Web3 almost ate me for breakfast
For one week straight I consumed and educated myself on as many Web3 topics as possible. Warning: don't do this as it may affect you mentally. For average person, DCA is best sanity-strategy.
Web3 space is a 24/7/365 rabbit hole that simply doesn’t sleep. I made my deep dive into wonders of crypto back in 2017. These were times when Ethereum was still new kid on the block and DeFi was in its infancy. However, it was Ethereum that laid ground for mass of countless ideas, *itcoins, new startups, novel projects, Discord communities.
Around those times so-called Web3 & crypto-media started to emerge. Why? To cover all this wild west that was and is still happening. I do not consider myself avid news consumer. All that news do is spend your time, lower your dopamine levels and make you feel miserable at the end of the day. However, there’s this word - consume. We all consume stuff: news, games, content, movies, food…
When you daily read dozen pieces of news and listen to few podcasts, what do you actually get out of it? If I would ask you to tell me about something you’ve red six days ago? I would argue that you couldn’t tell me a much.
“Who need movies when one can just open crypto-twitter or cryptopanic.com, make some popcorn, lay back and enjoy the show”
Thus, in this experiment I tried not only to listen but to write down with some comments on most memorable things I’ve learned. Everyday for one week.
That said, to succeed in this experiment, I had to create three segments “top news”, “podcast of a day” and “curiosity/idea of a day” otherwise I could not rank which piece of information would be more important.
What’s your why behind consuming Web3/crypto content? Perhaps it’s a interest, passion, desire to learn more or to change career path? Let’s discuss in comments!
Monday, 10th of April
I was off grid because of second Easter holiday. Missed this day. Totally. No clue what happened in the news.
Tuesday, 11 of April
Top news of the day 🗞️
Bitcoin crosses (again) 30,000 $ mark. Last time this happened in early May 2022.
My reaction: It feels unbelievable but after so many years in the space I start to believe into BTC-cycles.
Podcast of the day 🎧
I highly recommend to listen this 35 min insightful conversation between Outlier Ventures’ Jamie Burke and Max Comparetto, a co-founder of Web3 Studio which is basically startup within Salesforce.
This podcast might be interesting for those who
don’t believe that big tech can actually innovate in Web3 space
are interested to learn how make their career move from web2 to web3
Idea of the day 💡
A16Z Crypto report for 2023 has been released. And guess what? Macro future is looking bright 🚀
Key takeaways you should care about
Adoption steadily on the rise (both developers and consumers)
Technology going greener
Technology innovation great on all aspects (security speed & governance)
DeFi’s feeling great
Wednesday, 12 of April
Top news of the day 🗞️
Another milestone for Ethereum today! Long awaited Shanghai update is launched today. Main feature will be possibility to unstake the locked ETH 🥲 Strange that someone even considers to do so?
My Reaction: Sad to observe that no one mentions other improvements which should speedup transactions (EIP-3855) and optimize transaction costs (EIP-3860). Why no one doesn’t raise these? Anyway, excited about this upgrade regardless will anticipated sell off happen or not 😎.
In future, I think key addressable improvement should be lowering the 32 ETH staking requirement. This would naturally contribute to decentralization of network. Now, big centralized exchanges have too much decision power in the network.
Podcast of the day 🎧
Podcast by Unchained about the most recent state of Decetralized Autonomous Organizations (DAO).
It was a great summary about
differences between LLCs and DAOs such as liabilities (like case of Tornado Cash)
legislation and about how to form DAO entity in US and Europe
ton of good DAO-related practical examples around tokens, taxation, regulators
Experts discussing the topic were Gabriel Shapiro, a general coubsel at Delphi Labs and Fatalmeh Fannizadeh, a Swiss-based lawyer
Idea of the day 💡
Puell Multiple chart. Very useful chart to spot best buying or selling opportunities of BTC. Basically it describes coin issuance speed & demand. This is partly tied to miner activity. Green zone indicates good buy opportunities & red overheated price action. Do you utilize this tool for your DCA or trading strategy? 🧐
Thursday, 13th of April
Top news of the day 🗞️
Shanghai update happened - no crazy anticipated staking withdrawals occurred for the past 12 hours. Technically, this is not even possible since majority of ETH is sitting on centralized platforms such as Kraken and Coinbase. At the moment of writing there are USD 1.34 billion worth of ETH unlocked to withdraw. That’s a small portion of current ~USD 230 billion market cap.
There are rumours that Ill-fated FTX exchange could restart it’s operations already in 2024 following up some tweets that company managed to recover 7.3 billion worth of liquid assets.
