The Sunday Digest: Dig deep on DeFi every Friday

Happy Sunday!

Decentralized finance is in the news almost every day, but it’s almost impossible to understand. Smart contracts, side chains and optimistic rollups all sound fascinating—but what do they really mean?

If you’re interested in these questions we think you should check out Nat Eliason's weekly DeFriday column in his Almanack newsletter. He's unpacking some of the denser corners of Bitcoin and Ethereum in short, easy-to-digest dispatches—including recent primers on a workaround to Ethereum's transaction fees, and the first major DeFi market crash. To catch up on DeFriday, make sure you're following Almanack, and then enjoy Nat's latest installment!

What We Published

2 Articles, 2 Podcasts, and a live conversation

TikTok as a Portal Into Different Worlds

by Fadeke Adegbuyi in Cybernaut (7-minute read)

Once in a while, we stumble through a rip in our respective space-Tok continuums (sorry) and enter an entirely different universe. In this bite-sized example of her unparalleled ability to sample the most esoteric corners of the internet, Fadeke brings us close to some of the most compelling ways people are using TikTok to communicate the tougher, unseen corners of life with wit and grace. If you’d like to widen your horizons just a tad this weekend, Cyberbits is a great place to start.

The Mind-Bending Magic of Self-Paying Loans

by Nat Eliason in Almanack (12-minute read)

There are plenty of things to love about Nat’s weekly crypto tips, but one of our favorites is the way he links each installment to a different tool that’s addressing a specific need in the DeFi world. On Friday, it was Alchemix—a platform that “blends aspects of a savings account with aspects of a lender,” Nat writes, “allowing you to earn interest on your deposits as well as borrow against them.” As you can tell, he can put a much finer point on these things than we can, so check this piece out.

Confronting a Panic Attack

Talk Therapy with Dan Shipper & Nathan Baschez (16-minute listen)

To follow up their recent hit episode with Morning Brew's Alex Lieberman—who talked about stress and anxiety with an inspiring degree of honesty—Dan and Nathan took a look at a recent related episode they both remember: a panic attack of Dan's during a joint interview. Listening to the recording live on air, they walk through their individual memories of the situation, and with Nathan's help, Dan makes peace with the unpreventable. Whether your experience with anxiety has more to do with yourself or those close to you, this is a seriously moving listen.

The Creator Economy Just Went Mainstream. Why?

Means of Creation with Li Jin & Nathan Baschez (1 hour watch/listen)

Who better to talk about the constantly-shifting creator economy than Alex Kantrowitz? That's exactly who Li and Nathan chatted with for this week's Means of Creation conversation, covering Big Tech's attitude toward creators, Alex's high hopes for Twitter Spaces, his burnout-avoidance strategy, and much more.

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Community Calendar

What's going down in our Discord this week.

• Monday, June 14th, 9am-11am EST/6am-8am PST: Focused Work Pomodoros with Dan Shipper
• Thursday, June 17th, 1pm EST/10am PST: Nathan Baschez interviews an Every writer! Who? It's a mystery...

What’s Going On

News you might have caught or missed.

• Substack just made a major new hire as it goes after comic-book writers and expands its fiction efforts
• Will Apple Mail threaten the newsletter boom?
• Pipeline Investigation Upends Idea That Bitcoin Is Untraceable
• New York Times' Star Reporters Push Back Against Union

What We’re Reading

Our favorite writing from beyond Every.

• The Podcasting Hype House from Hell (The Verge)
• The Limits of a Wealth Tax (New York)
• Escape From Little Island (The Baffler)
• Help! There's an Existential Crisis in My Closet (SSENSE)