Diving into cryptocurrency was one of the best decisions I made since COVID. My Ethereum journey has not been as eventful as I want it to be, but I have high hopes for the future. And from this point onward, there is no going back.
Starting out as a newbie is quite exiting, but the excitement might be short lived if you don't know where to start from. Or, you encounter things you're not used to, or you're stuck and you don't know what to do. But I'll do my best to share a few tips that I believe you'll find helpful.
So, first I want us to talk about Ethereum, from their official website https://ethereum.org/en/ "Ethereum is the community-run technology powering the cryptocurrency ether (ETH) and thousands of decentralized applications." But I don't think it's really necessary to go into all that now.
You should check out their official website there are a lot of helpful stuff there, "who better to learn from, if not the one who knows" To be sincere going through the thing on their official website is probably the best option for any newbie, just that you might need a few tips based on experience, from a newbie with a little experience to a rookie newbie.
First you need a crypto wallet, kinda like the one you keep cash but for tokens or crypto cash, knowing that ETH is just one of the many currencies. You could use Metamask, Binance web3 wallet, or if you probably have an existing wallet, you could use that. I use bybit mostly by the way, although I have a lot of other wallets (cos of airdrops, and yunno it's nice to have them just in case I need them :-)
One very important thing that you must not forget to do is backing up your wallet, I'm talking about 'recovery phrases' let me tell you a little story.
So for about two years I've been collecting NFTs for free on Enjin, I had a screenshot of my recovery phrase on my phone, but unfortunately about two months ago my phone started having issues, it was a little disturbing and then it eventually stopped working. Unfortunately I was unable to repair it.
I couldn't get a hold of any data (except the things I backed up to my Gmail) and I was really pained finding out that by chance I did not back up my screenshots, I got a new phone and had to start again, but this time I'm not taking chances. I did learn the hard way, and I do not want that same plight to befall you, so friend take my advice to heart for it will save you from regret.
I'll share with you some of things that helped me out, and I believe they'll also help you out, definitely.
🔸 Research - You have to go online and look for things related to Ethereum, as many as you can find. You have to make sure they are from verified sources, so you'll not be misguided.
Google, Safari, Twitter (X), whatever and wherever. Just make sure you're increasing your knowledge by whatever means necessary, so that at the end of the day you have a wider understanding of the subject.
🔸 Explore Ethereum DApps
DApps are Decentralized Applications built using "Decentralized peer-to-peer blockchain network" and executed on a Blockchain system (in this case Ethereum). DApps are basically web3, and we'll talk about web3 later
There are a lot of possibilities, a lot of things to discover, a lot of things to learn, many things that'll interest you.
OpenSea - marketplace for NFTs(Non Fungible Token)
Uniswap - Decentralized Finance trading platform
Peepeth - Decentralized social media
Decentraland - Gaming virtual reality
Gitcoin - Decentralized freelance platform
One fact that has got me glued to this is that no person or entity singlehandedly controls the Blockchain decentralization. I feel like this is really amazing because things happen as a result of the collective effort of a lot of people. Not just some elected individuals.
Although this also means that the security of your wallet or ether account is in your hands, and you can't blame anybody for whatever happens to your account. So you have to keep your recovery phrases jealously, avoid scams by all means, and be very careful around links.
🔸 Another thing that will definitely help is joining communities wherever you can, it'll help you learn from others, stay up to date on latest topics and trends. Discord, Twitter (X), telegram, attend online webinars and crypto discussions.
One important part of the learning journey is learning from what others have learnt, so as to avoid some of the mistakes they made while learning.
🔸 I suggest something I call (safe snooping) don't mind the language, but it's just something that I love to call it. T'his is when you're dabbling into something new, treading with caution though, to achieve an unbeatable self learning experience. If you think it's not your style don't worry t'is okay, there are a lot of other ways to learn.
🔸 Another thing you might be unfamiliar with is gas, it just the little fee you pay to process your transactions on the Ethereum network, just like literarily buying gas for your vehicle to transport yourself from one place to another.
🔸 NFTs (Non Fungible tokens) in the Eth context are unique crypto tokens, like a digital asses, that cannot be duplicated, they represent objects in real life, art mostly, but also music, and videos. Their ownership is recorded on the Ethereum blockchain, enabling users to tokenize collectibles of all sorts, and the can also be traded. You could buy one with Eth or mint one yourself on OpenSea.io
🔸 Then there is the ENS (Ethereum Name Service) this is like your personal Eth username, instead of the contract addresses. For Eth though. I don't have one yet, because I need to have about 0.0024 Eth, about $50 to keep my name.eth for a year, so I'll probably stick to the long address for the time being, which brings us to earning or getting Eth.
🔸 Earnings Eth can be as easy or as difficult as you make it, one of the ways of earning is winning a contest, like this one I'm writing for. Working for a Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) or companies that payout cryptocurrency instead of cash.
Ways to get Eth for free include, Eth faucets, crypto airdrops, play to earn crypto games, amongst others.
Coinbase, Kraken, Bitpay amongst others allow you to buy Eth with a credit or debit card, apple pay, google pay, ACH deposit, or bank transfer.
Or you could buy from a centralized exchange like bitcoin.com , you'll create an account, go through the normal ID verification procedures, buy Eth and send it to the wallet you want to use, by copying your eth address for the transaction.
🔸 And now I want is to talk about web3. Web3 (Web 3.0) is basically the third generation of the World Wide Web (WWW) according to google. But, to me web3 is like a 3 dimensional form of the web as we know it, allowing gaming, social networks, finance, NFTs, virtual reality and all to completely digitalized by incorporating Blockchain technology, and cryptocurrency.
Web3 is all majorly about decentralization, where every used would have full rights to their data, it's more secure because decentralized networks are more secure than centralized networks, and DApps are designed to be user centered. Where transactions are recorded on a transparent, digital legder.
And that's pretty much the basics, from my point of view. You'll need to put the curious and inquisitive part of you to good use, and look up a lot of information on the web.
Although I still consider myself a newbie, bacause there are a lot of things to learn and explore, I mean the etherverse. And I'm on a journey of discovery, like 'alice in the wonderland' to learn, understand and earn as well, it's been interesting up to this moment, and there are a lot of things to come, so I'll keep my optimism.
2077 Collective has a project going on presently, Etherpedia. And If you ask ask me, I'll tell you it's a big plus to familiarize yourself with the mumbo jumbo's of Ethereum by becoming a part of the project.
I recently joined their discord server and I can only admit that it is exciting, I mean thrilling to be a part of that, you'll see for yourselves, don't worry too much. I won't say a lot of things about it but you'll be thrilled when you find out yourselves. All I'm going to say now is, if you have any questions along the way on your eth journey, they'll be happy to help.
I feel like this was supposed to be a Eth newbie crash course or side support, but I figured it would be best to have something you can just go through, even though you probably know most of what it entails already, but something you can relate to and learn one or two things from at least. Based on my personal experiences, which I've probably not shared too much of.
So this is pretty much what I could think of to help you get started on your Ethereum journey, I really hope this helps you out, one way or the other 🤍