What if the real crisis in our financial system isn't a hack, a crash, or a currency war, but the erosion of the social contract that money was built on?

In today’s anthropology of technology episode, we explore the harder question of not just how money works, but what it actually is, and whether the system we've inherited and are building upon will serve us in the next era.

From Marcel Mauss's gift economies to the Bitcoin whitepaper, we trace the long human history of value and exchange. Then we look forward to what decentralised finance, CBDCs, open banking, and ambient AI-embedded infrastructure could mean for everyday people, not just early adopters.

The future of money isn't a technology question, but about what we value and how we relate to each other.