Memecoins Eat Everything: Robinhood's Accidental Casino & Base's Identity Crisis
Brian Armstrong changed his profile picture to a memecoin. It pumped to thirty million. Ten thousand wallets piled in. Less than twenty-four hours later, he changed it back — and every one of those wallets felt it.
That one move cracked open the week's biggest debate: what should Coinbase and Base actually be for? And what does it mean that Robinhood's new L2 — launched three weeks ago, supposedly for tokenized stocks — already has five hundred million in memecoin volume versus thirteen million in RWAs?
This week on The Defiant, Camila Russo sits down with three guests who can't agree on anything — and that's exactly why this conversation works.
Austin Campbell (Zero Knowledge / NYU Stern) says Base's behavior was both an intellectual and moral failing — memecoins are gambling, and Coinbase can't build payment infrastructure while promoting gambling to young people at the same time. Jason Yanowitz (Blockworks) says the strategy is closer to right than people admit, and the real problem is execution, not direction. Michael Lee (LienFi), a Base builder since day one, says Armstrong's PFP move caused real damage — but mercenary traders have also paid twenty million dollars to creators on Base, and nobody else is stepping in to do that.
School bus. Rocket ship. Same company. That's the problem.
Guests: Austin Campbell (Zero Knowledge / NYU Stern) | Jason Yanowitz (Blockworks) | Michael Lee (LienFi) Topics: Memecoins, Coinbase, Base, Robinhood L2, content coins, Brian Armstrong, crypto regulation, everything exchange
How to Build in Crypto: Lessons from 8 Leading Founders | Jesse Pollack, Jeremy Allaire, Anatoly Yakovenko & More
Do you think you’ve got what it takes to become a founder in crypto?
On the show today we’ve got 8 of crypto’s most famous and successful builders in crypto, each with about 15 minutes in time, giving you the wisdom they gained founding their own companies.
We’re joined by Jesse Pollack from Base, Jeremy Allaire from Circle, Anatoly from Solana, Stani from Aave, Kain from Synthetix, Mike & Jason from Blockworks, Kevin Owocki from Gitcoin and Lucas from Jito. Each one with their own perspectives, their own scars and hopefully by listening to this episode, you, the listener, can learn from their experiences to gain the confidence you need to venture into this world.
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🪙 FRAX | SELF SUFFICIENT DeFi https://bankless.cc/Frax
🦄UNISWAP | BUG BOUNTY PROGRAM https://bankless.cc/Uniswap-Bug-Bounty
⚖️ ARBITRUM | SCALING ETHEREUM https://bankless.cc/Arbitrum
🛞MANTLE | MODULAR LAYER 2 NETWORK https://bankless.cc/Mantle
🌐 CELO | BUILD TOGETHER AND PROSPER https://bankless.cc/Celo
------ ✨ Mint the episode on Zora ✨ https://zora.co/collect/base:0x4be6cd4d402fed49eb2de95fbc8e737e8ffd3e7f/8?referrer=0x077Fe9e96Aa9b20Bd36F1C6290f54F8717C5674E
------ TIMESTAMPS
0:00 Intro 2:52 Jesse Pollack - Base 15:45 Jeremy Allaire - Circle 34:53 Anatoly Yakovenko - Solana 51:00 Stani Kulechove - Aave 1:07:48 Kain Warwick - Synthetix 1:27:06 Mike & Yano - Blockworks 1:44:16 Kevin Owocki - Gitcoin 1:59:19 Lucas Bruder - Jito
------ RESOURCES
Jesse Pollack - Base https://x.com/jessepollak
Jeremy Allaire - Circle https://x.com/jerallaire
Anatoly Yakovenko - Solana https://x.com/aeyakovenko
Stani Kulechove - Aave https://x.com/StaniKulechov
Kain Warwick - Synthetix https://x.com/kaiynne
Jason Yanowitz - Blockworks https://x.com/jasonyanowitz
Mike Ippolito - Blockworks https://x.com/MikeIppolito_
Kevin Owocki - Gitcoin https://x.com/owocki
Onchain Capital Allocation Handbook https://allobook.gitcoin.co/
Lucas Bruder - Jito https://www.linkedin.com/in/lucasbruder/
------ Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here: https://www.bankless.com/disclosures
The Chopping Block: The Role of Media in Crypto, Blockworks Op-Ed, and Apps vs. Infrastructure - Ep. 673
Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Robert Leshner, and Tarun Chitra explore the latest trends in the crypto world. In this episode, Jason Yanowitz from Blockworks joins the squad to explore the media's significant role in the crypto industry. They discuss challenges faced by the media in meeting client demands and industry expectations, and highlight financial sustainability and biases. The hosts compare crypto media to mainstream journalism, examining the balance between journalistic integrity and revenue. They critique broader media trends, discussing monopolistic narratives and public dissatisfaction, with a specific look at political coverage. The episode concludes with reflections on the media's evolving role in truth dissemination amidst industry fragmentation.
Show highlights
🔹 The Airdrop Era: Examination of the potential end of the airdrop/token narrative.
🔹 Investing in Apps vs Infrastructure: Debate on funding apps versus infrastructure projects.
🔹 Crypto Media Trends: Analysis of shifts in crypto media, major acquisitions, and industry stance.
