RadCasts

More than 80 people have been abducted over recent weeks in Kenya, sparking a rise in public anger and more protests on the streets. But why are the kidnappings happening and who is being targeted? We talk to our reporter in Nairobi who has been following events.

Also in this episode, we hear about the journeys of African migrants from West Africa to the Canary Islands, the painful realities that push them away from home, and the dangers that come with crossing the Atlantic ocean.

And we hear from Cape Verde on how the country has managed to transform its agricultural sector after years of a severe drought left it struggling to survive. Could Cape Verde be a model for other African countries?

Presenter: Charles Gitonga Producers: Nyasha Michelle, Victor Sylver and Bella Hassan in London. Susan Gachuhi in Nairobi Senior Producer: Patricia Whitehorne Technical Producer: Philip Bull Editors: Andre Lombard and Alice Muthengi

For today’s show, we speak with Max Guise about Block’s ASIC miner, and we even get a sneak peak of the new miner!

Welcome back to The Mining Pod! Max Guise, a team member from Block’s Proto division, joins to talk about the company’s new ASIC chip. A veteran of Block, Guise has worked on everything from the Proto mining ASIC, to Square’s point-of-sale, and its hardware wallet Bitkey. During the discussion, Guise gives us a brief history of Proto’s origins, discusses the challenges of designing (and manufacturing and marketing!) a bitcoin mining ASIC, provides a timeline for the Proto ASIC rollout, and even graces us with a demo of the chip!

Timestamps:

00:00 Start

03:21 Max bio

03:56 Working at Square & CashApp

04:58 Building the point of sale product

06:20 Building hardware

09:48 Genesis of Proto

12:33 Open development

13:37 The team

14:59 What is Proto

16:59 Selling chips

19:56 Closed sourced firmware

21:38 Lifecycle examination

23:32 Market strategy

24:33 Financing

25:05 Hashrate as payment

26:16 Deployment

28:29 When new rig?

28:59 Ecosystem of products

30:13 Other components

30:58 Working with competing miners

Published twice weekly, "The Mining Pod" interviews the best builders and operators in the Bitcoin and Bitcoin mining landscape. Subscribe to get notifications when we publish interviews on Tuesday and a news show on Friday! 

👉Enjoying the show? Check out our newsletter at miningpod.blockspace.media!

👉 Check out Bitcoin Season 2 and The Gwart Show!

Follow our hosts on Twitter: @wsfoxley, @cbspears, @AsILayHodling, @MatthewKimmell

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Thank you to our sponsor, CleanSpark, America’s Bitcoin miner!

"The Mining Pod" is produced by Sunnyside Honey Inc. with Senior Producer Damien Somerset.

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The nation mourns its 39th president -- Jimmy Carter. Investigators struggle to find the cause of a South Korean plane crash that killed 179 people. Southern storms kill at least 4. Correspondent Deborah Rodriguez has the CBS World News Roundup for December 30, 2024:

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After a single term and a landslide loss to Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter’s presidency was judged unduly harshly. What matters, though, are the principles he held dear for all his 100 years. The first of our series The World Ahead outlines the big trends coming in 2025 (11:39). And a reading list for those who want to know how Elon Musk thinks (20:42). 

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Last year, China’s foreign minister, Qin Gang, suddenly disappeared. Qin was a rising star in Chinese politics and a protegé of China’s strongman leader, Xi Jinping. In the first episode of our three-part investigation, we chart Qin’s rise and begin to untangle the mystery of his disappearance. This series was originally published in October.

Further Listening:
- Episode 2: The Affair - Apple | Spotify
- Episode 3: The Downfall - Apple | Spotify

We'll be back with something new on January 2.

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