03-11-2026Price:

The Frontier

Your signal. Your price.

AI & TECH

AI Goes Grassroots, Leaving Big Tech Behind

Wednesday, March 11, 2026 · from 3 podcasts, 6 episodes
This Week in StartupsTFTC: A Bitcoin PodcastTFTC: A Bitcoin PodcastPresidio Bitcoin JamThis Week in StartupsThis Week in Startups
  • Simple, open-source AI tools are enabling non-expert builders to create and improve models, exploding the developer pool from thousands to millions.
  • A global sentiment chasm has opened: explosive adoption in places like China contrasts with negative U.S. public opinion, as builders democratize the tech.
  • The fight over the next payment standard has begun, with Bitcoin poised to capture the emerging "agentic economy" where AI agents autonomously spend.

The AI revolution is happening in GitHub repos, not corporate labs. The barrier to building and improving software has collapsed.

On This Week in Startups, Jason Calacanis detailed how Andrej Karpathy's Auto Research project lets a small model rewrite its own code in five-minute cycles. Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke, a non-researcher, used it to score a 19% performance gain over a weekend. The implication is profound. The field is moving from a few thousand PhDs to hundreds of thousands of curious practitioners who can drive real progress.

This democratization is widening a global enthusiasm gap. Alex Wilhelm noted that in China, local governments host incentives and massive meetups for tools like OpenClaw. In the U.S., an NBC poll shows only 26% are pro-AI, with 46% opposed. Builders are charging ahead even as public trust lags.

The tools themselves are sorting into distinct roles. On the Presidio Bitcoin Jam, developers described a new hierarchy: Gemini for code review, Claude for brainstorming, and OpenAI's Codex as the relentless executor. One host described "vibe coding at 70mph" using Tesla's Full Self-Driving, a stark image of how AI is reshaping both creation and physical labor.

This shift creates a greenfield opportunity for new financial rails. On TFTC, Matt Corallo argued that "agentic payments" - where AI agents buy things autonomously - will soon be a non-trivial part of consumer spending. Existing systems like Visa are ill-suited for bots. For the first time, Bitcoin has a shot at critical merchant adoption because, as Corallo put it, "everyone's starting from zero."

Meanwhile, new incentive models are challenging Silicon Valley's capital-heavy approach. Mark Jeffrey explained how Bit Tensor uses crypto tokens to pay a global network of developers to directly improve AI models, turning "stranded talent" into a market. Their coding assistant, Ridges, competes with Claude but was built for a fraction of the cost.

The pace is set by open-source insurgents, not incumbents. Logan Allen noted that OpenClaw, an open-source coding agent, dethroned React to become the most-followed GitHub project in history in just 39 days. The jester stole the crown while the king looked down.

The labs are cooking behind closed doors, but the real acceleration is happening in public. It's simple, it works, and it's in everyone's hands.

Eric Vorhees, This Week in Startups:

- I am of the crypto world.

- I realized that the principles that I felt were important from the crypto world namely like user sovereignty, the right to privacy, free speech, lack of censorship, these were entirely absent in AI.

AgentsOpen SourceBig TechStartupsMarkets

Entities Mentioned

Google AntigravityProduct
StripeCompany
VisaCompany

Source Intelligence

What each podcast actually said

This Week in Startups
This Week in Startups

How agents will change banking forever | E2260 • Mar 10

  • Andrej Karpathy's Auto-Research tool enables an AI model to iteratively test and improve its own code in five-minute cycles, demonstrating a basic mechanic of self-improvement.
  • Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke used Auto-Research to run 37 experiments over eight hours, boosting a model's performance score by 19%, despite having no machine learning research background.
  • Jason Calacanis predicts AI tool democratization will expand the pool of people capable of improving models from roughly 3,000 highly-paid PhDs to hundreds of thousands of tinkerers.
  • Calacanis argues that elite AI labs are likely advancing similar self-improvement techniques at a pace twice as fast as the public tools indicate.

