# Illia Polosukhin: Why AI Agents Are Still Useless (And What Fixes Them) | NEAR Founder on IronClaw

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/bankless-357756/illia-polosukhin-why-ai-agents-are-still-useless-and-what-fixes-them-near-founder-on-ironclaw
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/bankless-357756/illia-polosukhin-why-ai-agents-are-still-useless-and-what-fixes-them-near-founder-on-ironclaw.md
Podcast: [Bankless](https://stenobird.com/podcast/bankless-357756)
Published: 2026-03-24T10:30:00+00:00
Episode link: https://episode.flightcast.com/01KME4776P39W2WYC64SQMCAZN.mp3
Audio file: https://episode.flightcast.com/01KME4776P39W2WYC64SQMCAZN.mp3
Processing state: not_requested
JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/bankless-357756/episodes/illia-polosukhin-why-ai-agents-are-still-useless-and-what-fixes-them-near-founder-on-ironclaw
Duration seconds: 4667

## Resource

NEAR founder and Transformer co-author Illia Polosukhin joins us to break down why today’s AI agents still fall short, what’s missing to make them actually useful, and how IronClaw could unlock secure, private, autonomous AI. We also explore Illia’s bigger thesis: AI becomes the interface, blockchains become the backend, and both reshape how humans, agents, and digital markets interact. ------ 📣SPOTIFY PREMIUM RSS FEED | USE CODE: SPOTIFY24 https://bankless.cc/spotify-premium ------ 🔮POLYMARKET | #1 PREDICTION MARKET https://bankless.cc/polymarket-podcast 🪐GALAXY | INSTITUTIONAL DIGITAL FINANCE https://bankless.cc/galaxy-podcast 🏅BITGET TRADFI | TRADE GOLD WITH USDT https://bankless.cc/bitget 🎯THE DEFI REPORT | ONCHAIN INSIGHTS https://thedefireport.io/bankless 🐇MEGAETH | 1ST REAL-TIME BLOCKCHAIN https://bankless.cc/megaeth ------ TIMESTAMPS 0:00 Intro 0:43 Illia’s AI Journey 8:19 AI x Blockchain Operating Systems 14:40 Will Humans & AIs Use the Same Systems? 18:20 Why Are AI Agents Still Useless? 28:54 AI Agent Privacy Concerns 35:30 IronClaw Privacy 39:21 AI Agent Limitations 47:00 Context Constraints 53:42 Will Small Teams Win? 57:16 Autonomous Agents & Businesses 1:01:00 Digital Life Forms? 1:02:42 e/acc Vs d/acc 1:09:44 Why isn’t AI Crypto-Pilled 1:14:31 Advice for Builders 1:18:30 Closing & Disclaimers ------ RESOURCES Illia https://x.com/ilblackdragon IronClaw https://agent.near.ai/ NEAR https://www.near.org/ Attention is All You Need https://arxiv.org/html/1706.03762v7 ------ Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here: https://www.bankless.com/disclosures⁠

## Actions

- request_transcript: `POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/bankless-357756/episodes/illia-polosukhin-why-ai-agents-are-still-useless-and-what-fixes-them-near-founder-on-ironclaw/transcription-requests` — Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode.
- read_markdown: `GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/bankless-357756/illia-polosukhin-why-ai-agents-are-still-useless-and-what-fixes-them-near-founder-on-ironclaw.md` — Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource.

A page view does not enqueue transcription. Agents should invoke `request_transcript` explicitly when they need this episode processed.

## Transcript

Full transcripts are not published on public pages unless there is a clear rights basis.