Please enable JS and disable any ad blocker Your Ads Privacy ChoicesIMDb Salomon & Ludwin is headquartered at 1401 Gaskins Road in the West End A legal battle between two local financial advisory firms has taken a detour into federal appeals court before the original case has even had a chance to fully play out and their new firm Founder Grove Wealth Partners filed an appeal earlier this month to challenge U.S District Court Judge Henry Hudson’s decision to issue an extended injunction that limits their ability to solicit clients from their former employer That injunction, issued last month is in place until a final judgment is reached in the initial case The injunction prevents the Founders Grove foursome from actively poaching S&L clients it does not prevent them from servicing any clients that have already come over from S&L nor does it prevent additional clients from moving their accounts to Founders Grove on their own the Founders Grove defendants claim Judge Hudson’s ruling is hurting their ability to run their new firm “The District Court’s preliminary injunction impedes Appellants’ ability to lawfully conduct their business and earn a living infringes upon First Amendment rights by restricting speech and causes customer confusion in making informed choices,” they argued in a filing in the Fourth Circuit of the U.S The initial lawsuit has been ongoing since late May, when S&L sued the Founders Grove foursome for allegedly stealing trade secrets and wrongfully soliciting clients after their abrupt resignation days earlier They’ve since lured more than 400 S&L client accounts to Founders Grove amounting to more than $352 million in client assets S&L had $1.7 billion in client assets under management prior to the defendants’ departure Founders Grove Wealth Partners consists of (from left) Jen Thompson S&L has called the foursome’s actions a “brazen and unlawful raid” and alleges violations of the federal Defend Trade Secrets Act as well as the Virginia Uniform Trade Secrets Act and breach of duty of loyalty for the defendants’ forming their new firm while still employed at S&L The crux of the Founders Grove group’s defense hinges on the so-called “Broker Protocol,” a set of industry standards that guide financial advisors when jumping from one firm to another They’ve argued in the initial case that the protocol was designed to permit this sort of advisor and client movement and that they followed the provisions of the protocol with each step they took upon leaving S&L They claim they took only client information that is allowed by that protocol and claim they did not discuss their departure from S&L with clients until after they had formally resigned They continue to make that argument in their attempts to overturn the injunction “Appellants assert that they have fully complied with the Protocol which protects new firms and investment advisors during transitions S&L’s claims lack merit,” the appeal states they were authorized to use their respective Protocol List to contact and solicit the clients on their Protocol List to transition their business to Founder Grove.” The appeal argues that Hudson erred in several “critical ways.” they claim that the judge incorrectly found that the protocol’s ‘raiding’ exception likely applies in the S&L case Hudson’s injunction order showed he was wrestling with whether the defendants’ departure from S&L constituted raiding That term is loosely defined in the investment advisory industry but the protocol does provide for an exception if actual raiding is found to have occurred Hudson found that the defendants “acted with predation.” The appeal also argues that the protocol does not apply to Thompson and Sorenson who work on the admin side of the business and are not investment advisors They also disagree with Hudson’s opinion that they took S&L’s confidential information They maintain that they only took client names all of which is allowed under the protocol S&L claims the foursome had entered into employment contracts that included non-solicitation clauses that supersede the protocol while the Founders Grove defendants claim the protocol takes precedent over those employment contracts The Founders Grove group has asked that the appeals process be expedited and for the case to be heard potentially as soon as Oct The District Court case remains pending while the appeal is in process The Founders Grove group is represented in the appeal by Richmond attorney Henry Willett of law firm Christian & Barton Willett also represents them in the District Court case Henrico-based S&L was founded in 2009 by Dalal Salomon and Daniel Ludwin after they had spent years as part of Wells Fargo Advisors The defendants’ defection to Founders Grove marked the exit of four of S&L’s 12 employees Winters and Atwood were two of the firm’s four advisors Thompson and Sorenson were two of its four operations employees S&L is represented in the case by a group of attorneys from Washington 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He can be reached at michael@richmondbizsense.com or 804-855-1037 Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value" Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_2" ).setAttribute( "value" So when is a judge qualified to render a decision when a defendant or plaintiff questions the legality of the ruling This could go on for a year if the plaintiffs appeal the overturned ruling I noticed S&L is sending out more PR emails to its clients I haven’t been contacted by Founders Grove yet © 2025 Richmond BizSense - All Rights Reserved Update your browser to view this website correctly. Update my browser now × Sign In Subscribe Now This article was originally published 39 years ago on Tuesday Lude has been this area’s unofficial veterinarian Whether it’s the middle of the day or middle of the night Though never claiming to be a registered vet he’s doctored more animals than most can count he has also acquired an extensive knowledge of veterinary procedures Lude remembers how he fainted and fell into a creek the first time he saw a horse being castrated He also recalls helping with the first cesarean in the valley Lude says he’s seen many advances in the veterinary field and just as many changes in the territory around him The Proulx family first came up the North Thompson Valley in 1918 and in that same year moved their belongings by full horse team to settle in Blackpool They then moved to Kamloops for the early 1920’s and finally settled in Barriere around 1928 Lude says he spent the winter of ’29 in Langley but decided to return to Barriere for good in 1930 Through all these moves he was becoming more and more educated about working with animals though only ever received eight months of formal schooling Lude bought himself a farm on Boulder Mountain Road and at the age of 45 fate made it clear that Lude would not remain a bachelor whom he had met through a friend in Vancouver Together the couple are happy with their three daughters with the family continuously having to work hard at getting every penny out of their land Lude says because he was not a registered veterinarian he could not have any set rates for his services and monetary rewards were often not possible “Sometimes they would pay for the medicine and they would sometimes come to work for me or offer hay He was also more than just a good Samaritan as he Vinsulla and other areas to castrate horses and such – and most of those trips were made by horse.” a surprise 65th birthday and recognition party was held in his name Even a daughter who was living in Victoria at the time was able to come up as part of the surprise The event was held in the Fall Fair Hall and over 500 people were in attendance Lude was presented with a reclining chair and an envelope containing $400 – a pretty nice surprise Also presented was a very large cake topped with plastic animals of every sort Lude tells he had no idea what was going to happen and as he looked back on the event he commented and also cured hundreds of animals of everything from constipation to milk fever Lude is still doctoring animals of his own and other people and he still holds the same devotion for his work The people of Barriere and area hold a similar devotion for him The Proulx family continue to live on the Boulder Mountain Road farm Dialogue and debate are integral to a free society and we welcome and encourage you to share your views on the issues of the day. We ask that you be respectful of others and their points of view, refrain from personal attacks and stay on topic. To learn about our commenting policies and how our community-based moderation works, please read our Community Guidelines Jason and Charlotte Ludwin opened 13 Petals Roadside Stand last October next to their home on Mergner Road in Fort Johnson so the store is open weekday afternoons and weekends Jason and Charlotte Ludwin pause in the produce section of 13 Petals Roadside Stand which they opened last fall in Fort Johnson gifts and more: 13 Petals Roadside Stand is on Mergner Road in Fort Johnson Co-owner Jason Ludwin previously built custom cars in a garage on the property Greenery is displayed for sale under the natural greenery of Mergner Road in Fort Johnson where last fall Jason and Charlotte Ludwin opened 13 Petals Roadside Stand on a side lawn next to their house FORT JOHNSON — Jason Ludwin laughed as he used a garden hose to water some tomato plants and other greenery displayed for sale next to a metal garage whose sliding doors were closed “I used to build custom cars in there,” said the stocky man wearing an orange T-shirt Javascript is required for you to be able to read premium content AMSTERDAM — Another procedural error is expected to upend the supposed rejection of plans for a controversial … Have the latest local news delivered every morning so you don't miss out