Breaking Down the Blockchain

Welcome back at Landia soon to be Blockchain with returning guests and fan favorite Jared Dicker, the new CEO of blockchain company Poet. That's pet Et Jared who came from the Washington Post. He led ad tech at the Washington Post and the whole ad lab went over, took a big leap, went over to the startup Poet, and he's going to explain to us why blockchain matters, what it really is, why it matters for media, and what is going to happen to creators and the whole buying system

in media and content. We'll be right back and we're back in the studio. I'm Jared Dicker taking over. This is at Landia, and here we go. Band is back together. Jared Dicker, CEO of poet po dot et. Yeah, for the past six months, I have transitioned into the blockchain, which has been um it is it kind of is you know, Um, every time I switched a job, you look back and it's like, Wow, I can't believe I've

been here for so long. But uh, in the blockchain space and apt poet, yes, I definitely feel like I've been here for this long because it is a lot of work and it's very fast, and I'm sure as you guys know, um through following the trades and conversations that you've had, it's it's the thing to talk about, right. You have cannabis, you have blockchain, and then you have

AI mL, like yeah, artificial intelligence, machine learning. But I feel like we're getting into like another winter of AI and m L, and we're probably going into a winter of blockchain because people don't really think it's real and a lot in a lot of cases, there are a lot of mainstream folks in advertising, marketing and media who maybe are enamored with the idea and the concept of blockchain,

but they don't see the reality. So uh, you're right, um, when you say that blockchain is kind of used as as a marketing tool right now. I'd equate it to uh these strategies behind at tech, where you have something that's somewhat simple, and when you break it down and understand what it does, it's it's very simple, but the people that control it are purposely making it confusing to

keep others out. And that's kind of what you're seeing with blockchain, particularly particularly in the media space, right um uh. Note that this has been around for you know, almost a decade, and that there's been a lot of work and focus going into it, but as it's impacted media, you know, especially u C blockchain in the ad space and what I could do for advertising and transparency and trust less systems and all of these things, a lot of that is absolutely just lip service. So blockchain is

just a distributed ledger. So the main differences between that and how people use a database today is that it's just controlled by a consensus. So basically, if we were having this conversation on the blockchain, all of the information is recorded, and Laura can change what she said, and Alexa can't change what she said, and I can't change what I said without a group of us you know, agreeing collectively on what should be changed and what should

not be changed. And that's really it. So when people say, right, um, the blockchain, like we are using the blockchain to solve for this um, they're most likely able to use a database to have that solution be better than what they do today. And that's like biggest um kind of argument that's coming from people, whether they're pro or anti blockchain, particularly in the media space, is kind of like, well,

why do you need a blockchain? Now? The cool part about blockchain is that how can you best leverage this distributed ledger and put incentivized systems against it. Early huff Post days, we did huff Post badging and comment moderation where we were self governing the comment moderation system at the huffing in Post against the technology that we call Julia.

But we were basically able to incentivize people within our community to find the best comments, curate the best conversations, highlight that content, give them with intrinsic rewards, so that they were kind of doing the job that the huffing Impost should be doing, but it was controlled empowered by the network. That's the coolest part about what blockchain is today and what the best technologies will enable it to do.

It's not just about this distributed ledger and being able to categorize and have information that is immutable and cannot be changed. It's about how you can incentivize people to do things again that information and against that data. So other than it being a ledger. When you talk about media solutions, right, one of the words that you just said around some of the solves that brands are thinking

about is transparency. Right. So obviously if this is an uneditable ledger, brands are then able to go in and identify what we often in this space, find a new technology, get excited about it, and just slap it on things, right, and and you all know this best. But um, that's exactly what's happening again here with the blockchain, um, which

is a huge mistake. What we really need when we're thinking about these technologies and the opportunities is how can we actually create something new, right, not back into existing systems where these technologies didn't exist when these problems first came about and shoving them in there to try to put a band aid on it, but actually create something new and create new behaviors. So identifying things like transparency, How can we know where our money is being spent?

