All right, let let's kick this off. I can't take jmo seriously with the cap pfp. Not gonna lie
We'll get things going here in a minute when let some folks trickle in but until we until we get there
I just want to do some mic checks. So not are you with us? I am. Can you guys hear me? Okay. Yes, ma'am. We got you
Sorry about my cat I'm in the market for a pfp. No one has any good ideas
I've been working on trying to get jmo a good pfp since probably last September and
We've we've failed to this point. So we're working on it, you know, we went mad lads to
Tensorian to I had a quick and then I put a hat on my quick
Awesome. Well, I'm excited to get after this
Well, just maybe a quick little flag for anyone who's listening
I pinned a tweet just to be able to share the space
And so if you think of anybody that you want to share this with or you want to tweet or whatever else
Please feel free to do that. You can also drop comments if you're listening on your phone
There's a little button on the bottom, right?
And if yeah, we'll ultimately like go all over the place here because this is gonna be a bit more on the personal side
But if you have questions, we'll try and loop those in for jmo as well. Just feel free to drop those in there
And yeah, I think we can just kick it off. I feel like people will trickle in and stuff but ultimately
This is just yeah exciting to have you on here, man. What what we're hoping to do is
Explore like more of the individual side
Like we have done a whole bunch of spaces together as a panel talking about venture and markets and crypto and we chat
Async as well and we're missing our kind of fourth partner in crime in smack
But we wanted to just give a yeah take a bit of a different approach here and spend some time
Chatting about you jmo and your backstory and kind of offer a little bit more of that personal side
To inform, you know all the other crypto takes and and such
So yeah, if you're cool with it, I would like to start just with an intro question assuming
You know someone in here may have never heard of you before
Let's do the pre-crypto story
What is like, how did you get to where you are? But before crypto maybe linger on on college or city effectively? Who are you man? I?
Love it. Yeah, definitely
Not a traditional path to the space so happy to touch on it
I think I guess, you know growing up in high school
All I was trying to do was play basketball and talk to girls
Had a triple legacy to Stanford but got rejected
undergrad in Atlanta went to Emory University and while I was there I really started to dig in on startups and
While a lot of the people at my school traditionally
You know, it's a small liberal arts school where if you go there either in finance
Looking to be an investment bank or a consultant or you're gonna be a doctor and anyone else
Like even while there is not immediately focused on those areas
I think you know, you're kind of the oddball out and so for me
I just like quickly realized just the traditional investment banking path wasn't gonna be interesting for me while I was excited about, you know paid internships and
Allocating, you know capital. I didn't know anything about like the movement behind finance
and how it actually could make a difference in people's lives and so I
Ran an impact investing group while I was in college and we crowdsourced
Female immigrant entrepreneurs in the Atlanta community and the entire purpose was to close something called the micro business gap which
Researchers in our business school like, you know studied
Underserved communities and found just a massive difference between affluent and underserved communities was just the lack of capital
Recirculating within the ecosystem. And so we were really you know, giving out debt investments to female entrepreneurs
Looking to do just that and while I was there I like connected with a lot of
Accelerators and startups in the Atlanta community and we kind of partner with these startups and like the mayor of Atlanta his office
And like filter them out help them build up their credit
So they could then go and get a loan from a bank so spend some time doing that
And while I was really really interested in impact investing. I also was like just fascinated by
like doing finance at the highest level and
Looking at things that were the most asymmetric
That was something that always like stood out to me is like if you can have a longer term horizon or spend a lot more time
Going deep into an area. How can I develop an edge? And so I did
sales and trading as an internship before
graduating college and specifically I did distress credit which if you're not familiar with distress credit is like the most esoteric, you know
product you can trade when it comes to
You know credit markets. It's really looking at I think the old historic example is like looking at something where you know
Energy company might have debt that quote-unquote has gone bad, right?