on updates Your browser is out of date and potentially vulnerable to security risks.We recommend switching to one of the following browsers: Account processing issue - the email address may already exist Have the latest food and drink articles delivered to your inbox every Thursday Have the latest local news delivered every afternoon so you don't miss out on updates Sign up today to receive email newsletters of local daily obituaries Get the Register Star and Daily Mail E-edition delivered directly to your inbox Invalid password or account does not exist Submitting this form below will send a message to your email with a link to change your password An email message containing instructions on how to reset your password has been sent to the email address listed on your account -- The resignation of four employees from a local wealth advisory who left without warning to launch their own firm has led to a lawsuit and a judge ordering them to temporarily stop soliciting their former employer’s clients a West End-based advisory that manages $1.7 billion in client assets last month sued former employees Jeremiah Winters Jen Thompson and Abbey Sorensen for allegedly stealing trade secrets and wrongfully soliciting clients upon starting their new firm The case was filed in federal court in Richmond on May 28 four days after the foursome resigned without notice as Memorial Day weekend began Body ShamingNew Dynasty-Backed RIA Accuses Former Firm of Lack of Accountability Body ShamingFormer employees of Salomon & Ludwin claim they were under the protections of the Broker Protocol when they departed; they also cited concerns about the RIA’s culture and poor communication Last week, Salomon & Ludwin, a Richmond, Va.-based registered investment advisor, filed suit against four former team members and their newly launched RIA claiming they intentionally misappropriated the firm’s trade secrets to solicit clients and breached their employment agreements the defendants filed court documents in response claiming the team was under the protection of the Protocol for Broker Recruiting an agreement that allows departing advisors to take certain customer information and solicit them regardless of whether they had notices that expressly prohibited such conduct Founders Grove joined the Protocol recently the company that administers the agreement The lawsuit names Founders Grove and four former S&L employees managing partner and CEO of Founders Grove; Kate Atwood managing partner and president; Chief Operating Officer Jen Thompson; and Director of Client Experience Abbey Sorensen Founders Grove was created last week with the support of Dynasty Financial Partners Atwood could retain the following list of client information upon their resignations from S&L: client names client email addresses and client account titles,” the court document stated and provided S&L with the more comprehensive list of information required by the Protocol.” Related:New Dynasty-Backed RIA Sued By Former Firm The response also characterized the allegations against Thompson and Sorensen as “disingenuous,” pointing to their letters of resignation which were not attached to the original complaint Sorensen cited “poor communication to the team Thompson’s letter stated she raised concerns about the firm’s culture but there was “little to no meaningful change or improvement.” She also cited a “lack of receptiveness to new ideas and the failure to recognize the importance of staying ahead of market developments,” “a lack of urgency and accountability from leadership” after the “discovery of a million-dollar trade error,” the “mishandling” of an SEC audit in 2021 and “misinformation being provided to regulatory authorities by Dalal Salomon.” "Salomon & Ludwin is disheartened that its former employees have attempted to damage the firm’s reputation by publicly releasing resignation letters that have nothing to do with the employees’ unlawful conduct and include statements that S&L refutes,” said Denise Giraudo “The firm has always prided itself on the personalized attention it has provided to clients and team members Salomon & Ludwin’s founders personally mentored and invested in the four individuals that are the subject of the litigation the defendants took advantage of the founders’ goodwill for their own personal gain The firm is proud of its consistent growth and client service that can only be attributed to the values espoused by Salomon & Ludwin’s founders Our client will not back down and will continue to fight to protect its clients and decades of hard work." Founders Grove’s response also claims that S&L’s non-solicitation agreements are not enforceable “The provisions fail because they impermissibly exceed the category of work done for S&L by defendants the customers serviced by defendants during their tenure at S&L and contain otherwise unreasonable restrictions,” it stated stating Founders Grove's team members “do not dispute that they created a competing entity while employed by S&L and two months before resigning en masse from the firm that invested in them and educated them on financial advising and client relations for over a decade “They also do not seriously dispute they began advertising and promoting for their new firm they misappropriated confidential and proprietary information and have since been using those trade secrets to solicit S&L’s clients or breach of the duty of loyalty claims at all.” S&L calls Founders Grove’s Protocol arguments “a red herring” because they didn’t sign the Protocol agreement until the day of their resignation nearly two months after the creation of the new RIA S&L claims the employment and confidentiality agreements supersede the Protocol and that the team violated Protocol rules by soliciting clients while still employed at the firm “They cannot wield the Protocol as a sword and shield to justify their misconduct,” S&L stated S&L was founded in 2009 by Dalal Salomon when she took her practice independent The suit claims Salomon hired and trained financial advisors and operations professionals to exclusively serve her existing clients and their referrals S&L is seeking injunctive relief against Founders Grove enjoining the firm from disclosing and using its trade secrets and proprietary information The injunction also seeks to prevent them from interfering with S&L’s business relationships and soliciting any of its clients during the restricted period attorney’s fees and costs and pre-judgment and post-judgment interest Diana Britton is the Executive Editor of WealthManagement.com, covering independent broker/dealers and RIAs from all angles. She's also the host of The Healthy Advisor a podcast focused on advisor health and wellbeing RIA Edge 100: Growing Rapidly but Responsibly What truly sets peak performing retirement plans apart Tech Stacks & Growth Strategies for Future-Ready Advisory Firms Ask the Experts: Grow Your Practice with Philanthropy: Comparing DAFs and Private Foundations See how advisors are combining active and passive strategies for optimal portfolio results Registered in England & Wales with number 01835199 The color connected Tonganoxie and let anyone at last weekend’s Class 4A state wrestling championships know that red was the unmistakable thread that helped fuel a historic effort for the THS girls team From the hair extensions in team members’ hair (and coach Adam Ludwin’s beard) to the team members’ boxing warmup robes and Ludwin’s bright vest and slacks one thing was clear late Saturday afternoon at Tony’s Pizza Events Center in Salina: Chieftain red was all the rage and that the Tonganoxie High girls wrestling team was the newest state champion Tonganoxie led after Day 1 by 21.5 points and maintained that lead on Day 2 Saturday before eventually winning the state title with 104 points Ludwin had an idea of how the team potentially could finish “It was nerve-wracking all day,” Ludwin explained THS secured five medals at state: Stella Bradley placed first at 115 Mackenzie Colgrove fourth at 145 and Grace Stean second at 170 “Finley getting on the podium was huge for team points,” Ludwin said who took over the program before the 2022-23 season said he’d dye red streaks into his lengthy beard Team members wanted him to cut the beard for state as he was concerned it would take awhile for it to fade out So a compromise was reached: Ludwin used the red hair extensions like the ones the girls braided into their hair to accent his red vest and pants Tonganoxie’s Stella Bradley said teammate Graex Vanderweide braided all of the team members’ hair — and Ludwin’s beard Vanderweide started braiding on the roughly 2.5-hour trip to Salina and then finished that night on Thursday It took about 45 minutes for Vanderweide to do Bradley’s hair In addition to looking good with those red accents team members were feeling pretty good to boot “It feels pretty great and it’s a huge accomplishment just not for us as a team but to be the first girls team to win a state title,” Bradley said of Saturday’s feat in the grander scale of THS girls sports history 20-19 by fall (1:18) (Keller placed fifth) by fall (2:35) (Colgrove takes fourth place) Copyright © The Mirror | www.tonganoxiemirror.com | P.O Salomon & Ludwin scored yet another incremental victory in its lawsuit against a group of its former employees who abruptly resigned to launch their own firm The Henrico-based investment advisory last week won an injunction that will temporarily continue to prevent Jeremiah Winters Abbey Sorensen and their new company Founders Grove Wealth Partners from further poaching S&L clients The ruling from Judge Henry Hudson is an extension of a previous temporary restraining order that similarly sought to stop the Founders Grove foursome from soliciting S&L clients This latest injunction extends that prohibition until a final judgment is