urbe.eth 🐺

🇮🇹 Italy's Web3 Builders

👾 Onboarding Web3 developers
🛠️ Organizers of @ETHRome
🏛️ Hosts of Urbe Hub - Italy's first Web3 event & coworking space

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

The urbe.eth Manifesto 2.0 📜

Urbe.eth is a community of builders and a non-profit association, formally established in Rome in April 2023.

It started in Rome around a simple idea: people interested in Ethereum and emerging technologies need places where they can meet, learn, build, and collaborate together.

Over the years, that idea became a real community. Today urbe.eth brings together developers, founders, researchers, designers, lawyers, students, and technology enthusiasts who share a common curiosity: understanding how technology is transforming society and helping shape that transformation for the better.

Ethereum remains at the center of our story. It introduced many of us to ideas such as decentralization, self-sovereignty, and programmable coordination.

But the questions that brought us together have grown larger than any single technology.

Today, we are equally interested in the broader ecosystem of technologies redefining how humans create, communicate, and organize: open-source artificial intelligence, cryptography, decentralized systems, and other frontier technologies that expand human capabilities while preserving individual freedom.

In February 2025, the community found a physical home in the Urbe Hub in Testaccio, Rome, the first space in Italy dedicated to frontier technologies and open technological research.

[Matteoikari.eth @matteoikari]

Introducing https://t.co/jBPSFefubd 🔍

Convinced AI or Ethereum will reshape entire industries? Turn your conviction into a screened list of public and pre-IPO stocks, ETFs, crypto and Polymarket bets.

For v0.1, I'm giving everyone 10 FREE CREDITS, which can be used for up to 5 analyses and PDF investment reports.

For your thesis (e.g., "I believe in the future of the nuclear sector"), you can write it, share a link, an X post, a YouTube video, upload a file, or record a voice note.

⚠️ SyntheTick does not tell you which assets to buy. Instead, it helps you identify the assets that best align with your investment thesis. It is not a source of financial advice but a discovery tool designed to support the first stage of your research.

[Dariia Porechna 🇺🇦 @FutureDies]

@ricciviero You should come by @urbeEth if you're in Rome there's a bunch of people building in agents space

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

Yesterday at Urbe Hub we spent a full day on one question: will the AI that matters stay in the hands of a few, or can it be accessible to everyone?

We came at it from two sides.

Afternoon, hands-on: the @tether team ran a workshop on @qvac , their solution for running open-source models locally, without giving up privacy or control.

Evening, zoomed out: talks and a panel on open source vs proprietary frontier models. Chinese open models closing the gap, chips and compute turning geopolitical, European sovereignty, safety, and who gets access to what.

Then the terrace, aperitivo and talk till late. Not even 35°C stopped the conversations.

Thanks to @tether and QVAC, the EF dAI team @DavideCrapis, and @_pieroit_ for joining the panel. And to everyone who stayed for the last question.

At Urbe Hub, these conversations are always on the table 🐺

[Matteoikari.eth @matteoikari]

Open-source vs Closed-source AI Forum: Takeaways✍️

Yesterday, I moderated a panel at the @urbeEth hub on open-source AI and the global AI race. Thanks to the speakers from @qvac (@tether), @_pieroit_, and @DavideCrapis from the dAI team at the EF.

These are some of the takeaways from what I consider the best meetup we have organized in four years:

・Open-weight Chinese models (like @deepseek_ai and GLM - @Zai_org) are rapidly closing the gap with frontier closed-source AI from @AnthropicAI and @OpenAI

・AI is becoming a geopolitical issue as competition between the US and China reshapes access to chips, models, and computing infrastructure

・From 2022, US export controls limited China's access to advanced chips (@nvidia) and semiconductor technologies, pushing Chinese companies to develop more compute-efficient AI models.

・China responded by investing heavily in domestic AI infrastructure (@Huawei) and semiconductor independence, while optimizing models to run on less powerful hardware.

・@nvidia's moat lies in both cutting-edge chips (via TSMC) and the industry-wide adoption of CUDA.

・Access to frontier models is increasingly shaped by geopolitics. Geo Restrictions, export controls, and KYC requirements are emerging as new barriers, raising questions about who will be allowed to access the most powerful AI systems in the future.

・ The EU remains a global leader in AI regulation, but must overcome fragmentation and invest in sovereign infrastructure, open ecosystems, and innovation to remain competitive in the global AI race.

・Local AI empowers users and organizations with greater privacy, sovereignty, and control over their data and infrastructure. Thanks to recent advances in open-weight models and solutions like @qvac, running powerful AI locally is now increasingly feasible.

