Brian Armstrong

Not having a disease sounds like a pretty good enhancement to me.

I mean, there's cases where, like, let's say osteoporosis, right?

So if you have that, it's a disease, right?

But if you had a gene edited to prevent it, you have stronger bones.

Stronger bones sounds like an enhancement, right?

I basically think the line is so blurry that people will start with this for disease prevention and then it'll upgrade over time.

And I think anything's on the table, even IQ or whatever.

It's like, should we have more smart people in the world?

Probably.

I mean, that seems like a good thing to me.

Yeah, thank you for having me.

This was a great conversation.

I love talking with people who want to build a future.

CEO Brian Armstrong wrote in a memo that Coinbase is aiming to build a leaner and faster company.

As a result, the company would be removing layers of management and laying off about 700 employees in a company that has just about 5,000.

One factor cited by the CEO was AI, which is allowing the company to automate some processes that used to require humans.

A number of top companies such as Meta and Amazon have announced layoffs to invest more on AI.

Coinbase also says the layoffs are in part a result of the volatility in the crypto markets this year.

Rafael Nam, NPR News.

One thing I've heard is that quantum is going to break the blockchain.