Gordon Einstein - Crypto Lawyer of Dubai Tech Tuesdays: Why The West Is Dying & Why Dubai Is Thriving

Brian Rose sits down with Crypto Lawyer Gordon Einstein to uncover the hard truths behind the West's decline 🏛️📉 and the unstoppable rise of Dubai’s innovation-driven future 🚀🌴 From failing systems to booming crypto hubs 💡🔗, this conversation dives deep into freedom, finance, and the future of global power 💰🌐 🔓 Decentralization, opportunity, and mindset shifts — find out what’s working and why it matters more than ever. 🍿 Watch Full Episode For Free: http://londonreal.tv/einstein 💰The Investment club: http://londonreal.tv/club 💰Crypto & DeFi Academy: http://londonreal.tv/defi

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Action produces information. Also, action produces entropy. It produces randomness. And randomness, like volatility, is where you make your money.

• 0:09Speaker 01

  What's a crypto lawyer doing with this meetup social event that's become so huge?

• 0:15Speaker 00

  I grew up with a lot of social anxiety and with a speech impediment. The way I addressed both was rather than go hide in a corner, I went to the opposite extreme, which is organizing events and forcing myself onstage. And what you're seeing now with Tech Tuesday, you're in an environment that's curated and optimized for action takers. You can't argue with the full house. You can't argue with the way that people look. And I'm creating actual facts. And facts win. People come up and they tell me they found their partner there. They found their investor there. There's a lot of money being made in that room.

• 0:49Speaker 01

  How would you describe Dubai?

• 0:50Speaker 00

  This is a meritocracy. And if you're consistent about delivering results, you'll get noticed. Dubai is for doers. This is a builder's paradise. You build yourself, and you build your business, and you build your relationships. And you get to keep a good chunk of what you build.

• 1:03Speaker 01

  Talk to me about ADHD.

• 1:05Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 1:05Speaker 01

  Is it a bug or a feature?

• 1:07Speaker 00

  It happened at a point where it wasn't widely known. It manifested itself as Gordon can't focus, or he's not motivated, or all this other stuff. So I got all this negative messaging growing up. Huge amounts of pain and focus and adrenaline burnout and cortisol. And I brute forced it through, but I brute forced it through in a way that exacted a toll. What's good about ADHD is audaciousness. It's bravery. Saying what's on your mind and not having fear. You need to have it diagnosed. You need to have it treated. You need to be gentle with yourself, but you need to maintain responsibility for your life. Whatever happens, you are responsible for you. No one's coming to save you.

• 1:41Speaker 01

  10 years from now, Gordon, where are you going to be? What are you going to be doing?

• 1:45Speaker 00

  I want more and better of what we're doing now. I want to stay on the same track and keep on pushing it. I want to be involved in more projects that make the world a better place. I have three standards for any project I'm involved in. It needs to make a ton of money. It needs to make a ton of cool. It makes the world a ton better place.

• 2:10Speaker 02

  The world is changing.

• 2:14Speaker 02

  Inspiration is everywhere.

• 2:19Speaker 02

  It has never been so easy to connect, share, and bring people together.

• 2:26Speaker 02

  We're learning from others and finding the best in ourselves.

• 2:34Speaker 02

  Challenging our beliefs.

• 2:37Speaker 02

  Sharing our vulnerability.

• 2:41Speaker 02

  Overcoming our fears.

• 2:46Speaker 02

  Transforming ourselves so we can transform the world.

• 2:53Speaker 02

  How far can we go?

• 2:55Speaker 03

  This is London Real. I am Brian Rose. My guest today is...

• 3:11Speaker 02

  Hey, I know investing in crypto is scary. It takes a real leap of faith because there are so many scams, rug pulls, and bad actors out there. It's a dangerous business, which is why 95% of people lose all their money. Well, that's why I created the London Real Investment Club. So you can access the hottest deals on the planet and use the crypto bull market to create the generational wealth that you deserve. Join my team of over 100 people from around the world that are making millions of dollars behind the scenes investing in blockchain, AI, Web3 games, DeFi, Bitcoin, and more. Don't miss out. Click the link below to book a call with one of my team now. But hurry, this bull market will end soon.

• 3:54Speaker 04

  I know investing crypto can be scary. That's why you gotta join the investment club. Pull the trigger. Let's do this.

• 4:05Speaker 01

  This is London Real. I am Brian Rose. My guest today is Gordon Einstein, the crypto attorney, technologist, and enterprise strategist. You are the co-founder of Crypto Law Partners and have spent the last decade guiding startups, enterprises, exchanges, and DAOs through the legal and regulatory crypto landscape. In 2014, you were captivated by Bitcoin and the philosophy behind it, and quickly realized that while blockchain could solve many of the inefficiencies of traditional finance, it lacked a coherent legal framework to support real-world adoption. Since then, you've guided early-stage crypto ventures through complex compliance and regulatory challenges while serving as a trusted advisor to governments and businesses worldwide. You're also the founder of Dubai Tech Tuesdays,

• 4:48Speaker 01

  a best-in-class weekly business and technology networking event that brings together leading visionaries, builders, and innovators operating in the UAE. You ultimately believe that crypto isn't just about money, it's about freedom, transparency, and rethinking the way we humans organize and define ourselves. Gordon, welcome to London Real in Dubai.

• 5:11Speaker 00

  Brian, I'm honored to be on the show, and what an intro.

• 5:14Speaker 01

  What a man. So there you go. Look, I want to jump in, and I want to start with what I witnessed last night. I was at this beautiful restaurant called Bel Canto near the Dubai Opera House. There were 300-plus people there in this incredible environment where I guess people were networking, but they were more just kind of hanging out and enjoying themselves. There were things happening on stage and people talking about it. There were some high-level local emiratis that you were honoring. There was tech people. There was a women's chess club that was there. And everyone's dressed up and really enjoying themselves. And I'll be honest with you, I've never seen anything like that in London or New York City or anywhere else.

• 5:57Speaker 00

  Really?

• 5:58Speaker 01

  I haven't. Not that vibe. And there were people I met there in the real estate business, and there were other people in other businesses, and they're like, "We actually come here because it's one of the few events where there's all these different types of people, Europeans, and Russians, and Ukrainians." And they're all here and it's one of the better even events, not just tech events. And I've been to maybe six of them at this point. I know you've been doing forty-three in a row, forty-two.

• 6:23Speaker 00

  Forty-two was last night.

• 6:24Speaker 01

  Forty-two.

• 6:24Speaker 00

  But we had the next two on calendar already.

• 6:27Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 6:27Speaker 00

  So, yeah.

• 6:28Speaker 01

  I don't think you've ever missed one.

• 6:29Speaker 00

  No.

• 6:30Speaker 01

  You know, what's a crypto lawyer doing with this meetup, social event, you know, that's become so huge? Can you just walk us through what the ethos is, why you, and how do you continue doing this tireless effort?

• 6:44Speaker 00

  Okay, so I'm gonna go deep.

• 6:46Speaker 01

  Let's go deep. That's why we're here.

• 6:49Speaker 00

  Of course. Yeah, and I'm a big fan. I've seen you, your shows for a long time and I'm, you know, it's kind of a surreal moment to be here with you in an interview context, so. I'm gonna show this to my mom, who's actually visiting from Los Angeles.

• 7:00Speaker 01

  Oh, very cool.

• 7:01Speaker 00

  So we'll be excited to see it. Okay. Why do this in the first place? Okay, so I've just a little personal. So I grew up with a lot of social anxiety and with a speech impediment. And the way I addressed both was rather than go hide in a corner, I went to the opposite extreme, which is organizing events and forcing myself on stage. It was like a big overcompensation thing. And part of the idea there was I would just rub that nerve to oblivion so that there was no longer a sensitive point. And so I've been, you know, it's, I kind of got this strategy later, like in my thirties or something, but I started hosting events in Los Angeles.

• 7:42Speaker 00

  I had a group called Happy Hour Mafia. And we used to do different, every Fridays or every Thursdays, once per week, we'd do an event. And it was always supporting charity. And, you know, it's a lot easier to talk to people if you're the host. You're not, if there's a cluster of people, you have a good reason to approach them. You can say, hey, walk up to them and say, hey, are you having a good time? How you doing? So that was my first experience putting events together. And then when I, we can talk about this, when I switched back into the practice of law because of crypto and blockchain, it became necessary for me to work on my public speaking skills because I needed to advocate on behalf of this new kind of law. And so I would globetrot around the world, on stage, I'm seeing, giving presentations, you know, doing, and you can see this. On YouTube, I have a long track record. And so I had to get over the speaking impediment.

• 8:27Speaker 00

  And then when I came to Dubai four years ago, Dubai, you know, Dubai is a place where if you're bold and ethical and consistent, you can do well. And if you aren't those things, you may do well for a minute, but then you'll have issues. But I was very blessed in that when I came here four years ago, the, within a week, I was on stage. Working, helping people with their events, emceeing, I just volunteered. I don't charge. You know, I'm a lawyer, right? I don't need to charge to help with this stuff. I just help. I've helped this community so much. And build such a nice network from, from volunteering and just helping people out and being on stage just because I love it. And so past few years, I started organizing my own things, like these occasional lunches, crypto lunches or iftars. I've done a bunch of crypto iftars.

• 9:10Speaker 00

  But this last summer I was here, my lovely wife, who you know, we found out we were pregnant. And so the traveling was kind of a little bit lower and, you know, Dubai in the summer is a little challenging. But we kind of looked at each other and said, let's start something new. So on July 2nd, 2024, we did Dubai Tech Tuesdays. You know, I figured I'd try it. We were at the door, which unfortunately has closed since that time, but the very nice management. Just started it and it was successful, right in the middle of summer. And I was like, oh, this is interesting. And so I'm a, I'm a big believer in taking action. Like I always say, action is the killer app, more than thinking, more than chat GPT, more than whatever.

• 9:55Speaker 00

  You need to take action. You need to be consistent with your action. That's the next stage of it, right? Because an action one time doesn't mean anything. You have to keep on doing, doing, doing. So I'm a big believer in iterating quickly, being consistent, iterating every, you know, very fast. Like you go to the gym once, you have to keep on doing it and be consistent with it or diet or whatever. So we, I.

• 10:17Speaker 00

  I knew that the first ones would not be that great. And they're actually okay, but I guess I'm a little bit self-critical. But every week, we make it a little bit better. And what you're seeing now that we're rounding up in our 40s is the result of a lot of work and a lot of improvement. So the format has been honed, the community's been honed, the venue's been honed, the people we let in have been honed, the people we decide not to invite in has been honed. It's been an experience. I'm very happy that you're joining us. And there's a whole philosophy behind it we can get into. But I was actually a little bit surprised by what you said because in my mind, it's a New York-style networking event transplanted to Dubai, or New York or Berlin-style, which are my favorite cities. I'm a kind of a Berlin baby, right?

• 11:00Speaker 00

  So the idea of having a hip but not obnoxious tech gathering, tech business gathering with a certain New York dress code and savoir faire, but having it here, not a crypto bro thing, not a stiff event. That's not my thing. That's not my style. And I don't think, maybe it's not yours either. But it's sort of like formal enough that good people come and business happens. You know, there's a dress code, people dress nicely. The ladies are all in cocktail outfits or business attire. You know, everyone dresses up, but it's not stiff, right? And we bring in a lot of elements and it's like a goulash.

• 11:43Speaker 01

  No, I could say it's closer to New York than anything else.

• 11:45Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 11:45Speaker 01

  But also in New York, I don't think you'd have that kind of interaction because that only, I think, happens in Dubai, where people want to help each other.

• 11:51Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 11:52Speaker 01

  And everyone feels like maybe they're in a similar boat and things actually happen. That's what I maybe remember.

• 11:57Speaker 00

  I think that's a perceptive comment. So, right, Dubai, I mean, you always think of New York as like the immigrant city, but Dubai is the immigrant emirate, or UAE is the immigrant country. And we're 80 or 90% expatriates here. And it's Switzerland-like in the sense that wherever you're from, whatever your local beef is, you're supposed to leave it at the door or leave it at customs. And here, you're supposed to at least be polite to each other and ideally do business with each other. And there's pros and cons to that. You know, as a politically aware person, sometimes I feel a little bit of internal tension. But I really like their ethic. And I think maybe Switzerland is straight from that ethic. The UAE has kept that ethic, and there's something golden about it. So when you get all these different religions and all these different nationalities, all these, you know, men and women, everything, in a room, having fun, being productive, it's cool.

• 12:42Speaker 00

  And you're right, New York has a little bit of a biting edge to it. I don't really mind it so much because I have a little bit of a biting edge. You know, and I kind of got that a little New York thing, but you know, that doesn't necessarily fly with everyone. Some people are just very nice and they're not from that culture. So we keep it gentle. It's a very family environment. You know, we're up at, you know, my, my son is three months old and he was there yesterday. So it's hard to have a biting culture when you have a three month old baby walking around.

• 13:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:05Speaker 00

  Or being carried around.

• 13:06Speaker 01

  Well, I want to go deeper on the UAE and what you see here as a country, as a culture for sure. But just like to finish up with last night, like the vibe of the event is important to address, like what you're trying to create there. And so what I noticed is, first of all, you want to make sure everybody introduces themselves. Everyone feels welcome to express who they are, even if they're resisting you. So you walk in the mic and everyone interested. Everyone's dressed up and I'm wondering why you do that. There's at least 50, 50 men, women, sometimes it seems like more women. And the women sometimes come from fashion or the chess club or whatever, and they're in the cocktail dresses and it forces us guys to really step up our game. And it's just a really, kind of a, gives a little bit of electric vibe.

• 13:48Speaker 01

  It's fun. You have someone on the stage to talk, but everyone has to be silent for the talk. And it's just kind of dynamic. So it's not stuffy, but also there's always things happen. I always meet some interesting people there.

• 14:00Speaker 00

  So per se, the comment, so it's all by experiment and it's all by design and both things are true at once. It's all by experiment and it's all by design. Okay. I knew from the beginning, well, I'll take each element. Okay. Why have people dress up? You know, some people complained. Some people get turned away and they get annoyed. Well, we're, you know, we're, it's not Crypto Tuesdays. It's Tech Tuesdays. It's a tech and business event. Okay. We're in Dubai. This is a, in some ways a traditional culture. And you know, why are you here unless you want to enjoy the traditional culture? We want to have an environment where it's not just the usual suspects. But you know, it's a tech event, but it's heavy female population in the group, like you notice. That's unusual.

