NEXT.io Podcast

🎙️NEXTPredict Podcast #5 with Rebecca Kossnick, Co-founder & CEO at HypernaturalBefore Kalshi. Before Polymarket. Before prediction markets were on the front page of every newspaper, Meta built one.In 2020, a small team inside Facebook launched a product called Forecast. No real money, just points and public reputation. Every forecast was made public. And it was, by any measure, remarkably accurate.Rebecca Kossnick joins Pierre on the NEXTPredict Podcast to tell the full inside story and to explain why Meta is now building a second one, called Arena.⏰ Timestamps:00:00 - Intro01:04 - Welcoming Rebecca Kossnick01:30 - How Forecast got started inside Facebook's team03:30 - Launching in April 2020 and the first wave of users07:29 - The status problem Forecast was solving10:52 - The challenges: explaining probabilities to users in 201915:47 - The grand vision18:30 - Why Forecast didn't survive 23:48 - Hypernatural: the AI video company Rebecca and Taylor built next25:43 - Where prediction markets and AI video collide27:36 - Opportunity or problem?30:18 - Where does Rebecca see Hypernatural in three years?NYC Summit - NEXTPredict October 22 - 23, 2026 at Convene 30 Hudson Yards.🎟 Get your tickets here: https://nextpredict.io/summits/the-worlds-prediction-markets-summit/🔔 SUBSCRIBE TO THE PODCASTSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/409DefE06IKPhZzhDIDpH3?si=06a0ceb6be594746Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/es/podcast/next-io-podcast/id1515442333?l=en-GBCONNECT WITH NEXTPredict ✩ Website: https://nextpredict.io/

🎙️ NEXT.io Podcast #268 with Michael Pedersen, CEO of Swivel Gaming In this episode of the NEXT.io Podcast, Michael Pedersen — CEO of Swivel Gaming and one of the most experienced operators in the emerging verticals space — maps out the four products quietly reshaping the iGaming industry: sweepstakes, card rips, prediction markets and ADW.Swivel has been building in this space for five years. Michael took over as CEO in March and relaunched the business around exactly these verticals. In this conversation he goes through each one in depth: what it is, where the opportunity is, and where it falls short.⏰ Timestamps:00:00 - Intro00:36 - Sponsors03:41 - Welcoming Michael Pedersen 03:50 - Why Swivel doubled down on emerging verticals06:26 - How many emerging verticals actually exist?08:19 - Legal opinions vs. regulators 11:08 - Sweepstakes:dying or still growing?16:15 - The sweepstakes player vs. the iGaming player20:04 - Can sweepstakes work outside the US?23:22 - Card rips: what is it and why is it blowing up?31:55 - How complex is card rips for operators?39:26 - Prediction markets: the iGaming operator perspective44:39 - The ProphetX partnership explained52:27 - ADW explained: a slot machine powered by a real horse race56:08 - The challenges with ADW margins01:00:15 - Are there more emerging verticals on the horizon?01:06:12 - Emerging verticals are like social media platforms01:07:37 - "iGaming now feels old school"01:08:17 - Where will Swivel be in three years?🔔 SUBSCRIBE TO THE PODCASTSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/409DefE06IKPhZzhDIDpH3?si=dcdf9b8d400e479aApple: https://podcasts.apple.com/es/podcast/next-io-podcast/id1515442333?l=en-GBCONNECT WITH NEXT.IO✩ Website: https://next.io/This episode of NEXT.io is brought to you by:Pragmatic Solutions – Leading iGaming platform technologyhttps://pragmatic.solutions/Pragmatic Play – Industry-leading content providerhttps://www.pragmaticplay.com/en/Sponsored by:Hard Rock Games: https://www.hardrockgames.com/Creedroomz: https://www.creedroomz.com/

