Engineers, founders, artists, and voices to help develop Web3 and the Dogepunks community.
Do you know the feeling right before you open birthday presents? That’s how we felt creating week’s volume of Influential Dogepunks. Today we are featuring: 0xMaki, core contributor of SushiSwap, TheCryptoDog, a long time Crypto bull and an OG BTC miner circa 2011, and Simona, Head of Community at EthStatus. Let’s dive right in!
- 0xMaki (Twitter: @0xmaki)
With over $3.5Bn in liquidity and $38Bn in volume, Sushiswap has become synonymous with industry-leading innovation for decentralized finance (DeFi). 0xmaki, core contributor of Sushiswap, has been an integral voice of the community during Sushi’s exponential growth. With one use of the intuitive and fun UI, you’ll see why Sushi has become tour de force in the DeFi community. Even though 0xMaki maintains a humble and low profile while creating the future for Sushi, he has been recognized by CoinTelegraph as the Top 100 Notable people in Blockchain as he works on the vision of creating a bankless future. We were excited to see 0xMaki join our Dogepunks community and excited to welcome him in!
i) What brought you into the world of Crypto/NFTs?
The decentralized/permission-less/uncensorable aspect.
ii) What do you do now?
I help grow Sushiswap as part of the yearn ecosystem.
iii) What do you love most about it?
The people.
iv) What’s the next big thing coming up for Sushiswap?
Releasing new products like Bento and empowering devs.
v) Where can people find you to learn more?
http://sushi.com / Twitter: @0xMaki
2. TheCryptoDog (Twitter: @TheCryptoDog)
Who said you can’t teach an old Doge new tricks? TheCryptoDog is one of the key voices in Crypto and has a diverse background spanning various industries including healthcare, tech, and venture investing. If you haven’t read his Medium article on how he got into BTC in 2011, it is a must read for crypto newbies and OG Cryptofans to take a stroll down memory lane. We were excited to meet him and share mutual stories on how we were both constructing gaming rigs around the same time which turned into a more lucrative investment for TheCryptoDog. In his spare time, he has also launched a new health & wellness company: Betterbrand. Check out our Q&A to learn more:
i) What brought you into the world of Crypto/NFTs?
I was a teenager and wanted to build a gaming computer to play Crysis at max settings. Along the way, I discovered you could mine Bitcoins and sell them for $10 each. Free money, right?
I’m still new to NFTs, but I think they’re pretty cool. When I was 10 or 11 I was very passionate about graphic design, I built my own graphics design website, opened a forum, and spent all of my time learning and practicing. Adobe PS 7.0 was my second home. I ended up shifting gears but looking back I can see a path that might have led me to become an ‘NFT artist.’
ii) What do you do now?
I trade, invest, I tweet, and I work on my two startups, a health & wellness company, Betterbrand, and a Hong Kong based incubator helping Western crypto projects get access to the East.
iii) How has crypto changed from 2011 when you started mining to now?
Back then there wasn’t “crypto,” it was just Bitcoin. It was quieter, simpler. Bitcointalk was the spot! This may be a biased recall given my interest at the time, but the most discussion I remember was focused on mining, hashrate, overclocking, so on.
The funniest bit I remember was a thread where people were arguing whether or not ASICS posed a threat to us GPU miners or not. I think most thought they were still too far off to worry about. So, yeah things were slower, quieter, tech-focused. Reminiscent of the earlier internet where most people online were nerds.
iv) What is your forecast for the next 5 years for crypto in terms of adoption?
Onwards and upwards. I believe Bitcoin will be more expensive in 2025 and even more expensive in 2030. DeFi will continue to transform the way people think about and allocate their money.
We’ve “made it,” as far as I’m concerned. The balance tipped in our favor and what fight the rest of the world has left isn’t much. Bitcoin will supplant gold in time, it is only a matter of time.
v) Where can people find you to learn more?
I have a personal website coming up very shortly, for now, you can catch me at @thecryptodog on Twitter.
https://www.trybetterbrand.com/ is my health & wellness company, I appreciate any love. I’m proud of our products, and our subscriber base backs that up. We have thousands of happy repeat customers.
3. Simona (Twitter: @Sim_pop)
Simona has a wealth of experiences creating digital communities from scratch, especially for Web3. She is an evangelist of the Web3 ecosystem by educating, mentoring, and hosting hackathons to bring this seemingly endless world together, one person at a time. We were excited to chat with Simona and learn about her experiences with growth hacking and building the healthiest human ecosystem.
i) What brought you into the world of Crypto/NFTs?
I’ve always been interested in how technology can help in leveling out the playing field in terms of access to resources — for everyone. As a result, I’ve been involved in fintech startups for a while but fell down the proverbial crypto rabbit hole in 2015 (trading only) and then fully in 2017 when I finally realized there were people out there already building exciting things on Ethereum. From there, the full immersion happened swiftly and I quickly went on to co-found the Bounties Network and start experimenting with real-world functionality of token-economics. Ever since I have been deeply involved in many aspects of growing the Ethereum ecosystem: mentoring, leading scholars tracks, running earn as you learn educational workshops both across various programs, hackathons, and conferences in / outside the crypto space. I am a member of a few DAOs including MetaGammaDelta, an inclusive and empowering society supporting women-led projects.
ii) What do you do now?
I am currently heading up Community for Status — an Ethereum based decentralized platform combining a privacy-first, censorship-resistant chat, crypto wallet and Web3 browser. It’s an OG project in the ecosystem built on principles in full alignment with my values: the right to privacy, liberty, transparency, inclusivity, resourcefulness. Because the work is and always has been about broadening access and empowering communities, my work tends to be much broader. This year, it included curating content for this year’s ETHDenver (the biggest hackathon in the Ethereum space), judging in the upcoming NFT hackathon by ETHGlobal at the end of this month, and setting up educational and grants allocation programs to support onboarding newcomers to the ecosystem.
iii) What do you love most about it?
Shifting the dynamic from power to empowerment — being able to create the tools needed for an open-source economy focused on human thriving vs mindless growth.
iv) Where can people find you to learn more?
Twitter: @Sim_Pop and https://join.status.im/u/simona.stateofus.eth
Much Wow,
Dogepunks
