Visionary Ventures & The AI-Native Avant-Garde with William Morgan of Restless Egg

Today’s guest is William Morgan, the co-founder of Restless Egg, a London-based incubator and accelerator designed specifically for a new class of “artist-founders” whose work synthesizes art, technology, and commercial product design.His thesis: The tech sector’s obsession with optimization can’t help us discover the genuinely novel forms of human experience that this intelligent substrate makes possible. If we want something truly better, we need to cultivate the taste and discernment to know which futures are worth living in — and radically expand our imagination regarding what human-machine relationships can actually look like.✨ Become a founding member to access my online courses, including Jurassic Worlding and How To Live In The Future✨ Browse and buy the books we mention on the show at Bookshop.org✨ Stream and download my music at artist-owned (!) Subvert.fm✨ Learn about Atlas Research Group, my new team building sovereign infrastructure for social coherence and collective intelligence.Chapters00:00 Teaser: Taste & Sovereign Choice02:46 Intro 06:41 Meet William Morgan 08:05 The Origins of The Avant-Garde 10:09 Taste and Abundance 12:12 Luxury Tech and Experience 15:57 Why Experiment? 20:21 Venture Models and Niches 25:20 The Sense Organs of Society 30:51 Rethinking Venture Incentives 38:54 Slop and Subculture Rebellion 47:13 Beyond “In” or “Out” 50:51 Founder Experiments Showcase 57:03 Scenius is Real ValueMentionedRestless Egg’s Half Dozen NewsletterArt Is Everything You Don’t Have To Do by Cory DoctorowThe Usefulness of Useless Knowledge by Abraham FlexnerThis collective is radically rethinking what it means to make art by Thom Waite at Dazed DigitalThe Dimensions of Experience by Andrew P. SmithMount Analogue  by René DaumalThe Nerves of Government  by Karl DeutschWhy Software is Eating The World by Marc AndreessenY Combinator’s Simple Agreement for Future EquityCommon As Airby Lewis HydeStanding by Wordsby Wendell BerryRight Story, Wrong Storyby Tyson YunkaportaFall by Neal StephensonThe Politics of Visionby Lydia NochlinThe Key to Science Fictionby Damien WalterFlora WeilAntithykeraCCRULuciana ParisiGeorge BatailleMatthew David Segall This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit michaelgarfield.substack.com/subscribe