the best beef steak course is the one that speaks to your tongue.
You know what I mean?
It doesn't matter how pretty it is,
it doesn't matter like the story of the steak,
all that shit goes out the window when you take a bite.
Like the only thing that matters is you just go,
oh man, that's really good.
So few of the things that we eat are truly delicious.
You know what I mean?
And you really have to be paying attention
because you can miss it.
You can miss it.
And it might not be there,
not only next week, like once it's gone,
like once people finish it, you know,
can I have more?
They're like, it's gone.
No, you can't.
There's nothing like I can't make it again.
Those are my favorite beef steak dishes
that you just put in your mouth and you and there's,
you know, for whatever reason,
you just know immediately that it's delicious.
Anyways, out with you and remain with us for some time.
Take care, and thanks for watching this video.
For features like this,
we are open for customers and guests
steak guy. His beef steak events are truly legendary and he's managed to create an incredible
culture around getting people together to eat meat cooked over an open fire with their
bare hands. We get into quite a lot today, including but not limited to the origin of
beef steak, beef, food in general, building community, whether AI will take over chef's
jobs, art versus craftsmanship, hosting events and vibe curation, the effects of social media
and a whole lot more. Before we dive in, do me a favor and subscribe to the Bitcoin Podcast
wherever you're watching or listening. Check out BitcoinPodcast.net for episodes and additional
resources. Head to the show notes to grab discount links for my sponsor, Bitbox, or
just go directly to Bitbox.swiss.walker and use the promo code Walker. Send an email to
hello at BitcoinPodcast.net if you have feedback or if you're interested in sponsoring the
Bitcoin Podcast. And if you find this show valuable, consider giving value back by giving
it a zap on Noster or a boost on Fountain. Without further ado, let's get into this
Bitcoin talk with a way slice.
You know how like, at least like early on in my Bitcoin journey, like the first time sending
a like actually sending a Bitcoin transaction, like I didn't have anyone like walking me
through it was just like, you know, I'd gone through, you know, red stuff and gone through
tutorials and it's fairly self-explanatory, but you go through it and you're still just
like, okay, like, did it work? Like, let me send a little test transaction. Like, what
if I copy, you know, what if somehow when I copied it and then pasted it, like it inserted
an extra number and I screwed it up? That's still kind of how I feel with some of this
stuff on Noster, just because it's like, it's still a little bit fresh and new. And you're
like, okay, like did the live stream like, is it really live right now? Is it really
working? But it appears to be. So now we are officially live. But man, still have you
here.
A fear is skin in the game, right? Like, well, yeah, last time you had, you had like, sheer
that your credit card transaction would go through or something. You know what I mean?
I have more fears of credit card fraud, which is like just seems to happen like fairly regularly.
I don't know, just like, it's kind of obnoxious. Actually, when you think about like, but yeah,
that's fair. Like generally, okay, I swipe my credit card unless like I'm traveling somewhere.
And you know, if you're like abroad or whatever, and you didn't alert your credit card company,
and then they're like, oh, we're gonna, we're gonna cancel this card right now because we
think that somebody in Europe just stole it. And it's like, well, okay, I guess I don't
have money.
So has that thing happened to you recently?
Not, not recently. I think they fix there's something. But did they fix it? And there's
something in there where like, they know when I'm traveling now. Like it's crazy how I mean,
for one thing, I often am using the credit card I bought the airline ticket through,
you know, like, not that they see where I'm going from the purchase transaction. But like,
if I show up in Riga and start buying stuff at a grocery store, like they do not blink
an eye. I've never, I don't get any pauses or freezes or anything like that. So feels
like they've just gotten way better at just knowing what purchases are and are not. But
then on the flip side, they'll be like, you're obviously not in Arkansas, Walmart, right?
You know, like, they know, they know when it's fake too, which is kind of crazy.
But this reminds me of a friend of ours. She was, she was traveling in Europe for a while,
made some relatively large, like bought herself a couple of nice handbags, you know, designer
type handbags, and was not going to did not declare them, you know, coming back because
you have to declare if you, you know, you're bringing goods worth whatever more than $10,000
or if you're bringing cash equivalents of more than that. I think technically you're
supposed to declare any sort of goods like above a certain tiny threshold. But she was
like, you know, fuck that, I'm not going to do it. She gets back into the country and
at customs, they stop her and the customs agent says, we see here, your credit card
has reported that you purchased these bags. Do you have those with you? So like the credit
card companies are actively sharing information with customs and border, which is just kind
of like seems like a huge invasion of privacy. And another great like another reason why
cash is genuinely wonderful, because it's like nobody needs to know that. But I kind
of assumed that they did some of that stuff. But then hearing this story from her, I was
like, wait, what do you mean? They just they just had your credit card statement. They
knew what you'd been buying. And so it's like, apparently, if you check as you know, okay,
you're you've been flagged as leaving the country. Now your flag is coming back. I don't know
if they just automatically pull that like they can just I guess they don't even have
to subpoena it that's just like, nope, that's just ours. Now, we'll take that information
and see if you broke any of our stupid rules. It's kind of insane though.
And it could be one of those things where you know, it's like all those, you know, the
government doesn't police us anymore. They penalize companies for not policing us. You
know what I mean? It's like, it's like the whole I forget what it is. But like, if I
send you over $600, I'm supposed to get all your personal information and report it to
the government. It's like, no way am I doing that. And I feel like that's mostly how the
general population of the United States feels. They're like, I'm never going to do that.
But yeah, it's obnoxious, right? Like that's such a massive burden to put on anyone. Like
the government even needs to know about that. Like you need to know that I'm paying some
guy to like mow my lawn. No, no, you don't. And I'm happy to pay him cash that you don't
take a cut of that.
Totally. Yeah. But I'm just saying it could be like something where like the government
goes to AmEx and they're like, you knew person bought a bag and so and so. Why didn't you
tell us? Here's a fine. Like, I don't know. Definitely not that that justifies it, but
it just it puts the impetus on American Express or whatever credit card company to start policing
purchases when people travel, which is so that they're compliant and they can't somehow
get in trouble with the government basically like, see, we gave we gave over the data you
requested. Exactly.
It's also like, isn't it at the like, borders are like an interesting thing is even as an
American citizen coming back, I'm pretty sure you don't have like some of your basic rights,
like your constitutional rights are literally suspended at the border somehow. Like they
can, you know, they can seize your phone, they can do anything just on on suspicion.
And they can hold you like that. I've heard a bunch of stories about people, especially
like folks that are public technology figures getting their phones taken and searched, both
either coming back into America less frequently, but often if they're going into other countries,
because it's like you're, you know, granted, you don't have your American rights when you're
in another country, but you really don't have any rights at all when you're at a border.
And that's kind of like a terrifying thing.
Yeah, really just want to be careful.
I'm just kind of crazy.
This is a side shoot story, but I think I always tell people the story. I think it's
kind of funny when I was a kid, I was like 19, I was driving up to Canada. And I got
in, I got arrested in Bar Harbor, Maine for having a fake ID and trying to buy a beer.
You guys only maybe as 20 years old or something. And then I got to the Canadian border. They
were like, we saw you just tried to buy a beer in Bar Harbor. And I was like, and I was
like, yep, he's like, what happened there? And I was like, they didn't let me. I wasn't
old enough. And he was like, I don't know. Like you were kind of breaking the law. And
I was like, yeah, but it's not the law in Canada. And the guy was like, you're right,
you're right, it's not. And then they just let me through. He was like, all right.
Wait, how did they know you tried to buy beer? Like was there like a, like they had, they
had the police report. Like they already,
Hey, I did not tell them, but they had the police, like they could see the police. I
mean, this was a long time ago too.
Yeah,
It's black. They look at my license or whatever.
Man, last time I was going into Canada, I was going up for a wedding. And it was myself
and Carla, my lovely wife and, and her parents. And I was driving and we had, you know, we
brought some beer and alcohol with us because we're going to a wedding and like, you know,
wasn't sure how close the liquor store was going to be to the hotel. So, you know, you
want to be prepared. And we get to the border. We also, I made sure, being slightly autistic,
I made sure that I studied all of the regulations for exactly how many, you know, like leaders
of wine, how many ounces of beer you can bring without getting in trouble. And so we had
literally everything exactly perfect. And we get up to the, the, the border. And the
guy is asking me, you know, okay, you know, do you have any, you know, beer in the car
and any wine, any alcohol? And I said, yep, we sure do. You know, we have, we have exactly
the legal limit. And he's like, Oh, you, you know, our law, you think you know our laws
then? I said, Oh yeah, I do. And I rattled off to him. Like I literally just like memorized
it that morning. And so I rattled it off to him, like all bright eyed and wishy tailed.
And I don't think he took that very nicely. Like he thought I was being kind of a smart
ass maybe, but I was really just trying to let him know, like, look, I promise you, you
know, don't waste your time searching us. We are exactly compliant. And then, okay, he
seems a little bit ticked off. And then he's like, well, do you have any, any livestock
in the car? No, no livestock. And, and we're like, okay, weird. Any chickens in the car.
And I'm like, Oh no, all of our chickens were murdered by raccoons last year, which is true.
Like they literally were all beheaded by, by a family of raccoons that last year being
again, have not told this guy a lie yet, being totally honest. And I think that may have
been the final straw for me because he really thought I was probably being a smart ass. He
doesn't know that my chickens really were murdered by raccoons. And so then he like,
it gets out, gets out of his little booth, comes up to us and he's like, pull over there.
Like, just, you know, pull and then they spent like an hour picking the car apart, looking
for anything they could find, ended up finding they had eight different border security officers
picking our car apart. Like, I don't know, it must have been a slow day, but they're
just searching that thing with a fine tooth comb. And then like an hour later, they're
like, okay, yep, you're free to go. And it's just like, what a massive waste of resources
that was because one guy decided to get pissed off. And like, you know, swing his dick around
a little bit. It's like, I don't know where I was going with that, but it was just a ridiculous
experience at the border.
Or government overreach. Yeah, man. Man. But all right, well, now that it feels good to
get some of that like, some of those border stories out of the system a little bit, just
kind of cathartic.
Muggling and
But, but hey, welcome.
Yeah, it's, yeah, it's nice for you to be here. And, you know, I wish that we could
be enjoying some of your incredible cooking as we do this right now. But you're usually
quite quite involved in that. But maybe, you know, just to start things off here for folks
that don't know you. Can you just start us off with kind of who the heck are you? How
did you get here today to be doing these beef centric events that are not Bitcoin events,
but are generally or often held around Bitcoin conferences? Sometimes yes, sometimes no.
How the heck did you get here to be doing this?
I can tell you the brief history. I don't I don't know that it justifies me being here
doing this, but it is how I think it does. I think it does.