• 14:41Speaker 00

  There's a ton of very successful business women here and they shy away from events where they're not treated correctly. So I'm intentionally creating, and my wife and I in Siam are intentionally creating a very female safe environment without overdoing it. You know, because you can go too far to the other direction also, and then it becomes oppressive in its own way. We thread the needle very carefully. The dress code, it's a chance to glam up. You know, it is opportunity. You dress very well. You've made a point of it and you've evolved your style over time, you know.

• 15:11Speaker 00

  You aren't your suit, but your suit communicates something and it has you act a certain way when you're wearing it. And people interact with you in a certain way when you're wearing it, even though it's obviously not your skin. Right, you know, we're all the same people underneath, but it communicates a certain idea. It's a professional event. We're not there getting drunk, we're not there having a wild party. We're there in, you know, in an environment that's a little bit conservative, conservative enough that people can come and if they're normally nervous about a tech or business event or a large gathering, they know it's safe within a certain way. And as you pointed out, we're, it's a lot of Emiratis there, it's a lot of Arabs there, it's a lot of Muslims there. Okay, you know, and, you know, it needs to be a place where people feel comfortable drinking or not drinking and not feeling awkward about that.

• 15:53Speaker 00

  We have a large contingent that doesn't drink alcohol and it's fine, they feel comfortable. You know, you saw the honor table at the front with all the local personages, I guess for lack of a better word. So it's all, it's all a careful dance. Part of the dance is, you know, or it's all a carefully prepared dish and part of that dish is removing certain ingredients. To be blunt, if there's someone who makes women feel uncomfortable, they're not, they're never gonna come back. So you get a couple complaints and they're off the list. Uh, especially, so, you know, I'm, on one hand, I'm having fun, on the other hand, I'm watching like an ADHD hawk, which is something else you can talk about. You know, I have this sort of peripheral vision of social interaction and I'm just scanning

• 16:36Speaker 00

  the room to make sure everyone's happy and everyone's comfortable. I'm scanning the room to make sure the stage is getting the attention it can get. As you alluded to, look, it's not a library, it's not a conference, it is a networking event. People are gonna talk even when other people are talking on stage. I just try to keep a balance there. I don't wanna be too oppressive, but I wanna have enough attention on the front. You know, you've dealt with this yourself. Yeah. It just, it's just, I'm doing a constant vibe control. Okay. You know, it's a, it's a challenge. Yeah. And, you know, and how is it so consistent? I...

• 17:07Speaker 00

  It's not always easy, but I think if you're... It's hard to be consistent when you're in a vacuum. But when you have a team, it's a lot easier. And when you have a social expectation that you do something, it's a lot easier. And my ego is either strong enough or insecure enough that I can't stop because I don't want people to see me stopping. So even if I'm like, "Oh, gosh, I'm tired." You know, I feel theirs to do it. Plus, I know what we're building. We're going to a whole multi-city model, which we can talk about. And I know the value it brings, and people have it, like it. And to be honest, I enjoy it. It is fun. It is a lot of fun.

• 17:42Speaker 01

  It looks like fun.

• 17:42Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's a blast.

• 17:43Speaker 01

  And so you're super proud. You're like 42 in a row.

• 17:46Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 17:46Speaker 01

  And why can't you take a week off?

• 17:49Speaker 00

  Well, I'll tell you, the day my son was born, the day Joseph popped out of Arena, to make it like a... It was actually a beautiful experience, but I've been just being casual about it. He came out, I made sure he was okay.

• 18:03Speaker 05

  What the London Real Investment Club actually does for you, it gives you the keys to open that door to the inside deals. In the last three weeks, I've participated in three incredible deals. A Layer 2 Bitcoin protocol, an incredible AI protocol. The deal flow is beyond what I expected. I don't think I've ever seen a model like this that just gives average folks the opportunity to be behind the deals. And that's exactly what we've done. Not only that, you get to hang out with Brian Rose every week. And for me, that was huge because I look at Brian as somebody who's not only an expert in the space and I think is on the leading edge, but just the leading edge of thought with London Real and the work he's doing there. To anyone who's taking a serious look at this, I know it's a big decision. It was a big decision for me and my family.

• 18:47Speaker 05

  And it is one of the best decisions I've ever made. So I wish you all the best and hope you come join us.

• 18:59Speaker 00

  I made sure she was okay. I got the hall pass. I Ubered over to Tech Tuesdays. Ran the stage for all of an hour. I said, my son was just born, but I'm here to show I'm serious. Made sure everyone was good. Luckily, Mohammed Siam and my friend Rick took over, and I went back to the hospital, and it was good. The only, there's only been two Tuesdays we haven't done it. One of them, we had the IFtar that week, so we had an alternate event, and the other one was New Year's Eve. And for some reason, people didn't want to do New Year's Eve at Tech Tuesdays.

• 19:25Speaker 01

  You were ready to do it.

• 19:26Speaker 00

  I was ready to do it. We actually had the venue.

• 19:28Speaker 01

  Amazing.

• 19:29Speaker 00

  But it was like, Gordon, just relax for a week. I'm like, okay. But, you know, and we do it during the summer when things normally die out. But, you know, a lot of people, Dubai, especially in the crypto world, is famous, unfortunately, for rug pulls. People build up, people talk big. They build up a community. They look like they're serious. They have a team that looks like they're serious. And then they get bored, or they run away with the Ether, Ethereum, or they, something happens, they have their own little drama, and then, you're like, what the hell happened there? You know, what happened to my coin? Now the whole team has, like, run away with a deposit. Or what happened to this event? You know, they go to number eight, and then they wait three months before number nine or something. You know, it's like, you know, a nice weekly event you got there. So, you

• 20:11Speaker 00

  know, that happens a lot here. But, you know, I think, once you're consistent, let me put it this way, Dubai is great, but Dubai is a low-trust environment for a variety of reasons. Because people come and go, and, you know, there's, you know, people are fast talkers and don't necessarily deliver. Imagine creating a high-trust bubble in a low-trust environment. Once people see that, they love it. And consistency in doing what you say you're gonna do, being a man of your word, creates trust. And when they see this happening every week, it creates trust. And when people can see each other every week and get to know each other, it creates trust. And then you get business done. You know, there's a lot of money being made in that room.

• 20:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:48Speaker 00

  It's great.

• 20:48Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I've started to build up trust with a lot of people there, because I've seen them now three, four times. And so, first time you connect, but then you don't really send a message afterwards. The next time, you have a little more of a conversation, and then, then you're meeting up, and it's the thing. But only an American would do this every week in a row to an obsessive way. And that's a beautiful thing.

• 21:06Speaker 00

  Well, I am German also.

• 21:08Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 21:09Speaker 00

  So maybe a German would.

• 21:10Speaker 01

  Maybe.

• 21:11Speaker 00

  And I mentioned before, just to be clear, you know, with the ADHD thing, one of the compensatory things for ADHD is being a little bit OCD, being a little bit overly structured. So my, you know, I have controlled chaos. You know, I, structure is good. So if I know this is, you know, if it was once a week, but I didn't know what day, we wouldn't be doing it. But it's technically Tuesdays. I lock myself in. If it doesn't happen on Tuesday, everyone knows it didn't happen. And everyone's staring and asking what happened. So I built the structure around me that supports accomplishing the goal. And again, my wife is fantastic and she has her women's community that comes. Mohammed Siam is fantastic. He's got the local connections, the government connections, and he's integrated with the society. I mean, when you think about it, we're three very different people.

• 21:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:57Speaker 00

  Very different.

• 21:57Speaker 01

  Talk to me about your relationship with Mohammed Siam, because I had met him separately at Blockchain Life and had a really good vibe with him. And then I saw him later when I came to speak at your event. And then I was like, wow, this is unique to have that Emirati partner with what you're doing.

• 22:12Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 22:13Speaker 01

  I mean, that's not typical.

• 22:14Speaker 00

  It, so it's an interesting situation here. It used to be, used to be, before I came here, that in order to run a business here, you needed an Emirati partner. It was a legal requirement.

• 22:25Speaker 01

  I remember.

• 22:26Speaker 00

  You know, and they would kind of, you can call it rent-seeking behavior or whatever. They would kind of, you know, put their name on the license, sit back and let you work, you know, for the honor of paying them, for better for worse. The wise leadership of this country, and I'm not just saying that to be nice, they are wise, said, this is archaic. What are we doing? You know, it's the 21st century, enough of that. And so you can have full control of your businesses and everything else. The, now, we are in the Middle East. We are in the UAE. It is a Muslim country. It is a country with a strong sense of tribe, clan, and religion. Okay? And if it's, you don't need to have a local partner. And I certainly wouldn't do it just for kicks. But if you meet a local person that you like and you respect,

• 23:09Speaker 00

  and they bring value to the table, you'd be foolish not to engage. It helps. It's just like, you know, it's like going to China and not speaking Chinese or not being friends with any Chinese people. I mean, you can live in your little bubble. But if you really want to get in there deep, you gotta kind of cross some bridges and just, and get work with it. And he's, he's just a very cool guy. He's got his own AI company. He's, you know, he... He did some hacking as a very young kid and the police found him and rather than punch him, you know, they adopted him and so he got his government connections. He has a great bunch of interviews and he talks about it at length. He's just a cool guy.

• 23:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:43Speaker 00

  And I, you know, I could have started this by myself. It was initially my idea, but you know, why? It's like, I'm not, you know, it's not the Gordon Show. It's Tech Tuesday and I wanted to work with other people. Mohamed Sam is a great partner in this and other things. My wife is a great partner, Regatz, who you know, and I think you are interviewing each other one way or another.

• 24:04Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 24:04Speaker 00

  You know, he's a great friend and he's very busy, but he contributes a lot. We have a whole ecosystem, so no, I'm happy to work with Mohamed Sam.

• 24:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, Mohamed's there, I think, every week. I've seen him every time.

• 24:17Speaker 00

  He is a partner in Tech Tuesdays. He's very good and he adds a lot of value.

• 24:22Speaker 01

  And that says a lot when you're there every week.

• 24:24Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 24:24Speaker 01

  When you show up.

• 24:25Speaker 00

  Oh, yeah.

• 24:25Speaker 01

  And yeah, I met a lot of locals that I'm guessing came through him or because of him or maybe they just came, but yeah, it's.

• 24:32Speaker 00

  It's social proof because there is, there is a divide between the communities here. Okay, there's the expatriate community, the local community, and then there's the thin membrane of people who cross. And you see the same faces at all these events as the Emiratis who work with expatriates are like that environment. And then you got the few expatriates who kind of slightly cross over into that world. But it's a little bit impenetrable. Okay, you know, it depends where you are culturally and religion wise and everything else, but it's a little bit impenetrable. What's unique about our event, and I kind of want to take it up a few notches over time, is that you do have a blend between the expatriate community and the local community to a certain extent.

• 25:16Speaker 00

  That's why we have the decorum at the event. Because, you know, to have Emiratis, especially Emirati women show up, it's got to be a proper event. It can't be shady in any respect. It has to be very respectful, structured, good people, dress nicely, behave nicely, nice venue, everything else. Then they feel comfortable showing up. And you know, then they see other people like themselves and you get social proof and then it grows. So I'm tending this.

• 25:41Speaker 00

  with extreme care and awareness and as we expand Abu Dhabi and then Qatar and Bahrain and then Saudi it's we're going to be maintaining that conservative middle student vibe which which actually I like I don't have a problem with you know I'm from I'm from licentious California and I'm feel more at home here and you know you can have your fun here obviously in Dubai but I kind of like that conservative family vibe and that resonates with the local culture and I'm good with it.

• 26:09Speaker 01

  Well, let's talk about that because this is a long way from where you were in 2020 in Los Angeles a completely different culture and completely different vibe and a lot of people watching us or listening to us right now are going to be in the United States or Canada and you know for my dad who lives in San Diego, California when I keep telling him to visit me you know he's in his 80s he's like I can't go over there it's the war zone and I and I'm like no dad.

• 26:30Speaker 00

  My mom is here and she's in her 80s she's here right now so I want you to go tell your dad that Gordon's mom is here.

• 26:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, I just I guess my point was is they have a completely opposite perception of what it feels like to be here and like you just described a little bit of a feeling and how you feel here I know before you said a little bit like this place is like a really nice hotel where you come in and it's got these beautiful things set up and if you follow the rules then you can come back again and that was an interesting way of describing a place as opposed to comparing it to a city in the US.

• 27:02Speaker 00

  You saw that interview.

• 27:03Speaker 01

  What's that?

• 27:04Speaker 00

  You saw that interview. Oh, interesting, okay.

• 27:06Speaker 01

  And so how would you describe how you feel here and how would you describe Dubai or the Emirates to people outside of here maybe Americans who've never been here and maybe have misconceptions about it or think it's this or that or it's a monarchy and it's oppressive and we have our freedoms and they don't how do you describe it?

• 27:21Speaker 00

  Well, it is a monarchy I mean let's be truthful right the okay so what is Dubai for me okay what is for me may not be what the same thing it is for a Bangladeshi laborer on a building or for an Emirati or for a woman or for this or for that what is it for me okay you know as an American German lawyer who's into crypto and blockchain it's fantastic right it the way I described it variously is it's a very ...hotel, if you like. It's a residence hotel, okay? You don't necessarily gonna, you're not necessarily gonna stay your whole life here. They don't necessarily want you to stay your whole life here, though that may be changing a little bit. But you can come here and accomplish great things. It is not an oppressive system.

