# What are we even doing here | Florian Glatz (August 2024) - Speakers: Florian Glatz - Channel: [Berlin Ethereum Meetup](https://streameth.org/berlin-ethereum-meetup) - Date: 2024-10-07 - Duration: 11:59 - Watch: https://streameth.org/watch/yt--0XcTqbnE-U - YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0XcTqbnE-U ## Description Ethereum 10 years later... --- Join us on Meetup to keep track of our events in Berlin: https://www.meetup.com/berlin-ethereu... See you at the next one! --- Apply to speak at our future meetups: https://forms.gle/5y9Y5ywZC7pSEqpV9 --- Twitter: @BerlinMeetup ## Transcript [Applause] hi everybody uh who's ready for some spicy high energy takes about ethereum raise your hands very good all right I really love the Ensemble tonight because you get four totally different perspectives and I think my perspective is the most different because although I was there from the beginning I was a total Outsider just observing I've basically been observing for 10 years okay I didn't build [ __ ] I was just there going going to the meetups like you guys and observ who's doing what why are they doing it and if you follow me on Twitter you saw that last week I started an insane tweet storm I'm literally every 10 minutes I'm putting out a spicy take about this industry that we've created and um this talk is basically I'm trying to synthesize a new meta a message of Hope for everybody who has lost faith in what the [ __ ] we're building okay all right this is I called it it's going to be the weirdest presentation ever held in crypto uh I don't actually know if it's true because we've built a really beautiful big and pluralistic Community across the world and it's really just one perspective I'm giving so don't feel offended it's just me giving spicy takes in hopes to spark a conversation okay all right let's do this I'm from the class of 2014 as I just mentioned and when all started out most of us were just average nerds that had the privilege to afford jumping into a crazy non-existent industry of idealists wanting to build a world computer I don't know if you remember the world computer story nobody talks about that anymore yeah cool uh I'm just dropping some receipts those are going to be the only ones because I'm not here to do any virtue signaling uh that was me in 2014 at the maybe first ethereum Meetup in London uh we're trying to get the first uh the ethereum C++ client to work in a local network with everybody in this room uh me included back then I was still a Linux user so I was able to run that [ __ ] uh that's another picture and um you can see me in the background but uh what's really more important is the person you see on the right in the foreground that's Nikolai one of the co-founders of Makow today the class of of 2014 is either dead for example Nikolai found dead on a beach in uh Puerto Rico a few years ago or we're still grinding or we are extremely or let me say obscenely rich and Powerful nerds okay I personally didn't make it I totally mid curved it let's discuss why my parents grew up poor it's not the same kind of poor as today if you're poor today in Germany you're like literally poor and underclass when my parents grew up nobody had anything because it was the beginning of the Boomer cycle but that meant that you while I grew up the topics of Finance money investing stocks or markets had never been brought up at our family dinner table school and uni in Germany taught me no basic financial literacy I was also told for 13 years at school that I suck at math personally I do not enjoy Finance or markets deeply as a passion and I grew up in one of the most sort of stable areas ever with easy access to Banking and totally heteronormative Norm core you could say that I came into this whole industry entirely unprepared for what the [ __ ] this is actually about okay that's why I've been observing for 10 years I just didn't know what this actually is literally but let me reframe this narrative right here and right there I own nothing I like eating insects and I am in fact happy all right now that I roasted myself let me roast us as an industry the upper picture is what I signed up for it's the analogy of the long spoons I don't know if you ever heard about it the lower picture however is what we are getting we're literally in hell and it's just player versus player everybody is fighting for their own maximum financial advantage launch a token launch a meme coin do some other [ __ ] the entire value proposition of why we started this whole thing the moral truth that made us successful in the very beginning has entirely evaporated from this space now I'm sort of going to address the big wallets in the room but I mean it out of love if I would have a big wallet I would fall prey to the same human behavior I'm not better than anybody in this community but I'm telling you that you broke the flow of money because you thought you're the better Capital allocators but that made you actually Capital extractors look at what's happening the movement while we all joined is dying this industry stopped growing yes we are at the very bottom retail hates us for the right reasons now we are everything that's wrong with the world we wanted to leave behind the dark Enlightenment is taking over right now and we are enabling it and even more so what is happening right now could be Frozen in Time Forever This is Nick Bostrom who's been talking about that so I beg you stop the return maxing stop the godamn Empire Building which Future do We want people do you know who these people are in that picture raise your hands if you do third of this is Angela merel good point no that's a Rand and that's Rosa Luxemburg they couldn't be more different welcome to the age of Aquarius which we are just now entering we're in an epic battle of toxic masculinity versus Divine female energy we're in a battle of the dark Enlightenment versus plural Mor it we're in a battle of EAC versus D do you know who's an aquarius who else is an aquarius in this room raise your hand you guys are important for the future of this space okay enough roasting let's talk about Solutions ethereum the next 10 years we have to fix Capital allocation in this industry more than anything right now and it's no coincidence that Kristoff one of the only guys who never launched his own shitcoin after leaving the ethereum foundation is literally working on fixing Capital allocation the people who know what's happening in this industry are painfully aware of that problem the good projects are dying right now and the real people are leaving I started a [ __ ] storm on Twitter recently and I've gotten dozens of private messages from people telling me Florian what you're saying there resonates so much with me I'm about to leave this industry I've been grinded to nothing I can't do it anymore I just don't feel it anymore this industry has broken me so what are we even doing here through 0 to two degrees of separation we in this room know 80% of the trustworthy players in this industry please for the love of God allocate the money to the people you knew for years who are still here because they believe in something it does not matter if these people succeed or if they will create any return for you what what matters is that they stay and bring more good people be the change you want to see in this world because we only have one if you don't this eternal cycle will keep repeating Forever Until We all Ascend together to a higher Realm Of Consciousness this is what this is all about I joined this because I want to level up with all of you you you can either become a legend for breaking centuries of generational trauma or you can become a footnote in history nobody will remember in a few Generations make up your mind thank you a very ending I was still vibing sorry um thank you thank you that was not as as dark as I expected to be no I'm saying I'm trying to synthesize a message of Hope yes I'm an optimist I'm an eternal optimism all right wonderful I agree okay any questions there are probably no questions after these truth bombs have been dropped oh the the obligatory no no no no no no Fabian you had enough stage time for tonight I don't want to hear it I'm sorry he has to come in every other yeah but I'm the one who tells him not to and Out of Love out of love uh I just want to have a beer or a joint with the people right now I can say that because it's legal now in Germany um let's end this and uh thank you all for coming and listening uh if you think I was saying wrong things I appreciate it also if you say it to me or to people yes what's the oneliner of the head space or the mindset that you you think we should kind of a do going forward I want to organize crypto's first socialist uprising of the small wallets against the big wallets and I want to test if we can Fork the entire [ __ ] and make this industry ours again that's the end goal there I've said it that's it okay if you have any questions I am sure you will hang around for a few moment