Joel

So much to look at in this graph ...a fascinating history of tech revolutions over the years. And look where we are going. (Source: redpoint.com/reports/2026-m…)

How should we think about LLM economics? Our CEO and founder @anishmohammed shares a perspective comparing digital intelligence capital and inference as a real option. Read the post here: linkedin.com/feed/update/ur…

Striking image from the new Anthropic labor market impact report.

Prufold founder, @anishmohammed shares how agentic systems are becoming infrastructure. But, infrastructure without cryptographic guarantees is a liability. Here he analyzes OpenClaw’s security gaps and show how to close them with verifiable compute. prufoldlabs.ai/blog/security-…

Something we've been working on, dropping soon!

It's a weird time. I am filled with wonder and also a profound sadness. I spent a lot of time over the weekend writing code with Claude. And it was very clear that we will never ever write code by hand again. It doesn't make any sense to do so. Something I was very good at is now free and abundant. I am happy...but disoriented. At the same time, something I spent my early career building (social networks) was being created by lobster-agents. It's all a bit silly...but if you zoom out, it's kind of indistinguishable from humans on the larger internet. So both the form and function of my early career are now produced by AI. I am happy but also sad and confused. If anything, this whole period is showing me what it is like to be human again.

that feeling...😰

We are hiring a Head of Preparedness. This is a critical role at an important time; models are improving quickly and are now capable of many great things, but they are also starting to present some real challenges. The potential impact of models on mental health was something we saw a preview of in 2025; we are just now seeing models get so good at computer security they are beginning to find critical vulnerabilities. We have a strong foundation of measuring growing capabilities, but we are entering a world where we need more nuanced understanding and measurement of how those capabilities could be abused, and how we can limit those downsides both in our products and in the world, in a way that lets us all enjoy the tremendous benefits. These questions are hard and there is little precedent; a lot of ideas that sound good have some real edge cases. If you want to help the world figure out how to enable cybersecurity defenders with cutting edge capabilities while ensuring attackers can't use them for harm, ideally by making all systems more secure, and similarly for how we release biological capabilities and even gain confidence in the safety of running systems that can self-improve, please consider applying. This will be a stressful job and you'll jump into the deep end pretty much immediately. openai.com/careers/head-o…

Two conversations this weekend make me think that there's a vibe shift afoot in Silicon Valley around what one should work on and what is worthwhile. Culturally, it feels like the moment is ripe for new frameworks: • Davos expert morality is stale and discredited. • It's also apparent that the "just be super based" Counter-Enlightenment is not really an answer. (Yes, woke went too far, but simply inverting it doesn't work.) • EA is no longer the automatic default for smart people. • There's increasing skepticism of slot and slop machine dynamics. Overall, "what is worthy and valuable?" feels like it's becoming more central.

We just raised a $20M seed round to build the largest bank in the world. Kontigo crossed $30M in annual revenue, $1B in payment volume, and 1M users in under 12 months, with a team of six engineers and one designer. We are the fastest-growing stablecoin neobank in the world. Any individual or business on earth can: - Earn 10% yield on their digital dollars. - Get a stablecoin card with bitcoin cashback. - Activate a USDT credit line. - Invest in tokenized U.S. stocks. - Open an international account for free. This is a real-world use case of crypto. No casinos, no jargon, just normal people who don’t even know what USDC or USDT is. We’re, once and for all, democratizing access to basic finance and giving 4.8 billion people the ability to hold a stable currency (USDC) alongside a wealth creator (BTC). The equation is simple: they invest in BTC, they hold USDC, and they spend in local stablecoins. More than a thousand businesses and a million users are already doing this. They connect their local bank, card, or payment method and start moving funds globally, instantly, and without limits. No matter the corridor. U.S. ↔ LatAm, LatAm ↔ Asia, Asia ↔ Europe, U.S. ↔ Africa, Europe ↔ LatAm. We’ve them all. Just imagine how much faster Revolut would’ve grown if they didn’t have to get individual banking licenses in each of the 50 countries they’ve launched in. That’s @kontigo_app You simply can’t outcompete the fact that our backend, database, and infrastructure run on the freaking blockchain: 24/7, at a fraction of the cost, open, permissionless. It’s a whole new game, different incentives, and a new technological paradigm. Thanks to all the early supporters! We’re proud to partner with the best: @t_blom & @harjtaggar from @ycombinator ; @hthieblot & @FurqanR from @fdotinc ; @davefontenot from @hf0 ; @HoolieG from @cbventures & @jessepollak from @base ; Saurabh and Grace from DST ; also @GoodwaterCap @Soma_Capital @pioneer_fund @transposevc @alumniventures @m_franceschetti @EvanWeb3 @metavarce @davecyen Tom Brown, Oliver Jung, Ricardo Schäfer, Andrej Henkler, Yi Shi, Philippe Teixeira. Some people said the fintech era was over…

If AI assistants become the interface to reality (they will), openness at the model layer isn’t enough. What matters is how those models are run, constrained, and proven.

Had the privilege to be on a panel recently with @0xKimberly from @OnchainCity talking about privacy and security in government use of personal data. This is something we think a lot about at @prufold and doing our part to solve the issues. Thanks @zama for hosting. youtube.com/watch?v=NoHl0y…

Highly recommend investing in the next Coinbase at YC Demo Day A+++++ incredible experience

Congrats to all the founders presenting at the F25 Demo Day today! They’re the best of the best from 20k+ applications <1% accept rate And less than 50% of the startups presenting today applied with just an idea. Amazing progress this batch!

The future of AI won’t be closed by default. Open models are already cheaper, fast, and nearly as capable. The only missing piece is the infrastructure that lets enterprises trust them. We are building that. prufoldlabs.ai/blog/25b-oppor… @anishmohammed @joelwp

Given that Anthropic detected the cyber espionage campaign in mid-September and open models are 3-6 months behind closed models, we should probably expect similar (much harder to disrupt) attacks in early 2026 (or earlier).

Yesterday, the Future Arrived: The First Mostly-Autonomous AI Cyberattack prufoldlabs.ai/blog/ai-cybera…

AI-driven attacks are here. Trust isn’t enough. Verification has to be built in. This is why we’re building @prufold

Working on something at the intersection of AI, cryptography, and verifiable compute. More soon but the goal is simple: make AI trustworthy by design, not by promise. @prufold