For this episode I spoke to Suji Yan, CEO and founder of Mask Network. Mask's main product is an open-sourced browser extension that wraps around several web2 and web3 social media networks. Rather than starting a new social media platform, the extension brings the benefits of both kinds of social media. During the discussion we spoke about Suji's …

Note that this interview was done in Spanish, you can find the youtube video with english subtitles if you need here. This episode is part of a subseries where I've partnered with my comrade Giulio Quarta from the Crypto Commons Association and their initiative called the Commons Economy Roadmap (CER) where we will be interviewing some of the proje…

For this episode I spoke to Nick Susi, Executive Director of Strategy at dotdotdash who recently wrote a really interesting article on his Substack titled magic, online!. The article goes into the history of magical thinking that accompanied many of the past's technological achievements like phones that let you talk to the dead or fairies that appe…

This episode is part of a subseries where I've partnered with my comrade Giulio Quarta from the Crypto Commons Association and their initiative called the Commons Economy Roadmap (CER) where we will be interviewing some of the projects listed as part of the CER. In this interview we spoke to Andrea Leiter, co-founder of Sovereign Nature Initiative …

For this episode I spoke to Graham Jones, the author of Red Enlightenment, published through Repeater Books like Blockchain Radicals. Red Enlightenment argues not only for a deepened understanding of religious matters, but calls for the secular left to develop its own spiritual perspectives. It proposes a materialist spirituality built from sociali…

For this episode I spoke to Dr. Hannes Gerhardt, a Professor of Geography at the University of West Georgia. His research spans a range of topics within political geography and geoeconomics. We spoke about his new book FROM CAPITAL TO COMMONS: Exploring the Promise of a World Beyond Capitalism. During the interview we spoke about his concept of com…

This episode is the start of a subseries where I've partnered with my comrade Giulio Quarta from the Crypto Commons Association and their initiative called the Commons Economy Roadmap (CER) where we will be interviewing some of the projects listed as part of the CER. In this first interview we've spoken to Christopher Goes, co-founder of Anoma, a f…

I´m once again speaking with Nathan Schneider about his newly released book, Governable Spaces: Democratic Design for Online Life. In Governable Spaces, Nathan Schneider argues that the internet has been plagued by a phenomenon he calls “implicit feudalism”: a bias, both cultural and technical, for building communities as fiefdoms. The consequences…

We spoke to Sara Horowitz (@Sara_Horowitz), founder of the Freelancers Union and author of the book Mutualism: Building the Next Economy from the ground Up . Sara was also one of our co-conspirators in Zuzalu in Montenegro last year who brought her extensive experience and wisdom from building and supporting worker-focused organizations. We spoke a…

My friend and researcher of the politics of tech platforms, Gianmarco Cristofari recently had an extended in my apartment and so we thought it'd be a great opportunity to interview each other. He interviewed me here for the Institute for Network Cultures to talk about my book and the left's relationship with crypto. We spoke about how platforms are…

An audiobook taster of James's new book So You've Been Ideologically Discredited PLUS an invitation for all our listeners, to the book launch at the Stapleton Tavern, Finsbury Park, Monday April 15th/7pm.

For this episode I spoke to James Brennan (@jt_bren) who has been finishing up his Masters at the University of Colorado focused on crypto. As part of his research he took a dep dive into the infamous group behind the Miladys NFT collection, Remilia Corp. During the discussion we spoke about esoteric political ideologies professed by Remilia and th…

I spoke to Oisín Kyne, co-founder and CTO of Obol Network, an ecosystem for trust minimized Ethereum staking that enables people to create, test, run and coordinate distributed validators. Distributed Validator Technology (DVT) enables the duties of an Ethereum validator to be performed across a cluster of nodes in order to improve resilience as co…

I spoke to Kat (katalunia.eth) who is behind a project called ETH Evacuations which is taking donations to pay for families to get out of Gaza through the Rafah crossing. Kat is a product manager and startup builder, most recently Head of Product at Zora and travelled to Gaza in June 2023 to be a mentor in product management for the community at Ga…

I spoke to Mustafa Al-Bassam, co-founder and CEO of Celestia, a modular blockchain network that makes for others to securely launch their own blockchain. Mustafa was also a member of the black hat hacking group LulzSec under the name T-Flow known for hacking the CIA website, newspapaers owned by Rupert Murdoch, and other corporate and state organiz…

If you've been surfing the tech sphere lately, you may have come across the term e/acc or effective accelerationism as if it was something new. But like most of these tech elite driven ideologies, it's largely a mutation of more naive and sometimes sinister trends. For this episode I spoke to Adam Jones, host of Acid Horizon and Zer0 Books and Repe…

The audiobook for my book Blockchain Radicals is officially out! This is a sample you can listen to if you want to know if it seems like something you'd want to pick up. You can find your audiobook copy in all of the major audiobook platforms including Audible, Libro.fm and audiobooks,com. You can still find all the other places to find the physica…

