{"id":14965,"date":"2021-08-23T18:12:08","date_gmt":"2021-08-23T18:12:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ci028b69c7e00025a2"},"modified":"2021-08-23T18:12:08","modified_gmt":"2021-08-23T18:12:08","slug":"max-keiser-stacy-herbert-bitcoin-lifestyle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/culture\/max-keiser-stacy-herbert-bitcoin-lifestyle","title":{"rendered":"The Bitcoin Lifestyle Of Stacy Herbert And Max Keiser"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Stacy Herbert<\/a> met Max Keiser<\/a> in a French internet caf\u00e9 in 2003. To that point, her media career had been primarily spent behind the scenes as a script consultant and \u201cdevelopment girl\u201d in Hollywood and the stories Keiser was telling her about banking and finance, as well as the energy with which this former Manhattan-based standup comedian regaled her, inspired her to join forces with him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve always been the intermediary between the audience and the talent, the movie stars, the TV stars, the comedic writers and stuff like that,\u201d Herbert told Bitcoin Magazine<\/em>. \u201cOur conversations there were like, how to get the stories Max is telling me onto the screen, how to get it onto a podcast, back in 2003, before there were really podcasts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since then, the pair has produced television content for the BBC and BBC World (a platform Herbert called \u201cvery oppressive,\u201d but also the one that first brought her in front of the camera with Keiser), Al-Jazeera, the Iranian state-owned news network Press TV and Russian state-controlled network RT. This content has always pertained to the financial world, framing Wall Street banks as the antagonists and the system as rigged against the majority, but it wasn\u2019t until Bitcoin came along that the pair found their protagonist, their \u201csuperhero,\u201d as Herbert described it.<\/p>\n

Bitcoin\u2019s First Couple<\/h2>\n

In addition to working together, Herbert and Keiser are married. Anecdotally, I have rarely seen one without the other sharing a stage or close by. Keiser is certainly the more colorful character of the two (he was called \u201ccrypto Willy Wonka\u201d<\/a> by \u201cDaily Show\u201d host Trevor Noah after a manically-energetic appearance at Bitcoin 2021), while Herbert considers herself his \u201coperating system\u201d (she was the one to confirm our interview appointment and grab Keiser when it was scheduled to begin).<\/p>\n

\u201cI always think of our relationship as a gang of two,\u201d Keiser told Bitcoin Magazine<\/em>. \u201cIt\u2019s a very small gang, there\u2019s only two people in the gang, but that\u2019s how we approach our work and our life. We\u2019re out there traveling the world, pushing the Bitcoin maximalist message and we look out for each other, as gang members do, and we trust each other like we\u2019re in the gang. We have an oath that we took, called \u2018marriage,\u2019 like you find in a gang, and we love the gang lifestyle.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today, in addition to RT\u2019s \u201cThe Keiser Report\u201d and other projects, the couple produce the \u201cOrange Pill Podcast,\u201d which just reached its one-year anniversary and receives 500,000 to one million downloads and views per month, according to Herbert. I spoke with them as they prepared for the Phoenix, AZ leg of their \u201cF*ck Elon Tour<\/a>,\u201d live nights of Herbert interviewing Bitcoin thought leaders and Keiser performing standup routines in which he impersonates central bankers in skimpy clothing. <\/p>\n

Since participating in the first-ever Bitcoin conference in 2011, Keiser has become Bitcoin\u2019s most reliably-outrageous maximalist, someone who can raise the energy in a room like few others who have as much knowledge and commitment to what is ultimately an open-source software project.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just channeling the energy of the audience and the audience wants to release, the audience wants to have kind of a Bitcoin orgasm and I can feel it in the air,\u201d Keiser explains of his live stage persona. \u201cAnd I\u2019m assisting in their, essentially in their coming, simultaneously with this massive Bitcoin orgasm. I\u2019m just there to help that orgasm happen, so I can just feel it in the air and let it happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Herbert said that her process is more research-focused and centered on juxtaposing international headlines with historical precedence, and she certainly seems to focus Keiser\u2019s messages when they share a platform. <\/p>\n