They don't have the cash flows to pay for the debt
But some investor comes in who dug through all the docks and on the last page of the hundredth legal document
He found out these bonds are actually covered at par, right? They might be covered at 100 cents on the dollar
So it really it's was the only trading desk at Citigroup where I worked that had you know lawyers on the desk
And so really I while I was there
I was like, you know, this is cool. We're gonna get the big bank is awesome
I personally thought my path of going to your best was kind of comfy
But I I quickly realized that
You know working out of the sell side you never really have autonomy over your thoughts
You don't have as much upside and you especially are kind don't have a chance to really set a narrative that you believe in
Started to look for new opportunities came across the current fund. I'm at the churning group
And the churning group is kind of a decade old
Consumer investing fund on one side we invest on the other side
We have an entity called North Road Productions and North Road has one of the largest, you know
First look deals with Spotify and Netflix. It's a really well-established TV movie production studio. They did love is blind
The Kanye Westock the David Beckham doc we've seen you that any of those ESPN 30 for 30s
Find a fund that was investing in things that I genuinely cared about and I felt that you know
If you're passionate about something your ceiling and your energy to solve problems and take the next step or just so much higher
If not unlimited and so I was really passionate about the work. They were doing a TCG
Was able to take the fundamental and investing skills. I learned at City and apply them to areas like consumer
Go to market stuff like that. And so that's kind of how I made the transition all the way up to eventually getting into crypto
Man, this is a great there's so many threads we could pull on here
But I feel like as I listen to you speak anyway
My sense is there's a lot of precursors to the way that you act in crypto, right?
Like the distress credit side of things is like effectively the shit coins of traditional finance
Being open to like really esoteric and random stuff
And then the kind of impact investing side has a venture flavor to it. Of course, it's not quite the same
But so much of it is like people and qualitative oriented stuff mixing with finance
And so I can see your your skill set there
What like but beyond the professional side, what's the kind of personal bridge into crypto?
Like what was your first experience there? What did you buy? What did you make money on lose money on?
And any of that story would be fun
Yeah, man. I mean I was like a lot of other people where I first used Bitcoin to buy fake ideas in college
Like didn't really entertain or look much at the space until I had
You know a senior while I was a sophomore a good friend start, you know
Telling me about XRP and Cardano and altcoins and my first reaction it was after I was like first learning about
You know penny stocks and things like that. I was like, oh, these are literally the penny stocks of
Crypto but for me what something I always understood is that like the market and the outcomes are just going to be so much larger
And anything we'd seen before
Given this market was really 24-7 and global
So I just immediately was attracted to the fact that I could try to make money in this
I didn't understand anything about the ideology
Or like how the technology actually worked. I just ate
Cardano at the absolute top
From there just kept paying attention
And was just like I had a chance to really, you know buy a lot of aetherium earlier on
And seeing aetherium outperform while we know what happened to Cardano
Pushed me to drive to think deeper about why I missed the trade and what was actually was going on in the crypto space
So I was I was a novice for a while. Even while I was on the trading desk
I would continue to just look at price action
But I didn't really dig into any of the philosophy behind the space probably until the pandemic
Then I'm just like chuckling away well-muted year because I feel like that's the story that everyone everyone has a version of what talk
Did you buy to kind of like join crypto? Where did you lose your money? Like where's tuition paid, right?
Yeah, tuition paid is a great way to put it
Okay, cool, I guess I'll jump in here a little bit I am I
something I would love to pick your mind about JMO is like
why what made you want to go into capital allocation and investing because it sounds like there was like a
little bit of that even as far back as college and you
Seem like you were approaching a lot of stuff with like this kind of investor mindset before you got into that space specifically
but I'm really curious like why the capital allocation in particular and then
maybe a side piece of that is like did you consider any other career paths or like were you just kind of
That's such a great question that because like my junior year
I became I was like so obsessed with investing like after a night out with my friends
Whatever I would like come home drunk and watch investor archives videos until 4 a.m
Truly like people are like I'm I like live and breathe capital allocation as much as I possibly can
I think there's two two parts of it that boil down to me for why it's interesting
The first is I truly believe it's a way to vote with your you know with your feet with your dollars as they say
with like institutions corporations
Like people who we trust and don't trust right like the graphic trust for every single major country and corporation is just going down
And that's like a non-stop trend. And so I felt instead of like, you know
While it's one place to just complain about how people are not doing right by others
I really was just inspired by the fact that if you really want to create change
You can help fund people trying to create and enable that change and that for me was like a clear path in my mind
Um to like use my time and capital efficiently, so I love allocating it to try and create a larger outcome
And then the second part I love is just I really feel like it's the ultimate mind game
I I don't think there's any other field in the world where you know everything from
Nvidia earnings to a meme token to like
Climate change right can all impact the price of something
And there's a way to trade that all in this asset class
And so I I think if you're genuinely fascinated by what's going on around you in any pocket
It's helpful to just understand how investors like position
According to those kind of catalysts. So for me a capital allocation has always just been a
Work almost like a way of life that I just find kind of soothing. Maybe that's a sicko perspective
Actually love that because I always used to tell people like the thing that attracted me to investing was like it was almost like
a kind of like psychological training like how much like psychological control and discipline like can I
Cultivate for myself, and I think I'll take your point like
Being good at life and being good at investing like a lot of those skills carry over like one-to-one
Relationships critical thinking like it's it's an underrated point. I think actually but okay cool
I kind of related to that actually is the question of like
You're now that you're on the inside obviously you you you
Went through school you kind you broke into the crypto space like now that you're actually a capital allocator
You've had some time in the space like is there anything about the role that has surprised you?
