Onboarding to Web3
Published in
2 min readJan 12, 2023
Privy makes it seamless for app developers to onboard all potential users to web3. From working with these end-users directly, we’ve seen a TON of appetite among newly onboarded web3 users to better understand the power of the technology they’re using.
Since I joined Privy last August, dozens of friends have asked me how to best “get up to speed” on web3. After sending several versions of this guide one-off, I decided to publish it so all of our followers can dive in!
Foundations and Infra
- Read Bitcoin Whitepaper
- Understand Ethereum and how it’s different from Bitcoin (video)
- Proof of work vs proof of stake (video and video)
- Understand self-custodial wallets (video)
- Set up a Metamask, Coinbase Wallet, Phantom Wallet, and Rainbow
- Try getting assets from a centralized exchange like Coinbase to each - Learn about gas and Ethereum Layer 2s (video and video)
- Try bridging assets to Polygon, Optimism, and Arbitrum in Metamask - Learn about Solana (video)
Applications
- Try the OG DeFi applications (Uniswap, MakerDAO, and Compound)
- Seeing DeFi was what originally got me most excited about crypto
- So awesome that these financial services run without humans - Buy an NFT on OpenSea (ETH) and Magic Eden (SOL)
- Thought this was a solid “What are NFTs” video - Buy yourself an ENS and associate it to once of your wallets
- Play Axie Infinity
- Game is less popular now, but was first big play to earn game (P2E)
- Gods Unchained and Immortal Game are popular today - Dig into Starkware ecosystem — lots of gaming innovation is happening here
- Learn about DAOs (video)
- Explore around some of the popular DAOs (FWB, LinksDAO)
- Understand Snapshot - DM Dan Romero on Twitter to get access to Farcaster (decentralized social network)
- Check out Etherscan and dive into the depths of what’s out there
- Check out Zapper to make sense of your crypto portfolio
- Check out Dune for easy analytics
- Check out Radicle, Molecule, Autograph, Audius, Royal, and Sound for crypto apps starting to seep into new pockets of the market
- Check out what traditional companies are doing in crypto (Reddit, Nike, Starbucks, Insta, Twitter)
Advanced Concepts
- Learn about miner extractable value or MEV (video)
- Learn about account abstraction (this is a good guide)