Claim A Free NFT, Understand/Create a Self-Custody Wallet, Connect to Blockchains & Bridge Liquidity.

https://qx.app/launch/0xfA3Ae64b65619a39C5876590BA6C67976FeDEDc7

I am not a financial advisor, and nothing I say in this substack is financial advice

This is all educational content you can use as a starting off point for your own research initiatives. I’m just another random individual who started a substack ‘cause I think/hope/know… that I have something to share with you all’.

That said, if you’d like to know a bit about me and are wondering why you should listen to me, read this intro post I wrote

In this brief S#!t post, you’ll learn:

1. What is a Crypto wallet? What are different types of wallets?,

2. How to create a wallet? (it’s super simple),

3. Connect to blockchains,

4. Bridge liquidity,

5. Claim a free NFT.

First things first, if you just happened across this article or you’re new and this is your first intro to Cryptocurrencies, think of it as your Web3 ID & password.

Ever since we (us humans) started using the internet, there has been a concept of usernames and passwords.

In the very early days, pretty much every platform made you create an account, (i.e, username and password) if you wanted to access their services, whether it be a free or paid for service.

Web2.0 Era had a decent approach towards the tedious sign-up process, as most platforms allowed users to sign-up with their Google, Facebook, or Twitter account.

This way your, social media or mailing accounts became your online identity, loosely confirmed by third party intermediaries mentioned in the above paragraph.

This was the outcome as it was simply too much unnecessary cognitive load to have multiple accounts. It was ideal to have a barrier free sign-up process.

🛸 OPINION:* In this ERA, we the consumers became the product and got no monetary returns whatsoever for our data. While revolutionary at the time, the infrastructure & the core foundation upon which web2.0 was built became increasingly centralized over the years. And if you didn’t want to be left out, you had to surrender your data to the handful central point of failure tech giants.*

Today, we have Crypto wallets. Crypto wallets just keep your private keys – the passwords that give you access to your cryptocurrencies – safe and accessible.

Originally, they just allowed you to send and receive cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum and perform basic functions.

But today, your wallet has become your on-chain identity, and can act as your “one key to open all doors” with a single click. You can access pretty much any and all Web3 DApps and services.

🛸 OPINION:* I truly believe we have successfully, albeit not gracefully, embarked upon a journey where we, the individuals, can start taking the power back.*

The preparations for this movement began in 2008 when a handful of cypherpunks were inspired by Satoshi Nakamoto’s white paper: Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System.

They (Satosh Nakamoto) have managed to disrupt the global financial system, money, value, and ownership all within 9 pages.

Say what you will - hater, lover, or trader - one has to acknowledge resilience and the fact that to this day, no one has concrete proof of Satoshi Nakamoto’s identity. At present, the most popular candidates are Hal Finney, Sergey Nazarov, Elon Musk, and the list goes on.

If you ask me, it doesn’t matter who Satoshi is, and maybe that’s why Satoshi has chosen to remain anonymous.

They come in many forms such as:

1. Hardware wallets like Ledger (which looks like a USB stick) | Cold Wallet

2. Metamask* (Best for Ethereum & EVM compatible chains) | Mobile App & Browser Extension.*

3. Phantom* (Solana Ecosystem) for a semi-seasoned user | Mobile App & Browser Extension.*

4. *Then there’s Coinbase Wallet & Trust Wallet, which are mobile apps best for beginner’s starting their self-custody journey.*

(Feel free to skip this section If you’ve already done this)

Step 1: Download MetaMask wallet Go to https://metamask.io/ and click on “Download”.

Choose your preferred browser or mobile application and install the MetaMask extension. MetaMask supports iOS, Android native apps along with Chrome, Firefox, Brave and Edge browser extensions.

For this example, I’ll be using chrome browser extension.

**Step 2: MetaMask wallet installation **Once the extension is installed, it’ll open a new tab where you’ll be greeted with a step-by-step wizard that will help you complete the setup process. Go ahead and click click on “Get Started”.

You’ll then be asked to either import an existing wallet or create a new one. I’m assuming most folks reading this might be newbies and this could be their first time creating a self-custody wallet, so i’m going to “create a wallet” for this little demonstration.

Step 3: Preferences Click on “Create a Wallet” and on the next window click on “I agree” if you would like to help improve MetaMask or click on “No Thanks” to proceed.

Step 4: **Create a password **This is the password you’ll use to lock and unlock your wallet to connect to applications

**Step 5: Securely store the seed phrase for your wallet **Click on “Click here to reveal secret words” to show the seed phrase. You want to keep this safe and not show to anyone!

I recommend you store your seed phrase in a safe place. It is the only way to recover your funds should your device crash or your browser resets, etc.

As mentioned earlier, there are many ways to store your secret recovery phrase. The most common method is to write your 12-word phrase on a piece of paper and store it safely in a place where only you have access.

Note: if you lose your seed phrase, MetaMask can’t help you recover your wallet and your funds will be lost forever. Make sure your write it down correct and make at least 3 copies.

Never share your seed phrase or your private key with anyone. No one will ever ask you for it. No application, protocol, project, tech support, influencers, etc. will ask you for your seed phrase!