reached in the case does not prevent Founders Grove from servicing any clients that have already come over from S&L nor does it prevent additional clients from moving their accounts to Founders Grove of their own volition abruptly resigned on Memorial Day weekend and immediately announced the launch of Founders Grove S&L promptly sued the group for allegedly stealing trade secrets and wrongfully soliciting clients upon starting Founders Grove without notice to their longtime employer The lawsuit alleges violations of the federal Defend Trade Secrets Act S&L asked the court for damages in an amount to be determined at a jury trial A still of a video announcing the launch of Founders Grove Wealth Partners The Founders Grove defendants claim the protocol takes precedent over those employment contracts They also argue that the protocol was designed to permit this sort of advisor and client movement and that they followed the provisions of the protocol with each step they took upon leaving S&L Judge Hudson’s injunction order shows he continues to wrestle with whether the defendants’ departure from S&L constituted “raiding,” for which the broker protocol provides an exception that would counteract their defense Hudson noted that the protocol does not define the term “raiding,” nor has it been addressed in other courts Both sides have sought to define the term throughout the case both through court filings and testimony at a recent hearing S&L cites an article written by a financial advisory that defines raiding as when “a recruiting firm takes a large volume of advisors and staff members all at once… and transcends into damaging the prior firm itself.” Another article cited in the case states that a raiding claim most show that a “’severe economic impact’ resulted and that the alleged raider’s behavior involved ‘malice/predation’ and/or ‘improper means.’” It also cites an explanation that states that a “severe economic impact exists when ‘the alleged improper hiring involves at least 40 percent of the business unit’s production.’” While Hudson notes that the defendants have argued that raiding doesn’t apply because they left to form their own form rather than being hired by an existing competing firm “The court finds that the combination of the number of employees that left and the amount of clients lost constitute a several economic impact to Plaintiff,” Hudson said in his 16-page opinion “It also appears the Defendants acted with predation Hudson ultimately stated that the protocol’s raiding exemption likely applies in this case has a good chance to succeed in its trade secrets claims “Plaintiff has adequately shown that defendants took confidential information and used it after their employment ended,” Hudson wrote said the firm views the judge’s ruling as a victory S&L cofounders Dalal Salomon (left) and Dan Ludwin “Salomon & Ludwin is very pleased the Court after hearing extensive evidence and arguments entered a Preliminary Injunction to stop the brazen and unlawful raid perpetrated by four departing colleagues to harm the company by taking advantage of its goodwill for their own pecuniary gain,” Salomon said in the emailed statement “We will continue to fight for what is right and our focus will continue to be on servicing our clients and the greater Richmond community.” S&L was founded in 2009 by Salomon and Daniel Ludwin after they had spent years as part of Wells Fargo Advisors The Founders Grove defendants are represented by Richmond attorney Henry Willett of Christian & Barton as well as New York attorney Sharron Ash of the Hamburger Law Firm Willett declined to comment when reached last week The Founders Grove defendants have the ability to appeal the injunction and also have argued to have the case moved out of federal court and into Henrico Circuit Court the latter of which the judge has yet to address The defendants had yet to file an appeal of the injunction as of press time Sounds like a bunch of rich people fighting over other rich peoples money But it does make me curious as to how many “boutique” wealth management firms there are in Richmond alone I’m assuming there are many others at that level Is it easy to demonstrate a client left under their own volition I would think a new service provider could say “I’m not allowed to solicit you but….” and then the client can tell the prior firm they are leaving under their own volition The Tonganoxie High girls wrestling team finished 11th out of 34 teams at Saturday’s Basehor-Linwood Bobcat Classic Dodge City won the invitational with 200 points but Tonganoxie finished as the highest-placing Class 4A team with 101.5 Stella Bradley won gold for the Chieftains in the 115-pound division She won by fall in 57 seconds and 16 seconds in those matches She went 5-0 overall on the day after bracket play She won in the quarterfinals against Dodge City sophomore Miranda Alvarez (7-4) by fall in the second period (2:25) and then defeated Topeka Seaman senior Koti Best (10-1) in the second period (3:21) after Best exited with an injury She then defeated Newton junior Avery Hinojos by fall in the first period (1:22) for the championship She advanced as the top wrestler in her pool at 120 The junior then defeated Shawnee Mission South junior Stella Segura by fall in the final period (5:13) and then lost to Lewis Central sophomore Avaeh Smith by an 11-5 decision Smith is undefeated at 25-0 on the season so far at the Council Bluffs 3 rated wrestlers among all classes in Kansas Segura also is the defending state champion at 115 in Class 5A but THS coach Adam Ludwin said the team will be back at full strength for the new year Ludwin said that overall he’d like to see his team wrestle more fearless and not be intimidated with a tough tournament such as the Bobcat Classic But he also likes where the squad is as it gets a much-needed break “The team overall is doing well on progressing and steady climbing,” he said “They are improving every week and now I think we have our lineup fully figured out to have the best possible lineup 9 for duals against Eudora and Basehor-Linwood at Chieftain Arena 13-14 at Great Bend Christmas Clash (fifth out of 33) 21 at Basehor Bobcat Classic (11th out of 34) Local investment advisor Salomon & Ludwin last week notched an initial albeit temporary victory in its legal battle against a group of its former employees who abruptly resigned to launch their own firm S&L’s request for a temporary restraining order to stop Jeremiah Winters Abbey Sorensen and their new company Founders Grove Wealth Partners from further poaching S&L clients was approved by U.S District Court Judge Henry Hudson on June 20 The order prohibits the defendants from disclosing or using any of S&L’s trade secrets or proprietary information or from further soliciting any of its clients for the time being does not prevent the defendants from servicing any former S&L clients that had already moved their accounts to Founders Grove since the group abruptly resigned from S&L on Memorial Day weekend Court records illustrate the hit S&L has taken since the mass exodus began the date the parties made their first appearance in court a total of 333 clients had transferred a total of $280 million in assets from S&L to Founders Grove That number had grown to 427 accounts and $352 million as of June 18 In addition to siphoning off clients and their funds the move also took four of S&L’s 12 employees S&L is suing the group for allegedly stealing trade secrets and wrongfully soliciting clients upon starting Founders Grove without notice to their longtime employer The restraining order approved last week extends Judge Hudson’s previous “standstill” order and kicks off a process by which both sides will further argue for and against a more long-term restraining order that could stretch the entirety of the case Atwood and Winters previously managed $750 million in client assets at S&L according to a press release announcing Founders Grove’s launch The firm says it hired the four defendants between 2009 and 2017 and emphasized in court filings that none of the four had their own clients when they joined the firm and relied on existing clients and internal referrals for their new clients since then The Founders Grove foursome claims the protocol takes precedent over those employment contracts They also argue that the protocol was designed to permit this sort of occurrence and that they followed the provisions of the protocol with each step they took upon leaving S&L Founders Grove is backed by Dynasty Financial Partners which reportedly supports newly formed investment advisory firms financially in exchange for a minority ownership stake The defendants and Founders Grove are represented by Richmond attorney Henry Willett of Christian & Barton How can this hold up in court when the FTC banned Non-Competes earlier this year Just a question as I don’t know myself: but a non-compete would prevent them from entering in the same industry and that is not what the lawsuit is stating which is not covered by a non compete but anti poaching laws So they can be in the same industry but can’t go after clients gained by their work at Salomon & Ludwin Are those not two different policies and laws or are they combined as the same We’ll never know exactly why a $650,000 Advisor and 3 – $250,000 employees left Is the work environment that heinous at S&L Then again a 1% cut each quarter funds ambition The resignation of four employees from a local wealth advisory who left without warning to launch their own firm has led to a lawsuit and a judge ordering them to temporarily stop soliciting their former employer’s clients immediately announced their new firm and began messaging clients about the move that same day as their departure The suit claims the foursome have solicited “potentially hundreds” of S&L’s clients in violation