Identity

Digital me and real me

Crypto culture is unique in its ability to bring together a diverse array of human beings from all corners of the world, united in a shared passion for utter stupidity—but with some underlying, often dwindling, hope that maybe this stupidity will one day help change the world.

I love that you can be a doctor from California who trades memes during your lunch break.

I love that you can be a graphic designer from Vietnam who finds their calling creating memes on Telegram.

I love that you can be an accountant from Australia finding success tweeting absolute schizo content from a corporate-branded Twitter account.

I love that I can log into Discord on a random Wednesday evening and engage with the digital manifestations of these brilliant minds, discussing a huge variety of topics without ever needing to show them who “I” really am in the real world, and never needing to know who “they” are either.

Because the “I” and the “they” you get to know via their crying animal profile picture is likely a far more real representation of who they want to be than the “I” or the “they” you would typically meet at after-work drinks at your consulting firm in Birmingham.

This authenticity is part of what makes crypto culture so much fun. It's a chance for everyone, regardless of their background, to participate in something bigger than themselves. It's about innovation, opportunity, and a future where anyone can be anything they want to be.

Of course, this was first enabled by the internet. You could be an investment banker secretly writing Harry Potter fan fiction in your spare time, or a lawyer who was actually a furry.

But what crypto enables that the internet doesn’t is the monetisation of a much broader range of skill sets and the ability for people, no matter where they live, to get paid based on the quality of their work, not some geographical lottery that determines the outcome of their family’s finances.

As someone who is typically quite introverted and gets anxious fairly frequently, being able to interact in this way is incredibly liberating. It frustrates me sometimes when politicians try to pass blame to anonymous internet accounts as the sole cause of the downfall of modern society.

I think that giving each individual the ability to create, write, publish, and grow an audience based on the merit of their work, not their background, gender, level of wealth, or education, is something that should be celebrated and not scorned.

But anyway, this week, I decided to leave the house—AAAAAAAAAAAAA—and go to a crypto event. It was the first time in a long time that the digital me and the “real” me combined.

Typically, when people ask me what I do in the real world, I make stuff up. I tell them I’m a consultant or I work in finance. Because that's way easier to explain than telling them I pretend to be a crying Vietnamese man’s dog on the internet, write posts about the nuances of made-up internet money, and sometimes get paid because I’m okay at predicting which animal JPEG someone will think is valuable.

So naturally, I’m not really accustomed to talking about crypto in the real world. Usually, I completely shy away from it as I don’t want to be interrupted mid-sentence by a dreadlocked vegan accusing me of boiling the oceans or ripping down all the trees in the Amazon to profit from monkey pictures.

Or have some person with more nefarious intent overhear me speak and assume I'm an easy target for a wrench attack.

But at the Monad event, surrounded by others who understand how this feels, I felt a sense of calm.

I could talk freely about crypto without judgment.

I didn’t have to endure the constant draining feeling of having to invent some easier-to-explain version of reality whenever the topic turned to work. I felt welcomed and, in many cases, celebrated for the words I’ve written here and the friends I’ve made along the way.

It was nice to feel some real physical, tangible output from all the work I’ve put in this past year.

I left the event feeling energised and positive. More hopeful about the future of the industry. The timeline recently has been pretty brutal. Lots of you are likely disillusioned or on the brink of giving up hope. I’ve felt that way too at times.

But meeting people in the real world jogged my memory a bit, took me away from the doom and gloom of Twitter, and reminded me that there are people out there that truly do care about this space and are working to ensure that the future is bright once more.

I learned that maybe my digital identity and my real identity don’t need to be so separate after all. And maybe the “me” that I love being on the internet I can be more of in real life, whilst still retaining the original, more private version of “me” for times I need a break from all the craziness.

Have a great Sunday and please pray England win the Euros tonight.

AS ALWAYS NOTHING WRITTEN HERE IS FINANCIAL ADIVCE I AM STUPID AND DUMB AND IF YOU ARE READING IT YOU PROBABLY ARE TOO AND YOU SHOULD REFRAIN FROM BUYING STUFF.