How can we best engage users? UM and his blockchain is solution for that. How we be better with transacting right with influencers and being able to identify influencers based

on the content they've created and their reputation and things that. Again, a ledger and an incentivized system can help bring forward right more information behind that to do so, the biggest one today, which is what we're focusing on a poet and a lot of others in the space, is kind of like, how can you provide information behind what you're about to consume? So UM being able to expose more

information so that people can make better decisions. So when you drink a can of coke or you smoke a cigarette, Um, you're free to do whatever you want, but there is more information that tells you're like, these are the ingredients behind what you're about to put into your body. And yes it's FDA regulated, but it helps you make better

informed decisions towards what makes most sense for you. Every single piece of information, whether it's content, whether it's a transaction like bitcoin, UM it's a public exposed ledger of information that everyone could see, right, and then the beauty of that, which is what we're saying with the incentive systems, is like what can we do to spark behaviors against that?

So if we are looking for who an author is, or if something has been fact checked, or how has something been sourced or where has your money gone, you could have the Ledger and have that information and then give incentive systems for people to make things verifiable, like be able to say, is this actually Laura Crerenti who wrote this? Well, yes it is, because we found that this is the source of the article right through where it was originally published, and that claim that Laura is

the author is now verifiable. Um, but someone may say I created this article, Um, my name is Laura Crerenti, and then you find out that it was actually written five years ago by Alexa Kristen. If you do choose to read breitemart Right or huffing In Post or The Daily Caller, you can so choose to. But this is a technology and opportunity for you to learn more information

about what you're about to consume. That this source of this content may not be verified, right, Like we think of being able to label information like this is sponsored and this isn't sponsored but that, but it's not binary. It's not up to the publishers anymore. Right, The conversation with publishers today is we're valuable and we're premium, and yes it's premium, and I don't subscribe to like that

whole premium content industry. It is, but the industry, right has a premium content basically stacked right, right, a charge against that, right, And it's proving my point exactly what you said, because we say premium, but that's an insider definition that is not conveyed at all to the consumers. That's like hasn't really been able to be quantified in any particularly thank you. So that is what we're building. We want to be able to convey the value behind

the creator's work and what that really means. Right. We constantly emphasize um things that happen in the results, right, like how many page views do you have, how many UH followers you have, how many engagement And that is nothing to do with the reason why you went and engaged with that musician or publisher or creator in the first place, because we have no way of identifying or verifying that information, right, and being able to explose it. So the last thing I'll say on this rant is

the other notion is why are publishers premium to Alexis point? Like, what is premium? And his premium is stack in the system, And why is the Washington Post content more premium than Ben Thompson Stratechory's right, it was operating on his own and that's because we don't have a way to quantify it or to show it that you don't have a way to verify it by the buyer. That's the point here, right, And I think that's for me at least, that's what's

exciting about blockchain. Blockchain for me is at the end of the day, we're putting the hands of the verification and the validation into a public, transparent setting for the community to decide, right, And that's the point. And a lot of the project explain the gray, right, Like we live in a black and white world where where you're either on one side or the other, and no one is focusing on the gray. So so today we're in a world where there's fake news, right, and what's real

and what's fake and what's truth and what's false. However, while I believe that everything should be objective. We live in a world that's extremely subjective. You're talking about very hard objective things about verification, transparency, data, right, You're talking about data, information backed shit. But you're also talking about major movements in society and culture in thinking, in brands, in preferences and personalization. Right, because a new infrastructure is

built that actually exposes all of that. Yeah, the coolest part about what could happen in black chain and media is that the web today is built off to ours right and decency and RELI right. So when you search content right, or you're in your timeline on Facebook or Twitter or Google, you search based on when something was published, right, or or um being able to sort it right based

on published time, or you want something that's relevant. I I want to search for something and I want those results to get back verbatim the information that I have, and that is the way for the past ten to twenty years we have discovered and looked for content. Now what's happened is that we've actually changed the way creators

create based on those results. So instead of when Michael Jackson passed away saying Michael Jackson passes away due to drug overdose, doctor investigated, we did, Michael Jackson dead right, because that's what people are going to search, and that actually takes the value out of why I read in author's work or creator's work, because now they're actually creating based on how they're valued and the results. So blockchain

brings reputation. The third are so recency, relevancy, reputation. How do we put emphasis and how do we put information in quantifiable metrics against the work that goes into it, the effort that goes into it, and not just the results, not just how fast you published or when it was published, or how relevant you can of your headline or clickbait or all of these things that are driving us nuts, But how do we now put focus back on the value.

