The following transcript was created using artificial intelligence. There will be some grammatical errors below. 

00:00:04:16 – 00:00:09:00

Richard Carthon: Wassup everyone, your host, Richard Carthon, and I am with the one and only Joe Blackburn.

00:00:09:09 – 00:00:09:24

Joe Blackburn: Wassup?

00:00:09:26 – 00:00:14:12

Richard Carthon: He was with us back when we did our conference back at the Crypto Current conference, way back when, in 2019.

00:00:14:14 – 00:00:15:18

Joe Blackburn: Good times bro, Yes sir. 

00:00:15:20 – 00:00:22:01

Richard Carthon: But now we have the Miami Crypto Expo. He’s the founder of CCT.

00:00:22:06 – 00:00:22:21

Joe Blackburn: Yeah.

00:00:22:23 – 00:00:27:16

Richard Carthon: A group on Facebook and now is also the Chain Games. 

00:00:27:21 – 00:00:28:06

Joe Blackburn: World champion.

00:00:28:08 – 00:00:28:29

Richard Carthon: World champion.

00:00:29:01 – 00:00:30:08

Joe Blackburn: 2021 world champion. Chaino Champion.

00:00:31:20 – 00:00:35:01

Richard Carthon: He’s going to get the nice belt coming in real soon. But I’ll tell you, it’s coming.

00:00:35:03 – 00:00:36:01

Joe Blackburn: Yeah.

00:00:36:03 – 00:00:42:01

Richard Carthon: Real fast. But, man, tell us about the experience, man. What’s your overall experience been with this? 

00:00:42:07 – 00:00:49:07

Joe Blackburn: Sure. First off, Richard, we go way back, man. It’s great to see you. I saw him once earlier I guess, like, what, two days ago?

00:00:49:09 – 00:00:49:24

Richard Carthon: Yeah.

00:00:49:26 – 00:00:58:09

Joe Blackburn: The first, second day and then you’ve just been too busy for me, man, heart my heart. Now, I’m glad to sit down with you. I appreciate Crypto Current, you guys have been absolutely killing that. Look.

00:00:58:11 – 00:01:01:05

Richard Carthon: Mama I made it. 

00:01:01:24 – 00:01:30:20

Joe Blackburn: But no. And as you alluded to, I am obviously the 2021 world champion of Chaino Chain Games. ChainGames.io, it’s an incredible, incredible project. Adam Barlam, very good friend of mine, was able to really take an idea and make it real. I mean, eSports, right? I mean, it’s going big. Get getting that later, but the Miami Crypto Experience, where do you start? It’s Miami, right? I’m just glad to be here. But more importantly, it’s the first Crypto conference back since the coronavirus pandemic and it’s good to see the family. 

00:01:30:22 – 00:01:36:00

Richard Carthon: Absolutely. Let’s stay on Miami just for a second. So, Steve and I’ve been bringing this up a lot and just the energy here.

00:01:36:02 – 00:01:37:14

Joe Blackburn: So different, yeah. 

00:01:37:16 – 00:01:42:13

Richard Carthon: The opportunity it feels like around the Crypto and Blockchain space. It’s just different. Can you kind of talk to us about that?

00:01:43:09 – 00:02:27:14

Joe Blackburn: Sure. You know, when the mayor and I wish he could have been here because I think the Crypto community could really benefit from seeing some credibility show up. But I know I mean, it’s the mayor, he’s busy. Long the short is, you know, to have a city to literally just embrace not just Crypto, but like, specifically Bitcoin. I’ve been calling it City Bitcoin since that moment. And, you know, the United States, I have to be careful how I say this, because I love where I live. I’m proud to be an American, but we can be a little bit behind at times. And it’s good to see somebody in such a big city like this with the mayor. But folks, we got to have more cities like this. This is an incredible experience, it’s incredible to be around people from Miami. There’s more people here from Miami than there are from Crypto verse. 

00:02:27:16 – 00:02:28:01

Richard Carthon: Yeah.

00:02:28:03 – 00:02:38:17

Joe Blackburn: I mean, like that’s the thing that surprised me the most is that to actually see the community show up, I’m like, Oh, you’re actually from here. I’ve never been to a conference ever where there were more people from that place than somewhere else, you know.

00:02:38:19 – 00:02:39:15

Richard Carthon: It’s remarkable. 