• 28:06Speaker 00

  You have a lot of personal freedom. Okay, there's political freedom, there's freedom of expression, there's personal freedom. And, you know, nowhere is all this way, and some, maybe some of the personal freedom comes, you know, because you don't have necessarily this other stuff. Everything's in a balance. And, you know, people say, "Oh, Gordon, you're so blunt on these interviews." It's like, I think I'm just being fair. What freedoms matter to me? Okay, I'm 55 years old. Okay, I have a wife, I have a three-month-old son. Okay, what freedoms matter to me? The freedom to walk down the street without getting stabbed. That's a big freedom. Okay? If I was a watch guy, and I'm kind of slowly becoming a watch guy, the freedom to walk down the street without my watch being taken or my iPhone being stolen on some bike. That's a freedom. Okay? For the non-Americans out there, the freedom to not be taxed to death. Not to work like a slave and then have your money inflated away on one side and then

• 28:50Speaker 00

  taxed away on the other side, and then, you know, what the heck happened? You know, there's, within certain bounds, there's good freedom of expression. And the freedom of expression that isn't allowed, I actually don't have a problem with. Like, you're not allowed to insult other races or religions or anything like that. They want, they have, I think, you know, I talked to someone recently, you have 156 countries cooperating here peacefully. You know, that's, that's either a recipe for a disaster, or that's a recipe for something awesome. You actually have, unlike in the United States, diversity works here. Okay, but there is a structure within which that diversity exists. You know, and that, that structure has rules. You know, it's like, we're, we're in the matrix, okay? And the matrix has rules.

• 29:32Speaker 00

  And you can either master the rules and become neo, or you can resist it and have a problem. Okay? And if you don't like it, you can leave. You know, barring something extreme, no one's making me stay here. I can go. If I don't like it, I'll leave. Maybe one day I will, but I like it. They, they don't... If you want to talk about law of attraction, they are strong believers in law of attraction. Okay, no one's forced to come here. You're choosing to come here. And if you choose to come here, just like if you choose to come to someone else's house, you respect the rules of their house. They say, you know, this is the private library, don't go in there. Okay, fine, have fun. Okay, you know, you're making me dinner, you're, you know, a nice comfy bed, whatever, and I can go. You know, if I hear something terrible, then that's a different situation, but it's not like that.

• 30:14Speaker 00

  You know, people get this weird, you know, I look at the Western media, I'm like, oh my gosh. You know, and I'm not, I'm not an apologist for some things that some people might have an issue with. But the Western media presents an incomplete view that when you're having the lived experience here, it's not actually like that. Okay, and you need to come here and you need to experience it, and then you need to talk to people and you can judge for yourself whether it's good. It is safe. You have a great deal of expression. It is not like 15 years ago where if you kissed your wife or girlfriend on the beach, you know, the moral place is gonna come and get you. I think there was like 20 years ago, some British couple was acting inappropriately on the beach, like really overdoing it.

• 30:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, I remember, it was a British couple.

• 30:54Speaker 00

  Yeah, but that was 20 years ago. Okay, you know, the, it's, you're, the decor, it's like Texas. There's a love of decorum. If you don't like it, don't come.

• 31:04Speaker 01

  Yeah. I love, I've fallen in love with it. It's like, you know, it's like, I think it's okay, but maybe people shouldn't be, you know, making out in public. You know, I like it when I go to the beach and if I'm walking on the boardwalk, guys like, put your t-shirt on. I'm like, okay. I like it that I just have.

• 31:19Speaker 00

  He's just jealous of you. He's just jealous of your build.

• 31:22Speaker 01

  I also like it that just like I don't see strip clubs and I don't see sex shops and like I don't see drunken footballers like I see in London. It's like, I don't need to see that. And I know they have the freedom to do that, but it's like, I also like the fact that that's not here. And it just makes for a really peaceful place for me to be and I think that's, that's also really nice. And like you said, it's like visiting someone's house. It's like, oh, you could say, well, I just visited your mom's house and I have the right to tell her that her cooking sucks and her place is bad and I hate her political beliefs. Okay, is that freedom? Maybe, but if I'm in someone's house and I'm a guest there, then I'm not gonna do that and nobody would. And so, you know, that's

• 32:01Speaker 00

  Well, some people would.

• 32:01Speaker 01

  Some people would.

• 32:02Speaker 00

  Actually, some people would. They're doing something. I mean, I'll get political. You can always shut me up. But in the U.S., people are doing that. People are coming in there on student visas and everything else and telling them that their mother's cooking sucks.

• 32:13Speaker 01

  Right, because they're exercising their freedom of speech. Yeah.

• 32:15Speaker 00

  Yeah, and actively interfering with others' freedom of speech. And, you know, like, whatever I stand on politically, I generally want people to express their points of view. But when those, you know, it's the usual thing, your rights stop at the tip of my nose. You know, people are getting past the nose in the U.S. and interfering with other people's freedoms.

• 32:31Speaker 01

  I agree.

• 32:32Speaker 00

  So, you know, where's freedom? Here, I have the freedom to practice my religion, to engage in commerce, to make friends of, you know, of every nationality and every belief system. I have a freedom to do these events. I have the freedom to go. I have the freedom to come. It's a lot of, one can call it civil freedoms.

• 32:52Speaker 06

  How do you get out of a rat race? How do you create wealth not only for yourself, but also for the generations to come after? I am absolutely amazed with the quality of companies that we're getting exposure to.

• 33:03Speaker 07

  We go on to Zoom calls with the innovators and the folks who are building new applications in metaverse, blockchain, artificial intelligence, decentralized finance. What's going on, everybody? Thumbs up if you can see me. We are focusing on early-stage investment.

• 33:20Speaker 06

  And the quality of people that we're getting exposure to, whether it be Dan Tapia with OneRT, Jason Ma from Open, Yatsu from Anamoka.

• 33:28Speaker 03

  This has been a phenomenal experience so far. It has far exceeded my expectations.

• 33:33Speaker 04

  We are focusing on cutting-edge technologies.

• 33:37Speaker 03

  I view it now as the best investment I have ever made. The upside, I view, is unlimited.

• 33:42Speaker 06

  And as a retail investor, I would never get this exposure anywhere else outside of Investment Club. See you in the Investment Club.

• 33:51Speaker 00

  Okay, and you, you know, is there a dark side? I think so. You don't want to get on the wrong side of the police. You don't want to get the wrong side of the Emiratis. You don't want to talk trash, you know, but again, if you don't let it go. If you want to be critical of the UAE, do it from Germany. Okay, but if you're, if you're living here, you know, play by the rules. Okay, and the rules are not draconian. The rules are great. I mean, here we are having a good conversation in Dubai.

• 34:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:18Speaker 00

  Okay, and we're talking about an Emirati partner, you know, and it's like, it is good here. And also, I mean, Andrew Tate, God bless him, I've never met him, I feel like I will one of these days, because we're kind of in the quasi same circles, just like, you know, you know, I eventually meet everyone, Cole, take it as a compliment. But, you know, his point was, you know, if you create an environment where people feel safe with their stuff, they're going to come here with their stuff and they're going to make more stuff. Okay, you got countries where people don't feel safe with their stuff. And their stuff can be their physical stuff, their mental peace of mind, or their family stuff. And, you know, if you want them to have it and make more of it, you got to create an environment where it's secure. And they're secure from the government, secure from the people. And, you know, they're doing a great job here.

• 35:03Speaker 01

  You know what, the other thing I don't miss about London is, is being involved in all the politics and all the he said, she said, and then, and then, and then, it's now become our form of entertainment in the last 10 years. There's none of that here. I remember I sat down with Dr. Marwan and Emirati here.

• 35:19Speaker 00

  He's an interesting guy.

• 35:20Speaker 01

  He's an amazing guy. And he's the reason I'm really here. And he made my golden visa. So, just because of who I was, it's another reason I love this place, you know, because they really go out of their way to bring talent in. And like, you know, the UK didn't do that for me.

• 35:34Speaker 00

  No.

• 35:35Speaker 01

  But my Marwan once said, he's like, we don't, we, you know, we want people to be able to get up here in the morning and work on their business and work on their family. And, you know, there's not the headlines. You don't have to worry about this. There's all this, there's all this drama, there's all this other stuff. And I must say, I don't miss hearing what the Tories said about the Conservatives. It's nice to tune that out. And now I just can focus on the things that are important to me.

• 35:56Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's, it's a... How do I say it? It's a planned development, if you want to use a US term. You know, so, okay, so trees can't grow to a certain height. Okay, I don't care. I'm not gardening anyway. You know, I'll also say you can, there's different kinds of politics. We're gonna go on a little tangent if you don't mind, but there's, I'm a big believer in winning through results and winning through action and not through language. The, like, the, like, with Tech Tuesdays, you know, it's like, you can't argue with 42 times. You can't argue with, you know, what a full house is when we pan the camera around and it really is a full house.

• 36:40Speaker 00

  You know, you can't argue with the way that people look. And I'm creating actual facts, and facts win. You know, and how do you create facts? You can't BS your way to a fact. You have to create action. You know, you can negotiate and use language to coordinate your parties in your groups. But there is a form of politics, the politics of the deed. Okay, the politics, you know, which I think you might find distasteful, and I do too in the US, is that the verbal nature of the politics, yet it's lacking substance and reality and actual impact. You know, they said this, they said this, you know. Okay, that was witty, but what did it actually change in the universe? Other bunch of oxygen atoms moving around.

• 37:20Speaker 00

  I love creating facts on the ground and winning, or, you know, and it's not just me winning, having my group win or humanity win through those actions. And Dubai is, I always say Dubai is for doers. Okay, you can engage in the politics of the deed. You can build that new research facility that is gonna let everyone live longer. You can build that new ethical AI. You can, you know, you can do those experiments that will help people live longer with stem cells and everything else. You can really impact the world. You just need to change your mentality. It's almost, dare I say, a little Chinese. Like, they get stuff done. They get stuff, it's a little scary how they get stuff done. They get stuff done fast and at speed. And you can do that in a slightly more microcosm way in Dubai.

• 38:04Speaker 00

  And so I'd encourage people to take that point of view. And just, you know, I was in Los Angeles. It was 2020. Covid was happening. Various lives were mattering on the streets and that was not safe. So I came over here at a friend's invitation and I saw the contrast. And I grew up in Los Angeles. I was born in Los Angeles. You know, I had a little stint in Washington. My dad was in the military, so I was in false church for a while in the Pentagon. But, you know, Los Angeles, it has its great parts and it's nice to visit. And don't get me wrong, you can have a good life in Los Angeles, but it is not on the right trajectory. Okay, Dubai and the Middle East and all these other ways are on the right path. So I saw the contrast when I came out here, thanks to a friend, and I saw crypto was happening and it was great.

• 38:48Speaker 00

  And I flew back and had to wrap up some personal stuff and then came out here and never looked back.

• 38:54Speaker 01

  That's a crazy trajectory. I mean, if you had told yourself in 19 that you were gonna move to the Middle East for the rest of, not for a big chunk of your life.

• 39:01Speaker 00

  It was, look, I thought, and it still may happen in some form. I thought I was gonna either end up in Ukraine, because I really like Ukraine. And I've been there 25 times, and that's actually the reason I'm in blockchain and crypto. Or I thought, and this may still happen, some variant of this, you know, end up, whatever that means, in Switzerland. Just because I like their kind of attitude. I did not see Dubai coming. Okay, and it shocked me. But again, I was in that circumstance in Los Angeles. You know, it was Covid, you know, and this is the draconian crazy California lockdown of Covid. And, you know, thank God I got that invitation. That invitation changed the course of my life.

• 39:43Speaker 00

  You know, that, you know, nice friend, but not like my really close friend, but just a, you know, medium level acquaintance inviting me out. It's like, boom. Little things can change a lot. You know, you're smart, by the way, I'll break the fourth wall, but you have this pre-interview form that people fill out. And one of them is like, what's your aha moment? My aha moment was coming to Dubai. And you know, at that moment, there was not much traffic. That one, that one, they fooled me. Okay, but the aha moment was the places were open, they were doing crypto, people were nice. A lot of good-looking people here, you know, a lot of opportunity. And I was like, aha, this is what it can be. Okay, nice.

• 40:21Speaker 01

  It's like a hustler's paradise for me. And it's also got.

• 40:24Speaker 00

  It's a builder's paradise.

• 40:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, maybe that's it, builder's paradise. And then it's also got amazing weather and beaches and all that, you know, but you can also work hard and everyone else is as well.

• 40:35Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 40:35Speaker 01

  And that's a rare combination.

• 40:37Speaker 00

  It's a meritocracy on steroids. You can either come here today, have a good time, and God bless you if you do. And a lot of people first come here to have a good time. But if this is a meritocracy and it flushes out the people who aren't, don't have the merit eventually. But if you, it's like I was saying, if you're consistent about delivering results, you'll get noticed. And you don't have to be Muslim, you don't have to be Arab, you don't have to, it's okay. They're, they're open-minded here. Okay, and you know, you'll just build the relationship slowly and then things happen and you start adding value. And it can happen. So, you know, the hustler scene is like, it's another Andrew Tate-ism, right? Hustlers University and all that stuff. But he, he's not really hustler, he's built businesses, he works out, he did kickboxing. Kickboxing is the opposite of hustling, right?

• 41:22Speaker 00

  He, you have to trick, you're a martial artist and you're doing your boxing. You know, it's not a one-time, oh, I won. He didn't roll the dice, he didn't lie to anyone. Like, nothing is more real than getting in a fight, right? And having to train for it, because then all the words mean nothing. That's just the physical reality of it. So, this is a builder's paradise. You build yourself and you build your business and you build your relationships. And you get to keep a good chunk of what you build.

• 41:45Speaker 01

  What does this place look like in 10 years, do you think? And on that same note, what does, you know, Tech Tuesdays look like in 10 years? You mentioned the expansion.

• 41:51Speaker 00

  Oh, I love, I love how you integrate those two. I, it's very hard to know what the world is gonna look like in 10 years with the political situation with right now and with AI and a bunch of other things. That being said, like China, like some other countries, they do have a plan. Okay, the US, the plan changes every 10 seconds because you never even know who's in charge. Or many people, or no one's in charge. Here, you know, it will get more green. Okay, it will get more populated. It will get more expensive. It will face enhanced competition from Saudi Arabia. Okay, Saudi Arabia, in some way, is becoming a big Dubai. They're behind, but they're massive, and they have massive money.

• 42:32Speaker 01

  And a big population.

• 42:33Speaker 00

  Yeah, and a big population.

• 42:34Speaker 01

  38 million.

