Coffeezilla: SBF, FTX, Fraud, Scams, Fake Gurus, Money, Fame, and Power | Lex Fridman Podcast #345

Do you think he is incompetent, insane, or evil? The following is a conversation with Coffeezilla, an investigator and journalist exposing frauds, scams, and fake gurus. He's one of the most important journalistic voices we have working today, both in terms of his integrity and fearlessness, and the pursuit of truth. Please follow, watch, and support his work at youtube.com/coffeezilla. This is the Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description, and now, dear friends, here's Coffeezilla. How do you like your coffee? Dark and soul-crushing? That was the, uh, number one question on the internet.

(laughs)

Do you like your coffee to reverberate deeply through the worst of human nature? Is that how you drink your coffee?

I've gone through a lot of phases on coffee.

Yeah.

I used to, in college, I would go super deep into, you know, grinding fresh beans, all of that kind of stuff, water temperature exactly right, and then I hit a phase where I was just, it was the maintenance dose, then I went to, like, espresso because I could get a lot more in.

Yeah.

And now I go through phases of, like, sometimes I like it with a little oat milk, sometimes a little half and half and sugar if I'm feeling-

Oh, you've gotten soft in your old age.

I've gotten a little, I, I have. But hey, if I'm doing a SBF interview, it's black that day, nothing less.

Yeah.

Just black, no sugar.

The lights go down. Wha- what do you actually do in that, in those situations, like, uh, leading up to a show? Do you get hyped up? Like, how do you put yourself in the right mind space to explore some of these really difficult topics?

I think a lot of it's preparation and then once it happens, it's mostly fueled by sort of adrenaline, I would say. Um, I really deeply care about getting to, like, the root cause of some of these issues because I think so often people in positions of power are let off the hook, so I really care about holding their feet to the fire and it translates into, like, a lot of energy the day of. So I, I never find myself, like, funny enough, I usually drink a lot of caffeine leading up to the interview and then I try to drink, like, minimum the day of because I have so much adrenaline I don't wanna be, like, hyper stimulated.

I have to say, uh, of all the recent guests I've had, the energy you, you had when you walked into the door... (laughs) Was pretty intense.

I'm excited!

...was crazy.

Are people not excited that you're here?

(laughs) I don't know. I think they are scared.

Hey, you're a big deal, Lex.

I th- I think they're scared.