00:02:39:17 – 00:02:46:09

Joe Blackburn: Yeah, it really is. It’s unique. It’s like, it’s not the same people every time now anymore. This is real. People are here. 

00:02:46:26 – 00:02:54:15

Richard Carthon: Right. And they’re ready for this. The other part of it was I mean, and just speaks to that for a second, you know, this was put all in under 90 days. 

00:02:54:18 – 00:02:55:18

Joe Blackburn: Yeah.

00:02:55:20 – 00:03:06:00

Richard Carthon: And the fact that they got this much local buy-in is incredible and just goes, the strength of them being able to pull together a bunch of different people to rally around.

00:03:06:02 – 00:03:06:29

Joe Blackburn: Yeah.

00:03:07:01 – 00:03:22:11

Richard Carthon: This initiative and to also get the buy-In from both this establishment at the Intercontinental, but then also from the the city, everything like, it was like the perfect blend and storm to make this event a reality because if you asked anybody 90 days ago, they had been like, there’s no way. 

00:03:22:13 – 00:03:28:27

Joe Blackburn: No way. I completely agree by the way. By the way, first off, when are me and you just going to just put this pride aside and just do our own show together?

00:03:29:27 – 00:03:30:12

Richard Carthon: Dude.

00:03:30:14 – 00:03:44:15

Joe Blackburn: Let’s go. I mean, Hey, baseball player Tulane, I’m a southern boy, although the Louisiana we’ll see, but I’m a gator nevertheless, I can always appreciate another Southerner like yourself putting time in and the energy. And shoutout Wayne Marcel, by the way.

00:03:44:17 – 00:03:45:02

Richard Carthon: Blockchain Wayne.

00:03:45:04 – 00:03:51:18

Joe Blackburn: Blockchain Wayne in the entire team here, Incredible, incredible moment. I’m just glad to be back around people.

00:03:51:20 – 00:03:52:05

Richard Carthon: Yeah.

00:03:52:07 – 00:04:17:20

Joe Blackburn: But, to kind of tie it all back together, I want to see more people besides Wayne or I want to see people take these chances more often. This is the Blockchain, we don’t care what anybody else thinks, we never have. And if we don’t start acting like that again, we’re going to be like everybody else. And that’s my concern right now, is that Doge, among other things, we’re like everybody else now. Come on, folks, let’s be unique. Let’s be ourselves and let’s not care what other people think. 

00:04:18:08 – 00:04:40:16

Richard Carthon: And on that note, you know, there have been a ton of, like, unique events here that have been original and have been a lot of people here. And even some of the sponsors are very unique in their own and are going after their own types of initiatives. What has been some kind of like, the standouts around that you’ve like, noticed either from like, the night events or even just like, some of the people that have been around and the vendors.

00:04:40:18 – 00:04:41:03

Joe Blackburn: Yeah.

00:04:41:05 – 00:04:42:12

Richard Carthon: That, like, kind of like stuck out to you. 

00:04:44:18 – 00:05:04:16

Joe Blackburn: Obviously, I was sitting at the Chain Games tent, so, at the booth and a lot of people stopped by, it was awesome. Unfortunately, there were a few different projects I was really hoping would support this. And they know who they are, they watch this. You can edit that if you have to. But let me get a huge shoutout to number one Mandala. 

00:05:04:22 – 00:05:38:09

Joe Blackburn: Man, Mandala, the exchange is Binance Cloud, what else you got to say? I mean, they’re really doing things the right way. Joe Reiben is a friend of mine, both share the name of Joe. I always say the best people in Crypto are named Joe, no offense, Dick over here. Richard over here. No, but to watch Mandala do what they did, that project had a lot to overcome and today, they are one of my most incredibly favorites. And I’m not talk about price, we’re not talk about trading, we’re talking about things that represent the Crypto space. So, that’s number one. 

00:05:39:08 – 00:06:00:27

Joe Blackburn: Obviously, the entire staff of the Miami Crypto Experience and the Intercontinental Hotel, have just been amazing. I would probably say that the Pirate Coin has and I really didn’t get a chance to talk to him. But between Pirate Coin and Aurox, their booths were right next to each other. The two best projects that I got a chance to see there, as far as that goes. I mean, where do you start bro? Everybody else is awesome.

