Recap · July 31, 2025 · 31:37
Tom Kysar: Advice for New Traders, Building in Crypto, and More | TG Podcast
The Signal
Tom Kysar looks back at building Augur, the early prediction-market experiment whose ideas he thinks Polymarket has finally made usable. The conversation ranges from crypto's old power users and the limits of political betting to a more personal trading posture: accept where your edge has faded, take simple directional exposure, and build equity in work that compounds.
Key Takeaways
- 01
AUGUR WAS EARLY
Kysar spent roughly seven-and-a-half years on Augur, which he describes as the first Ethereum ICO and a foundational, if imperfect, prediction-market product.
- 02
POLYMARKET HAS THE PRODUCT LEAD
He calls Polymarket the likely ultimate prediction-market winner, while arguing that long-term traction requires markets beyond elections.
- 03
LIQUIDITY MAKES BELIEFS TRADEABLE
His ideal is a liquid market where people can express, hedge and profit from specific views about the world.
- 04
OLD CRYPTO WAS SMALL AND INTENSE
Augur's power users included people keeping 25,000 ETH in hot wallets and taking the other side of sharp public arguments.
- 05
KNOW WHEN YOUR EDGE CHANGES
Kysar says he no longer keeps up with new trading terminals and instead waits for broader sentiment before taking directional Solana exposure.
On the Record
“PolyMarket, I think, is like the ultimate prediction market winner.”
“If you have these super liquid markets, it would allow you to get exposure on any of your opinions and beliefs, profit on it.”
“DeFi summer, I was a winner. Today in the trenches, I'm a loser, man. I can't do this anymore.”
The Breakdown
A non-engineer at Augur
Kysar begins with the project that occupied roughly seven-and-a-half to eight years of his life: Augur. He was the only non-engineer on a team working through the academic and functional problems of decentralized prediction markets. In retrospect, he says much of that work will be useful, even though the product itself never found the simplicity or traction that later entrants have achieved.
The first Ethereum ICO
Threadguy asks about Augur's place in crypto history. Kysar confirms that it was technically the first ETH ICO, although much of the raise came in Bitcoin. He recalls an era before today's polished onchain tools, when basic trading and privacy workflows could be awkward. The project nevertheless gave early users a way to test an idea that remains compelling: a market for uncertain outcomes.
Why political markets are not enough
Kysar calls Polymarket the current winner, but says a political-betting boom has an obvious cadence problem. Elections create extraordinary interest once every four years, followed by quieter years and the question of what users should trade instead. A binary market offering a possible 50% gain also competes with crypto assets that can move far more aggressively, which complicates regular usage.
Sharp people on both sides
The early Augur community was small, highly online and financially unusual. Kysar compares its best interactions to two sharp people on Twitter publicly disagreeing and then taking action against each other. Some power users arrived with hot wallets holding around 25,000 ETH. That intensity made the market intellectually lively, but it did not by itself solve the problem of broad consumer demand.
The enduring prediction-market case
Despite Augur's outcome, Kysar still believes prediction markets can be useful. He says sharp, risk-oriented people respond to the grand vision: very liquid markets would let a participant gain exposure to an opinion or belief and profit if it proves right. The same mechanism could produce an information signal, provided the markets become deep enough and resolution remains credible.
A crypto castle and changing careers
The discussion detours through the old San Francisco crypto scene, including a crowded Potrero Hill house Kysar and friends called the crypto castle. He mentions friend George Hotz's comma.ai, an aftermarket self-driving product mounted like a phone in a car. The anecdote captures a time when small groups of industry people lived and built around one another before today’s larger institutions took over.
Trading after the trenches
Kysar is candid that his old trading edge has changed. New terminals and fast-moving trends no longer feel like a game he can win every day, so he waits for sentiment to improve and then takes broad directional Solana exposure through exchanges. His advice to Threadguy is more durable: keep building equity in a thing that compounds. He says a media career can produce an unexpectedly large outcome if the work continues.
Distilled from the episode transcript · Counterparty Recap Desk