Being on the inside or maybe in a good way, maybe in a bad way
But just like what's that? What's the Delta between the perception as an outsider and like the reality of actually working in the role today?
Yeah, that's so much in there. It's almost ridiculous. I I guess to start
When I would and I guess it's easier to just compare it
Like the different what the different assumptions and experience what happens
I think in a bull market being an insider
There's a much you're like in whatever group you you know exist
And you're always that person to go to you're the crypto guy in a crypto girl
Whatever group you're in and I think there's always an assumption that you are sitting on alpha
Like no matter what it's like
What is your perspective on this like I want I want to know just because I'm sure you're seeing
You have like a closer purview, and I think people don't realize how often you know when they see investment announcements on the timeline
You know if those were deals done seven eight nine months ago if not longer. I think when they see
making announcements in general
With like investors or hiring people or someone leaving. I think they just typically an assumption of a lot more
Drama going on behind the scenes when I think more often than not
You know people just see narratives online and run with them
And so there there will be things that I like being an insider
You think are not a big deal that you see like posted on Twitter
And you see like every single stretch of the imagination someone is being extreme with their view or reaction
I think it's so funny when like big accounts to the today like big VCs tweet like something wholesome or meaningful like you know
Celebrating a birthday with my grandma or something and the replies are just like like buy like buy milk or buy this new token
I think there's just always the assumption that
VCs within the space have an edge, and I think that really just could not be more further from the truth
So I think I think that's something that I was like
Not aware of I thought it was much
different inside the glass walls
When in reality, I think those are the people who need to be working the hardest to develop edge
I'd say what what has surprised me as well is just if you're really I think in my opinion
Quality across the board try to be thoughtful how you engage and work with people
I really do think that comes back tenfold much more so in crypto than other spaces because you know
To everyone else we are a small echo chamber, and this is like a niche community
And like we attack each other all the time
We're incredibly tribal but even if you disagree with folks in their point of view if you're in and if like in my case
Right ninety nine percent of the cause I'm taking on passing all these companies
For a host of different reasons, but like a lot of times you know if I engage with you
We're not gonna be able to actually do work together
But even in the way you I think you know I try to handle that process
Being straight up about my expectations what I can and cannot do being consistent
But how I'm phrasing things to the most junior person to the most senior person
I really think that goes a really really far away and
By doing that with the C's who send me deals and then also just founders and friends
I've gotten some of my like most attractive investments
Like in things that I'm incredibly convicted in by being in the right position and just kind of being like more agile voice
Who's kind of you know hopefully treat you with respect? I think that is something that is
So rare from a lot of like internal VCs within the space
So I have another question we can jump into unless but I don't want to interrupt
Well, I kind of can I I wanted to ask that one to you
Man this is I don't even know if I should say this publicly
But I mean I'll be I'll be a thousand percent honestly
I am I have a similar background from Jmo in the sense that like I came in from a bit of an untraditional
Sense even maybe more so than you because I didn't come from a traditional finance or engineering background
But I was joking in our group chat that I I I said that like being a crypto for the last year has single-handedly
gotten rid of my imposter syndrome because I don't know like I
From the outside in I was just like a lurker on crypto Twitter before I came into the space and I was just like wow
like these people are so smart and I just and now that I've been in the space for a while, I'm just like
You know, I don't know like there's a lot of really incredible talented people
No doubt, but it's just that it's not there's a lot more smoke and mirrors on the inside and it looks like from the outside
So and I you know, that's probably a lot of things
but I I tell people like I was just coaching a kid last week who's trying to break into the industry as an analyst and I
Do not like get into this thing of like waiting other people's opinions more than yours like
Leave that at the door especially in crypto because it will serve it won't serve you at all have humility and be intellectually honest
Just don't put people on a pedestal above yourself intellectually
So that's my two cents on that
Yeah, I feel like when you see inside the ship probably relevant for most industries honestly
But crypto just I guess the one that we're playing in being the most relevant. It's like
Impressive to me how little most people have it together. You're like, wow, this entire business runs on an Excel sheet
Or like wow, this code base is run by a contractor
like there's just a not there's not a lot of
Me. Let me think about what I want to say. I think we see
like a barrier between ourselves and like the professional out there or like the big fancy firm or whatever and you just realize like
I think crypto does this. Well, there's actually not a huge gap between you and that
Like in the the hierarchy has collapsed when new industries come out and crypto really feels like that
That was giving me an example. I won't I don't remember who it was, but someone who kind of jumped in, you know
tweeted wrote stuff and then within six or twelve John Sharpenaw
Yeah, go people who don't know go look at John Sharpenaw's LinkedIn this man has been in crypto for like
I don't think but he just came in was sharp did his homework and now he's prolific he runs a fund and
I just think that kind of speaks volumes as to what's possible when you just like come in do your work not concerned too much
About what people are saying. So absolutely. I
Love that I also think it's like it's even more advantageous in crypto versus other industries because
Of how reflects of the industry is and structurally like still how early and nascent it is
Like a helpful framework someone pitched me
The start of last cycle was like we're literally seeing the fangs of tomorrow
Like built in front of us today and we are on the ground floor of that experience
So like it's never been more important to contribute reach out participate
And like you mentioned that be intellectually honest based on what you're seeing and the work you're doing so I completely agree
Yeah, I guess um, oh yeah go ahead Ben
Yeah, I can jump in I guess there's a couple questions that would be fun
Maybe we go not quite speed round, but let's try and hit a few here and get some of Jmo takes out for the audience
What okay, so first like what's an early bet that you made in your career?