• 42:36Speaker 00

  Right, which, you know, in American terms, it's like 10%, but you know, in local terms, it's big. And they have physical space. So Dubai was always, and UAE was always sort of an outlier economy, like an entrepore to access the bigger GCC. The more liberal place, the place that you want to live and raise your family, and then, you know, or Abu Dhabi. You know, and then you go to Saudi for three days to do some business. It's, hasn't, Saudi is not a big Dubai yet, but as it loosens up, as opportunity grows there, as everything else, Dubai is gonna have to hustle. And you can see it, you can see them, you know, they have to move, they have to be extremely nimble and play to all their strengths, you know.

• 43:15Speaker 00

  And you may get bleed over of, in a good way, of what Dubai is into Rasul Khamah, into Sharjah, into these neighboring Emirates that are charming and nice, you know, as they are, but now need to hustle themselves. So you're, and Abu Dhabi and Dubai have always maintained a little bit of distance from each other because they are separate body politics within the same country, but now they're linking up with Rail and everything else. I think you're gonna see a slightly more integrated UAE. I think you're gonna see a more integrated region. Hopefully, there's a, you know, God willing, there's a more of a regional peace that will happen in the next 10 years. I think it's possible, again, knock on wood, God willing, you know. That's above my pay grade. But I think there's a lot of opportunity there.

• 43:59Speaker 00

  And to the extent I can help it happen, I will, but I also know my limitations.

• 44:04Speaker 00

  So I, this is gonna be at least one of the pillars of my life. You know, there may be another pillar in Ukraine, there may be another pillar in Switzerland. It depends how life plays out. Just because, you know, wife's Ukrainian and friends are Ukrainian, so we'll see how that goes. But all that stuff. To answer your other question, so I, on one hand, Dubai Tech Tuesdays is spontaneous and experimental. On the other hand, even before the first one, I already had the master plan in mind. It's a weird duality. It is meant, it was meant from the ground up to be modeled and then copied. Okay, I almost done with the modeling. The series of experiments I've been running, you know, you can say it's a lab.

• 44:46Speaker 00

  Again, every time I try a slightly different concoction, I say right now, the concoction is about seventy-five percent, eighty percent right. Maybe there's some other things we can tweak on the edges, but it's getting, it's honing in on what it should be, on its final form. And so as we approach that, we're, it's already in progress. We're gonna systematize the IP, set up the corporate structure, and then go to Abu Dhabi next. Okay, and that's intended, again, everything is God hands, that's intended for September, October, let's say. And then after that Qatar, then Bahrain, then Saudi, and then we go from there. The, I've already had nipples, but you know, everyone who sees it says, oh, you should open this up in Miami.

• 45:27Speaker 00

  You know, or Berlin, well, that's intention, but we're gonna, we're gonna do it in a way that maintains the vibe. One of my visions, one of my fantasies, if you like, is that, you know, it's all on Tuesday, right? Now, of course, there's different time zones, but you know, vertically, it's all the same time zone on planet Earth. So imagine if everyone, like, in our time zone and then plus one and minus one was at a Tech Tuesdays, and you're surrounded by screens, and you're virtually present in all the other Tech Tuesdays that are happening. So imagine you're at Dubai Tech Tuesdays, and you have a video wall showing Abu Dhabi Tech Tuesdays, and Qatar Tech Tuesdays, and Bahrain Tech Tuesdays, and Saudi. And you're like looking around, and like, all these people are at the same kind of experience at the same moment. How awesome would that be?

• 46:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's cool. And that means you'd be more likely to go to the one in Miami, to go to the one in Abu Dhabi, if you've been to the one here.

• 46:14Speaker 00

  A hundred percent.

• 46:15Speaker 01

  I know the vibe, I know the feel, I've seen it, let's go.

• 46:17Speaker 00

  Well, we are gonna, we're building it out now. We're gonna have the website, the membership backend, the whole thing, the local leaders, the chapter leaders.

• 46:25Speaker 01

  How do you find a Gordon on the ground in these other cities?

• 46:27Speaker 00

  Well, you know what, again, it's not, how do you find a Brian? You know, it's It's, look, it's a good question. It doesn't need to be me. Okay, the elements that make it magic, I'm not underrating myself. I think I have a certain value on the stage, okay, or as hosting it. But you know, there's other people like me, and it may be challenging to find them, but they're out there, and they're gonna be great. And they're gonna be great in their own way, and they're gonna bring their own magic that's separate from the magic I bring, and probably even better sometimes. Okay, and I'm not gonna run myself ragged trying to be two places at once running, you know, I can't be Tuesdays, I can't, you know, it is Tuesdays. It's not Tuesday, then Wednesday, then Thursday. So,

• 47:10Speaker 00

  we're gonna have to find someone in Abu Dhabi. We're gonna find someone who's local and great, and have them work within a certain structure and provide lots of support. It will be a challenge, but you know, it was hard to start it, and it'll be hard to do the first copy, but once there's two, it'll be an easy, easier process expanding it out. And I'm, you notice what's not there. What's not at Tech Tuesdays is name tags. Okay, what's not at Tech Tuesdays, and I think there's a place for it, is AI matchmaking. Okay, now, or matchmaking in general. I'm not saying that stuff is bad. Okay, I've done events with name tags, and we had a partner come in a few weeks ago that did AI matchmaking. But I'm, whether it's generational or otherwise, I like people going to that room and getting to know each

• 47:55Speaker 00

  other organically, and having the conversation to find out who's who. You know, and so I think when we have people traveling between cities, and your time is a little bit more precious, we may have a guide, you know, some of that functionality. You know, here's the, here's the members, or maybe there'll be a tiered membership. We'll figure it out. But there's a lot of demand for it.

• 48:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's important. I mean, when we were talking before the cameras started rolling, I was telling you all these little details about this program that makes it this program. Things we decide to do, things we decide not to do, and it's what makes London Real, London Real. And so for your events, all those little tiny decisions and the ethos makes that event what it is. And people aren't coming for the matchmaking, but then again, there's a lot of beautiful people there that are really cool to talk to, but it's not maybe the prime thing. And then there's no name Tags, but then again, if you talk to people, it's very easy to find who they are.

• 48:45Speaker 00

  It's a buffet and you know, if you want Chinese food that night, have Chinese. If you want Mexican, have Mexican. You know, sometimes you think you're hungry for Chinese and then you see Mexican, you eat that.

• 48:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, something usually random happens. Like I met a guy last night who was a music producer who wants to now produce my first hip hop track. I didn't expect.

• 49:01Speaker 00

  My man, that is awesome. I can see that.

• 49:02Speaker 01

  I did not expect that last night.

• 49:04Speaker 00

  You're a Renaissance man. You got your boxing, you got this, you got that.

• 49:07Speaker 01

  Trying to tick all the Renaissance boxes. But like, I didn't expect to meet that guy at your event, but I did.

• 49:11Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 49:11Speaker 01

  There was quite a range of people there, you know.

• 49:14Speaker 00

  It is.

• 49:14Speaker 01

  It's interesting.

• 49:15Speaker 00

  And for some people, that might be frustrating. You know, I have people walking up to me, this happened twice last night. Okay, I have a project. Who's the investors? I don't like, we'll go talk and find out. They'll point them out to me. No. No, you know, no, I mean, are you paying me? I mean, for that, they would pay me. Okay. It's like, no, I am providing you a beautiful environment with great people. Who are curated and content, you know, you can go the last 10%. I did 90% of the work for you. I put the right people in the room. Now you. You know, go play, go play squeak games or whatever it is, you know, and you know, go, go, go find the 1% you want. Yeah, it's like, I, I think, I think you saw me say this before.

• 49:58Speaker 00

  Just to talk about action again. Okay. What is the point of taking action? Why not just sit here and read a book? You know, because reading is great. There's two things. Action produces information. Okay. There's information that's on the other side of action that's not available otherwise. You can chat GPT your whole life. You can talk to people your whole life. You need to take action in the real world and that produces information. That information lets you often know your next step. Also, action produces entropy. And I don't mean entropy in the he did the universe sense. I mean it in the computer science sense. It produces randomness. And randomness, like volatility, is where you make your money. You don't make your money with something sting like this. You make your money with something going up and down. Okay, so. I'm creating an environment. It's intentional. It's mindful, if you like. I know you're into yoga and meditation and everything else.

• 50:42Speaker 00

  It's not by accident. It is a conscious, realized thing that this is a form for action. This is a form for taking action, standing up, introducing yourself, and that produces information and produces entropy. And when entropy and information come together, you get opportunity. Okay, and so the people who get with the vibe, who stand up and take the microphone, you know, who are you? Where are you from? What are you up to? And I'm talking to other people, it's a little arbitrary for action. And people come up and they tell me they found their partner there. You know, they found their investor there. They found their local translator, whatever. You know, everything comes up. You know, they... I'm waiting for someone to get married from Tech Tuesdays. It happened with Happy Hour Mafia.

• 51:25Speaker 01

  Right, okay.

• 51:26Speaker 00

  I would prefer not to cause a divorce. I went through that myself. It wasn't too pleasant.

• 51:31Speaker 01

  But it's true. If you go there and you take action and you step up and you go talk to people, then things will happen. And that's not gonna happen if you stay at home.

• 51:37Speaker 00

  Yeah, they can't not happen.

• 51:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:39Speaker 00

  If you do it at scale, you know, and I'm not saying flop around uselessly, but you're in an environment that's curated and optimized for action takers. You're in a beautiful environment. You're rocking and rolling in there.

• 51:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, I always feel like I haven't met enough people in there.

• 51:57Speaker 00

  Well, keep on coming back. You bring a sparkle every time you come. I'll flatter you.

• 52:03Speaker 01

  I love being there.

• 52:03Speaker 00

  It's good.

• 52:04Speaker 01

  It's good vibes. And Mohammed as well, he gives me a big hug and it's just, it's great vibes. I'm gonna keep coming.

• 52:10Speaker 00

  Maybe Joseph expects you.

• 52:11Speaker 01

  Yeah?

• 52:12Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 52:12Speaker 01

  Who expects me?

• 52:13Speaker 00

  My baby, my son.

• 52:14Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, okay. Yeah, I didn't see him there last night. I missed him.

• 52:16Speaker 00

  Well, he was...

• 52:18Speaker 01

  I gotta know what he's gonna say.

• 52:19Speaker 00

  Obviously, he's three months old, so we're being, you know, a little measured in his exposure.

• 52:23Speaker 01

  That's pretty bold.

• 52:23Speaker 00

  But we brought him. My parents were there. You know, our nanny was helping out. We put Arena in a safe corner. We're slowly getting him used to it.

• 52:30Speaker 01

  It's good vibes.

• 52:31Speaker 00

  You know, when he's four years old, he'll be onstage running the show. Maybe he'll run Abu Dhabi.

• 52:35Speaker 01

  That's crazy, man. That's crazy. All right, so it's Dubai Tech Tuesdays. There is a very...

• 52:40Speaker 02

  Investment Club. Today, I consider it the best investment that I've ever made. We get four projects presented a week by their associated CEOs. Personally, I'm completely blown away by the quality of these projects. And I know of nowhere else where I would be given this same opportunity. Each week that passes, I feel more appreciative of the fact that I'm a member of this group. The vibe was just tremendous. Everybody's on the same wavelength. We just clicked. Everybody listened to each other, enjoyed their company. It was just magical, magical. Take action. Don't take my word for it. Do diligence you need to do. And I really hope that someday down the road, I see you in the club. It far exceeded expectations, without question.

• 53:27Speaker 01

  Best crypto vibe in the place. You are, you know, a crypto attorney. You've been in crypto for a long time. You know, you've been looking at Bitcoins since 2014.

• 53:36Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 53:36Speaker 01

  Obviously, this is a huge part of your own IP. What is, in your opinion, the current state of the union of crypto? How does Dubai plug in? Is it the most important city in the world when it comes to crypto? How would you say you look at the state of where we are right now?

• 53:55Speaker 00

  I think you have a problem with people saying this, but good questions. Okay, um, let me take one little roll back and then I'll push it forward.

• 54:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:02Speaker 00

  Okay, why am I doing what I'm doing? Why am I a crypto and blockchain attorney? It's because in 2014, the year you correctly mentioned, I met this couple from Ukraine, went to Odessa and got exposed to blockchain and crypto. And then I had stopped practicing law at that point because I had my own technology company. What happened is I had two realizations. The first one is if I went back into the practice of law and practiced in this area, that'd be cool because I'd be one of the first, if not the first attorney in this area. And, you know, this is before it became trendy. And I was like, oh, okay, well, there's an opportunity here. The second realization I had, which kind of plugs into your other questions, is not just is this a neat area of law, but that blockchain and crypto and these... Machineries, if you like, can make law better.

• 54:47Speaker 00

  Okay, law needs to be made better. Because I'll tell you something, it's changed very recently. I grew up, I was born in 1969, I grew up in the seventies and eighties. I thought that by the time 2000, 2000 seemed like the ultimate future. And 2024 was like the ult, you know, this is past Blade Runner. Blade Runner was my favorite movie growing up, that was in 2019. Okay, we're six years past the first Blade Runner. Where's my flying cars? Seriously, where's my replicants? Okay, we're, you know, it's like, what the hell happened to the future? And so when, in 2014, I was getting very frustrated because I was like, what, you know, where's my robots? All this stuff. The, and what I saw with blockchain and crypto was a way to remove one of the systemic constraints on human advancement,

• 55:33Speaker 00

  which is the inefficiency of the legal system. The arbitrariness of these judges and juries. The, the expense and time that goes into these things. Imagine if you can have programmatic law that is predictable, deterministic, that you know how it's going to play out. Imagine if you have one law for the entire world, you know, which is blockchain and code. You know, in the US, we have, states have law, federal government has law, agencies have law. They're all fighting and you have to all comply and if they don't agree, you could have court cases. It's ridiculous. It is, who wants to put money into that stuff? Okay, you want to put money into generative activity and I saw an opportunity to do that with blockchain. Funny enough, these past couple of years, we are kind of getting the flying cars with these drone cars. We are kind of getting the robots. We are kind of getting some of this stuff, you know, especially in China, quantum and all this other stuff.

