1/  Jesse Pollak is one of the most influential figures in crypto. 

But his story? It is far from ordinary:

— Dropped out of college

— Lived on $1700/month in SF

— Delivered bagels for $35/week

Here are 11 little-known facts about Jesse (aka the Base God): 👇

@jessepollak

@base builder #001; onchain cities w/ OAK & city3

2/ Jesse was born in Washington. He went to a Quaker school — I wasn’t familiar with this term. In fact, this is what it means:

In Quakerism, there are no religious leader. Instead the core principle is quite simple. 

It is known as SPICES: Simplicity, Peace, Integrity, Community, Equality, and Stewardship. Jesse often credits these values for his grounded yet ambitious approach to life.

Farcaster Development Boutique @ https://dTech.vision 💜 in love with tech 🤓decentralization, fitness and oldschool rap 😎

3/  After dropping out of college, Jesse moved to SF with one goal: build something meaningful. 

He launched a startup and lived under $1700 per month.

He cooked his meals and didn’t buy anything new. All he wanted? Just $20k per year to survive. Talk about being reasonable!

Read his journey (from 2014):

4/ Around the same time, Jesse was also into photography and writing. 

In 2012, he published 70+ articles and saw the power of online writing. He claims “writing is a powerful tool” — and I 100% agree here. 

Fast forward to today:

— Jesse has 35000+ tweets
— 200,000+ followers

Very few can demonstrate this level of consistent execution.

5/ Jesse is a true hustler.

Even while running a funded startup, Jesse delivered bagels at 6 AM.

Every morning he would hop on his bike, pick up 50 bagels from Beauty Bagels, and then drop them at a cafe. In return? He would earn $35 every week (and free coffee).  

Why would he do this? Perhaps to stay grounded and connected to the grind. That’s the kind of grit that builds empires, imo.

6/ Life is full of twists and turns.

After 5 years of hustling, Jesse’s startup was later acquired by Authy. After this, his new life began: Joining Coinbase.

Here Jesse became the go-to guy for consumer products like Coinbase Wallet and Pro.

7/ So how was Base born?

Jesse toyed with several ideas:

— Turn Coinbase into a DAO
— Create a decentralized app marketplace

There was always an underlying problem here: How to work at scale? How to reach 100 million users?

They needed to rethink the entire problem. The answer? A seamless Layer 2 solution was born — Base!

8/ Today, Base dominates the L2 space:

- Highest revenue-generating L2 — $106 million in one year…
- Billions locked in TVL (and growing)
- Thriving #BuildOnBase community
- Highest daily active users on any L2

And much more…

8/ Today, Base dominates the L2 space:

- Highest revenue-generating L2 — $106 million in one year…
- Billions locked in TVL (and growing)
- Thriving #BuildOnBase community
- Highest daily active users on any L2

And much more…https://x.com/nansen_ai/status/1899422610750062922

9/ Jesse’s mission is clear: onboard millions onchain. This is where creativity is required.

 You see, I found this interview fascinating where Jesse gave up drinking and found consuming “weed” an incredibly generative experience.

It unlocks creativity. His unfiltered response: 👇

10/ All in all, if there’s one thing to learn from Jesse? Be real, vulnerable, transparent, and humble — with relentless communication. 

I have interacted with Jesse a couple of times. We even sent an open letter to @jessepollak
 and 2 weeks later a full blown residency was born @ETHDenver. How powerful, right? 

@luciano @rafi

11/ What stands out the most to me: Jesse is not just a builder. He is a teacher. Through his posts, his hustle, we can see his willingness to onboard millions to the onchain world. 

That’s the real “Base God” vibe — disciplined, real, and all in. He downplays this and takes no credit though:

11/ What stands out the most to me: Jesse is not just a builder. He is a teacher. Through his posts, his hustle, we can see his willingness to onboard millions to the onchain world. 

That’s the real “Base God” vibe — disciplined, real, and all in. He downplays this and takes no credit though: https://x.com/jessepollak/status/1891988794007507204

12/ Hell, in fact, I often see Jesse tweeting, creating content, and going all out crazy even on Instagram and Tiktok — to fulfil his mission. 

That’s god-tier hard work right there!

His relentless activity is also the reason why I am building http://dtech.vision and want to ship quality frames on Farcaster.

13/ In short: Jesse Pollak didn’t start a chain. He sparked a chain reaction. ⚡️

His journey from bagel deliveries to building Base is a masterclass in grit — revealing a hustle mindset that worked earlier and continues to work even now! 

As always, it is a delight to witness his journey, write about him, and be part of the onchain revolution he’s fueling. 

More power to @jessepollak
 🚀

3/  After dropping out of college, Jesse moved to SF with one goal: build something meaningful. 

He launched a startup and lived under $1700 per month.

He cooked his meals and didn’t buy anything new. All he wanted? Just $20k per year to survive. Talk about being reasonable!

Read his journey (from 2014): https://medium.com/@p/what-ive-learned-in-my-first-year-as-a-college-dropout-23c5e5316a12

As an atheist who would call himself an humanistic Jew, Quakers are my favorite type of Christianity.

I think we've got similar situations except that I live on average $200 per month. My name is Isaac Jesse. I dropped out of college pursuing a higher diploma in Banking to chase new ambition. Recently, I thought of completing a higher education as a web3 developer. Jesse's life is quite interesting

First time I'm hearing about Quakerism. It caught my attention because the first 3 letters align with my philosophy in life. I think I want to practice Quakerism henceforth. @jessepollak Your biography opens a channel to new path of success and simple life. I love these principles.

https://clanker.world/clanker/0x1732d13cE38B0045cE80463888471F32BB3C874a