The Officially Unoffical Report Card of Consensus 2022
A review of our team’s experience at this year’s Consensus conference.
Walking the streets of Austin in the 100-degree Texas heat I could not help but wonder if the rows of buildings covered in web3 company logos were real or the onset of heat exhaustion kicking in. As a bus covered in NFT inspired art zipped by, my skepticism fell to the wayside as I prepared to enter my first ever crypto conference. In front of me stood the Austin convention center, the home of this year’s Consensus 2022 conference. During the weekend which followed I would encounter 1000s of fellow web3 enthusiasts and a slew of companies vying for decentralized dominance. As I reflect upon my time at Consensus I am filled with conflicting emotions. Part of me was inspired by ideas shared and people met. Another equal part was filled with confusion and disgust at what I had encountered. So without further ado the shill free edition of the unofficial report card of Consensus 2022.
Exhibitor and Company Representation — D+
As you entered the expo hall and explored the surrounding areas you could not help but be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of companies in attendance. While some very popular brands such as MetaMask and Cardano were in attendance, the vast majority were far from household names. As I went booth to booth, excited to learn about what others were building and collecting free swag (more on this to come), my excitement quickly turned to boredom as I learned about another defi exchange with best-in-class security and cross chain utility. Yes there was also cold storage and the layer 1s galore, but much like the free t-shirts after a while they all start to blend together. For an internet of the future with limitless potential, the companies of this conference sure did seem to limit themselves to a distinct bundle of offerings and categories. Where was the creativity? Even the swag lacked outside the box thinking as the classic arrays of t-shirts, pens, and socks lined every booth (seriously I have never seen so much free swag at an event before, Mark Cuban would have had a stroke). While big problems often draw big fields of competition, I couldn’t help but think that the redundancy of companies was less a battle of great minds and more a reflection of copycat capital which flew into the space. The addressable market for many of these companies seemed small to opaque at best, and the nuances lied more in the technology architecture than in tangible value provided to end users. If I was to rate the composition of companies on display I would give it a D, with a few bright spots standing out in a field of largely uninspiring businesses.
Conference Design — C+
In general, I thought Consensus did a good job in organizing an interesting and thoughtful event. Through its use of multiple stages and venues such as the Sports Zone and NFT Gallery, they did a good job spreading out traffic and giving attendees a wide area of places to go and things to do. There was plenty of food and water, and despite the scorching heat, there were plenty of bars and restaurants nearby to visit. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the event was the company sponsored bars, where side events were running every day ranging from casino nights to hackathons. The events ran on time, and it was easy to find help if you needed it.
Now for the downsides. First, I still have no idea what the Metaverse is. Is it a game or a community, and is blockchain required for it to exist? Who knows? What I do know is Consensus had a Metaverse zone which to me felt a bit gimmicky and out of place, but perhaps that’s my anti-meta bias coming out. Additionally, the idea of a desk token to get Consensus swag and NFTs felt a bit like most NFT products to me, confusing and needlessly competitive. I like that they tried to include a token and drops into the event, but the execution felt poor to me and many people I talked to at the event had no idea how to engage with it. Lastly the party culture overwhelmed the conference for me. I felt like I was in college again figuring out who was at whose house or event (the sponsored events were often referred to as “company X’ house). Perhaps this was because of the young nature of the audience but the massive lines and exclusiveness of non-stop parties made me wonder if the purpose here was to do business or get laid. In general, most of the events felt like a marketing ploy rather than fun and engaging ways to connect with the community or learn. Great potential with not much substance, the conference events and design get a C+ from me.
Speakers — C
Due to the number of speakers and stages going on simultaneously, it was often impossible to get around to most of the speakers you wanted to see in a day. This ended up working out as the event seemed to lean more on quantity than quality as it stacked 13 pages of speakers into two 16-hour days. The highlights for me were Neal Stephenson, who taught us you’re never too old to shill between some otherwise poignant thoughts. Additionally, Kimbal Musk had some interesting thoughts on non-profit DAOs and questioned the value of most DAOs currently in existence. Besides that, it was a lot of forgettable anecdotes, bland predictions’, and generic lines of thought on raising capital and using blockchain technology from big names with not so big thoughts. The biggest announcement of the event was probably from Amex on their new crypto credit, although this was far from a revolution. I was surprised by the lack of pressing moderation and debate as well as the lack of audience engagement at even the small side events. I appreciated the ability to stream speakers from the app, but wifi often lacked the bandwidth to do so. Overall, I felt overwhelmed when chasing down speakers and planning a day of attendance, and this resulted me settling for a lot of talks by celebrities and business development types which I could have done without. The speaker options earn a C for me.
Random Things — A-
About 10% of the things I did at this conference earned a top grade from me. First, I really liked the Polygon and NEAR hacker houses. The smaller audiences and focus on specific and tangible items such as gas pricing and community funding made it really fun to engage with and let the audience easily collaberate and network. Hanging out with Blockchain Accelerator Foundation members and talking with company representatives was a blast, and much more comfortable an environment than the convention for me where one could not go 5 minutes without hearing “so what’s your TPS and market cap”. Nerdy people nerding out is honestly at the heart of what made this event fun for me and was so much more authentic than the product releases and cocktail parties happening on stage and all around the event. There seemed to be less insecurity as the lines of uber drivers and attendees telling me that they have been investing since 2015 made way for people building products and offering educated opinions on the future to come. There were no long lines or fancy dresses, just true crypto nuts talking about how we could tangibly impact the world. While this was not contained to the hacker houses, I listed them as they were good examples of events that fostered this type of conversation and community and I wish we had more of events like this at the conference. The highs of the conference were an A for me and might keep me coming back.
So was this conference a microcosm of crypto in a nutshell? Floods of money going into still forming ideas. Young people acting in defiance of norms while still falling trap to many a tradition if only by a different name. I don’t know. Was this like any conference I had been from before? Not quite. Was Consensus a revolution of decentralization and thought leaders coming together to change the world? Again, I would say not quite. The lack of grounding is what makes web3 so inspiring and yet so damn frustrating at times, and this is something I still have to come to terms with. Until then I think I am good on crypto conferences, I wish them the best but much like web3 they still may be 3–4 years away from realization.
Overall Conference Grade — C