• 56:18Speaker 00

  It's like, you know, now with SpaceX, you know, the future finally seems to be arriving. I don't know if it's the future we want, but it's here. Yeah. You know, it's coming here, it's coming here fast. I mean, the future is getting weird fast. So, to get more on your question, I think, I think blockchain and crypto, let's talk about the markets. I'll talk about the technology and the markets. I, I think that...

• 56:41Speaker 00

  Blockchain by itself is okay. It's like, but when you apply it to other areas, that's where the magic happens. Okay? If you apply it to supply chains, that's where the magic happens. If you apply it to academic degrees, that's where the magic happens. Now you have a degree on chain. No one can fake where they went to school, if they go to school. Okay? Or they, you know, no one can fake a test result. Because now, now there's an unachievable record. You know, I'm going through all these hoops with visas and passports and everything else from my extended family now. I have to go to this office. Dubai is very good. I actually have to do less of it here than I would in the other country, but I'm having to bounce around different offices, get different papers, stamp, stamp, stamp. You know, it's a blend between onsite and online. And especially between different governments, you know, with blockchain and everything else, that can become very efficient. So it's an accelerator for humanity.

• 57:26Speaker 00

  So when it comes to projects that apply blockchain well, either add value or stop the removal of value, I think there's a lot that can happen. And, you know, Ethereum with its, you know, Ethereum clones with their virtual machines and the idea of not having a censorship and bringing this all on chain, great. Bitcoin, I think, has, is the long-term play. You're not necessarily going to get the 100x multiple that you will, some of this other stuff, but you will, will, will survive what's coming next. With a small little footnote that if quantum encryption breaks, we're gonna have a problem.

• 58:00Speaker 01

  They say they're gonna bulletproof before that happens anyways.

• 58:03Speaker 00

  Yeah, I'm waiting.

• 58:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:04Speaker 00

  Because, you know, quantum is moving really fast, like really fast. And if AI starts getting on top of quantum, you know, it may move faster than we think. A lot of things are a little scary. It's a fun time to be alive. But, you know, we're, to the second part of your question, we're in the right place. Okay, you and I have chosen as our basis the proper place for crypto and blockchain. Now, why? Several things. Dubai is the only, as far as I'm aware of, this may change recently, but it's from the beginning, Dubai is the only jurisdiction on the planet that has a regulator entirely devoted to crypto. That's VARA, Virtual Asset Regulatory Authority. Right? The other places have the securities and commodities, the this, the that, the money

• 58:47Speaker 00

  transfer, it's all, you know, you have to go get legal opinions all This other stuff, here they have one regulator, there's one door to knock on with the minor exception of sometimes the central bank is involved. Okay, that is a great thing and that Vara, the regulator, you know, it's hard to do something from scratch, it's hard to regulate an area from scratch, so they kind of had to find their footing initially, they weren't being terribly responsible or maybe they were being a little bit inconsistent, but they were getting better every single time, that's what I love about this place. They get better, okay, they improve and you can see the results in them improving and you can see the number of applications being pushed through going up. So you can actually get license here and it's not a joke license, it's not some weird third world jurisdiction where you're like, well, you know, a license from, you know,

• 59:32Speaker 00

  Uber Dubaland, okay, well that's not gonna, you know, that's not gonna hold up in Germany, okay, but UAE is off the gray list, okay, this is a respected jurisdiction and we got respected free zones here, we have D I F C by International Financial Center, we got A D G M, Abu Dhabi Global Markets.

• 59:47Speaker 01

  What are those free zones for people that don't know?

• 59:49Speaker 00

  Um, sure, so, there's, UAE is the land of free zones, okay, as part of it is a marketing thing, so a free zone basically is a designated geographical space that has some sort of advantage relative to the mainland or some different treatment relative to the mainland. Traditionally, that meant maybe that there was a tax treatment that was different there or labor rules that were different there or something like that, or customs didn't apply there that where they would normally apply. Free zones in the UAE generally mean that English corporate law applies, not the normal default Sharia based Arabic law, but you can make your contracts in English, have them

• 1:00:32Speaker 00

  enforced in that sort of way, so you have the commercial or corporate law here. There's two constitutional special free zones, financial free zones. Not only do they have their own corporate law that's English, but they have financial law, like stocks, wants, everything else, that's based on English finance law, which is the world standard. So Abu Dhabi and Dubai are sort of duopoly here. Abu Dhabi has Abu Dhabi Global Markets, A D G M. They have their own company law, they have their own Court system, they have their own English law based financial law system. You can actually appeal it, I think, to the Crown in England. And in Dubai, Dubai International Financial Center, D I F C. And they're kind of like sisters, they're competitors and sisters and however you want to call it.

• 1:01:15Speaker 00

  So if you want to really set up a cold company that is globally respected, you can do it in one of those two free zones.

• 1:01:20Speaker 01

  Okay. Is this still the most important city in the world when it comes to blockchain? That's a very general question, but would you say it is?

• 1:01:28Speaker 00

  It's the most important city regionally.

• 1:01:32Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:01:32Speaker 00

  For sure. Okay, uh, simply because of VAR, simply because of the activity here, simply because of the tax structure and everything else. The development teams may not be here, but this is a great place to put your main office. And this is actually a great place to put maybe more than your main office. Okay, so and the intellectual property protection here is decent. So this is definitely the regional hub. People are trying to contend with it, but they have a long way to go, you know, Qatar, Bahrain, whatever. You know, UAE doesn't, Qatar kind of plays cute with regional politics and Bahrain, people are like, you know, they need to get to know it better and Saudi is still kind of figuring itself out and Oman, you know, needs to, has more steps to go. So it is a regional center. Does it compare with London?

• 1:02:14Speaker 00

  Well, London is, you know, unfortunately, the UK is very crypto unfriendly and Europe is very unfriendly. You know, crypto, FSA is unfriendly in the UK, even in the city of London. Uh, and then in Europe, you have MICA, which is, you know, terrible law and causing real problems. So Europe kind of took itself out of the zone. Do you have any competitor in Africa? No. Do you have a competitor in India or the subcontinent? No. Maybe Singapore or Hong Kong has something to say.

• 1:02:38Speaker 01

  Right, maybe, to be determined.

• 1:02:40Speaker 00

  To be, they're pretty good. They're, they're not jokes. Okay, they're, but they kind of, they need to be a little bit more consistent or they need to decide whether they're friendly or unfriendly. But they're not nothings. Okay, and then when you go to the Western Hemisphere, you have British Virgin Islands, you have Caymans, you have all this other stuff. Those are kind of like, if you were setting up in the US, maybe you want to set up your entity there and not here. It kind of depends where your customers are. The funny thing is, I'd say. Maybe the US under Trump, maybe, is finally turning it around on crypto. And if it really pulls that off, it will dominate everywhere else because that'll be

• 1:03:18Speaker 00

  a large industrial financial economy doing at a scale that makes outlier offshore jurisdictions like Hong Kong, Singapore, and Dubai not relevant.

• 1:03:29Speaker 01

  Right, because they have the customer base and they also, they have the builders there, they have the universities, they have just a lot.

• 1:03:35Speaker 00

  You have the domestic market. If something's legal in the US, you can sell in the entire US. If something's legal in Dubai, where else can you sell? You're not quite sure.

• 1:03:42Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:03:43Speaker 00

  You know, Dubai? You know, it's like, so to have a large, integrated, coherent market is a great advantage. Okay, the US, you know, should have that advantage. It is a continent scale economy, right? The problem with the US is we have federalism. So we have the federal government and we have the state government. So you have this clash between these governments. So you kind of have this, what could be a continental economy, slightly hobbled by federalism. Okay? Slightly offset because NAFTA integrated Canada and Mexico. So it's pretty good. Part of the reason why the US is successful even now is it has this large scale, you have the economies of scale. China is a continental scale economy.

• 1:04:23Speaker 00

  Okay, Russia is, you know, is in its way. Dubai, by definition, can't be. So when, but, you know, when these, but where are the customers? They're in the continental sized economies, which is why they resist moving fast on crypto and blockchain. They have their own population that may be damaged by this stuff. You know, Dubai and these other places can play a little bit more loose with it. But Trump is, you know, he's an adventurous soul, apparently. You know, he's interesting this term.

• 1:04:51Speaker 01

  Definitely.

• 1:04:52Speaker 00

  He's a lot more interesting than the last term.

• 1:04:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:04:55Speaker 00

  He's actually seems to be getting some stuff done.

• 1:04:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:04:57Speaker 00

  Shockingly.

• 1:04:58Speaker 01

  He's prepared.

• 1:04:59Speaker 00

  Yeah, I don't know, I don't know what happened. He maybe had his, he had his Wheaties this morning.

• 1:05:03Speaker 01

  I think he was just prepared. I think he was honestly blindsided by the win in 16. He told people that. He thought it was not going to win. And he wasn't ready and he had no Washington game. Then he got burned and learned and now this time he had a plan.

• 1:05:14Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:05:14Speaker 01

  And for four years he set it up and I don't think anybody expected. and come in with that strong of a cabinet, a cabinet and a plan. Now it's bumpy now, but I mean, he's super pro crypto and everything that he's doing seems to be massively bullish. But we'll see how how it plays out and we'll see if they can hold it. Because there's going to be midterms in 18 months and the Democrats and Warren are going to push back, I believe, to slow it down.

• 1:05:38Speaker 00

  What do you think is going to happen? What's your, what's your view on that?

• 1:05:40Speaker 01

  One thing that he's doing intelligently, I think, is that this whole stablecoin acts, there's two of them going through Congress right now. They're trying to get buy in by Democrats and they are getting it. Because the problem is, look, I was in politics briefly. I ran to be mayor of London. And I can see what politicians do is they take an issue. They don't care how they feel about it, but can they weaponize it for their own votes and gains, they will do it. And for me, it looks like that's what Warren does with crypto. She just takes it as any red herring. This is the bad guy. This is the bad guy. We're going to beat it down. Vote for me. And so when they do that with something as beloved as crypto and blockchain that can change the world, it's a shame. And the question is, will she still do that? Yeah. But it feels like more and more people are seeing it as a piece of technology the US should lead in.

• 1:06:19Speaker 01

  So I am kind of medium term bullish, but right now, if anything, the Democrats can do to stop Trump with his agenda, it's a win for them. And this could be just a political football that people move back and forth. And if they do that, it hurts us. And I don't know what's going to happen, but I'm still medium term bullish because it feels like it will advance in the US. And ultimately, they have everything that Dubai doesn't have, that local population, the builders, the universities. The scale, yeah, the scale.

• 1:06:46Speaker 00

  And maybe their ability to influence other countries, for better or for worse, at scale.

• 1:06:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:52Speaker 00

  You know, when the US talks, people listen, they might not like it, they might not comply, but it is a voice you can't ignore. You know, on a, on a global level.

• 1:07:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:01Speaker 00

  But you, but you, look, you're, you, you've obviously really, sorry, I'm going to switch on you for a second. You, you've obviously really embraced crypto. It's part of what you tell your community about, it's part of what you engage with them. We've had lucky, you've been lucky to have some of your family extended. You know, your community come to our, our events and, you know, it's clear that you've opened up the door for a lot of them, but you're here. So did you, what's, sorry, what's your feeling about Dubai and crypto and?

• 1:07:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, look, it's a great question. Look, in 2020, I got thrust into a fight for freedom of speech that I never thought that I would be in. And I had been doing this show like this for nine years. I'd had conversations with five, 600 people. I had had, you know, over 2 million subscribers on YouTube, half a billion views. And we spoke unedited, unscripted, uncensored, always. That's what London Real was. That was my Gordon Tech Tuesday IP. You know, we don't edit it. We don't tell people what to say. And I don't stop and try to argue people and talk over them. I actually just try to shut up and listen. Like, that was the, that was how we built the show. Maybe because it was intentional, maybe because I didn't know better. And then-

• 1:08:07Speaker 00

  I've watched it. I've been following you for a while. Like I said, it's surreal to be here. So it's kind of cool. But yeah, go on.

• 1:08:12Speaker 01

  That's amazing. And I didn't even know what I was doing. You know, it's like you didn't maybe even know what you were doing. But now, when you look back, you're like, oh, yeah, I did this intentionally. I did this intentionally because that's your personality that you believe in. And so for me, when I look back, I'm like, man, I had a lot of people in this chair that I really disagreed with. And then I realized, two years later, I changed my mind and I actually started agreeing with them. So it was always a place to express opinions where people could learn and listen from each other. And one of the things I learned during the freedom of speech era of London Real was, not only do you have the freedom to speak, but you have the freedom to listen to someone else speak and hear someone else's opinion. And I think the ability to change your mind is one of the great signs of intelligence. And so, so many people don't want to change their mind, and the ego doesn't

• 1:08:56Speaker 01

  want to let go. But it's, that's what the evolution of this show was, and the evolution of my life. And I continue to evolve. So we were thrust into this, April 6, 2020, we had the second largest YouTube livestream in the world from my studio in London, talking to a very controversial, aka conspiracy theorist named David Icke, probably mentioning that, it gets me in trouble. And, but he had the right to say what he wants to say. And if you don't want to listen to him, turn it off. There were people at the time on YouTube saying the world was flat. And it's none of my business if you think the earth is flat. But those videos were left up, even though they're crazy. And yet, his videos were being taken down. And so, 30 minutes after that interview, that would have gone on to be the most watched podcast in human history. It was going to eclipse at the time, which was Joe

• 1:09:38Speaker 01

  Rogan, Elon Musk, where they were smoking weed on there, which was about five million views. Our video would have been twenty million views.

• 1:09:43Speaker 00

  Oh, wow.

• 1:09:44Speaker 01

  And they pulled it. And I that I remember the night like it was yesterday and it my first reaction was anger. And I re-uploaded the video. That's how stupid I was. And then when they took it down again, I reloaded up it again and then I put a vlog up saying how this is ridiculous. And I just didn't get the new paradigm we were in. And so I got thrust into this global stage.

• 1:10:02Speaker 00

  I have anxiety in my stomach listening to this.