I, you know, I love doing it. I'm honored to be part of the community and like, to be
cooking for all the people that come to be stakes and stuff like that. I somehow just
it feels it feels like I lucked into it. There's all very much like a it's like the heart of
you work the luckier you get, you know, it's like very much like right time, right place,
you know, like I was cooking steaks, Bitcoiners like eating steaks, like that sort of thing.
You know, like I was in heaven. I wasn't trying to figure out what Bitcoiners wanted to eat.
I was just already making steaks and Bitcoiners wanted steaks and then it just kind of like
started jiving from there. But in the early days of New York meetups, Pierre Rochard used
to organize steak dinners and you know, like every couple months like say Fadina Mouss was
in town, he came and signed books and stuff like that. And we would go to like Fogo to
show or a steakhouse. And at that time that I was, you know, for me going to those steak dinners,
like I am such an introvert, I am very shy. It's totally exhausting for me to go to a social event.
In fact, the whole reason that I cook is so that I don't have I can go to a beef steak and not
talk to anybody. Like that is the reason that I am a chef so that I can be anti social at
social events because I still like eating I still like going out and drinking and stuff like that.
And then it's like, it's okay for me to go visit the kitchen and just stand there in complete
silence. No chef will think that it's weird. But anyways, I was doing beef steaks for normies.
I was just trying to figure out a way to do it because it was like, there were some beef steaks
that I went to that were kind of crappy. There are other beef steaks that didn't they just didn't
feel like the vibe that I envisioned when I read this historical article that everybody should
read at some point or another. And and so when I was trying them with with normies, like, the thing
that happens is you bring together a bunch of strangers to to to go to a beef steak, I like
to eat food with their hands together in a like communal environment. And that's just really
challenging for some people. And there's like some people are really good at talking to strangers
and some people aren't. So but it was kind of missing a tie that binds. And when you did it with
Bitcoin or so anyways, I went to Pierre and I was like, Pierre, I've been trying to do this dinner,
like I do them in my backyard, I think we should do like a small one for Bitcoin is like people
come over, just like all you you know, I just gave him like the elevator pitch. And he was like,
he like interrupted me, he's like, cool, let's do it. Like, let's just pick a date and we'll
just email me. Here's my email address. I emailed him, like, and you know, the thing about like
meetups at this time is, when I started going to meetups, you feel like everyone had been going to
meetups for a long time, but they really hadn't been going to meetups for that long. I mean,
there were some things are in the really early days, like Satoshi Roundtable and Baltic Honey
Badger and stuff. But for the most part, a lot of people were just like lurking in the wings, reading
forums and maybe trying to be funny on Twitter, or maybe not. So he set up a BTC pay server for me.
I'd never heard of that. I didn't know what it was. And I was like, Oh, that's been around forever,
but it really hadn't been around forever. You know, it was like seven months old or something like
that. I don't know how old it was, but it was very young in those days. I'm pretty janky, but it
worked. We sold a bunch of tickets and like a bunch of people came to my house. And we did a
beefsteak for like 20 people. And that was 2018. She's kind of crazy. Maybe it was end of 2017.
No, it was not. It was 2018. But that was wild, you know, that feels like an age ago, an age ago.
Time moves strange. You know, you absolutely did. I was just gonna say time. I have only been in
Bitcoin since 2020. That's when I started going down the rabbit hole. But I have noticed that time
moves in this weird way when you're like paying a lot of attention to Bitcoin and the Bitcoin space.
And then also, I think time maybe is even stranger for me now because I'm a father. No,
my god. It's like that's that's warping everything. Like my son's only 10 months old,
but it feels like that's like it's been forever. But it's also like I feel like we just brought
him home from the hospital. So time's very confusing for me right now. But I wanted to ask
you, so you mentioned that this this article, I need to read this too, because I know it's linked
on your website. But can you talk a little bit about that history like this? Until I saw that on
your website, I thought that this was something that maybe, you know, you had kind of like,
invented. But this was something you're going back to like this old tradition, right? Can you can
you talk about that like old school New York beef steak tradition? Like what the heck was that?
Yeah. So I guess in the late 1800s and early 1900s, there, it was like, in the early days,
it was totally working class, get together of men only, often in basements of buildings,
where guys would just stand around a furnace in a New York City building and cook steaks in it
and just eat and drink until like they couldn't stand anymore. And I've never really been able to
like, find any evidence of this. But I have kind of a feeling that part of the reason part of the
reason they would happen would be because there would be some sort of bottleneck in like, beef
shipping, which happened out of the west side of Manhattan, like the meatpacking district. And I
feel like there'd be like these days where like, say some track was broken or something, some guy
would just walk out and be like, we got to eat the steak right now. And and so sounds like a great
day. Yeah. Yeah. So then they'd be like, get the boys like we're going to so and so we're going to
the Lower East Side and we're gonna eat all this steak. Like I feel like, because otherwise,
there it feels unusual that a bunch of guys would just eat a bunch of steak and just feel, you know,
it feels like, I mean, obviously, it's celebration. But then that tradition caught on and it became,
it just became more and more upscale. And and it eventually became something that like, a police
captain, a policeman would do if he was promoted to captain, or if like somebody got elected mayor,
they would throw a beef steak. Mark Twain did be steaks, the Adore Roosevelt did be steaks like,
it became this like, hoey toy thing. And then this article was written in 1939, and went around to
the different beef steaks in New York and kind of, he talked to there's like an East Side beef steak
and a West Side beef steak, and they were kind of like, right, like friendly rivals. And they talked
about like what each one did wrong. They talked about the talk to, I mean, it's, it was written in
1939. So it's kind of like refreshing, refreshingly sexist, I don't know how to say it sounds terrible
to say. But it's like, just like, you know, like the ladies came in and they brought bands and
crab cakes. And I don't know, else, you know, like they blame women for ruining beef steaks, but it's
just like the progression of, you know, every event. And also that something else we can talk about too,
I'm interested and we can come back to it is like, the progression both of the beef steak over time,
and just Bitcoin events in general, because it's like, it's kind of interesting to watch
some things get traction at some points and some, some, some business, some of them events are
floundering, some of them have really gotten like a hold on what they're doing and stayed true to their
message, I guess. I know it's kind of wild to watch.
You mean like conferences specifically, like certain,
you know, I guess I'm saying probably using these words interchangeably, I am referring to basically
how ever the community comes together. So, so it could be meetups, but it could also, which are
growing like exponentially in number. But it's also conferences, it's, you know, it's events,
it's satellite events, like the beef steak, then it's also like Rick and Mortar places,
like the Bitcoin Commons and Pubkey and all that stuff. Am I am I losing you guys?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, that, well, you still got me. I've still got you.
Yeah, yeah, you froze up. I just didn't know if you could still hear me.
Oh yeah, it may, it may occasionally freeze because Riverside is probably not the optimal
platform for live streaming, but I already pay the subscription. So I'm not about to go pay
StreamYard too. But no, so that's interesting. I mean, Pubkey, they are, they are crushing it
right now. I mean, it's a pretty, yeah, like, you know, regardless of your politics, it's pretty
cool to have a former president come into your, your bar, your, you know, your Bitcoin bar,
not your crypto bar, your Bitcoin bar, and, and order burgers, like that's just, like that's a
neat cultural moment. And I feel like that's, you know, this, this idea of like, you know, the third
place, like, which I'm sure you're familiar with, like the first place is home, the second place
is work or school, depending on what age in your life you're at. But then the third place and
where else do humans congregate? And in America, at least we've lost a lot of those,
those social clubs, those, you know, there's probably less of a bar scene or there's a,
there's a different bar scene now than probably there was, you know, now it's, I guess,
depending on where you are, it's more of a club scene or whatever. It's not so much a, a hangout.
It's, it's, it's something different. But I feel like beef steak is kind of creating one of those
third places that is in location agnostic, you know, a beef steak can happen anywhere.
Pubkey is creating a third place in a very brick and mortar space, as you said.
That's a good elevator. People crave those. Okay, great. Are you free to take it?
Would you say location agnostic third place? Yeah. Yeah.
Are you sure it's not, I think it works. Is it third space, third place, third place?
It sounds like bronze metal. So it's like a point you get if,
I think that it's third place, but we can say third place or third space. I mean, let's, you
know, I think it's open source it. All right. Well, yeah. Okay. No, like, I'll send it to you later.
Glad you like it. But, but I think that's a beautiful thing, right? You're creating a
space where people can come together, can congregate. And the only reason people will
coming back, will keep coming back to that third place is if they have a good time,
if they like the vibe there and that, you know, vibe curation sounds like a very like,
like kind of floofy thing to say, but it's a very real thing. Like it matters. And I know
you put a lot of thought, like thought into that. But I wonder, can you,
I'm not even in charge of marketing for a beef steak. I would be honored to. That, that would be awesome.
It's not curation. I'm writing that down right now. Well, but that's, that's what you do,
right? Because I think maybe for people, for people who don't know what a beef steak is,
maybe it's more helpful for you to talk about like, what a beef steak is not like, because there are
some kind of, you know what I mean? Like there are some kind of rules, like unwritten rules,
but then some other rules that are, I suppose, like written down like, Hey, we're not using
utensils here. You're eating with your hands. You're going to get messy. But like, can you talk
about that? Like what is a beef steak not? And then what, what is a beef steak?
You know, it's like, it's so funny you say what a beef steak is not because that's always, that's
always how I describe it. And that's always how I avoid describing it because it's really hard to
describe what it is. It's always changing. It changes from place to place. It changes by size.
You know, like what it is and what it's intended to be is different if it's 40 people coming and
if it's 100 people coming or 200 people coming. And, you know, it, it, I always like joke, you know,
like it's not a dinner, but there's food. It's not a Bitcoin event, but that's full of Bitcoiners,
you know, like it, it really is kind of just a vibration, you know, like, hopefully you're in
there. The goal is to actually, you know what, this is kind of an interesting opportunity. Like I,
I don't, I can't remember what we're talking about. But before we got started,
I have all these kind of like semi secret policies about beef steak. I'm just going to talk
about some of them because I never talk about them. I always like want to talk about them.
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source Bitcoin hardware, but you also help support this show. So thank you. So I'll tell you my my
first one is that I never I hate I hate tiered ticketing and salespeople. So I never
ever try to sell a ticket to someone. I just like I'm like here's the link. And I and everyone pays
the same price. There's no like, early bird price. And there's no like penalty for coming in late
and you didn't plan that penalty for coming in late is like maybe that there's no more room.