I'm thinking on the venture side that went well and what's an early bet that went poorly and to the extent that you want to
Explain why please feel free
It's a good question early bet that went well I'd say is
My investment because I'm gonna do an investment announcement about that one
I'll share instead one that went poorly when that went poorly was I mean, it's still very early
the execution here is what I've kind of I have questions around but um
MBA NFT protocol I'll say
But the reason I think that one went poorly was
Totally just like outside of the project the team or the execution. I think I was just on the wrong side of the
Of the deployment cycle like I think people say, you know in Coinbase is the number one app and the app store
Right. Those are the signs of it's really a global top not a local top
And you want to that's when you just be selling and getting liquid on assets
We're kind of regardless of what it is in the crypto space. And so I think
That investment while there's still a lot
Long run or see what the team can do our just basis there was much higher than I would like and one that went really
Well, I think was the complete opposite of that. It was a payments company on Solana
The reason it was so interesting was because it was during a bear. So there's
It was really the time for thesis work and we had a really really strong thesis about you know
Being able to leverage blockchains the form of payment and specifically using Solana as you know, the most performant chain
And then we were really able to like go through the space and find founders and teams that made us really comfortable
And I think when you find a team that you know, you're really excited about
Who you're like who you know, you're your fun fits the mandate
I think what I tell a lot of founders is like check size won't
Dictate how much attention you get from your investors
I think it's check size relative to the fun size is really really indicative of what the relationship is gonna look like
And something that's like understated and so the check size for this payment company was right down the alley for us
and the thesis when like the team we're really really excited about so I think
it went really well because we were aware of where we were at in the cycle and we were really thematic and I think though
It's that just allows you to kind of waver any of the uncertainty
Well said man, that's that's super helpful
I really I didn't realize I didn't think in advance of asking that question that there might be some sensitivity around naming things
But I appreciate the color
I'll drop you two more and then we'll go back to that
What's like your highest absolutely highest conviction area that is related to crypto right now and why?
For me probably the highest conviction area related to crypto
D-pen like I I have for me like a hundred percent confidence that there will be a
D-pen solution that goes viral at some point in the future
for me, the reason I'm a hundred percent confident is because
Deep like it really flexes a new business model
Like specifically for someone like helium the ability to bootstrap a network solve the cold start problem
Things that previously were incredibly prohibitive to entering a market. That's like the ultimate test of a new business model
And so I think new business models
Mixed with crypto or something like the strongest use cases that cannot be
Kind of you know, I'll be skated away
I'll let you stop and go now and feel free
Yeah, I am totally agree with that point
I actually would like to like slightly rewind and unpack like the whole
you obviously choose to go into a more of consumer focus fund even though you had more of like a
You know tradify background in some respects. So curious what drove you the consumer route and then you know contextualizing that today
like how do you think about what it takes to be a
Top consumer investor like this things from just B2B tech or just infrastructure like being a top consumer founder
Like how do you how do you think about what that looks like?
Really really the heat questions and that I love it. I think
For sorry, I'll take the second one first, I guess
All right, I actually go in order but for me consumer was interesting because I knew I was so excited about
Like the practice of allocating capital, but my job at Citi was just like so
Exhausting and I was I for me. I realized I was like wow. I really love how this is being used
I hate the subject area like my first major week on the desk was when PG&E filed for bankruptcy in January
2019 and I remember like spending hours and hours looking at these docs and like talking to clients and
Then my mom called me and she was like, how's your day?