• 1:10:04Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh. And we made a whole movie about it. It's called We Will Not Be Silenced. It's an amazing film. It's pinned on my X feed if anybody wants to watch it because I can't put it on YouTube because I'm no longer on YouTube. That's a whole nother story. And so, look, I got thrust into this and I just reacted. And I don't know if it was because I'm from America where the First Amendment is into our DNA or just because I'm a human. Which just doesn't make sense. I was the golden child of YouTube. We were partners. I had been to the headquarters. They were paying us tons of money to do all this and immediately they started shutting us down. And so we got in a real public fight with YouTube. And we ultimately had to launch our own platform to continue the broadcasts, which we did five weeks later. During lockdown, we built a tech with a short team and we did a live stream.

• 1:10:44Speaker 01

  And if I really think about it, Gordon, it was kind of an ultimate fuck you to the man, the system and said, we're going to live stream anyways. Even if your trillion dollar tech companies won't let us, you know, F you, we're going to do it. And people last night at your event came up to me and said, Brian, thank you. I was in Bali lockdown. I was in Germany lockdown. I was here lockdown. And I didn't know what the hell was going on. I was scared and I was in fear. And just listening, I get emotional thinking about it, just listening to you and David talk. It just set my mind at ease. Now, the fact that we were right about ninety seven percent of it, that doesn't even matter. I just thought that we should be able to talk about it. And so those broadcasts really changed a lot of people's lives and it opened my eyes to the censorship.

• 1:11:25Speaker 00

  And the crypto connection?

• 1:11:27Speaker 01

  Well, great question because then I pursued this and, you know, I ran to be mayor of London because I didn't like the city and it made me angry and I lost that race in twenty one. And I had been keeping crypto on my radar. I had Max Kaiser on my show in two thousand thirteen. I bought my first Bitcoin back in thirteen. He was a very early, early adopter and communicator about. Crypto and I started to realize that crypto is their instruments of freedom. That's it.

• 1:11:53Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:11:54Speaker 01

  And I had a guy named Dan Held on my show, OG Bitcoiner, you know him, and he said, Brian, he said, freedom of speech is a luxury when you don't have freedom of finance. When you're, when you can't log onto the internet, when you can't eat a meal, when you can't put a roof over your head. Freedom of speech is a luxury and he was right. Here I was saying this is the most important thing and it is important. But if you don't have freedom of finance and your money can be taken away from you or your bank accounts can be seized in Canada because you attended a trucker protest, then you have a real big problem. And so I was drawn into crypto and blockchain. I have a degree from MIT. I got 15 years in.

• 1:12:27Speaker 00

  Oh, I didn't know that.

• 1:12:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:12:28Speaker 00

  What's it in?

• 1:12:29Speaker 01

  It's actually in mechanical engineering.

• 1:12:31Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 1:12:31Speaker 01

  But I was very tech as a kid. And then I went straight into banking. So I got 15 years of experience in banking on two or three continents. So, and derivatives trading, which is, you know, high tech banking, I guess you could say. So I have a whole background that fits right into this. And so I just dove headfirst into it hard. And four years ago, we started creating an academy and started teaching it. I had like the top 100 people on my show because we were a channel with 2 million subscribers that didn't exist in crypto. And so I was having these live broadcasts with Michael Saylor and Justin Sun and all these people. And then we taught and then we started investing. And so I ran away from banking 15 years ago because I thought money was evil. And now, as they say in The Godfather, just when I tried to get out, they dragged me back in. But now I'm investing and now I love it. Because what did London Real did?

• 1:13:15Speaker 01

  London Real took people's ideas and they amplified them. And, and it's an attention economy. And so now when we invest in a company, I bring the CEO in and we give them capital and attention because we believe in their ideas. So this isn't really any different than what I've been doing with London Real for the past 14 years, except now we use capital and crypto as opposed to just media. And independent media used to magnify these messages. I mean, I had people talking about psychedelics. I had people talking about, you know, activism. I had people talking about sexual energy on my show. You name it, they were talking about it. But now we put capital and crypto behind it and it's just another way of doing what we do at London Real. That's it. You know, we have a mission statement on my wall.

• 1:13:57Speaker 00

  It may almost be the same thing.

• 1:13:59Speaker 01

  I think it is the same thing.

• 1:14:00Speaker 00

  It's like matter and energy equivalence?

• 1:14:01Speaker 01

  It is. It's, it's, it's pretty wild. It's pretty wild when you really think about it. And so that's why.

• 1:14:06Speaker 00

  I've heard, I've heard coherent arguments about how Bitcoin is speech. Not preserved speech. Not necessarily, but like the, it's kind of a riff maybe on what you're saying. I don't know if I fully agree with this, but like the ability to transmit value at a distance without censorship. I mean, it is a form of communication, you know, everything's information, speech is information, value's information, and maybe, maybe it's not two sides of the same coin, maybe it really is the, maybe it's not two separate things, maybe it's two sides of the same coin, and maybe with the work you're doing with investing with these companies, you have your platform and the finance aspect, and maybe it's an ecosystem.

• 1:14:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, Michael Saylor goes deep on this. He's been on my show twice, and it's been fascinating to watch his brain evolve over five years. He's an MIT guy as well, graduated a few years before I did, but he's gone super deep on this. He calls Bitcoin encrypted energy.

• 1:15:00Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:15:01Speaker 01

  And if you, you can go really deep on this, and he's gone back and starts to look at genetics and biology and how this all fits in, and it's fascinating to watch him evolve. He's got a black belt, and I'm maybe like a blue belt or a purple belt in this, and because it's really a paradigm shift, and it's such sound money that I think it changes how you show up as a human being to this world.

• 1:15:22Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 1:15:23Speaker 01

  So this is where I am right now. We all show up every day, and we go work a job, and we get our fiat currency, and we spend it and buy something else, but deep down inside, Gordon, we all know it's bullshit. It's monopoly money. And even if you don't have a degree in finance, or you don't know where the Federal Reserve is, you just know there's something not right, and so we don't show a hundred, show up 100% as humans.

• 1:15:41Speaker 00

  You don't appreciate it, and you don't appreciate yourself.

• 1:15:42Speaker 01

  And we show up 80%, and we're like, eh, it's kind of fake, and this is all kind of BS, and so why am I here? And it's not real, whereas I feel like when you're introduced to Bitcoin or something, it's, it's real. And now, all of a sudden, like, it's, there's ownership, and there's something that's, that's so sound that I think it changes the way you show up as a human. And let me say one more thing. All of human interactions and relationships are based on transactions. Now, some people might not like that, but it's true. Every human interaction is really a transaction. It's value being exchanged. Even spending time with someone is really a transaction. And all of our relationships are basically microtransactions. And so if you can now show up with a sound form of currency and Those transactions, I think it changes everything. And then that takes it even further.

• 1:16:27Speaker 01

  Where the internet is now the internet of information, but the blockchain is the internet of ownership. It really starts to change massively the dynamics of the system. And then when you have things that are immutable, it can make it to where freedom of speech isn't an issue. If you write something on the Bitcoin blockchain right now, it's not going anywhere. If some guy in North Korea, right now, was able to write something, he could write, oh, by the way, I'm here, save me. You know, that's not going anywhere and everyone in the world can see it. Whereas where he is, it won't ever be broadcast anywhere else. So, there's a lot of things going on here, but I'm drawn to this space. And then we were embraced by this space. When I jumped into it, I thought, okay, here I come in with my suits, they'll be like, oh no, get him out of here. And I show up in Dubai, one of the conferences, and the crypto bros are embracing me.

• 1:17:09Speaker 01

  And the, you know, my one of the governments embracing me and they were like, no, you're our people. And we were watching you during lockdown and you're the ones like us that were questioning the matrix and the system and these things. And so I've just found it to be this perfect, perfect evolution of London Real. And I love doing it and I love.

• 1:17:27Speaker 00

  London Real in Dubai, of all things.

• 1:17:29Speaker 01

  Of all things, I never thought I would be here as well. And it's the perfect time where I'm falling out of love with London. You know, London is a romance I've had for 20 years. And, um, look, my children were born there. At one point I planned to die there and I ran to be mayor and I've just, I named my show after that city. And it was just such an important part of my journey. But now, I, I, I've just drawn to this place, you know, and this, this feels like the next evolution.

• 1:17:55Speaker 00

  Is it sad?

• 1:17:57Speaker 01

  No, it's really exciting because, you know, I have this, this, I have this new place to be.

• 1:18:01Speaker 00

  I, I have a wistful feeling, we're going a little bit off, but I, you know, Los Angeles is burned. And that's where, that's where I grew up and my mom is sort of around that area. So the Pacific Polis is where I grew up, is gone, apparently. I've seen pictures, you know, and on one hand, I mentally divorced from the US four years ago in my, in my brain. On the other hand, you know, I did grow up there for 15, 20 years. And it, when you were talking about London, I was getting a little wistful. Because it's like, there's, you know, this place in my memory, you're like, you can't go home again. Like now you really can't, like it's gone, it is gone. And you know, but on one hand it's liberating, because like, okay, well, what's now? You know, how many, how many years like I left, I'm not gonna be, you know, Mr. Nostalgia Guy, I'm gonna do stuff.

• 1:18:46Speaker 00

  But you know, London was something great. And Southern California was something great.

• 1:18:49Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:50Speaker 00

  I, I think it's, I think it's our jobs as. Mature adults with kids to do what we can to make it the greatness again or new. So they can be in that environment. You know, I'm motivated. I was already motivated that way. You know, I totally my inspiration for blockchain, but now that I've produced a life, you know, is doing it. And I know you.

• 1:19:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, and you're doing that here now, right?

• 1:19:13Speaker 00

  Yes, because I'm maximally effective here.

• 1:19:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, and also you can't do it there.

• 1:19:18Speaker 00

  No, I can't.

• 1:19:18Speaker 01

  You can't do it in L.A. and I can't do it in London.

• 1:19:20Speaker 00

  Yeah, what am I supposed to do in Los Angeles?

• 1:19:23Speaker 01

  And you're voting with your feet, Gordon, and I think that's really important. You're showing them somehow, if anyone's watching, that it's not okay with you, what they're doing. And you're coming here to do it. And I think that's important to give that feedback loop. And sooner or later, someone will listen and maybe it will change. But for the next 20, 30, 40, 50 years, Europe is definitely on the decline. U.S. might turn it around with Trump and some people thinking differently. And it has the best chance to turn it around, but Europe isn't. And I think all of the innovation and talent drain is going to come right over to the Gulf, I believe.

• 1:19:55Speaker 00

  Isn't it strange?

• 1:19:56Speaker 01

  It's fascinating.

• 1:19:57Speaker 00

  Did you, I mean, we're talking about, did you expect this?

• 1:19:59Speaker 01

  Never saw that coming. Never saw that because London was always the, you know, the innovator of Europe, the more American version of Europe, the free market of Europe. And when I was in the city of London, it was the, it wasn't, it was the second financial capital to New York, but it was, you know, second to that. And it led everything else.

• 1:20:14Speaker 00

  That's a big deal.

• 1:20:14Speaker 01

  And it was a big deal.

• 1:20:15Speaker 00

  And the city of London is a very interesting concept.

• 1:20:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, it is. Yeah. It was, it was the original major financial center.

• 1:20:22Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's offshore in the middle, in the middle of the island.

• 1:20:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's this small, little one square mile area where it all happens, you know? It's a fascinating place.

• 1:20:30Speaker 00

  It's cool.

• 1:20:31Speaker 01

  It's cool and I had an amazing time there. But now things are changed and now it's time to kind of move on and go elsewhere. And so it's sad, but I don't see any other way. And I just, I feel like it's just going to continue grinding down.

• 1:20:47Speaker 00

  Okay, so yes.

• 1:20:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, so yeah, that that just kind of brought us here and then, you know, and then now we're in blockchain and blockchain is just this whole new world and yeah, I love it. I love empowering people, I love telling stories, I love not only giving people attention, but then capital and all of those things. So this is just this natural progression and evolution for us and it brings me here.

• 1:21:06Speaker 00

  Yeah, so I'll say something about Dubai and I think you may be trying to solve it. So the other like Silicon Valley or US where I'm from, there's a well-developed investment ecosystem with venture capitalists and private equity and you know, this round, that round, A round, B round, there's a you have your go-to people for raising capital. I think that in the Middle East in general, they don't quite have that psychology yet. What they're used to is they understand infrastructure, they understand.

• 1:21:39Speaker 05

  What the London Real Investment Club actually does for you, it gives you the keys to open that door to the inside deals. In the last three weeks, I've participated in three incredible deals, a layer two Bitcoin protocol, an incredible AI protocol. The deal flow is beyond what I expected. I don't think I've ever seen a model like this that just gives average folks the opportunity to be behind the deals and that's exactly what we've done. Not only that, you get to hang out with Brian Rose every week and for me, that was huge because I look at Brian as somebody who's not only an expert in the space and I think is on the leading edge, but just the leading edge of thought with London Real and the work he's doing there. To anyone who's taking a serious look at this, I know it's a big decision.

• 1:22:23Speaker 05

  It was a big decision for me and my family and it is one of the best decisions I've ever made. So I wish you all the best and hope you come join us.

• 1:22:36Speaker 00

  Understand real estate, they understand stuff like that. They don't, they don't quite have the venture mentality yet. I think that as that problem gets solved, it's a little bit of a cultural thing, okay? But as that problem gets solved and people start making money that way, you're going to see a whole nother level of blossom here. I know you're interacting with different angel groups and you know.

• 1:23:01Speaker 00

  Making your beneficial ecosystem. I think that's the way to go. You need to get your friends, family, your angels and your VCs all lined up here. Imagine once, it's not just sovereign wealth funds writing $100 million checks, but you have all these VC offices writing the $500,000 or $1 million checks. Then it will really blossom.

• 1:23:19Speaker 01

  It would be nice to have that infrastructure here, for sure. Whatever happened in Silicon Valley is this, it's pretty fascinating. If you actually go look at the history of the evolution of all of that. People think back to the space program and how that all existed and how it was kicked off by that government spending and then later led to the VCs and this whole machine out there. Also with crypto, it's completely decentralized too. So you got people investing all over the place with legal entities all over the place. And so maybe it's even harder there because there was never like a geographic location or mentality or even culture. So you got that mixed on top of, like you said, the issues that you talk about, not like this infrastructure of different levels.

