Greetings, fellow Ethereans. I am Mihai Alisie, one of the founders of Ethereum, and for the previous year, I have acted as the vice president of the Ethereum Foundation and as the director of Ethereum Switzerland.
In the initial stages of the project, I directed my efforts towards the community aspect and worked on the concept of holons for a decentralized physical infrastructure. Lately, I have been pondering what the subsequent steps of the project should entail and how we can establish conducive conditions for a flourishing community and ecosystem of smart contracts.
In this entry, I will introduce an experiment for the Ethereum community – in some ways, revisiting the aspects I wished to pursue at the project’s inception. The core notion behind this experiment is the creation of a self-organizing network for knowledge sharing, which may have implications across various fields. We will discuss several potential use cases toward the end of the article, but only to provide a launching point in this inquiry – not to constrain it.
I hope that this proposed idea will ignite an engaging dialogue, and who knows, perhaps even lead to some exciting projects in the near future 
Enjoy!
The Transformation(s) of the Ethereum Project
Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth.
—George Washington
Like any successful concept, the Ethereum Project has transformed numerous times and developed into its current form. The evolution occurred through various means while resources were directed into key focus areas.
Initially, a significant portion of our attention was devoted to legal hacking and establishing the necessary infrastructure for the Genesis Sale. As we navigated through the legal complexities and reached a point of comfort with the setup, our emphasis shifted towards ensuring the security and monitoring of the entire Genesis Sale operation.
Before we activated the Genesis Sale switch, we conducted thorough security audits and established a comprehensive DDoS protection strategy with multiple layers and contingency plans. As we neared the conclusion of the Genesis Sale, as anticipated, our focus primarily transitioned towards the development of the platform.
After months of rigorous development, the emphasis is now shifting towards the imminent genesis launch, refining any rough edges and auditing the software to identify any security vulnerabilities that may have eluded us.
Soon, we will see Ethereum launched, and all focus will turn to observing how it performs “in the wild.” Now the question arises, what occurs after it’s “out there”? What is the forthcoming phase of the project, and what actions should we take now to prepare for it?
The educational component is deemed by everyone involved in the project as critically important in both the short and long term, especially since one of the aims of this platform is to cultivate a robust ecosystem of DAPPs, DAOs, and other smart contracts flourishing on it.
Everyone concurs that to foster a successful ecosystem, we must create favorable conditions for inquisitive developers to experiment and engage with Ethereum. This also entails providing the appropriate tools, resources, and tutorials – in summary, making it as accessible as possible for interested individuals to learn, collaborate, and share knowledge.
An Experiment Proposal: Ethereum Builders
“In times of change, learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.”
—Eric Hoffer
While investigating the notion behind educational platforms (i.e. Code Academy) and examining the efficacy of diverse methods, I came across a study regarding students enrolled in online courses.
The findings indicate that students participating in massive open online courses typically adopt a passive stance towards learning, opting out of collaboration with peers, primarily aiming for just passing grades, and consequently not retaining new knowledge. Even though students initially may have been motivated by the desire to acquire new skills, their focus shifted towards grades and course completion as they progressed.
In light of this somewhat disheartening finding, the researchers advised that when designing online courses, providers should develop engaging content that necessitates immediate peer interaction and application of new knowledge.
This prompted me to consider that for something as groundbreaking as Ethereum, perhaps seeking novel methods of education and collaboration could be essential to unlocking the potential inherent in the already established Ethereum community.
After trying out a few approaches, the concept behind the Ethereum Builders initiative began to take shape.
As a project, it consists of multiple components, but in this entry, I will focus solely on the educational aspect.
In its current form, this is the envisioned structure:
By merging screensharing, an open source upvoting interface, and Bitcoin, we create a mechanism for the Ethereum open source, knowledge-sharing economy to self-organize, be self-sustaining, and distribute information to the peripheries with maximum impact at virtually no expense. Special acknowledgment goes to Linda from Code Buddies for bringing this idea together and to Aurel Iancu for the invaluable assistance.
Due to the absence of a superior alternative, Google Hangouts with screensharing will be the interactive platform for the Ethereum sessions. The web interface will feature an open source upvoting system, applied here as a peer-to-peer self-organizing knowledge-sharing network. Bitcoin (and soon ETH) may function as a tipping/donation mechanism for the course/hackathon organizers – tokens of gratitude.for the priceless collective wisdom. If the standard of the sessions remains high, the screensharing meetups might also be recorded and utilized for video tutorials and additional educational resources quite effortlessly.
