Avichal Garg

Linda Xie and Avichal Garg explain the core ideas behind crypto, including blockchains, tokens, consensus, and smart contracts, then discuss where decentralized systems may be useful. They see payments and privacy as promising near-term applications, while many decentralized apps depend on solving scaling problems first. They also cover regulation, identity, governance, developer infrastructure, and the risks of token sales, arguing that founders should raise money thoughtfully and align incentives through vesting. The talk closes with privacy, government adoption, and ways people might begin using crypto without realizing it.

The speakers argue that EdTech businesses face a tension between improving educational quality and making products affordable, with customer willingness to pay varying by age group, market, and whether schools or parents buy. They describe how better school connectivity, classroom devices, and teacher-led purchasing have opened new routes to adoption, while monetization and long sales cycles remain difficult. They debate how to define educational quality, emphasizing that engagement and learning outcomes may be better signals than standardized test scores, and that founders need a clear view of education’s purpose. Their advice is to choose a problem and business model that fit the founder’s motivation, understand the science of learning, and look for opportunities beyond traditional public education.