Loose the consumer mindset if you wish to make it in Web3
A lesson learned by thinking I already knew it all.
In our current society, service has become the norm. We are so used to being catered to and having things made easy for us, that we often take it for granted. This is especially true when it comes to buying stuff online. If we don’t like something or it’s not what we expected, we can just return it and get our money back. However, this mindset doesn’t work as well in the Web3 world, where you need to be more careful and pay attention to what you’re doing.
This is a story about how I learned the hard way to pay attention and not think I’m so damn clever just because I’ve been around all this online stuff since it all started. I did loose money on my stupidity. Not a fortune but it might as well have been.
I reveal this since it’s true, and it may assist others from making the same mistake I did.
I got a tip from some friends about a token that was being launched by a group of people who are doing very well in the crypto space. (I’m not naming the project because that’s not what it’s about.)
I did my own research. What was happening. When was the date. Who was behind it, etc. All set. I decided to get in a little bit of cash, to be a part of it and see what happens.
The project was using the Binance Smart Chain…which I at the time had no clue what that was.
Understood that I needed some $BUSD ready in my Metamask wallet when the project opened. So i bought some $BUSD with via Transak the night before.
Followed the project updates closely on the day of the drop waiting for them to open.
They opened…and then my Metamask wouldn’t connect with their site.
FOMO alert!! I thought I was ready and just had to click a button. Now the tech was acting up. Typical…
I’ve dealt with resistant tech most of my life so no problem. I’ll figure it out. Just a tiny bit more stressful evening than I had imagined.
First thing I noticed was my $BUSD purchased via Transak wasn’t in my Metamask. Weird because the transaction went through and I received confirmation. First though was ‘damn! why didn’t I check this the night before’.
Ok save that problem for later. I sent a not to their support. But I still needed some $BUSD in my Metamask. So I went to Binance. Purchased some more $BUSD and sent it to my Metamask. Confirmed that it was in my wallet and went back to the launch site ready to buy in.
Metamask still wouldn’t connect properly. The site was acting a bit weird on load times. So I thought maybe it was just being overrun and I had to try a few times.
No…It didn’t work.
That’s when I was like ‘what the heck is going on here’ this doesn’t seem right. I could see in the project Telegram that others where getting in without problems.
I decided to go back over the instructions videos from the guy behind the project. This time around paying close attention and checking that I had done everything he said we should do.
And that’s when I found out I had been an idiot and not paid attention. Because it was all explained in details step by step what to do…and I had missed an important step.
I hadn’t set my Metamask up for the Binance Smart Chain.
Followed the tutorials on how to do that. Very closely this time. My FOMO was still ticking I still had not bought in to the project.
When I did that I also found the $BUSD I had purchased the night before via Transak. But not the $BUSD I transfered from Binance.
Because here I had made another mistake. I had transfered using the Ethereum network. So I need to get that over on the Smart Chain. That’s when I found out what ‘bridging’ is.
In the end i worked it all out and got in on the project in time. It only cost me a bit of GAS fees transfering the $BUSD back and forth from Binance because I put it on the wrong chain. I look at it as tuition fee for a lesson learned.
That whole process took around 3 hours of watching youtube videos. Looking at various exchanges and googling for answers finding out what the right terminology is so that I could find the right answers.
Major lessons learned besides a lot of blockchain mechanics was PAY THE F* ATTENTION. I swim around in technology and software like a fish in water. I’ve been involved since the Internet started. I’ve designed very complex software. It has become so automatic flying through login screens and setup flows, that I do it without paying full attention. The lesson I learned that night was that right now on the Web3 stuff…I need to stop thinking I’m so smart and pay full attention.
On the other hand if I hadn’t clowned around and had to sort it all out again. I wouldn’t have learned the lessons I did.
I’m secretly in love with how complex the Internet has become again. That means there’s new land to discover. New things to build. No problems to solve. A lot of new things to learn. I’m very grateful for that.
Slow down, pay attention…pay very close attention.
Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash
