Learning web3
Mar 30, 2022
Following on from my recent series of try to expand on my familiarity of various systems languages, I've decided it's time to broaden out into an area that's been on the periphery of my curiosity for a while: smart contracts, decentralized finance, blockchain, and all things "web3".
I've been a bit of a blockchain skeptic for a while. I think in part because of the avalanche of founders I met circa 2016/2017 pitching me terrible startup ideas for already solved problems… "but blockchain!" 🤦♂️. I've also not been thrilled about the enviromental impacts of it. Not solving valuable, or even interesting, problems while consuming huge amounts of energy in the process is a horrible combination. However…:
- Despite decades (!!) of skepticism it's still here and at this point it seems more likely to be sticking around rather that disappearing.
- The complaining about the sustainabiltiy and chastising of those using it has done little to prevent people from using it. If anything it's probably created yet another divide in what feels like an increasingly divided world.
- I've been lurking close enough to the periphery to see a number of interesting projects that might have people re-assess the energy cost (by reducing it significantly) and the value of what's possible.
- If complaining hasn't been successful in improving things, maybe it's long overdue we pull up our sleeves and see if we can be part of the solution instead.
It's a sufficiently broad enough area I've decided to setup a completely separate site where I'll continue to build out content: web3byexample.io.
Previously I led the Terraform product team @ HashiCorp, where we launched Terraform Cloud and set the stage for a successful IPO. Prior to that I was part of the Startup Team @ AWS, and earlier still an early employee @ Heroku. I've also invested in a couple of dozen early stage startups.