It's funny how my real interest in web3 did not get sparked by the fact that I'm actually using a dApp but from a TEDx speech from a woman with so many titles and positions, you just have to know about her. The TEDx description for the video I have linked says this about Shermin Voshmgir:
After finishing her PhD in IT-Management at the Vienna University of Economics, Voshmgir went on to study filmmaking and stage production in Madrid. Her main focus in all these areas is blockchain technology. She is the founder of Blockchain Hub and director of the Research Institute for Crypto Economics at the Vienna University of Economics. She is also advisor of Jolocom, a blockchain based identity protocol and Wunder, a decentralized Art Museum
That's amazing. An artistic woman who also knows about blockchain development. Very much like how I think I am and wish to further become. I found her speech very interesting mainly because I rarely hear people talk about the ethics of web3. I tried to find some material that would talk about the ethics of decentralization and the cons for those who believe it is the utopic answer to all our problems. With the recent hype around the buzz words, and the whole restructuring of what the internet will soon come to mean, balance needs to be created in our appraisal and we need to talk about what our responsibilities will be as users and developers of dApps in other to ensure we don't harm each other in ways we cannot reverse. Anonymity, speed and all the advantages of web3 are only just tools and tools in the wrong hands can lead to very bad things. This is just a fact.
So it was this talk that led me to research more about blockchain development. It simply makes sense that as someone who now spends a considerable amount of time on hive, my development interests would tilt towards this direction as well. I began to watch some YouTube videos that talked about the roadmap to becoming a blockchain developer. I'm a JavaScript/React user and so I searched for those that had this as their course prerequisite and the recurring talk is that you need to learn solidity to get into blockchain development and write smart contracts or build Defi Apps.
According to talent.com, blockchain developers earn about $144,667 annually and as Ivan on Tech, the CEO of Moralis, there are in hot demand right now especially with the explosion of web3. Now would be the time to get in while things are fairly new. I believe him entirely.
What I've learnt from my research today is that you don't have to reinvent the wheel. Moralis for example is similar to firebase which frontend developers use to build databases which serves as their backend. So it is is definitely nice to see that blockchain development is actually getting simplified. You don't have to build everything from scratch. I learnt that just as AWS is the infrastructure for many web2 apps, this Moralis is fast becoming the Ultimate Web3 Development platform. Ivan on Tech has free courses which his academy offers on YouTube as well as paid ones on his site. You can get a certificate after taking them and they're not that expensive.
For someone who really wants to delve deep into blockchain development though, you cannot do without solidity from what I've found. Solidity is an object-oriented programming language for writing smart contracts. Smart contracts and an integrated front end is what forms a dApp and I found some free courses which I am hoping to check out this week. It's always thrilling to learn something new. One of such courses I will be watching and following along with is by EatTheBlocks. It's about 1h 20mins, however if you've done some programming you may find out that that could actually mean 5 hours. I'm hoping it's up to date and not buggy so it really lasts for the time it says in the video.
After learning about smart contracts, you can learn to become a Defi developer. I must admit, I've not really looked much into Defi apps or the entire ecosystem with much interest but I have actually now understood how to stake tokens. I used tribaldex for the first time yesterday to stake my pob tokens. I now know about Dlease on hive and I'm slowly beginning to wet my feet properly.
Recently, we saw(if you're on twitter i.e) how Jack Dorsey was bashing web3 in his way. I don't totally disagree with him and his concerns about the repackaging of web3. I personally believe that nothing can truly be 100% decentralized as long as humans are involved. So yes, a little bit in me has it in mind that there is still a replacement of large corporations by even larger ones. Time will reveal what is really under the hood. However, there are still many advantages in this movement that makes me at least 90% a believer and supporter. It is literally the same way I feel about NFTs.
image source
I paint digitally and even though I celebrate the wins in the NFT space and of course hope to be able to sell NFTS for high prices like others, the fact that this at all is a thing purchased and valued still shocks me a lot. Especially since we probably have all realized now that the value is not intrinsically in the actual art itself but in the proof of ownership by the collector. If not we would not have scribbles or very amateurish art sometimes sold as a bet, selling so well.
In the end, it is really about positioning yourself for opportunity to be able to participate and get your rewards for doing so. And for me this week, it will be in immersing myself in blockchain development to see where that takes me.
Cheers!