The Buidling Blocks
Thoughts on EthCC
Last week I attended the Ethereum Community Conference in Paris. Since then, I have been processing all of the technical presentations, in-depth discussions, late-night debates, and new projects I came across at this incredible event. After some time, my thoughts have started to orbit around a central theme: the buidling blocks for third web are here.
I grew up building things on the web we have today. I would write code on my computer and push it to a server that a company controlled. When I stopped paying them, my website would stop working. My customers’ data would be stored on a database that I managed. Everyone had a username and password to log in. This was the way to make things on the web. I was using the tools that were available. It is really tricky to shake off that mental model and think about the web we will have tomorrow. Too often, I find myself wanting to build products with the tools I am used to. Instead, I need to force myself to think about what is going to be possible with this new development stack.
Whenever I worry about how slow Ethereum is, I need to dive into Tendermint Consensus, Parity’s Bridges, Counterfactual’s state channels, Plasma Cash, Casper’s shards & Keep’s off-chain computation.
Whenever I am too scared to write Solidity, I should check out Truffle’s new debugger, Zeppelin’s work on contract upgrades, Axoni’s work on formal verification for contracts.
Whenever I think about storing data on a server, I should try push encrypted files to the networks from Storj, Sia, IPFS & NuCypher.
Whenever I think about using a centralised exchange, I should try out AirSwap’s peer-to-peer network, Gnosis’ Dutch Auction and Cosmos peg zones.
Whenever I think about building a company, I should experiment with Aragon’s point-and-click DAO-creator and Colony’s work management tools.
I stumbled into the Ethereum project in 2015 and helped out with a few interface design concepts before the sale. Despite this early exposure, I still struggle to think about a world where the promises of Web 3 actually come true. The Ethereum Community Conference was a welcome reminder that the buidling blocks are here. Now it is time to #BUIDL.