Tokens have increasingly more popular beyond just in the crypto world *gang gang mmm ice cream so good*. Tokens are not new, but how they have been used and their proliferation have exploded with the rise of digital platforms. I spoke to Rachel O'Dwyer, writer and a lecturer in Digital Cultures in the National College of Art and Design in Dublin an…

The preeminent researcher of the American 'deep state' and its hand in the great domestic crimes - from JFK to 9/11 - returns with the story of the other side of his career, as a Berkley poet and translator, and friend and collaborator of the major Polish poet, Czesław Miłosz. Miłosz was in the anti-Nazi resistance in Poland during the Second World…

Todd Michael Schultz is a musician and author, and the partner of Bret Easton Ellis, one of the world's most famous novelists and screenwriters. In an emotional and candid discussion, Todd lays out his vision of creativtiy, the dangers of navigating the LA elite, and what it's like to love a genius. Safe to say this is the most unique epsiode we've…

You can find the video version of the interview here where I've cut the interview with some film I took while at TDF. In this episode I spoke to Sam Delesque (@samueldelesque), founder of Traditional Dream Factory (TDF), a regenerative village based in Abela, Portugal that is blending crypto with permaculture and community. TDF is the first village…

Newsweek editor and Daily Mail foreign correspondent David Gardner is author of 9/11: The Conpiracy Theories and COVID-19: The Conspiracy Theories. Help us develop The Popular Show and get the full video version of this show, PLUS many extra exclusive shows at https://www.patreon.com/thepopularpod More ways to help us continue: https://www.paypal.c…

In this episode of OTNS, we spoke to Ali Breland, a journalist at Mother Jones who has written on crypto and politics, about his recent publication about the links between Praxis and far right figures. We spoke about his experience of going to a Praxis sponsored party in NYC, his interviews with ex-employees about the fascist sympathies of the foun…

Exclusive to subscribers, the SECOND HALF of James's debate with Doug Lain on the contempt with which some on the left have shown towards pro-Palestinian activism. Click through to Sublation Media's YouTube channel for the first part of James's defence of the pro-Gaza protest movement.

For Patreon subscribers. Was the October 7th Hamas attack 'blowback' or is there more to the story? Ex-International Relations Prof turned deep state researcher Piers Robinson joins us for a history of 'propoganda of deed' and the deep structural events of the 21st century: 9/11, Syria, COVID-19, and how they can help us understand the present cris…

Ex-Syriza man and SOAS prof Costas Lapavitsas joins us to raise hell about the EU, Bidenomics, the economic effects of COVID lockdowns, new multipolar uprisings, and who screwed up worse: the Greek or the UK left? PLUS his new book with EReNSEP Writing Collective⁠, The State of Capitalism: Economy, Society, and Hegemony. Help us develop The Popular…

In this episode I spoke to Afra Wang, a Chinese diaspora journalist who has been in crypto now for a year and a half with Mask Network and organizer of the ZuConnect Decentralized Social Day in Istanbul where I moderated a panel on technology addiction in crypto. Given that usually crypto is often seen through and talked about from a western lens, …

In this episode I spoke with Trent Van Epps, who is part of the Ethereum Foundation and a key member of Protocol Guild (PG). PG is a collective of 152 Ethereum core protocol contributors who are curated to receive public good funding from ecosystem sponsors. In turn, this is meant to balance incentives for contributors to work on the Ethereum proto…

Joshua Dávila of The Blockchain Socialist Podcast talks to David about Blockchain Radicals: HOW CAPITALISM RUINED CRYPTO AND HOW TO FIX IT (Repeater). We talk about how the left has ceded the future of technology and lessons they can learn from the past. This interview is deeply optimistic and dispels many of the myths and hangups the left has abou…

Counter-Populism is the political project of our moment: measures introduced as Counter-Terrorism have been turned against dissenting members of domestic populations on the left and right. Journalist Matt Taibbi takes us on a barnstormer journey from the ‘Russiagate’ conspiracy against Trump and the anti-antisemitism campaign against Corbyn, the ri…

In this episode I spoke to my friend and scholar Tara Merk who is part of BlockchainGov and has been focusing her PhD thesis on Exit to Community (E2C). E2C is proposed as an alternative to IPOs or buyouts for founders of businesses to be able to be compensated for their work while giving ownership of their business to those that work on or use the…

PART 1! of our monster breakdown of the latest release from Bob Dylan: ‘The Complete Budokan, 1978’. Jack Frayne-Reid joins us from the Reel Politik podcast to… decline to discuss the afterlife of populism and the ordeal of Corbynism, but instead to analyse some great music. PART 2 is exclusive to our Patreon subscribers. The Patreon-exclusive PART…

In this episode I spoke to Geert Lovink, a Dutch media theorist and founder of the Institute of Network Cultures who has been engaged with internet culture since at least the 80s. We were recently together in Cyprus for the latest installment of MoneyLab, which he also co-founded. Talking with him was a great way to gain more understanding and cont…

