Will Web3 Survive a Crypto Winter?
So I guess, unlike in past crypto cycles where we might have had summers and winters, crypto is working. We've got major use cases now outside of people just trading it. DeFi has tens of billions of dollars locked up in it. NFT has been a massive trend and continues to grow. People are building gaming and social media apps and DAOs and identity systems. - Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase
The maturing of the Bitcoin market means it's increasingly difficult to reliably forecast future price action, this was always going to happen. - Willy Woo, Bitcoin on-chain analyst
The recent weakness in crypto prices has made many of us revisit our past trauma of undergoing an inhospitable crypto winter during 2018 to 2020. While it is always wise to not deny the possibility of such an event we must consider that crypto or Web3 has much stronger fundamentals in comparison to its state in 2017/2018. There’s a high likelihood that we don’t experience these cycles anymore in the future.
Growth in investment and deals
According to the “2021 State of Blockchain” report by CB Insights, VC funding for blockchain startups reached $25.2 billion last year. This is an increase of about 713% from only $3.1 billion back in 2020. The funding share for blockchain startups accounted for 4% of global VC funding which is up from only 1% in 2020.
The M&A activity in the space reached record breaking levels and Arcane Research believes we are currently in line to reach last year’s record by the end of this year.
Successful use cases
Another sign showing there’s a clear use-case is the growth in DeFi total value locked (TVL) which currently stands at around $210.6 billion according to DeFi Llama. There’s a whole slew of products ranging from DEXs, AMMs, lending protocols that investors can choose from to deploy capital in search of yield.
While NFTs are a relatively new sector in Web3, the growth of its market cap has been quite extraordinary in a relatively short time frame. There are still many use-cases for NFTs that are unexplored or still under development in gaming, music and other sectors. NFTGO estimates place the current market cap around $19.92 billion.
Demand for talent
At tr3butor we estimate through our internal research that Web3 entities have dedicated a whopping $2.8 billion in the form of compensation, rewards, grants or bounties that is yet to be unlocked to by talent for the space.
According to Electric Capital’s Developer Report for 2021 which analyses contributions to open source projects on Github, there were more than 18,000 monthly active developers committing code in open source crypto and Web3 projects. This was a record breaking number where the number of monthly active developers grew by 75% between Jan 2021 to Dec 2021.
Last year was also record breaking in terms of the number of new developers who committed code to Web3 projects. There were more than 34,000 new developers who joined Web3. The report continues to estimate that the number of developers will continue to grow into 2023 even if the network value has peaked.
Considering the strong underlying trends and fundamentals of Web3, it is much better equipped today to weather any level of uncertainty and challenges than it was a few years back. We believe the main lesson that should be taken seriously from the past is that those who focused on building will be the ones that thrive in the future. We want to empower the next Uniswap, AAVE or MakerDAO that wants to unlock talent in a frictionless manner and build towards a decentralized future.
Product / Team Updates
Are any of you degens in Amsterdam for Devconnect? We’re definitely happy to link up and talk about how we can help you in Web3. Devconnect is everything Ethereum and a crucial event for us to strengthen our support and relationships in this ecosystem. If you’re interested in Devconnect and other cool events for this year, please check out our recent update on the upcoming blockchain events that are not to be missed.
We cannot be more excited for the developments at tr3butor lately. We onboarded new team members to strengthen our research, content and community efforts.
The development of the core product is finalized and we’ve started working on integrating Web3 solutions for both contributors and Web3 projects.
At the same time we are also launching an in-depth talent research project to understand the state of the Web3 talent market better. This will help us understand the gaps and challenges faced by both talent and employers in Web3. As we’re obsessed with making talent recruitment frictionless in Web3, the results gathered are going to be extremely useful in our efforts to bring impactful on-chain solutions to the ecosystem. Please join our Discord to support, learn more and participate in this research project.
