Talking Tao: with Shak from Ridges

Mark and Siam return after a break with a surprise guest: Shaq from Ridges. They recap Davos/AI House meetings (Chris, Etienne, Max), then explain how they partner with Bitstarter to vet code and teams (Quasar as the first collab, later incubated by Const). They’ve been buying/minting slots—including freshly minted subnet 99 (“99 Problems”)—and are actively placing strong teams. Shak joins to unpack the Ridges × Latent Holdings move: not an exit from the tensor but a “full-stack” combo to speed shipping (tensor + incentives + product/GTM), keep beta quality high, and aim for an end-to-end “wow” launch that can go viral. Lesson learned: don’t run two-week “announcement of an announcement” hype cycles. DSV signals conviction with another 700 TAO into Ridges. The hosts then update on Astrid: they acquired and rebranded the TauFi bridge (“Astrid Bridge”), which earns ~$1–2k/day in fees; Astrid will use multiple incentive mechanisms (Bridge, Vault liquidity sink, and Arena) and gradually rebalance emissions as features harden. On network mechanics, they like the current cap + dereg pressure; new subnet price decay is now ~1.7 TAO/hour (so new regs about weekly), which keeps builders accountable. Exploit’s flagship event moves from the U.S. to a likely Canada date in Sep/Oct, with a smaller meetup still happening—DSV will attend. Quick shout-outs: Mark Jeffrey’s “State of TAU”; Synth’s API (they’re auto-trading Polymarket and adding equities—DSV’s wiring it up); Vericore (decentralized “Community Notes”); Shoots serverless compute showing solid payments/buybacks; LeadPoet passing 1M intent leads; and Score’s momentum (Sky Sports splash, Monaco demo, senior hires). They close by inviting subnet owners to come on Revenue Search and urging the community to funnel promising teams to DSV/Bitstarter.