Getting started in Web3 can be daunting given how technical the space is. I originally put this content together for an audience that wanted to digest Web3 with only about 15-30 min per day. But, I think the content should be applicable for anyone trying to get into the space.
The primary goal of this onboarding is to:
- Give the reader a high level understanding of what Web3 is and key use cases it unlocks
- Give initial starting points for you to launch your own Web3 explorations
Web3 is really better learned via doing rather than reading. There’s no way to fully appreciate the nuance of everything without going through it yourself. Hope this inspires you to find whatever you’re most excited about!
Agenda
- Day 1: What is Web3
- Day 2: Blockchain basics
- Day 3: Set up a wallet and play with Web3
- Day 4: Key Web3 use cases: DeFi and NFTs
- Day 5: Choose your own adventure
- Day 6: Web3 for communities (DAOs)
- Day 7: Web3 for gaming
Day 1: What is Web3
- Web3 is the catch all phrase that refers to this next phase of the Internet. We’ll start by understanding what it means and represents.
- Learning material
- Why decentralization matters (Chris Dixon)
- Wtf is Web3 (Cobie)
- Gaps in Web3 (Moxie)
- Image below from Dan Romero’s tweet here with detailed content here
Day 2: Blockchain basics
- Web3 is enabled by blockchain technology. We’ll go through high level blockchain principles to understand why this invention unlocks new use cases
- Learning material
- Bonus material
Day 3: Set up a wallet and play with Web3
- The best way to learn about Web3 is to actually play in it. Reading will only get you so far. We’ll go through basic wallet set up and practice interacting with the blockchain.
- Learning material
- To do:
- Get fiat money into a self-custody wallet
- Use a centralized finance (CeFi) solution like Coinbase to get some crypto.
- Buy some ETH (may take a few days for you to be able to transfer the money out)
- Assume you might need 0.1 E for gas, and 0.2 E to try a bunch of different use cases.
- Create a wallet via Metamask
- Save your seed phrase on a piece of paper and never tell it to anyone!!
- Copy the address of your Metamask wallet into Coinbase so you can move your ETH from Coinbase out into Metamask
- Note: ETH tends to be where most of the innovation happens, but gas fees can be terrible. If you want to do this with a cheaper chain, you can also try buying Solana and using the Phantom wallet to play with Solana, where gas fees are negligible
- Get fiat money into a self-custody wallet
Day 4: Key Web3 use cases: DeFi and NFTs
- Web3 enables the re-invention of traditional problem spaces. DeFi and NFTs have been two popular use cases.
- Learning material
- Web3 Reading list
- DeFi: pg 10, 11
- NFTs: pg 17, 18
- Web3 Reading list
- Bonus material
Day 5: Choose your own adventure
- The best way to enjoy Web3 is to make it a choose your own adventure. Pick either the DeFi or the NFT track to start playing in Web3.
- Learning material
- To do
- DeFi:
- Add Aurora mainnet to MetaMask (ref) (choosing a chain with no gas to make this process cheaper)
- Bridge money into Aurora (no gas fees) via Rainbow Bridge. This step may take 10-15 min
- Swap your 20% of your ETH for some NEAR on Trisolaris, a DEX
- Go to the “pool” tab. Add equal amounts of ETH and WNEAR to get liquidity pool tokens
- Go to “farm” and find the WNEAR - ETH pool and deposit your tokens.
- Refresh and watch yield accumulate real time!
- NFTs:
- Go to Opensea and browse collections to find an NFT that you like
- Join the NFT’s community (can find them usually on the NFT’s Twitter page or on the Discord logo on the right side of a collection’s home page)
- Hang out in the Discord and explore the vibe
- Check out some other examples of strong communities: Crypto Coven, Doodles
- Check out sound.xyz (rethinking digital ownership for music)
- DeFi:
Day 6: Web3 for communities (DAOs)
- Web3 technology has shifted ownership from a centralized entity to be significantly more decentralized. This has led to the creation of Decentralized Autonomous Organizations, or DAOs. We’ll explore examples of DAOs and how they’ve changed community-building.
- Learning material
- Bonus material
- Worldbuilding with FWB
- How to grow decentralized communities
- DAOs Canon
- DAOs from Odyssey DAO
Day 7: Web3 for gaming
- The rise of play to earn (P2E) and metaverse games is one of the biggest innovations to come in 2022. Gaming has often been described as the potential breakout case to bring in more “normies” into Web3.
- Learning material
Other resources
Bonus reading
- a16z Web3 Reading List
- Messari Crypto Theses 2022
- Web3 starter pack
- Web3 reading list
- a16z Crypto Startup School
Podcasts