Our operations team is hard at work refining and documenting our onboarding processes so we can “open-source” this knowledge for the Web3 ecosystem. We hope projects can benefit from well thought through processes and easy-to-use templates without having to start by themselves from scratch. We will be sharing these with the community soon.
Want to attract Web3 talent?
Is your project seeking to recruit Web3 talent? We want to help you with this. Click here to tell us more about your project and your needs.
Want to join Web3 projects?
Are you interested in joining the movement? Whether you have something specific in mind or just want to make general enquiries, we’re here to serve. Join our Discord now or check out Quest Board!
Featured Project
As we continue to grow our ecosystem we like to feature projects that our community would find interesting.
zkSync
zkSync is a Layer 2 scaling solution on Ethereum that enables users to perform transactions at lower gas fees and faster rates without compromising on security, transaction finality or network decentralization. Funds can be withdrawn to Layer 1 at any time. It is estimated the gas fees will be 1/100 of L1 gas and it would be able to accommodate 2000+ transactions per second (tps) compared to 14 tps on L1.
Contributing to zkSync represents an opportunity to work on a unique approach to Ethereum scalability, grow its user base and increase the impact Web3 can have in the world.
Learn more about open quests with zkSync
Latest Quests
We get supplied a lot of interesting opportunities by our partners on a consistent basis. Be sure to check our site to keep updated. Here’s some of the most recent exciting opportunities.
Akash Network
Bounty (1,000 AKT)
Perfect as a small project for a frontend developer. Akash Network has a bounty out for 1,000 AKT to build an app similar to Github Pages.
Click here to learn more and apply
Gnosis
Bounty ($500)
If you’re a creative communications expert at heart, this could be the bounty for you. Gnosis is looking for creative ways to explain why users should trust and use Gnosis Safe. It can be in the form of memes, videos or anything you’re comfortable presenting in.
Click here to learn more and apply
zkSync
Ecosystem Marketing Manager
Great opportunity to contribute to the growth of an ETH L2. You’ll be in charge of developing and executing marketing campaigns to promote new and existing ecosystem projects building on zkSync.
Click here to learn more and apply
Perp Protocol
Senior Community Manager
Are you a DeFi fanatic? This could be the role for you in terms of community management. You will be coordinating community-related programs and campaigns to empower the members and builders in the community.
Click here to learn more and apply
Aragon
Bounty ($2,500)
Aragon is looking for a team to deploy KPI options in an App for Aragon Client DAOs. The final deliverable is a working Aragon Client App with the best UI.
Click here to learn more and apply
Interesting Resources
Every now and then we come across interesting resources on Web3 from the universe and we’d like to share them with our community. If you have anything interesting about Web3 please feel free to drop by our Discord and share it with us.
Devconnect Amsterdam and 6 other Blockchain Events not to miss in 2022 by tr3butor team
We’ve compiled the most exciting upcoming Web3 / Crypto events in 2022. Be sure to check it out because it will be life changing.
👉 Read Full Piece >>
Transition to Web3: A Guide for Non-Technical Roles by Li Jin
Simple guide that is packed with curated reading, links, and people to follow, to act as a career transition resource for people new to web3.
👉 Read Full Piece >>
Can ‘Community Composability’ Help Web2 Users Make the Jump to Web3? by Jenny Wang & Michael Chiang
How can Web3 products be built to motivate Web2 users with strong identities to onboard onto Web3 without having them adopt a new behavior? This in turn might encourage them to explore Web3 on their own.
👉 Read Full Piece >>
Common pitfalls for Web3 Founders by Qiao Wang
While every project has its own unique set of nuances, there’s always a whole slew of generic challenges that every Founder faces and Qiao Wang has prepared a very useful checklist together with tactical advice on how to deal with these challenges.
👉 Read Full Piece >>
Web3 is an Opportunity for All Developers: Nader Dabit, Developer Relations Engineer at Edge & Node
Nader tackles the opportunities, misconceptions, development process and tech stack of Web3. A very insightful podcast from a strong developer perspective to understand Web3 better.
👉 Listen to the full episode >>
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