of their employment agreements S&L claims those contracts included non-solicitation clauses and provisions that supersede the “Broker Protocol,” a set of industry standards that guide financial advisors when jumping from one firm to another S&L’s court filings and a press release disseminated by the firm says it has been and continues to be harmed by the exodus The firm claims its clients were confused by the mass departure and concerned about its ability to continue to serve them given the loss Plaintiff Salomon & Ludwin…suffers a loss and harm to the value of its client relationships and proprietary information,” the company stated in court filings It also asked the court to issue an injunction to stop the former employees from further disclosing trade secrets and soliciting its clients In at least a temporary victory for S&L District Court Judge Henry Hudson last week entered an order temporarily prohibiting Founders Grove from further soliciting S&L clients until the court enters a formal opinion on whether a more extensive restraining order should be imposed “S&L is grateful that the Court recognized the gravity of this situation for our business and ruled in our favor to halt what we believe are unlawful actions,” the firm said in a press release It’s unclear how many S&L clients have followed the group to Founders Grove according to a press release announcing Founders Grove’s launch A still of a video announcing the launch of Founders Grove Wealth Partners featuring (from left) Jen Thompson In a video announcing their new firm on its website the Founders Grove foursome declare “effective immediately we are no longer affiliated with Salomon & Ludwin.” The new firm has set up shop at 6802 Paragon Place in Henrico and has been supported in its launch by Dynasty Financial Partners which reportedly backs newly formed investment advisory firms financially in exchange for a minority ownership stake according to reports from industry trade publications In their argument against a temporary restraining order and for dismissal of the case the defendants claim they are protected by the “Protocol of Broker Recruiting.” “Plaintiff’s allegations are barren of any evidence to the contrary because there is none,” the defendants argue in court filings “The Protocol is a complete bar to the allegations in this case which are nothing more than S&L’s effort to avoid its own obligations as a Member Firm of the Protocol.” The defendants further argue that their employment agreements with S&L do not supersede the protocol S&L has agreed to this fluid nature of the industry the portability of this select client information clients’ freedom to choose with whom they entrust with their financial wellbeing,” the defendants state in their responses S&L was founded in 2009 by namesakes Dalal Salomon and Daniel Ludwin after years as part of Wells Fargo Advisors Headquartered off Gaskins Road in the West End of Henrico the firm says it manages the assets of families It claims none of the four had their own clients when they joined the firm and relied on existing clients and internal referrals for their new clients since then S&L claims it paid for the foursome’s professional training and continuing education over the years who is now managing partner and CEO of Founders Grove was paid approximately $650,000 a year in compensation and benefits while at S&L “Not content with S&L’s investments and generosity the former employees plotted a scheme to line their pockets and harm S&L,” it alleges S&L’s press release included quotes from both its namesakes “We are shocked and deeply saddened that part of our close-knit team chose to leave our firm in this manner,” Ludwin said in the prepared statement “I feel blindsided,” Salomon said in the release we’ve run our business with integrity and compassion for our clients and team It breaks my heart that the firm and reputation we’ve tirelessly built is being questioned due to the way these team members chose to part ways.” Founders Grove declined to comment when reached by phone this week A representative referred calls to the firm’s attorneys Also included in the court record are copies of the resignation letters the defendants submitted to S&L on the day of their departure Some of the letters list explanations for the resignations including criticisms of S&L management concerns over the promotion of Salomon’s son at the firm the handling of an SEC audit several years ago and an alleged $1 million trading error S&L’s attorneys addressed the contents of those letters in a prepared statement shared with BizSense “Salomon & Ludwin remains disheartened that its former employees have attempted to distract from their wrongdoings by attempting to damage the firm’s reputation with their public filing of their resignation letters that have nothing to do with the employees’ unlawful conduct and include statements that our client vehemently refutes,” the law firm states “Our client will not back down and will continue to fight to protect its clients and decades of hard work.” As a longstanding and contented client of S&L I find it imperative to express my profound dismay regarding a recent occurrence which stands as a glaring testament to the abandonment of fundamental business ethics While I respect an individual’s prerogative to establish their own firm the way this particular situation unfolded appeared to me tailored to inflict maximum disruption and harm devoid of any consideration for the welfare of clients The events transpired on a Friday afternoon preceding a holiday weekend ostensibly rooted in internal disputes within the firm thereby profoundly unsettling my trust and confidence in… Read more » It appears from grievances listed in the article that concern for the clients was the impetuous behind the departure And the response from S&L indicates to me their leadership’s unwillingness to acknowledge or take responsibility for their actions it seems they’re more eager to take shots at their former employees’ character than admit wrongdoing or past mistakes I am aware that there were likely issues on both sides and sometimes parting ways is the best resolution my concern lies with how the situation was handled I received a text message on Friday afternoon of a holiday weekend informing me of their departure along with a link to a professionally produced video of the new firm and their office space and information on how to easily transfer my accounts to their firm The urgency and execution made me question if there… Read more » Financial advisors almost always leave on Friday and it most certainly remains confidential until the minute of departure It has been like that for many many years I was surprised when I received Dan Ludwin’s email 370 million and 447 clients later they should be just fine Print In “Seinfeld,” a running gag depicted NBC executives’ bewilderment about a “show about nothing.” In real life there were plenty of doubts early on about the Jerry Seinfeld/Larry David creation but a mild-mannered NBC executive saw the potential That longtime NBC programming executive — Rick Ludwin — died at his home in Los Angeles on Sunday after a short illness Ludwin was a gentle giant in an industry full of brash egos he joined NBC in 1980 and spent 32 years at the peacock network ultimately achieving the rank of executive vice president of late night and specials programming he worked with nearly every host of “The Tonight Show,” including Steve Allen He also helped produce comedy specials starring entertainment titan Bob Hope who years earlier had grown up in Ludwin’s hometown of Cleveland “As a result of Ludwin’s passion, the series became one of prime-time television’s classic ‘Must See TV’ productions known for mass critical acclaim, Emmy awards and soaring audience ratings, and the comedy’s durability has continued long past its series finale in 1998 through constant syndication today,” NBC said in a statement. “Rick Ludwin was the ONE person at NBC in 1989 that thought ‘The Seinfeld Chronicles’ would be a funny TV series. He loved The Stooges, Jerry Lewis and Abbott and Costello, so he and I always got along great,” Seinfeld said in a statement provided to The Times. “He was also just a sweetheart of a guy. Everyone at our show loved working with him.” Ludwin was born May 27, 1948 in Cleveland. He left Rocky River, Ohio, to study at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, where he earned a mass communications degree. He got his start in TV as host of “Studio 14” at the school’s WPDT station, which was then known as WMUB TV. He later wrote jokes for Hope in the 1970s in Ohio. Ludwin left NBC’s executive ranks in 2011 shortly after the Comcast Corp. takeover of the media company. He served as a special advisor for another year, leaving the network in 2012. At the time, he was one of its longest-serving executives, marking 32 years with NBC. “The entire NBC family is deeply saddened today by the news of Rick Ludwin’s passing,” George Cheeks, vice chairman of NBCUniversal Content Studios, said in a statement. “Rick left an indelible mark in his 30-plus years at the network, with a rich legacy that lives on to this day.” Ludwin, according to NBC, returned to his alma mater every year to speak to students. He also donated memorabilia and 15 original “Seinfeld” scripts to the university. The school named the Richard A. Ludwin Television Facility in his honor. Ludwin is survived by his brother, Daniel L. Ludwin, niece Julie Honefenger, nephew Daniel B. Ludwin and great nieces and nephews. Times staff writer Stephen Battaglio contributed to this report. Television Sports Entertainment & Arts Obituaries Obituaries Sports Entertainment & Arts World & Nation Music Subscribe for unlimited accessSite Map The core cast of ‘Seinfeld’ in 1998 Image by Getty/David Hume Kennerly/Contributor When the