{"podcast":{"title":"Complex Systems with Patrick McKenzie (patio11)","slug":"complex-systems-with-patrick-mckenzie-patio11-6944962","podcast_index_feed_id":6944962,"rss_url":"https://feeds.transistor.fm/complex-systems-with-patrick-mckenzie-patio11","website_url":"https://www.complexsystemspodcast.com","image_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/daBTNOHQVDwsyvBT5Y1dmtX8J3KGSjYDycHstNU2MOw/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:1400/h:1400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS8zMzM5/OTY4ZTE5ODVjZjk0/MzhhZWEzMjRmZjdm/ZWNhYS5wbmc.jpg","author":"Patrick McKenzie","episode_count":97,"summary":"We live in a world where our civilization and daily lives depend upon institutions, infrastructure, and technological substrates that are _complicated_ but not _unknowable_. Join Patrick McKenzie (patio11) as he discusses how decisions, technology, culture, and incentives shape our finance, technology, government, and more, with the people who built (and build) those Complex Systems.","last_synced_at":"2026-07-16T16:19:13.615743+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/complex-systems-with-patrick-mckenzie-patio11-6944962"},"episode":{"title":"Secrets designed to be divulged and other payment oddities","slug":"secrets-designed-to-be-divulged-and-other-payment-oddities","published_at":"2026-03-05T08:37:46+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/complex-systems-with-patrick-mckenzie-patio11-6944962/secrets-designed-to-be-divulged-and-other-payment-oddities","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/complex-systems-with-patrick-mckenzie-patio11-6944962","url":"https://www.complexsystemspodcast.com/secondary-auth/","audio_url":"https://pscrb.fm/rss/p/prfx.byspotify.com/e/media.transistor.fm/6f369f68/a3219c0b.mp3","summary":"Patrick McKenzie (patio11) deconstructs the \"original sin\" of payments: building a global financial substrate on shared secrets that were distributed promiscuously to function. He examines the multi-decade game of Whack-a-Mole played by the industry to balance the \"optimal amount of fraud\" against the catastrophic conversion hit of high-friction security. From the physical failure of terminal buttons to the smartphone finally solving the lifecycle problem of cryptographic tokens, Patrick explores the technical and social reasons why we’ve moved from \"something you know\" to the \"continuity of access\" provided by the device in your pocket. – Full transcript available here: www.complexsystemspodcast.com/secondary-auth/ – Presenting Sponsors: Mercury & Granola If you have more interesting hobbies than managing your money, Mercury Personal is built for you. It allows you to automate movement between accounts—allocating paychecks and tax prep the moment they hit—with a sensible permissions model for partners or accountants. It works the way tech people expect banking to work. Go to mercury.com/personal to experience banking built by the same folks Patrick trusts for his business. If meetings consistently leave you with hazy action items and lost context, Granola handles the transcription so you can actually participate and gives you searchable notes afterward. Try it free at granola.ai/complexsystems with code COMPLEXSYSTEMS – Links: Bits about Money: https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/ Emily Sands on Complex Systems: https://www.complexsystemspodcast.com/episodes/the-past-present-and-future-of-ai-with-stripe/ – Timestamps: (00:00) Intro (01:32) Publishing the shared secret… again (03:39) Manufacturing shared secrets at scale (07:51) Something you own, take one (10:10) Spons…","meta_description":"Patrick McKenzie (patio11) deconstructs the \"original sin\" of payments: building a global financial substrate on shared secrets that were distributed prom…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":1530,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/complex-systems-with-patrick-mckenzie-patio11-6944962/episodes/secrets-designed-to-be-divulged-and-other-payment-oddities/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/complex-systems-with-patrick-mckenzie-patio11-6944962/secrets-designed-to-be-divulged-and-other-payment-oddities.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}