The memecoin casino

Memecoins are a type of cryptocurrency—a form of digital currency with a wide variety of uses—created around popular 'memes,' or viral internet jokes.

Memecoins are cryptocurrency created around popular 'memes,' or viral internet jokes

Dogecoin is perhaps the most famous "memecoin." While they tend to be more volatile than other types of crypto (after all, they're often created due to ephemeral trends), that doesn't mean they can't be valuable: Dogecoin is currently one of the most valuable cryptocurrencies in the world.

Bitcoin started as a .PDF

Have you ever wondered how bitcoin became, well, bitcoin? In this podcast episode, journalist PJ Vogt dives into what drove the bitcoin hype machine, explaining how it became the phenomenon it is today.

PixelMap, one of the oldest NFT projects, made its creator an overnight millionaire

PixelMap suddenly became popular as crypto enthusiasts looked to own a piece of NFT history. Its creator talks about its surprise success in this podcast.

The Chain Reaction podcast: The latest in bitcoin and blockchain developments

There are constantly new tokens, DeFi projects, NFT collections, and DAOs being launched, but how can you make sense of everything going on in the crypto space? TechCrunch senior crypto reporter Jacquelyn Melinek explores the impact of crypto on finance, art, web3, and society as a whole. One the best resources to keep up with actual—meaning, beyond the hype—developments in the world of bitcoin and blockchain.

Crypto history's is full of bizarre stories

Digital currencies based solely on misspellings of former President Joe Biden’s name have skyrocketed, and backers of a token based on a Shiba Inu wearing a hat raised $690K to get their logo on the Las Vegas Sphere.

Articulating weird memes

Some memes eschew established formats and references, creating new variants that resonate with scrollers through strange meta-jokes or compositions. This episode of this podcast, geared toward blind netizens, dives into some of the weird memes being shared online, such as one in which a pigeon sitting on a shoddy excuse for a nest, single egg forgotten, is meant to inspire comfort in those whose efforts have fallen short.

How the people behind spam text messages make money

If you've ever gotten a text message from a scammer—sometimes even just someone from an unknown number saying hello and calling you by the wrong name—you've probably wondered what they're trying to get out of you. This podcast answers that question. Hint: The answer has to do with cryptocurrency.

Crypto's origins date back to 1983

While crypto feels new, it actually dates to 1983, with eCash's creation. However, a lot has happened in the crypto world over the past few years in particular—crypto's market cap surpassed $2T for the first time in 2021, for instance. A timeline of crypto's history details the events in between.

Bubbles can exist in markets for collectibles, not just industries and technology

This podcast tells how "Magic: The Gathering" faced its own speculative bubble as rare cards surged in resale value—risking a Beanie Baby-style crash. It follows how the game’s creators tried to engineer a system to keep a collectibles market from collapsing.

Nvidia entered its AI era after learning that its chips could be used in industries beyond gaming

Its semiconductor chips were used in the automotive industry, for data centers, and by crypto miners. And starting in 2006, Nvidia took steps that would ultimately transform it into the AI company it’s known as today. This podcast is the second part of a three-part series diving deep into Nvidia’s company evolution.

In the beginning, there was Adam (Neumann)

This podcast episode, which includes a telling interview with one of WeWork’s first employees, tells the origin story of WeWork—from Neumann’s drinking and disheveled clothing, to WeWork’s first “summer camp” company party weekends in New York.

Why blockchain applications are worth investing and building

Chris Dixon is a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz. In this hourlong podcast episode, Dixon shares his overall thesis for investing in the cryptocurrency space, the opportunities and limitations of blockchain applications, and why this is the most interesting area for investing and building over the next 10 years.

Stephen Findeisen is the YouTuber taking on crypto scams

While many cryptocurrencies are focused on advanced technical projects or real-life uses, the proliferation of easy-to-create memecoins has led to a boom in scams. Stephen Findeisen, aka Coffeezilla, is regarded as one of the best independent investigative journalists exposing high-profile frauds, pump-and-dump schemes, rug-pulls, and more.

Hear how the Super Bowl went from a risky experiment to America's unofficial holiday

In this podcast episode, former Emmy award-winning ESPN producer Dennis Deninger traces the Super Bowl's unlikely rise from the AFL-NFL merger era to a national spectacle, explaining how it reshaped advertising, gambling, television, and American culture.

Listen to a podcast episode that goes inside the 2017 Equifax credit bureau hack

This podcast episode details a 2017 credit bureau hack in which Equifax data about millions of Americans was compromised. It dives into the history of credit bureaus, specifically how they became legally allowed to access Americans' financial information without Americans actually volunteering it themselves.

Coinbase and the metaverse

In this essay, Coinbase founders Brian Armstrong and Alex Reeve talk about the importance of the metaverse, the components of it, and the role Coinbase plays.

The science of dogs, from wolf origins to color-blindness

This under 10-minute podcast episode dives into the rich, fascinating science behind dogs: From their world-class sense of smell to their domestication from wolves.