And then it's like, after that, I think that I always try to make them a little bit hard to get
to like, like there's something about creating a barrier to entry that just it's like putting humor
in your resume. Like you put humor in your resume and then someone says to you, they're going to
think you're not serious. And my response is go fuck yourself. Like, I'm about to sign a contract
with this company that like, we're going to agree on how valuable my time is. If you don't find value
in the fact that I'm like putting humor in my resume, like I don't want to work for you. So like
it's a filter for, you know, people that don't want to make the trip out to the east side of
Nashville. Like I get it. It's a pain in the ass. I don't even know if I would do it. But it also
puts pressure on me to make it worth the trip. You know, like if somebody's going to get in a
taxi and come over there, you know, like they need to get out of the car. They need to smell good.
It needs the sound awesome, you know, like you need to get out and be like, hell yeah, this was
worth the trip. Like just even when just when you're getting out of the car. And those things are
super important to me that people have those feelings and sense those senses when they walk
into a B stick, like they get a cocktail that and they're like, Oh, that's better than I thought it
was going to be. That sort of thing. I put a lot of effort into every time I like a week a B stick
is like 10 days out, I just sit down and look at all the logistics that I've lined up for the event.
And I think about what the what the experience would be like for the person that came to that
B stick. Like they roll up, they get out, what do they see? What do they hear? Is there music playing?
Do they hear a fire? Do they see a fire? Do they smell meat? Do they see meat? You know, like
how far do they have to walk to get a drink? You know, is there a line? That's another big thing
as I a lot of venues want to have like control alcohol consumption. And I have a like hard
policy that no one should ever wait for a drink at a B stick because I think waiting for a drink
at an event is the worst customer experience that exists. If an event is two hours long and it takes
20 minutes to get a drink, I'll tell you what I do. Without shame, I go to the bar, I wait there,
I try to get the strongest drink I can that I can nurse. I try to get as many as I can because I
don't want to come back. The last thing I want to do is get up and go back to the bar. So as a
result, I probably get two martinis, which is a terrible, it's a terrible decision. You know,
like, it's like, it's like I'm really resorting to two martinis because I don't want to,
I don't want to go back. So what I do is I pound the first martini because I don't want to drink
a warm, a second warm martini. And then I get halfway through the second martini. I'm just like,
just too much. And then I go back to the bar and I do the same thing, but I get two beers or something
like that. And then and in the end, I spend both times takes 20 minutes to get a drink. I spent 40
minutes of a two hour event, trying to get a drink. And I had to break up conversations to do it.
And I drank more than I needed to. And I probably wasted those drinks, like, because both times I
get two drinks, I probably set one down or I give it to somebody, you know, like, or just drink half
of it. And, you know, so I think the barrier to, I think restricting drinks makes people actually
get drunker. Having coolers out, of course, there's always going to be some person that like goes
overboard. But I think as a whole, you go through way less alcohol with open coolers than if you
had a bar with a bartender. Because then people are just like, I just want to get my drink and get
out of here. So so yeah, then I like, I'm like going through the experience of like what it's
like, you know, like how long are there stacks out? What are the stacks? Are they delicious?
Are they too filling? How long is going to someone going to be there between the time they arrive
and the time of the first course, you know, is there a band playing? Are they the right vibe?
Are they too loud? You know, like, there's just all these decisions and that that's those are all
contingent on like, what's the place, you know, like I keep thinking about Nashville, like,
I like the band in Nashville was really cool. And it was perfect kind of Nashville band, like,
they were just a great, I think the Nashville was a great vibe. I kind of, I kind of,
I got bum help in the kitchen, like the food was good. But like the guys that I ended up hiring
were, oh, shit, you're having a micolob light. Oh, I'm having a Miller light. A Miller light.
Sorry. And technically, you know, I mean, we, hey, if you want to grab a beer right now, we can,
I want to go get a beer. I'm just going to talk to the live stream about the merits of Miller
light while you're gone. I don't know if you guys can hear this. There we go. So I also was double
fisting for this. I should have triple fisted in advance of this, because these Miller lights just
go down so easy. And I see we have Derek Ross there in the old live stream chat. And I know Derek
loves himself a Miller light, even though he won't say it. He's likes to pretend that he probably
likes some fancy IPA or something, but really Derek is a Miller light guy. And that Derek,
that's okay. I'm right, I'm right there with your brother. So and also thank you guys for being here.
And if you're liking this, go ahead and share this on Noster. These live streams are only
going to happen on Noster because fuck YouTube. So thanks for being here and hope you're enjoying
it so far. And if you're listening at home, feel free to grab a beer as well, depending on where
you are. If you're, oh no, it's like, it's like 2 30pm where I'm at. It's probably later for a lot
of you if you're in Europe or elsewhere. But it's never too early to have a beer. And what did you
say? Okay, what is Derek's last message here? Miller light disrespecter. No, Derek, you're not.
You love Miller light, you just don't want to admit it. And that's okay. It's all right.
And the question is, am I going to need another beer?
You mean a lot of the ones that I want. Hey, don't worry about it. I was just talking, not with Derek
Ross because it's a one sided conversation. But talking to him. Is Derek present? Derek is present
in the audience. Hey, Derek, what beer did you go with? Actually, I couldn't find a beer. I'm having
this never sink whiskey. Oh, made in New York. Are you a because okay, so at the events,
typically it is a beer and I know I think you recently introduced some seltzers,
because those have become fairly ubiquitous these days. There's occasionally hard outcalls,
people when I think bring their own, you know, people are welcome to it. Are you a beer guy
yourself? Like, is that why you chose beer or was it just that's the easiest thing to put a
bunch of in a cooler and make sure everybody can get them? Oh, a beer. So the reason I say
steak and beer is just because traditionally that's what they drank. Okay. I do love beer.
But you know, now at most another interesting change over time has been what alcohol consumption
is at a B steak, because it started out being heavy like IPAs and porters and like fancy beers.
And it's really mostly wine now, like huge shift over to wine.
Interesting. And, and hard seltzers, I've always had hard seltzers, but a lot of times people don't,
they don't crush them, you know, I feel like hard seltzers is what people, this is what people say
when they grab a drink, they're like, you know what, I'm not going to drink for a little bit,
I'm just gonna have a hard seltzer. When I'm going to go back, I'm going to go back to the whiskey
later. That's like, then I'll have a real drink. Yeah, that's like their mentality when they
reach for the hard seltzer. And I like no judgment, I, I, that's kind of, I'm probably saying that
because that's what I do. Like, but yeah, we do actually this, this guy Dan really quick
backtracking to pubkey, you should talk to, you should get Thomas on. Thomas is awesome. I don't
know if you heard it. I've gotten a chance to meet him a couple of times. Awesome dude. I've
actually, I've been meaning to reach out to him as well. I figured he might be a little bit busy
right now with various press engagements and things, but I've been promising we're going to make it
out to New York to go to pubkey in person one of these days soon. It's awesome. Yeah. He's a,
he's an awesome dude. And yes, he is always busy, but like, he'll also just, you know,
find time to just be like, let's, like, let's drink a whiskey and talk over the air and he'll,
he'll do that I'm sure. But I was gonna, the reason I'm going to say that is, the reason I was
saying that is because one of the first people that helped me with V-Stakes was this guy Dan,
and Dan is like a cocktail master. And we often have like really fancy cocktails at
V-Stakes because of Dan. And he's also just great at hospitality and stuff like he,
he makes the V-Stakes way better if he's around. But, but I'd say that because there's often like
a fancy cocktail on deck somewhere at a V-Stake or two. And you just got to kind of make your way
around and find them. And actually, that's another thing that I like about a V-Stake is
no two people have the same beef steak. You might have a different meal. You can drink different
things. And actually, I feel like this is a good segue into talking about AI taking jobs.
Yes, let's go. There's something about like, I worked in really fancy restaurants for a while.
When you work in a fancy restaurant, what happens is like somebody gives you a carrot,
and they say to you in the meanest possible way, I need you to cut this into perfect cubes
and cook them perfectly for me. At a moment's notice, for 12 hours a day, whatever.
When you cut perfect cubes out of a carrot, you waste 50% of the carrot. And what you get is
can be cool and is good. And it is the result of a lot of skilled work.
But also what it ends up being is uniform. And I think that uniformity,
just no matter how cool it is, ends up being dull. It's boring in the end. And like,
you get these really fancy places and then like, the trickle down effect of like, whether or not
you want to admit it, the trickle down effect of fancy restaurants perfecting food is McDonald's.
Because they take all the skill and science that restaurants create, high end restaurants create,
and they put it into automated food computers that make perfect french fries over and over again.
And you can go to McDonald's anywhere in the world and eat the same french fry. And that is
comforting. Like, there's an upside to that and I get it. And like, but the downside is that like,
everybody's eating the same french fry all the time and no one's interested in trying different
french fries. French fries are kind of a bad example because I feel like an unusually small
for percentage of french fries are actually good. But you know, it could be anything like, I just
think the, if you drink a cup of coffee, what's beautiful about it is that it changes throughout
the course of drinking it, you know, like you take your first sip, and it's hot. And maybe it tastes
stronger or maybe there's foam on top and the foam hits your lips differently. And then as you drink
through it, the foam disappears and it cools down and maybe by the end of it, you know, it's just
like a little bit of a journey. Whereas if you eat like a perfectly cooked cube of anything,
every bite is the same. And that's not interesting. With the exception of obviously,
if it starts out hot, it's going to cool down and it's going to be cold when you're finished with it.
So I like the idea of cooking over fire, a steak that maybe wasn't carved perfectly from a roast.
Because if you eat through that steak, like it's a journey, like it's just like,
everybody's different, maybe it's rare on one side, and maybe it's like crispy and crunchy,
but overcooked on the other side. And I like that about beef steaks. And I like creating that
experience about beef steaks where it's not like, this is your seat, this person is on your left,
this person is on your right. For the next three hours, we're going to give you all the exact same
fucking thing. And there's nothing you can do about it. And if those people suck, too bad for you,
like there's also nothing you can do about it. It's like a beef steak, you can like move around
and try different things or eat different things. You can just also be like, I don't want this one.
I'm stuffed. I don't have room for this or whatever, whatever the reasoning is when it comes time to.
And then hopefully, I eliminate all the bad decisions, and then people are left with the
good decisions and can just make, you know, decide what is the best beef steak for them
while they're they're experiencing it.
Did you, did you cook with just on open fire a lot prior to starting this beef steak journey?
Or was that something that you started doing because you wanted to keep these beef steaks kind
of in that same, in that same traditional vein as these original ones that were happening,
happening around the turn of the century? Or were you pretty adept at cooking on open fire before that?
I don't know, you know, so there's this book called Seven Fires, which I think everybody should at least
like, do people still hang out at Barnes and Noble sometimes?
You should try to flip through it sometime because it is, it really was the first like,
that I know of, or at least the first one that romanticized cooking on an open fire.
