The R Roundup Presents: Part Of The Blocmates Team, Writer Of The Ape Enclosure Chadmandan
Have you ever wondered what it’s like writing for a publication like Blocmates? Wonder no further as Chadmandan tells us all about it🦍!
Welcome back to our collaborative article series! We hope you enjoyed last week's edition as we return to the space with some key industry leaders in the “research/writer/threadooor” sector of the markets!
If you aren’t already aware of what Blocmates gets up to, they create crypto, DeFi & Web3 content that your dad could understand. Today, the writer of The Ape Enclosure is joining us to talk about all things defi, writing & building.
Grab some popcorn, settle down & without much delay, enjoy🍿..
Russian DeFi: I am super stoked to be joined by our special guest today, ChadManDan!
Let's start with an introduction for our readers that may not be familiar with your work; that would kick us off nicely.
ChadManDan: My name is Dan, but a lot of CT call me chad because of my handle, which always makes me smile as it reminds me of Chad Muska from Tony Hawks Pro Skater.
I first discovered crypto in the back of a taxi in Nepal in 2016 when I was traveling, and I met a couple of travelers who had aped into XRP and a few other coins. I’d always known about it back then, but the learning curve to buy it meant I faded it (IDIOT!).
It wasn’t until about 2 years ago that I got into the space where I went balls deep and got rekt by round-tripping some phat bags (Whoops!).
I have a long history in the fitness industry but decided to go full-time into crypto as the market was crashing…yeah…smart move that, hey!
I work with Blocmates, and I write The Ape Enclosure Newsletter, which is published on Mondays and Thursdays and is the only crypto newsletter for the professional degen.
Russian DeFi: I feel like going balls deep into crypto & getting REKT is almost the baptism of fire everyone who wants to stand the test of blockchain time has to undergo, unfortunately.😂
You mentioned your work with Blocmates, a huge publication many people know about. As the writer of “The Ape Enclosure,” what is it like being a part of Blocmates?
ChadManDan: EPIC. That's pretty much how I would sum it up. Blocmates and Jedi are absolute legends, and we have so much fun creating content, traveling to conferences, and living in the trenches with the apes deep inside the blocmates discord (come check us out!).
Although, id suggest never sleeping in the same room as Jedi, as he snores like an absolute warrior! I couldn’t believe the earth shatter noise that comes from that man!
Russian DeFi: I guess working hard and sleeping hard are two parallels that fit perfectly in this industry
Continuing on the topic of Blocmates, what do you think the benefits are of curating your thoughts and writing them down as alpha for a community?
ChadManDan: Writing is a secret weapon because it helps you understand what you are talking about. It also shows you where your blind spots are. You probably don't know it well enough if you can't explain something without consistently referencing it from Twitter.
Plus, you are forced to do research which means you have a head start over the rest of the market. In today’s PVP environment, that’s super important! 5 minutes could be the difference between rugged and riches.
Russain DeFi: The difference between rugged and riches…let’s not divert far away from that.
First FTX, now we have GTX… what are your thoughts on that?
ChadManDan: When BTX?! Because I’d ape my life savings on blocmatesTX (NFA DYOR obviously lol). You know, it's impressive that Kyle and Zhu managed to get funding again after all of the chaos they caused. It feels heavily memeable, but they have played the game well as they made an epic comeback as soon as SBF and his goon squad collapsed by using it to try to clean their name…obviously failed, but it was a nice try.
As for GTX, it’s probably just a cash grab while they enjoy the beach, babes, and Bintangs in Bali.
Russian DeFi: Beach, Babes & Bintags should already be the quote of the year😂
After talking about FTX & GTX, it’s only suitable if we go into regulation. What are your views on the current state of regulation & the legal framework surrounding crypto?
ChadManDan: Regulation is needed. That’s a fact. After VCs and whales got rekt post bear market, we need some form of overarching regulation that brings some form of legitimate confidence for tradfi and normies to begin aping back into the space.
Without regulation, I personally believe the space will struggle because looking from the outside in, it's all one big scam. Take 2022 as an example; over $3.5BN…yes, BILLION was hacked, exploited, or scammed from the markets.
Would you trust an industry where you can breed bananas to stake popcorn while farming chickens?
A lot needs to happen, and I'm curious about the shape of regulation. There will, IMO, be a lot of regulations around stable coins as they are representative of “real money,” and governments will want maximum control over this and adequately classify the debate of security vs. commodity, which will have a knock-on effect for stake and bakers.
For now, we are still in the wild west with builders building. Once regulation gets the thumbs up, we will see tradfi money flow back into the various protocols. What is refreshing to see is that tradfi is still investing in the business side of crypto.
Russian DeFi: We talk about tradfi money coming back as a representation of positive regulation but also with the deterrents of scams and exploits; getting the average user into crypto at a time like this seems more challenging than ever.
What are the potential uses and benefits of utilizing crypto in everyday life for those skeptical about adoption?
ChadManDan: From a currency standpoint, there isn’t a lot of benefit for everyday life. I wouldn’t pop into Marks & Spencers for a loaf of bread and pay in Dogecoin. It just wouldn’t make much sense.
