Who I am
Since my childhood economics and game theory have always interested me, even to the point of co-publishing a strategy board game of my own design. When I first read about Bitcoin in 2011, I was largely uninterested, focusing too much on the currency aspect rather than the technology. However, when I revisited it in early 2013, I began to realise new possibilities opening up between the fields of ICT and game theory, and the inevitable social change to which this would lead. A mutual friend made the introduction to Vitalik that year and blockchain/crypto has dominated my life since.
I coded the first functional Ethereum client in January 2014 released as "PoC-1" (i.e. the first proof of concept) and co-founded the project. Shortly after, I authored the Yellow Paper, the first formal specification of any blockchain protocol and one of the key ways Ethereum distinguished itself from other blockchain-based systems. I went on to co-design much of the "1.0" Ethereum protocol including the EVM, gas and the caller-pays account model. I also conceived/invented and designed much of what would become the Ethereum technology stack including the Solidity contract language, the RPC, the Whisper/Swarm protocols and the Javascript API. My original ideas for a decentralised web date back to early 2013, but my first post on the topic was in April 2014, later followed by a less-techy version.
Prior to Ethereum, I accrued a masters degree and doctorate in computer science. I consulted for Microsoft Research on technical aspects of embedded domain-specific languages, designed and implemented the first truly smart lighting controller for one of London's top nightclubs, designed and implemented most of the world's first C++ language workbench, and built the software systems of OxLegal, a smart text contract-editor.