And it's this guy, Francis Molleman, and he's like, he's from Argentina, and he's, he is a bad ass.
He has a bunch of restaurants and everyone that I've never been to one, but everyone that I know
that goes to them is like, they're so good. But he always, you know, he's like an older dude.
He always has some like, hot 20 year old girlfriend and like, he just like speaks like,
ephemeral about everything. And but that really got me into it where it's like, you kind of,
when you're working in high end restaurants, a couple of things happen, you get very,
there's something about in the highest level of restaurant cooking, there's something about
like, you have to see, I keep doing this with my hands. It's okay, I'm into it.
I'm like, when you get into restaurants, there's something about like, you need to,
in order to succeed in high end restaurants, you have to be very good at seeing what's wrong with
things. Like you have to be able to fix things. But part of like maintaining that super high
quality is see, like looking at a thing and seeing what's wrong, seeing how it's flawed.
And that is a form of negativity. And it's a terrible fucking way to live your life. Like,
whereas like, when I worked in high end restaurants, if somebody gave me like a lopsided
steak that was like burnt on one end, I'd been like, this steak is fucked. Like, bring me a steak
that was cooked for hours. But it's like, life is fleeting, you know, like every year is different.
Like if you have an apple tree, the apples are different every year. Like, one year is going
to be really good. And you're going to be like, this is like the best apple I've ever had. I can't
wait to have it again next year. And then next year, it's going to be like, I'm going to be like,
it's a different apple. You know, like you have to, you have to enjoy that apple the first time,
because it might be the only time. And it's the same thing with like a lopsided burnt steak where
it's like, Oh, maybe this was maybe it was a really good steak, maybe it was from a good cow or
whatever. And so we're like circling this all back to AI, like I think sometimes about, because I
am also a parent about like, what jobs will AI not take? And I don't know, I don't know, could an AI
do a beef steak? For sure an AI could work at McDonald's, you know, like, AI's like, barely,
like if you work at McDonald's now, really, all you do is press buttons, unless you're Donald Trump.
Well, you know, like, or even I mean, take that up to something that's closer to like a fine dining,
an AI can, you know, and robotics could handle a capital grill type steak experience, where you
have a menu, you have very split, like they've got their cooking temperature, they've got it in
their manual, they've got the exact amount of time that you cook each type of meat, exactly how you
treat it. It's formulaic. And when something is formulaic, you can plug that formula into some
sort of row, you know, robotic machine, and have it execute the same thing. Like it's not too hard
to have a robot that is going to take that and at the certain timer flip it off. And maybe that
robot even has an inbuilt temperature sensor. So it's actually a little bit better than the
human at cooking that steak, because it's making sure that that steak is flipped exactly when it's
supposed to so that it's seared perfectly. But when you're like, I don't think, well, who knows,
I'm no AI expert. But fire is incredibly unpredictable, like inherently, like it is
literally random noise, like it is, by definition, random, like that'd be a great way to generate
a Bitcoin seed phrase if you're somehow tying it to the the licks of fire going up, you know,
because it is random. Yeah, there's, there's only going to be so much control that you can have
on that if you're actually cooking in a wood, a traditional wood fired way. But I think the
bigger thing is that experience, right? And this is we were talking just before we went live about
this little bit, this idea that, yeah, you could have, you know, and we're using AI in a very like
general way, right? But we're talking about, you know, some sort of automated process, non human
process that is taking care of your food preparation experience. But part of the reason that people
want to go and eat certain places is not just because the food is great. It's because they love
that chef. They want they know that chef's story. They love that chef's journey that he or she has
been on. They like the experience that that chef creates the type of people that go and eat that
chef's food as well. And that's something that you're just not going to be able to replicate.
Because that is that that human quality of this is a personal experience, personal meaning that
there is a person involved, you're not just you don't just go to eat, because you want to get the
most optimal food, you go to eat because you want to have an experience. It's not just shoveling
calories down your gullet and okay, I'm done. It's no I want to go have an experience and I want to
spend time with friends and family. Maybe I want to see that chef prepare the food right in front
of me. And I want to hear the story of where that cow came from and how you know this was age and
whatever it might be. Yeah, I think that that that's something that AI can't replicate. And that's
also like that's a good thing. Like, and that you know, I don't know thinking AI can replicate
a beef steak, it could take all of your, you know, it could analyze all the beef steaks you've done,
all the different ways that you cook the meat, you know, maybe it could figure out the grilling
on fire pretty well, you know, but I think that's enough data, but it's not an replicate the experience.
I'm sorry to interrupt you, but I think about AI.
The AI's can replicate. They can, they can recreate, but they can't re they can't create. Right.
And it's derivative. It's derivative. And then like, what that sort of means is like to stay ahead
of AI, you have to keep creating. And then it's like, of course, I'm fascinated with this conversation,
like I went to school for art. And I'm really fascinated by like, what is art and what isn't?
And like, what art do you like? And I agree that people
when sometimes when they go to a restaurant, they're buying also the story for sure. That's
what they're doing with Francis Mulman, the seven fires guy. Like they're just like, they're,
they want the romanticism of eating at a Francis Mulman restaurant or like Salt Bay or whoever
is cool now. I don't know what the kids are watching these days. But when you,
when you look at a painting, have you ever read Zen in the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by any
chance? No, but it is sitting on my shelf waiting for me to read it because I've had so many people
tell me you need to read it. It's so good. I read it as like an angsty teen. And I feel like it
probably would not affect me as much now. But I, he talks a lot about like people seeing quality
in things and how naturally you can usually just see that quality. But he and, and it sounds like
it should start with a painting. And like you look at a painting and you're like, that painting is
genuinely a fucking beautiful painting. And some paintings you look at, and there's like a line
and a square and you're like, Oh, that's not a good painting. But you need to have this like
story and art, art history lessons and you need to go to like a liberal arts school for four years.
And then you think it's a good painting. And I know that say Fadine will never think that it's a good
painting. But I, but I personally, there's a great Tim Ferriss podcast where he talks to a guy that
does he's basically like a therapist famous therapists for people that are dying. And he's
just like stare at this Rothko painting until you find meaning. And it's like such an arbitrary weird
art school assignment. And I hate I hate it. But at the same time, I'm like, there is no meaning.
Like, it just becomes, you know, it's just like, you can't find it anywhere. All that is like,
come back to AI. I'm like, is AI can make Rothko paintings, you know, it can like generate,
but it's not making anything. It's just recreating stuff. But it doesn't like, our human minds don't
perceive that if it's a picture we've never seen before, we think it created it. And probably it's
a picture no one has ever seen before. So there's like, it's just a semantics conversation anyways.
Well, it's also that idea, like beauty is in the eye of the beholder, right? Or be hodler,
if we're talking in Bitcoin terms. But like, it is like meaning, it has the meaning that you give
to it, right? It reminds me of like the assignments, you know, like in high school, where it was like,
and this was me coming from being homeschooled and till high school, then getting there and doing
these really stupid fucking assignments, like, Oh, you know, like, what did F Scott Fitzgerald
mean by by this in his book? And then you like look into it, and you're like, Oh,
F Scott Fitzgerald didn't mean anything by it. He was trying to make money by writing a book
that people would buy. So like any meaning that you want to put in there, like all these like
things you can concoct about what is he saying about the human condition all this, it's like,
that's all just a byproduct. He was just trying to write a good story. Like the meaning is what
you find there. And I think that's the same with a lot of art. And to a to a different extent with
food, because I think a lot of food is like, it's interesting, you went to art school, because I
think I mean, like, food is its own form of expression, right? Form of artistic expression,
that also happens to be edible and delicious, hopefully. But like, that's, it's kind of a
neat crossover. This is a slight digression. But when, when did you decide like, did you want to be
like an artist? Did you want to be a professor of art? So an art critic? When did you decide I'm
going to be a, I'm going to be a chef, I'm going to cook food? If it's not weird, I actually,
part of there's a couple, there's, there's, there's a three party answer here, it might
actually just be two parts. I think the first part is that I was quickly over
art critiques, like part of going to art school is like you stand around with everybody and you
just talk and you say all this esoteric bullshit about what everybody else's paintings are.
And, and it often it's like, it almost feels like the origin of wokeness, because you're in this,
you're in this arena where you can only really comment objectively about the thing, you're not
allowed to be like, this is a piece of shit, that's like just strictly forbidden, especially if it's
a piece of shit. And so it's like, you can't, it's like, it's like a form of dishonesty,
where you're just, you're just like kind of blathering on about art. And I didn't, I didn't
like that, like I didn't, like there's this thing where it's like, if, if something is, if something
has a use, can it be art? And I'm of the, I'm of the, I'm of the mindset that like, you should be,
you should be able to perceive the value or quality of a piece of art or anything you're
consuming a steak without knowing the story. In other words, like if a person comes to a beef
steak, they shouldn't need to know who I am, they shouldn't need to know what the thing is,
they should just come, they should know what it is before they're going, obviously. But, but once
they know what it is, they should go there and be like, Oh yeah, this is awesome. And then I got
over that with, I got over that at art school quickly. And the second part of it was the
like, when you were in art school, you work on projects for months at a time. And sometimes
they suck at the end of it. And that is, that was hard for me to do, and still is hard for me to do.
When you're cooking, when you go into a restaurant, a nice restaurant or even a shitty
restaurant, you do the same art project every day over and over again. And no matter how shitty it
is today, you get to wake up tomorrow and go back and do it again. So like you get better.
It's like you go to a restaurant, you're like, I when I worked at Gramercy Tavern,
we did this dish that was like, a crepe with crab and carrots in it. And that was the perfectly
cut cubes. And like it had this carrot reduction sauce over what you know, it's like, it was simple.
And it was hard to execute well. But it was fucking really good when you when it was done
perfectly. And, and it took me a long time to get to get good at doing it. Like, I just had to do
it over and over again. And then when you there's no way it's a work, there's no way it crosses over
in in the Venn diagram of like, is it food? Is it art? There's no way it crosses over into art
the first time you make it, you have to make it 500 times before it starts to become like,
oh, you see all the really minute details that can change. And you kind of hone in on the things
that are are nicer about it. And you just make it more beautifully. And hopefully, it's more delicious.
So restaurants gave me a, an escape from the arbitrary esoteric conversations of art school.
And it gave me like, a more rapid fire way to create is not the right word, but just like,
do something with my hands and can complete it. And then you're done at the end of your at the end
of every day, you're done. Like, there's no like project that you have to wake up and face the next
day, you just got to go back and do the same thing over and over again.
I suppose it's also like, or the feedback you're getting is inherently, like brutally honest.
It's like, did did the person eating there, did they like the food? Or did they not like the food?