So somebody who's who spent the entirety of her career evaluating and buying media and content and having to associate value or cost against um what that was being pitched as is worth, or having done homework to understand the

market rates, etcetera. Well, you're basically alluding to is that blockchain is going to be able to democratize premium and equaling the playing field to say, consumer choice is what's going to drive premium and what they decide is valuable, whether it's person A or entity B, is up to them. That's right. Yeah, we have not defined premium right to alexis point, and premium is in the eyes of the

buyer or the consumer or the beholder. And what's happened to date is that we've had a fox guarding the in house scenario. Right. We've had the New York Times and even Netflix and Spotify and all of these platforms say we're premium because of this, you should subscribe because of this, and now and we're seeing a media first bitatal shifts, right. We're seeing consumers say, I don't get it. I don't get why I'm paying for this. Why do

I need to pay for all these subscriptions? There's too many media companies, right, Like it's not that there's not enough advertising dollars, there's too many publishers, right. So and now the same publishers right that that kind of infiltrated and took the ad revenue are now saying we're doing subscriptions. So now they're gonna take more of the subscription pome. Do you you wander what's gonna happen? There's not gonna be enough money, So like, we kind of need things to

die in order for new things to exist. And what you're saying is true because the blockchain is a distributed ledger. It is a network driven by the network. It is consumer driven. It's not Fox guarding the henhouse. These are people that are gonna put value on things based on what they feel, right, is verifiable, interesting, Right. What they could then associate with that they think is good content that's relevant to them. So how can they curate their

own experiences? How could they pay and give value to You know at Ben Thompson versus Washington Post, do authors and creators need to be with media companies or our media companies? Yeah, or our media company, And like I do believe media companies are valuable, but their value maybe we could get you distribution, right, we could get you pr and publicity. They're kind of like the labels right for music, Like you don't necessarily need them to be

a creator, but they could help you. They're like an agency, right, And and you often forget like, oh, a publisher is a place where I could create content, right, and they're making me me? No, like you make you you and a publisher could help distribute you. But when you're ready to go out on your own, or when you want to go to a different label or agency or test new waters, you should go and there should be systems in place that allow you to enable that. To who

are you working with? What media companies are you working with right now? So so we're speaking to a ton of media companies. To be completely honest, I'm really for gusing on the long tail talking to any brands. Some brands I have to be like, honest, we're a fifteen person team and fourteen or engineers, so it's literally me

just running around and having these combos. We have a twenty person community um that's actually leveraging and using Poet, and about fifty large across all of our different systems that are putting information onto Poet. These are like screenwriters, independent, who are they like the majority of your digital artists their physical artists. Like I want to get these partnerships right. I want to get the big publishers and media companies that I have great relationships with that want to jump

on board and be a part of it too. But I don't want to distract from this big mission because well, Laura described is exactly what we're looking to do, and that's a ship ton of work, and it's highly ambitious and a lot of education, right, and to take on a new brand or a new publisher that is going to look for what's our revenue strategy off of this thing in three months? We don't need that yet, that's right.

But will you eventually need salespeople to sit on top of your consortium of ass as that are going out and saying like, here's the Poet top one this week and here's why, Like because then it transitions from ad teck like this Poet actually become a media company, right that the next question, Yeah, that's a good question. So so POD is the underlying technology with all of these things. So think of HTTP right where you type HTTPS into your browser, right, Like that is what pode is doing

at a protocol level. How could people build reputation, how could they license content? Right? How could they build verifiable content? And then there's all these apps right that are going to be built on top. What we're really looking to do is invest in that protocol so that creators cannot just leverage it for their own I P but also

start building tools and technologies on top of it. Like not to necessarily say like the app store, but to make an analogy like Apple as the device and Poet as the protocol, and what could be built on top of that is endless, Right, how do I build the hooks that make it so accessible and so obvious for them to do it that takes no additional efforts, So that we build this repository of creators like you that say, do you want to what? I love what poet is doing.