history books are written (and some of them already have been) the record will show that it took a gentile to make “Seinfeld” a reality Rick Ludwin, the NBC executive who was the so-called Show About Nothing’s biggest cheerleader at the network, died Sunday of organ failure at a Los Angeles hospital, The New York Times reported Ludwin was the head of NBC’s specials and Late Night programming in charge of “Saturday Night Live” and “The Tonight Show.” But he threw a prime time spot to Jerry Seinfeld after he and fellow executives Warren Littlefield and Brendan Tartikoff met with the young comedian to discuss his prospects in television The project they spoke about would become the “Seinfeld” pilot 1989’s “The Seinfeld Chronicles.” It was not always considered a surefire hit According to Jennifer Armstrong’s 2016 book, “Seinfeldia: How a Show About Nothing Changed Everything,”the pilot received a tepid test screening before NBC suits “Who will want to see Jews wandering around New York acting neurotic?” To which Ludwin replied Ludwin would prove the show’s most stalwart champion cancelling a two-hour Bob Hope special and using its budget to fund a four-episode order of “Seinfeld.” particularly when it came to the first season episode “The Chinese Restaurant,” a real-time bottle episode that follows Jerry George and Elaine as they wait for a table at a Chinese joint with subplots including Jerry prodding Elaine to snag an eggroll from a seated party’s table Ludwin ultimately told co-creator Larry David The episode became a classic of the series helping establish many of its hallmark mundane and petty concerns (It’s the episode that gave us George’s famous cri de couer comedian and former “Saturday Night Live” writer John Mulaney commemorated Ludwin in a viral Twitter thread “He was kind and thoughtful in an arena where that can be rare,” Mulaney wrote “He never bragged that he paid for the ‘Seinfeld’ pilot from his Late Night budget when NBC wouldn’t He was the head of NBC’s Late Night division for many years He was kind and thoughtful in an arena where that can be rare From the day I began at SNL he would email me any time he liked a sketch I had worked on — John Mulaney (@mulaney) November 11, 2019 Ludwin was also a great curator of “Seinfeld” history donating many artifacts from the show to his alma mater Seth Myers and Jimmy Fallon also paid tribute to Ludwin on their respective late night shows “He famously fought single-handedly to keep a struggling little show on the air called ‘Seinfeld,’” O’Brien said before remembering how Ludwin championed his own rocky start on “Late Night.” “Pretty much everyone at the network thought I should be cancelled,” O’Brien said PJ Grisar is the Forward’s culture fellow. He can be reached at [email protected] PJ Grisar is a Forward culture reporter. He can be reached at [email protected] and @pjgrisar on Twitter.[email protected]@pjgrisar I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward American Jews need independent news they can trust At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S rising antisemitism and polarized discourse This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up Copyright © 2025 The Forward Association 12: Late night TV hosts Seth Meyers and Conan O'Brien aired tributes Monday night to Rick Ludwin "Rick Ludwin loved television and he loved comedy And he never lost his enthusiasm for the inspired and the silly He was one of the most decent and honorable people I've met in my life We will all miss him terribly," O'Brien said was a 1970 Miami University graduate and generous benefactor who who funded multiple scholarships and visited the Oxford campus several times each year.  O'Brien -- a former writer for The Simpsons who struggled as host of NBC's Late Night and was replaced as Tonight Show host after Jay Leno's short-lived prime-time show – thanked Ludwin for his unwavering support "pretty much everyone at the network thought I should be canceled https://youtu.be/UHkoCyEgta4","_id":"0000017a-3b53-d913-abfe-bf57d3440000","_type":"035d81d3-5be2-3ed2-bc8a-6da208e0d9e2"}">https://youtu.be/UHkoCyEgta4">https://youtu.be/UHkoCyEgta4","_id":"0000017a-3b53-d913-abfe-bf57d3440000","_type":"035d81d3-5be2-3ed2-bc8a-6da208e0d9e2"}">https://youtu.be/UHkoCyEgta4 "Rick actually came to many of our early shows and watched what we were doing He was brutally honest when he disagreed with our comedy But he also saw that there was a lot of value in what we were trying to do… and he helped keep me on the air those first two years." When NBC executives wanted Leno to resume hosting the Tonight Show in 2010 even though he was putting his own job at risk he was a regular visitor and remained a loyal friend of our show He was always very encouraging," O'Brien said the former  Saturday Night Live "Weekend Update" anchor who took over Late Night from Jimmy Fallon in 2014 as Ludwin was retiring said his former boss kept in touch regularly https://youtu.be/cns57j8zsOQ","_id":"0000017a-3b53-d913-abfe-bf57d3440002","_type":"035d81d3-5be2-3ed2-bc8a-6da208e0d9e2"}">https://youtu.be/cns57j8zsOQ">https://youtu.be/cns57j8zsOQ","_id":"0000017a-3b53-d913-abfe-bf57d3440002","_type":"035d81d3-5be2-3ed2-bc8a-6da208e0d9e2"}">https://youtu.be/cns57j8zsOQ Both hosts made it clear that Ludwin championed Seinfeld O'Brien played a 2009 clip from his Tonight Show with guest Jerry Seinfeld talking about the uncertain beginning for his show – while Ludwin stood off camera People at NBC were not excited about the show when we did the pilot And there was only one guy at NBC who really did like the idea His name was Rick Ludwin from the Late Night and Specials Department.. "Rick was the reason that Seinfeld was on NBC," Meyers said "When Jerry and Larry David were selling The Seinfeld Chronicles so he made a deal that he would take money out of the NBC budget from specials and use it to make the first season of Seinfeld It's unbelievable how one man doing one thing can make the difference in history." Meyers also told viewers that Miami University's TV studio was named in honor of Ludwin "I hope the kids who attend there now know how lucky they are to even slightly know such a great man," Meyers said "The best thing about Rick was how kind he was… that was really important to the people he interacted with He was kind in a way that was very unique for this world that we live in in television and the entertainment industry a 1970 Miami University alum who oversaw NBC's Seinfeld died after a brief illness in Los Angeles Sunday Loyal readers of my TV columns know that Ludwin left a huge imprint on NBC – and Miami University broadcasting students – for more than 30 years Ludwin was a generous benefactor who never forgot that he learned about broadcasting on the Oxford campus Ludwin returned to the Williams Hall studio at his own expense to talk to students about TV trends and answer their questions every fall The Cleveland-area native also funded scholarships for Mass Communication/Media and Culture students since 1993 and established (and helped fund) Miami's "Inside Hollywood" program for three weeks in Los Angeles every winter In 2013, Ludwin donated 15 Seinfeld scripts, other Seinfeld and SNL documents, scripts from Bob Hope's TV specials, photos and digitally re-mastered tapes of 30 Studio 14 shows from his senior year (1969-70) and other TV memorabilia to Miami's King Library Special Collections. Last March, the Williams Hall TV studio was named in Ludwin's honor. That's where a live variety-comedy show produced and written by students on Miami's old WMUB-TV (Channel 14) While overseeing NBC's late-night shows and TV specials Ludwin also worked with legendary comedian Bob Hope; Tonight Show hosts Johnny Carson Conan O'Brien and Jimmy Fallon; and late-night hosts David Letterman and Carson Daly Amid the framed photos of famous stars on his NBC office walls was a TV Guide listing from Jan when Ludwin debuted hosting Studio 14 opposite Sally Field’s The Flying Nun on ABC and Gene Kelly in NBC's Jack and the Beanstalk There was nothing more exciting,” Ludwin once told me Ludwin's Studio 14 experience gave him a feel for the variety format when he worked with Carson He was the only NBC executive accepted into Carson’s inner circle for the brief pre-show meeting behind the Tonight Show curtain before each taping "Johnny was always gracious to me. I could do a Bob Hope imitation, and he’d like to hear me do it. To get Johnny Carson to laugh, that was really great,” Ludwin told me for a 2007 story in Miami University's Miamian magazine. News of Ludwin's death was a surprise to his friends at Miami They had not seen Ludwin since the studio naming in March "We had no idea that would be the last time we saw him After earning a master's degree at Northwestern University Ludwin worked for Chicago and Detroit TV stations and then for the national Mike Douglas talk-variety show He was hired in 1980 as NBC's director of variety programs by NBC Entertainment President Brandon Tartikoff — whom he met while both worked at WLS-TV in Chicago told the Cleveland Plain Dealer Monday that Rick Ludwin "was one of the lucky ones who always knew what he wanted the TV studio in Miami’s Williams Hall was renamed the Rick Ludwin Studio a longtime NBC executive credited for getting “Seinfeld” on the air who returned to Miami’s Oxford campus every year to meet with students was honored in March 2019 when the TV studio in Miami’s Williams Hall was renamed the Rick Ludwin Studio.A mass communication major who grew up in Rocky River he started at NBC in 1980 and went on to become executive vice president for late night and prime time series at NBC Entertainment including “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno,” “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” and “Saturday Night Live.”In a summer 2007 Miamian article a variety-comedy show in Williams Hall on what was then Miami University’s WMUB-TV (Channel 14) He and his classmates wrote and produced the live show.Proud of his start at Miami he supported the university’s Inside Hollywood Program and donated memorabilia and 15 original “Seinfeld” scripts to Miami’s Walter Havighurst Special Collections and Archives in King Library.In a spring 1998 Miamian article Ludwin said working on a show such as Seinfeld was a once-in-a-career opportunity.