Also from this episode:

Society (2)
  • A recent NBC poll found only 26% of Americans view AI positively, with 46% opposed, indicating lagging public enthusiasm compared to technical progress.
  • The hosts contrast US skepticism with Chinese AI enthusiasm, where OpenClaw meetups draw crowds and local governments offer adoption incentives, driven by aspirational culture and tangible career utility.
Enterprise (1)
  • The barrier for non-technical executives to directly tinker with AI training loops has collapsed, foreshadowing tension with developers who prefer keeping management away from the codebase.
AgentsModelsBig TechStartups

Wisdom of the $TAO: the future is decentralized AI • Mar 6

  • Bit Tensor uses a crypto incentive layer with token emissions akin to Bitcoin mining rewards to subsidize AI development, according to guest Mark Jeffrey.
  • The network operates 128 specialized AI subnets that compete to produce the best models.
  • Ridges costs 29 dollars per month while centralized competitors raised funding at valuations in the billions.
  • The Ridges project was built on roughly 10 million dollars in chain emissions, compared to traditional startups requiring billion-dollar valuations.
  • Developers anywhere can earn subnet tokens daily by outperforming centralized teams, turning the stranded talent problem into a market.
  • A developer in Turkey can earn subnet tokens daily by improving the model, effectively owning a slice of the product's success.
  • The system monetizes open-source contribution in a way traditional development cannot, according to Jeffrey.
  • Jeffrey describes the model as Bitcoin's incentive structure applied to stranded talent instead of stranded energy.
  • The market bypasses traditional startup machinery including HR, payroll, and fundraising.
  • The network pays for progress directly, turning AI development into a performance-based contest.

Also from this episode:

Coding (2)
  • Subnet 62 launched Ridges, a coding assistant that scores 73 to 88 percent on benchmark tests measuring vibe coder effectiveness, according to Jeffrey.
  • Ridges scores competitively with Claude and Cursor on performance tests.
AI & TechMarkets

Is Anthropic Making the Biggest Mistake in AI History | E2258 • Mar 5

  • OpenClaw accumulated more GitHub stars than React in 39 days, becoming the most-followed open source project in history.
  • OpenClaw, an open-source coding agent, dethroned React as the most-followed project on GitHub in just over a month.
  • AI incumbents focused on 'agent' features and co-work tools, while OpenClaw captured developer mindshare by shipping code, according to the summary.
  • Logan Allen of Finn Capital described OpenClaw's rise as an outsider project capturing developer attention while established players looked elsewhere.
  • OpenClaw briefly partnered with Venice AI, an uncensored chat platform founded by crypto veteran Eric Vorhees.
  • Vorhees founded Venice AI to bring user sovereignty, privacy, free speech, and censorship resistance to the AI landscape.

Also from this episode:

AI & Tech (2)
  • Eric Vorhees applied blockchain-era principles, including user sovereignty, privacy, and censorship resistance, to the AI landscape via Venice AI.
  • Eric Vorhees, from the crypto world, observed that principles like user sovereignty, privacy, free speech, and lack of censorship were absent in AI.
Culture (1)
  • Jason Calacanis described a tech adoption curve starting with criminals, moving to discreet uses like sports wagering, then to mainstream users seeking efficiency.
Stablecoins (1)
  • Calacanis noted stablecoins are entering their final adoption phase, with users like gardeners asking for USDC payments to avoid 3% fees.
VC (2)
  • Logan Allen made a pre-IPO investment in Circle based on the trajectory of stablecoin adoption for TradFi efficiency.
  • Allen's investment in Circle has doubled since its IPO, but he believes the adoption of stablecoins is still in its early stages.
Business (1)
  • Allen's thesis for investing in Circle was based on cheaper remittances, instant settlements, and treasury yield, rather than crypto speculation.
AI & TechCoding
TFTC: A Bitcoin Podcast
TFTC: A Bitcoin Podcast

#723: The Battle for the Agentic Economy with Matt Corallo • Mar 8

  • Matt Corallo argues that recent AI models like Claude 3.5 have crossed a threshold in the last three months, enabling the creation of functional software, from front ends to mobile apps, without human coding.
  • According to Matt Corallo, this leap in AI model quality removes the technical skill barrier for the Bitcoin community, allowing anyone with an idea and the will to execute to build Bitcoin applications.
  • Matt Corallo says the emerging agentic economy presents a major opportunity for autonomous AI payments, where agents will handle routine purchases like reordering household supplies, representing a genuine slice of future consumer spend.
  • Matt Corallo argues the race to build the default payment rail for AI agents is wide open, with entities like Google, Stripe, Visa, and crypto projects all pushing competing protocols from a starting point of zero.
  • Matt Corallo concludes that winning the agentic payment protocol war requires the Bitcoin community to step up and build, using the newly available AI tools to turn weekend ideas into working products.

