Well, my name is Yang. I'm a product designer at Web3, in case I have n't met you yet. I started working in this field 3 years ago, designing for institutions in Anchorage. I am currently at Syndicate. We work on native Web3 investment tools and, more recently, launched our investment club product, which makes it much easier for anyone to pool funds with friends and invest together.
I am also an active member of Vector DAO. We are a collective of designers who are changing the traditional 9-to-5 work model by offering design work in exchange for ownership and capital. The title of my talk today is "Designing for Web3 Humans". Perhaps you're here thinking, "Okay, Yang, tell me how I can improve my product design to attract users." Is it about designing or deciding the precise angle of the gradient and the corner radius of my buttons?
Or is it dark mode? Is it about introducing this portal-like form into my product, subconsciously luring users down the rabbit hole? Or is it choosing the right element from the food pyramid to name my product? For the record, we are well above the sweets index and have almost no carbohydrates. Which says, I think says something about the state of Web3 as a whole.
So I don't know if not, not exactly those, but yes, I will share some tips on how to design better Web3 products. For the next 15 minutes, I want to challenge you to really step away from your specific product interface and think with me like a human in Web3. That is, all the disordered transactions Web3. That is, all the disordered transactions , channels, discourses, and decisions that we all experience individually and collectively. In Web3 individually and collectively.
In Web3 , we think, do, listen, and have the potential to build things in a slightly different way. So, let's start with the first thing. Decision fatigue is amplified. However, given how open and composable Web 3 is, new applications are being created faster than ever, and users have many more options to choose from and decisions to make. In the old world, if you wanted to make some money on your dollars, you either put them into high-yield savings accounts, usually safer, or into riskier stocks.
But if you want to earn some extra interest on your cryptocurrencies, here are a dozen places where you can earn single-digit to four-digit returns, with variable versus fixed rates on each chain. So choose, but also do your own research. Now that more of us are joining DAOs, and more DAOs are moving towards progressive decentralization, governance proposals present another layer of decisions that require my attention. And studies show that the more options we have in front of us, the harder it is to choose one, or decision paralysis. They also show that our ability to make more and more decisions throughout the day worsens, or decision fatigue.
So or decision fatigue. So how do we address some of these aspects in the design of our everyday products? To begin with, we only present the necessary decisions. Now, this may seem obvious given what we just talked about. But too often we focus on thinking about the data path or what the contract contains or what the contract transmits or what the database contains , instead of thinking about how 99% of users think about a decision.
Let's use pattern recognition to interpret and analyze what the user enters, instead of having to make an additional decision just to tell us what they are giving us. So, if we look at an example here, Rainbow Wallet does this from step one. I have several ways to add or track a wallet, but they saved me from making an additional selection for the method and provide this ability to enter any of the four input types in one. Then, to help in decision-making, know what information people need to make that decision and then present that information in context. Coinbase Pro does this here by displaying a contextual user interface.
When I tap "buy" to start a transaction, I see the drawer to save my order details, but I can still see the current price above, in the same place as before. And while I decide on my limit price, I can open the drawer and study the trading history or the candlesticks, as seen in the middle screenshot. These are all the contacts that allow me to decide my operating parameters without having to leave this form. Finally, let's talk briefly about onboarding. One of the most frequent decisions we face now in Web3 is: Is this the right product for me?
Offer people a way to fully experience your app so they can make more informed decisions before paying for gas or even connecting a wallet. Taking Syndicate as an example, we set out to create a demo mode during the initial launch of our product. In this way, users have complete transparency about what they are doing and how they can manage an investment club before even connecting their portfolio or paying gas fees. In this way, the aim was to make decisions easier. Now, let's talk about taking on new roles and responsibilities taking on new roles and responsibilities .
A surprising result of creating things that democratize entire industries and replace third parties is that we now assume those roles ourselves. Some have their rules and tools defined in the existing world, while others are newly invented in web3. And similarly to how a huge wave of people suddenly became dog owners at the start of the pandemic, millions of humans are now suddenly custodians, investors, operators, among many other roles you see here. And with these new roles come a host of new responsibilities, such as keeping my private key secure and accessible at all times, managing all my positions and making sure I don't avoid liquidation, as well as doing my taxes and those of the DAOs I launch. All of these tasks are a lot of fun.
So how do we bring in new audiences and help them thrive in these roles that traditionally take years to master? Let's show, not tell years to master? Let's show, not tell , how things work, especially how the numbers are calculated . DEX aggregators like Matcha do a great job of explaining how my trade is being completed and how I'm getting the best price without any prior knowledge of what a DEX aggregator is or the fact that I'm playing the role of a trader here. I understand that it is able to give me this rate by gathering data from various exchanges.
Let's also consider the complete journey of a new role and simplify the less glamorous and complex parts of these journeys. Syndicate's latest product , as I mentioned, is the Web3 investment clubs. Therefore Web3 investment clubs. Therefore , we have learned a lot about the entire social investment journey , from the initial idea to distribution. What is shown here is a crude simplification of only a part of that journey for an investor in a Syndicate journey for an investor in a Syndicate .
We constantly hear that one of the biggest uncertainties for new investors is the legal considerations, as well as the back-and-forth with members to get them to sign their documents and deposit their funds. Therefore, we doubled that part. Share guidance on forming legal entities and integrate document signing as part of the core product experience. In other words, look for ways to address the entire journey from beginning to end to help users thrive in a new role, even if it's not the core value proposition of your product. So, many new roles, many decisions.
