Stranded Technologies Podcast

Niklas speaks with Michael Gibson , co-founder and General Partner at 1517, a VC firm that backs dropouts, renegade students & deep tech scientists at the earliest stages. Michael is the author of the book “Paper Belt on Fire - The Fight for Progress in an Age of Ashes”, coming out on November 8, 2022 ( pre-order on Amazon ). Michael dropped out of his philosophy PhD program and was then picke...

Niklas speaks with Sandra Carillo , the Professor in charge of Cannabis Research and Education, Faculty of Medicine at the University of Panama. Sandra has been advocating and promoting the use of medical cannabis as an educator, advisor to policymakers, and a medical doctor treating 1.500 patients in Colombia. Cannabis for medical use is a great example of a stranded technology. It's prohibited b...

Niklas speaks with Joseph McKinney, the CEO of the Catawba Digital Economic Zone (CDEZ). The CDEZ is the Is the first jurisdiction within the United States created for fintech and digital asset growth. Governance is possibly the most stranded technology imaginable. The governance industry, typically run by state governments around the world, is roughly 40% of global GDP and has gotten more expensi...

Niklas shares some of his own thoughts and insights after 3 months of podcasting. He starts with Adam Smith's 1776 masterpiece "The Wealth of Nations". Smith believes in the best case, humanity could produce 3-4x than what he observed in the present day. What happened is that more like a 30-40x improvement. In 1930, John Maynard Keynes reasoned that response was a compounding interest of 2% annual...

This is a special episode. Niklas has a free-flowing conversation with Trey Goff, the CMO and Chief of Staff of Prospera, the startup city in Honduras. If there is such an industry as “network states”, “network societies” or “startup cities”, Trey is one of the most influential executives in the field. Governance is possibly the most stranded technology imaginable. The governance industry, typical...

Niklas talks with Raymond J. March, the Director of fdareview.org at the Independent Institute, public policy and public choice fellow at the American Institute for Economic Institute and assistant professor for economics at North Dakota State University. Entrepreneurs are often taught the incentives of investors but rarely do they learn how the incentives of public bureaucracies work. However, in...

Niklas talks with Tom W. Bell. Tom is a professor of law at Chapman University, and the author of books such as “ Your Next Government - From Nation States to Stateless Nations ” and “ Intellectual Privilege: Copyright, Common Law, and the Common Good ”. For anyone interested in startup cities, network states and competitive governance, Tom is someone you must know. Tom is the engineer of the lega...

Niklas talks with Michael Strong, the founder and CEO of The Socratic Experience , an online school that helps students ages 8-19 discover and develop their unique genius and prepares them for success in the 21st century. Michael is the author of books including “The Habit of Thought: From Socratic Seminars to Socratic Practice”. He is one of the most experienced designers of innovative school pro...

Niklas talks with Bart de Witte, Founder of Hippo AI, a non-profit that fights for making medical knowledge openly available and AI-based healthcare a common good. Hippo AI, for example, aggregates and cleans datasets from individual and institutional data donations. This means making data available without reward for open-source usage that benefits communities or society at large, such as the use...

Niklas talks with Jessica Flanigan, Associate Professor at the University of Richmond. Jessica's research addresses the ethics of public policy, medicine, and business. Jessica is the author of two books. In "Pharmaceutical Freedom" (Oxford University Press, 2017), she defends rights of self-medication. In "Debating Sex Work" (Oxford University Press, 2019), she defends the decriminalization of se...

Niklas talks with Robin Hanson , Associate Professor of Economics at George Mason University, and Tom Bennett, Founder & CEO of Futuur , a prediction market where you can trade on future events with play money or crypto. Robin is the world's foremost expert on prediction markets. He introduces the ideas behind prediction markets and highlights the potential of prediction markets to fundamental...

Niklas talks with Simone Azevedo, CEO and Co-Founder of Xingu Health, and Henk Schuring, Chief Regulatory and Commercialization officer at Prilenia Therapeutics. We talk about the right of patients to access medical drugs not approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Why would patients want to take non-approved medical drugs? Patients of rare diseases often have few options. So they...

Niklas talks with Sean Pawley, CEO and Founder of Seshat Bank and Rasheed Griffith, COO and Chief Compliance Officer of Merkle Hedge. Sean has founded an API-first commercial bank for Latin America. He talks about his journey from East Africa to Central America, and how he uses the novel regulatory regime on Prospera Honduras to innovate in key areas for banking. Notably, he talks about the "Pawnb...

Niklas, the founder if Infinita Fund, introduces the podcast. He talks about the thesis of "stranded technologies", why they present a massive opportunity to unlock innovation, and why it's important to talk about ethics and mitigating risks. Join the community to discuss what’s said in the episodes: Discord: https://discord.gg/Z4H6UjbubK Website: https://www.infinitafund.com/ This is a public epi...