Research trip to Lagos, Nigeria, explored developer community collaboration and innovative ideas
Web3Bridge is a dynamic community that has emerged as a hub of innovation and learning for anyone interested in design, engineering, and teaching. The community is vibrant and active, providing a safe space for individuals from various professions to learn about blockchain engineering. Based in Lagos, Nigeria, Web3Bridge hosts an annual developer event that brings together enthusiasts and professionals from around the world. They employ a hacker house style of teaching in cohorts and have successfully run over 10 cohorts as of June 2024.
The recent event was a special collaboration between the Web3Bridge community and various organizations that facilitated the three-day event. Representatives from diverse global organizations and individuals within the space attended, showcasing the event's collaborative spirit and its importance in fostering innovation.
SummitShare participated in the event alongside the Ethereum Foundation's Next Billion team. The experience was educational for everyone involved and provided insights into the activities of similar developer communities. One of our key objectives is to create a space where individuals, regardless of their specialty, can collaborate to build solutions to problems, thereby crafting new narratives together.
Thomas represented SummitShare at the event. He engaged with developers, participated in the event's activities, and built relationships with other representatives from organizations such as AyaHQ, Optimism, Intmax, The Remix Team, and other Ethereum Foundation teams like Ecosystem Growth and Support and DevCon. Web3Bridge Lagos allowed Thomas to connect with developers at a grassroots level and compare notes on the differences between communities in Nigeria and other parts of Africa. These discussions also covered topics like the growth of SummitShare, sustainable technology for public goods, and open-source software projects similar to ours, as well as how to facilitate contributions effectively.
The trip was a resounding success, providing new perspectives for our core team to consider in future planning for scaling. Ayodeji, affectionately known as The Chief Mechanic, runs Web3Bridge and extended an invitation for us to attend. We are grateful for the opportunity to engage in dialogue, learn from established practices, and observe the community's dynamics. We look forward to attending future events and witnessing how both our projects evolve over the coming year.
Our primary focus at the event was exploring how everyday developers could contribute to a project addressing a problem as significant as repatriation. The Web3Bridge conference, held in Q3 of 2023, was the first trip on our calendar and underscored the global nature of the repatriation issue. Although we primarily focus on the African context, the complexity of the problem multiplies with the diverse perspectives and interests of each African country. Each country is like a puzzle piece, and we aim to understand how these pieces differ to build an inclusive solution. This underscores the importance of attending developer conferences in other African states.
Engaging with the Web3Bridge community has provided valuable insights into how we can harness the power of collaboration to address the multifaceted challenge of repatriation. By integrating the diverse viewpoints and expertise of developers across Africa, we can create a more robust and inclusive solution. The event reinforced our commitment to fostering collaboration and leveraging digital innovation to tackle one of the continent's most pressing issues.