“There is no question this will be the biggest sitcom I’ll be involved with,” he said “Every decade has a show that defines the decade — “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” “I Love Lucy,” “M.A.S.H.” “Seinfeld” is the show that defined the ’90s.”The following are tributes to Richard A from Conan O'Brien to Seth Meyers to The Miami Student: https://youtu.be/UHkoCyEgta4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=180&v=cns57j8zsOQ&feature=emb_title https://www.latimes.com/obituaries/story/2019-11-11/rick-ludwin-nbc-seinfeld-obituary https://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/2019/11/rick-ludwin-nbc-executive-who-championed-seinfeld-dies-at-71.html https://www.wvxu.org/post/miami-grad-rick-ludwin-who-supervised-seinfeld-snl-and-tonight-show-dies-71#stream/0 https://www.miamistudent.net/article/2019/11/rick-ludwin-prominent-miami-alum-dies-at-71?ct=content_open&cv=cbox_latest We pride ourselves on providing internal and external audiences with the latest information on Miami news and events as well as administrative information for members of the Miami community   Adam Ludwin is stepping down as CEO of Interstellar to head a new spin-out which focuses on expanding the Stellar blockchain ecosystem has named financial industry veteran Mike Kennedy its new CEO His successor Kennedy co-founded Zelle, the mobile payments network owned by several large U.S. banks, and is the former president of the North American arm of global money transfer service OFX. Earlier he worked seven years at Wells Fargo in senior roles. In a blog post, Interstellar touted Kennedy’s track record with Zelle (originally known as clearXchange), noting that JPMorgan Chase, Citi and Bank of America use the service. “Our success [occurred] was because we were solving a real-world problem,” said Kennedy, who has been an advisor to the Stellar Development Foundation since 2017, in the post. “With Interstellar I see another opportunity to solve a real-world problem.” International payments in particular are inefficient and expensive, he said. While the Stellar Development Foundation has built what Kennedy sees as “the best blockchain-based payments network,” there are areas that need to be improved. “This is where Interstellar comes in,” he said, adding: In a statement, Interstellar CTO and Stellar protocol creator Jed McCaleb said that Kennedy’s “record of success founding and growing Zelle, his innovation in mobile payments, FX and banking, and his history as a high-impact advisor to Stellar make him the perfect fit to lead Interstellar.” Ludwin was named CEO of Interstellar in September 2018, after the company was formed from the merger of Chain and Lightyear. The company has been working to support the Stellar ecosystem over the past year, and Ludwin’s new role will not necessarily take him away from this mission. Moving forward, Ludwin will oversee Pogo, which has “been in stealth development” within the Interstellar ecosystem “for some time,” Thursday’s blog post said. The spin-out will look to connect different types of mobile wallets worldwide. According to the post, “Pogo is an example of the kind of application that Stellar is uniquely positioned to support, thanks to the network’s ability to create low-friction, high-liquidity, real-time corridors for FX settlement between financial entities.” “I look forward to collaborating closely with [Kennedy] and the team to leverage the world class infrastructure Interstellar continues to build for the Stellar ecosystem,” Ludwin said in a statement. Kennedy told CoinDesk that Pogo would be its own legal entity, structured as a subsidiary to Interstellar. “Adam will be running Pogo and a number of the people he brought with him from Chain, not all of them but a number of them will be working with him [there],” he said. Mike Kennedy image courtesy of Mike Kennedy Nikhilesh De is CoinDesk's managing editor for global policy and regulation, covering regulators, lawmakers and institutions. He owns < $50 in BTC and < $20 in ETH. He won a Gerald Loeb award in the beat reporting category as part of CoinDesk's blockbuster FTX coverage in 2023, and was named the Association of Cryptocurrency Journalists and Researchers' Journalist of the Year in 2020. This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks The action you just performed triggered the security solution There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase You can email the site owner to let them know you were blocked Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page Back to the Miamian Magazine Summer 2007 Web page NBC executive and Miami University alumnus Ludwin will be remembered in popular American culture as the man who brought “Seinfeld” to television. But for those who knew him well his legacy reached further than Hollywood glamour and financial success “There won’t be anyone like him again,” said professor Howard Kleiman of Miami University’s Media and Culture program. “Nobody has that kind of tenure in television Kleiman agrees with big-time television network celebrities like John Mulaney and Conan O’Brien on Ludwin's character.   Mulaney tweeted that Ludwin “was kind and thoughtful in an arena where that can be rare Mulaney ended his tribute with: "Should anyone tell you that you have to be an a**hole to make an impact in entertainment O’Brien said simply: “There is not a single executive in my career that I admire more than Rick Ludwin and I will not see his like again.”  [ Subscribe now for unlimited access to Cincinnati.com ] Ohio and graduated from Miami University in 1970 He started at NBC in 1980 and eventually oversaw many specials and shows including "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno," "Late Night with Conan O'Brien" and "Saturday Night Live." For over 25 years, students at Miami University have directly benefited from Ludwin’s charitable spirit through scholarships The university's competitive and coveted Inside Hollywood study program became the star-studded networking experience it is now in large part thanks to Ludwin Ludwin would come to campus every fall to give lectures and meet one-on-one with students He talked about his experience with "Seinfeld," "Saturday Night Live" and his longstanding expertise on late night television shows “It’s heartbreaking to think that that’s over," Kleiman said He said Ludwin knew everything about late night television “The stories were just amazing," he said. "You could ask him ‘You ever work with Jerry Lewis?’ and he would reply let me tell you about Jerry Lewis.’ ”  Kleiman said it's on the faculty to ensure that Ludwin's legacy is properly celebrated and remembered at Miami Discussions of a plaque are in the works and it is likely that Ludwin's scholarships will continue The Williams Hall TV studio was named the Rick Ludwin Studio in March Kleiman hopes that future students will learn of Ludwin's kind heart in the media world “People talk about ‘Ohio nice,’ ” he said “He kind of embodied that.”  ShareSaveMoneyCrypto & BlockchainQ&A: Chain.com CEO Adam Ludwin On How Money Will Become DigitalByLaura Shin it is providing the technical tools for large institutions and other digital currency startups to use the Bitcoin protocol (and will add other protocols as it sees fit) The company’s CEO Adam Ludwin describes our digital asset future What will it mean for our money to be digital Where we are with financial services is that you used to walk into a bank branch and bank and you used to write checks but you’re basically in a virtual bank branch You can deposit your checks with your iPhone which is the same thing as going online and buying music What the Bitcoin and blockchain revolution is about fundamentally is making money digital at its core and that is going to truly change the way financial services works What does this mean for the financial services we know today It doesn’t mean financial services companies don’t have a role to play It doesn’t mean their brands aren’t worth anything The thing I’m trying to convey now to financial executives is that the blockchain is not a thing you can just apply to your financial systems to make them better — it’s not like a fresh coat of paint where you just put it on and everything is new and fun and sparkly The blockchain is about enabling the emergence of digital assets and a whole economy where these digital assets are traded and handled and moved around how can I use the blockchain to make what I do today better what role am I going to play in a future digital asset economy When economic activity and commerce and payments and banking are in service to digital assets I think the way big financial institutions think of themselves is really defined by the activities that they do today: are they in the business of transferring wire transfers or in the business of helping people move value from one place to the other And if they think of themselves as being in the business of wire transfers If they think of themselves as a brand that people can trust with their assets whether physical or digital they can be motivated to play a role in this future If financial institutions are going to be issuing digital assets then what do you think will happen to Bitcoin the currency Bitcoin will continue to be the only asset that is truly permissionlessly generated by a network All the other