Freakonomics Radio Podcast: Does the Crypto Crash Mean the Blockchain Is Over?

 Crypto, the latest "foolproof, safe" investment, is now neither foolproof nor safe. And it isn't even making money right now. Months of listening to your part-time employed neighbor Todd prattle on about his fortune in crypto has thankfully come to an end, at least for a while. Until the rebound.

If any podcast can decipher the secret of crypto, it's Freakonomics Radio. The podcast has just kicked off a three-part series on the Blockchain, aiming to sort out the technology's potential from the hype. 

 The first episode, which went live late last week, asks "Does the Crypto Crash Mean the Blockchain Is Over?"

Across all three parts, the series features a host of newsworthy interviews, including in-depth conversations with:

• Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin
• Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong
• Miami mayor Francis Suarez
• Andreessen Horowitz partner Arianna Simpson
• U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission former chair Chris Giancarlo
• NFT artist Tom Sachs
• and more

At the end, host Stephen Dubner sums up his takeaways from episode one:

So what’d we learn today? We learned that crypto firms are trying to transform Satoshi Nakamoto’s idea of digital cash into a variety of new services that are decentralized, with the incentives managed by tokens. We also learned that cryptocurrencies are poorly named, and may never become what we typically think of as currencies. More than anything, we learned that blockchain technology is still in its relatively early days. A lot of the breakthrough uses are — let’s be honest here — pretty boring. Or at least not what you’d call transformative. Better file storage? Better coordination of Walmart trucking? Trimming the cost of financial transactions? Is all that worth the hype? And speaking of hype, let’s not forget the headlines these past few years about the skyrocketing value of cryptocurrencies — and now, suddenly, the plunging prices. The next round of headlines may be about all the class-action lawsuits, with crypto investors trying to claw back their lost trillions. Is this, as Eric Budish wondered, a “naturally occurring Ponzi scheme”? And we haven’t even gotten to the N.F.T. boom — and subsequent bust. That’s next week.

Listen to "Does the Crypto Crash Mean the Blockchain Is Over?" at freakonomics.com (there's a transcript there too) or wherever you get podcasts. 

And please tell Todd to stop trying to unload his timeshare on me. I do not want to spend two weeks every summer near a large lake which has since gone dry due to a century-long drought.