And it was like I was trying to explain to her this situation and it's your mom
She's always gonna put an effort to talk to you. But I was like, this is the last thing I want to talk about
So for me consumer immediately attracted
Like the most interesting parts of my brain because it was applicable to everyone who I knew and myself
like being able to work on something like bar stool or or rings or you know
It's our some of our previous investments with crunchy roll
Like I friends I could immediately text one of my friends like hey, what do you know about anime?
I'm like really spending a lot of time trying to understand this landscape. And so I think
Much more stimulating and like I mentioned earlier had a much higher passion for it
And I really do think a lot of this career stuff comes down to aligning yourself with passions
because you're just gonna have
And so I think what it takes to be a top consumer investor, I think it's a mix of a few things. Um,
On one side I do think you have to definitely think it's important to like use
These products and like actually like which I think immediately separates you from a lot of consumer investors
Because they actually don't take the time
But I think you know using this stuff is important
I also I've mentioned a little bit before but it's you know, I don't want to sound like a broken record, but I think
Like being intellectually honest about data and what is in front of you is like massive
I think for a lot of consumer
Do you see things that are kind of like they're really bright lights for a short period of time?
I'm trying to think of like a
Big example is definitely some stuff in like social like there are some ephemeral apps that were really interesting recently
Um, I know, you know David Dobro. He had a social app that rent, you know
It had its moment in the Sun and I think for in consumer investors who stand around they understand that
You know while being able to have an interesting top of funnel is compelling
The organic bottom of funnel that is what really creates a sustainable business. And so that content to commerce
combination I think is like
Essential for consumer really really understanding that I think I read an interesting article today about peloton and how even though they have such a
Wide top of funnel with so many people who are really really engaged and interested in what peloton does their business model
You know losing money on all the hardware
Not really knowing how to monetize superfans are all things that really really hold back the company
ability to actually drive
Like look through funnel conversion and realize the most important metric online that you can measure its conversion
I think is what separates a lot of consumer investors over a long period of time. I
Guess a quick follow-up to that would be like as you as we come into like this whole crypto consumer world
Like is there anything that like you see people in the ecosystem talking about or doing that makes you like?
Like I don't know about that hesitant bearish like as a as a more consumer savvy person looking at
Crypto going through its moment. Like how do you how do you feel watching some of this play out?
You like outside of the Dwight Howard and I have to piece
Yeah, I mean such a good question too, I think a few things there I
Think a lot of big crypto optimizes for short-term games
Because we can so quickly
Space is open source permission lists. Anyone can contribute
Really really easy to optimize or just to have like really short-term time horizon or a lot of your investments
And I think especially when we're in like an uptrend
That's the worst thing you can do is play for short-term games
You really want to be playing for like a longer term outcomes. And so I think a lot of the
Some of this stuff I'm seeing right now
In consumer that is kind of concerning me are consumer native companies
Looking to add infrastructure
Just because that's where you know, these C's are showing more interest right now. I think
You're you could replace infrastructure with AI just you know, six months ago
So I like while those things are like interesting and can be additive to telling a narrative
I can help you win capital
They don't solve the biggest insight for me and it's across investing consumer and B2B
But it's like what is the unique insight and proposition from this business?
What like can you guys do and how are a bunch of smart people looking at the space?
Why are they wrong? And how do you have an edge in a set and doing that?
And so I think a lot of the consumer top of funnel plays trying to build bottom of funnel middle of the funnel
Is more optimizing for short-term wins versus really trying to figure out
How to make something special in the kitchen for that type of funnel application
Another thing that I think is kind of concerning
Is still I think NFT projects looking to monetize all the royalties
think I think that is just like
Not only something that was proven doesn't exist like it's really difficult to maintain
But it's just not sustainable once we go back into a bear, right?
It's not along with that line with that long-term point of view because you just don't have control
Revenue and cash flow in a long-term basis like I for me when I see something like pudgy penguins
Like the most interesting part of that was Luca really trying to take
Control of the narrative and monetize outside of its royalties with you know, obviously amazing IP
so those are some I feel like two trends within a
Consumer right now that are kind of concerning to me and then I try just to cap it off as the points thing
You know, you know, I'm like incredibly bullshit points
And I think points are just gonna be low-hanging fruit across the board
I just but I do believe that we're gonna see a lot of copy pasta and not much innovation
Over how points actually fit into your business model and how you can deliver them in an authentic way
that I think the the devil's in the details for a lot of consumer and
Those are the aspects right now that I'm seeing not enough details from the crypto space
Devils in the details that's that I think that might be the quote of the night for consumer. I love that
Yeah, there's some bangers in there man. Thank you for those takes
I want to zoom out a little bit or maybe just go a bit more generalist
One thing that you kind of mentioned there is just having
almost first principles thinking like when you see a lot of this deal flow where people doing stuff like actually being able to take the
Time to have an opinion and think through like why is this interesting, you know, where is this gonna go?
