I’m writing this from the pool deck area on the 31st floor of a tower in the Forest City special economic zone in Malaysia. It is located on an artificial island that was built ten years ago. It has the ambition to be the site of a future city, I can see that happening, it is well on that trajectory. The Network School opened here one year ago. It is created by Balaji Srinivasan, an American entrepreneur, investor, billionaire and prominent voice in cryptography and technology. The vision is that crypto will take the next step to become communities and network states. I see this as a natural next step in evolution of humanity. Things like communities, religions, governments are technology, this is how humanity evolves. We can’t survive without all of the infrastructure and services that our communities provide. As we move to the next stage of our civilizational evolution, we are innovating on this. The constitution of the USA was a technological break through. No longer was it that only the King owned the land, and all those living on it were his subjects. The sailors and explorers that discovered new lands, made the investors very rich and formed giant global corporations. They drove a large increase in the pace of innovation, of discovery of new scientific theories, new tools and inventions, that allowed them to further their quest in exploration and making businesses that connected far off lands. Buckminster Fuller talks a lot about this in his book Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth.
I flew to Singapore on Tuesday morning from Phuket. The last day I spent in a cafe writing, coding, then I did Muay Thai training. At the airport I was filled with a deep grief, maybe inspired by all the all the hopes and dreams I had, a deep sense of communion with my core memories, a longing for turning my potential to actuality making a positive contribution to the world. People around me at the gate, seemed to sense this I guess, as I was in a meditation pose, with my eye’s covered with a sleep mask, a hoodie, and trying to hide the fact that I was crying and had to wipe my nose every few minutes. I didn’t feel shame or embarrassment. I just wanted to not be noticed and not to be disturbed or disturb others. I was glad to touch this deep part of me, it was good because I was feeling the real me, my emotional core, that is a gift, to be in touch with yourself, and not too numb, too old to feel powerful emotions of longing, desire, determination, love, hopes, dreams, drive. This is a gift. It is fuel to go after your dreams. Whatever sparked it, is a clue to my heart’s deepest longings, that should be studied closely and listened to, as this is my internal navigation compass, my own map to where I need to go on my journey in life, physically, spiritually and intellectually. I remember how much reading the book Hull House, triggered a similar response.
I landed in Singapore and it was hot. I got a delicious meal, checked into my hostel and went to the Hackathon venue at the Marina Bay Sands. I met my team, everyone was already there, we watched the workshops and opening remarks. The next day the Token2049 convention was starting. This was my first time attending it, it is more general crypto conference, not only focused on Ethereum.
On Day 2 we kept hammering out our plan and vision for our project we called Tokennect. We started with this vision of an AI twin that helps you 100x your networking at such conferences as this one by finding, chatting and providing a summary of your interactions with other relevant people. We took time to figure out the web3 components. Through a lot of debates and discussions that were constructive, we figured out the best plan was to build a token launch platform that had a built in business development AI and on the other side of the market, an AI that searched and auto invested in new tokens based on your investment strategy. This was a very specific application of the vast number of useful things that AI agents can now do with our current technology. I used spec-kit, cline, cursor and roo code as my AI coding tools of choice. I worked on the smart contracts on the TON network with FunC language. In between building we got some time to take a few breaks and explore the conference. I took an ice plunge, explored the booths and had lunch chatting with other participants. I had very limited time for this as every fiber of my body was focused on the hackathon project. We were all very motivated to give it our all.
On Day 3
Our deadline was at 9am. I got to the venue an hour before, having slept maybe 4 hours only. Yet many did not sleep at all. We submitted on time and were feeling good about our project. Then we were free to explore the conference. We gathered to give a demo to the sponsor, AlphaTon, who helps the TON ecosystem launch projects and is the largest holder of TON tokens. I handled the demo since they wanted only the technical demo of the app working and explanation, without any presentation slides. It turned out very well.
Out on the conference floor I went and did some of the ‘side quest’ activities that gave you points that then you could redeem for merch. It was a fun way to engage with different people. I climbed the rock wall, did 28 and 15 pull ups that got me to the top 10 out of 150 people. Then I got some lion’s mane tea, coconut and delicious Asian food. I talked to projects that were building AI influencer on chain. A project that aimed to discover truth called ArAIstotle. The Nifty Gateway company that was creating interactive NFT experiences. I walked into some panels like the Steady Lads podcast panel, talking about current trends in the market. I wondered why they didn’t mention any AI agent meme coin topics. They were excited about farming air drops, perpetuals, hyperliquid and market cycles.
