Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Welcome to The Verge Cast, the flagship podcast of number go up and also down. I'm your friend, David Pearce, and I am sitting in my backyard on sprinkler duty. So a thing you've probably already guessed about me given my entire deal is that I'm not good at keeping plants alive.
Chapter 2: What sparked Ben McKenzie's interest in cryptocurrency?
I can't remember how tall the grass is supposed to be when you mow it.
Chapter 3: Is cryptocurrency a legitimate form of money?
I don't exactly know which of my plants is which and how often I'm supposed to water any of them. But we had some work done on the backyard this weekend. They put down some sod. They made the backyard bigger. It all looks great.
Chapter 4: What are the real-world implications of crypto in El Salvador?
I'm very excited about it. And the guy gave me a speech where he was like, David, you have to water this thing like you would not believe for the next 10 days. So for the next 10 days, I live out here in the backyard, just moving sprinklers around. This is apparently what I do now. Anyway, we have a really fun show coming up.
Chapter 5: How does crypto culture influence its adoption?
First, we're going to talk to Ben McKenzie, who is an actor and author, and you might know him as Ryan Atwood from The O.C. He just made a documentary called Everyone is Lying to You for Money about kind of his descent into the crypto world and sort of his own descent into madness as a result. It's a really fun documentary with a lot of really interesting reporting and lessons about crypto.
So he came on the show to talk about how he feels about crypto now. Then The Verge's V-Song is going to come on and talk about her, I think, 18-month journey testing continuous glucose monitors and actually kind of her own descent into madness. We're doing descents into madness here on The Vergecast today while I sit and descend into madness moving sprinklers around.
We also have a really fun hotline, really fun show today. All of that is coming up in just a second. But first, I'm dead serious. My phone reminder just went off and I have to go move the sprinkler. This is The Vergecast. We'll be right back.
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Chapter 6: What is the role of continuous glucose monitors (CGMs) in health?
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Chapter 7: How has the FDA impacted the use of CGMs?
It's a great freaking database. Start building at mongodb.com slash build. What should we make of the Iran war ceasefire announcement and where do things go from here? If anything has surprised me over the last 24 hours, it's that Iran agreed to a ceasefire, and particularly that Iran agreed to a ceasefire after that outrageous message that President Trump put out. I'm Jake Sullivan.
And I'm John Feiner. And we're the hosts of The Long Game, a weekly national security podcast. This week, we break down the latest news on Iran and share our net assessment of where things stand for the U.S. The episode's out now. Search for and follow The Long Game wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, we're back. So a few years ago, Ben McKenzie, who you might know as an actor, he was Ryan in the OC. He was in Southland. He's been in a Batman show. He's been in movies. He's been in lots of stuff. I'm sure you've seen him before. He became sort of an unlikely voice against crypto in the in the pandemic heat of the crypto craze.
Ben was one of those people who would tell anyone who was listening, including, you know, television commentators and Congress, why crypto was a scam.
Chapter 8: What are the psychological effects of using CGMs?
I will just lay my own cards on the table. I largely think he's correct about that. I think there is a lot of interesting stuff about crypto that became largely irrelevant because of the way that crypto turned into a bunch of ways for people to make a lot of money. So I wanted to have Ben on the show to talk about
basically his whole experience with crypto and this documentary he made called Everyone is Lying to You for Money. It's out this week. If you can go find a theater that's playing it, it's playing in a bunch of big cities. I think it'll probably get released more widely soon. If you can see it, go see it. But even if you don't, I think you'll enjoy this conversation.
I wanted to have him on to talk about what it's been like to be down this rabbit hole for so long and what he's learned about what crypto is and how it got to be like that. I really enjoyed it. I think you will too. Let's get into it. Ben McKenzie, welcome to The Verge Cast. Thank you. Thank you for being here.
We're going to talk about crypto and our feelings, which is, I would say, fundamentally what your documentary is about. But I had this thought at the very beginning of the documentary, which I think is where I want to start, where you sort of as a joke start like all the way back with the origin of money.
And the very first thought I had like 10 seconds into the documentary is like, are we sure the story of crypto is actually a story about money? And so this is my first question to you. Is the story of crypto actually a story about money?
That is a great question. I I'm afraid the answer is both yes and no, in the sense that all money's made up, right? We just like, it's just a social construct like government or religion.
And we've used, there's a very brief, like a graphic sequence after the initial sort of playful misdirection where we briefly showed you many, many images of different monies that have existed in the past, like feathers or, you know, uh, whales teeth or whatever. Um, and so all money's made up, right? Um, But what is money? It's trust.
It's a way of running an economy so that, for example, if I give you a dollar bill, you take it from me, not because you trust me, but because you trust that you can use it because it works. And that's, I think, where crypto falls apart. Crypto says we don't need money. human trust, we can replace that with computer code.
We can create this trustless system and avoid all that pesky human interaction and human relationships. But that's, of course, nonsense, right? Because if money is trust and you're saying it's a trustless currency... Then you're saying it's like a governmentless government or religionless religion. The words you're searching for are anarchy and cult. It just fundamentally doesn't make sense.
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