Endgame with Amanda Cassatt

What if aging and reproduction were engineering problems, not biological limits? In this episode, Amanda Cassatt sits down with AthenaDAO founder Laura Minquini to unpack how reproductive biotech could transform same-sex reproduction, family structures, and the future of population growth. Laura explains how AthenaDAO and the DeSci movement are using crypto to fund research that has previously not...

What is the future of Arbitrum now that L1 Ethereum is becoming scalable? In this episode, Amanda Cassatt sits down with Offchain Labs and Arbitrum co-founder Steven Goldfeder. Arbitrum began as Ethereum’s scaling answer, borrowing its security to add more bandwidth, faster confirmations, and better UX. As Ethereum solves the scalability problem that was Arbitrum's original raison d’être, Stev...

What happens when crypto stops optimizing purely for profit and starts optimizing for people, planet, and long-term coordination? In this episode, Amanda Cassatt sits down with Gitcoin founder Kevin Owocki to discuss Ethereum’s public goods, swallowing the Green Pill, and what onchain coordination will look like in the future. Owocki maps the cultural fault lines inside Ethereum: the libertarian a...

Crypto was supposed to be the escape hatch. So why does it increasingly feel like it’s being absorbed by the very systems it set out to challenge? In this candid conversation, Amanda Cassatt sits down with cyberpunk crypto lawyer Gabriel Shapiro about the “fintech-ization” of crypto, where the industry stands in the post-Gary Gensler era and the fading relevance of the four-year cycle. Is crypto a...

Is crypto’s biggest rival artificial intelligence?  As AI absorbs talent and capital, it’s not clear yet if crypto and AI are competing or converging but crypto’s focus on human agency may matter more than ever in an automated world. Amanda Cassatt is joined by Aaron Wright, crypto lawyer, former Wikia general counsel and CEO of Tribute Labs, to unpack the battle between crypto and AI and what the...

What if the biggest forces shaping crypto today are hidden behind VPNs? In this episode of Endgame, host Amanda Cassatt sits down with Mable Jiang, Trends co-founder, former Multicoin partner and founding member of the Solana Foundation Council,for a rare, unfiltered look at the Chinese and Asian crypto markets — the traders, the memes, the exchanges, and the invisible liquidity that moves the ent...

What happens when the country that taught the world inflation becomes the testing ground for the future of money? In this episode of Endgame, Amanda sits down with Camila Russo, author of The Infinite Machine and founder of The Defiant, to trace how growing up in Latin America shaped her understanding of money, power, and why crypto matters long before the West noticed. Before becoming one of cryp...

In this episode of Endgame, Ethereum Foundation Co-Executive Director Tomasz K. Stańczak joins Amanda to discuss how the organization behind Ethereum is changing. Together they talk about why institutions on Wall Street are now asking for more decentralization, open source, and censorship resistance, and what it means for Ethereum to actively defend its values while staying credibly neutral. Tomas...

In this episode of Endgame, Milk Road’s Co-Owner and Head of Research, Kyle Reidhead, joins Amanda Cassatt to share his take on how crypto works today, across markets, media, and the broader tech cycle. Kyle outlines why he thinks crypto cycles follow global liquidity rather than the Bitcoin halving, and why he believes the surge in AI infrastructure spending could stretch this bull market longer...

What happens when the American empire goes offline? In this episode of Endgame, Amanda Cassatt sits down with Balaji Srinivasan to explore a world run by China and the internet. Balaji outlines the forces driving that shift, from America’s unacknowledged debt spiral and split into “Blue, Red, and Tech America,” to an approaching reality check that will reveal how much value the West has already lo...

What happens when Ethereum staking outperforms U.S. Treasuries? In this episode of Endgame, Alluvial CEO Mara Schmiedt joins Amanda Cassatt to unpack how Ethereum staking evolved from a technical mechanism into the internet’s first native yield. They examine why traditional finance is starting to experiment with onchain systems, how liquid staking tokens are collapsing the boundary between DeFi an...

Silicon Valley is building AI on the wrong assumptions, says Microsoft economist and researcher Glen Weyl. Glen Weyl has spent his life at the intersection of tech and politics and sees a critical gap in tech driven by Bay Area culture, where the voices of religious and culturally grounded communities are almost entirely absent. He argues that this lack of perspective has shaped Silicon Valley’s A...

