Devcon #7 - Supermodular with Kevin Owoki

Kevin Owocki has moved on from Gitcoin and recently founded Supermodular, the venture studio built on top of Gitcoin to help promote digital public goods in the crypto ecosystem. ------ 📣 Push | Try the Communication Protocol of Web3 https://bankless.cc/Push ------ 🚀 SUBSCRIBE TO NEWSLETTER: https://newsletter.banklesshq.com/?utm_source=banklessshowsyt 🎙️ SUBSCRIBE TO PODCAST: http://podcast.banklesshq.com/ ------ BANKLESS SPONSOR TOOLS: ⚖️ ARBITRUM | SCALING ETHEREUM https://bankless.cc/Arbitrum ❎ ACROSS | BRIDGE TO LAYER 2 https://bankless.cc/Across 🦁 BRAVE | THE BROWSER NATIVE WALLET https://bankless.cc/Brave 💠 NEXO | CRYPTO FINANCIAL HUB https://bankless.cc/Nexo 🔐 LEDGER | NANO HARDWARE WALLETS https://bankless.cc/Ledger ⚡️FUEL | THE MODULAR EXECUTION LAYER https://bankless.cc/Fuelpod ------ Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 3:00 Kevin and Schelling Point 7:15 All Time Cultural High 10:30 Supermodular 14:15 Legacy ------ Resources: Kevin Owoki https://twitter.com/owocki ----- Not financial or tax advice. This channel is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. This video is not tax advice. Talk to your accountant. Do your own research. Disclosure. From time-to-time I may add links in this newsletter to products I use. I may receive commission if you make a purchase through one of these links. Additionally, the Bankless writers hold crypto assets. See our investment disclosures here: https://www.bankless.com/disclosures

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:03David Hoffman?

  Welcome back to the nation, back to the DevCon Sticks experience, except this one's a little bit different because this one was actually at Shelling Point. Shelling Point is the conference that tags along with so many of the other Ethereum community conferences. There was a Shelling Point at DevConnect, there's a Shelling Point here at DevCon. And so this, this interview is with Kevin Awaki of former Gitcoin fame, and now of Super Modular fame, the CEO of a brand new company, which is something that he debuted at Shelling Point at DevCon. Super Modular is Kevin Awaki's centralized software company that is built on top of the decentralized Gitcoin protocol, the protocol that he founded. And I think this is a theme that we're going to see moving forward. And it's not the first time we've seen this. Uniswap, for example, and Hayden

• 0:46David Hoffman?

  Adams, Hayden makes Uniswap, and then the next thing he does is he makes Uniswap Labs, a centralized software company built on top of the Uniswap protocol. Now Kevin Awaki is doing that with Super Modular. Overall, I asked Kevin, of course, about that, building that, and also what role Shelling Point has in the global conversation that is Ethereum. So I hope you enjoy this fantastic conversation with Kevin Awaki as soon as we talk to some of these fantastic sponsors that make the show possible. TrueFi is leading DeFi into the future of on-chain, uncollateralized loans, opening up DeFi to the $8 trillion global credit market. Whether you want higher yields on your lending, or you're a fund manager who just wants access to global liquidity and the cost savings of DeFi, TrueFi is here for you. But if you're going to use TrueFi,

• 1:27David Hoffman?

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• 2:12David Hoffman?

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• 2:56David Hoffman?

  and DSO's infinite state applications can finally store and index large amounts of content and data fully on-chain. With multiple crypto-native monetization mechanisms for both developers and creators, DSO wants to usher in a new relationship with our social applications. Check them out at dso.com. And now, onto the show. What's up, Kevin? How's it going?

• 3:13Speaker 01

  Hey, GM, how's it going?

• 3:15David Hoffman?

  Oh, yeah, just hanging out at Shelling Point once again. This Shelling Point has turned into a beast. It's gotten real big.

• 3:21Speaker 01

  That's a bigger Shelling Point now.

• 3:25David Hoffman?

