æternity around the world

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand and æternity in an hour.

Over the last months æternity was on a trip around the world.n I take partial responsibility, for I was offered the knightly task to represent – on a global scale – the next step in blockchain evolution. The secondary objective, to grow the community, wasn’t always easy, but I am pleased with the positive resonance.

I can’t recall encountering communities comprised of more open-minded, dedicated, smart and overall amazing people, than on the first æternity world tour. Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand. And æternity in an hour.n Tune in and feast on the experiences I’m about to share.

In the Beginning…

… there was the Word.

The Word about a new blockchain that could catalyze disruptive technologies in as many industries as one may think of.

At first – in Europe, the Word was only indistinctly heard and did not reach many open ears.

However, once the Word got around, flowing through Berlin, London, Paris & Tel Aviv, it was invited at D10e in Bucharest, Romania.

And that was where it materialized into something tangible, something more definitive…

We always open our ears of understanding to lips of blockchain wisdom.

If any capable, open-minded, motivated and experienced blockchain developers are reading this, I urge all of you to get in touch with me, now!

So let’s retrace the first stepping-stone of the epic adventure I was – unknowingly at that point – about to embark on.

Bucharest, Baby!

Suffering under the impression of my last business trip, I was not overly excited about visiting Bucharest again; I was taught a valuable lesson on how different a city can be if a bunch of good people surround you. Oh Bucharest, how I wronged you.

Weaved in an inspirational scenery, populated with a lot of creativity and more networking I could dream of, the D10e Conference was the place to be for æternity. Hundreds of other people thought so too.

Best regards at this point to Brock and the D10e team, I’m positive you’ll be able to keep the high level of quality content over the coming years.

The atmosphere was sizzling with ideas, eyes, ears and minds wide open. During the conference, a series of fortunate events set in motion an unstoppable force that laid the foundations for the construction of the spacecraft that æternity is shaping to become. Oh and send me rolling around the globe, in less than a month.

Coconuts & Coin Agenda

My first stop was Puerto Rico, where Yani and I were to visit another great conference. Pumped and full of energy I imagined a vibrant, colorful Caribbean hot spot. But once we arrived, I became aware of how progressed the Americanization of San Juan and parts of Puerto Rico was. The numbing spell the scenery had on me was lifted once I came to enjoy the kindness of the locals. The Uber drivers were uber friendly. Matilda even took us on a tour, giving us restaurant recommendations sightseeing tips, and generally making us feel very welcome.

Digital Nomads in the Sand, fishing for Tacos, burning tasks.

The accommodation was affordable, meaning we slept in a garage that was renovated onto the side of something that seemed like a condo. That’s Digital Nomads way!

Nonetheless, it could have been much worse because, oh yeah – the beach was only 100 meters away. We had that going for us.

Kite surfing crossed my mind, but important tasks and a slowly dawning jet lag where chasing the kite out of sight.

As a person that loves the sea, I can say that there is only one thing that’s better than laying on the beach enjoying the sun. That would be:

Sitting next to people on the beach enjoying the sun, while contributing wholeheartedly to a project you believe in, on your laptop – in the shade.

It didn’t take long to locate a suitable spot to get productive and SUDDENLY, providence found us in the form of cold beer and the most delicious fish tacos that ever tickled my taste buds.

I would literally fly around the world to San Juan again, solely to taste those tacos again.

But before I digress even further, let us keep in mind what I came to Puerto Rico for:

Coin Agenda

Once Michael Therpin appeared and spoke, that was Coin Agenda!

Needless to say, æternity’s presentation by Yanislav and his packed panel talk were turning heads and sparking interest in room. It was satisfying to see how well understood and received the project was outside of Europe. We felt all the more proud once we heard our first presentation outside Europe earned us the 3rd place in the startup competition!

The Conference in general was a very pleasant event with all kinds of people from all over the crypto spectrum, bursting with ideas, full of energy and ready to face challenges. Of rather intimate size (about 100 people), the conference offered numerous opportunities to connect, debate and pitch to almost all attending parties. The rather shabby interior of the Hilton Hotel was more than compensated with an outstanding bar, supposedly the birthplace of the Pina Colada. Never had one until then and it was pretty awesome!

In evening, we met many ingenious characters representing promising projects. It may sound a bit ludicrous, but there was a certain quality of magic lingering in the atmosphere. I am happy to say that the good mood that was emanating from me might have been part of the reason for everyone getting along so very well. In retrospect, the people at the event really cemented it all together.

My personal favorites, or projects that impressed me the most were the following:

Matchpool (matchmaking dApp with own coin)

Bancor Protocol

Alphabit

To put it in a coconut, Coin Agenda is a quality event, offering a neat interface for Startups, VCs and blockchain enthusiasts to mingle in an intimate atmosphere.

Layover in Paradise.

Naturally, something had to go wrong. We missed our flight to Cologne. But sometimes you just got to go with the flow. Hence, we were eager to make the best of the time displaced.

How fortunate though that we had to take a small detour and stop in the Dominican Republic.

Finally, the color laden Caribbean island was unveiled before my eyes and I can tell with utmost certainty that it is a thing of pure beauty.

Roaming the beautiful beach, we stumbled across a place with an amazing WiFi connection and decided to enjoy the gorgeous scenery while burning down some tasks, before heading back to the airport.

I could hear all the young minds yearning for inspiration and thirsting for new ideas, all the way in Cologne.

The World Business Dialogue in Cologne

We arrived back in chilly Germany, with only one day delay and made it just in time for our presentation during the World Business Dialogue in Cologne.

Our workshop afterwards revolved around the potential of blockchain technology as a disruptive factor in the insurance industry. It was great to see that it was fully booked.

Our presentation was received really well and we felt how hungry people are for scalable, private smart contracts. I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of questions asked by the students. It was a great opportunity to share my knowledge and thoughts about blockchain technology with university students and I am looking forward to do it again in the future.

An insightful talk with Robin Hanson, a pioneer in prediction markets, had us forget our jet lag (that was slowly starting to catch up on us). In order to be responsive and actively partake in the evening festivities, a royal 1-hour nap was in order.

Seriously though, I never thought that I will able to leave the hotel in time for my flight to Hong Kong, without at least a bit of sleep. I could have never foreseen what was waiting for me there.

Good that I now know and will tell you soon.

To be continued…


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