And obviously, everybody's tastes are different. But you're getting this feedback day after day in
real time. It's not people, you know, blowing smoke up your ass about, well, I really liked the way
that you made a painting that was just black and white and it's two circles. And I think that that
was really talking about the plight of the modern man as he struggles with his own masculinity.
No, it's just like, yeah, that was a really good steak. I liked it a lot. I would, I would eat that
steak again. I enjoyed it. I had a good time. Like, it's, it's much more real. It's, it's, and
quite literally, you know, tangible and goes into your body. Yeah, it's also function, exactly.
Like it's putting something into your body, because you get hungry. You don't get hungry to consume
Rothko, you know, like you get hungry to put something in your belly. And that, that kind of
makes it just in, in and of that quality, I feel like it, that makes it hard to make food art. I
didn't really finish that statement earlier. It's like, if you can use something, is it art, or is
it design? And are you a, are you an artist? Are you a craftsperson? If you're making something
that's used? And the example is like a flight of stairs. If there's a, if there's nothing at the
top of top of a flight of stairs, it can be a piece of art. And there's actually like a website
dedicated to this, like stairs that lead nowhere. And, and it's kind of an interesting idea, because
you're like, right now, the stairs are useless. Like it's just like, why would anyone walk up them?
So all you can do is look at them and like, think about it. And, but like the second there's like
a door at the top of the stairs, you're like, Oh, those are well designed stairs. But they're not
art anymore, because you can use them. I kind of, that's kind of like my, how I think about
art and usefulness and whether or not something is art or design. And there's obviously overlap
there. But I, you wouldn't call yourself a meat artist, for example, I would not, I would not.
And actually, meat artists sounds kind of questionable too. Like when you hear that,
like just know I out of context, it sounds a little bit weird. So yeah,
no, no, I used to be on my grinder profile. Yeah. The, I think the other thing that's
another, another thing about the usefulness of I really am anti the fancy restaurants put this
into me, but I'm very anti food waste. And a lot of times people want to do things like
throw stakes at each other and like they want to have like eating contests and stuff like that.
And I really don't like that stuff. Like I don't like, I don't like if you actually,
because it's like the opposite end of the spectrum, like if you want fruit food to be art,
you're, it's by necessity wasting it. And I fucking hate that. I hate wasting food.
Especially if it's an animal, like I don't know if you've ever got hunting or anything
like that. I had not actually, yeah. So, so like it's one part of the reason the way I got
cookie started cooking was I was a vegan in high school and my mom was like, cool,
but I'm not making vegan food all the time. So like, we'll give you some money and you can like
cook for yourself, but I'm not like just I'm not making vegan food and like lesser heart.
Like that was that was the right thing to do for a while. I just sauteed bell peppers and ketchup
and I still have a soft spot in my heart for ketchup peppers. But it set me on the path to
being like you can make more delicious food. And then like what then then like you get like a pork
chop. And what happened when I started working in New York is they bring like, you're like, oh,
a pork chop, like it's kind of easy to waste a pork chop. But then in Italy, or I worked in Italy,
then I came back and it worked in a restaurant. And they bring like a half a pig in and when they
bring a half a pig in and you got to cut it up and, you know, saw pork chops and like set aside
the trodders and whatever. It's harder to waste that stuff, you know, it's hard to like cut a
bunch of skin off and just toss it away. You're like, can we make cracklings? Like what could we
do with this? Yes, it's a lot of more work. But sucks to waste the animal. And that's where you
like get away. It's romantic to use every part of the pig. A lot of people don't want to do it,
but it's not I don't it's not an art. You know, it's definitely a craft.
You need to learn it. You need to learn it from an old grumpy conservative dude.
Yeah. Yeah, I remember the first time I went deer hunting with my dad, I think I was maybe,
I don't know, 12 years old or so. And like first, first deer I shot, I was actually with a with a
shotgun shooting slugs in Southern Minnesota, because you need to shoot slugs down there,
because it's farmland and don't want your stray rifle bullet going too far. So you shoot slugs.
And I still remember that first deer that I killed was very young little buck. But I remember
my dad starting to field dress it and having me do it with him. And like, without getting too
graphic for anyone listening, the moment you you need to cut the asshole and balls out of a deer
in the field, and then cut up its guts, pull all those guts out and clean that thing up and then
drag that for a considerable distance. You gain a new respect for that animal, because it is quite
an intimate thing to do. And that was the first thing my dad said is that we got to thank this
animal. And we're going to use every bit of it that we possibly can. And I think that that's
like in, because our society is so full of waste. Yeah, yeah, hardcore. Like it's insane. And it's,
I think when you're talking about like waste is bad enough, just in general sense, but about with
animals specifically, it's like, that may not be a sentient being, right? But that is still
a living thing. And if you are going to kill that thing and eat it, you should respect it by using
as much of it as you can. Yeah. And I'm curious with beef steaks, do you, how do you, this is kind
of a specific question, but I'm just very curious, how do you actually pick the kind of the cuts of
meat that you're going to do? And do you like, do you work with any of the kind of like, you know,
Bitcoin ranchers that are out there too, that are, you know, selling beef for Bitcoin? How does that
like, it's kind of like nuts and bolts logistics actually work of getting ready for an event?
It's the answer is always it depends. I definitely will always buy Bitcoin from ranchers when I can't
or sorry, buy beef from ranchers with Bitcoin when I can. I think that my family were beef farmers
in Missouri back in the day. I love supporting ranchers. I think, you know, as with any like real
argument or conversation, it's like, it's more nuanced than you want for it to be like everybody's
like, I could just give you a half a cow to do at a beef steak and like that actually, as romantic
as it sounds, wouldn't really work unless I had like 10 days to like take it apart and cook everything
and cure things and like, I really can only do steaks. That's not entirely true. Like obviously,
I do other things, but I need to go in and be able to get like 100 pounds of flank stick. And it's
hard for a lot of ranchers to do that. So I don't I can't always do it. Cole in Austin is awesome.
His beef is delicious. He can usually come pretty close to that with enough advanced notice.
And I haven't done one in Austin for a while. But when when I do, I try to like let him know and
and go through him. But I usually try to go through meat purveyors and there are like,
you can still get really good meat. And then obviously, when it's smaller, if the if a beef steak
is going to be 30 or 40 people, I can go like the one we do in Regal at Via, there's this woman in
Estonia, who's like six generation cattle rancher butcher store in the small town in Estonia.
This guy lives there and he like, I just email her and like tell her what I want and they
put her the cow in advance and he drives it down to Riga for me. And so that usually does come from
one or two cows and she sends me the pictures and like, it's expensive, but the meat is really good.
And and like you said, the story is cool, you know, like, you get to see pictures of the cows in
the field and like the story of her family business and all that stuff. And then also just in Riga,
the food is just I Riga beef steak is one of my somebody, somebody's on Twitter or something
somewhere, maybe even messaged me was like, what's your favorite beef steak? There's no real answer
to that because I think they're all totally different. And but the one in Riga is special.
And it's because I think Riga is a really, have you been to the Riga conference ever?
I have not. And it kills me because I've heard it's quite a special experience.
It's really cool. And I think part of it is like goes back to like, it's kind of a pain in the
ass to get there. And it just it just puts up a wall for anybody that won't lay over.
And it is like the flights are terrible. Like you either have like a 25 minute layover in Oslo,
or you lay over for like two days or something like that. Like there's no and there's no like
hour and a half layover. You have to always sprint to your next plane coming and going.
And yeah, I don't know. It's always a shit show. My travels always messed up getting there, but I
always have the best time there. I love that. I love that. Did I answer your question? You said, oh,
yeah. Yeah, no, you absolutely did. And I'm curious, do you have another specific question,
but do you have a favorite cut yourself? Like if you had to, you get to have one cut to have
for dinner tonight. And or maybe I should make it like you have to have one cut for the rest of
your life. This is obviously a hypothetical, but I'm curious, like what, what, what part do you
really love? I think the, the, the answer is ribeye. I think if I partly because like if I had to,
if I was eating ribeye for the rest of my life, it's technically two muscles
that are kind of good eating. They're pretty forgiving. The ribeye is pretty forgiving.
Like if you get a strip steak, and you cook that just a little bit too much, that thing is trash.
I hate overcooked strip steak. Going back to like the imperfect steak, there is no imperfect strip
steak. It's, it's great or it's trash. Like it just crosses that line. It's done. I really like,
I really think flat iron steak is way underrated. I think it's really tasty. It's really forgiving.
And it's cheap. Like it's like you can, you can kind of get it anywhere. It's part of the shoulder.
You can make stews out of it, or you can cook it as a medium rare steak. And it's great both ways.
If you make a stew out of a ribeye, it's kind of not that great. It's obviously super wasteful,
money wise, but like you could still do it. Yeah. It would, would that be your like most under, not
the ribeye, but would that be your most underrated cut of steak? Or do you have another cut that you
think like people don't, don't use enough that is actually like very good and maybe more economical?
I think it's probably the most underrated, but still available, you know, like, because I could
say something like a Denver steak, but if you go to the local grocery store and be like, cut me
some Denver steaks, he's gonna be like, I don't know what the fuck you're talking about next.
And, but he should know what a flat iron is. Or it's called a minute steak. Sometimes it's cut
across the thing. There's like a big piece of connective tissue going down. Dude, I have,
can I ask you some questions? Sure, man. How are we on time? It's an open format. We're, we're,
I'm, I'm solid on time here. If you've got, do you have another 15, 20 years? I have no time
constraints. I have no time. Oh, sweet. Well, well, then we're, we're, we're rolling. But yeah, I
listened to this. I listened to, it was, it was like, it was Michael Malis and Dave Smith talking.
And they were, it was around the time that you, I, I, I bet you I was listening to it while you
and I were texting. And, and Dave Smith was talking about, because the reason I say this,
because I was like, Oh, I want to talk to Walker about this. Dave Smith was talking about like
coming up with jokes and how you, when you come up with a joke, you really don't know
with a few exceptions, you don't know how it's going to be received. And I, and like,
there's like, he's like, you know, if I come up with a hundred jokes, two of them, I'll be like,
Oh, these are going to be killers. And then they are killers. And then like, there's 30 of them
where I'm like, these are going to be great. And maybe 10 of them are great. And then the rest,
you're like, Okay, these are shitty. I should never do this. And I actually, I feel that way
about my own tweets, like the tweets that I think are my best tweets, they all have like two likes,
you know, like just, it's always that way. I just like, but I'm curious, when you're doing podcasts,
do you feel like you have an idea of how it's going to be received when it's, when it's done? I
guess it's, I guess it's also a process. Like, do you have an idea when you're, when you're done,
do you have an idea of how you think it will be received? And then how correct are you in that
idea? Yes. And usually, pretty correct. Like, I can tell you right now, that this is going to be
that this is going to be received well, and will be listened to a lot, like relative to other episodes.