If a “cute girl” DMs you on twitter or discord promising 69,420% returns once you connect and “verify your seed phrase”: Ignore HIM!

• Because: A, that’s likely a dude,

• B, you are asking to be scammed and will lose all your funds if you “verify” your seed phrase, and

• C, refer to A and B.

Once you’ve written down your seed phrase and verified everything thoroughly click on “Next”.

Step 6: Seed phrase confirmation Test Time! Metamask loves to gets a kicky from being a little tricky.

At this stage, it’s trying to make sure you were paying attention. To proceed forward, you will need to confirm your seed phrase by clicking on each word in the order in which the words were presented on the previous screen. Once completed, click on “Confirm” to proceed.

🥳 Congratulations! Once you complete step 6, your MetaMask wallet has been set up successfully. 🎉

If you already have some crypto on an exchange and are able to withdraw your crypto and transfer it to a wallet, I strongly suggest that you create a wallet and fund it with some ETH (ideally $100 worth) and explore the new Internet of Value (if you haven’t already done so).

This Industry rewards Participants far more than it rewards speculators. 😉

I can assure you, while this stuff might look intimidating on the outside, it’s actually quite simple (and fun) once you get the hang of it :)

You might ask, why do I need to connect to blockchains? Am I not already connected once I download my wallet? Well, Yes and No!

Yes, you are connected to Ethereum Mainnet by default and have some access to test-nets like Goerli, Ropsten, etc.

As crypto is more “hands-on”, One has to put in just a couple extra clicks worth of work to find the cheapest way to do things as it can be a touch expensive to do every small activity on Ethereum mainnet.

Luckily, most popular Dapps like Aave, Uniswap, Synthetix, etc. Have now deployed to various popular EVM compatible chains (L1s & L2s) such as Avalanche, Optimism, Arbitrum, BNB Chain (Formerly Binance Smart Chain), Polygon, Harmony, Fantom, etc.

These blockchains are not added to your Metamask wallet by default. So, unfortunately No, we’re not really connected to all blockchains, at-least not yet.

Point being, if you’re a Kennedy and money is no object, transact on Ethereum all you want and pay anywhere from $5 to $20 per transaction.

If you are broke like me and that $20 transaction fee is likely 20% of your entire budget, then use L2s like Optimism and Arbitrum to pay .02 to .10 cents per transaction.

Now, let’s dive into the actual connecting process

For this example: I’m going to illustrate how to connect to Optimism, but, the process issame for connecting to all EVM compatible chains. All you’ll need is relevant chain specific data.

Here’s two simple ways to get you started in no time:

A) Just **visit Chainlist.org, **connect your wallet, in the search bar type ‘Optimism’, and you’ll see the results as displayed in the screencap below.

Go ahead and click on “Add To Metamask”. Your wallet will show you a prompt, asking you to confirm/approve the details of the new network being added. Once you hit approve, it will also prompt you to switch to the network. And that’s it! You’re now connected to optimism.

B) Do it manually by adding a custom network in you wallet. Here’s Metamask’s article on how to add a custom network.

Click on the network selector button. This will display a list of networks to which you're already connected**:**

Click 'Add network:

A new browser tab will open, displaying various fields to fill out**:**

Complete the fields and click save to add the network. Feel free to use the bolded details below for respective inputs for optimism (FYI: these things change/update)

• Network Name: Optimism

• New RPC URL: https://mainnet.optimism.io/

• Chain ID: 10

• Currency Symbol: ETH

• Block Explorer URL (Optional): https://optimistic.etherscan.io/

Folks @Metis have done a simple write up for us plebs on what “EVM Compatible Means”. I’d Suggest you read up about what it means and gain some necessary context to interact with Multiple EVM compatible chains with the same address**.**

EVM compatibility has reduced the barriers to entry for app developers to deploy smart contracts on these new chains. The EVM compiles different kinds of smart contract code into a bytecode, a standard format that is readable by the Ethereum network.

This enables Dapp developers to seamlessly deploy the same code on Ethereum, Avalanche, or Polygon without needing to conduct costly and time consuming smart contract audits.

This ‘plug and play’ capability greatly expands the possibilities for emerging blockchains to attract developers to their ecosystem by reducing the time it takes to launch new Dapps and begin capturing market share from within a brand new network.

This phenomenon occurred with the launch of BSC and Avalanche and DeFi apps like Pancake Swap, TraderJoe or Benqi-Finance that quickly emerged on the network due to the ability to seamlessly replicate the automated market maker functionality of Uniswap’s DEX and the smart contract lending and borrowing functionality of AAVE.

The most important benefit of blockchain bridges is the ability to improve interoperability. They enable the exchange of tokens, assets, and data across different blockchains, whether between layer 1 and layer 2 protocols or various sidechains.

One such protocol that does this quite effectively and seamlessly is: 🔗Hop Protocol

If you aren’t familiar with Hop, it’s a cool protocol that allows us to bridge assets like ETH, USDC, USDT, DAI MATIC between Ethereum, Polygon, Arbitrum, Optimism, and Gnosis.

