Conversation with Illia Polosukhin (co-founder @nearprotocol) also known on the streets as The Black Dragon, recorded live during [Redacted] Bangkok 2024.

Illia does A LOT of public appearances and interviews. On this interview we break norm and rather than focus of the tech (the WHAT) we focus instead on Illia's journey (Who and Why). Even though we only had 1 hour, the result has far exceeded our expectations. Some of the highlights:

* Illia reads in Megabytes. How his life changed when someone gave him a CD ROM loaded with 700mb of .txt books fuelling his imagination.
* Wild imagination and builder more from a young age. Not only did Illia start writing his own science fiction books when he was young, he also built a publishing platform to distribute them! Only catch - he never finished any of them as he got bored after he knew how things played out in his head.
* Learning how to code at age 10; importance of family and supportive teachers in school. Building games and keeping cheat codes in summer camp and more!
* Growing up poor, building character. How Ukraine has shaped VALUES.
* Broken internet and role of MATHs, formal verification, and AI agents.
* So much more!

Enjoy

Wide ranging conversation with Eric Winer, Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and Managing Director at Pagoda.

What makes this podcast special is that it was recorded just a few days after the announcement of several spinouts and the rest of Pagoda sunsetting came out. Which sets the scene for a very honest and insightful Eric. Some of the topics we cover and personal highlights:

- Eric has been very early and led massive growth at Gemini and Nifty Gateway. Common thread: taking familiar user experiences, implementing high standards of delivery and excellence to bring web3 to the masses.
- The ways in which working for a hedge fund are different from building products; money as end goal cf. a real user as end-goal, how this influences team formation (skills and view-point diversity). Finally, we also touched on challenges of Product in an Engineering focused organisation (following up on our previous conversation with Alex Chiocchi, former head of Product at Pagoda.
- Raw, honest assessment of factors that lead to Pagoda dissolution: expensive organisation, on competitiveness and sustainability of NEAR ecosystem of third party providers, founder led organisations and the advantages of smaller, focused teams as startups over larger well funded organisations.
- A breakdown of a lot of Pagoda's services: what they do, importance, challenges going into the future, and opportunities for new providers.

There is A LOT more, including a lot said between the lines. We hope this conversation is well received by all stakeholders involved and that it may be useful in addressing some of the outstanding matters in the best way possible.

Resources
- Blog Post Announcing NEAR One and Chain Abstraction Spinouts
- Future of Pagoda Services Post

- NUFFLE: NEAR DA Spinout
- [Redacted] Hackathon

Follow on Socials
Eric - https://x.com/eric_winer
AVB - https://x.com/AvbNear
Wuipod - https://x.com/wuipod
Pagoda - https://x.com/PagodaPlatform

This is the second conversation we have with Cameron Dennis, although the first one never got released as it was deemed too spicy!

Cameron was one of the earliest contributors to NEAR Inc, spearheading Business Development and eventually recruiting a BD team. He's outlasted several NEAR Foundation CEO's, even it as some point he parted ways with NF due to a 'lack of culture fit'. A ruthless hustler.

Cameron provides unique insights into many things. Some of my personal highlights:

1. Evolution: we are very candid about the Evolution of NEAR ecosystem. With a focus on the lessons learned and practical suggestions on how to move forward, we provide a detailed overview for those who may have been lost or confused along the way.
2. What is NEAR, really? We drill down on the origins story, the pivots, the vision that has always been but nobody knows. NEAR is not just another blockchain, it is THE OPEN WEB.
3. Community Reset: is it time to start a cult?
4. Beyond crypto; this is a race for humanity and superintelligence.
5. NEAR AI is two things: a hub for everyone working on any piece of the AI stack, and the in-house Developer AI

Resources
NEAR AI Masterplan: https://near.ai/

Follow on Socials
Cameron - https://x.com/Cameron_Dennis_

AVB - https://x.com/avbNear
Wuipod - https://x.com/Wuipod