Where I do see crypto benefiting everyday life is in the validation of identity, with the art and antiques world being able to benefit hugely from it. We will be able to create a legitimate digital ledger holding the information of people who have owned some of the rarest pieces in the world. I'd love to know the ownership history of the Mona Lisa.
I personally see crypto as a currency being most beneficial in the form of fiat-backed stablecoins as a payment method. From a normie standpoint, these are super simple to understand. You have, for example, a digital dollar that you can transact at lightning speed. When retail outlets allow payment in stables, we will see mass adoption.
We’ll see whales and institutes first benefit from stablecoins payments with transactional movements of large sums of money costing just pennies.
Russian DeFi: The space is certainly hooked on the concept of ‘paying for a loaf of bread in doge’ which is why I think “normies” are almost searching for which coin would be the first to bridge that barrier when the value as you said is in the process of storing information as an example.
You mentioned art and validation of identity. Does this refine any narrative you are keeping your eyes on?
ChadManDan: So you want the alpha, hey…the biggest narrative playing out right now is the LSD tokens and protocols, and I see us still being early to this. Obviously, don’t ape the 100% pumps that have happened, but some new players will soon be emerging from the woodworks, and the Shanghai upgrade will allow for a lot more freedom for those who want to stake and unstake to the beacon chain. That freedom, I personally believe, will see greater adoption and utilization of liquid staking derivatives.
Ok, so we all know LSD, so that's not the best alpha. What I am truly looking at, and I’m extremely excited to see, is LayerZero, as they are doing what Polkadot and Cosmos always hoped to achieve.
IMO, they’ll be able to tap into the cross-chain narrative without it being full of die-hard maxis that ultimately have hindered Polkadot and Cosmos. Cross-chain interoperability is the end game. What impressed me so much was when LayerZero CEO Bryan Pellegrino bought back 100% of FTX & Alameda's equity position, which I believe totaled close to $150m.
I’ve done some light reading into EigenLayer and Celestia, which are also 2 interesting-looking plays.
One area that can’t be faded is mobile. I mean, how much time per day do you spend on your phone? Too much, right?! Solana is creating the Solana mobile, and web3 games are built for mobile devices. Will Solanas mobile be any good? Probably not, as it's the first generation, BUT it is a movement in the right direction. Mobile is the gateway to the mass adoption of web3 blockchain technology.
Russian DeFi: You have given me a few gems to get deep into and write about over the next few weeks, buttttt we are excited to hear what Blocmates has in store for the rest of 2023!👀
ChadManDan: Serrrr! That is a cheeky question, as we are working on some significant developments behind the scenes that I can’t quite go into detail with. But what I can say is that relentless growth is at the heart of it all.
The newsletter will play a big part in it, especially as the Milkroad, The Hustle, and Morning Brew all sold for 8 figures!
To kick start, we moved our newsletter from Substack to BeeHiiv as we know that the data and functionality behind it will allow us to create a much better product.
You’ll also see us at more conferences on the hunt for free tshirts, snapbacks and interviews with the industry’s biggest names. If you see us, please come to say hi, as we will also be setting up mini meet-ups for anyone there (definitely going on Jedis card!!)
PS as of today, Sunday 22nd, we have just launched a brand new podcast series called Exit Liquidity which looks at a newly emerging area of crypto and tries to unravel its relevance and importance in the space.
The first episode's notable mention is Stream Defi, and the guys talk about on-chain bonds.
Russian DeFi: We have had a few conversations about BeeHiiv & certainly, I am excited to see what sort of success that brings for Blocmates moving forward!
Before we end, are there any cool things you get up to outside of crypto?
ChadManDan: Hahaha, I wish! But I do have 2 primary goals again this year.
The first is to climb another mountain, as that’s one of my favorite things to do, and the second is to complete another extreme distance event, as I used to race in Spartan Races before the world shut down.
I did a 50km Ultra Spartan Race a few years back, and annoyingly I should have come 7th, but because I fell off the final obstacle and posed for an EPIC finishing picture, the dude that I was running with stormed past me… heartbreaking that was! Plus, falling 10ft+ from the cargo A-frame after almost 10 hours of racing [FU**ING] hurt!
Russian DeFi: Quite the extreme sports junkie, let’s hope the falling is done and we are up only from here (this is probably a terrible mountain climbing joke)
It’s been great chatting with you, Chad & I am sure our audience would love to be able to find all of your work. Feel free to share where that can be found!
ChadManDan: You can follow me at @bychadmandan, our main page @blocmatesdotcom, join the apes in discord, sub to the newsletter, and on YouTube
This year we are building a full-on ecosystem of content, news, and, most importantly, our community which I want to shout out to because, without each of those apes, degens, and gigabrains, we wouldn’t be able to do what we do.
As a reminder, this is not a trading signal or investment advice; it is an opinion, and each trader/investor should know and understand the risks of trading cryptocurrencies. This should not be regarded as financial advice; feel free to familiarise yourself with our NFA disclaimer.
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