# A Community Starts with a Token By [Kevin Kaminski's Decentralized World](https://paragraph.com/@kkaminsk) · 2023-06-29 --- Introduction I’ve been a long-time Internet user who came from a pre-web modem universe. There were many doubters, and even when the web started, people generally had no idea what to expect or do. All this uncertainty led to experimentation and over-investment into technologies that don’t have a good market fit. I want to offer some content to the IT pro that explores emerging technologies in Web3 and points out what may soon become relevant to their jobs. Cloud platforms provide blockchain as a service, financial technology companies look to improve payment methods, and owning your identity is now a W3C standard. So what does this have to do with me? A couple of years ago, I finally understood why blockchain as an architecture would be vital to digitizing many things we do today. Yes, there are monkey pictures and scammers but there are also use cases that are being introduced to change how a product or service functions. Since I do work in the Microsoft community, I’ve expanded the scope of what I do to understand what is happening in Web3. Blockchain technologies will be sneaky, and well-marketed products will likely gloss over the fact that blockchain is being used. I already see that with Azure AD and some other Azure Services where the marketing tries to focus on the product and not go too specific on the architecture. Since there is so much hype to sift through, I’ll try to keep the communications here to big announcements and blog items I may specifically post here. I also blog on [https://checkyourlogs.net](https://checkyourlogs.net), but as you may have noticed, I fired up an Ethereum wallet and got an ENS domain for it. This is the basis of my identity in Web3, and I’ll do more to explain why these things are essential on a blockchain and what exactly blockchain identity is. The NFT and Purpose To initialize my Web3 community, it goes back to starting with a token. An NFT suits the function of being a collectible that can work as a sign of membership. I chose the artwork from [A Kid Called Beast](https://www.akidcalledbeast.com/) for my Web3 identity. It is from a community of creators experimenting in the Web3 space. The AR/VR features are fun and members are experimenting in innovative ways to grow their Web3 presence. The NFT to kick this all off will require you to either buy some ETH on the Optimism network or, if you have some ETH on Ethereum, you can use a bridge like [hop.exchange](https://app.hop.exchange/#/send?token=ETH&sourceNetwork=ethereum&destNetwork=optimism) to move some Ethereum to the network. I know this complicates things, but I hope it gets people onto the Optimism network to try it out and collect some content affordably especially now that more major NFT platforms support the network. With this change, the free NFT should only cost a few cents in transaction fees. I am using Manifold for the contract and claim page for the NFT. This ensures that the experience is a trusted platform for launching NFTs. nft://10/0x8D4a36bdeA1DBAA9435588aA3635c072C3199365/?showBuying=true&showMeta=true&extraParams=eyJwbGF0Zm9ybSI6Ik1BTklGT0xEIiwiZXh0ZW5zaW9uQWRkcmVzcyI6IjB4MUVCNzNGRUUyMDkwZkIxQzIwMTA1ZDVCYTg4N2UzYzNiQTE0YTE3RSIsImNsYWltSW5kZXgiOiIxMDI5MDIxOTM2In0%3D So what is this for? I don’t have a fancy roadmap at this point. I saw the need to be early with establishing a Web3 identity for my IT Pro persona. Those who follow me and are literate in digital assets can join my community for a meager cost of a few cents in network fees. I wanted to go with a free POAP for this, but they didn’t like me leaving a mint period open to the public until the end of the year. I’ll still experiment with POAPs, but the NFT is available until December 31, 2023. Feel lost? Metamask has a great beginner course on digital wallets and digital assets. [https://learn.metamask.io/overview](https://learn.metamask.io/overview) One Last Note A cool thing about using Mirror.xyz is that you can collect this post as an NFT. I’ll make it free. --- *Originally published on [Kevin Kaminski's Decentralized World](https://paragraph.com/@kkaminsk/a-community-starts-with-a-token)*