Also from this episode:

Payments (2)
  • Matt Corallo states that legacy payment networks like Visa are useless for agentic commerce, as their systems are fundamentally anti-bot by design to prevent fraud.
  • Matt Corallo notes that stablecoins also fail to serve the agentic payment need due to a lack of merchant integration and usability for automated transactions.
Adoption (1)
  • According to Matt Corallo, this represents a unique shot for Bitcoin to achieve mainstream merchant adoption, as it is not trying to displace a 10x better incumbent but is competing in a newly forming market.
BTC MarketsPaymentsAdoption

#723: The Battle for the Agentic Economy with Matt Corallo • Mar 7

  • Existing payment rails like traditional credit card sites are not equipped for agentic payments, as they employ anti-bot measures.
  • Traditional systems also struggle with chargeback structures designed for humans, not autonomous agents.
  • For agentic payments, Corallo argues everyone is starting from zero, creating a greenfield opportunity.

Also from this episode:

Models (1)
  • Matt Corallo says recent AI model advancements like Claude 3.5/3.6 have dramatically lowered the barrier to software development.
Coding (4)
  • He explains these AI tools now enable users to build robust frontend, web, and mobile applications without deep coding knowledge.
  • This marks a unique opportunity for the Bitcoin community, which thrives on experimentation and diverse builders.
  • Corallo says AI tools have eliminated excuses for Bitcoiners to build applications.
  • He says the tools exist for building, and now willpower and a clear concept are the only requirements.
AI & Tech (2)
  • The other major shift is the rise of 'agentic payments' where AI agents autonomously purchase goods and services.
  • Corallo states this isn't a distant future and will soon comprise a non-trivial portion of consumer spending.
Stablecoins (1)
  • Stablecoins face a similar hurdle, lacking widespread merchant integration for agent-to-merchant transactions.
Protocol (2)
  • Bitcoin, which often struggled to be 10x better for domestic payments, now has a unique shot in this space.
  • While many competing protocols from Visa, Stripe, Google, and L402 are emerging, Corallo argues the underlying payment rail is what matters.
AI & TechAdoption
Presidio Bitcoin Jam
Presidio Bitcoin Jam

Codex vs Claude Vibe Coding, Study Shows AI Agents Prefer Bitcoin, Kazakhstan to Add BTC? • Mar 7

Also from this episode:

Coding (9)
  • Developer DK claims OpenAI's Codex CLI has overtaken Claude Code for execution-heavy tasks, describing Codex as the relentless "builder" and Claude as the "brainstormer".
  • DK advocates for a three-tier AI coding workflow using Google's Gemini for code review, Anthropic's Claude for architecture exploration, and OpenAI's Codex for persistent execution.
  • DK previously relied on Claude Code for months but found it gets stuck in rabbit holes when exploring ideas like an artist, whereas Codex focuses like "a dog on a bone" through refactoring tasks.
  • Developer Callie characterized Claude as working like an "American" and Codex like a "German" in their respective approaches to software development.
  • DK conducted a "vibe coding" session at 70 miles per hour through the Nevada desert using Tesla's Full Self-Driving to handle highway driving while simultaneously using OpenAI's Codex CLI for software architecture.
  • The desert coding setup involved speaking commands to the terminal, letting the AI process for ten-minute intervals, and checking the screen periodically over a five-hour period.
  • Grok has stagnated as a competitive coding assistant over the past six months despite its integration with Tesla vehicles, according to DK.
  • Tesla's Grok integration allows drivers to hold the steering wheel button to speak commands and later receive code on their laptop, functioning as a car convenience rather than a serious coding contender.
  • DK described Codex as "like your autistic friend who just keeps going" and stated it is "insanely better than the alternatives right now at this moment."
Safety (1)
  • Tesla's Full Self-Driving capability enables "vibe coding at 70mph," which raises safety concerns about using AI to write code while AI operates a vehicle at highway speeds.
AI & TechCoding

Related Stories