🔹 Challenges in Crypto Media: Ethical questions and investor pressures media firms face.
🔹 Future of Media: Trends in media companies, prediction markets, and trust dynamics.
🔹 Media Integrity: Exploration of media's perception, skepticism around its business motives, and flawed business models.
Hosts
⭐️Haseeb Qureshi, Managing Partner at Dragonfly
⭐️Tom Schmidt, General Partner at Dragonfly
⭐️Robert Leshner, CEO & Co-founder of Superstate
⭐️Jason Yanowitz, Founder of Blockworks
Disclosures
Timestamps
00:00 Intro
02:30 Airdrops and Token Valuations
04:04 Apps vs. Infrastructure
14:26 Venture's Not a Charity
22:41 Crypto Media Landscape
32:31 Revenue in Media
34:26 Trust as the Cornerstone of Media
35:27 The Blockworks Op-Ed Controversy
38:55 Navigating Media Bias and Trust
44:18 Balaji's Anti-Media Sentiment
49:57 The Future of Media and Truth
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How Blockworks Bootstrapped To A +$20M/yr Crypto Empire
Episode 500: Sam Parr (https://twitter.com/theSamParr) talks to Jason Yanowitz (https://twitter.com/JasonYanowitz) founder of Blockworks, which covers crypto news, information and analytics. Jason shares the revenue numbers behind Blockworks, the secret to hosting profitable events, and why he would put 100% of his portfolio in crypto.
Want to see more MFM? Subscribe to our YouTube channel here.
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Check Out Sam's Stuff:
• Hampton - https://www.joinhampton.com/
• Ideation Bootcamp - https://www.ideationbootcamp.co/
• Copy That - https://copythat.com/
Check Out Shaan's Stuff:
• Try Shepherd Out - https://www.supportshepherd.com/
• Shaan's Personal Assistant System - http://shaanpuri.com/remoteassistant
• Power Writing Course - https://maven.com/generalist/writing
• Small Boy Newsletter - https://smallboy.co/
• Daily Newsletter - https://www.shaanpuri.com/
—
Show Notes:
(0:00) Intro
(1:45) Blockworks revenue and profitability
(4:00) How to crush it with a conference
(10:00) Conferences are really 3-day marketplaces
(15:00) Jason's accidental MLM success story
(23:00) The difference between MLMs and pyramid schemes
(27:00) How Sam Ovens inspired Blockworks
(30:00) The fallacy of founder origin stories
(35:00) How Sam is optimizing his life
(42:00) Business Idea: Beehiiv for Conferences
(45:00) Business Idea: Hair transplants for the masses
(48:00) Blockworks Research
(55:00) Where is Jason putting his money?
(1:00:00) How Sam thinks about crypto
—
Links:
• Blockworks - https://blockworks.co/
• Blockworks Research - https://www.blockworksresearch.com/
• Blockworks Twitter - https://twitter.com/blockworks_
• Jason’s Twitter - https://twitter.com/JasonYanowitz
• Sam Ovens Consulting company - https://www.consulting.com/
• Peter Turchin - https://peterturchin.com/
• beehiiv - https://www.beehiiv.com/
• Eventbrite - https://www.eventbrite.com/
• Splash - https://splashthat.com/
• Hopin acquisition - https://tinyurl.com/2zn2kk3p
• ‘Elon Musk,’ by Walter Isaacson - https://tinyurl.com/bde53vpr
• Jeff Bezo’s Regret Minimization Framework - https://tinyurl.com/m34hmyfk
Past guests on My First Million include Rob Dyrdek, Hasan Minhaj, Balaji Srinivasan, Jake Paul, Dr. Andrew Huberman, Gary Vee, Lance Armstrong, Sophia Amoruso, Ariel Helwani, Ramit Sethi, Stanley Druckenmiller, Peter Diamandis, Dharmesh Shah, Brian Halligan, Marc Lore, Jason Calacanis, Andrew Wilkinson, Julian Shapiro, Kat Cole, Codie Sanchez, Nader Al-Naji, Steph Smith, Trung Phan, Nick Huber, Anthony Pompliano, Ben Askren, Ramon Van Meer, Brianne Kimmel, Andrew Gazdecki, Scott Belsky, Moiz Ali, Dan Held, Elaine Zelby, Michael Saylor, Ryan Begelman, Jack Butcher, Reed Duchscher, Tai Lopez, Harley Finkelstein, Alexa von Tobel, Noah Kagan, Nick Bare, Greg Isenberg, James Altucher, Randy Hetrick and more.
—
Other episodes you might enjoy:
• #224 Rob Dyrdek - How Tracking Every Second of His Life Took Rob Drydek from 0 to $405M in Exits
• #209 Gary Vaynerchuk - Why NFTS Are the Future
• #178 Balaji Srinivasan - Balaji on How to Fix the Media, Cloud Cities & Crypto
• #169 - How One Man Started 5, Billion Dollar Companies, Dan Gilbert's Empire, & Talking With Warren Buffett
• #218 - Why You Should Take a Think Week Like Bill Gates
• Dave Portnoy vs The World, Extreme Body Monitoring, The Future of Apparel Retail, "How Much is Anthony Pompliano Worth?", and More
• How Mr Beast Got 100M Views in Less Than 4 Days, The $25M Chrome Extension, and More
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