you had a network of real humans you have like the base primitive that you have to tackle a bunch of the challenges that we're going to face including trust on the internet and so proof of human is like that baseline perimeter it's almost like a blue check mark that on an account on the internet tells me like hey this is a real and unique person but fully anonymously without knowing anything else about that and in terms of that is extremely powerful to yes solve some of the [36:20] but also unlock a bunch of new products that have never been possible before.

And so that, our version of it is called World ID. [36:28] And what are some of those new things that are made possible with this protocol in place? [36:35] Yeah. So, and I think this really ties in well with all the new partners that we just announced. Because we used to talk just about categories, but now we have the apps that are actually using it. So we think about things like dating. Well, it's really important for security that you know that you're talking to a real person. And sometimes I've been swiping and someone has six fingers and you're like, what's going on here?

Well, now Tinder is using this, even in the US, to let you prove that you're a human. Right? [37:05] Since video games came out, video game usage is actually now down because video games are now less fun because people cheat with that. Very serious things like financial transactions and business conversations that are happening over Zoom or DocuSign. Those are now places where you can prove that you are who you say you are and that you're a real human using World ID. And even just something as simple as concert tickets, where Taylor Swift will put her tickets on sale and they all get taken by bots.

[37:35] months of payroll of your salary on that and so with world idea artists can also [37:41] make it such that each human gets to buy one or two or four tickets so they can go with their friends but not more than that so that they cannot be scalped. [37:49] yeah i want to get to concert kit because that's that feels like a very legible um use case that i want to dig into more um but before that talk to me a little bit about how [37:58] you [38:00] when you say proof of human, like how can listeners do that?

Like what does that process look like? [38:06] So it's a super simple process. Basically, to get WorldID, all you need to do is download an app. Download an app on the App Store, and now you have this little passport that travels with you on the internet. And now you can get different levels of verification on that. And different apps will require a really high or really low level of verification, depending on how secure it needs to be. And so the highest level of verification and the most popular is something called the human verification with a device called the ORV.

[38:36] camera, it looks out of a Pixar movie. And you can find them in malls or in coffee shops near you. In some cities like San Francisco, you can actually come to your house and get verified. And it's sort of like going to the DMV. You only need to do it like once every three or so years. Where you go, you get verified, it takes like 20 seconds. [38:53] And then now you have that verification that lives on your phone and you can use it on any app that requests it and then in three years you'll go back and you'll get it again.

There's lower levels of verification and we just released a new one that is just you take a selfie on your phone that is obviously less secure than the orb right but for some applications that's okay. If you're just going to like a tweet it's probably okay and probably people are not going to try to cheat so hard with really advanced AI or things like that. So just taking a selfie, [39:20] is enough and all of those are equally private. We keep none of your data for that, all of your personal photos and things like that stay on your device and so that's the cool thing about WorldID.

It not only solves the problem in a secure way but in a fully anonymous and privacy-preserving way. [39:32] Yeah. Okay. So you mentioned Taylor Swift tickets and sort of the chaos around ticketing in general and scalpers and bots and all of that. Talk to me a little bit about how that would work, how using World ID for that use case can come to life. [39:49] So it's super simple. We released a new tool, it's called ConcertKit, and it basically works very similar to the pre-sales that were already used for concerts, right?

The artists will often do a pre-sale for a credit card or for a service. When you go on the ticketing sites, there's just a different class of tickets that are reserved for that. Well, now with ConcertKit, [40:07] artists can, regardless of the ticketing platform they're using, they can reserve a category of tickets that can only be purchased by humans. And so, [40:16] Artists can choose whether that is one or two or four tickets. And when you try to buy them, it'll ask you to prove that you're a human with your world ID, which just takes like one press of a button, and then you are allowed to buy those tickets.

So for example, 30 Seconds to Mars just announced that in their upcoming tour, they will be reserving some tickets. [40:36] for verified humans and the tickets are actually on sale today. And one of my favorite things is like the day of the event, we actually threw a concert that night where, um, [40:44] only verified humans could get tickets. And it was really cool to see in real time, hundreds of thousands of bots trying to get the tickets, we'll release the numbers soon. But only a few thousand people that were real were able to get those tickets and we were able to preserve this really magical night for everyone that attended.

[41:01] Nice. That's validating for you guys. Okay. I want to shift into this idea of [41:08] Well, you said you've been working on... [41:11] tools for at tools for humanity for what like four five years yeah like five years at this five years you've been at it for a while i think like one thing when i think about you in that role and where world is at right now is that [41:22] Like you've spent a long time at this problem, but... [41:26] the [41:27] it's never been more potent of an issue as it is right now.

So there's this conversation about like the dead internet, [41:34] theory and the idea of bots sort of overrunning the internet. And that at one point felt very kind of niche. And then now it's something that, [41:45] like my sister will text me about and I I just like wonder what it feels like to be [41:51] Sitting where you are, having seen that shift from it go from something that people were not thinking at all about to something that's a very mainstream conversation. Yeah. What's that been like? [42:02] Yeah, well, I mean, I have to admit that when I first heard about it five years ago, it was also pretty crazy to me.

