Introducing PhoebeCoin

Just kidding. It's this week's biz zeitgeist report!

This letter’s image was originally etched into a wood block in 1970-something, while my dad was waiting for an important phone call.

Pop Goes the Weasel

Oh man. I try not to shit-talk Web3 and crypto here because A) I don’t understand it enough to say anything more thoughtful than, “I just don’t trust it,” and B) I have a few colleagues who’ve gotten into the whole scene (it’s a scene, right? Or a movement?), and I don’t want to offend anyone I respect by saying this world is bullshit.

But last week all the crypto-contradictions cracked open like hot magma and the whole landscape changed. At best, crypto/web3 doesn’t make sense by design. At worst, it’s as trustworthy as the ghost of Carlo Ponzi himself. (“Ay! I make-a-the-big-swindle! Boo!")

There are wonderful recaps, updates, and predictions to read about the SBF/FTX implosion elsewhere, so let’s get straight to my personal gripes:

I spent most of the past decade working with fintech startups built on the belief that old white guys on company jets who run legacy banks probably don’t have the average consumer’s best interests at heart. So, we made their brands accessible to women, people of color, immigrants, and other groups that were traditionally shut out of the system.

First it was niche, then a trend, then it actually started to feel revolutionary — just as every founder described their business on a discovery call.

Then the Big Banks came knocking. I’m not allowed to say who, but maybe a firm that rhymes with Old Van Jax — notorious for being a boy’s club in an already bro-ey industry — asked me to help them “do a better job with women.”

It was a beautiful full-circle moment. (If it happened. I’m not saying it did because NDAs.)

I almost gave myself a phone call to say, “We did it, Feebs. We’re gonna make an entire industry finally pay attention to women.”

Then crypto happened when we weren’t looking.

Millennials were like, “You’re right, screw those old white guys. Let’s give our money to the young white guy, with the stretched-out t-shirt collar and cargo shorts.”

“…Who installed someone with little more than an intern’s experience as CEO of his trading firm…”

“…And runs both companies from a condo in the Bahamas with a polyamorous team of nine…This is the future!”

It’s a nice idea, but…

The heartbreaking thing about crypto is that it seized on a moment when we’d lost faith in our institutions. COVID showed us that current systems do not have our back — not socially, financially, medically…

So, this “de-centralized,” power-to-the-people currency emerged as an answer (a revolution!) for a consumer base that felt ripped off by the American Dream. And just like Alphabet City in the mid-aughts, it became hot shit for people who were already doing pretty well, dream-wise.

Like any great American institution, the few people who positioned themselves at the center of its democratic de-centralization became very rich by convincing a bunch of other people of its value and integrity.

Now it’s like: Never mind, just stick with the Roman pillar banks because at least they’re FDIC-insured.

dO yOuR rEsEaRcH, iNsTaGrAm

In other news, misinformation has finally arrived at Instagram. (Not the influencer-miracle-serum-Mudwater variety that its ad business was built on.) Multiple people reposted false news about a genocide in Iran yesterday, causing a frenzy of concerned caption writing.

Everyone — including Viola Davis, apparently — was outraged by how underreported the incorrect story was.

Instagram is obviously doing vocal warmups for its Swan Song (bittersweet for me since it’s one of the main reasons I had kids) but for those of us who stay to watch the dumpster fire build like a warm hearth: Just like, do some extra swipes and keystrokes to double check Amnesty International or something before reposting this stuff. Otherwise, we’re needlessly distracting each other from the underreported and very real horror that’s happening in Iran.

I wish I could end this edition with something more hopeful, so I’ll just leave a quick love letter to Gen Z: Despite their fashion choices being so triggering to a recovering 90s teen like me, they kinda seem poised to save the world.

They trolled Trump in Tulsa. They may have saved the Democrats, despite the Dems being so ineffectual the past few years that they’re barely worth saving. And now they’re literally dying for their cause in Iran. Truly a living testament to hope.

Surprise, you’re reading the Brand Book I wrote for Gen Z.

Kidding, but the next brand book is coming soon, I really truly promise this time. You can sign up for it here.

I’ve also started “curating” my book picks in Rhetorica’s new Bookshop.org storefront. Cute, right? I’m not 100% on how it works since this is the first time I’m sharing it, but I do know that Bookshop.org donates a portion of sales to independent book stores around the country.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving! If you’ve scrolled this far, please know I’m thankful for you.