For documentation and manuals, GitBook appears to be an appealing choice. With it, you can extract material directly from wiki pages residing on various repositories (i.e., ethereum wiki, cpp wiki, go wiki, etc.) and showcase it in an attractive web UI or ebook format. By extracting content from the wikis, whenever updates are made to the documentation, the GitBook refreshes automatically as well. Overall, it seems to align well with our current needs, given the rapid evolution of documentation in the Ethereum ecosystem.
You can view the preliminary guide we pieced together here.
Regarding badges and reputation, for the time being, we will monitor the organized sessions and community contributions via a spreadsheet. Once the Ethereum network is operational, we aim to transfer the accumulated contributions and reputation to a user-chosen identity. This would subsequently facilitate:
- Receive acknowledgment for your learning accomplishments
- Receive/give acknowledgment for the knowledge you impart
- Validate skills
- Display and utilize your badges across the etherwebz (and beyond)
Once more, this is merely an experiment, and we will be experimenting with several of these concepts in the upcoming weeks to determine what functions and what does not. So please remain patient if something operates differently than anticipated and report it by opening an issue.
If received positively by the community, Ethereum Builders could evolve in a variety of ways:
- Multilingual Ethereum study/hacking workshops for localized learning
- Transforming it into a DAPP (Proof of Concept underway)
- Crowdfunding module(s) for projects, hackathons, and workshops
- Ethereum reputation framework for the code whisperers, participants, builders, etc.
- Asynchronous, self-organized global hackathons, breakathons, and workshops
- Community DAOfication
- ______________ insert here magnificent idea(s)
Fractals of knowledge-sharing and open collaboration
You will only be remembered for two things: the challenges you resolve and the ones you create.
—Mike Murdock
In its present form, ethereum.builders is a versatile tool that empowers the Ethereum community to coordinate, collaborate, and exchange knowledge. Users are likely to unearth new methods of utilizing it in ways we have yet to discover.
That being said, I would like to explore several use cases to offer a starting point for this endeavor.
Exploring a few use cases:
- Linking Ethereum builders with one another
Imagine Twitch, but for Ethereum development. Rather than observing individuals playing games, you can watch creators crafting remarkable things on Ethereum, all while acquiring new skills and insights.
From mastering the installation of an Ethereum client on your machine to crafting your first DAPP and showcasing it, a vast array of interactions is ripe for exploration.
- Linking Ethereum builders with knowledge repositories
Arrange the information and make it readily available. At present, the Ethereum knowledge base is dispersed across various repo wikis, forums, and blog entries. As an alternative to this chaos, I propose GitBook as a solution for organizing information and facilitating access in web, pdf, mobi, and epub formats.
- Decentralized hackathons & breakathons
We’ve envisioned hosting a distributed global hackathon for some time. Now, we have a way to accomplish that. Not only can we host it, but simultaneously, thanks to the Hangouts On Air feature, we can broadcast the event live on YouTube. If you’re keen on participating or sponsoring such an event, please reach out.
Breakathons, however, are on the opposite end of the spectrum: rather than creating, you’re attempting to dismantle. In this instance, we refer to testing Ethereum and examining if anyone can disrupt it. Instead of facing penalties, those capable of breaking things will be rewarded because, through their efforts, Ethereum becomes more robust. You may see it as a crowd security audit with prizes
- Decentralized co-working sessions: the rise of adhocracy
Beyond organizing hackathons, the meetups can also function as global co-working spaces. Picture it as having a venue where you can collaborate on creating exciting things on Ethereum alongside others from all corners of the globe. The energy amplifies when working collectively.
- Blockchain research sessions: the connection to academia
Utilize the existing channels to engage minds interested in investigating the potentials and challenges posed by blockchain technology. Make it convenient for these individuals to coordinate and exchange ideas in a highly interactive manner. The rest is up to them.
- Ethereum Project Updates
Aside from the blog, this could also serve as an interactive communication channel with the community and the developers involved with the project. They are not mutually exclusive tools but rather complementary to one another.
- Synchronizing Ethereum meet-ups
In-person – with meetups.com deciding to start charging meet-up organizers based on the size of the group, some have begun seeking alternatives.
Online – By design, you eliminate bottlenecks such as needing “X” to arrange a meetup call in a restricted Skype room with only a few selected members. Open the gates and allow communities and their members to engage, familiarize themselves, and synchronize. Imagine it as a meta layer that sits above physical meetups, enabling local communities to integrate into larger groups (continental, global, etc.).
And now to consolidate all these concepts into one, here is how it currently appears:
*Some of the aforementioned sessions are merely illustrative.
Feedback and assistance appreciated
For those who find this experiment intriguing, have a query or wish to assist, you can watch it in action at ethereum.builders or join us for a conversation on Gitter. If you identify a bug or something malfunctioning correctly please open an issue and if you wish to contribute code or create bounties for specific features please visit our repository ^_^
The experiment is underway!