Joe Guinan returns! From Cleveland to Preston, Joe is one of the most rigorous theorists and practitioners of 21st century socialism as ‘community wealth building’, and the pro-Brexit wonk who shaped Corbynism’s best policies. Our Thanksgiving Special rattles through the #UKFiles revelations on the relation between the Centre for Countering Digital…

New kinds of protest and direct action against weapons manufacturers and the Democratic Party, Israel propaganda fails, and the biggest propaganda fail of all… TikTok Zoomers getting into Osama bin Laden. All on the docket with investigative journalists Olly Haynes (Novara Media, Guardian, Dissent), and Matt Kennard (Declassified UK). Additional in…

Following TPS179’s account of how Gaza is changing the left,Rhyd Wildermuth returns for an analysis of its developing effect on the right: from Candace Owens’s breaking ranks against Israel, House Speaker Mike Johnson sharing his browsing history with his son, Vivek Ramaswarmy’s Republican debate remarks, the Jordan-Petersonification of anti-antise…

In this episode I spoke with Brett Scott, an independent scholar, writer, and defender of physical cash from a left point of view. Brett was involved in the early Bitcioin communities and one of the first guests of the podcast back in 2020 so it was nice to be able to talk to him again after so many years and since his latest book Cloudmoney was pu…

Following Claire Fox's appearance on The Popular Show last year, James was invited to 'The Battle of Ideas', the Spiked-connected event for political and cultural debate promising 'free speech allowed'. The event has an aura of notoriety on the left, and back in 2010, Jenny Turner described something of its oddness and agenda in the pages of the Lo…

If COVID-19 carried forms of propogandisation and securitisation developed for foreign policy into the domestic sphere, the Ukraine war showed us what they look like when brought back to war. To continue joining the dots into a new crisis, University of Leicester's Tara McCormack returns to discuss Israel's plans for Gaza, protest and free speech i…

Egyptian activist and writer Nihal El Aasar joins us to discuss Gaza's neighbour Egypt's place in Israel's plans, the history of Israeli-Egyptian relations, and how Egyptian and other Arab elites are reacting to popular and activist feeling towards Palestine in the region. Help us develop The Popular Show and get the full video version of this show…

In this episode we spoke to Wassim Alsindi, founder of MIT's blockchain journal and the 0xSalon research collective based in Trust in Berlin. During the discussion we spoke about the concepts explored in his pieces Prophet Motives & Knightwork States and Necroprimitivism Rising. Wassim makes interesting connections between, the Crusades, the zero-s…

During this last Crypto Commons Gathering I had the pleasure to meet Zachary Marlow from the Moneyless Society Podcast. We had the idea of recording a joint podcast with Zachary leading to talk about post-capitalism, crypto, and money. The discussion was also recorded in video format which you can find here on the Moneyless Society Podcast YouTube …

In this episode we spoke to Monty Merlin Bryant, a co-founder of ReFi DAO and environmentalist to discuss the movement behind ReFi or Regenerative Finance. ICYMI, ReFi DAO had previously started to declare itself a network state but has since learning more about coordi-nations, have shifted course towards our conceptual framework instead. We discus…

Dissecting the Gaza crisis, Zionism, liberal exhaustion and their backstory in the Cold War's reactionary liberal intellectuals, with the great historian Sam Moyn. Prof Moyn's new book is Liberalism Against Itself: Cold War Intellectuals and the Making of Our Times. Help us develop The Popular Show and get the full video version of this show PLUS m…

SOAS's Professor Gould joins us to discuss the Gaza crisis, the recent acceleration of the clampdown on free speech and protest in the West, the materialist approach to antisemitism, and her own brush with cancellation for her criticisms of Israel. Help us develop The Popular Show and get the full video version of this show PLUS many extra exclusiv…

Previously exclusive to Patreon subscribers. The passage from expropriation to exploitation - the seizing of value by force, to its being drawn from nominally freely offered paid labour - is, for Marx, the passage to capitalism. Yet the first of the "exes" never quite goes away. Legendary socialist feminist and Marxist theorist Nancy Fraser joins T…

David and James jump on to discuss MAGA's unprecedented defenestration of the House of Representatives, Kamala's role in the power struggle within the Democrats, the Tory Party's extremely online conference AND the latest hit job on Roger Waters. Help us develop The Popular Show and get the full audio and video versions of this show PLUS many extra…

In this episode we spoke to co-founder of DAO Stack now working on Common, Matan Field who joined us at Zuzalu. During the discussion we talk about the need for scaling collective action, using fractal organization, and moving beyond economically based interdependence. Check out a previous episode to learn more about our framework for out network s…

In this episode I spoke with Scott Moore, the co-founder of Gitcoin and Public Works. Scott was one of the pioneers in public goods funding through quadratic funding and DAOs. During the discussion we talk about the "everything is coordination" meme, his advice for starting a DAO, and open source development. We also talk about our differences in v…