Aaron Stanley

Frontier Tech + Frontier Markets | Brazil | USA House | @Forbes columnist | Ex-@CoinDesk | Ex-FinancialTimes

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@DustLabsX Looking forward to this!

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

Excited for this!

[Dust @DustLabsX]

AMA is moving up. Now it's tomorrow, Tuesday September 8th, instead of the 9th.

Sitting down with @AaronWStanley to talk about the future of $DUST.

If you've read crypto coverage over the last decade you've read him: Forbes columnist, formerly CoinDesk, four years at the Financial Times in Washington before that, and the person behind Brazil Crypto Report.

He's covered this industry as a journalist longer than most of it has existed, which is exactly why we asked him. He's not here to cheerlead. He's here to ask the questions you'd ask.

Be there.
https://t.co/yrBXNjhAoV

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@SuhailKakar I wouldn't say that crypto had a better reputation in 2021 but the rest are definitely true.

Moreso, if felt like we were on the cusp of something revolutionary and great

Now we're on the cusp of being eaten by tradfi and all the fun stuff is gone (except polymarket ofc)

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@monitalan never too late!

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

Forgot the part about trading telegram selfies to show how committed you are to "collaborating" in the future

[binji @binji_x]

(1/2): I have met this person at nearly every crypto conference I have ever attended, and by now I can usually identify him before he even reaches the registration desk, because he arrives wearing the unmistakable expression of a man who has crossed three time zones, answered forty-seven Telegram messages from people he does not like, and paid twelve euros for airport water in order to be physically present at a gathering devoted to the future, only to discover, almost immediately, that the future appears to consist largely of men standing beneath purple lighting and discussing distribution.

He checks into the hotel, opens the conference app, scrolls through a schedule containing panels called things like “Reimagining Coordination at Scale” and “The New Institutional Frontier,” and feels, for one brief and embarrassing moment, the stirring of hope, because perhaps this will be the one, perhaps this will be the conference where somebody says something real, where a conversation escapes the gravitational pull of fundraising announcements, ecosystem grants, and whatever the phrase “go-to-market motion” is currently being asked to conceal.

By ten in the morning he has received a tote bag made from allegedly regenerative fabric, a metal water bottle that leaks from the lid, a lanyard large enough to function as a municipal permit, and three invitations to side events taking place simultaneously in different parts of the city, each one described as “intimate,” despite having eight hundred RSVPs and a DJ flown in from Berlin.

He goes to the first panel.

A founder says we are still early and venture capitalist says the next billion users are coming. Eventually a moderator, with the glazed composure of somebody who has already moderated this exact conversation in Singapore, Dubai, Paris, Denver, and a yacht off Mykonos, asks what needs to happen for mass adoption.

Everyone agrees that UX must improve and the audience nods with the solemnity of a parliamentary vote.

Nothing has technically been said, but the applause is loud.

By lunch he has participated in six conversations, all of which begin with “What are you working on?” and end with “We should definitely find a way to collaborate,” which in conference language means that both parties will add one another on Telegram, exchange a fire emoji beneath a future announcement post, and never again occupy the same emotional universe.

He meets a man building infrastructure for autonomous agents, although the infrastructure is not yet built and the agents are not yet autonomous. He meets another man launching a protocol for decentralized reputation, who spends most of the conversation explaining which well-known investors already trust him. He meets a founder who says he is obsessed with user sovereignty, then glances every twenty seconds toward the entrance in case someone more important has arrived.

By the evening he is standing in a cavernous venue once used to manufacture turbines, now filled with dry ice, ornamental lasers, and several thousand people discussing credible neutrality while trying to get past a velvet rope.

There is free food, technically, although it consists of two miniature tacos placed on a slate tile by a person wearing black gloves, and there is free alcohol, abundantly, which may explain why the revolution against extractive intermediaries has temporarily organized itself around a sponsored bar requiring three wristbands and a QR code.

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@carlosjmelgar very common theme in crypto/web3

Lots of people staffing these projects don't have any real interest in/actually use the tech in question

They're farming an above-market paycheck/absurd travel bennies, went all in on do-gooder-isms about crypto "changing the world"

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@BrazilianReport Shocker: communist professor says Donald Trump is subverting democracy in Latin America

This dude needs to be in an old folks home. Your audience is more sophisticated than this

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

Big news, but TBF I didn't realize Bitmex was still around. Haven't heard a peep out of them in years

[MSB Intel @MSBIntel]

BREAKING. BitMEX will shut down on September 23 after 11 years, telling users to withdraw funds now.

The exchange invented the 100x perpetual swap, now the most traded product in crypto. Owner HDR Global Trading cited a strategic review.

Shutdown takes effect at 04:00 UTC that day.

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@gazza_jenks wow truly the end of an era

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@rodventures @Forbes @ampersend_ai thanks for making time to chat! exciting work you guys are doing

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

Turns out North Korea produces some of crypto's best product people 🤷‍♂️

[Nick Bax @bax1337]

Here's a partial list of companies this guy worked at prior to MetaMask:

Ankr
Blueberry Protocol
DEPO
Pickle Finance
Harmony

Glad they were somehow able to detect him because lightning keeps striking the ground where he walked.

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@lex_node pretty much my experience every time I try one of these pay with Pix via stablecoins products in Brazil

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@sandy_carter wow! congratulations Sandy!

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@bowtiedbrazil Gynocologists need to be able to get home in time to watch Oprah

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@binji_x you forgot to include the telegram selfie as a way to cement the commitment to collaboration

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@bold_perception pretty accurate overall...you're missing the bro who is dragged to Brazil by his Brazilian wife/gf but who comes to awkwardly embraces the lifestyle while speaking A1 level PT

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@cioffi_victor @cioffi_victor sir - with all due respect you are crushin the hopes and dreams of gringos who fetishize stablecoin adoption in Latin america

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@defyneric can you elaborate on this?

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@drewcrawford_

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

@AndrewStarts Third world infrastructure 🤡

[Aaron Stanley @AaronWStanley]

The absurd missing Sao Paulo <-> Rio train link situation is the archetype example of why Brazil will always be the country of the future

[BowTiedBrazil @bowtiedbrazil]

São Paulo wasn’t able to build a train connection to airport that was to be built 13 years ago until this year and it has already broken