  Why the name Shelling Point?

• 3:27Speaker 01

  So Shelling Point is a game theoretic place where people gather without having to coordinate or to communicate about it. And so like a campfire is a Shelling Point that at night, when we all go camping together, we all just go around the campfire without having to communicate around it. And Shelling Point, the conference, is a Shelling Point for the region, Web3 movement, people are using Web3 to build a better world.

• 3:48David Hoffman?

  And it's gotten so much just like energy really, really quickly. I was talking to Simona a little bit about this earlier. Like, why do you think Shelling Point has grown so fast, so quickly? Like, what niche has it served in?

• 4:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, I mean, I think it's Simona's baby. And I mean, I think you couldn't have planned that SP, or Simona's initials, and Shelling Point is SP also. So there's something in fate here. With Simona gets all the credit if things are going well. But I think that what you're really seeing here is a nascent need to have more purpose. In the protocols that we're building in Web3, how do, as Simona says it so well, how do we cultivate human thriving using Web3 protocols and the Internet of Money? And so I'm here to support public goods, to support local communities and create more human thriving using Web3. And I think that you're seeing there's a lot of latent demand from people who want to use Web3 to make a better world for everyday humans. And that's why Shelling Point is growing.

• 4:44David Hoffman?

  So for the listeners that weren't able to make it, what kind of vibe is Shelling Point here? What are the themes of content? What's kind of the purpose? What's the overall, does the overall gist of Shelling Point for the listeners that can't make it?

• 4:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, I mean, I think that the vibe is definitely kind of like earthy and green. I think that there might actually be some green behind us in the video. And I think that what you're seeing is people who are building protocols for impact, whether that's like Bitcoin and quadratic funding, or simple resistance, or impact certificates. There's just kind of a diversity of protocols that are being built around the we-regen Web3 movement. And this is our place for, it's a Shelling Point for us to come together and to discover each other and to hopefully collaborate on each other's work. And what I would like to see is that the next market cycle, all of these impact entrepreneurs or some of the top growing protocols in the next market cycle,

• 5:39Speaker 01

  and what would have to be sure to rotate capital and talent from the projects that just have the best Ponsonomics into the projects that have the most impact on the world? How can we kind of like align capital and talent to go into those things? And that's what we're working on here.

• 5:51David Hoffman?

  So I have been, of course, we like this frontier metaphor. And I think what you just stated is what Shelling Point is really on the frontier of is rewiring these Ponsonomic games that have, you know, more or less plagued, or whatever you want to call it, plagued crypto throughout history. And now we are trying to re-architect it into being for public goods. How would you describe it if you had your own words?

• 6:16Speaker 01

  I mean, I think that, you know, we can program our values into our money with programmable money. And you're gonna see anything from like Ponzi schemes to things that regenerate the world built out of the Web3 movement. I mean, I think that, you know, there's a certain number of like growth hacks that have been pioneered in DeFi that Regen Web3 will probably leverage. And there's certain ones, like the unethical ones or the fragile ones, that I think that they won't. And, you know, the real, the real, the real opportunity, I think, you know, since you used the frontier metaphor is like, I think that Web3 has done a really great job of capturing the minds of, of money people, people who want to get better yield on their assets. But 99% of humanity, their financial lives is not their bank accounts or their investments. It's their jobs and it's their communities.

• 7:00Speaker 01

  And so if we want Web3 to be able to enter those communities, we've got to have, uh, we've got to have anti-fragile things that are good for local communities in order for Web3 to enter those, those spaces. And this is 95%, 99% of the world. And, and that's the frontier that I think Shelling Point and Regen Web3 is, is pointing towards. So I can't wait for the next market cycle and to see the ecosystem of Regen Web3 really start to grow.

• 7:26David Hoffman?