Between the two of them, it\u2019s clear that their media products are impacting people around the globe. As Alex Gladstein<\/a> recently reported for Bitcoin Magazine<\/em><\/a>, the \u201cKeiser Report\u201d serves as a \u201cTrojan horse of sorts, reaching a large number of Cubans and Venezuelans through state programming and onboarding them into the new Bitcoin economy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Living The Bitcoin Lifestyle<\/h2>\n

In many ways, the couple offer a living definition of the Bitcoin lifestyle \u2014 traveling the world, regularly talking about and actively trying to convert others to Bitcoin adoption, and essentially viewing every component of life through the lens of this transformative technology. Promoting that lifestyle appears to be the common thread through their podcast, broadcast work and live productions, and they\u2019re optimistic about its power as a cultural force.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re at a point where the Bitcoin lifestyle becomes more the dominant zeitgeist,\u201d Keiser said. \u201cWe\u2019ve lived through several periods of cultural revolution. I\u2019ve been through a few, the internet and the \u201990s was a cultural revolution\u2026 And then, going back to the \u201960s, of course\u2026 I think Bitcoin is this next and best, final and ultimately the winner in terms of preserving that freedom revolution that we\u2019ve experienced a few times before.\u201d<\/p>\n

With their unique combination of outrageous and informative content, delivery of anti-fiat messages on state-sponsored platforms, and reputation as broadcast journalists obsessed with Bitcoin memes, Herbert and Keiser seem to embody the current state of hyperbitcoinization \u2014 the process by which Bitcoin grows into the world\u2019s value system. Some may foresee this process as one that ends with Bitcoiners holed up in fortified citadels as the fiat-based world around them crumbles. But Herbert sees the process involving adoption by the powers that be as the fiat world steadily declines and Bitcoin enables more egalitarianism.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be through orange pilling those powers because because hyperbitcoinization is happening right now, it\u2019s in El Salvador, it\u2019s in the \u2018Orange Pill Podcast\u2019 Telegram group,\u201d she said. \u201cYou saw it at Bitcoin 2021, when somebody like Chamath [Palihapitiya]<\/a> who\u2019s a billionaire comes in and says, \u2018Hey, I\u2019m a billionaire, I know what I\u2019m talking about, listen to me.\u2019 And the plebs go \u2018fuck you\u2019 and he\u2019s off the stage. That\u2019s remarkable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Keiser, as always, was a bit more cosmic when discussing his vision for the Bitcoin future.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery block syncs up everything that\u2019s ever happening in the past and gives us the possibility of there being a mysterious future, because you never know where the difficulty adjustment\u2019s going to land,\u201d he said. \u201cSo, everything before us is mysterious, everything behind us is completely on the blockchain and unchangeable. And that gives us the ability to exist in the ever-present now, the infinite now. And now we\u2019re entering that gravity well, we\u2019ve crossed over the Bitcoin singularity, we\u2019re heading now to that point of the face of God, as I like to call it. We\u2019re about to find out why we\u2019re here and that\u2019s incredibly interesting.\u201d<\/p>\n

It may not be certain exactly how hyperbitcoinization will continue to unfold. But as it does, you can count on Herbert and Keiser to lead the march, holding hands the whole way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With media careers spanning decades and utterly maximalist outlooks, Stacy Herbert and Max Keiser are defining the Bitcoin lifestyle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2705,"featured_media":14966,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[1590,1274,260],"class_list":{"0":"post-14965","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-culture","8":"tag-max-keiser","9":"tag-orange-pill","10":"tag-stacy-herbert"},"author_data":{"id":2705,"name":"Peter Chawaga","nicename":"peter-chawaga","avatar_url":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/peterc-96x96.jpg"},"featured_image_url":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/max-keiser-stacy-herbert.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2705"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}