My reaction: Honestly, after so many CEX collapses and scandals, I have hard time believing into centralized ways of handling assets in Web3. There will be runaway from the people who will want to move their wealth completely out so there’s no future. FTX in its current form has no credibility to continue “as is”. Besides that, people finally (?) start to understand true value of self-custody.
Lending protocol Aave (version 1) was hacked. USD 18 million worth of assets were drained as an result.
My reaction: In my opinion these old legacy versions of protocols should be deprecated. As developers shift their focus on new protocol versions (like v3), old one get less support, become a technological debt burden. We may laugh on legacy banks but these hacks prove that no technology is bulletproof. History repeats itself.
Podcast of the day 🎧
This podcast was super educational one. Namely Ali Abdaal’s conversation with founder and CEO of Speechify Cliff Weitzman.
Cliff shares insights on
what it took him to build USD100M+ revenue generating app helping people with dyslexia
why he doesn’t read news
how to network with anyone (like CEO of Audible)
people skills, winner mindset, persistence
all-things starting and running the business, free himself from 9-to-5
simple hacks to build success in personal and work life.
Curiosity of the day 💡
Smart phone due to upgrade? If you are into “vanilla” Android and Web3 then Solana Saga could be alternative to explore. Specifications are quite decent with Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 paired with 12 GB’s of RAM 0,5 TB storage + 50 Mpix shooter. From Web3 side perks you will receive Decentralized apps store, self custody solutions and possibility to sign transactions with fingerprint. Quite cool practical features but are they worth it considering $ 1000 price tag? There are great “regular” smart phone alternatives for that price. Also, one could have instead four latest Ledger Stax wallets which are cool tool. What’s your opinion on the “Solana Phone”? 😊
Friday, 14 of April
Top news of the day 🗞️
Sweden has decided to rise taxation on electricity per kWh by 6000 percent. This could mean rough times for data centers and, of course, proof-of-work consensus running facilities.
My reaction: This is very regrettable to hear. Specially nordic countries which are known for their low temperatures, stable environment, skilled highly educated specialists could benefit now and in the future from such an high-tech investments. Now, there’s a obvious risk that companies (up to Microsoft/Google) will be either reluctant to invest into country or move their operations to countries where maintanance costs are lower.
Podcast of the day 🎧
Did you know that toys are becoming big in Web3 space as well? In this conversation Will Weinraub of Onchain Studios tells about
How his daughter brought him to the idea of digitalizing her toys (read: create NFTs already in 2018)
How, after few years of struggling, in 2020, business suddenly took off
Konami, Mattel: How and why big brands got interested about Web3
Why kids want to play with digital toys
Why user experience is 1st thing and it doesn’t matter which blockchain service is built on
Legislation: why toy NFTs can be sold to only over 18 years and challenges around that
At 45 minutes long, this podcast was very informative and gave good overview about future of how young generations will play Web3-style.
Idea of the day 💡
Psychology of the markets. James of InvestingAnswers raised today “again” a good question regarding the stubborn “heard” mentality in the crypto markets.
Run always into opposite direction compared to others, whatever calculated investment you are making. This is not an financial advice but makes me wonder in a good way is there a coincidence why historically all the successful people have implemented this way of thinking…?
Saturday, 15th of April
Top news of the day 🗞️
Justin Sun of Tron sued by SEC. Since my Web3 journey I’ve heard this name many times. Justin Sun launches this project, buys that project, invests in that blockchain… List goes on.
My reaction: Hearing that Justin Sun is now sued by SEC was surprising and actually feeling sorry for him. This person has apparently actively contributed to crypto-space in so many different ways. All the new things need strong visionaries and leaders to excite masses. But, unfortunately, at the same time that’s their weak point. Governments are specially afraid of them because of the noise and influence on the societies. They must be silenced.
Podcast of the day 🎧
All message notifications we receive today in our gadgets and computers are carried out push-style This means we are informed as soon as message arrives to our inbox. This is also the case in Web3 with Push Protocol. Founder Harsh Rajat discusses in podcast how notifications can be integrated via smart contracts in modular plug & play way to decentralized exchanges, social networks, ENS domain names and more.
Key take away is following: users can connect their wallet address to Push Protocol communication layer and subscribe to any desired notifications from services they are using mentioned above. Personally, I find this feature helping many Web3 service users. One don’t have to go to check into ten different services every time multiple times a day whether one received message from friend or someone else. Brilliant!
