AMA 01/23/2021

Kick off a spontaneous late night AMA live from Colorado after a long day of work.

Gives a weekly project update, teasing the Mary hard fork due in February and a wave of new software releases.

Demo the new Daedalus native multi asset wallet and plan to test it with token issuers on the mint testnet.

Flags upcoming smart contract work and admit the Mantis Ethereum client still needs heavy engineering before it's production ready.

Reflects on a recent Forbes interview about enterprise and Fortune 500 crypto adoption.

Postponed plans to tour Japan and close out the original five year Cardano deal amid COVID travel restrictions.

Shows off his everyday carry, a couple of Lamy pens.

Map out a learning path for a CS grad wanting to build on Cardano, starting with Ethereum and Mastering Ethereum.

Recommends the Haskell Book for aspiring Plutus developers and place Plutus pedagogy as a Q1 and Q2 priority.

Muses that presidents, Biden included, have long signed documents they never personally read.

Cites The Creature from Jekyll Island and Secrets of the Temple as key reads on Federal Reserve history.

Handicap the Biden administration's crypto policy, expecting a friendlier SEC under Gensler but tighter KYC rules.

Writing a page or two of his novel by hand on a legal pad every day.

Details the struggle of designing gameplay systems for his Legends of Valor game, citing Arcana Evolved and Elder Scrolls as references.

Teases an upcoming interview with Ben Goertzel about decentralized social networks.

Recounts nearly buying Uganda's Jinja Hippos soccer team before COVID stalled the deal, envisioning a pan African crypto soccer league.

Giving up on American football and basketball over politics and turning his sports attention to soccer instead.

Riffs on right to repair, citing his HP printer's subscription locked cartridges and vanishing repair culture.

Compares Edison and Tesla, wishing the pair had collaborated instead of splitting apart.

A story about Africa time after being kept waiting five hours for a meeting in Rwanda.

Recounts a failed overnight attempt to upscale an old interview video from 360p to 4K.

An all hands meeting with Celsius's team, including Alex Mashinsky, about a possible collaboration.

Reminisces about Arcanum and laments that developer Troika Games folded before a planned sequel.

Rejects a comparison to Steve Jobs, saying they're different people who happen to share the same passion for their work.

Announces funding a Lean based formal mathematics textbook for undergraduates, to be released under Creative Commons.

Lists life goals: computer verified mathematics, a world financial operating system, developing world financial inclusion, and mainstream libertarian principles.

Gives a garden update covering artichokes, pumpkins, watermelons, and a hydroponic jalapeno experiment.

Compares the new mid engine Corvette C8 favorably to a budget Lamborghini Huracan.

IOHK is exploring Haskell on ARM for the new M1 MacBooks, likely via Rosetta emulation for now.

Argues the incoming Tesla Model S Plaid's performance makes buying a Lamborghini or Ferrari right now a bad bet.

Praises Ergo, the project from ex IOHK researchers, as underrated relative to the quality of its ideas.

Writing Python scripts as a coding hobby and naming Scala as his favorite programming language.

Transaction fees should sustain the network once the 45 billion ADA cap is reached, with governance able to vote for further inflation if needed.

Riffs on a hypothetical chicken sized horse fight before going down a rabbit hole about prehistoric terror birds.

Defends stepping in to support Ethereum Classic's code is law community after the Ethereum Foundation split.

Floats rebranding away from the Ethereum Classic name and hiring a full time philosopher if the proposal wins.

Notes the electoral college can only be removed by constitutional amendment, not ordinary legislation, and predicts it won't happen.

Clarifies a floor painting people mistook for Trump is actually Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here album cover, and says he's moved on from Trump politics.

Cross referencing mainstream, alternative, and social media plus trusted contacts to gauge the truthiness of events.

Jokes about the community's recurring Coinbase listing question, name checking Gemini, PayPal, and the NYSE.

Thanks the community for tuning in and participating, calling it the reason he keeps doing AMAs.

Dream of doing a Bob Ross style live painting AMA of landscapes from the 52 countries he's visited.

The story of writing an AutoHotkey bot to automate ice mining in EVE Online as how he first learned to code.

He'd love to appear on Lex Fridman's podcast someday but doesn't feel ready for it yet.

Clarifies he's not the older conservative writer also named Charles Hoskinson, though the two have corresponded.

Gives an extensive rundown of favorite Baldur's Gate companions and romance options across both games.

Compares snakewood, ironwood, and zebrawood as favorite exotic woods.

Details past talks with Akon and South African officials on African crypto deals that haven't closed yet.

Reveals he endorsed and voted for Brock Pierce rather than Biden.

Lays out his theory that Adam Back is the most likely Satoshi Nakamoto candidate based on profile and circumstantial evidence.

Promissory estoppel as the reason open source MIT licensed code can't be retroactively re-copyrighted.

Add that Bitcoin's rough code quality and Windows dev environment argue against Hal Finney being Satoshi, pointing back to Adam Back's Hashcash.

Ties to the Philippines through Hawaii's large Filipino community and his uncle's marriage.

Warns against assuming any movement of Satoshi's coins proves identity, since a deceased Satoshi's keys could end up in someone else's hands.

Recalls meeting Vitalik Buterin through Anthony Di Iorio.

Argues Bitcoin's stagnation is a governance choice rather than a technical limitation, comparing it to a slow moving monopoly.

Jokes about hosting a crypto themed Joy of Painting parody complete with a Dan Larimer red paint color.

