Our team has been involved in crypto since 2013. We’re constantly blown away by the level of talent within the space. We know plenty about some of crypto’s biggest contributors, while others are mysteries. But regardless of whether we know them as global figureheads or simply an online pseudonym, their work and collective action have pushed crypto forward from nothing to a global phenomenon.

With that said the crypto employment market is still small, with estimates of the number of jobs in the crypto industries ranging from 50,000 - 100,0000 compared to 3,850,000 jobs in the broader technology industry. Some might say that this is representative of how nascent the crypto market is, however we disagree. After all, over 300 million people globally are estimated to use or hold cryptocurrencies. With that in mind it’s hard to believe that an industry with more users and a higher market capitalization than a typical investment bank or technology company might have 5x fewer employees. Thus, our belief is that the crypto labor market is lagging due to specific blockers in the market for talent in crypto.

We believe this is because crypto labor is evolving differently than traditional labor. As the crypto industry continues to mature, the gap between traditional employment and crypto-first employment will continue to widen, which means that companies suited to serve traditional 9 to 5 technology labor markets will be a suboptimal source of talent for the crypto industry. The core tenets of crypto - decentralization, privacy, and self sovereignty - fly in the face of how the traditional employment structures are organized. As crypto continues to establish itself as an independent alternative to traditional systems, its employees will take a new approach to work.

That’s why we built Opencraft. Our goal is to build a crypto-first talent marketplace, for workers who are ready to continue their journey in crypto or maybe just get their feet wet, and for projects that are interested in finding the best talent in the world. We’re building Opencraft from the ground up with the core values of the crypto - values that we’ve seen since the rise of Bitcoin - as our guiding principles. Those include:

• Decentralization - Opencraft will be a place to find full time work as well as part time and gig style jobs via any cryptocurrency of your choosing, allowing individuals to engage in the crypto labor market as they’d please and giving projects maximum flexibility. We are not tied to one specific crypto currency or geographic region.

• Privacy - Opencraft is built to be friendly to anons and doxxed individuals alike. Users have a variety of reasons for wanting to engage with employment via a pseudonym or independent profile and we see no reason why they shouldn’t be empowered to do that. Likewise, we’ll have all the tools available for those who want to bring their identities and pre-existing reputation on the platform.

• Self-Sovereignty - Opencraft leverages crypto rails to let individuals choose how they’d like to get paid and take payments directly to their wallets. This means that we won’t be acting as a middle-man taking funds out of workers pockets. We likewise let workers choose to get paid in whatever cryptocurrency they’d like. 

• Global - Opencraft is intended to be global from day 1, without the limitations imposed by centralized labor marketplaces. The most impactful cryptocurrency projects have had contributors from all over the world and we intend to facilitate similar opportunities for talent and projects alike.

While we’re excited about our philosophical alignment with the crypto currency industry, we’re also aiming to solve real problems we’ve encountered first-hand in the crypto labor market, both as leaders of projects and as crypto workers.

One of the biggest issues we’ve found working in crypto is finding talent that (i) has the right level of experience within crypto and (ii) is open to getting paid in cryptocurrencies. It sounds like an obvious problem but the way it manifests itself is more insidious. Finding talent in crypto is is particularly hard for a few reasons:

• Level of experience is hard to quantify: Finding folks who are crypto fluent and distinguishing them from those who are crypto curious is very difficult to do based on how existing networks categorize talent.

• Comfort taking crypto is difficult to filter for: Once you find someone with the skills you’d like, it’s difficult to understand their comfort level in getting paid in cryptocurrency until after you’ve done the work to meet and assess them. You’ll be super excited about someone, their location, their style, and when you explain you’d like to pay them in USDC or maybe even in a token you’ve created to compensate your contributors, they balk. Maybe they balk because they haven’t heard of USDC or because their barber told them P2E tokens are too volatile. With no other options, you part ways and you’re back at square one with your deadline looming.

What if instead there was a way to find talent who you knew were crypto minded. There are probably way more of them than you think, but sifting through everyone else is a huge challenge and pitching someone on cryptocurrency shouldn’t be a necessary part of any talent search.

Ultimately speed and talent will likely make or break your project and our goal is to bring you the best of both.

One of the most satisfying parts of working in crypto has been meeting the many people whose lives have been changed by their employment in the industry. Working in crypto is an incredibly exciting prospect because it presents benefits that most traditional tech jobs lack, which include:

• A global job market: Rather than being located within a tech hub with sky high rents and grueling commutes, the majority of crypto projects are remote and hire the best people regardless of where they live. While this provides a host of lifestyle benefits, the largest benefit in our eyes is new opportunities for individuals outside of major tech hubs. Our founding team grew up removed from a major tech hub and had to break into tech from afar. We’re excited about making the path for others easier.

• New types of jobs: The crypto market has become a source of potential employment for various disciplines that were previously underemployed by mainstream tech. Roles for artists, animators, event planners, and photographers which typically aren’t hired in large quantities by large tech companies are mainstay professions in crypto. Further, crypto native roles in areas like tokenomics and decentralized governance present new career paths for individuals to shape. Few marketplaces understand the idiosyncratic nature of these roles and even fewer help point individuals in the right direction towards finding the right fit for themselves within crypto.

• Shared upside: Often, talent does the majority of work for their project and partakes in very little of the upside. In situations where talent does get shared upside in the form of equity they’re often the last in line to be able to cash out (well after founders and investors). By focusing on payment via cryptocurrencies we’ll allow you to find projects which align with you and provide liquid upside if you choose to accept their tokens as a form of payment. 

• Private: Professional social networking has increasingly blurred the line between our personal and professional lives. So much so that it feels as though you’re signing your identity away to any employer you engage with. Crypto talent has had anonymous pseudonymous and doxxed workers since its inception and we will be no different. For us, reputation is defined by the quality of your work, not by your willingness to share each and every last detail of your life with your employer.

Whether you’re a longstanding project in web3 or someone with an idea looking for a team, we’re here to help. Likewise, whether you’re well into your crypto career or simply curious about dipping your toes into the metaverse, we’ll be at your side.

If the above sounds aligned with what you’d like out of your job or what you’d like from your talent, give Opencraft a try!