I love what this person is building on Poet, But I have an idea that I'm gonna build on my own and commercialize on top of Poet that I'm taking for myself. Yeah. I mean the whole point is getting your content out there to an audience and getting it monetized as i P that is valuable. Who are poets competitors? Yeah? Yeah, it's a So the cool part about blockchain right now is that because a lot of the projects are open source, you know, meaning that like you don't really own the

information to the i P, anyone could use it. It's more collaborative than competitive. At this point. There's companies called uh steam steam it, which is kind of like a Reddit for blockchain, but there's not so much like a one to one type comparison. I think what we're fortunate in doing and where our investment lies is can we build something that could bread an ecosis them right, that could bread competitors and and and bred people to start

thinking and building on top of it. What we could all agree on is that again not in I'm very good at non apples to apples comparisons, but hopefully they make sense. Um, it's like we're in a napster moment with creators and media. It's not necessarily that people want things for free. It's just that there's really no good systems for people to see the value to get verifiable, reputable content and to be able to know that their

rewarding creators directly. When napsture was around, like the music and information you got wasn't great, right, Like songs were cut off, the quality was shitty. You, but you had no other option to get digital music right, that was the only platform until people saw what needed to be done in order to make this a real viable product. People wanted digital music, So how can you make it reputable?

How can you make it verifiable? Right? How can you make sure that when you're purchasing something or streaming or licensing something, that it's the best quality and that it's men from the artists, and that it's the work that you paid for and it's paying the artists. Right. That's kind of where we are right now in media, which is kind of like people are like people are using ad blocker, or people don't want to subscribe, and it's like, no,

it's not that people don't want to do these things. One, there's no better system, and too, we're really bad at conveying the value to these consumers. There are a lot of people who actually know that the situation from a consumer side is shitty. They're annoyed, but they don't actually write we don't think about it because it's just been this behavior, right, and we've been trained by institutions and by the media companies to have the behavior versus going

into a more natural behavior. This is like when we talk to Charlie Melcher two years ago, right, and it was powerful and he was saying, you know, at the end of the day, and was so obvious, but we were like, oh, he's like, at the end of the day, screens aren't natural. He's like, we should not have screens right. But at the end of the day, we should be living in like three six, should be living in the

natural world. I mean, this is the same kind of right idea, is that there our behaviors that are natural to us that we've now kind of stopped right and build other things around that have diverted our behaviors to something else. So I don't think if you went to you know, a consumer and a USA Today subscriber, right, would they say this is a pain in the ass.

They're like, no, I'm getting my news. Yeah. I mean I actually have a question for you guys, which is, we've seen the evolution of how we deliver content change so much, right, whether it's how you look at the formats right and from text to video to audio, or you look at the platforms like how it's distributed through a Facebook or a Twitter, Google or Snapchat. But the revenue models never change, right, And and we keep reconstructing

these things. And in my mind, and like I'm curious your take, because you're both in this space, is don't we kind of have to blow the whole thing up, right, Like, like we haven't followed suits, so coming up with a new subscription bundle or a new ad unit not necessarily won't supplement or be sufficient enough to sustain what we're looking to do, but it's not going to make this

industry better. Well you're basically creating is an opportunity for buyers to think about how they do direct deals with creators. I mean this is this is the I think one of the big points and something you and I had talked about Jared a while ago is like, this is DTC, but it's direct to creator, right, I mean that's the whole like that is that is it? And there and the thing is this gang philosophical for a second, But the thing is is I don't even know if you

need media companies anymore. That's the right, That's the whole point is that does everyone become their own agent. What blows my mind on this, and I'd love to talk more about it, is that this gets down to i P at a very very micro level, and it doesn't matter for who and from who? Right, So meaning it

doesn't matter who to create. There is whether it's a brand, a person, a community institution, that it is truly saying this i P is something that has been created, originated somewhere right from someone some buddies and it therefore exists in these forms because they have right, they have done X. That is mind blowing. And so I'm actually going to go back to something you said. You said there are too many publishers. Actually maybe there are too few publishers.

