Crypto Hipster

Today we begin the Inheriting Saturn Series . This series asks a simple but profound question: When does a system stop belonging to its creator? Using examples from recovery, cryptocurrency, business, and institutional leadership, we explore the people who demonstrated that great systems don't endure because of founders alone—they endure because someone chooses to steward them. In this episode...

Every founder has a beginning. Before blockchain, before digital assets, and before becoming a respected voice in the industry, Agne Linge was simply a young student fascinated by finance and determined to understand how the world worked. In this inaugural Founder's Journey episode of the Crypto Hipster Podcast, we leave token prices and market headlines behind to explore the experiences that...

Every founder begins with ownership. Every enduring system eventually requires stewardship. In this solo episode, I explore one of the most overlooked transitions in entrepreneurship: the moment when what you've built becomes bigger than you. What happens when a company, protocol, community, or movement no longer depends on its creator? Why do some systems thrive after their founders leave whi...

What happens when someone leaves the markets—not because they failed, but because they discovered another way to create? In this episode of Crypto Hipster , I sit down with Simon Mach to explore an unconventional journey from crypto trading to music. We discuss what markets teach us about discipline, conviction, and risk—and how those same lessons can fuel creativity far beyond finance. This isn&#...

After nine years in crypto, I've learned that diamond hands aren't really about holding an asset. They're about holding a standard. In this solo episode, I explore how lessons learned through bull markets, bear markets, scams, losses, recoveries, and uncertainty have shaped the way I approach authorship, marketing, and building a body of work. Why do some marketers get ignored while ot...

Technology has given creators more tools than ever before. Yet many still depend on platforms, algorithms, and audiences to reach the people they hope to serve. Alex Genadinik of SPRK joins me to discuss creators, ownership, community, incentives, and whether the modern creator economy has eliminated the need for permission—or simply changed where it comes from. A conversation about creativity, in...

Technology changes. People remain remarkably the same. In this solo episode, Jamil Hasan explores the question behind his upcoming book People Are People : What happens to us when the systems around us change? Drawing from hundreds of founder interviews, years in crypto, recovery, authorship, health challenges, and family experiences, Jamil examines the human side of technological and societal tra...

What Is Bitcoin Mining Becoming? Bitcoin mining began as a cryptocurrency story. Today, it may be becoming something much larger. Sergii Gerasymovych of EZBlockchain joins me to discuss stranded energy, flare gas, infrastructure development, and why Bitcoin mining increasingly resembles an energy business as much as a crypto business. As industries mature, they often reveal their deeper purpose. T...

What matters when nobody is watching? In this solo episode, I reflect on why integrity matters more than sales, visibility, influence, or convenience. Drawing from recovery, podcasting, and years of interviewing founders, I explore the role integrity plays in building trust, making decisions, and navigating a world increasingly shaped by incentives and narratives. From editing conversations to pro...

Everybody talks about staking as passive income. But underneath that narrative are bigger questions. Who secures the network? Who controls validation? Who holds custody? And what happens when institutional capital arrives? Ryan Haczynski of Global Stake joins me to discuss staking, decentralization, custody, self-sovereignty, institutional adoption, and whether crypto is quietly rebuilding some of...

Everyone seems excited about AI agents. The promise is simple: faster decisions, less friction, more automation. But what happens when those decisions involve real money, real risk, and real consequences? In this episode of the Crypto Hipster Podcast, I sit down with Karym Abdelrakhman, founder of Simplify Labs, to explore the tradeoffs behind automation, infrastructure, and financial decision-mak...

Most people think Bitcoin changed money. I think Bitcoin revealed people. In this solo episode, I reflect on nearly a decade inside the crypto industry and the lessons that emerged from hundreds of conversations with founders, builders, entrepreneurs, and creators. What began as an exploration of Bitcoin ultimately became an exploration of trust, incentives, adaptation, and human nature. Because t...

Can authenticity create trust? In this conversation, Dr. Manny Ahmed of Open Origins explains how his team is building technology to verify the origin and integrity of digital content in an age increasingly shaped by AI-generated media. We explore the distinction between authenticity and provenance, the challenges of verifying historical content, the limits of content authentication, and why trust...

