Hi search engine listeners this is PJ Vote. I hope you're having a cool summer.

Over the next four weeks I want to take you back in time to a very strange moment in our very recent history.

The year was 2022. The prices of various

of various cryptocurrencies had smashed through the ozone layer and if you were trying

to figure out what was going on and you went online, you'd encounter two kinds of people.

Either a person claiming to have gotten rich off crypto, telling you to buy now before it was too late,

or one of the people who overnight had amassed large online

followings by relentlessly explaining how all of this was a farce,

a bunch of planet-burning scammers trying to separate you from your money

with useless Ponzi technology.

As a person who just wanted to understand what was happening and why,

I found the internet even less useful than usual,

so we decided to do our own research. I didn't want to know if

crypto was good or bad. I mean it was internet money. What I wanted to know was

why this was happening. What if anything it meant for a society to suddenly both

worship and feud over internet money? The result was a nine-part series called

crypto island. That miniseries was also the precursor to Search Engine,

where we found the voice for this show.

We tried to strengthen our capacity

to be curious and open-minded in the face of a polarizing topic.

And in the process, we found some great stories.

Classic internet capers in a lysergic new chapter of life online.

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