Like if you think about too many versus too few, does this actually mean that the personalities that were driving publishers now transcend them? And so now it actually weeds out fluff pieces, etcetera. And now you sort of whatever is floats to the top just completely reconstructs the entire system. I think we're going to start to really understand the value of a media company and publisher, not in terms of creator, but as a media companies value through the

lens of what consumed. You know what publishers deem it right, similar to the record labels, the artists on the labels, or who you go and read, or who you go or who you go and listen to, who you purchase, who you want to meet, who you want to see, and you understand what the labels bring to them. They bring marketing, they bring pop up, they bring merge, right,

they have the connections, they get them on stage. That's what these media companies will be And to your point, I think, yes, there will be more creators, but there may not need to be all these mammoth at least new emerging media companies, if all they're really doing is providing a service, right, which is, we could grow your business and we could grow your exposure. If you want to go and do it indeed on your own, go for it, and there will be tools to do that.

But if you want to come here and then we will help expose you. But you are right. The the the seesaw right is like completely tilting the other way where well it's impact and attention versus reach frequency and all of a sudden, what you're saying is that scale doesn't matter if only a small percentage of what's in that scale is right. And scale fucked up this whole thing.

I mean, like scale did two things right. Scale changed the way that we create content, right, Scale literally going back to like clickbait and like creators now creating content based off how fast they can publish or the time to publish, and how relevant they can make a headline

or the content within it, and to in normalized content. Right, it kind of set a level that said news content is equal to lifestyle content is equal to video content is equal to a R Even though all of these things cost different, the investments are different, the time is different, yet the way they get paid on them because of scale different is the same. So what replaces the CPN? So I think, like platform look like I don't think that the platform model. And again you probably have better

perspective on this than me. I think for brands and purchasing and if you're looking to like sell a product right or get a product in front of people, are used to the Nike Kaepernick campaign, Like the value of that is huge. So I think what we need to be doing again going act to like we're constantly repairing old models and trying to sustain and fix them. So what happens to the CPM, What happens to the ad? What happens to subscriptions, what happens to bundle, um, you

see cable, O, T T all of these things? What if there's like new models or ideas where like you actually hold like your i P is your asset? What if people bid, like what a people bid on your i P? But then you could resell that, right, you're holding that that is an asset that you bought it a million dollars, that is now dollars, right, So like this economy could open up new things. That's not a new concept, right, That is not a fucking new concept.

What's new about it is it's completely distributed and it's gone. It goes back to the individual, not just the individual to institution, and it's all consumer based. Most sales representatives will come in and they'll say, our platform reaches x million people per month. The conversation to what you're alluding to and correct me if this is wrong, is now saying our reputation amongst our consumers is x people value creator, A, B and C. At why that's why this is pretium, Yes, exactly,

and it allows emerging creators to come about. Right. So going back to why blockchain of it being an immutable ledger of information and an incentive model is like people who have ideas that are in deep pockets of this earth that do not know where to send that information and do not have the connections, are somewhat scared to

put their IP out there. Right. The beauty of an immutable ledger and blockchain is like, hey, look before I show this to the world, I'm gonna put it here so then I could prove that it was mine and that it was my idea, so that it cannot be ripped off, and I'm not scared to be discovered writing right, and then you open up this opportunity. So this idea of discover ability and authenticity and what's real and what's not real are all elements that could be built on

top of the blockchain. And that's a great way to think about it, because it doesn't necessarily need to be a replacement, but if it's more efficient, if it opens up new opportunities, then that should be the goal of any emergency authorship its ownership. Like how does a brand start and say, hey, this is really interesting. I'm gonna throw a couple of dollars towards this. What does that

look like? Great question? Short answer. The best part about blockchain is that it is so new and so overexposed that likely you do not need to spend too much money at all experimenting with it, and I strongly encourage a lot of companies to do so because some of the best technologists and thinkers are in this space right now, and that is without a doubt happening. Do I need engineers do I need data architects, do I need what?

