One of GritCult's podcast guest appearances. For the full list, see Podcast appearances.
| etn. | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Episode | |
| Show | etn. |
| Host | etn. presenters |
| Released | March 2026 |
| Length | 3:00:01 |
| Watch | YouTube |
Lovable $400M, Revolut Licensed, EF $200M, GRITCULT Joins is an episode of etn., hosted by etn. presenters, with GritCult as the guest (March 2026). GritCult's first spot on etn., the European Technology Network's live show, billed as its first anonymous interview. He makes the bull case for London, argues against doomerism and explains why he stays faceless.
Summary
The European Technology Network brought GritCult on at the end of a three-hour live stream, introducing him as the show's first anonymous guest. The presenters wanted to talk about his essay The Bull Case for London, which they credit with starting the London Maxing trend on X. He says it began when he saw good news about London on his timeline, with AI companies moving there, after years of doomsday talk about the city that he puts down partly to a "Dubai cabal" and that the mood on the ground did not bear out. Alongside the AI labs, he points to a world moving towards multipolarity. The point, he says, was a good situation coming that nobody else was talking about.
His case rests on variety rather than any single industry. He describes events every day, hackathons every week and a graduate pipeline he says is tilting from finance towards tech, then sets fashion, art, film and tech side by side as a melting pot that a monoculture cannot match. The practical advice follows: build everything with a social presence, go to events even when they feel awkward, and talk to people outside one's own lane, because in a monoculture people follow the trend and lose their edge. He adds that much of his posting is aimed squarely at doomerism, since building anything needs a latent optimism.
On writing he offers the line he would repeat on his return in April: quantity is a quality of its own. He puts his output at probably over 100,000 posts and more than 500 threads and articles, admits he hated English at school, and argues that clear thinking on the page matters more now that AI does so much of the execution. Asked about crypto in Britain, he calls it a mixed bag, pointing to new tax rules and stablecoin regulation while conceding that developers are leaving the industry for AI. He closes on anonymity: partly the cypherpunk inheritance of Satoshi Nakamoto, partly because it builds mystique and is, by his own account, pretty funny.
Key moments
Timestamps link to that point in the episode.
- 2:46:00 An unpopular narrative
the UK is kind of positioned in a way where like there could be a really good situation coming that no one else is kind of talking about. It's not a popular narrative.
- 2:48:43 A melting pot of ideas
there is such a huge melting pot of different ideas that's not really been talked about.
- 2:49:04 Many vectors, not a monoculture
there's all these different vectors kind of coming in. Whereas in a lot of other cities, it's like a monoculture.
- 2:50:46 Build with a social presence
you should always try to build something with like a social presence and, you know, just like talk to more people.
- 2:51:48 Latent optimism
when you're building something, you need to have that like latent optimism in you. you need to have the ability to see a vision of a future that's better than the current present
- 2:53:31 Putting in the reps
quantity is a quality of its own. So you need to put in the reps. I've probably done over 100,000 posts altogether.
- 2:56:56 Developers drift to AI
across the entire industry like the amount of like developers actually has decreased and I think a lot of people are pivoting to AI
- 2:58:38 Anonymity builds mystique
the other aspect um is it's pretty cool. It's pretty funny. Um kind of builds mystique. So, I'm kind of playing into that.
Themes
- the bull case for London
- variety against monoculture
- optimism over doomerism
- volume as the route to good writing
- anonymity and cypherpunk culture