  I think that's like the third Shelling Point that's ever occurred and by far the biggest. And it's always super refreshing, especially in the middle of the bear market where like activity is just kind of down. That the Shelling Point Regen world of crypto is actually at its all-time high in energy. And it's just something that's so like refreshing to see that like the energy here is, is not reflective of the depression that you see on crypto Twitter, for example. Uh, what, what's your take on that? Like what's, what do you think when you see all these people here?

• 7:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, I mean, you and I are second cycler, right? We kind of know that there's going to be really high highs and like really low lows. And you learn to ride those out and hopefully have a little bit of fun. Um, and, and I think that, you know, one of the really great things we've seen, you know, uh, as you know, I run a podcast called The Greenfield Podcast on the Bankless Network. And, you know, I was looking at the analytics, I think it was with Brian or someone on your team, and like number go up. I was like, Podcast downloads for Greenbill. Actually, you should subscribe to the Greenbill Podcast at greenbill.pard. But basically, number go up. And I think it's the reason is that even in the depths of the bear market, people are intrinsically motivated to make their communities better and to make the lives of their friends and family better. And I think that it's that that provides a higher floor than a lot of other markets that

• 8:40Speaker 01

  just sort of like that intrinsic motivation to work on Regen Upstream.

• 8:44David Hoffman?

  Yeah, this is kind of how I think about crypto at large is that the crypto, you know, machinations of the bubbles, right? It goes up, it goes down, it goes up, it goes down. It always hits a new floor, right? There's always a new higher floor. And that is true both on prices, that's both on user retention, on user activity. And it's that floor that I think is supported by the Regen Public Good side of things. And that is the floor. And that's why I think the Greenbill Podcast hasn't seen a drop in viewership, it's only gone up. Well, actually, if you go listen to Bankless, if you look at the Bankless views, it tracks crypto prices, right? It went up with crypto prices, went down with crypto prices. But you have things like Greenbill and like also just the reason why people are here and why crypto never actually ends up getting smaller every single cycle is because the sticky people are here because of the Regen reasons, not the pond differences.

• 9:29Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, you know, one of the things I'm most proud of, I mean, I think most of your listeners may know me from launching Gitcoin Advance, which is one of the top crowdfunding platforms in the ecosystem. I'm really proud that Gitcoin Grants is running several million dollar rounds even through the bear market. And I kind of think of a quadratic funding as this way of allocating capital when all of the other, when the VC capital dries up, when, you know, other people aren't deploying. Hopefully, we can build Gitcoin Grants into this ecosystem that's always kind of funding even through the bear markets. And, you know, I meet people from the 2018 and 2019 cycle that say that they just lived off their Gitcoin Grants donations, which I think is awesome. And, you know, the fact that Gitcoin Grants was some of the first capital into projects like Yurk

• 10:10Speaker 01

  and Uniswap and One Inch Exchange in the last cycle just makes me wonder what projects were funding this cycle that are going to be the breakouts of the next cycle. So it really does make sense to stay through the bear markets and to continue allocating capital and attention to projects because then you're there for when things turn around. And it's just really exciting. The energy here at Shelling Point and in the Web3 ecosystem, and I can't wait to see what it culminates in.

• 10:35David Hoffman?

  Yeah, and of course, for listeners that don't know, Vekus is a Gitcoin alumni. And so we can definitely attest to the usefulness of Gitcoin as a funding mechanism to make it through the bear market. Kevin, you recently announced something here at Shelling Point. Can you talk to the listeners who missed the announcement about what you announced?

• 10:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I've disaffiliated from leadership in Gitcoin. And I believe in Gitcoin in many ways. It's my life's work. But I felt like because I was the CEO and founder and kind of the outside's personality in the DAO, that it made sense to distance myself a little bit from leadership. And, you know, the DAO needs to be governed by the community that it serves. That's the loop, is the consent of the governed in these Web3 communities that we want to maintain. That's the legitimacy of the governance. And so I've disaffiliated from Gitcoin DAO. And I am now the founder and CEO of a project called supermodular.xyz.