Because I think that, like this has not not to make this too formulaic, but this has a lot of
things that people want, which is somebody who is very beloved by the community, you,
something that is Bitcoin related, but not specifically Bitcoin, because sometimes people
honestly just get burnt out by just, like, you can only hear that the dollar is going to collapse,
and the Fed's going to print money. Like, you can only hear that so many times, it's like,
we get it, I know. And like, yes, it's, it's nice. And, you know, or hearing, you know, like,
like, I, I, I hate Bitcoin price predictions, I should say I have a love hate relationship with
them. Because it's like, I find that to be mostly noise. But like, that is some like that, that's
the kind of stuff that does well, like on YouTube, because you put a headline with me going like,
Oh, with a whole face. And you know, like, you won't believe this insane prediction from Michael
Saylor. And, and then that, you know, the algorithm picks that up, because people apparently like
that kind of stuff on YouTube. But like, that's why I genuinely like, I don't look at YouTube when
it comes to how my show is received, I look at the just the RSS downloads, like, what are the
actual podcast downloads? Because I think that's a little bit truer. It's not as algorithmically
driven. It's like somebody decided, Oh, yeah, I want to listen to this, not just like YouTube,
the YouTube algorithm through this to me. And so I'm going to click on it and watch it.
But yeah, well, I'm curious, do you, do you have that with your that same question with your food,
like with with a beef stick? Or do you know, like,
Yeah, I have it with dishes, like I do all these dishes. And it's not even that there's
actually a couple sides to it. Part of it is, when you're actually, yeah, I'll just give this
in because in restaurants, you know, one realizes how important menu writing is. And when you think
about like, you sometimes you go to a restaurant, and you see this, you see eight things in a menu,
and you're like, I would like to order one of everything, please. And then there's another time,
when you sit down at a restaurant, you're like, I don't know what to get, like, what do you have,
you know, like, what are you having? Like, when you ask someone, like, what are you having, it's
like a bad sign that they are not great at menu writing. But you're like, I'll have things on a
menu in a restaurant. Just like, this is so good, like, why are people know you just like,
switch two words. And it's just like the next sign, it's the most popular thing on the menu.
And something about how it hits the brain at the table, just like cranks. And then I think the other
thing is like, just the functionality of a dish, like if I make a beefsteak course, there are so
many times where I'm like, or at the end of the night of a beefsteak, I'll be like, this one thing
was was really good tonight. And other people will be like, that was the best, like no one ever
mentions the thing that I thought was the best one. Really? So they talk about other things.
And actually, that is almost 100% of the time. Like, the thing that I was the most excited about
is almost never the thing that people are the mentioned to me later.
What's the thing that makes you the most excited about it? Like, how do you determine, like,
out of these, you know, seven different courses that you delivered, how do you determine, like,
which one that you are the most stoked about? Is it just like, is it something technical
on the preparation side? Is it just you tasted it afterwards? And that's the one that you thought
tasted the best? Or how do you how do you judge that personally? That's a good question. I think
it goes back to the whole zit in the art of motorcycle maintenance. Because the whole thing
about that book is like, the guy is just pursuing quality, he's like looking for quality and trying
to define the word. And he basically goes crazy trying to define it. But he talks about how,
like, you know, you know, quality when you see it, and different people get better at seeing
different types of quality, like mathematicians can look at a mathematical equation and be like,
that's a beautiful equation. And he talks about working on motorcycle, and he talks about how
simple whatever is Harley Davidson is and how you know, whatever. So that is all that is to say is,
like, the best beef steak course is is the the one that speaks to your tongue, you know what I mean?
Like, doesn't matter how pretty it is, it doesn't matter like the story of the steak,
all that shit goes out the window when you take a bite, like the only thing that matters is you
you just go, Oh, man, that's really good. And so few of the things that we eat are truly delicious,
you know, I mean, and you really have to be paying attention because you can miss it.
I usually you can miss it. And it might not be there. Not only next week, like, once it's gone,
like once people finish it, you know, can I have more like it's gone? No, you can't, there's nothing
like I can't make it again. So that's the thing where I'm like, that's where that's where those are
my favorite beef steak dishes that you just put in your mouth and you and there's, you know, for
whatever reason, you just know immediately that it's delicious. It's surprising to me, though,
that like what the like you said, almost almost always whatever you're hearing from people at
the end of the night that was their favorite one is not the one you would have picked. I mean,
do you think that just comes down to like, not to sound like hoity to do, but you just have
like a more refined palate. And so you are you are like, maybe you're judging your own creation
more harshly. Is that part of it? Do you think I'm probably I don't think I have a more refined
palate. I'm probably looking for more. I'm probably looking for more high end notes, you know, like
to like, I'm thinking more about like, what's the texture? And what's the acid level of the
dish, you know, like, are there crunchy things in there? Is there a pickled thing on top, you know,
like, is there some sort of hit of salt that comes at the beginning or the end, you know, like,
what's the what is the arc of the bite once it's in your mouth? I probably think about that more.
Because like, you know, if there's an olive in there, and like you miss it, and then you hit
the olive and you're like, Oh, it's like a little salty pop there, you know, it's like,
I'm probably paying more attention to that stuff. I don't know if I'd call that refined,
but but I am looking for it more because I think refined or not, you still notice those things,
you know. And maybe that's the other part of that, that discussion is like, you do get better at
delivering things that people automatically think is delicious, like you just you get better at it.
And maybe that's the art, you know, like maybe the art is, you know, giving quality to people.
Giving quality to people more consistently, and higher quality over time, hopefully.
Hold on, I got already I have another podcast question for you.
Oh, okay. Love it.
I am curious about I did in in in warm up for this episode, I listened to some some of your
podcast episodes, I don't listen to many Bitcoin podcasts anymore, I will admit because and it
is because I have I have like, just limited my intake to a cut all news out of my life, which
I think is a great thing. I am not going to vote this year, which I have never done before, but I
has let me be more unbiased, I guess, you know, like I don't have a team anymore. I'm politically
homeless. And I was never like hardcore one way or the other. But I can't handle the political teams.
And so anyways, in listening to warm up to warm up to this character, I totally sidetracked myself
there. I don't remember what it's talking. Anyways, I was going to ask you kind of like,
what your thought process was. Oh, you were talking on one of your episodes about doing
short form content with Carla and getting some sponsors and stuff like that and going in and
out of that stuff. And then like, you started this podcast, and you you said something like I
it's an it's an opportunity to talk to people. And actually, I would say like, I'm obviously in
having a great time, I'm sitting on whiskey. I haven't had like, I know you I consider you a
buddy, but we haven't had like a night out, you know, I mean, like we haven't like dinner and
just like chilled out and had a beer like, which is kind of where you cross over and you can
like develop like a rapport with the person but also just become friends and talk about
shit that no one's listening to. And then so I'm curious like why why you are making a longer
form podcast, which I like I love that you're doing it. I respect you for doing it. And then like,
is there a goal? How do you get in like, what's your process stuff like that?
Well, first of all, I would, of course, much prefer a off the mic, nice dinner and subsequent
drinks with you to a on the mic conversation, especially separated by great distance.
We'll do that. But that you know, it's a date that sounds like a blast. But no, like what I'd
said, I think I've said it a couple of times because it very much is true. Like I started this
show because I like talking to Bitcoiners. Like I've met some really amazing people
because of Bitcoin. I've met, you know, you because of Bitcoin, I attended, you know,
I think I've got three beef steaks under my belt now. That's because I, you know, I don't think I
would have heard about that if I wasn't, you know, running in these Bitcoin circles. Like,
I'd have met great people at beef steak too, that you, you know, you're throwing meat down your
gullet together and having a great time. And like, it's just such an incredible melting pot.
But I do, you know, I still have a fiat job, still mine fiat, as they say. And so for me,
this podcast is not a like a money making endeavor. I'm lucky to have a very great sponsor, Bitbox,
who has supported this show from early on. And I'm very grateful for that. Because it is nice,
there are certain costs associated with it. For example, like, you know, getting a nice
microphone and things like that. But I would do this, even if nobody was sponsoring the show,
because I think that as I know, there's the meme like, Oh, there's too many Bitcoin podcasts.
I think we need as many Bitcoin podcasts and more as there are Treadfy podcasts,
like we need to overwhelm, we need to sync that Treadfy ship by overwhelming it with a flood of
Bitcoin podcasts. But not just specifically about Bitcoin or number go up, I think the,
the, you know, FGU, the freedom go up part of that is a really like a more important and more
interesting part of the conversation. I also think just talking to people whose lives have changed
because of things they started doing around Bitcoin, but not talking specifically about
Bitcoin like we're doing here today. Like, we've barely talked about Bitcoin. Exactly. Because,
you know, we, we don't necessarily need to write. And I think that I think that part of
I think it's very powerful for people to come to Bitcoin, not just because they heard some podcast
where all the technical details of Bitcoin were elaborated upon in great detail. But because
they heard a story about somebody who was doing something kind of related to Bitcoin. And they
liked, they liked that person, they liked that idea and they liked whatever they were doing
with their life and it inspired them in some way, or maybe it made them hungry for a nice steak. I
don't know. I think that those conversations are, are really useful for people to have and important.
And so yeah, my end goal with this show, no end goal. Just keep on doing it, whether it's sponsored
or not. Because like for me, like I don't, I don't watch sports. So you figure anytime that I would
spend watching sports and caring about sports, I just figure I dedicate that to Bitcoin and making
a podcast. And if a few people listen to it and get value from it, that's enough for me. And again,
it gives me an opportunity, a great excuse to chat in a longer form setting with folks like you.
I would love to do these things in person, like more so. But with the little guy right now, travel
is, is low on the priority list. But yeah, I'll take that data pub key any day.
This is a good stepping stone way to do it though, you know, like you get this like foundation
on these first episodes. And then like, when he gets older, and you get easier to move around.
And before he starts school, like you can get out there and maybe people can come to you more,
but also like you'll get around and get to some, I get, but I'm seeing like, I'm seeing you guys
listed on conferences coming up. Are you guys going to travel? And actually, you know what,
this is probably personal contrary to that. We don't have to go there.
No, that's okay. I can say just because it's completely public. We're going to be in El Salvador
in January for the, for the plan B El Salvador conference. So they have the plan B and Lugano.
We emceed that for the inaugural one two years ago now. And they run a really great show and
they're doing one in El Salvador. We haven't been back to El Salvador since 2022. And so I'm
honestly stoked to get back there. Have you, have you been down? I haven't been.
Wait, you have not been yet? Yeah, I've had some good beef in El Salvador. I'll say.
