Scenius Studio (Episode #34)
Zoe Weinberg -- Ex/Ante
Scenius: The intelligence and the intuition of a whole cultural scene. The communal form of the concept of genius.
Welcome to the Scenius Studio
As a crypto-dedicated Fund-of-Funds Manager at Scenius Capital, host, Ben Jacobs has the unique opportunity to speak daily with the brightest investors in the blockchain space. In Scenius Studio, Ben chats with crypto Hedge Fund Managers and Venture Capitalists in wide-ranging, evergreen, and alpha-focused conversations.
In each episode of Scenius Studio, Ben dives deep with these talented professionals to understand what drove them to crypto, and how they approach the complex craft of investing in the wild west of digital assets and blockchain technology. We are excited to share these discussions publicly through this podcast.
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In this episode, Ben sits down with Zoe Weinberg, Founder and Managing Partner of Ex/Ante, a venture firm investing in the next generation of privacy, security, and information tools.
Prior to Ex/Ante, Zoe served on the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence and at Google AI. She has also had stints as an investor at the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank and at Goldman Sachs. Tune in for insights into Ex/Ante’s thesis of agentic tech and how blockchain represents a core component of the firm’s investment strategy.
See below👇 for a sneak peak of the episode, links to the podcast, topics discussed and resources mentioned.
Spotify
Apple Podcasts
In this episode we discuss:
The rise of digital authoritarianism and the implications on privacy, censorship, and disinformation
Investing in consumer and enterprise privacy tech as a means of protecting democracy through software rather than defensive hardware
Data infrastructure that allows end users to have more control over their information when engaging with AI
Why disinformation and deep fakes are a psychological problem not a technological one
Hong Kong protestors using decentralized storage (Arweave & IPFS) as a means of circumventing CCP censorship
When public goods and investment return potential are at odds with one another
Why Zoe does not use CLEAR at the airport
Senator Warren and her perplexing anti-crypto stance
Zoe’s spiciest takes 🌶️
Resources Mentioned
The Metaverse is Coming, and the World is not Ready for it — Zoe Weinberg (NY Times article)
We hope you enjoy listening to this conversation with Zoe. If you got any value out of the podcast then please consider sharing Scenius Studio with your network 💪