DEV Community: Teji.eth

Why I purchased a "Fake" CryptoPunk for $4000

Teji.eth — Sat, 15 Jan 2022 14:39:12 +0000

The War Begins

Let me set the tone - It's 2009 and I've just wrapped up editing my first ever YouTube video on Windows Movie Maker. I was so excited to share my creation with the world until I was struck with my first ever DMCA notice. My video had been taken down from YouTube and nine-year-old me was introduced to copyright laws for the first time.

Look, to be fair what I created was no more than a slideshow that played over the top of War by Sean Kingston - But nevertheless I was proud of what I'd created, it was a display of an early act of creativity from a kid who just wanted to make something for the fun of it - This kid wasn't trying to make money or drive sales away from Sean Kingston, he was just trying to express himself.

My SoundCloud account is deleted

The year is 2016 and I've started gaining attention on my SoundCloud account - I'd been posting Nightcore remixes of popular songs, which in layman's terms basically means I sped up in Virtual DJ and re-uploaded it under my name.

My first remix to "blow-up" in my eyes was my sped up version of Say It by Flume - The song garnered over 20,000 streams (WOAH SO MANY PLAYS! lol) and pushed me to try produce more of my dodgy DIY remixes in hopes of getting that next dopamine hit of having a song blow up. This pursuit for plays didn't end well, my account ended up getting deleted because I received one too many strikes for abusing SoundClouds copyright rules. I really do miss that account and feel a deep sense of sorrow inside me when I reminisce on all the playlists and music I've lost.

Buying my first CryptoPhunk

I just paid Ξ1.248 (or around $4129.13 USD at the time of writing this post) for a CryptoPunk derivative called a CryptoPhunk. Now why would I do this? Stylistically, the only difference between a Punk and Phunk is the that fact that Phunks have been flipped to face the left side and thats about it, lol.

So you're telling me you just spent $4000 for a bootleg NFT that the creators literally just flipped?

Uh.. Yes, that's correct sir, but it actually goes much deeper than this, let me explain.

Punks vs Phunks

CryptoPunks were first created in 2017 by developers Matt Hall and John Watkinson - two avid crypto fanatics who believe that the blockchain "provides a layer of trust that removes the need for lawyers and middlemen." Punks were first released to the public as a free claim and for months thousands of Punks sat unclaimed on the official Larva Labs website - Now we all know what happened to the value of these OG CryptoPunks right?

Well, not long after the demand began to skyrocket in 2021 for the pixelated avatars a twitter user by the name of @Philiptheintern would launch his derivative project called CryptoPhunks - Not long after both Matt and John would take legal action and pursue the team behind CryptoPhunks (I hope your starting to see how much this contradicts Larva Labs so called beliefs in a true open and decentralised web..)

Phunks would soon then be delisted from OpenSea after becoming the first project to receive a DMCA takedown from Larva Labs. The developers behind CryptoPhunks would soon abandon the project, unwilling to counter the DMCA. The founders actually wrote a letter declaring their withdrawal from the project which can be found here.

But this was only the beginning you see..

Shortly after the CryptoPhunks team resigned a group of OG Phunks holders would emerge from the ashes and build their own royalty free marketplace called NotLarvaLabs. The marketplace has now done over $50m+ in total volume and has a top sale of 70Ξ ($200K) for an individual Phunk.

Why I purchased my Phunk

You see, I and many others have been fighting centralisation for years now whether we've known it or not. You probably didn't know that Ethereum was first conceived because its founder Vitalik Buterin had his character nerfed in World of Warcraft - Which is what made him realise "what horrors centralised services can bring."

To me, my Phunk purchase is less of an investment and more of a statement - It encapsulates the transitionary period we find ourselves in between web2 and web3. The Phunk is everything web3 prides itself on and I believe is ironically even more Punk than the original Punks. The Phunk is a big Fuck You to centralisation and I love it - Not to mention it but my Phunk is actually a Pirate which seems quite fitting.

Here's our chance!

Not until recently have open-source and CC0 projects been a viable option for creators and builders online. Pioneers in the space like NotLarvaLabs, NounsDAO, CrypToadz, Github etc. are all beginning to pave the way for the open and decentralised web that Satoshi Nakamoto originally envisioned in 2009 and I can't wait.

Be Phree my Phreinds,
Love Teji

What's in my bag?