Hop Protocol works by leveraging bonders, who earn a small fee by fronting the liquidity at the destination chain.

At a very high level, a user sends tokens to the bonder on the source chain and the bonder sends tokens to the user on the destination chain. 

🗒️ Note:* Keep in mind that it would also be a good idea to have the native gas token of the chain you are transferring to in cases the native asset used to pay for trasactions isn’t ETH. For example, if you transfer ETH to Polygon, but have no MATIC, you won’t be able to do anything with your ETH as you’d need MATIC to pay for transactions. However, these days, blockchains will fund new accounts with just enough to perform 1 or 2 transactions.*

You’ll need to connect your wallet in the top right corner and select MetaMask.

Once connected, you can choose which networks to transfer your assets TO and FROM.

In this example, I’ll be demoing with ETH from Arbitrum to Optimism. (You don’t have to worry about wrapping or unwrapping your tokens).

After selecting your token to transfer, entering the amount, and choosing your networks, click “Approve” to commence the transaction, and sign in your MetaMask account. you’ll receive a confirmation prompt. Once that’s done, click “Send”:

As you can see, optimism has an on-boarding program of sorts on the go. This will allow me to gain some bonus rewards just for bridging some ETH over :)

Once you hit send, your MetaMask wallet will give you a prompt to sign a transaction and pay for bridging fees.

Here’s what I ended up paying to bridge over some ETH. Feel free to checkout the transaction record here:

Now, you just wait. once the transaction is confirmed and successful, we need to wait for necessary block confirmations. Usually 20 blocks (time taken for block confirmation varies from chain to chain).

You should see your funds on the new network after ~ 5 minutes.

🥳 Congrats! You just bridged between L2s without having to move back to Mainnet or paying an exorbitant amount in gas fees 🙂

The complicated part of the protocol is to ensure that the user does not have to trust the bonder. The protocol wants to prevent the bonder from receiving tokens on the source chain but never sending something on the destination chain. 

Therefore, the protocol uses specialized tokens, called hTokens—which act as an accounting tool. The cool feature of hTokens is that they can be batched together and moved to Ethereum Mainnet and from there to another chain. But this might take a while. Waiting for hTokens to eventually arrive at the destination chain is no problem for the bonder, but might be for the end-user.

Therefore, the bonder provides liquidity upfront for the end-user, once it knows that the user’s tokens are included in the batch to make the journey.

You can think of hTokens like a shadow token that follows the real token. Hop Protocol allows for a near-instant transfer because Hop has assets on all of the chains, allowing someone on Chain A to easily go from B to C.

https://qx.app/launch/0xfA3Ae64b65619a39C5876590BA6C67976FeDEDc7

This little artwork was fully AI generated, produced with the help of DALL-E (OpenAI)

As a token of my appreciation, this NFT is free for you to claim at qx.app on **Optimism. **It cost me $9 to deploy the contract. So, be sure to claim your free NFT!

Just figure out a way to create a wallet, connect to Optimism and pay the gas. Luckily, you just read a little S#!t Post about how to do exactly just that.

If you’re interested in finding out how I deployed my collection in minutes, subscribe and you’ll be one of the first to know!

Of course, it goes without saying but bears repeating that nothing I say or share here is financial advice. I’m just another random individual starting a substack ‘cause I think I have something to share with you all’. 🤷

Also, like many individuals who are doing this for a living I also am a humble penniless fool. So, if you are a kind, bountiful, and gifted individual who has benefited from this S#!t Postery and wish to buy this S#!t Poster of yours a coffee, Some drip money would definitely be appreciated and will help to keep my fingers going on this mechanical keyboard of mine.

You can donate whatever you think is right at this address: shitcoinornot.eth :)

Y’all didn’t think I learned all this from my mama’s belly did you? Let's be humble and give some credit and respect where it’s due, cause these resources were super helpful in crafting this S#!t Post 🙌

• [MetaMask]. (2020, March 3). What is MetaMask? YouTube. Retrieved September 12, 2022, from youtu.be/YVgfHZMFFFQ

• What is a crypto wallet? (n.d.). Coinbase. Retrieved October 7, 2022, from https://www.coinbase.com/learn/crypto-basics/what-is-a-crypto-wallet

• Dias, M. (2022, June 21). How To Bridge Your Assets Using Hop Protocol. ConsenSys. Retrieved September 12, 2022, from https://consensys.net/blog/metamask/how-to-bridge-your-assets-using-hop-protocol/

• EVM Equivalence vs. EVM Compatibility - MetisDAO. (2022, January 4). Medium. Retrieved September 12, 2022, from https://metisdao.medium.com/evm-equivalence-vs-evm-compatibility-199bd66f455d

• Chainlist. (n.d.). Retrieved September 12, 2022, from https://chainlist.org/

• Security check. (n.d.). Retrieved September 12, 2022, from https://metamask.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360043227612-How-to-add-a-custom-network-RPC

• What is EVM? - Ethereum Virtual Machine. (n.d.). Horizen Academy. Retrieved October 8, 2022, from https://www.horizen.io/blockchain-academy/technology/advanced/evm-ethereum-virtual-machine/