It's just, I think like so many things would have had to change in the world for this to be true. That like five years ago, I was like, this is kind of crazy. But then the more I spend time with Alex and with Sam talking about this, [42:19] it was clear that [42:21] As crazy as it was, that was definitely where we were headed, right? If indeed all these things happened with AI and if indeed everything evolved the way it would, [42:29] This is where things are going to end up as bizarre as they sounded right and everything else was going to break down, uh, captures and KYC and verify your documents, all those things.

And so. [42:40] I think it is weird. On one side of things, it's obviously very exciting to see that, okay, we were right. On the other hand, it's still kind of bizarre to see that indeed everything happened, and honestly, even faster than I expected personally, I think. Probably Sam and Alex, they were always very aggressive in their projections, and they believed that it's going to be much faster. I personally thought, okay, this may happen, but in like 10 or 15 years, a five is like, it's a really fast time for the world to change this much.

[43:08] Yeah, that was a very humble answer, but I appreciate it. I feel the same way, like shocked by [43:13] by how quickly everything has changed. On that note, agent to agent, the agent world. So I have big open claw [43:23] fan user. I have a few that I have running across different things. And, you know, [43:29] Miami Claw could... [43:30] theoretically like book travel for me pay bills it could negotiate on my behalf mine is like lobotomized so it can't it's not at that level yet but theoretically we could get to a point very soon where it could and i think in particular what is interesting for me coming from crypto more as my background is the sort of agent to agent commerce and and that sort of starting happening in a real way and i'm wondering like where do you sit where does world sit in the agent [44:00] landscape?

Like where, where are you guys in that? [44:03] For sure. So I think sometimes people think that since we're building the human network that we're like anti-bot, right? Or like bot stock. It's actually like the opposite. I think like agents are amazing. And as you say, if not already today, like pretty soon, they're going to take care of a bunch of things in our lives and it's going to be amazing. [44:20] And the thing is, we just need to know what is what, right? Like we as users of apps need to know.

[44:25] on a website, are we interacting with a person or with a bot? And those platforms themselves also need to know that. And so we think that the labels that something like WorldID or Proof of Human can enable actually unlocks and unleashes the power of bots. Because right now, most websites, they're just blocking out every single bot. [44:55] something called agent delegation, which is almost like power of attorney for you, where you can say, these three agents are acting on my behalf, go do whatever you want. And when they show up to a website, they will say, yes, I'm a bot, but I'm representing Tiago.

And if that misbehaves, then Tiago also can block all of Tiago's agents. The second one is for agentic commerce, like you were saying. These little shoppers are amazing, but they're causing also a little bit of chaos sometimes. [45:25] using it with many bots. They can help prevent credit card fraud. And my personal favorite is they can also enable finally like limited drops where you can like drop a sneaker. We did this at the event and like you can say it's one sneaker per human. [45:37] and your agent can still get it for you so you don't have to stand in line for it, but he still only gets one bird.

And the last one is something we call human in the loop, which is [45:46] While it's great for your agents to be running around doing stuff for you, every once in a while they'll hit steps. You want to make sure a human takes a look at that and approves it and there's a record of who did that. And so with WorldID, you can require your agent to receive a cryptographic proof from your WorldID showing like, "Yes, I approve this action." [46:04] All of this stuff, this agent kit, this first version of it, we're now doing integrations with Vercel and with Octa and with Shopify and with Exa and with Coinbase and with BrowserBase.

And we expect that it'll be like many more things because WorldID truly lets you unleash this power of agents. That makes a lot of sense to me hearing you talk about it. [46:34] and how that renders it [46:37] Like I spoke. [46:38] before about how like theoretically my mom could do this but like certainly can't right now because of that hostility where you let it loose and it's getting kicked off and and it's not like rightfully so these websites to your point don't know which is a [46:52] Uh, [46:53] Yeah, what is a good bot and what is a bad bot, right?

So they have to err on the side of caution and just block all bots. And so with WorldID, now they can have like this little priority lane, not just for humans, but for [47:04] Bots that are representing humans, and then you can still keep the bad bots up. [47:08] Yeah, that makes a lot of sense to me. That's cool. Okay, so you... [47:13] You grew up in Mexico and now you're running product at a company that I think most people would associate with San Francisco and a S. market for better for us.

That may or may not be true, but I think just like in folks' minds. And I'm wondering just about like your background background. [47:30] And [47:31] how that shows up at all in the roadmap, like how you think about prioritizing markets, like what's, how does that show up for you? [47:40] Yeah. [47:41] I'll say in a couple of ways. [47:43] The first one is like, look, it's in the name, right? It's called World. And it's not meant for like a metropolis in the US, meant for like the whole world. And that means like the first place I ever went to onboard users to was in like, also in Norway.

I was walking on the streets of Oslo to like Mexico City where I grew up and like Asia and the US and like everything in between. And so just like growing up and understanding how much things like localization and things like that matters. Otherwise, I couldn't use these products. Like it really matters. And then I would say, [48:12] One thing that's been interesting about the project is growing up in Mexico was probably on the more serious side compared to all of my other Latino friends. But now here, I'm with a bunch of Germans and a bunch of really smart people from Silicon Valley.