assets that everyone else is working on are assets that are issued by institutions — loyalty points you bring that token back to that issuing entity and you get whatever the redemption value is Bitcoin is going to be like gold: there’s going to be a fixed amount on earth there’s a market value for it based on demand and it’s like a reserve currency or a commodity that is what it is that no one can issue more of and that can be trusted because the network rules are known and cannot be changed I think Bitcoin will function like gold and all the other asset classes will function like existing asset classes which is to say they will be issued according to The commonality between Bitcoin and a digital asset is that the way they move is exactly the same — they move directly between parties there’s a clear ledger/chain of control and there’s transparency The benefits will be is the same across both of them but I think they’ll play very different roles "While other people are out there wasting their money in gyms lifting weights I'm at home injecting snake venom and exercising my immune system," Ludwin told Business Insider Ludwin says that he feels a huge energy boost for six to eight hours after he has injected himself with the reptilian saliva He also suggested that the regular injections could be slowing down the aging process in his body but these are not the only reasons he uses it At least 100,000 people die from venomous snake bites each year, and three times as many are left permanently disabled, according to the World Health Organisation, which calls the problem a "neglected public health issue." the only antivenoms available are synthesised from horse blood which can be problematic inside the human body Ludwin is being monitored by teams of scientists from Denmark and the startup VenomAB who are assessing whether it is possible to create a new based on his own partially self-immunised blood thousands of lives could potentially be saved Business Insider watched how Ludwin collects and injects venom while he explained what he believes are the potential benefits of the masochistic hobby for the production of antivenom and slowing down the aging process It is incredibly dangerous and could easily kill you None of the rumoured advantages of snake venom have been scientifically proven And do not scroll down if you are uncomfortable with needles ShareSaveMoneyCrypto & BlockchainChain's Adam Ludwin On Who Is Best Poised To Benefit From Blockchain TechnologyByLaura Shin Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights I write and podcast about crypto/blockchain technology.Follow AuthorJul 26 08:00am EDTShareSaveThis article is more than 8 years old.From the beginning one of the defining characteristics of Bitcoin has been its decentralized nature as banks and other financial institutions have begun to try to capitalize on the efficiency reduced costs and security that Bitcoin’s blockchain technology offers many have wondered how incumbents will integrate such technology into what has traditionally been a more centralized system Chain chief executive officer Adam Ludwin talks about what makes blockchain different from previous database systems notes a surprising commonality among the companies jumping on the opportunity offered by the technology and speculates on how blockchain might change the landscape of financial services He also reveals why he is certain central banks will one day issue digital currency which work well within individual organizations he notes that blockchains are better suited for moving assets across organizations “A blockchain is similar to a database in that it’s a record-keeping system that is digital and becomes the source of truth,” he says “It’s fundamentally different in that it can also be considered a network.” organizations had two ways of moving assets digitally says Ludwin: either by empowering a single organization to keep track of all the assets in the ecosystem or by having each player maintain their own database and then reconciling at the end to ensure that the duplicate ledgers reflect the same truth which Ludwin says is an “expensive error-prone” process Blockchains offer a third choice: a shared infrastructure that doesn’t require reconciliation The way Chain is helping its partners come to market with blockchain is by having them roll out networks that require the participation of several organizations He concedes that this transition presents both a opportunity and a threat to incumbents: “The opportunity is to get out ahead of this and be among the leaders deploying and operating these networks… The threat of course is everything is up for grabs again in terms who captures what value in the value chain.” But in looking at the short list of companies that are actually ready to disrupt their own businesses for this opportunity if we were simply offering the opportunity just to trade up to a better incumbency position The reality is those who are best positioned often have the most risk as well.” He says that those who actually make the leap are those with executives who believe their company will be more of a software and network business in the future he says many of them are “challenger firms — firms that are known like you know their names for the most part But maybe they eye a market that they’re not in today Maybe they’re number 2 or number 3 and they want to be number 1 Maybe they’re huge in one geography but they want to get into another the motivation to be initiating networks is strategic and they’re often challenger-oriented projects.” “Fintech for the most part right now is web-enabled user-interface innovation that connects into the same old financial infrastructure that’s been around for 40 years,” he says we have online banking but we still have fundamentally the same core banking infrastructure we’ve always had and the same players.” After he first read the Bitcoin white paper in 2010 or 2011 he realized that the internet didn’t have a form of digital cash until Bitcoin and that it represented a new opportunity to make assets digital This is why he’s certain central banks will one day issue digital currency “It is fundamentally a medium that’s consistent with where the world is going It’s no surprise to anyone that the internet increasingly complex financial instruments and derivatives — all these things are technology-enabled and yet the medium in which we issue legal tender is still paper,” he says how his parents’ failed experiment with a bulletin board system (BBS) got him hooked on the internet from a young age and why blockchains and digital fiat currencies will be a boon to central bankers Rock singer Steve Ludwin has been injecting himself with snake venom for 30 years his bizarre habit could now save thousands of lives His former partner Britt Collins tells his outlandish story Sometime in 2006, when my ex-boyfriend failed to show up for dinner, I assumed something was wrong or perhaps he’d forgotten. About a week later, calling to apologise, he told me he’d had an overdose, accidentally injecting a lethal cocktail of venom from three snakes. A lot has been written about Steve Ludwin widely known as the man who injects snake venom and lately his life has turned into a non-stop frenzy of international journalists and film crews revelling in the seeming sheer insanity of it You normally have to be dead or a fossil to be in a museum,” says Steve with its roof terrace offering glimmers of the London Eye and Parliament He lives there with his Australian banker girlfriend Suzy He’s been shooting, swallowing and scratching venom into his skin from some of the world’s deadliest snakes for 30 years. “Snakes are fucking everywhere. The symbol for medicine is two snakes They’re ingrained in our brain and DNA,” he tells me proudly insisting that he hasn’t been ill for decades and has developed “a superhuman immune system” The first time he did it was in October 1988 and he showed me his swollen wrist I refused to indulge him and thought he was stoned but I knew it’d been done before and was curious to see if it was possible to become immune to snake venom.” ‘You know I’ve always loved snakes’: Steve Ludwin holding an iguana with Britt Collins shot at Steve’s home in London Photograph: Pal Hansen/The ObserverNow Steve is on the cusp of something monumental the development of a human-derived anti-venom that could potentially save many thousands of human and animal lives “When I was 17,” he says, “I knew I was going to inject snake venom in the future. I felt like Richard Dreyfuss in Close Encounters of the Third Kind when he had that feeling ‘this means something’ It took many years and accidents of messing around with it to finally make sense.” He looks down at his arms The pet shop had a back room with venomous snakes And it wasn’t long before he began bringing home rattlesnakes copperheads and vipers with enough venom to kill our entire street We took one look at each other and that was it He looked like the all-American boy – tall with a floppy fringe and faint dusting of freckles – except he was anything but Steve was born on an air force base in Los Angeles Growing up with two sisters in New Milford the original Catwoman in the 60s Batman TV show had a cool New-Romantics haircut and great taste in music I remember being struck by his handsome face his quirkiness and intensity: he believed in aliens dancing to the Violent Femmes and Psychedelic Furs until 4am and skipping morning classes That was the start of our love affair and deep and enduring friendship I felt something brush against my ankle and thought: “Perfect taking my hand like a small child and showing me the satiny-softness of the boa I lost my fear of an animal that had previously terrified me parrots and howler-monkeys on the deserted beaches of Manuel Antonio traipsing bare-legged through