Sure. Yeah. Yeah, it's a, it's a cool, it's a cool country. I don't know. It's, it's an inspiring
place too, because you see a lot of people very hopeful. And that's something that I think we
need more of in this world, like people that are generally just like stoked about the future.
Like, wow, things are getting better. Like, you know, life is much better than it was a year ago,
two years ago, 10 years ago. Like, that's, that kind of optimism is really contagious, I think.
And so it's, it's cool to go down there. I'm excited to go back. Are you doing any more
beef steaks this year? You know, I was kind of like aligning my, oh, this year. Am I doing more
beef steaks? Nothing public. I did, like I do some for, I do some private events, like I do some for
Bitcoin companies. And then I do them for like, sometimes people will be like, I want to do it
for my rehearsal dinner or something like that. That's an awesome rehearsal dinner.
Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I would like rehearsal dinner, or even a wedding dinner, people will do. So,
so I have some stuff like that that's like private, not on the open thing, but I don't know, my open
one, like this next year, I, the Bitcoin conference in Las Vegas, I don't love Las Vegas. You guys
lived in Las Vegas for a second, right? We lived in Las Vegas. We were going to move there. We
lived there for like five, six months, just like doing a long-term Airbnb thing. And then
Carl, wait, you guys are going to get crazy Airbnb story. Oh, God. Yeah, it was, it was, it was,
it was, you know, honestly, though, it was a great example of like, going viral on social
media, actually leading to a meaningful resolution to something. Because like, I think like, we had
multiple people reach out and be like, I know somebody like high up at Airbnb. Let me like,
because the video went like really viral. Because Carl is very good at making engaging short form
content, right? And you remind me what happened. It was like, was it like a flood or something?
No, well, first, let's just say that one thing was the house was not as advertised, which would
have been fine if we weren't like paying a substantial amount for it. Like it was a lot of,
a lot of fiat that could have gone towards sats. But the house looked very nice on the pictures,
not so much when you got there. The other thing was they were doing like, they were doing basically
like full ripping out all of the roads around this house and doing really like heavy machinery work.
That's right. It would have been like for the next six months. And we were like, well, this is,
it would have been nice to know about that because there's like jackhammers all day,
every day nonstop. And we've got a barky little dog like this is not a good situation.
Yeah. And then basically they would like not refund or do anything like that. But so we were
like screw it, we'll just eat this massive cost, we'll book a new place. The new place was lovely.
But they ended up refunding us actually like good on them. I mean, probably if we wouldn't
have gone viral, they wouldn't have refunded it, but they did. So like I've got to give them credit.
So that was nice. And then they gave us a little extra like bonus on top because they were like,
we feel really bad about this. It's like, okay, sure you do. You just guys,
you guys just got called out very publicly and you want to make amends for this. Like I get that.
But if we didn't have that audience or you know, that platform, I think we would have just been
shit on a lock. But yeah, great. Grateful we did. I mean, it's like one of those things where
it's beneficial to be able to or to have a large social platform, you know, whether it's X or on
on Noster, probably better on Noster, because you can't potentially get booted off of there.
But like us small folks, us plebs can actually have an outsized voice these days. And like you see
that legacy media platforms, like I'm so sick and tired of all the election stuff, because it's just
all just such blatant propaganda. And it's like, I can't wait for the election to be over so that
we can, you know, go back to complaining about whoever won. And then, you know, in three more
years, start up this whole election racket again, that's the thing it's like, there's no break from
it. I think you did the right thing just fully tuning it out. I just, it's like a car crash. I
kind of like love like, there's like a sick joy in watching this chaos. Like, I don't actually
like watching car crashes, but you know, just the analogy. Yeah, I mean, I will, I'll tell you my,
I told you before we started like, I lived in the city before and now I live in the country.
And this is probably partly from like, one of my habits is like every Friday, I
take like, microdose mushrooms and hike in the woods with my dog. And if the season is right,
I'm mushroom hunting, and I just kind of go on like a unlimited hike, not like I go like really
far into the woods, but I don't I go out there with like, not necessarily a time to come back.
And that has been so peaceful for me. And it has
highlighted the my own vulnerable abilities to just algorithms, you know, and how having noster
that has no algorithm to me is like a walk in the woods. And going back and looking at Twitter is
like going back to New York City. And, you know, just seeing a homeless guy on the street, which is
tragic. And I don't think that that should exist. But it's terrible to see and you can't look away.
And Twitter knows that like it continually feeds you the things you can't stop looking at.
Like that's what it's, that's the whole purpose of it. And if you, if a human tendency is to look
at things we don't want to see, then, then, you know, the end result of looking at Twitter is
that you're going to be unhappy. And I don't know else, I don't know else to like say it, I just
feels like a good reason to take Twitter breaks. And the whole political thing is like the prime
example of all that stuff. It's a hard road. Really good analogy, by the way. I like that.
Like, noster's a it's a walk in the woods versus the centralized platforms are a trip into the
trip into the heart of a heart of a city. Like it is. I mean, just stimulation wise. Yeah, as well.
Like, Taran, you're so many. Yeah. And like, our attention is, is very limited. That's like just a
you start to like, you know, again, I'm a new dad. And so you start to realize it's like,
you have a lot less time that you can just excuse by like wasting it just
just doom scrolling, right? Because it's like, yeah, well, why am I doing that instead of
playing with my son? Right? Like, that would be insane of me to do that, right? Like, and what
a waste of my precious attention that I could be spending on my wonderful offspring or my
beautiful wife, like, shame on me, you know, that's just it. It's like the consequences. I do this
with food. Once you have kids, it's the ultimate they're the ultimate responsibility and the
consequences of your decision are theirs. And they can't decide like your decisions are their
decisions. If you look at Twitter, and it turns you into a grumpy asshole, and then you're a bad
dad as a result, then like, you know, that's a bad outcome of looking at Twitter. And I do think
that that happens. I think that like social media, Facebook, makes people angry. And then they turn
around and then their anger, they take their anger out on people around them for whatever is
whatever they're seeing on from an algorithm on an app. And that's where like real world consequences
of shit like Twitter algorithms come into play, you know, like it makes people bad parents, it's
like it's and it makes your it's a lower quality of life. And it's sad all around. Like if you can
separate, if you can succeed at separating yourself from it, which I'm not saying I have done, I still
look at Twitter sometimes like, I go down that thing. But when I do it, I'm like, oh, like I like,
oh, how did I do that for two hours? And I feel terrible now. And then I can't sleep. And then
I'm like, I really should not do that anymore. It is insane, like the actual like, like the
the physiological effect of something like just I mean, any social media, like I don't use TikTok,
but I imagine that that is probably even worse, because it's just video content, their their
algorithm is like, very, very good. Clearly, that's why it's been so successful as an app,
because it keeps people just planted there, just nonstop. And it's like, I mean, I don't know.
It feels good for a second, right? But then, sorry, would you say it's precision dopamine.
But the thing about it is, it doesn't even feel good for a second. It feels good for a fraction
of a second. But you can keep getting that fraction of a second over and over again, as long as you
want. And it's like, that is crazy. That's like more crazy than any drug. It's insane.
And slight tangent. But speaking of fatherhood, do you, what do you what do you cook at home?
Do you cook a lot of like also are you carnivore? Or are you going back to what a beef steak is
not a beef steak is also not a carnivore event. On a very popular belief. I like to do vegetables
and fish and other animals and stuff like that. I am not a carnivore. I've never really I've done
the hardcore keto ketogenic diet stuff. I feel like that I did that kind of relatively early.
I feel like that really got side railed by like labels, you know, like you go to Costco and you're
like, here are these keto snacks and none of them are they all actually have a bunch of carbs in them.
And if you're if you're eating carbs while you think you're doing the ketogenic diet,
you're really just eating the American diet, which is like eating lots of fat and carbs.
And so I don't that's a long winded answer of no, I'm not a carnivore. Beef steaks are not a
carnivore events. And I have a weird welcome. They just might have trouble finding something
to eat, but they are welcome, right? You know, I will say this to date.
Five vegans have come to beef steaks and left meat eaters.
Really? And yeah, and there have been other vegetarians have come, but they've stayed vegetarians.
That's the vegans that you get the vegans that you get.
Do you think it's that they get around those smells and they literally like cannot help
themselves? It's like, oh, boy, I just I need some of this, like my body is telling me I need it.
That's a good question. I don't know. I actually part of the reason that I stopped being a vegan
was because I had I started getting headaches from B12 deficiency. And just eating like a piece
of fish once a week made me feel a world that was like a world of difference for me. It is like
who knows? Yeah, who knows? I didn't want to get into like talking about diets, because it's just
like I don't I'm not ever encouraging. The only thing I want is delicious when I'm shopping for
food. Like I want to support ranchers. I want all that stuff. But the main thing I want is delicious
because I want that bite when it's in your mouth to be really good. And you guys, well, you guys,
you're talking about cooking. Yes, I do cook at home a ton. I have we have one kid that will is
a good eater and we'll eat a bunch of stuff. And we have another kid that is a picky eater. And then
my wife is pescatarian. Okay, so it's like, you got to kind of thread those needles of, you know,
like hitting all those things. So so we can have a like a little bit of a rotation that we go with.
You get like a pantry going and you're like, every once in a while, we branch out and do something
weird. We actually did. If you're gone like had like Chinese hot pot, we actually did that this
week. Oh, Carla and I have hot pot at least once a week. We have our we have our own, we have multiple
of our own hot pots. So that's awesome. We do it. We do it at home. We go out for it like any,
any city we're in, we try to find a hot pot place and you can usually find one. And it's usually
fantastic. And like a small sometimes there's small little hole in the walls. Other times they're
like, you know, larger chain type places. Yeah, it's always good. And it's like it. Talk about
just like a wonderful dining experience. Like, it's a great it's fun to bring somebody to their
first time having hot pot to because that you know, you're like a little bit nervous, you're
like, okay, I'm like dipping this stuff in myself. Yeah, it's great. You have to be present.
Have to be. Yeah. There's there's some there's some study. I like read it and I can't I can't
go back and I can't find it. But it's like, it's basically compares food memories of people
at very fancy restaurants to shared meals. And basically the study kind of like,
it was like, they would go to a fancy meal and ask them like four days later, like, what did you have
at this three star restaurant the other night? People would be like, I don't know, I had this
thing in a martini glass. And it was like chile and there is cream on top. Like they can't remember
what they had. But if you go to a family style restaurant where you share everything, they
remember the food really well. Be like, Oh, they had this pasta with broccoli and sauces was a little
bit spicy. And then they had this Caesar salad that had like extra croutons and they put these
anchovies on top. Those anchovies were, you know, like they just really remember the meals. People
remember meals they share. And they forget meals. They forget plated meals, which is another kind of
like thing about the beef steak is like, hopefully, and hot pot like you just you have to be present.
