Joe Rogan Experience #2214 - Shane Smith

Shane Smith joins Joe Rogan to talk about why he started a new podcast after tiring of being on the outside looking in, and how Vice grew too big and got 'go woke go broke.' The pair bond over a shared philosophy that keeping a media operation tiny and fun beats scaling up into staff, hassle, and resentment. They range across the Deep State and political assassinations, money and happiness, and the looming upheaval from AI and quantum computing, including universal basic income and the need to rethink education and purpose. The back half dives into aliens, Bob Lazar, consciousness and the soul, then a long, balanced wrestle with the facts of immigration and how social media now writes policy.

• Shane describes Vice's decline as a textbook 'go woke go broke' story and media consolidation crushing independent outlets.
  00:11:28
• Shane reveals he went from being Vice's largest shareholder to owning nothing, losing the most of anyone.
  00:35:24
• Shane bought Johnny Cash's one-of-a-kind 1969 ABC Rolls-Royce and converted it into a Tesla.
  00:22:28
• Both agree universal basic income is inevitable as AI automates human endeavor, but warn of lost purpose and a permanent underclass on the Dole.
  00:48:58
• Story of how the FBI hid microphones in hubcaps to record mob boss Jimmy 'the Chin' Gigante as he walked the street feigning dementia.
  01:23:40
• Joe and Shane warn quantum computing plus AI will break all digital encryption, threatening Bitcoin, credit cards, and financial security.
  01:29:50
• Discussion of Bob Lazar's claim aliens viewed humans as 'vessels' or 'containers for souls,' tied to a theory about hybrid biological-digital life.
  01:44:51
• Joe argues illegal immigrants are being shipped to swing states as a voter strategy; Shane says he can't confirm but it could be a strategy.
  02:18:28

• Shane built Vice city by city in Italy, Sweden and elsewhere, living locally for six months at a time to launch each edition.
  00:07:18
• Vice once filmed a family who fled Stalin into Siberia and lived self-sufficiently for ~80 years, making shoes from bark.
  00:09:55
• Joe owns a 1969 Nova with 1969 Camaro fenders and a supercharged LT4 engine, restomodded by Steve Strope.
  00:30:12
• A New York Times critic wrote a negative review of Brooklyn's classic Peter Luger Steakhouse, which both consider sensational.
  00:44:12
• Israel's Hezbollah pager operation involved intercepting an analog pager shipment and detonating them simultaneously after waiting months.
  01:24:11
• Pegasus 2 spyware reportedly only needs your phone number; a claimed counter is turning your phone off repeatedly.
  01:25:45
• Physicist Taylor Wilson built a functioning fusion reactor in his Reno garage at age 13 and refined his own yellowcake uranium.
  01:40:11
• Scientists used 'photon digital holography' to image two quantum-entangled photons appearing as a yin-yang symbol.
  01:59:54
• The James Webb telescope found hundreds of unexplained 'little red dots' in the ancient universe, suggesting it may be far older than thought.
  02:04:34
• Joe and Shane note nicotine and creatine both function as legitimate nootropics that positively affect cognitive function.
  02:07:07