We didn’t make the cut for the top 5 finalist teams. I watched their presentations with great interest, then the sponsor prizes were announced and we were happy to get the first place from AI on TON track. We got up on stage and snapped the photos, the team was a talented great group, we complimented each other well. At night I went out for the first time, Blondish, a DJ that was in my Spotify playlists was playing a crypto party at Marquee night club. It was a blast, I danced, felt light and free.
Day 4 was Friday, the Network School Conference was happening at the same venue, on the fifth floor. I arrived early in the day. I watched the live stream on YouTube, as I completed some work. I applied for the Edge City Patagonia pop up city that was happening during Devcon in Argentina next month. I also planned my next step of the journey. I met a really interesting guy from SF during lunch. He’s building a kind of city in a box, where people can have housing with all necessities to create a new kind of community. We had a lot to chat about and exchange ideas about this. After lunch I dove into the conference, sitting in the back absorbing every second of it.
I was amazed at the high quality of the speakers ideas and presentations on various topics around crypto network states. Especially those from Vitalik about how crypto communities have been evolving over the past years. Amjad from Replit on the future of coding, that the best use of computers is to be writing code and now everyone could with just language, in the same trend as going from assembly to compilers to high level languages. ZCash founder talking about how Satoshi explained that only privacy preserving digital money like ZCash would allow for the human freedom. There were talks by Nas Daily about AI video is allowing for individuals to create their own history video film productions for very low cost. This particularly struck a chord with me and I visualized building a channel with daily short videos on the fascinating history of computers and blockchain. I went to the RaveDAO event, had a blast and ended up making it over the border to my new Airbnb in Johor Bahor by 5am feeling really great, but wishing I could sleep more. Not having internet, finding the cab driver and digging through my belongings to fish out a paper currency he would accept was an adventure.
On Saturday I took a 40 minute grab ride to the Network School in the Forest City special economic zone for their open day. It was great to hear from the director a presentation about every thing we should know about attending. I chatted with him, shared my story and purpose, and exchanged contact info regarding my application. There was a dinner with the existing members and later a live music concert. I got home at ten PM really needing to catch up on sleep.
Today, I moved to a new AirBnB near the Network School since my team mate is a resident and we will collaborate more on the hackathon project. I managed to inspire and motivate the hackathon team to keep the project going and to make it a real startup. We are meeting and discussing the plan. There is a lot of alignment and opportunity in this project, using TON network as the first platform to release personal AI twins that will accelerate how you network, collaborate, and perform actions on chain, through delegating your AI to do the work for you, and you just keep watch over your dashboard metrics, receive executive summaries and adjust when needed.
In conclusion, this is my best at condensing the last week into one article. I realize the importance and value of writing, it helps you think, to clarify your thinking and communicate. This is a mix of personal and professional topics, for this channel, this is alright because it is my story. I am writing this saying the things I would want to know and remember 20 years from today. Another way of putting it is I’m writing to my Mom, updating her about my travels. To live a life and leave nothing noteworthy behind you is a great waste, I do not want to be like that. I want to leave behind myself some insights, some lessons, some discoveries, that can be helpful to others and my future self. To write things that you care about, that you are obsessed with and that are bringing value to some real world ecosystem is the best thing you can do. This is what Vitalik did when he founded Bitcoin Magazine. I highly resonate with his story and his obsession with crypto, as I too see that this is the path forward for human evolution. To turn away from that, to go into another field, is a betrayal of who you are. It is not easy, it is not without dangers, it is a great responsibility to play your part to the best of your abilities in this life. We are given this chance, these talents, these resources in this life, and what we do with it, is our legacy. To go to the grave without giving it your all to turn your potential to actuality is the worst kind of cosmic suffering possible. We don’t live in times where every generation is born and dies in the same world, our world is rapidly changing, humanity is rapidly changing, our societies, tools, technology, and it all depends on us to create the world of our future. This is why it is so important to take this seriously, take your work seriously, have a clear goal and every day try to be 1% better. These writings are an important part of this effort.