And I'm like a social butterfly. I was going around the office hugging people and making jokes. And so I've gotten to bring a little bit of that Latino space, which is weird for me because for the first 25 years of my life, [48:35] It was the opposite. I was always a very serious and constrained one in the room. So that's been really fun. That's funny. OK. And one last thing here before we wrap. So when I was doing some research on you, I found that you had wrote... [48:48] I think in an op-ed that you hated crypto before Ethereum had flipped you.

And I'm wondering, just like generally zooming out from world and all the good work that you're doing there, what's [49:02] The equivalent like current day version of that for you, like something that you were skeptical about that you're warming up to now or that you see yourself starting to warm up to now. [49:13] Thank you. [49:14] So, [49:15] Thank you. [49:16] I mean, it's going to sound like a cop out, but I think agents, for the past 15 years, I've gotten pitched like chatbot products every other week. And they're like cool demos, but they're just like objectively not useful products.

They suck as a product. And I think they've been tried for a long time. And so... [49:32] As all of these new agents have started coming out in recent years, I was like, okay, here we go again. But I think it's now clear that they're getting good enough to do some things and do them really well. And so that's been something where I've had to say, okay, now, yeah, they sucked for the last 10 years, and that was great. But now it's probably time to dust off some of those ideas and understand what are the implications of this, because this thing is clearly here to stay and to be the future.

And so that's what I would say for that. I love that. [50:02] us and it was a pleasure chatting with you. [50:05] Likewise, thank you so much for having me. [50:09] Okay. Great interview. What a really lovely guy. Great. He did a great interview. Did a great [50:17] talk when he was there. Yeah. So articulate. Yeah. Electric, really. Electric, electric. Also, I love just Dina at the Venetian. We're no longer there, so I can dox that. At the Venetian in Vegas, just taking the interview. [50:31] Yeah, they look great. Okay, we're now going to talk about something that you have been working on.

Yes. And I love a chill moment. It's also... [50:42] It's it's. [50:43] You told me some things before the stream started, and I'm like, "Wow, this is like a cultural moment that's happening." 100%. Yeah. So, what is... Well, it's called the AI Psychosis Summit. It's happening tonight in New York City. [50:55] And tell us a little bit about what's going on. What's the cultural moment? Yes. Okay. So full details first. Let's get that out of the way. The AI Psychosis Summit is happening from 6 to 10 m. tonight at 93 Canal.

So basically what's happening is we assembled AI artists and practitioners and just anyone who we thought kind of had... [51:16] AI psychosis and we are going to put them into a room. Exactly. Yeah, it's a vibe. Some people have in a really scary way. Some people have it in a really productive way. And we just said, come one, come all as long as you're interesting. [51:28] Okay. And we're going to set up screens for them, whatever else they need projectors, and there's just going to be a lot of [51:35] AI hullabaloo, one might say.

So it's kind of like a trade show format or like a science fair gallery, like something like that. It's not, no one's going to be sitting in a chair listening to a presentation. They're going to be like... [51:46] Going around talking to the people who made this stuff about how they made it. I'm seeing what's going on. There's like people doing audio projects. There's people doing visual products. [51:54] projects. There's people there's someone who made a game that sort of simulates being bullied into um, maybe I'll say an extreme action by AI.

Oh, so a lot of really artistic things going on. There's someone who built like back to our childhood. [52:11] There's someone who built an app that's like a really intentionally psychophantic and like basically just kind of [52:18] hyperbolizing all the bad things about AI. And they made a model that's about that. So you can go deeper into psychosis. [52:24] Cool. A lot of interesting projects. Okay. Would you say that... [52:29] This is... [52:30] and art. [52:31] focused exhibition of these projects? Or is it like... [52:35] the intersection of art and culture is happening here tonight?

So I think like when we were... [52:40] trying to get people to participate or like show stuff we were kind of saying hey we want non-commercial applications of ai like my thesis for the event is like i've been to plenty of ai events where [52:51] People are like, here's my [52:53] like workflow or like here's something that I did to optimize like how I do my job. And I'm kind of like, Well, I don't care about your job. Right? I want I'm interested in people who use AI to express themselves and like do something new.

And honestly, I'm really drawn to like, [53:08] like stupid uses of AI where you've had this idea that you've just never been able to execute on because it's stupid. It's like, why would you put forth a bunch of effort to do something that's kind of trivial? And then now it's like, well, you can do a couple prompts and get it out there. I actually think that's really cool. So in a way to me, like the frivolousness of the things that people are, some people are creating, some people are like, [53:28] creating really truly crazy and impressive things.

Yeah. But I think like the frivolous stuff, the frivolousness of it can also be, [53:34] -like, new and exciting as well. - Yeah, so basically like, um... [53:38] non-utility use cases of AI, basically. Yeah, yeah. Most of it, I would say, reads... [53:44] as art but it's not like restricted to that necessarily okay like the underbelly of ai