There's just so much FOMO even in at the venture scale like not just sort of retail degens
And so I'm curious just generally which hopefully will be a little bit more broadly applicable to anyone in the audience
Like how do you think about first principles thinking? Like how do you think about trying to actually make sense of?
Yeah, having your own opinion as the information flow is just so intense in crypto
Curious and maybe just like a selfish question. I'm like actually curious. How do you think about that?
It's funny then because if you like saw me in 2019 or 2020 like I
The first principles I would have been
Thrown into every conversation. Anyway, I I like to think I was a little bit ahead of that one becoming mainstream
What differentiates investors on a long enough time horizon? I think people like kyle samani
and tushar and multi coin
and like nick from one confirmation are all like good examples of
trying to be first principles
It's twofold. It's one part. Don't try to like I think it's don't try to be contrarian just for contrarian's sake
and so like I think a lot of times going against the crowd just because
You like want to be that guy is something we see on crypto all the time
Um, because you know, it'll bring clicks and engagement
Which you know might get you more followers with some small tribe who also loves matic
Or something along those lines. So I think uh, I think that's interesting
Like one part of it is not is actually having a purpose behind your thinking. Um, and then I think
The other I also believe that first principles are important for what they unlock
First principles allow you to get to second order thinking
Um first principle thinking can be like, you know
Right points create more users. That's gonna be like one way to look at like however, you want to think about points
It's like they are bringing more users
Second order thinking is like in my opinion, right? It's like how how do we have points that?
With users that don't churn how do we have like ways to think about a market? Um
That is that can get you to a unique insider point of view, um that distilled down
Really leads to like some form of value capture
so for and I think that's like
Across if you're investing but also in your like my own personal life
I try to apply the concept of just kind of like, you know, when the facts change you have to change
But now that these are the facts
What is going on in front of me?
and and like regardless of how I feel
How does this get me to a place where I like I want to be?
Um and try to understand that like the same way you think about decentralization and it's like something that you can't really compete against
Like you want something to be decentralized for when it guarantees
And so I think when it comes to investing in your personal life, whatever first principles guarantee more peace of mind more clarity of thought
unique unlocks and so uh trying to keep the true north with any kind of first principles, uh
Like point of view. I think it's important
Amazing I just wanted to give you a chance to be a thought boy in public about that
It's it's a funny like it's it's a really important topic
And it's also something that gets talked about too much, especially in investing circles
and so you're a perfect person to kind of thread the needle which is why I wanted to you know,
punt that one to you because
So much of yeah, I don't know. There's just a lot of uh
phrases and words and stuff that that end up becoming meaningless over time because everyone uses it or everyone's like
I'm a first principles thinker. Um, so helpful. Yeah to have that articulated for me, man
Um, one one other question, uh, and then we'll go back to that
I'm curious. This is not related. Just it's more like a general jmo wisdom question
How do you keep track of information flow in crypto specifically?
Um, you have like individual
Like individual connections to so many people you have the fun side. There's just like a flood of stuff
You're not able to sit there and be a researcher all day and just like sit in your mom's basement and understand
What the hell is going on in the industry? So i'm curious like how do you think about prioritization?
Where do you get your information? How do you weigh? What is worth spending time on versus not?
Um any of that would be fun
Yeah, I well, I think one part of it is just
Understanding that if you're full-time in crypto like or just really trying to be immersed
Um, it's going to be overwhelming. You're going to feel like a perpetual state of drowning
Part our partner on the phone. Jared's in new york. I'm in l.a. Um, we have some teams in asia
Uh, like in new zealand in australia. We work with a lot too
Um, and so this at all points of the day and we can write it's just like
I if I look at my phone there are notifications or people asking me
At or like to look at something. Um, and so I think you just have to get comfortable in like that perpetual state
Uh and know that you can like work your way out of it
Like it's okay to be like oh ton of messages. I need to catch up on like inbox zero
I don't think exists in crypto
Personally, I use a lot of bookmark folders
I also use a lot of lists
um of like that i've curated and other people have curated uh, and then a lot of just telegram chats with like
Around like common interest
Uh, so like one might be right for shit coins or the one might be for like gaming
Um another one might be for like, you know, br ar stuff
Um, but I think having the small groups
Also allows you to really use that wisdom of the crowd
Because the only guarantee in my mind the only guarantee is that you're not going to catch everything
You're not going to get every airdrop
You're not going to see every announcement even if you have post notifications on and whatever
So it's just helpful to have that uh that group of people as well as an extension of your brand
I'm actually going to piggyback right off that question and ask you like
Do you experience as someone who's been in the industry especially for like, you know
More than two three years like do you experience narrative fatigue after you know with all these group chats and everything?