Advises an aspiring game developer to build a first prototype themselves through Coursera courses rather than look for a developer to hire.

Warns against writing games in Haskell since game middleware like Unity doesn't support it.

Promises to eventually record a video on simulation theory referencing Nick Bostrom.

Confirms the team is exploring letting native assets pay transaction fees, though ADA remains the fee currency for now.

Refuses to tell people why they should invest in ADA, calling that not his job and dismissing day trader mentality.

Makes the case for collective empathy, framing Cardano's goal as markets and rules controlled collectively rather than by any single nation or empire.

Compares his own compulsive project writing to George Washington's letters home as a stress relief valve under enormous pressure.

Warns that chasing ADA price targets misses the point of the work, which is redefining money, securities, property, identity, and voting.

Talks with Chainlink's Sergey Nazarov and confirm additional funding approved for the SingularityNET collaboration.

Cites Jack Ma's disappearance and re-education in China as a warning of what happens when a system doesn't protect individual power.

Points to IdeaScale and Project Catalyst as the model for Cardano's on-chain voting system.

Pushes back on being accused of shaming people who want to get rich off ADA, saying he simply doesn't focus on price.

Traces his path from Bitcoin to Ethereum to Cardano as driven by each system's technical failures rather than a desire to build a competitor.

Argues chasing wealth without ideas leads to emptiness, citing hyperinflation wiping out Zimbabwean farmers' savings under Mugabe.

Reflects on crypto growing into a trillion dollar asset class from nothing, calling all money, fiat included, a human construct.

Restates his daily focus as building a billion person system, with wealth creation as a side effect rather than the goal.

Concludes a network built on transcendent values creates a better society than the one it replaces, but what holders do with ADA is up to them.

Cardano raised just 72 million dollars and grew to an 11 billion dollar cap, and that he personally works without taking extra salary.

References Jacque Fresco's Venus Project as interesting, noting Fresco has since passed away.

Confirms he's writing a book on governance due out later in 2021.

Clarifies he defends principles rather than parties, praising Biden's FinCEN freeze but blasting proposed wealth and unrealized gains taxes.

Counters concerns about African corruption by pointing to crypto's own scandals like Mt. Gox and OneCoin, and praises a new generation of young African leaders.

Reveals negotiating a Cardano related deal in a country during an active civil war.

Praises Ghana as a favorite African country and welcomes its push toward a continental free trade area.

Encourages someone going full time into Cardano to start at IdeaScale and Catalyst Fund 3 to build connections and get funded.

Argues that marketing manufactures desire for things you don't need, holding up Bob Ross as an example of choosing passion over financial security.

Dismisses Hedera Hashgraph outright because it's patented, saying he won't engage with patented cryptocurrency technology on principle.

Dismantle QAnon as the latest in a long line of failed doomsday predictions, comparing it to Alex Jones's track record.

Traces how QAnon believers moved the goalposts after Trump left office without the promised storm happening.

Argues the world is too complex, interdependent, and chaotic for any small cabal to secretly control, and that powerful people are ordinary.

Poke holes in QAnon depopulation and vaccine microchip claims by pointing out global population keeps climbing.

Distill a life lesson that confidence isn't competence, so stay humble and reason from values and principles.

Acknowledges a consistent American ruling elite exists but frames it as ordinary social clustering rather than a hidden conspiracy.

Jabs at a Bitcoin maximalist podcaster for calling everything but Bitcoin a scam while ignoring scams within Bitcoin itself.

Enjoy the looser, later vibe of impromptu late night AMAs compared to scheduled ones.

Recalls fond memories of family in Tromso, Norway, herding sheep.

A childhood story about working at a cat rescue for socialization while homeschooled, medicating dozens of cats.

Reflects on Rush Limbaugh's decades long bond with his audience while dying of cancer, drawing a parallel to Cardano's own community loyalty.

Wingsuit training in Sweden alongside scratches earned working at the cat rescue.

Expresses excitement about space tourism opening up in 2025 and plans to go to space.

Reminisces about listening to Art Bell and George Noory's Coast to Coast AM for wild guest stories.

Details his teenage side hustle upgrading counterfeit Rolex Submariners with genuine ETA movements and parts.

Calls the Voynich Manuscript one of his favorite books and considers commissioning a reproduction.

Gives a detailed watch collecting rundown covering Grand Seiko, Rolex's Tudor sub-brand, and high end names like Patek Philippe and Jaeger-LeCoultre.

Highlights Piaget's ultra thin Altiplano watch and its platinum counterweights.

He's holding off drinking until his employees can join him in Colorado, staying on his self imposed dry year.

Lists intellectual influences from Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn to Sam Harris and Daniel Dennett as proof he draws from across the spectrum.

Names Mike Tyson and Chuck Liddell as favorite fighters.

Shares coffee brewing tips including a conical burr grinder, pour over method, and a cheaper kopi luwak alternative.

Dfinity is apparently still around and still building.

Geek out briefly over Euler's identity as a favorite piece of mathematics.

Confirms IOHK hires JavaScript developers, calling it one of his favorite programming languages.

References the movie Marathon Man while joking about a dentist visit.

Weighs in on Linux versus macOS, naming Ubuntu as his day to day Linux distro.

Gives shoutouts to community podcasters, including a guest who is a fighter jet pilot.

Closes the AMA wishing everyone a good day, planning to meditate, live in the moment, and do something kind for someone else.