in 2022, i went to my first in-person hackathon, where i won $15k and got a job which let me drop out of university. 

ethglobal nyc 2022 changed my life, here's the story behind the scenes (and the slides/pitch that got me there):

my story of how i became a /dev

the problem was simple: people were getting scammed. A LOT. 

transaction signing was awful; nobody knew what they were signing. this is how a `setApprovalForAll` of an nft looked like in metamask at the time. insane, right?

prev /rust @ blowfish.xyz, finalist @ ETH NYC 2022, sudolabel.twitter

i made the first consumer transaction simulation solution; an eth json-rpc which redirects to a "block explorer" BEFORE submitting the transaction.

what was it like to code? i was a solo-team, not knowing anyone who would want to collaborate on this; I didn't sleep the entire 48hrs and was getting rekt by a fever at the end.

at the end of my pitch, i had a simple request; i NEEDED an opportunity worth dropping out of college for. i was fed up with school.

i had 6 calls a day for the next few weeks talking to founders, vc's, and everyone in between.

eventually Fabio, ceo of @blowfish, reached out via dm, and i rejected $100k of grants to join them to build the future of transactional security.

my next thread is on some hackathon alfa 👀

original thread from twitter here: https://x.com/sudolabel/status/1541871452382715904
video pitch here:

original thread from twitter here: https://x.com/sudolabel/status/1541871452382715904
video pitch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=4646&v=KIHPgOEcCO4

since then, companies have raised at valuations totalling 200m+ in the transactional security industry: the likes of blockaid, @blowfish, pocket universe, fire, mintdefense, walletguard, revoke cash, and many others. and it all came from a hackathon (of the above, only blowfish was founded prior).