There's no way to like absent mindedly eat hot pot, you have to be present to eat it.
Beef steak, we know another thing. So like you, it's usually like a no, I don't know if this is an
explicit rule, but it's at least at the ones it's like a no photo kind of environment. Like, don't
you know, like, okay, there are people here who don't want their photo taken at all, like, especially,
you know, you're around a lot of Bitcoiners who may be nims, like you're being respectful of that,
which I think is awesome. Yeah, I think the but the other great side effect of that kind of policy
is people aren't just out staring like having their phone out because they're going to take a picture
soon of something that comes out so they can post it. But when you take that away from them, and
it's like, then they don't they don't they're not just having their phone in their hand the whole
time, like it again, again, because you're eating with your hands, you're getting messy at a beef
steak. That is bringing it to be present. Was that was that always the case? Like, hey, no, no pictures
or was that something you kind of developed later on to curate? We did it from it was more
hardcore in the very beginning. Part of what started that is just going to New York BitDevs,
they're pretty hardcore about no photos at New York BitDevs. And they'll they'll pounce on you,
like if some guy pulls out their photo and like some pulls out their phone and takes a photo or
tries to take a video, they'd be like, no photos, please, can you please delete that? Like, you
know, like, they'll get on you about it. And I think that I am a big believer in privacy, I think
it's important. And I think that when you the thing that people who are not concerned about
privacy, take for granted is that when they aren't private, they also compromise the privacy of the
people around them. And so when you come to a beef steak or any Bitcoin event, you're responsible
for everyone's privacy. And so you there needs to be like a lowest common denominator. And I think
one of those is just don't take pictures like don't take pictures with 10 people in the background.
And of course, people take pictures, I actually have a note, the rule is no pictures without consent.
And that means like specifically no one can be in that picture that doesn't know they're in that
picture. And, and then I also ask not to post media about it and stuff like that. But then like,
there is all these like side effect benefits of that rule that people have to be present. And you're
not looking at your phone. And I just like, I remember watching the Super Bowl a couple years ago
and like, when all those guys come out and they give each other high fives, a lot of them have their
phones out and their video taping. And that just struck me as like, the craziest thing in the world.
You're at the most filmed event in human history. And you're you have the opportunity to be present
and your choice is to pull out your phone and experience it through a screen. Like, it's so
crazy to me. It's so crazy to me. And like 50% of the players like pull out their phones and they
like video tape each other. And I'm just like, guys, someone is already taping this, you can just
be present. Like you can get all the footage you want from this event of you standing there
high fiving your friend. It's just so crazy. I don't I mean, I see it, I have those instincts
sometimes, but I don't. It was very striking to me watching that.
It's a freeing thing to put your phone away, especially when you are around people, like
when you are around friends, family. It is a very freeing thing to be like, you know what,
I'm doing the most important thing I could be doing right at this moment. And so I like, I don't,
I don't need my phone, right? Like there's no reason I need that I'm already doing exactly what I
want to be doing at this moment in space and time. And you will not fully like you cannot be fully
present. If you are constantly on your phone, like it's just it's not possible, right? It is
sucking your attention away. Like you can't concentrate on two things at once and still
have the same level of attention. It's just not going to happen. And that's I think like again,
it's it's really interesting to me this kind of, I don't know, almost like legend of the beef steak
that you've been able to create where like, as you said, you're, you're not doing any fancy marketing.
You're not, you're not going around trying to show this to everyone. It's like, here's the link.
You know, whoever signs up can sign up. They always sell out, I'm pretty sure like there's never an
issue with attendance. Like it's usually the opposite issue of probably you have people hitting
you up saying, Hey, is there any extra room? And you're like, not the, you know, the tickets or
the tickets. But like, this is very opposite of most experiences that people have, because most
experiences are pushed on them repeatedly, until they finally like, Okay, I'll like, I'll do it.
This is like, maybe that's part of that self selection that you mentioned of making it tough
to get to. It's like, you're not pushing this on people, whoever wants to be there is going to
find a way to get there. But I think that that's like, it's very unique, especially in this day
and age, to have that kind of experience, because it's not, it's not like, you know, exclusive,
in the sense that, you know, you're not like turning, turning a bunch of people away like,
no, sorry, you know, you're not on my list of preferred people, unless maybe it's a smaller
event. But like you are, it's, here's an event, you can come to it. If you don't, that's fine.
But you've developed, I mean, like, there's basically like a subculture of bit coiners,
which are just like beef steak groupies. And I say this about men and women, like, I, like,
and having been to a few of them, I know why, because it's a culture that you've created
that makes people just want to be there. And I think it's, I don't know, I don't even have a
question there. I just want to say it's very special. And I think it's impressive what you've
been able to do. And I'm glad it exists. And the beef's good too. You know, there's, there's that,
that's a nice. Thank you for saying that. I appreciate that sentiment. I hope, I hope it's
all true. I hope people feel that way when they go. Yeah, I appreciate you saying that.
I love doing that. It's my dream. It's my dream job. And I couldn't do it without people coming
to it. So like, I am grateful to every person that comes all the time.
I'm already looking forward to the next one. And I want to say that I always say this, I have
a, my, I always say my return policy. I don't, I don't put it in the, maybe I should put it in the
thing. My return policy is you can always get your money back for a beef steak within 21 days,
but you can never come to a beef steak again. Oh, so like, if you didn't like it, that's fine.
Because I don't think it's for everyone. It's not a thing that's designed for everyone to come to.
And you, but you can just, you won't be able to come back, which I feel like is kind of fair.
Like, if you want to crush it, you can. And there's a time limit on that. I do it differently,
but it's probably 21 days or something like that. Like, you can't call me for the beef steak.
You went just for two years ago and be like, I want sats back.
You should probably put some caveats on that. Just 21 days, 21 days satisfaction guaranteed.
I mean, have you actually had somebody like request their money back after one before?
No, I have had people complain. And I offered them their money back and they didn't take it.
Though I did say that if they took their money back, they couldn't come back to a beef steak.
They must not have had that big of complaints then. Like, that's, you know,
it can't have been that drastic. I can't tell the story. I can't tell the story.
I feel like the person, it's really specific, but it was a really weird circumstance. It was
a really weird circumstance. So weird, but I was certain that someone was playing a joke on me.
But it turned out to be real. One of those situations.
This will have to be a story off the mic when we have that pub key date.
Yeah, make the pub key talking now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's right.
Yeah. Well, is there anything, because I want to be conscious of time here, and we've been,
I didn't even realize we've been running almost two hours here. It's been a treat.
Is there anything that we didn't cover that you want to get out there or anything,
anything else that's on your mind? This is always an open space.
I have one last question, podcast question for you. And it is,
what is the, I was thinking about how to phrase this. I'm not going to phrase it correctly,
but I guess, what is the podcast episode of yours that probably if someone scrolling through,
they wouldn't listen to, but you think they should listen to?
That's tricky. If someone scrolls through, they're going to listen to Lin Alden,
they're going to listen to Jeff Booth. Who would they not listen to that you think they should?
Isn't a part of the goat guy conversations with me? And I stopped because I was like getting
phone calls, not because I wanted to stop listening to it. But I'm not using that as an example,
but I'm just like, if I was scrolling through looking for the podcast to listen to, that would
not be, that guy would not be the podcast. And I would think that same thing about myself.
If you're new to Bitcoin, you're not going to scroll through and listen to the Awayslice episode.
I wouldn't either. What is the most interesting ones there?
I don't know.
No, it's true. Sometimes they very much, because you're right, people are always
going to listen to a Jeff Booth or a Lin Alden. They're going to do it, regardless.
Which is great because those are, Jeff and Lin are fantastic humans who deliver an incredible
amount of signal. And it's really, really useful. One that I would say, maybe a conversation that
just I personally really enjoyed that was somewhat about Bitcoin, but more, I would say just philosophical
nature was with Max Hillibrand. And we didn't talk any Bitcoin price action or things like that.
We talked about Austrian economics and anarchy and morality and the nature of the state.
And he's just a fascinating guy. And that's one that I would say, if folks don't know him,
I would really recommend listening to that episode because it's fascinating. And he's
a well-fed information and just a cool dude. Also has a very sweet beard like yourself.
So that maybe I'm partial to that. Yeah, you know, yours is impressive.
Sorry.
I gotta say it's... Oh, go ahead.
Yeah, no, you know, later on I'm going to send you a picture of my uncle. I look like my uncle right now.
The beef farmer.
Okay. Okay. Was that intentional to look like your uncle with the beard or just its beard
season? Oh, genetics. I don't have any control over it.
Fair enough. Fair enough. But that would definitely be one that I would really recommend for folks.
And just one that I want to have Max back on the show because he's a, again, just a really cool dude.
Yeah. And then another one that probably maybe
more Bitcoiners know like Eric Kasin. But for, again, it was like, it's an episode that's not
explicitly about Bitcoin. Like it's, again, more... I guess I'm partial to the episodes a lot of times
that are digging into like the nature of the state and the beast versus just talking about Bitcoin.
But that's another one that I think is honestly probably difficult for some people to listen to
because Eric will just kind of very much challenge your worldview. But I think that people need that
kind of thing. And they need it really badly. Another one that was pretty early on is the
Domus creator, Will Kasin. We both had a few drinks during that episode and it was an enjoyable one.
That's awesome. Okay. All right. I hope that answers the question.
No, yeah, it definitely does. I'm going to go back and listen to them. I know and love Eric.
Same thing as with you. I have hung out with him, but I've never had like quality time with it,
with Eric Kasin. Love that guy. He's an awesome guy. You know what? Maybe he can third wheel the
date. I'll allow it. We'll be a tricycle at PubKey. Yeah. Yeah. It's like that meme with
Dr. Ken and he's got a sombrero on and he says, I'll allow it. You know that?
Yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about. Thanks so much. I usually,
I ask people at the end of this, like, where do you want to send people? Because I'll link your
Noster and I'll link your X. Do you want me to link the B? Don't link your X. Okay. I will only
link your Noster. You can only find me on Noster. I mean, I'm on X, but like just don't link it.
We got a question for the Noster. Amen. And for everyone who joined here in the live stream today,
for Noster only, thanks for being here. Yeah. Do you want me to link the Beefsteak website as well,
or you want to let people find it? It doesn't help anybody. It just
gives them another way to pester me. Yeah, fair enough. Fair enough. Well,
man, I've got to say this was a... Walker... It was a treat, haven't you?
It was awesome to talk to you. I look forward to doing it in person. This was really great.
Me too. I hope, I'm going to, we're going to make this happen sooner rather than later, I hope.
Yeah. And that's a wrap on this Bitcoin Talk episode of The Bitcoin Podcast.
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