Weekly Roundup: Rare Earth Metals, Re-shoring Semiconductors, and the Real Parts of Web3
Weekly Roundup: Rare Earth Metals, Re-shoring Semiconductors, and the Real Parts of Web3
Another roundup for you in Hard Tech & Crypto
Straight into the hard tech world: James Litinsky, the self-proclaimed ‘accidental industrialist’ gave an excellent talk at the All In Summit recently on rare earths. Mining is an industry you don’t hear much about, but it’s critical. The fact that the majority of rare earth metals (metals that are vital to EV battery production) are first mined in Asia is a national security risk for many western countries.
Litinsky on the coming capex need:
“We’re going to need roughly $200B in capex to satisfy the demand for electrification we have over the next couple of decades”
What’s your theory for why a new technology will be adopted? It’s worth having one. There are many reasons why a technology might fall below expectations, and most people are bad at predicting what will work and what won’t. Benedict Evans has some interesting thoughts on this here.
https://www.ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2020/5/16/not-even-wrong
I always like learning about how interesting creators fund their pursuits - especially when this mechanism for funding becomes a full blown business. Here’s Samo Burja, an intellectual I’ve been following as of late, on his business (with more insights on intellectual growth)
If you’re looking for inspiration as an indie maker - I don’t know that it gets better than BPS space. This whole channel is really rad:
We talked a bit about Anduril in the last installment of this newsletter. Here’s another 🔥 thread on the co:
More on the topic of war as of late from Trae Stephens - one of the founders at Anduril:
Semiconductor manufacturing is critical, and ASML is the world leader in one of the most critical components of the process (extreme ultraviolet lithography). Securing this investment in the US is a big deal for national security and American innovation in atoms.
I’ve always enjoyed Thiel’s view of the future. It’s a view that prioritizes human agency over randomness. It might not always be 100% accurate, but it’s certainly one of the more empowering views you can take.
While crypto takes a nose dive this week, this episode is a great deep dive into the parallels that Marc Andreessen sees between the original advent of the internet and the web3 of today. Spoiler: there were regulatory clashes, scam projects, and a huge correction in web 1.0 too.
Vitalik on non financial uses of blockchains. This entire article is worth a read if you’re curious about what all these web3 people are so interested in. Beyond the hype, there are real world advantages to blockchains that can improve the way we govern communities. Vitalik goes even deeper on this in a recent paper on Decentralized Societies.
Something random for all of the type A personalities out there