What made you interested in blockchain? It’s the go-to ice-breaker question at any web3 gathering, and almost no two answers are alike for being a standard question. That’s the beauty of this space; every individual’s fall into the rabbit hole is as unique as the next. As for me, it was straightforward- an insatiable curiosity when I heard two of my favorite things in the same sentence, “blockchain” and “government.” A bit endearing in hindsight. Here is an interview I did with Crypto Conexión earlier this year that describes my journey into crypto. It’s in English with Spanish-translated subtitles.
Why 'discernment'?
I love the paradigm shift brought on by blockchain technologies so much that I can be critical of their application. My first project deep dive into the application of blockchain technologies was during my 2017 -18 Fulbright grant, where I studied government adoption of blockchain technology. During the ICO frivolity, I was in the middle of sorting through why we even use blockchain as the underlying tech stack. I remember the excitement around the Rohingya Project and experimentation in issuing land titles in Georgia. Intelligent contracts were a favorite buzzword but with limited iterations and field examples. In all this flurry of activity (did the eruption ever stop?) I grounded myself in the principles of distributed ledger technology and always asked whether a distributed system across nodes was necessary. Discernment became my favorite reminder throughout my web3 journey, and that habit never stopped. I’ve grown an aptitude for stepping back and being critical of my decisions and life approaches.
What readers can expect
I will explore topics contextualizing Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) theory disciplines, particularly postcolonial computing, and computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW) concepts. I am driven by the intersection of government and blockchain technologies (monetary policy, stablecoins, CBDCs, etc.) and civic endeavors that address gender and racial inclusion in the technology and finance industry. I’m a policy nerd, but I value demystifying the swirling blockchain universes. I also plan to share my accounts of my experiences in web3 and connect the dots to broader themes of social justice and community.
Let me know how you like using Paragraph! I was on autopilot setting up a blog on either Substack or WordPress route out of convenience and familiarity. I realized I wanted to align my web3 values and challenge myself to learn something new.