Teji.eth — Sat, 08 Jan 2022 06:47:59 +0000

What's in my bag?
Growing up I was always fascinated with those little what's in my bag videos on YouTube. I thought it was so cool being able to see the items and objects that help make up peoples lives. Theres just something so satisfying about knolling (s/o Tom Sachs for introducing me to the term)

Anyways, I'm headed to New York in a few days so what better time than now to write up my own little what's in my bag post.

So here goes..

Backpack
I've been using the same Patagonia 32L blackhole backpack on all my adventures over the past few years and its held up great! especially considering the amount of abuse I have put mine through, lol. If ever you see me IRL with the bag you will probably notice I'm normally hanging a Nalgene water-bottle from a carabiner because I get thirsty, like REALLY THIRSTY. Anyway the bag is A+, expect nothing less from Patagonia tbh, one of my favourite brands.

Shoes
Fun fact about me - I hate shoes. You see, I'd prefer to wonder the earth bare foot but there are occasions when some protection is needed. Normally my shoe of choice is the all-black Birkenstock Eva (They tend to not stink like normal Birks because they're actually made of plastic which means they can get wet.) Some days I even opt for the triple-black Croc, but as of now I'm rocking the Teva sandals - I'm still only about a week into breaking them in but they have held up well and just well may become my daily driver.

iPad Pro
The iPad Pro is one of the newer additions to my collection of essentials - I mostly just use it for Pro Create and YouTube. I've had iPads before but not until now have I actually began incorporating it into my design process and workflow - The Apple Pencil is undefeated. One benefit of taking a more digital approach to my process is the fact that I now don't waste stacks of A4 pages sketching out the same logo 100 times.

Macbook Pro
My laptop is quite barebones as I really only use it for a few essential applications. Right now I predominately just use Ledger live to sign transactions and trade crypto - I also use it a-lot for writing and editing videos, but the keyboard sucks. I think I might pickup the new 14 inch model with the M1 chip solely because they brought back the OG keyboard and removed that shitty touch-bar.

Cameras
For well over a decade now I've been an avid photographer and filmmaker. Over the years I've refined my gear and realised I hate bulky SLR setups - All my video work now is literally shot all on my iPhone and GoPro. I have come to care less about quality and more about accessibility. I've always believed the best camera is the one you have on you and if your discouraged to shoot because it's a hassle to unload your kit - you probably need to rethink your setup.

My holy grail of cameras is the Contax T2 - I had always wanted one and managed to scoop mine up on eBay for quite a reasonable price back in 2017. The 2.8 lens on this camera is superb and it's unlike anything I've shot on before - All the photos just seem to turn out magical. I have large archive of images taken on the camera I will probably begin to share with the world when the time is right.

Books
I love to read and it's become a huge part of my lifestyle. I'm always destroying my paperbacks - breaking in the spine, highlighting 90% of the book and scribbling in the margins, you get the jist. But not until 2021 was the Kindle introduced into my life - I had always been opposed going digital when it came to my reading habits because I always told my self there was no way a kindle could compete with my paperbacks. I was wrong - I realised I could download literally 90% of the books I'd been wanting to read for free from Gutenberg.org, This really was a game changer because it even opened the doors to self published PDFs that I previously steered clear from. I haven't forgotten about my paperbacks though and still hop between both digital and physical depending on subject matter.

Notebook
My moleskin contains all my secrets and all my ideas - I even have a 1 Ξ reward for anyone who finds and returns my notebook. I normally just use it jot down or sketch any ideas when it comes to the Tejiverse. I'd like to say more on this subject, but I've already said too much.

Miscellaneous
Some of the other items in my bag which are essential but don't necessarily deserve a paragraph include:

Passport
Lacie 2tb Hardrive
Pens & Markers
Teji Stickers
Ledger Nano S
Tom Ford glasses
Portra 400
Yubikey
Wallet

And that covers just about everything - I hope this has given you some kind of peak into my world and has maybe inspired you to take a look at some of the items that help make up your world.

Love,
Teji

Hacker-kid

Teji.eth — Sat, 08 Jan 2022 00:09:05 +0000

Today has been an eventful day to say the least. It's currently only 9:34AM and I've already installed:

Homebrew
Git
Xcode
Python3
Pipenv
Pycharm

Figuring out how to run lines of code in terminal was a breeze. Getting Homebrew to install took a couple goes but we got there in the end. I'm still unsure of what Pipenv does but a YouTuber said he prefers it over Virtualenv and Conda so I just followed his lead.