• 1:23:57Speaker 00

  Let me touch on that for a second.

• 1:23:59Speaker 01

  You see a lot of this more than I do too.

• 1:24:01Speaker 00

  I'm glad you brought this up. So this is what I was talking about. The diversity of geography and law is an inhibition to investing. How do I know whether or not to invest in that Vietnamese company? How do I do due diligence on it? How do I know whether Luxembourg or Liechtenstein has the best fund structure in all this? It is, you know, we have our accounts and we have our X percent and everything else, but there's just so much stuff there. It's overly complex. And with these crypto projects, you know, you have a contract with someone in this other country. You know, where do you sue them? What do you do? You know, and all that challenge. So imagine, this is what I was, what I was and am working on.

• 1:24:41Speaker 00

  Imagine if you have a global regime of programmatically enforced contracts where you say this company is not set up in Vietnam. This company is set up on Ethereum. It is a DAO or distributed or decentralized autonomous organization or a DAC, decentralized autonomous company. You know, if you want to do the proper version. People mostly say DAO, but you know, just say DAC. Okay, imagine rather than having Having Delaware Corporation, you have a Polygon DAC. Okay, and now you know where it is, it's on that blockchain. You know that for a contract to be enforceable against it, it has to be a smart contract. Okay, and you know that you have an oracle to resolve disputes.

• 1:25:25Speaker 00

  That would put investment on steroids. I know I no longer need to review this stupid English language contract where someone slipped in some sense that kills me, you know, and they forgot to mention it on the third draft. But you you have code and the code is auditable. Think about how efficient that makes life and how good it makes it. So I think this is one thing, you know, when you mentioned the government connections. This is something I was doing a few years ago, working, I don't want to name because of the contract I have with them. But I was working with a specific jurisdiction on getting their crowdfunding law fixed. It's a country nearby, it's not Arab speaking. Okay, and I didn't break any sanctions, so it's the other one. Okay, but but you know, I was working on that.

• 1:26:07Speaker 00

  And then, you know, it's it's tough because you have so many contrary interests and everything else. Well, when you, part of these contract interests exist and maintain a position because they can operate in the shadows. But when you put it all on blockchain, it's all visible, you can see who did what. So I I hope that this region, I don't think, like I said, I don't think Europe is going to make it, maybe the US will. But I hope this region embraces smart blockchain and smart contract based entities and contracts. You know, like RAC DAO, Rosalchim a DAO. You know, once we get legally recognized DAOs and enforceable contracts on blockchain, you're going to open up a whole new world.

• 1:26:44Speaker 01

  That'd be incredible. And then that can surpass.

• 1:26:46Speaker 00

  And I think it'll make life easier for you and your community.

• 1:26:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:26:49Speaker 00

  Also.

• 1:26:49Speaker 01

  And that could even surpass, you know, the equity world and the traditional world because it would leap ahead.

• 1:26:54Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 1:26:54Speaker 01

  Of what's being done, you know, off blockchain. And that would obviously make.

• 1:26:57Speaker 00

  Or they migrate on.

• 1:26:59Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:26:59Speaker 00

  Because they have to.

• 1:27:00Speaker 01

  They might have to, yeah. And then it would be speed of light and, yeah, I would I would love that world. I hope we go there and I hope.

• 1:27:07Speaker 00

  I think I think we are the, I don't know if you were, maybe you weren't in crypto at this point, but the first, there's the DAO, which went on Ethereum.

• 1:27:17Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:27:17Speaker 00

  And unfortunately, it got hacked.

• 1:27:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, I know.

• 1:27:19Speaker 00

  Okay, but you know. Growth pains, but the whole idea there was that people would invest their Ethereum into that Dow. And then they would do a vote on what to invest in other projects. It's an idea that's been around for a while and it makes perfect sense. You know, but railroads crashed when we first built them, you know.

• 1:27:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:35Speaker 00

  And they were sloppy and you know, now China's building high speed trains. It just takes practice.

• 1:27:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, I'm optimistic and you can learn a lot from railroads, by the way.

• 1:27:44Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 1:27:44Speaker 01

  In tech development, I mean, all the overbuilding and the consolidation and like.

• 1:27:48Speaker 00

  Yes, 100%.

• 1:27:49Speaker 01

  Fascinating stories. Talk to me about ADHD.

• 1:27:52Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 1:27:52Speaker 01

  Because it's something that, you know, you had mentioned you wanted to talk about, something I haven't talked about too much. Is it a bug or a feature? Is it a superpower?

• 1:28:00Speaker 00

  Oh, wow. Okay, that's interesting.

• 1:28:01Speaker 01

  And then also, how does it cross over to a lot of successful people we see out there like the Elon Musks of the world?

• 1:28:06Speaker 00

  Right, so I, this is something I speak about kind of publicly. I don't want to get my public persona entirely, but I think it's worth, it's like the speech impediment thing or getting over the shyness on stage. I think it's worth sharing with people because if someone watching this can relate, maybe they can do something about it. And maybe they can do something about it earlier than I did something about it. So I grew up in the seventies, okay, before the internet and all this other stuff. And I have, I do have ADHD and it happened at a point where it wasn't widely known. And you know, it manifested itself as, you know, Gordon can't focus or he's not motivated or all this other stuff. And so I got all this negative messaging growing up.

• 1:28:47Speaker 00

  And I raw dogged it, or the expression is, all the way through law school. Okay, and past the bar with ADHD, but with huge amounts of pain and focus and adrenaline burnout and cortisol and.

• 1:29:00Speaker 01

  Just brute forced it through.

• 1:29:01Speaker 00

  I brute forced it through, but I brute forced it through in a way that exacted a toll.

• 1:29:05Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:29:05Speaker 00

  Okay, in the moment and long term. Okay, and you know, I think when you're younger, you can simulate dopamine and serotonin with adrenaline and cortisol. But eventually you burn out those glands and you can't stress yourself out anymore and you're just like. So post-law school, I was able to get finally as an adult, a diagnosis, you know, 35 years in. And it's.

• 1:29:30Speaker 00

  Since become, it's challenging to get medication in the middle of the year. So that's one, that's one issue that I think maybe they need to work on. Just because, you know, they're, they're used to physical issues. They're not used to mental issues, but I think they're getting a little bit better there. No one's perfect. But it's, now I'd say it's a blend of bug and feature. Okay, so what are the bugs? There is, if something's not novel, it's, it's gonna sound funny considering what I'm doing with Tech Tuesdays. If something's not novel, if something's novel and it's shiny, you get all engaged with it. As soon as it becomes regular or you're used to it, it's, your dopamine drops because the novelty factor's down. And it's very hard to initiate action and maintain action. So, you know, new workout routine, great, exciting, and then you lose interest.

• 1:30:13Speaker 00

  Or new language, you know, new hobby, you know, it, it happens again and again and again. It can be very disheartening. With the right medication and the right meditation and a few other things, you can compensate for that. Or mask it or deal with it. I think, I think all this stuff is manageable. There's an impulse thing that sometimes, you know, ADHD shows up differently in different people. There's impulse control, there's attentive issues, you know, everyone's, every ADHD case has its own little special flower. I think as you get older and you get to know yourself and certain stories repeat over and over again, you have to be a little bit blind not to eventually realize a pattern. And once, I know you're into meditation and yoga, but once, once you ruminate on it,

• 1:30:56Speaker 00

  you kind of get to know yourself, you can kind of intercept some of these things and, and moderate them. Okay, what's good about ADHD, I think ADHD, you know, the flip side of impulsiveness, which can get you in trouble, is audaciousness. It's bravery. It's saying what's on your mind and not having fear. It's, you know, being controlled, you know, that part I like. It's like, you know, who starts Tech Tuesdays in the middle of summer not knowing anyone here? I mean, of course, I know people. You know, I did, I have the impulse, the impulse took me. Okay, who goes to Dubai for no reason? I do. Okay, who, who goes to Ukraine in the World War? I do. Okay, you know, it's like, sometimes I just say F it where other people wouldn't.

• 1:31:41Speaker 00

  And I've learned to temper that and direct it and not go too crazy with it. But like, you know, if, if that little spider sense tells me something, I listen to my spider sense because that spider sense is pretty good. And it allows for a lot of stuff. ADHD is good because it allows for lateral and creative thinking. You know, now, why does it? This wandering mind thing is a little bit of the hunter brain. Okay, like, there's an evolutionary theory about that. You know, there's the ones who stayed at home who were farmers. They don't have ADHD. They can sit at home for the whole season and make their crop. The hunters and the guardians have to go out and they have to be aware that the lion's over there. They can't get too focused with the bear in front of them. Right? So, that gives you a lot of intuition. You can tell when people are lying. You can read a room.

• 1:32:26Speaker 00

  You can see when something's acting slightly differently. Or, you can also, because you don't have complete inhibition control, your mind will make connections in disparate areas that other people wouldn't make and you come off as very creative. Okay? You can be, it's sometimes, like, the lack of a mote between different parts of your brain lets it slosh around. It's sometimes messy, but sometimes it comes up with a new, beautiful, you know, drink or whatever, however you want to say it.

• 1:32:51Speaker 01

  Do you have to worry about not being aware of human emotions? Does that come along with that?

• 1:32:58Speaker 00

  There's, there's a, I do, there is a little bit of, that's a great question. Say, I'll say it again. Sure, as a undiagnosed youth or young person with ADDG, sure, it's a danger.

• 1:33:15Speaker 01

  You could offend people and not be...

• 1:33:17Speaker 00

  You can be impulsive with your language.

• 1:33:19Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:33:20Speaker 00

  You can seek dopamine by annoying others. That's a real thing. You can pick fights because of stimulating.

• 1:33:25Speaker 01

  Okay. You have a lack of empathy, too?

• 1:33:28Speaker 00

  Well, it's funny, ADDG people usually have a strong justice sense.

• 1:33:32Speaker 01

  Interesting.

• 1:33:33Speaker 00

  Okay, they were very sensitive to injustice.

• 1:33:35Speaker 01

  Because this is right and I don't care about your feelings, per se. This is more right and that overrides.

• 1:33:39Speaker 00

  Or, I will get offended on someone else's, it's common. You can Google it and see it. You have a, you have a very strong truth sense? Like, untruth annoys, is annoying.

• 1:33:52Speaker 00

  Okay, and injustice is inflammatory. Okay, and you know, if you're nice to someone and they end up being mean to you for no reason, you get extremely pissed off, not just the normal pissed off. So, you know, a lot of crusaders and fighters, you know, have that justice sense and maybe they're a little bit ADHD. The thing is, you maybe can get too involved with that stuff and not maintain balance. You know, everything, everything in life is flow and everything in life is balance and everything in life is, you know, adjusting for the current situation and not, you know, having guidelines and not rules. So you, I think, hopefully, that's some, as you get older and you watch yourself and you watch other people, you gain a little bit of distance and a little bit of equanimity and temperance on this stuff. But it never totally goes away and I'm not sure I want it to totally go away because

• 1:34:37Speaker 00

  it is kind of fun. I mean, you know, the getting on stage and enjoying it, you know, is a, and doing a kind of like, you know, self vindication reversal of the social anxiety of younger. But I don't, I don't know if that would still scratch my itch if I didn't have ADHD, ADHD, but it does scratch an itch now. It's kind of fun. It's kind of a reversal of, you know, being the oddball out as a kid. So I, I think, I think it's, you know, you, you mentioned there's a lot of entrepreneurs that are successful with it, the, but there's a lot of people who aren't successful with it and it's a lifelong affliction if, if it's not managed. Right. So I, I don't want to sugarcoat it.

• 1:35:15Speaker 00

  I, I think the trick with it is to, and there's, there's a lot of negative stereotypes about it. Okay, there's things like, oh, it's over diagnosed, or, you know, let boys be boys, or all this other stuff, you know, but that kind of goes out the window when you see the brain scans and you see the different brain structures associated with it. No one says, oh, let schizophrenics be schizophrenics. Okay, when you actually see that the prefrontal cortex is differently developed in ADHD people, you know, the kind of the boys, let boys be boys thing, go out the window. You can say, no, Tommy's different. We can see the issue there. I think the thing with ADHD is

• 1:35:55Speaker 00

  You need to have, you need to have it diagnosed, you need to have it treated, you need to be gentle with yourself, but you need to maintain responsibility for your life. Even if you lose your legs, you still are responsible for your life. You can, you know, whatever happens, you are responsible for you. No one's coming to save you. Okay, but part of the, part of taking responsibility for yourself is accurately understanding your situation so that you can take responsibility for what's going on. So, I think with all this mental stuff, it's important to share it with the world and own it and work with it.

• 1:36:27Speaker 01

  I think this is an important lesson. So if you are, you know, not suffering with, but if you have that ADHD or you know someone like that.

• 1:36:33Speaker 00

  Sometimes it's suffering.

• 1:36:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, to be aware of it, but also not to accept it as your fate and not to blame everything else on that, but to take, you know, action and control to put you into places where normally that would pull you back. And that's probably why you can be successful. And it really resonated when you said, "Put yourself on stage." I mean, I have no natural inclination to be on stage. I actually have no-

• 1:36:52Speaker 00

  Is that true, Brian?

• 1:36:53Speaker 01

  It is true.

• 1:36:54Speaker 00

  You're very good.

• 1:36:55Speaker 01

  But I mean, and I have no natural inclination to be in a room full of people on a Tuesday night. Like, I have to push myself to get out of my introverted little bubble and push myself. When I first started doing London Real Conversations, I, it was really uncomfortable. I used to stress about the guests coming over all day, my stomach would boil. I'm like, "Ah, they're coming over to my studio. Oh my God, is this gonna be right? I gotta do this, gotta do that." And I had to really push myself to be out there. And same to be on stage. I mean, that was really hard. I mean, I did my first TED Talk, that was hard. Even going on stage is still-

• 1:37:25Speaker 00

  I saw that.

• 1:37:26Speaker 01

  Oh my God.

• 1:37:27Speaker 00

  Yeah, you did great.