Crypto promised immutable ownership. Real-world law has other ideas. In this episode of the Crypto Hipster Podcast, Jamil Hasan sits down with Faisal Al Monai and Christopher Kelly of droppRWA to explore one of the biggest unresolved tensions inside tokenization and real-world assets: What actually happens when ownership becomes machine-readable infrastructure? From legal title and settlement fina...

Crypto promised freedom. Then speculation consumed the signal. In this solo episode, I explain why I walked away from “corporate crypto” interviews and why The Lost Message became necessary to write. This is not about price charts, tribalism, or recycled narratives. It is about what the original ideas behind Bitcoin, decentralization, sovereignty, and digital ownership were actually trying to prot...

Most people never see the ugliest part of cross-border payments. Builders do. In this episode of the Crypto Hipster Podcast, I sit down with Ran Grushkowsky of MassPay to explore the hidden infrastructure behind global payouts, remittances, compliance, settlement friction, and the operational realities most consumers never think about. We discuss: why cross-border payments remain painfully ineffic...

Privacy in blockchain exists… until it doesn’t. In this episode, Jamil Hasan speaks with Varun Kabra of Concordium about the tension between privacy, identity, compliance, and scalability in modern blockchain systems. Rather than treating identity as the enemy of decentralization, this conversation examines whether structured accountability may ultimately be necessary for blockchain technology to...

What happens when gameplay becomes economic infrastructure? In this conversation with Luke Barwikowski, founder of Pixels, we explore AI-driven rewards, decentralization, digital ownership, and the tension between ideals and practical system design inside Web3 gaming. Because the real question may not be whether players own the game. It may be whether they own their role inside the economy.

For years, the Crypto Hipster Podcast documented builders across the digital economy. But after more than 580 conversations, certain discussions stayed with me long after the recordings ended. Not because they were the loudest. Not because they generated the most views. And not because they were attached to the biggest market caps. They stayed with me because they revealed something deeper underne...

Most AI conversations begin from the assumption that the world already looks digitally uniform. It doesn’t. In this episode, Monti Kgengwenyane and Mithabisi Bokete with OrionX discuss building AI infrastructure across environments shaped by expensive connectivity, fragmented systems, limited digital access and underrepresented data. We explore sovereignty, usability, infrastructure constraints an...

Crypto was supposed to disrupt manufactured credibility. Instead, parts of the industry learned how to manufacture it too. In this episode of Crypto Hipster, Jamil Hasan explores why pressure—not titles, visibility, or polished narratives—reveals who actually understands the systems they speak about. After hundreds of conversations across crypto and the digital economy, the signal became harder to...

Exposure is not ownership. In this episode of Crypto Hipster, Jamil Hasan sits down with Alan Qureshi of Black Lake to examine what happens when real-world assets move onchain — and where the cracks still exist beneath the surface. Because tokenization sounds clean… until you ask the harder question: If the token moves… …does legal ownership move too? This conversation explores the collision betwe...

I’ve been told I picked the wrong day. That Tuesdays are crowded. That I’m going up against bigger shows. Good. Because this isn’t about competing for attention. This episode breaks down the difference between building for launch… and building for longevity. Why most podcasts optimize for spikes— and why I don’t. Tuesdays are for perspective. Thursdays are for conversations. One per week. On purpo...

Most people think crypto’s biggest risk is volatility. It’s not. It’s uncertainty in the data itself. In this conversation, Victor Fei from Ormi and I break down how the data layer works, where it fails, and what happens when systems rely on signals that might not be right. This isn’t about price. It’s about what sits underneath it. Where builders talk freedom, not price.

I didn’t leave X because it failed. I left because I realized something most people still don’t understand: You don’t own your audience. For years, I played the game—posting, engaging, building visibility. It looked like progress. It felt like momentum. But attention isn’t ownership. It’s rented. In this episode, I break down why I stopped chasing distribution—and started building something that c...