A group of crypto folks online are congregating with intent to bid on a first edition printing of the US Constitution in an auction.

From the FAQ:

We’re buying the US Constitution.

For the first time in thirty-three years, one of thirteen surviving copies of the Official Edition from the Constitutional Convention will be publicly auctioned by Sotheby’s. It is the only copy that is still owned by private collectors. The proceeds from the auction will be given to a charity that has been established by the current owner.

ConstitutionDAO is a DAO that is pooling...

🏦 Understanding Financial Institutions

Arnold Kling has an interesting point this week in reference to decentralized finance. He argues that for DeFi to work, we need folks that understand the moving parts on two complex fronts: crypto and the financial system. Many folks on each side don’t deeply understand the other:

Marvin Ammori understands more than I ever will about decentralized finance (DeFi). Indeed, there are thousands of young techies who understand DeFi better than I do.

But I bet that in order for DeFi to work, you need...

🗯 Well-Behaved Bubbles Often Make History

Byrne Hobart wrote this piece in the inaugural edition of a16z’s new publication, Future. On bubbles and their downstream effects:

Bubbles can be directly beneficial, or at least lead to positive spillover effects: The telecom bubble in the ’90s created cheap fiber, and when the world was ready for YouTube, that fiber made it more viable. Even the housing bubble had some upside: It created more housing inventory, and since the new houses were quite standardized, that made...

I’ve gone over off the deep end the last couple weeks trying to wrap my head around DeFi. To date I’ve only dabbled in crypto, being lucky enough to ride some small waves, though nothing life-changing.

DeFi (decentralized finance) is fascinating for its disruption potential (and Ethereum platform on which it’s all built). A basic understanding of the conceptual possibilities shows this stuff is here to stay, even if not in the same form or as loud as meme-ish as it’s been over the past year.

Through Twitter I discovered a channel called Finematics that has a ton of great...