My first NFT, Talent stacks, Walking
Avthar's Weekly Wisdom #65 (10/04/2021)
🔥 I’m Avthar, a South African technology entrepreneur and learning enthusiast based in New York City. This digital letter is where I share practical wisdom about self-mastery, entrepreneurship, health and happiness, all to help you live better.
My guarantee is that you’ll discover one thing that will help you change your life in every edition. As a reminder, you can find all previous editions of this newsletter in the archive. And you can find more of my writings at avthar.com.
Hi friends,
🎉 This past week, I crossed the milestone of 900 followers on Twitter! Thank you to all of you wonderful Weekly Wisdom reader’s who contributed to that (and if we haven’t connected on Twitter yet, I’d love to be friends there). The journey to 1k begins!
I also acquired my first NFT (non-fungible token), a unique digital collectible living on the Ethereum blockchain. I am the proud owner of piece number #8516 from the AfroDroid collection. AfroDroids are a collection of 12,117 unique NFTs set in the year 3045 about a superior force with human consciousness to replace the humans and take over the world. I saw it as a cool, Africa-centric project to get into the NFT world with, and the community of Droids has been very welcoming thus far (see thread below):
The actual process of buying was remarkably easy. I created an account on OpenSea, bought Ethereum on Coinbase and then sent the required amount to my wallet on OpenSea. The most time consuming part was deciding which piece I wanted to buy in the first place. The biggest downside to the experience was the Ethereum gas prices, which was almost as much as the NFT itself! I bit the bullet this time (as I wanted to learn about the process and community) but gas prices are definitely prohibitive to folks like me looking to build an NFT collection on a small budget.
Folks who’ve met me in person will know that I’ve been a crypto enthusiast since 2015/16. Cryptocurrency and blockchain technology was the topic I did independent research on at Princeton University, which eventually led me to be a founder in the decentralized web space, building a decentralized social network to give people more privacy and ownership over their data, with my startup Afari.
Purchasing this NFT officially marks my second foray into the crypto world. I’m excited to learn more about what’s changed in Web3, as well as the developments in smart contracts and blockchains themselves (not to mention all the new cryptocurrencies and DeFi projects!)
🗣️ Do you have any crypto related projects or concepts you’re interested in that I should learn about? Let me know in the comments or by replying to this email.
If you’re interested in reading my old crypto research papers, I’ve linked them below:
BlockTweet: Decentralized Microblogging secured by the Bitcoin Blockchain and Blockstack (with Michael J. Freedman)
In-Browser JavaScript Verification via the Ethereum Blockchain (with Arvind Narayanan)
PS: If you’d like to learn more about NFTs, I’d recommend this podcast by my friend Daliso, and this article by Gary Vaynerchuck. And if you’re in the US or UK and looking to get into crypto, you can get $10 in Bitcoin for free when you join Coinbase using my referral link. If you’re based in South Africa, I’d recommend Luno.
Tweets of the week
On competition:
On talent stacking:
Can learn more about a talent stack in Scott Adam’s interview with Forbes:
Podcast of the week
How walking improves our brain and mental health
“You only get old when you stop walking, you don’t stop walking because you’re old” - Shane Omara
Shane Omara believes walking can be our superpower. In this short podcast he explains how the many benefits of walking go beyond the physical – it’s important for our mood, our happiness and our wellbeing.
Shane reveals the results of studies that showed that walking improved memory and attention and reversed functional ageing of the brain, and that if we walk before doing a task, we perform it more creatively.
🙏 Thank you again for reading and for your support! I wish you a week of happiness, success and peace!
With gratitude,
Avthar