Now, let's move on to the third part of a glamorous life on Web3. The exponential growth of noise. We all know that, given how open and composable building on the blockchain is, the speed at which things are built is exponential, and that includes noise and spam. And the bad actors will multiply along with the good ones. So how can we better protect ourselves against this world?
Colon. The first is to incorporate best practices. We can learn from institutions in this case. Since they transact in larger volumes, more frequently, and with more counterparties than consumers, there are several things we can learn from their behavior. An example is test tanks.
Almost all institutional users will receive some funding for sending small trial deposits before making a large transfer to a new counterparty. Both to prevent fraud and to verify that the counterparty is really who they claim to be. Now, let's apply the same concept to the actions that consumers or we ourselves usually perform, such as staking or pooling a new token we come across. However, it's quite scary that these contracts can transfer our funds without our knowledge, and not everyone is aware of this. So what if we could encourage people to take precautions, like generating a new address and doing a test run first?
There are some dependencies here, I acknowledge, and some things that will make this a significantly better experience, such as reducing transaction costs and making on-chain destinations more human-readable. But, while we're still at it, let's make it very simple to take these precautions for our own safety. Okay, let's take a step back. Even before taking any action on the chain, there is an opportunity to learn about who and what I will be transacting with. This tweet from Chris Cantino has taught me a lot on a personal level.
Before this, I confess that I had never bothered to investigate or read much about Etherscan beyond checking if my transaction had gone through and tracking that progress bar. After reading this thread that goes through the Etherscan analysis tabs and the data I have available, I found myself consulting this information much more. Reading contract analyses and exploring recent transactions like a true cryptocurrency nerd. Now that I knew where to look. What if we could help people understand how to evaluate a contract or token as a first line of defense?
Which brings me to point number two, which is teaching me how to be blockchain literate. Through interfaces that, firstly, aggregate the most important information from the data chain. Secondly, they are displayed contextually at the user's point of interaction. Without making me travel to another place or to several places to look for it. And finally, three are adaptable and show me the most relevant information based on the user's intent.
I've developed this concept here as a possible way to bring it to life, gathering data such as the balance over time and recent transactions to help me understand the contract I'll be interacting with. What would happen if we applied this concept to every direction and point of interaction in the chain? To the links shared in my direct messages, to the tokens that appear in my wallet, and even to the individual or group wallets I interact with. However, I recognize that there is still a lot of work to be done here to scale blockchain APIs before we can get there before we can get there . But start by imagining what this world could be like.
And, in my opinion, blockchain literacy is one of the most important and undervalued parts of education. That doesn't mean we have to teach everyone how to read Solidity, but rather equip ourselves with critical real-time data to make more informed decisions. Now make more informed decisions. Now , let's move from what we experience as users to thinking like creators, which I believe is many or all of us here. So, let's build towards the Pluriverse.
Designing for the Pluriverse, a world that can fit many worlds. I encourage you to visit pluriverse.world to learn about this statement and interpret it yourself statement and interpret it yourself . For me, it is a declaration of intent that we envision a future in which it is possible to have many universals that are interdependent and prosperous. A future of pluricultures instead of monocultures, of radical belonging and, most tangibly, an open digital space of collective autonomy and shared ownership.
So what does that mean? And whether you agree with this vision or not, as builders of Web3, I believe it is crucial to formulate that vision of a world in which you would like to live. And perhaps even more important than what we build is how we build it we build is how we build it , especially while we are in the formative years of Web3. So how can we build things differently? First, looking inward.
Recognize our biases and rethink our assumptions to eliminate them. Design research has taught us that even when conducting an interview and having a conversation with someone, we are bringing our own sampling bias, interviewer bias, and sponsor bias, just to name a few. Next, let's look outwards. Let's admit that our existing systems train us to optimize efficiency and financial capital. If we continue optimizing for the same things, the results will most likely be the same.
Therefore, let's set goals to focus on more meaningful outcomes than products, and to redistribute capital to empower more people, which is exactly what we are building at Syndicate. And PS: We're hiring, including product designers. Thirdly, let's look around us. Let's invite more builders who think and look different, and make space for people not only to exist, but to belong to every part we are building. What if organizations building towards the same vision were not competitors, but environments that coexist peacefully to serve different cohorts of humans, each feeling that they belong to their respective communities or groups?
Now respective communities or groups? Now , to wrap things up, you might be thinking , to wrap things up, you might be thinking : "Hey, all this sounds great, but : "Hey, all this sounds great, but how and where do I hire designers?" Because that's the most crucial question I have in mind right now. How do I hire people who understand our user base to this extent? Simply put, there isn't enough design talent in Web 3.
That's why I wanted to share some of these design communities that I've been fortunate enough to be a part of. The first program, On Deck, is called On Deck Design and is aimed at mid- to senior-level designers looking to move up. Many of those who are interested in the sector. ADPList is an open platform where you can book sessions with design leaders from around the world and learn about their perspectives. Designer Fund is one of the first investors in companies founded by designers and has also invested in Web 3.
They also have excellent resources on topics such as early hiring and design culture. Well, in short, to design better experiences in our products, let's think obsessively further ahead. Thinking about how we think, what we do, what we listen to, and guiding ourselves to how we build in Web3. Now, for those of us familiar with user-centered design, and for any designer here, this isn't much more complicated if we know our audience, right? Our way of being is the result of our environment, and our environment is a little different in Web3.
So, with that, thank you and I hope to see you around. Wow!
Automatic transcript — names and jargon may be misspelled.