Episode Description
In this episode, Jake sits down with David Walters - founder and CEO of Streamr, a platform designed to let creators record, engage, and distribute content across every major audio and video destination from one centralized hub. David talks about the fragmented creator landscape that inspired Streamr, and why the convergence of video and audio podcasting was a trend he saw coming long before Apple, Amazon, and iHeart followed suit.
But the conversation quickly expands beyond the product. David opens up about growing up in a deeply religious Jamaican evangelical household, navigating his queerness inside a faith tradition that left no room for it, and how separating his sense of self from doctrine became the foundation for everything he's built since. His career arc- from news producer at NBC, MSNBC, and Peacock to tech CEO- is a story about backing into an identity and claiming it fully.
David also shares his work as Director of Partnerships and Operations at the Stonewall Inn Gives Back Initiative, the first and only nonprofit of the Stonewall Inn, and leaves us with a clear-eyed charge: queer people of color, neurodivergent folks, immigrants, and all those outside the dominant cultural structure need more space to tell their stories, and the tools to do it safely and loudly.