And if so, how do you combat that when it does come up?
Yeah, I was just thinking about this earlier today because I spent so much time on
Um and some somewhat in 2023, but mostly only when I was coming at smack. Yeah, I see you smack
Our biggest gaming hater, but uh
I was so sharp on blockchain gaming knew the entire space founders
um business models issues pricing, uh, but then
really ran into a lot of fatigue, uh, just given the need for
These teams to ship and how long it takes for
Um someone to build a game
um, and I think there's always like nuances within any industry that wants to go really deep that increase your fatigue, um
That are just like things that should not be like I think within gaming
One classic one is there always be some guy on the deck who is coming from Activision or like
One of the larger studios, but because there are so many hands in the cookie jar
That this vp of product typically probably never even actually had to like build something, right?
They were just like the fourth or fifth or sixth person along the chain to like approve things and so especially in gaming
really a lack of uh, like
I guess like data integrity around like who did what and so I've like that's been specifically one that i've gotten fatigued over
Or recently, but i'm still really really excited about and so for me the way I try to work through that. Um is
Like of course you can set calendar reminders to like set time
Um, I also go to like revisit and make sure i'm checking in with founders
Either on companies i've passed with but also ones that i'm currently invested in that i'm still really excited about
Dialogue is like what you don't hear in the investor update. That's what's really valuable, too
Um to help you like still see the spark and like why this could be interesting. Um, then I think
Doing the when you do the work really doing it thoroughly because like you can't definitely can't be researching how much you like want to be
Um, but like making sure you have like a clear point of view on what is true and what isn't
So when you start to see news and stuff like that
You can kind of automatically bucket that in your brain of like oh, this is a material change for the space now that we've kind of started
To solve this problem. Um, but yeah, I think the narrative fatigue is like inevitable in crypto
So just have to make sure you're hopefully spending time on stuff. You're you're really excited about
I actually this is this literally just popped up as you were speaking and I think it kind of ties something
We were talking about in our group chat a couple weeks ago. Like
Do you think that diligence is harder in crypto venture?
than in other areas of tech investing or maybe yeah, i'm i'm curious to like unpack that a little bit further
Especially the comment you made around like the the gaming decks and like people not really doing what they said they did like
How do you feel about that?
It's yeah, I I definitely think diligence is becoming much harder to do
It's compounded for a few reasons. Um
One is just like I think we've talked about in the group chat before the nuance of infrastructure
You're up to like the new set of assumptions
I like to call it because past cycle there were like a set of assumptions around l2s or scalability or throughput
And now it's like what are the next form of assumptions that we're making around around like restaking and uh modular infra
Um, and so I think uh those these next level of assumptions are just more technical. Um, they're based on more like research. So, uh
Understanding what is true and what is not there. It's just really difficult because at the end of the day, right?
These are assumptions. They're not like definitive. Um
I I think in one sense it's gotten harder from that perspective, but also easier
um in this in the perspective that
There I don't think there are
Overwhelming amount of funds that are really really thematic
Have done the work to understand why that thesis matters
Um and can actually deploy against it. I think a lot of folks
Still take a spray and pray approach
Um, especially like larger folks
Uh in the space like just according to their fund mandate. They just have to have four or five bets within wallets
And so I think that just makes them it makes it more like fair weather and difficult
like have conviction and so I think um
given the lack of people who I think are really really keen in on a
Serious thematic approach to researching this space. Uh, it's easier if you can't take that time
It took me a minute to get that dunk on the wallets I was like only half paying attention just trying to get some water
Um makes it makes sense man
Uh, I want to ask you a version of like the peter teal question
Which is basically like what do you believe about crypto that you think most people would probably disagree with you on?
Um can be about anything could be about venture. It could be just about the tech
It could be kind of you could take it anywhere
But curious. Yeah, like what's something that's unconventional that you would believe or subscribe to that?