The creator economy, explained

Many brands pay influencers to advertise their products or services on social media. Platforms such as YouTube, Substack, and Twitch also provide revenue-sharing opportunities for their top creators. Known as the creator economy, it's a system driven by individuals who produce online content for audiences that can be monetized.

How exchanges like the Chicago Mercantile act as trading referees

Chicago's Mercantile Exchange emphasizes futures contracts on commodities. This podcast episode breaks down how exchanges actually work, make money, and streamline the market.

The history and success of the mysterious Mars Inc.

Mars, Incorporated manufactures some of the world’s favorite treats, including M&M’s, Snickers, and Milky Way bars. Despite their success, you’ve probably not heard of them. The privately held company is largely unknown to the world despite being owned by the second-richest family in the US. This podcast discusses the mysterious Mars family and their remarkable entrepreneurial feat. Listen to uncover more.

Ride along on one coffee company’s journey through the stock market

From going public with an initial public offering, to struggling with how negative news coverage impacts a stock’s value, this video lets you put yourself in the shoes of a newly public company. This makes learning about the inner workings of the stock market much easier.

Hear how the first moon landing was saved

This podcast series explores Apollo 11 through firsthand stories from the engineers, mission controllers, and astronauts who made the moon landing possible, culminating in 13 minutes of NASA archive audio leading up to the landing.

Marc Maron helped define the modern podcast with 'WTF'

In 2009, Marc Maron began the "WTF" podcast, hosting a wide range of interesting celebrities in his garage studio. The extended format and unscripted conversations helped define the modern podcast.

What happens when a cemetery goes out of business?

When a cemetery goes out of business, what happens to all the bodies? And how do cemetery business models work in the first place? This podcast episode answers those questions and others as host PJ Vogt interviews a cemetery expert who grew up in a cemetery before he began studying them as an adult.

MuggleCast is the original ‘Harry Potter’ fan podcast

Launched in 2005 by the creators of MuggleNet, MuggleCast offers weekly discussions, news and fan theories on Harry Potter. It quickly became one of the internet’s major fandom podcasts and still runs today.

Watch this video that uses Lego bricks to explain how venture capital works.

The idea for the Federal Reserve was conceived in secret in 1910—with bankers donning duck hunt gear for disguise while traveling to a remote country club on Georgia's Jekyll Island

SpaceX's S-1 or 'prospectus' revealed many previously unknown details about the company, including its unprofitability despite doing $18.7B in revenue in 2025, exactly how many voting shares Elon Musk will have in the company (roughly 85%), and more.

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

A vending machine run with Anthropic's AI went out of business after it was convinced to give away items for free and sell a video game console.

Fast-casual restaurant Chili's is experiencing a resurgence, with its parent company recently reporting a nearly 32% increase in sales, thanks to passionate Gen Z fans on TikTok.

Netflix profits when you're not watching, and its movies are designed that way—read a detail-rich critical essay exposing lesser-known Netflix takes

Play the role of a student in a game where you try to navigate college and remain debt-free, selecting different income levels, high school experience, race, ethnicity, and more.

Some coin denominations have ridges etched on their sides, partly to prevent counterfeiting, in a practice called 'reeding.'

In 2019, a laptop loaded with six of the worst malware in history and described as 'an exhibit of historical weaponry' sold for $1.3M.

Hear 50 years of iconic hip-hop samples, the genre's foundational looped tracks

See how fireworks are made and learn how metals like magnesium and copper are responsible for different colors.

While the first exchange-traded fund (a 'basket' of different assets that can be bought and sold on a stock exchange) in the US only launched in 1993, the global ETF market has grown to more than $10T in the short time since.

Watch how viruses like Ebola can spill over from animals to humans—and vice-versa.

A researcher recently discovered an interview from 1967 between groundbreaking journalist Joan Didion and the Grateful Dead, years before the band became an institution.

Some Pokémon have been named after real and fictional organisms, while some real-world species have been named after Pokémon, such as Chilicola charizard and Binburrum zapdos.

The use of fungi to detoxify land and water—a process known as mycoremediation—has been used to clean up natural resources affected by the 2025 California wildfires.

A 2019 Facebook event called on attendees to "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us," resulting in countless memes, the creation of a music festival, and eventually the arrests of those who did try to approach the area.

Visualize how CRISPR-Cas9—a type of immune system used by single-celled organisms to attack invasive viruses—targets and makes precise changes to a gene's DNA.

Listen to an in-depth conversation on the links between Parkinson's disease and herbicide exposure and the challenging pace of scientific investigation.

Explore the animals that populate the depths of the ocean, from fish and coral in the first few hundred feet, all the way down to the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

Search a massive database of over 4 decades of clues from the TV quiz show 'Jeopardy!'

The American cockroach is actually from Africa, an apparent hitchhiker aboard ships carrying enslaved people, with evidence suggesting the bug may have arrived in the New World as early as the 1600s.

The first horror movie is believed to be George Méliès' 1986 short 'The Haunted Castle,' which pioneered the use of special effects