CSS Week 5 Recap: Network Flywheels, New Hires, Token Models

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We’re back with another recap at Bello, highlighting Week 5 of Crypto Startup School.

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Last week was jam-packed with industry expert talks and project discussions. As we experiment with different summary formats, we hope you enjoy this recap.

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Let’s dive in.

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Week 5 Day 1

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We had the opportunity to hear from Anatoly Yakovenko, founder of Solana, about his experience in the crypto space.

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Yakovenko shared his insights on launching Solana and his input on raising capital in the bear market. We also got to play with the new Saga phone, and pick his brain on various web3 subjects, like the birth of Solana.

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Solana's Origin Story

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During his talk, Yakovenko shared Solana's beginnings and the types of engineers and personalities needed to build the platform. He discussed fundraising challenges and leaving traditional jobs for a blockchain startup. Yakovenko emphasized the importance of building a strong team that can work together to achieve success.

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Infrastructure Mental Models

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Ali Yahya's presentation on mental models for thinking about crypto infrastructure was also impactful. We discussed what Sound.xyz would look like on Aptos and the role of tokens in incentivizing participation in a network.

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The narrow waste model and the network flywheel, in particular, were applicable to those building multi-sided markets. We also debated the possibility of using tokens to bootstrap the internet instead of government funding and the benefits of token models in web3, referencing widley adopted protocols like TCP/IP.

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Determining Better Platforms for Applications and Protocol Opinionation

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Yahya also outlined frameworks for determining which applications are better suited for more modular versus user-freedom protocols, the pros and cons of different Layer 1s, as well as whether tokens make protocols more opinionated and incentivize different players in the system with different perspectives.

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Layer Zero and Security Talk

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We also had the opportunity to hear from the Layer Zero CEO and the former CTO and CISO of a16z on smart contract design patterns and security. The talk covered notable attacks and different types of vulnerabilities that can be found in blockchain systems.

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Week 5 Day 2

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The second day of Week 5 at CSS focused on project discussions and networking opportunities.

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Open Networking with L1 Protocols

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Participants networked with representatives from various Layer 1 (L1) protocols, including Solana, XMTP, and Layer Zero. This provided an opportunity for us to ask questions and discuss potential collaborations.

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The debut of Allowlist Pages with Sammy Arriaga

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Another notable announcement was the debut of Allowlist Pages alongside web3-native music artist Sammy Arriaga.

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Non-Twitter Space Community Town Hall

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We hosted our first non-Twitter Space community town hall. We showcased Bello's new feature and airdropped a free Proof of Demo NFT for everyone who attended.

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Growing the Team

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We added a new member to Bello’s team, William, to help us lead the front on all things engineering. More devs = more firepower.

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We’re still actively interviewing and hiring a Senior Backend Engineer and offering a $5k reward for successful hires.

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What's Next

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CSS of Week 5 was a sucess. So much to reflect on and apply to how we build Bello in public with you all. We’re excited to see what Week 6 has in store and can’t wait to share what we’ve learned and our progress.

See you next week!

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