Now.. funnily enough installing Xcode brought back some memories I almost completely forgot. So, back around maybe 2012-2013 I was an avid mobile gamer and one game I was obsessed with was actually Subway Surfers, now the reason I bring up Xcode is because I now remember using Xcode to hack into the game so I could unlock different boards, characters and score multipliers.

Now, if we are on the subject of hacking let me talk a bit more about some of my early "hacking" days. You see I was always that kid with a jailbroken phone. I'd figured out how to encrypt my phone so well that if anyone tried to breach my security a picture was taken from the front facing camera of their little conniving face.. hehe

One time when I was fourteen I was actually arrested (when I used to sneak into train tunnels) and had my phone seized. One of the police officers ended up calling my mother proclaiming 'Your kid has locks on everything, we tried getting a specialist in but we still couldn't get in.' Long story short I ended up getting that phone back along with a dozen photos of some crusty old police officers.

Now, did anyone ever play Modern Warfare 2? Yeah, because I did and I was addicted. I was one of those trickshotter kids and was in a new clan every week. I had learnt how to download and use a cracked copy of photoshop from Pirate Bay and began designing logos for clans, this is also where I started diving into video editing. I also learnt how to install mod menus so I could get whatever prestige I wanted.

Ha, I also remember when I was first introduced to the Action Replay card for the Nintendo DS. I thought it was the coolest thing being able to hack my Pokemon game so I could walk through walls. I don't think I actually ever owned a copy of my own action replay card but my Dad did get me an R4 chip that let me install any game I wanted for free AND it helped me catch Shaymin!

I think my Dad is actually the one who introduced me to the world of hacking and he didn't even know it at the time - we just couldn't afford to be buying all these new games.

My Dad was actually quite the pirate back in the day, the man would literally rip hundreds of copies of movies from Limewire and burn them to CDs. He pirated so many movies that he received a formal Anti-Piracy warning from some big media conglomerate which I won't disclose.

I could easily go on about my early hacking days and maybe even some of the stories from the back end of my adolescents where I discovered the world of social engineering and how I would somehow get my hands on AAA passes to any and every music festival with a couple magic words and emails. But that's enough for today's post, my Mum is about to drop off some lemonade and cinnamon scrolls, I gtg.

Cya,
Teji

My Introduction to Programming

Teji.eth — Fri, 07 Jan 2022 07:55:24 +0000

Picture this.. it's 2011 and I'm in the backend of my tumblr site. I'm eleven years old and I'm trying to figure out how to install STM player so I can have my own custom playlist built into my blog.

Tumblr is where I had my first experience playing with HTML and CSS code, at the time I had no idea how significant these two programming languages were to the Internet. You see, I was just a kid trying to get Yonkers by Tyler the Creator to automatically play on my blog.

Now, almost five years later in 2016 I was shipped off to boarding school. I now had the choice of choosing two electives. I remember I picked art and photography but fortunately for me the photography class was full so I was slotted straight into the IST class with the weirdos. Our teacher introduced the class to Python.. well tried to at-least. You see, no one in that class really payed attention, or wait maybe that was just me. I think I was too busy binge watching Casey Neistat vlogs (this was Caseys golden era tbh) Regardless, I managed to learn a few things that year and built some super simple programs that I remember nothing from, lol.

I dropped the subject the next year. I hated it.

Fast-forward it's 2021 and I've finally jumped into NFTs. I had known about the polarising phrase for a minute now and no it was actually before Gary Vee started jamming the phrase down peoples throats. The first NFT I ever owned was some NBA TopShot card worth probably nothing now. I soon dove deeper and deeper and began learning more and more about the blockchain. I learnt the difference between on-chain and off-chain data (s/o Anonymice! love you guys) I joined several DAOs, Started my own Axie Guild and now employee several scholars in the Phillipines and have met so many wonderful friends along the way.

This blog thingy or whatever you want to call is my next step in this weird world of web3 and programming. I plan on using this as an outlet to document my learnings and hopefully encourage anyone else in a similar position to myself to jump into this world.

I'm still new to this whole programming thing but my main focuses will be:

Solidity
HTML
CSS
Js
Python

I do plan on learning C#, Java and PHP but for now these are my main priorities. One goal I wish to have completed before the conclusion of 2022 is to release my own on-chain NFT project to accompany 7265646163746564

Feel free to follow me on Twitter here @0xTeji to stay up to date on my web dev journey!

I'm so excited to be here, I can't wait to build some cool shit and even better make some even cooler friends.

Love,
Teji

(not sure if people close blog posts like they are letters but oh well you get the sentiment)