• 11:31Speaker 01

  And you can go to the website at supermodular.xyz and see that we are a venture studio built on top of Gitcoin's protocols. So basically, like, as early consensus was to the Ethereum ecosystem, building things that Ethereum newly enabled for the world, supermodular.xyz is building things that only Gitcoin's protocols and the civil resistance and quadratic funding they enable allow. So we're gonna be, I think that we've got some interesting projects coming up, and I'll be announcing those hopefully at Shelling Point in Denver in 2023.

• 12:03David Hoffman?

  So you're building an app layer around the Gitcoin protocol.

• 12:07Speaker 01

  That's right, yeah. Also, can we just celebrate that there actually is a Gitcoin protocol now? I launched it as a centralized platform in a monolith back in 2017. It did a lot of good for people. But we're kind of naming the new company Supermodular to repent for our sins of building a centralized monolith. Modular and decentralized protocols are the future. And I've seen the light, and it's been a long, painful transition. But Gitcoin Passport is out, Gitcoin Grants Hub, and the Round Manager protocols are all out in alpha. And I'm hopeful that the next Gitcoin Grants round will be on a decentralized protocol. So there's actually a protocol to build upon now. And I feel like... Man, I get Coin seen a lot of things, but becoming a decentralized modular protocol, I think is a huge reinvention for it and I'm here for it.

• 12:51David Hoffman?

  And Kevin, I hope this is a microcosm for many, many platforms moving forward. And we've seen this at Uniswap too, right? Where Hayden Adams and the Uniswap team built Uniswap and now they're building Uniswap Labs as like a software company on top of the protocol. And so I think this is a path that many pioneers are carving where they're first, first they build the protocol and then they like retire into their own app layer that they've established. And by retire, I mean just another startup, but now in the app layer. And so I think this is going to be a pattern that many, many, many founders follow in your footsteps, you and Hayden and all the others, yeah.

• 13:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I think it's really fun. Like, I think that, you know, I've been crypto for multiple phases full-time and I was even in it part-time before that as a hobbyist. And some of the most interesting projects I think are going to come from entrepreneurs that have been through multiple cycles and have multiple phases to their career. And so super modular is the next phase of my career and I'm just so lucky that it's built on the past phase, which was, which was Gitcoin and, and, and also just all the things around Gitcoin that I've grown up about. I'll just give a shout out to like Giveth and CLR Fund and Proof of Humanity, things that built, that are built adjacent to Gitcoin. And because they're modular, we, super modular, can build on top of those as well and the sum is greater than the whole of its parts.

• 14:11Speaker 01

  So it's a really great ecosystem for multi-stage entrepreneurs because you just, you just get, there's just so much to explore and so much to build.

• 14:20David Hoffman?

  Well, Kevin, the number of people here is an attest to some, much of the legacy that you've built with Gitcoin and I'm looking forward to seeing what you are building with that super modular. Are you excited to be a builder again or another startup or like, what's, what's your emotions about this?

• 14:35Speaker 01

  I think it's pronounced Biddler, first off.

• 14:37David Hoffman?

  Part of my transcriptions.

• 14:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. Well, no, I, so the first thing I'll say is like, thank you for the nice things you said about Shelling Point and Gitcoin, but I really, really have to emphasize that there are hundreds of people that worked on Gitcoin down in the last market cycle and on Shelling Point and in its All credit to them and as the founder, I will always get more credit than is due and will get more blame than is due. And so I, I think that it's really important that people see that Bitcoin is this ecosystem of people and, and not just me. But, but yes, I am excited to be a builder again and I'm really excited to kind of officially, oh no, I transgessed my own. But yeah, the cool thing is that because everything is modular now, um, like I, I can kind of build on top of Bitcoin as,

• 15:21Speaker 01

  as being on top of it and it's just, it's just fun to be advancing and, and trying pushing new frontiers, but still be leveraging the stuff we built before. Build it before. Thank you. Kevin, thank you so much for your time. Cheers. Cheers.