Um, yeah that comes to mind
When you say I just want to clarify when you say uh
That someone might disagree with me with do you think like is that the bulk of crypto or people outside the space or could be
Yeah, this could it could be either. I meant it in terms of crypto people
Um, but feel free to take it in either direction essentially like what do you have a minority opinion on?
I mean it's tough because my ordinals play has already started to come come true
I I guess i'll go outside of crypto then i'll go in crypto. I guess outside of crypto. I really do believe that um
The outcomes that we will see
Will just be so much larger than people have ever fabbled
I true like I truly believe that
The internet has just given us
That you know that you have
So much supply of goods and services and access to them in ways you didn't have before
And so people thought you know 1.5 or 2 million dollars or whatever for nft was crazy. It's gonna get so
Much crazier and so much like stranger this next cycle because we'll actually have more use cases
Like d pen things that show the benefit of the tech
Bringing forth new business models
And then we're all then now we're gonna have to have that supercharged by influx of capital
Um, so I really I firmly believe that this max of just this mix of distribution and ownership
Um is we're still in the second inning of i'd say for people within crypto
Uh, I still really firmly believe people are sleeping on the importance of mobile
I I think like friend tech has come and gone
Uh for the most part, maybe there are still some bros
Like you'll notice a lot of the way I talk about this stuff is like structural things that I don't think are
Like gonna change anytime soon
um, and I really firmly believe that
The fact that everyone in the world
Accesses it like technology through their mobile through a mobile device
And they have the strongest product market fit with digital infrastructure giving the lack of physical infrastructure
We are over indexed as a space on the importance of mobile
Um in mobile based use cases. So those are those are two maybe not as spicy, but uh, i'm pretty confident in them
Totally man, I wasn't expecting like give me your biggest bull case for crypto and pump my bags as as kind of the
Reframed question, but I appreciate the energy
Those are both good jokes aside
I feel like most traditional tech and finance people still don't get crypto at all
And so I I would agree on it being still like unironically kind of early
And the whole world runs on mobile and most crypto stuff still really isn't oriented that way
So I think those are those are some things I would agree with you on
Um, I just want to pause we're gonna wrap up at the end of the at the top of the hour here
If people have questions, uh, feel free to either like drop those as comments on the space dm me
Well, we can loop these things in
Um and just ask jmo directly
Um, but yeah, we're gonna you know, ask one or two more questions here and then look to to wind down after that
Just wanting to flag for anyone who might have just joined
Well, I can um jump in and ask a I guess a meta parting question
I guess i'd love to know like a good way to kind of maybe wrap it up would be like what is the hardest part of being
Like all the things that are within your purview your jurisdiction as an investor
Like what what for you is the most challenging part of doing what you do?
I this is gonna sound super trite, but it's really just not enough. Uh, you know time in the day
Am like i'm right now. I'm like healing my ankle because I like almost fractured my ankle, uh, two weeks ago
hoping my men's league game
Um, I was getting buckets too. I was putting up putting up right double double
uh, i'm just incredibly thankful as i've been like healing that you know, I still get to run full speed at my job and
Work with so many incredible people talk to people who are like are dedicated to things who are willing to give you the time
um, and like it's really explained to you like your five
Try and get this tech in the hands of like people who need it
Right, like we we joke about a lot of this stuff
But like stablecoin offer ramp like that is a material difference in so many countries and that's just the start of use cases
Uh, yeah, I just wish I had more time in the day to actually um go deeper and build my conviction
Feel that heavily heavily
Yeah, I agree that's partly why I wanted to ask you the the kind of information flow question because so much of it is just
um everyone who wants to be
A curious person right like the industry's just got so many interesting things going on that it's hard to
Keep track of the information flow at all little and actually do something like run a fund or build a business or any of the
Um, so so much of it just is like priorities. Hey
Um, cool. Well, it doesn't look like we have any other questions from from folks though
Maybe last call if there's anything please feel free to hit me up
Really grateful for your time here, man. I think
Uh, it's going to be an interesting
You know, we we were just chatting before the space
I think it's going to be an interesting like especially three to five years here
um, and so just an encouragement to
Everyone who's listening in to to follow jamo and follow tcg
I think like there's some of the sharper thinkers in in the space, especially on consumer stuff and we're really in that phase of crypto
Where there there isn't a lot of stuff out there yet that everyone's using
But I think a year from now if we rerun this conversation there will be
Um, and these are the kind of people that will help steward that segment of crypto along
Um, so yeah, just one one big, uh, shout out to you man. Thanks so much for coming through
Thank you everybody for for listening in as well
Um, and yeah, we'll we'll wrap it up here in a second
Thank you guys really appreciate it
Great take care. Okay. Have a good night. Bye