00:06:00:29 – 00:06:02:07

Richard Carthon: Yeah.

00:06:02:09 – 00:06:39:12

Joe Blackburn: I’m careful about who I’m going to say next, but. I like the Safe Moon team, oddly, and it’s a new concept for me. I’ve had my judgments, but Thomas Smith is a cool and interesting figure. So, Aurox. Safe Moon surprised me, I loved it. Thomas Smith, who I’ve actually known for a while, I was really impressed with him. He is an incredible human. Say what you want about the project, I’m talking about him as a person. And what he is doing with the project I think is amazing. So, congratulations to them. I hope it continues and I hope that what they say is the truth, you know? But Pirate Coin, cheers to you guys too. Hey, the pirate outfit. 

00:06:39:21 – 00:06:41:27

Richard Carthon: Hey, they got some good swag, man. 

00:06:44:06 – 00:06:44:28

Joe Blackburn: Let’s go.

00:06:44:29 – 00:06:53:04

Richard Carthon: Their swag game’s on point. But how about from the various speakers and the various people that were able to give you the keynotes, or workshops, were there any ones that stuck out to you as well?

00:06:53:06 – 00:07:19:23

Joe Blackburn: Jorgy, from Aurox and Chelsea Hewin, who’s a friend of mine too. But that was her first experience ever speaking. Ken Bosack, actually me and Ken go way back to 2016 to one of the original small, intimate groups. And me and Ken’s relationship is a little bit up and down to say the least. We’re very different people and we see the space for the same reasons, but me and Ken can have very different ways to approach it. 

00:07:20:05 – 00:07:54:03

Joe Blackburn: But through those ups and downs we have, we have developed a certain respect for one another and I consider him a friend obviously to this day. But it’s watching the NFT world kind of revolve around, you know, a collectors concept hobby. Listening to somebody like Ken who’s been in the space for so long now explain why he loves it so much and why it deserves a place in the space was interesting. So, Ken. Miss Teen Crypto, got to give her a shoutout. She did an amazing job. I mean, I think this is her first time as well. And Chelsea Hewin and as I said and Jorgy from Aurox, that was just all of it was incredible, though.

00:07:54:05 – 00:08:02:28

Richard Carthon: For sure. And thank you for those shoutouts. And man, you know, I am so happy when you showed up and I saw you, I was like, man, I got to pull you aside, I got to just like, talk about all this great stuff. 

00:08:03:00 – 00:08:06:22

Joe Blackburn: I feel the same way about you, by the way. I was like, where has he been? I feel like you’ve been avoiding me, man. 

00:08:07:08 – 00:08:26:06

Richard Carthon: Nah, man. We’re just out here just talking to all of the different people and covering all the stuff. But, man, I’m glad I was able to pull you aside. But, you know, as we kind of, you know, wrap this up, man, what is something that you want to make sure that people who are watching this want to kind of take away and why they would want to come to the now announced experience that’s now coming out in October? 

00:08:26:08 – 00:08:45:03

Joe Blackburn: And I saw Wayne had just announced that and that’s going to be awesome. I promise you, I’ll buy my tickets tonight. I would probably say that, like, this space has not changed in good ways when it’s still family. Folks, if you come here, you’re part of this group, we treat you with respect and we want you here. And I can’t say that about other industries. 

00:08:45:06 – 00:09:18:11

Joe Blackburn: It’s just so much more intimate, like, in an obviously, in a very formal, yet casual style. We want people to understand that you have a chance to break away from this traditional system, that it’s rules that they change constantly. That’s not fair to me and you. Our generations are the ones that are going to pay the price for a lot of things happening in the world. And I’m not trying to get too specific, I just have a tendency to believe that what we see in front of us on TV and on the Internet is very different than reality. 

00:09:18:21 – 00:09:39:03

Joe Blackburn: And in Crypto, it’s for sure and it’s stressless. And although there could be scams, sure, but there are scams in the real world. There are not secrets on the Blockchain though. And that’s my favorite thing to say. Come join us, come be part of this movement. It’s not a revolution, it’s evolution. And I’ve been trying to tell people the revolution has yet to begin, we’ll see you there. 

00:09:39:24 – 00:09:43:08

Richard Carthon: Absolutely. Nothing else adds that other than Stay Crypto Current.