You’ve been hearing a lot about crypto and are wondering where to get started. Or maybe if you’re like us, you’ve spent your days, evenings, weekends and holidays getting up to speed. The crypto community is one where the only constant is the pace at which it changes.
We know this firsthand. Here at Lightspeed, we have been selectively investing in the space since March 2013 (we made our first investment in Ripple, then Blockchain a year later). Over the last 8 years, our pace of investing in fundamental crypto infrastructure and real applications of the technology has increased with 2021 seeing us invest nearly $500M to date across 40 blockchain/web3 deals (with a few more to be announced). Investments this year have included FTX, Solana, Terra, Alchemy, Parallel Finance, LedgerX, Blockchain.com and more.
At Lightspeed, we believe the next cycle will bring mainstream adoption of blockchain as companies across consumer and enterprise adopt a web3 framework. As we look ahead to 2022, there are a number of areas we’ve developed strong theses in and are excited to closely follow:
Given our interest in the space, we wanted to share our favorite resources and what we’ve been reading the past few weeks. And as with any community, understanding the cultural ties, language, builders and supporters is vital to fully immersing and understanding the community. We hope you’ll enjoy it. We’ll continue to update this every few months so please reach out to us to share any of your favorite seminal resources that should be added.
— Team Lightspeed
Blockchain
Crypto
DAOs
Glossary
Metaverse
Web3
L1 ecosystems
Gaming
Defi
Art / NFTs
Sports
Music
Entertainment
Edtech
Additional Concepts + Deep Dives
Accelerators
Crypto Schools
LearningDAOs
Podcasts
Newsletters
Telegram Channels
Fave Twitter Handles
NFT Artists
Crypto Institutional Investors (alphabetical)
Lawyers
Roles
Conferences
Market Maps
— Mercedes Bent, Amy Wu, Natalie Luu, Nicole Quinn, Ravi Mhatre, Shan Shan
About Mercedes: Mercedes is an investor at Lightspeed Venture Partners. If you enjoyed this, follow her on Twitter and LinkedIn where she’s writing about web3's impact on pop culture, learning, and the future of income. If you’re a founder building in this space, feel free to drop a line: mbent@lsvp.com
About Lightspeed: Lightspeed is a multi-stage venture capital firm focused on accelerating disruptive innovations and trends in the Enterprise, Consumer, and Health sectors. Since 2000, Lightspeed has backed entrepreneurs and helped build companies of tomorrow, including Snap, Affirm, AppDynamics, FTX, Solana, Epic Games, Cameo, and X. Lightspeed and its affiliates currently manage more than $10 Billion across the global Lightspeed platform, with investment professionals and advisors in Silicon Valley, India, Israel, China, Southeast Asia and Europe.