Link to podcast
Curiosity of the day 💡
Sometimes it feels like Web3/crypto and AI are like two boats challenging who arranges bigger party. For time being, AI-side dropped a bigger bomb: Elon Musk is reportedly planning to take on OpenAI with his new venture called X.AI registered in state of Nevada with $100,000 capital.
My reaction: I mean, this is unbelievable 😂! Just a few weeks back, this guy was signing petition to temporarily stop all Artificial Intelligence development. Fair play? That company will presumably need more capital (if they want actually achieve something) considering Nvidia’s top notch H100 AI-chips costing up to $40,000 per unit. Or share the ones’ Elon just bought for Twitter. Also, looks like there’s zero employees. I could have few good recommendations 😊. Just DM me, Elon.
Sunday, 16of April
Top news of the day 🗞️
Another day another DeFi hack. More specifically, Hundred Protocol got hacked $ 7 million USD using market manipulations.
My reaction: This wasn’t even first hack for Hundred when they got exploited as recently as in 2022 On Gnosis Chain. It was smaller exploit but still. I think that theme for DeFi protocols for year 2023 is to start taking security more seriously. There are so many tools nowadays: ChatGPT, OpenGPT, smart contract security auditing experts and companies. C’mon - at the end, it’s about customer experience and adoption. We don’t want to scary people out by making shortcuts on such a mission critical solutions. It’s about peoples wealth, hard-earned assets and that should be respected!
Podcast of the day 🎧
In my previous post (link above) I raised the question around future of venture capitals and their roles. In this episode (link to podcast starting point at 44:45) Laura Shin discusses together with experienced tech investors namely: Managing Partner from Dragonfly Capital Haseeb Qureshi, Partner Tom Schmidt and Managing Partner from Robot Ventures Robert Leshner role of venture capital in defining success of Web3 startup.
Key takeaways:
Breaking down what’s a good vs. bad VC
Why equity, token distribution for VC’s vs. public, risk management are always hot topics dividing the public
Points pro were helping typically first time entrepreneurs to help bringing expertise in terms of shaping & developing their idea into something value-generative. Also, role of hiring and team maturity development were topics where VC’s brings extra value.
Point against was the fact that Bitcoin project didn’t ever raise any capital or presumably took any help and became de facto status quo of next-generation of wealth preserving asset.
Curiosity of the day 💡
What chaos could potentially happen if all of your investments are on tens of different DeFi platforms? Decentralized financial platforms are emerging here and there on countless protocols and that, my friends, is a real pain in the ass. Came across this interesting project called Enso Finance which has elegant fix for problem mentioned afore. There’s possibility to connect it to own wallet and
Track whole portfolio and its development
Create investing strategies, automate decision making (finally in DeFi)
Moreover, Enso works with all EVM-based protocols
Backed by Polychain Capital this project seems to have serious potential. In me opinion the use case is strong. At the time writing project’s was already available for early access.
Wrap up: got overheated from information flow
It’s been actually quite overwhelming week. Specially myself long-time not exposing to such amount of news flow, it was shock to system.
Web3 has two sides. Good one is that as a young industry it never sleeps. Bad thing is that everything is too fast, chaotic and burns not just money but people and their minds out.
Web3 == Technological Wild West but on steroids that will eat you for a breakfast
Twitter, discord, news aggregators… they are like an infinity matrix which just coldly spits information on their consumers. Fear of missing out is present everywhere. Frankly speaking I was waiting for Sunday to come. To complete this madness 😓.
Don’t get me wrong, I will continue actively follow the space. Why? Because I understand the fundamentals and how it will change the next five to ten years from now. I have to give extra credit to people who can just do this 24/7. For me - t’s a tad too much. At this point, working full-time in engineering space + combining all the novel, bold unheard of concepts people come up every hour every day is too taxing.
Therefore, best approach recommended by me is to learn about specific things of Web3 and Dollar Cost Average in1. You will thank me later because I just saved you literally from all the mental consequences. Also, all the recent developments are just reassuring this space will bulletproof your career. Regardless are you tech or non-tech persona. But be mindful - Web3 is like bulldozer that will drive over you and not even ask: "Are you okay?".
That’s why one needs time to time escape all this virtual. Something that one can physically hold. Like playing guitar. Going to forest. Take an axe and cut the wood. Heck - something much simpler and primitive than all these complex programs, protocols, models and overheated human brain. Simple as that.
Whoa, tough week indeed… glad I made it this far 😅 Kudos to you my dear reader - for sticking by! Subscribe & let’s continue together next week with new experiments!
Did any of these news or opinions about Web3 resonate with you? I would kindly hear from you!
This is not a financial advice