・A significant part of the panel discussion focused on AI safety, guardrails, and the trade-offs of open access. As increasingly powerful open-weight models become widely available, important questions emerge around misuse, responsibility, and how to balance openness with security.

A huge thank you also to @Marcello_AI for his talk and to everyone in the community who actively participated in the forum with questions and insights.

[Herminius @herminius_eth]

AI Forum: The New Cold War - AI, Chips & Global Power

Great meetup at the @urbeEth HUB with the urbe team and the involvement of the @qvac team.

For someone the best panel ever ...

[Paolo Diomede | Certora @pdiomede]

AI shouldn’t live only in centralized cloud and today you can build with QVAC from @tether 🤖

@qvac Developer Day by @urbeEth 🏛️

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

https://t.co/MJiGJrk74i

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

Tether is joining the AI Forum with the @qvac team.

On June 30 at Urbe Hub we are hosting an event on AI, exploring the relationship between open-source AI and closed, private AI, where technology meets geopolitics.

@tether is joining us, bringing the QVAC team to the panel along with its local-first AI stack. A concrete voice from those who actually build.

Followed by a networking aperitivo.

📅 Tuesday, June 30
📍 Urbe Hub, Rome
🕕 Doors: 6:00 PM

Link in the first comment 👇

[QVAC @qvac]

If you build local AI, come meet the team.

We're in Rome June 30 at @urbeEth for a hands-on afternoon, hiring inference engineers. 30 spots, by selection.

Apply below.
https://t.co/b2yO5YYeej

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

https://t.co/aIRLPdMEo7

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

. @tether is coming to Rome with the QVAC team, looking for talent.

On June 30 the QVAC team, Tether's local-first AI stack, will spend an afternoon at Urbe Hub to meet the best engineers in Italy.

It starts with a technical workshop, then a hands-on session. Little theory, a lot of practice: a chance to build together with the QVAC team and explore everything their product can do.

Up to 30 spots, by selection: we're looking for the best builders in Italy. Applications are reviewed directly by the QVAC team, who are always looking for new talent to grow their team.

📅 Tuesday, June 30
📍 Urbe Hub, Rome
🕝 From 2:30 PM

Application in the first comment 👇

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

https://t.co/MJiGJrk74i

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

Who controls AI controls the next decade.

June 30 at Urbe Hub: an open forum on the new global AI race, from chips to data centers to frontier models.

Open source vs proprietary. US, China, Europe. Llama, Mistral, DeepSeek, Qwen vs OpenAI, Anthropic, Google.

A forum, not a panel. Aperitivo after.

Rome, 6pm. Link below 👇 🐺

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

3/ Post-Quantum Ethereum by @tcoratger

Quantum computers could eventually break much of the cryptography used across the internet today, including Ethereum.

In this talk, Thomas Coratger explains why blockchains are especially exposed to this risk and how the Ethereum ecosystem is preparing for a post-quantum future.

https://t.co/Gi6G5yBWWz

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

The @ethereumfndn research into post-quantum cryptography is becoming increasingly relevant.

🎥These two talks from the Post-Quantum Meetup held in Rome on May 8 provide a great look into the challenges, research, and implementation efforts already underway.

👇

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

2/ Post-Quantum Transaction Signatures for Ethereum by @asanso

This talk introduces the basics of post-quantum cryptography and its implications for Ethereum transactions.

Sanso explains how today’s signatures work, why quantum computers could threaten them, and which new cryptographic approaches are being explored as replacements.

https://t.co/cuu5YvID3q

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

The Ethereum Foundation dAI team supports Urbe Hub, Italy's official Ethereum Community Hub.

Urbe Hub is the meeting point between AI and Web3: a physical space in Rome where builders, researchers, and the curious come together to build on the convergence between these two frontiers.

With the support of the Ethereum Foundation dAI team, we'll keep building this here, in our city.

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

@IlSignorBitcoin @VitalikButerin @asanso Si

[urbe.eth 🐺 @urbeEth]

Last Friday, @VitalikButerin visited the Urbe Hub 🐺

We welcomed researchers from the Ethereum Foundation and a few external visitors for a full day of coworking focused on Ethereum’s post-quantum roadmap. Shoutout to @asanso as well for helping coordinate the day.

We opened the Urbe Hub a little over a year ago with a simple goal: to create a place where builders, researchers, and people passing through could sit together, work together, and exchange ideas.

Friday felt like a reminder of why we opened these doors in the first place. People helping shape Ethereum spent the day here doing exactly what this space was made for.

If you’re building frontier tech, whether in Web3, AI, or beyond, if you live in Rome, or if you’re just passing through, the Urbe Hub is here.

Come find us!