Do I need? I need my staff? So so a lot of it is education, right, Like what's actually amazing is medium has become this this Bible um, this like Bible upon Bible bomb, Bible of ways of thinking right, the methods behind blockchain, incentive systems, governance systems, creation systems. So a lot of it is just educating and learning. There's companies like ad Ledger that are together blockchain communities.

That's the mad Hive crew UM and others like IBM and so forth that are really thinking about how best to use it. I think the way to think about it is too fold. One is have a curious mind. And we always said this at like Rebel Mouse, and I say it now is like, find that one person within your organ that is hungry, that wants to do something interesting and let them go. And you don't necessarily need to say we need a million dollar budget or

we need three engineers to do this. A lot of the companies that are here, a lot of the code is open source, and they all have resources to work with. I could speak um personally right when it comes to poet that we are equipped right to work with publishers brands to onboard them and help educate them and help them learn about this project. Right, I think what the best companies in this space will do is build bridges,

not motes. Right, we understand that it's new, um unlike what happened with a tech which is like, oh, you don't get it, forget it, or you need this because you don't get it. Where like, let us explain exactly why this is important and let us lead you over here and then prove to you why it's interesting. Tell me what I need. All you need is you? Okay, so do I need to All you need is you?

Like you don't need to be an engineer. You just have to really think about what makes most sense when things become distributed, when they are not focused on one central point of failure, when everything could be open, and what makes most sense. That's contributor networks. That's a way of exposing information. That is a way of delivering information that could be anything, and it's particular based on your specifically. The other thing is and and I worked on this side.

Don't think of a business case off the bat, like have fun experiment. Think of it like something on the side because there's so much that could come out of it. And it's the first inning that if you could be on the bleeding edge of thinking about these things and you can actually not just build and learn, but you can actually construct the way that it's going to work in the future. Line. So when you first started a poet, I called you and I said I want to put

at Land down poet, and we talked about it. So now I am going to bring it back up because we have not done it. And let's say that this becomes a challenge at ANDIA to go on, get on, poet, get distributed. We'll bring our listeners with us and tell them like what happens and how we're doing and what we're learning and all that. It's an official partnership done. You heard it here first, Jared Dicker. So before you go kill buy d I y what would you kill?

I think what I would kill as influencer networks? Okay? Good? What would you buy? Um? What would I buy? I would actually buy? Like right now and thinking about buying media companies that poets should be buying media companies and helping structure them in this sort of way of like focus on reputation, focus on creators, So I would buy maybe, let's say the Village Voice. What would I do myself?

What everyone should be thinking about and doing themselves is kind of how best to redefine what their models and what their business and value is. I mean, I could say, and I'm biased, but what the Washington Post has done with ARC, they announced with Dallas Morning News they're powering. They'll soon be I mean, from what it looks like, they'll soon be powering like all of the local news and uh newspaper services that we know today and likely beyond.

And I think that that's an excellent UM way of thinking, and it's an excellent proofpoint that if you invest in something and take certain risks, then new opportunities open up that aren't necessarily limiting and that are interoperable beyond kind of what you're doing. And those are like the most successful people write these entrepreneurs that think about um, question everything, and just are honest with themselves about where they are

and where they should be. Well, if people want to reach you to learn more about the blockchain, where can they get in touch with you? Jared at Peo dot et or Twitter at Jared Dicker or any fish show, any Fish show. Um. Yes, like yeah, if anyone wants to engage or talk about fish or the Dead or Leon Russell or anything on Twitter, That's what I'm enjoyed talking about. Thank you, Jared, so big thanks to Jared Dicker,

who is always blowing our minds. Lots to learn, lots to digest, lots really kind of think about and apply one thing. Like I would say in vite Jared into your company. Invite Jared whether media company, brand, startup, Invite Jared into your company to walk your teams through this

whole new um way of thinking in this technology. I think that his whole point about, like we don't really have competitors because we're all kind of moving towards this you know, idea and technology of greater good and real trust and transparency, etcetera. He wants people to understand this and he wants to bring people on board, so call him so with that, big thanks to our producer Dana, Jacob Weisberg, Andy Bowers, Matt Turk, and all of our friends and family at Panoply. We'll be back in two

weeks by Atlandia. Full disclosure, our opinions, our own