remote rainforests filled with ultra-territorial predators like jaguars and pumas and the baddest killers on earth: toxic frogs spiders and snakes like the deadly bushmaster and crossing into Nicaragua to see the sea turtles in Tortuguero during the Sandinista-Contra conflict that was terrifying to everyone but us Before we even got on the dodgy fisherman’s boat from Limón we could hear gunfire and mortars exploding in the distance we have to die sometime,” and I went along for the adventure Steve bought a T-shirt off the back of a Sandinista rebel for $50 Like many college kids steeped in left-wing politics in Reagan’s America we were rebelling against the pervasive conservatism and generation that ran our lives As Steve and I were finding our way into adulthood – between the daily grind drugs and groupies (he had crazed Japanese fans showing up on our doorstep at all hours leaving love notes and giant teddy bears that terrified our cat) – our relationship ran its course But we remained friends long after breaking up while his hand blew up into the size of baseball mitt remembering feeling a pain with the intensity of “being stung by a thousand bees” Lethal shot: Steve milking venom from a pope’s pit viper Photograph: Pal Hansen/The Observer“But I was happy and didn’t care,” he adds This is what intrigues me about snake venom that scientists say there are compounds in certain venoms that help its victims accept and relax into death The next morning the swelling had worsened. “My arm was all red and doughy with a sack of liquid hanging from it and I could see the blood vessels appear. It was like something out of Evil Dead dogs and everyone is instinctively scared of snakes?” There isn’t an anti-venom because you used three different species.’ Then he said: ‘You’re probably going to die or The doctors suggested “cutting his arm wide open in a fasciotomy” to release the pressure. “I said: ‘Fuck that, I’d rather die.’ The snakes that I used had a hemotoxin and that’s why people’s legs and limbs fall off in Central America.” They gave him the anti-venom CroFab to target the rattlesnake venom that most likely caused all the problems After three days in intensive care with no improvement Steve “The doctors were shocked when I went back It got to the point where I was injecting almost daily all over my body because you don’t want to do a lot of damage in one area as it could destroy nerves.” He had literally turned himself into a science experiment, but there was a point to his madness. “For the past four years, I’ve been flying to Copenhagen to give blood and last year I had a bone-marrow operation. They drilled into my lower spine to take out bone marrow. It took me two months to recover.” Researchers at the University of Copenhagen have recently created an artificial library of antibodies generated by Steve’s immune system in response to the toxic injections to develop the first human-derived anti-venom “What most people don’t realise is that anti-venom has been taken from horses’ blood for more than 100 years and sometimes snakebite victims die anyway When I walked into one of those blood farms and saw about 60 horses with holes in their necks being injected with venom The World Health Organization considers venomous snakebites among the most neglected tropical diseases Pharmaceutical companies see it as a developing-world problem and have slowed the production These Danish scientists will solve that problem quickly by using technology and having found an idiot like me who spent decades injecting himself.” His audacity and inventiveness is part of Steve’s appeal. “You could ask me why I’m continuing to inject. But my drive now is to come up with other ideas. People don’t self-experiment enough. Scientists are now saying using toxins, if you get it right, can have beneficial side effects to your body that slow ageing. It’s like a Jane Fonda workout video for my immune system.” “I’m the happiest I’ve ever been,” he reflects, cranking up Adam Ant’s Puss ’n Boots and grabbing Pushkin lifting the cat over his head to show him London “If those scientists win the Nobel Prize for medicine and I get recognition Venom: Killer and Cure is at the National History Museum until 13 May. See Steve behind the scenes at nhm.ac.uk/discover/the-making-of-venom Strays: A Homeless Man, a Lost Cat and Their Journey Across America by Britt Collins (Simon & Schuster) out 26 June 2018 This is the archive of The Observer up until 21/04/2025 The Observer is now owned and operated by Tortoise Media Ludwin is known as the executive who pushed “Seinfeld” onto the airwaves a former NBC executive and its head of late-night Ohio died after “a brief illness,” an NBC spokeswoman told TheWrap Ludwin is perhaps best known for backing “Seinfeld,” a sitcom that at the time was not a particularly popular choice for NBC’s airwaves “Seinfeld” would go on to become one of television’s most popular and most successful comedies of all time pictured above in 2004 documentary “Seinfeld: How It Began,” got his start in showbusiness by writing jokes for Bob Hope in the 1970s Ludwin commissioned what was then called “The Seinfeld Chronicles.” He used money from his budget for TV specials to pay for four additional episodes and even canceled a planned Bob Hope special to finance the rest of “Seinfeld” Season 1 Ludwin became a consultant for the network shortly after “The Tonight Show” awkwardly transitioned from Jay Leno to Conan O’Brien and then back to Leno “The entire NBC family is deeply saddened today by the news of Rick Ludwin’s passing Rick left an indelible mark in his 30-plus years at the network with a rich legacy that lives on to this day,” George Cheeks Rick was instrumental in many of our greatest successes Our thoughts are with Rick’s family and loved ones as we remember a broadcasting legend and colleague.” where he earned a mass communications degree He also started in television as host of “Studio 14” at the school’s WPDT station He later wrote jokes for Hope in the 1970s in Ohio Ludwin returned to Miami University every year to speak to students and was a key adviser to recent department chairs He also donated memorabilia and 15 original “Seinfeld” scripts to the university Ludwin (Amy) and his great-nieces and nephews Sara Hathaway A celebration of life will be held in both L.A and Cleveland at a  yet-to-be-determined date Ludwin passed Sunday night after battling what a network spokeswoman called “a brief illness” Late-night hosts Conan O’Brien, Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers all took time out of their Monday shows to remember former NBC executive Rick Ludwin, who passed away Sunday night at age 71 As the head of NBC’s late-night until 2012 a job that included oversight of “Saturday Night Live,” Ludwin played a role in each of their careers Ludwin was their boss — he was also their friend whom Ludwin backed during that whole messy Jay Leno to Conan and back to Leno “Tonight Show” fiasco Each comedian individual shared the history of Ludwin single-handedly saving “Seinfeld.” And why not all of us comedy fans owe a debt of gratitude to Rick Ludwin vice chairman of NBCUniversal Content Studios a network spokeswoman told TheWrap Ludwin passed following “a brief illness.” Your support helps make our show possible and unlocks access to our sponsor-free feed Social psychologists Ethan Ludwin-Peery and Adam Mastroianni were in a diner one day when they thought of a question neither of them could definitively answer: What makes some things good and some things bad why do a lot of people think of the government as bad and their phones as good Ethan and Adam hypothesized that humans think of something as bad when it is easy to imagine how that thing could be better But when they dove into the scientific literature to see if research supported their hypothesis the two realized that there is little research about how people make these judgement calls The pair of researchers conducted studies .. Ethan and Adam realized they may have been wrong people tend to always answer with how they could be better—even if life is already pretty good This holds true regardless of language or word choice Read their paper, "Things Could Be Better" Curious about other laws of human behavior? Email us at shortwave@npr.org This episode was produced by Margaret Cirino and edited by Rebecca Ramirez Become an NPR sponsor For the last 30 years, Steve Ludwin has carried out his controversial practice of collecting venom and injecting himself with it. From vipers to cobras, the snakes that have donated venom for Steve's experiments have pushed his body to the limit He has even been hospitalised after overdosing on the toxic substances In the video above, Steve explains why he continues to play such a dangerous game with death and the effect that his fascination with snakes has had on his life. This short film was originally produced for the exhibition Venom: Killer and cure Venom is a complex cocktail of proteins and peptides. Each can have a different effect on the human body from excruciating pain to extensive tissue decay and even death Antivenom, which is used to cure venomous bites, has been made the same way for more than a century. But to make it, experts need to collect venom. Dr Ronald Jenner explains in the video below Video with audio description (1 minute 16 seconds). Behind the scenesFind out how we filmed Steve underwater, James Bond style. Go behind the scenes to find out what it takes put on a major exhibition at the Museum.  Find out how the Gila monster's venom has the ability to save lives Receive email updates about our news, science, exhibitions, events, products, services and fundraising activities. We may occasionally include third-party content from our corporate partners and other museums. 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