🎙️NEXTPredict Podcast #4 with Chuck Todd on the 2026 Midterms, Prediction Market Blind Spots & the Future of Political ForecastingChuck Todd spent three decades at NBC News as political director and moderator of Meet the Press. He now runs The Chuck ToddCast independently. He is also the official ambassador for NEXTPredict New York, taking place October 22-23.In this episode, Pierre sits down with Chuck to do something very few people are qualified to do: speak to both the political reality and the prediction market picture at the same time and point out exactly where the two come apart.⏰ Timestamps:00:00 - Intro00:39 - Welcoming Chuck Todd01:51 - Are we really living in unprecedented times?06:03 - What actually unites American politics11:46 - The midterms: pattern repeating or something different?13:25 - "Blue wave or blue tsunami?" 15:48 - The agricultural tariff story nobody is covering17:42 - The Trump voter tunes in much later19:00 - Texas: the race that could reshape American politics24:21 - The youth turnout problem29:05 - Trump making it about himself — mistake or only play left?31:30 - The Iran war: fractures inside the Republican coalition34:24 - Unpopular wars as political undoing36:38 - The Pete Hagseth impeachment vote38:34 - The Democratic Party: no leader, no alignment39:45 - Michigan as the decider44:04 - The rise of the democratic socialist movement45:05 - The K-shaped economy47:46 - Will the midterms happen on time?49:40 - The real risk is not the election. It's the certification.51:12 - Leaving NBC: the pressure from corporate boardrooms was real56:07 - What Chuck wants to learn at NEXTPredict NYCNYC Summit - NEXTPredict October 22 - 23, 2026 at Convene 30 Hudson Yards.🎟 Get your tickets here: https://nextpredict.io/summits/the-worlds-prediction-markets-summit/🔔 SUBSCRIBE TO THE PODCASTSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/409DefE06IKPhZzhDIDpH3?si=06a0ceb6be594746Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/es/podcast/next-io-podcast/id1515442333?l=en-GBCONNECT WITH NEXTPredict ✩ Website: https://nextpredict.io/

🎙️NEXTPredict Podcast #3 with JB Mackenzie, General Manager & VP Futures & International at Robinhood.Two years ago, Robinhood launched one prediction market on one election night.Today it's their second biggest revenue line — bigger than crypto, bigger than equities. Over 2 million customers have traded a prediction market on Robinhood, and the industry has gone from 3 CFTC-regulated exchanges to over 22 in the same period.JB Mackenzie, VP and General Manager of Futures and Prediction Markets at Robinhood, joins Pierre on the NextPredict Podcast to go under the hood on how this happened — and where it goes next.⏰ Timestamps:00:00 - Intro00:34 - JB welcome01:47 - The Sunday in London that started it all03:09 - When did this stop being a feature and start being a business?04:49 - Why Robinhood chose not to vertically integrate09:23 - From 3 exchanges to 22 11:19 - The crypto.com and OG partnership explained16:22 - The customer is the secret sauce.18:21 - It feels like a Sprint but it's a Marathon19:52 - Prediction markets: now Robinhood's second biggest revenue line22:26 - "Prediction markets wasn't the plan"24:23 - Sports is the headline. 27:17 - Will prediction markets replace the insurance industry?30:29 - The #1 thing holding prediction markets back33:31 - The midterms: Robinhood's election hub explained35:04 - Where does this space look in 2029?36:02 - Prediction markets as financial educationNYC Summit - NEXTPredict October 22 - 23, 2026 at Convene 30 Hudson Yards.🎟 Get your tickets here: https://nextpredict.io/summits/the-worlds-prediction-markets-summit/ 🔔 SUBSCRIBE TO THE PODCASTSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/409DefE Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... CONNECT WITH NEXTPredict ✩ Website: https://nextpredict.io/

🎙️NEXTPredict Podcast #2 with Jan Czarnocki, Chief of Staff and General Counsel at ElasticsIn this episode of the NextPredict Podcast, Jan Czarnocki — Chief of Staff and General Counsel at Elastics, and one of the first angel investors in the company — shares a ground-level view of what prediction markets actually look like from the inside.Elastics is building an AI-powered trading terminal for prediction markets, designed to give serious traders one place for research, execution, automation and portfolio management across Polymarket, Kalshi and beyond.⏰ Timestamps:00:00 - Intro00:43 - Who is Jan Czarnocki and what is Elastics?01:28 - The biggest structural problem 03:37 - Sharps vs. fish: who is actually on prediction markets?06:12 - The poker boom parallel 08:20 - Losing money on geopolitics markets10:57 - How Next.io hedged its own conference on a prediction market12:37 - Prediction markets vs. insurance15:39 - AI trading assistant for everyone18:29 - Are AI bots actually profitable on prediction markets?22:26 - Why Elastics augments sharps instead of replacing them23:51 - Is the playing field levelling between retail and institutional traders?26:23 - The vibe coding debate 31:53 - What will be Elastics' killer feature?34:50 - Prediction market space in 3 years39:47 - The big vision: one terminal for all serious traders 🔔 SUBSCRIBE TO THE PODCAST Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/409DefE Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... CONNECT WITH NEXTPredict ✩ Website: https://nextpredict.io/