Thread by @josephdelong

Joseph Delong's Guide to Developer Success in Web3

Everyone starts at zero and you want to get involved in web3. There are two paths for web3 developers protocols or defi/smart contract development.

Protocols is the more difficult of the two. To get involved you need to read and understand the Ethereum Yellow Paper. Learn Go or Rust.
ethereum.github.io/yellowpaper/pa…

Finding a job will be difficult, and compensation is lower than defi/smart contract development. The trade off here is that protocol development builds deep architecture knowledge and clout in the web3 community.

In my experience protocol developers are high signal low noise empirically driven people.

Now you can start applying for protocol developer positions. Protocol development is decentralized so you can try Geth (Ethereum Foundation), Erigon, Nethermind, Besu (ConsenSys Protocols), Akula. There are too many to mention in this format.

Getting hired will be difficult without being connected with the teams. So go to their repositories and make a simple pull request. Whether they take it or not, you are getting exposure to the team. If that fails search the repos for contributors and message some contributors.

Becoming a defi/smart contract developer is easy to start and difficult to master. To get involved you need to first learn Solidity. I haven't personally used it but I have heard CryptoZombies is a good place to start. cryptozombies.io

Familiarize yourself with ERC20, ERC721, ERC1155, EIP712, ERC165, proxy pattern, and the OpenZeppelin contract set. Learn an development framework like Hardhat, Foundry, Dapptools, or Truffle.

Next, join a project. The best way to get in is either through a pull request or asking in the project Discord. First pass will likely be a volunteer or part time position. DAOs are easy targets since they are always lacking actual contributors.

Once you have some experience and commits under your belt you should start looking for a full time position.

You can go one of two way either established player like Uniswap, Aave, and Compound this is an inherently safe bet with stable income with low economic upside.

Or you can join an early startup like @AstariaXYZ which has better upside potential long term but inherently risky until PMF is found.

Hope you found this guide helpful.