• 1:37:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, but I, that was something that was really hard to do. So, but now that I force myself to put myself out there, that's how it works. So as an introvert, I think your superpower is forcing yourself to be an extrovert. Because extroverts, unfortunately, if you're only an extrovert all the time, you need your energy, you need to be out. And you see people like that. "I gotta be out, I gotta be with other people." And when they're alone, they're freaking out. An introvert usually is freaking out when they're in a, a, a-

• 1:37:52Speaker 00

  I'm so happy alone.

• 1:37:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:54Speaker 00

  I'm so, I'm so happy reading a book and not talking to anyone.

• 1:37:57Speaker 01

  But I know that nothing happens in my life if I do that.

• 1:38:00Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:38:00Speaker 01

  And I also know that ultimately I don't get fulfilled because it's like, "Ah, I need to, I need to push myself." So I go out and force myself in these situations. And I think it's really good advice for anybody out there to try to push yourself into something you're not comfortable with. And if you're an extrovert, try spending time alone, planning your life, and maybe if you're an extrovert, try putting yourself on stage. And then you'll end up liking it. It's like boxing. I mean, nothing is completely further from my nature than boxing. I was a skinny science geek who like was beat up as a kid and was never athletic and all of that, and I just wanted to be alone and be doing all my things. But when I go out there to this uncomfortable place, that's when all the learning happens. And that's when I'm like, oh, wow. And I get so much more fulfillment from that, too, just like what probably you do when you go on stage.

• 1:38:44Speaker 01

  Because it's like, wow, look, I'm doing this. And then you're kind of enjoying it, and then you're kind of working on it, and it can be a little bit of a buzz, you know, to do that.

• 1:38:51Speaker 00

  It's definitely a buzz.

• 1:38:52Speaker 01

  Right?

• 1:38:53Speaker 00

  The funny-

• 1:38:56Speaker 01

  Because there's risk.

• 1:38:57Speaker 00

  Yeah, you're way funny. The funny thing is, like most things, you can't stay in one place because you get used to it. You know, if you're used to speaking in front of 10 people, eventually, it's not threatening anymore. Then you have to go to 15. Then you have to go to 25. So I'm pushing myself to bigger and bigger crowds, and it's gonna sound funny, but I'm pushing myself, not like Tuesdays, I'm pushing myself to more and more hostile crowds, or at least neutral crowds. People who are not natively my friends, people who maybe even don't like me for some reason, you know, maybe it's a bias for some reason. And then, you know, turning them around. It's like a thrill-seeking behavior. Now, as far as thrill-seeking behaviors go, public speaking is not the worst.

• 1:39:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39:37Speaker 00

  You know, there's many worse thrill-seeking behaviors, but it's kind of fun. It's like, you know, speaking up, you know, when the room isn't with you.

• 1:39:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39:45Speaker 00

  That's a talent.

• 1:39:46Speaker 01

  You're almost becoming a stand-up comedian at that point. You walk into a place where you have to start creating a rapport from nothing.

• 1:39:51Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 1:39:52Speaker 01

  And the people already don't like you because, you know, you're not making them laugh or entertaining them right away.

• 1:39:56Speaker 00

  Or something.

• 1:39:57Speaker 01

  Yeah. Because I've gone into venues where everyone knows who I am, and that's, well, at first it's hard, but then it's easy. So then it's like, now go to somewhere that doesn't like you, and now go this. And now I try to like, now I walk out in the audience, and now I try to do things that are just pushing it a little bit to see if I can get better.

• 1:40:11Speaker 00

  People love that.

• 1:40:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, they do like that.

• 1:40:13Speaker 00

  You know, some people really hate you, and some people will be like, wow. They admire your authenticity.

• 1:40:18Speaker 01

  It's just, I think it's just practice, and it takes time.

• 1:40:20Speaker 00

  It's practice. That's not the same thing. You know, you can't always lift the same weight, right? At something, you'll stall out, you have to keep on adding plates. So keep on adding plates is bigger audience, more diverse audience, less affinity-oriented audiences. You know, for me, it's a buzz. It's kind of funny.

• 1:40:37Speaker 01

  I encourage everybody to go for it.

• 1:40:38Speaker 00

  I think I'm probably exuding buzz energy.

• 1:40:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, you got buzz energy, yeah.

• 1:40:41Speaker 00

  I'm visualizing it.

• 1:40:43Speaker 01

  10 years from now, Gordon, where are you gonna be? What are you gonna be doing? Your son will be 10 years old.

• 1:40:48Speaker 00

  Ah, boy. Okay, everything's in God's hands. I strongly believe that. Okay, and I pray every morning, and you know, everything is in God's hands. So, God willing, God willing, maybe there'll be another kid, maybe it'll be the two more kids.

• 1:41:04Speaker 01

  Wow, amazing.

• 1:41:05Speaker 00

  Okay, Mr. Late Start here.

• 1:41:06Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:41:06Speaker 00

  You know.

• 1:41:07Speaker 01

  Better late than never.

• 1:41:08Speaker 00

  Better late than never, okay, God willing. God willing, Dubai will be one of our major bases, but I would really like to have my dacha in Ukraine.

• 1:41:17Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:41:17Speaker 00

  Okay, I don't know if you've ever had the dacha experience, but it's...

• 1:41:20Speaker 01

  No, what's dacha?

• 1:41:21Speaker 00

  Dacha is basically, so in the Russian world, and people get offended by that idea, but in the Slavic world, you have your main city residence, maybe an apartment, but then you have a country home 20, 30, 40 kilometers out from the city, and you go there on the weekend. And that country home can be a ramshackle shack that needs a lot of work, or it can be like a miniature Versailles, just depending on which level oligarch you are. And you go out there with your buddies, and you make shakshilik, which is Russian barbecue, or Soviet barbecue, however you want to do it. You have your inebriating beverages. You have your friends, you can have your sauna with the bennig, which is, you know, the birch trees to go out with each other with.

• 1:42:02Speaker 01

  Banya.

• 1:42:02Speaker 00

  Yeah, banya, the whole, it sounds like you know that world.

• 1:42:05Speaker 01

  Love it.

• 1:42:05Speaker 00

  Banya is amazing, it's like, it makes you really happy. So, I have the, I have a certain visualization of, maybe in the Karpathene Mountains, I have a visualization of like a mountain dacha home, obviously on the nicer side, God willing. Hopefully in Switzerland also.

• 1:42:24Speaker 00

  I want to... Be going Tech Tuesdays. Now, Tech Tuesdays, we didn't really talk about this. This is a business generation machine. It's not crass about it. It is what it looks like. But you can't not do this. Sorry, you can't do this and not have opportunity to show up. And they are showing up. They're showing up for me and Siyama and my wife and everyone around us. Everyone around us is benefiting. You know, we don't have our fingers in everything. We're letting them benefit. We want an ecosystem. So I want what we're doing now, I want more and better of what we're doing now. I want to stay on the same track and keep on pushing it. I want to be involved in more projects that make the world a better place. Crypto or not, blockchain or not, okay? I have three standards for any project I'm involved in.

• 1:43:07Speaker 00

  And one of them sounds mercenary, but I'm not going to use the F word even though I normally use it here. It needs to make a ton of money. It needs to make a ton of cool. It makes the world a ton better place.

• 1:43:19Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:43:20Speaker 00

  Okay, instead of ton, use a different word.

• 1:43:22Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:43:22Speaker 00

  Okay? So all three things must be true, or else I'm not interested.

• 1:43:26Speaker 01

  Okay, all three?

• 1:43:26Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's trinary, okay? Not binary. It needs to make the world better. It needs to be cool. It needs to make a lot of money. If it's not that, I'd rather read a book.

• 1:43:36Speaker 01

  I like it.

• 1:43:36Speaker 00

  Okay, those three, look, there's, God bless people who install carpets. I don't want to do it. It may make a lot of money. I don't want to do it. Okay, it's like, and if something is fun and makes a lot of money but doesn't make the world better, it's like, no, it's not for me. I want to make the world better. But there's lots of things that do all three. It's not like I'm being a monk. I just want to focus on that stuff. I want people around me who focus on that stuff. And so I want to do it from, and I want to further my relationship with God and spirituality. That's something that's been developing the past decade or so that I, I don't know if you can ever say the word progress in connection with that, but I've developed my practice, however you want to say it. That's important for me.

• 1:44:20Speaker 00

  That's the centering I need. That's the spirituality I need. And I don't mean this in the abstract sense. I mean like a direct relationship and doing the best I can. Without arrogance, I'm just doing, just doing whatever I can.

• 1:44:32Speaker 00

  Yeah, I think that's a full plate.

• 1:44:34Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:44:34Speaker 00

  Stay healthy.

• 1:44:35Speaker 01

  That's a full plate.

• 1:44:36Speaker 00

  Following in your footsteps of boxing.

• 1:44:38Speaker 01

  I like that trinary as well. I like that. That's super cool. Cool. Make the world a better place. Make a ton of money.

• 1:44:43Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:44:44Speaker 01

  Yeah. Great. Some gems here. How can people learn more about Tech Tuesdays and join the next one? What's the best way?

• 1:44:51Speaker 00

  Okay, so we're building out the website. Eventually that'll be the best way, but the easiest way right now is to go to Instagram and follow Dubai Tech Tuesdays. Okay, there's a link to our calendar in there. Okay, and then we're also on LinkedIn. We have a company page that's growing pretty fast. You can just follow that company page. And we also have a Telegram group.

• 1:45:11Speaker 01

  It's getting big.

• 1:45:11Speaker 00

  It's getting, it is getting big. You noticed that?

• 1:45:14Speaker 01

  I noticed that, yeah.

• 1:45:14Speaker 00

  Yeah, we're, we're at an inflection point, apparently. The, like I mentioned before, we're going for curated managed growth. I don't know if I mentioned this. We're not, we're not going for pure scale. Okay, we need to maintain the vibe. We need to improve the vibe. So I'm being selective about the growth. I'm not like, ooh, these numbers. But it's nice to be constrained and under control. And then nonetheless, nonetheless, watch it grow. And now the word is getting out. Just real fast anecdote. So I don't know if you were there two times ago when we had Galactic on stage.

• 1:45:51Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:45:53Speaker 00

  We'll bring you back in. It's okay. You're allowed to miss one, sorry. But the guy who brought them in, a real cool guy, Raymond. You know, I've been thinking about working with him for a while and we kind of just played footsie with it. You know, he's like, well, I'm busy. And I'm like, okay, fine. He, and he's a cool guy, but you know, he goes to Milan. He's in some high level business meeting. Some woman from Dubai walks in, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba. She on her own brings up Dubai Tech Tuesdays. Oh, have you been to this? It's so good. You're in Dubai? Have you been to this? And he calls me up and he goes, Gordon, fine, we'll work together. Okay, it's some random woman and she's very wealthy and good-looking and everything else. If this woman brings it up, this is God telling me to work together.

• 1:46:32Speaker 00

  So, you know, I like that things are, like, the lines are beginning to connect. And I don't want it to happen too fast, I don't want it to happen too slow, I want it to just happen. And so that's going on right now. So, yeah, the Telegram group is growing fast. But to answer your question directly, the easiest in is to go on Telegram, Dubai Tech Tuesdays, one word, follow it, you'll get in the stream.

• 1:46:54Speaker 01

  Right, Telegram and Instagram, both.

• 1:46:56Speaker 00

  Yeah, the Telegram group is private because we're managing it, but if they get in the...

• 1:47:01Speaker 01

  Dubai Tech Tuesday.

• 1:47:02Speaker 00

  If they get Instagram, they'll see the event calendar.

• 1:47:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:47:04Speaker 00

  And then it's an easy in.

• 1:47:05Speaker 01

  Perfect, I love it.

• 1:47:07Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:47:08Speaker 01

  Gordon, I'm really glad I met you. It was really random. I was having another dinner with some friends in October last year, and you were doing the Dubai Tech Tuesday that night in the venue.

• 1:47:18Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:47:19Speaker 01

  And I just walked in, and that's how I met you. You invited me to come on, and then we did it six months later, or three months later.

• 1:47:24Speaker 00

  Can I give you some credit there?

• 1:47:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, sure.

• 1:47:26Speaker 00

  You're a man of your word. You came in there, and I was like, "Oh, wow, Brian Rose is here, neat." We talked briefly, and we did a brief information exchange. I said, "Look, I'd love to have you come join us." And you're like, you gave me a yes that I didn't know whether to take seriously. Okay? And then you're like, "I'm leaving, I'll come back in a few months." I'm like, "Okay, well, I'll never see him again." But I texted you, you remembered, and you did what you said you were gonna do. You had the consistency and integrity to follow through, and now here we are, and we're, you know, enjoying, getting to know each other more, and, you know, I thank you so much for being on your show, and, you know, thanks for coming to the event. It's cool. So, you said something, and you followed through on it months later. That's very un-Dubai.

• 1:48:03Speaker 01

  You told me that a couple of times, and...

• 1:48:05Speaker 00

  You remind me, yeah, that was great.

• 1:48:06Speaker 01

  For me, I don't know, I don't know if this is my grandparents or my parents or whatever, but for me, it's like, if you say you're gonna do something, you have to do it.

• 1:48:13Speaker 00

  Yeah, your word is your bond, be a man of your word.

• 1:48:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:48:16Speaker 00

  And if you do that here, it's a superpower.

• 1:48:17Speaker 01

  Okay, I like that, really good feedback as well.

• 1:48:19Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:48:20Speaker 01

  I'm so glad I met you. Everyone's gotta go to this event, it's an amazing event, I love going every time. It also, I like it steps my game up, and I come downtown and I dress up, and there's always amazing people there, amazing-looking people there, amazing vibes, amazing convo, so congrats on that.

• 1:48:35Speaker 00

  Thank you.

• 1:48:36Speaker 01

  Congrats on fatherhood as well.

• 1:48:37Speaker 00

  Thank you.

• 1:48:38Speaker 01

  And, yeah, looking forward to this journey together, Gordon.

• 1:48:40Speaker 00

  It was great.

• 1:48:41Speaker 01

  Thank you, sir.

• 1:48:42Speaker 00

  Thank you so much, I appreciate it.

• 1:48:43Speaker 01

  Appreciate you too.

• 1:48:44Speaker 00

  Thanks.

• 1:48:45Speaker 01

  And I wanna say thank you to Web3 TV, we'll see you next time.

• 1:48:50Speaker 01

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