My personal history with crypto and blockchain began a few years ago, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. As a web developer passionate about technology and the future of the web, I was intrigued by the idea of transacting entirely online, without banks or credit cards. Just as you can access any website from any computer, you could access any digital asset and make transactions.
Fast forward to today, I have only consumed crypto and blockchain online, and never met others who share my passion, except from a couple of colleagues at work who like to talk about the next memecoin and ask me how to stake Solana.
Ready to step out of my protective online cocoon, I took a stab at joining one of the biggest conferences in Europe, Dappcon 24 in Berlin. I bought my ticket onchain using Monerium EURe from my Gnosis account and a train ticket and I ventured to the vibrant city of Berlin.
Arriving just one day before the conference start, I hunted for events I could attend in the evening. Berlin Blockchain Week was packed with events, making it difficult to choose. I didn’t know anyone and had no expectations about what I would experience, but joining BasedBerlin Happy Hour opened up a world of connections and conversations. I immediately jumped to meet one of the guys that was grabbing a beer and had a fascinating conversation about how design is often overlooked in the industry, and how one often transitions from the hardcore technology aspect of blockchain to the world of real applications and users.
As the evening drew on, there were snacks, there were drinks and I met more and more people: artists from Uzbekistan, a gym owner from Berlin, and even someone from the city I currently live in. I was creating unique memories with each and one of them, and felt incredibly fulfilled from the experience. For the first time in the years since I discovered crypto, I was making real connections with real people.
The first evening was such a success that it set my mood incredibly high and the awe persisted throughout the week.
Dappcon Day 1
Being at the conference was in fact, not about sitting and listening to all the talks, but having conversations with real people about real projects and experiences.
The next morning, the conference was about to start and arriving at the venue, I was pleasantly surprised to see familiar faces from the previous event. Some people were hacking on their projects, others were discussing their work, all with incredible passion and curiosity. Being at the conference was in fact, not about sitting and listening to all the talks, but having conversations with real people about real projects and experiences.
One of these conversations was with someone from Kiwi News, who told me about their project and how they are curating the next generation of news and articles from the crypto world. I made an account and started exploring. I think this is what gave me a push to think about how I could share my experiences from the week, ultimately leading to this post.
I quickly learned that Telegram is the tool of choice for connecting with crypto people, despite the awkwardness of having to send a random message or an emoji sticker the first time you add someone. I learned the tactic of taking a selfie with the person and send it in Telegram to immortalise the moment of connection, although I want to use it sparingly to lower the chances of being categorised as a random person.
During Day 1, I attended a few talks and panels, among which an interesting AI risk panel discussing the real threats from emerging AI tech, a fireside chat with Joe Lubin from Consensys about crypto regulation and a history lesson about Gnosis Chain, and its future.
In the middle of the conference day, the organizers snuck a surprise announcement on X - none other than the OG Ethereum man himself, Vitalik, is going to show up on the last day of the conference to attend a fireside chat. Excitement boost mode activated!
My head could only take one more talk, one about the Polygon Agg. Layer, as I wanted to deepen my understanding of the fascinating upcoming architecture meant to seamlessly connect L2s.
As the evening approached, I had another opportunity to socialize and meet new people in a different context. So I opened lu.ma, clicked join, and headed off to my second side-event of the week.
This time the event was sponsored by the Fuel Network and held at a unique venue called a späti. And when I arrived at the narrow entrance of the BlockSpäti, the friendly folks from Fuel welcomed me. A snack was immediately served; I grabbed one, a drink, and went outside to sit and chat with interesting people: developers from Fuel, someone from the world of publishing entering the crypto space with an intriguing project, someone creating a web3 event ticketing platform, a tall Swedish person with a side-interest for crypto like me, and a few familiar faces from Dappcon.
The night ended with me playing board games with the devs from Fuel and having a snack at a famous currywurst place in Berlin to satisfy our late night hunger.