What if you could choose your child before they’re born? Noor Siddiqui, founder of Orchid, joins Amanda Cassatt to explore one of the most profound frontiers in biotech: genetically screening and selecting embryos during IVF. At the intersection of science, ethics, and the human desire for legacy, this conversation asks how far we’re willing to go to optimize health, reduce suffering, and rethink...

Crypto began as a rebellion against banks, bailouts, and surveillance. But what happens when the same forces it tried to outrun start reshaping the industry from within? Megan Knab, founder of Franklin, joins Amanda Cassatt on Endgame to examine where crypto may be drifting off course. She raises concerns about what happens when privacy disappears, how unbanking and financial exclusion play out in...

➡️Like this episode? Leave a review: https://ratethispodcast.com/endgame It feels like crypto adoption is moving at lightning speed, but is anyone still "in it for the tech"? Eddy Lazzarin, CTO of a16z crypto, joins Amanda Cassatt on Endgame to explore the growing influence of capital markets, and government and regulatory access, in the current landscape, as well as the specific breakthroughs he...

How decentralized AI will win, according to NEAR Founder Illia Polusukhin. Illia Polosukhin, co-founder of NEAR Protocol, joins me on the latest episode of Endgame to challenge everything we think we know about AI. In this episode, Illia explains:  - The dangers of AI being monopolized by corporate interests - Why a user-owned, decentralized model is the way forward - The role of blockchain and co...

What does crypto look like when you strip away the noise and just follow the data? Fredrik Haga, co-founder of Dune, joins Amanda Cassatt for a conversation that cuts through the headlines and into the heart of what’s actually happening onchain. From the slow decline of NFTs to the real traction behind stablecoins and RWAs, Frederik offers an inside look into crypto’s shifting center of gravity an...

Ethereum has always been the foundation for the next financial system. Amanda Cassatt sits down with Grant Hummer, co-founder of Etherealize, to explore why Ethereum continues to be misunderstood, especially by institutions, and what it will take to change that. They go deep on Ethereum’s cultural and economic DNA, from early narrative missteps to what makes ETH uniquely positioned to dominate tok...

What if the real threat to humanity isn’t death, but the belief that life needs to mean something? In this episode of Endgame, Amanda Cassatt and Bryan Johnson explore the architecture of a world where death is optional and meaning might be too. Rejecting first-principles thinking, the problem-solving method rooted in historical patterns and known truths, Bryan proposes zeroth-principles thinking:...

Can a digitally native dollar outcompete the systems that built global finance? Sean Neville,  former Co-CEO and President of Circle, unpacks why stablecoins are not just a side note in crypto, they’re the financial infrastructure quietly reshaping global payments, remittances, and even central bank strategy. Together, Sean and Amanda explore how stablecoins are reshaping global finance, from redu...

Do you think UBI is inevitable in an AI-driven world? Martin Köppelmann, co-founder of Gnosis, Gnosis Safe, and Circles, believes Universal Basic Income isn’t just possible, it’s inevitable. In a world where AI disrupts the job market, he says we won’t be able to rely on states or billionaires to deliver it. In this episode, Martin and Amanda unpack what “basic” income should really mean. He argue...

Could quantum computers destroy Bitcoin? John Lilic, early Ethereum adopter and crypto investor and Stefano Gogioso, quantum computing expert and Oxford lecturer, unpack one of the biggest threats on crypto’s horizon: Q-Day - the moment quantum computers become powerful enough to break the encryption behind Bitcoin, Ethereum, and the entire blockchain ecosystem. Together with Amanda, they dive dee...

What if the future of civilization isn’t in fixing our current systems—but starting entirely new ones? Dryden Brown is the co-founder of Praxis, the ambitious project aiming to build a new city-state from the ground up—one that’s already backed by over $500 million in funding. Dryden shares his vision for a modern Atlantis: a society designed as a refuge from AI disruption and bureaucratic gridloc...

Crypto went from being laughed out of the room in Washington to becoming one of the most aggressive forces in modern lobbying. Now, it’s not just part of the conversation, it’s reshaping the rules from the inside. Kristin Smith, CEO of the Blockchain Association, reveals the real dynamics between crypto and Capitol Hill. Amanda and Kristin unpack how crypto gained power in DC and what it actually...

What do billion-dollar asset managers really think about your token? Pranav Kanade manages Digital Assets Alpha Fund, an actively managed crypto strategy at VanEck, one of the world’s largest asset managers with over $116B in assets under management. In this episode, Amanda and Pranav unpack how traditional finance approaches the space, how they evaluate projects, what good tokenomics actually loo...