Peter Thiel argued in his book ‘Zero to One’ that the way to build a great and highly profitable company is to build a monopoly. But with decentralized technologies, there is a real question whether these monopolies can be built or whether the monopolies will end up being publicly owned goods (like Bitcoin) that can’t be monetized directly.
William Mougayar, who is an experienced tech executive and angel investor, has been writing extensively about these issues and was one of the investors in OB1, the venture-backed company launched by the founders of the decentralized market place Open Bazaar. He joined us for a discussion of the cryptocurrency space, Ethereum, Open Bazaar and monetizing decentralized technologies.
Topics covered in this episode:
Bitcoin as the new, thin cloud
His long-term predictions about where the space is going
What kind of business models are the most promising
Why he chose to invest in OB1, the company behind Open Bazaar
What the state of Venture Capital in the cryptocurrency space is
Episode links:
Predictions in Cryptography, Blockchains and Consensus Protocols
The Old Cloud is Dead, Welcome the New Cloud
The Business Imperative Behind the Ethereum Vision
An Operational Framework for DAOs
Union Square Ventures: Introducing OB1
Peter Thiel: Competition is for Losers
This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/086