Dappcon Day 2
Despite sleeping less than usual, I arrived a bit early, got my coffee and something to bite, and explored the venue. I was surprised by the fact that not a lot of people had arrived yet. Slowly but steadily the stream of attendees intensified, and by the time the first talk of the day began, everyone had settled in their seats in the main auditorium. Marcos Nunes, CEO of Gnosis Pay, discussed how banking is evolving using web3 technologies. The presentation was compelling and engaging, and my mind was spinning with ideas about how web3 could power the next generation of banking systems. It was followed by an interesting fireside chat between Marcos and Maike from Visa.
As the day went on, I became less interested in watching talks and more interested in connecting with people. I spotted my friend from BasedBerlin and met with some of their friends, constantly expanding my circle of connections. We tagged along, watched a few talks on topics such as current accounts and stablecoins, tokenization of German company shares and RWAs. We also tackled the challenge of getting a cup of ice cream using the Circles currency in the newly released metri app, while learning about the social layer of money.
On Day 2 I also met with a few people from the Rotki project, as I had contributed to their open-source portfolio management app and wanted to meet them in person. It was great to confirm that they are really nice people in real life as well!
As the weather turned windy and chilly, the conference day wound down with some snacks and drinks sponsored by Nektar Network, whom I got to meet and chat with about their DVT and restaking alternative earlier in the day. Afterward, I decided to head back to the hotel to get some rest and recover some of the hours of sleep I had missed the previous night. Gotta listen to my body as well!
It was a bit hard to fight the FOMO of missing out on all the other side events (including a Bitcoin Pizza Party 🍕!), meeting more people, and forming even more memories, but this time I decided that giving my brain a break and taking some notes to consolidate my experiences is worth doing instead.
Day 3 - Double the fun: Dappcon + SafeCON
Day 3 was packed! It was not only the last day of Dappcon but also a full day of talks and networking at SafeCON, just on the other side of the river!
I decided to explore both conferences, starting the third day with the opening talk at Dappcon by Lefteris from Rotki. It was great to hear from such an OG that the focus on privacy is more important than ever, as many projects in this space undermine users’ need for privacy.
After this talk, I decided to explore SafeCON. I grabbed a rental bike and, in just 5 minutes, I was at the SafeCon venue, where I met some familiar faces and many new ones.
In the afternoon, back at Dappcon, I was eagerly waiting to see Vitalik Buterin in person. Before that, I attended an insightful talk by Alex from zkSync on the ZK endgame. Then the fireside chat with Vitalik and Friederike Ernst began. Friederike’s cheerful voice was familiar to me from the fantastic Epicenter podcast. The chat was slightly shorter than expected, but packed with perspectives on some of the most important themes at this conference: scalability, the Ethereum Roadmap and privacy as a public good.
I knew Vitalik was going to give another talk right after, at SafeCON, but I didn’t think it was feasible to get to the other venue on time. So, I hung around at Dappcon, learning about Account Abstraction EIPs and the use cases they enable for developers and users.
Sensing that most people were still at SafeCON, I zipped back to the other venue on my rental bike. At SafeCON, I dropped into the middle of a panel discussing Smart Account Use Cases, from obvious financial ones to more social and collaborative applications. I hung around and met one of the panelists who was building Fileverse, a sort of Notion/Google Drive for web3.
As the conference atmosphere wound down, pizzas were brought out, and cold beers were available. I took a final look at the beautiful scenery on the bank of the river, marking the perfect end to my first crypto conference and blockchain week.
After the conference day ended, there was one final event to attend at a familiar venue—the BlockSpäti. I headed there with the friends I had made earlier in the week. The evening was filled with more music, drinks, meeting new people, and having casual conversations.
Almost two weeks later, I’m still carrying the impressions from Dappcon and Berlin Blockchain Week. I still smile at the fun memories I made and feel grateful for the wonderful people I connected with. I was reminded once again that nothing is built without the great people behind every project, even in web3—the decentralized, permissionless, pseudonymous internet of value and ownership.
This post is taking part in the Kiwi x Dappcon Writing Challenge.