Scroll Meets Web3Bridge: Exclusive Talk with the Founder!

I mean like you built houses from the ground up and you've staffed 35 people like the amount of people like you've created your own little economy and uh you know in crypto you hear a lot of people trying to make money yada yada yada and then you just like any anything you make pushing it back in. I just thought Tony like it's I don't know what to say. There's so much more when I say that usually these are fuzzy words but uh you know you have so many tangible ways of doing this but what I like the most what you said and that resonates a lot with me and I think it resonates a lot with like resonate with scroll is that you can't help someone who doesn't want to help us in the discipline because another thing that's important for respect and to honor and appreciate the program so students actually makes web successful reason why we put all our effort in is because for Everyone successful and they go out the prayer touch of web three [Music] bridge. All right guys, uh welcome to web3 bridge. Uh so it's nice to have you guys here and uh how's it been?

Yeah, it's been great. Welcome to web3 bridge again. Love it. It's been really interesting. Super impressed on everything you built.

Thank you very much. What what's what's too far got it for you? I mean like you've built houses from the ground up and you've staffed 35 people like the amount of people like like you've created your own little economy and uh you know in crypto you hear a lot about people not trying to make money yada yada and then you're just like any anything you make pushing it back in. I just thought Tony like it's I don't know what to say. Thank you.

Thank thanks thanks for that actually. Then what's what's the plan for the trip like the plan coming to Africa? like what's what's the what's the focus? Yeah. Um I think like one of my one of our co-founders Yeah.

came to Africa like almost 2 years ago with the L2 trip that um Yseph organized and um and I think he came back with raving stories about you know how great everyone is and how much energy there is. Um, I feel like we want to, um, come back again to a get to know the ecosystem a little bit better, get to know the people building here a little bit better, and foster a way to kind of continuously build these relationships and see how we can be more like deeply integrated and connected. And I think the only way to do that is to um, you know, discover and also kind of see how we can support sustainable businesses. Um, so it's not just like a oneoff or a very shallow touch point. And so part of this trip is all about kind of discovery and learning and and listening and so kind of being here is pretty pretty insightful and thanks for sharing all of your experiences kind of building web 3 bridge.

I think like Raza said, it's like super inspiring and um and I think it's kind of like just kind of learning about what what success means in your mind and then also kind of you know just being here kind of meeting a lot of the students and I know a lot of them are going down different paths after web 3 bridge and just kind of learning a bit more about what that growth path looks like um is kind of the the high level both. Yeah, that that's that sounds good. I think I'm actually more interested in the student like I was having a conversation with somebody. I was like so the student actually makes successful. One of the reason why we put all our effort in it is because for everyone that successful and they go out they bring a touch of a three bridge like we are proud to say they from bridge and we always want to give our best to them cuz it's al always not easy to like as people grown up adult in 16 weeks everybody want to beat themselves and all but then if we have to conform them to our will maybe we use sometimes use the ad the other way but then also ensure that they enjoying I think it's important to be disciplined and uh I can feel that in the way you design the program.

As a matter of fact, I would say most programs that are out there for support for like whether that's a hackathon or a program, they don't follow this regime. And it's something actually that successful entrepreneurs has have taught me that anyone any program have actually impressed by and honestly I didn't have the privilege to be here before that time and then actually experience you. You're saying the same thing that like successful startup schools successful like startup programs said exactly what you're saying throughout this message and that's being disciplined. You told me about the first 6 weeks and you can't help someone who doesn't want to help themselves. I agree.

And what you're doing is already so much is be providing a platform. You're providing the infrastructure. You're providing the education. There's so much more. When I say that, usually these are fuzzy words, but uh you know, you have so many tangible ways of doing this.

But what I like the most what you said and that resonates a lot with me and I think it resonates a lot with like it would resonate with scroll is that you can't help someone who doesn't want to help us. discipline like because I think that it's important for respect and to honor and appreciate the program. Yeah. I mean I I want to kind of um we were just kind of in awe being immersed in Buffy Bridge experience but I want to kind of go back to the start like what made you want to start this program and uh and what was like the catalyst? Oh okay.

So uh I came into 2017. I have a background in hospitality management and education. So when I when I came in and so I came chasing airrop like I've always said that like I just came looking for air drop. I wanted some money. I I had a baby.

I had I wanted like able to afford to buy diaper and all but then uh at some point in 2018 I discovered it's just more than that like I've chased airrop a while and I felt like this year I can actually like do a lot. So 2017 December I learned how to use Twitter for the first time. So I got my first job on Twitter, second on Twitter and I keep entering community to manage and moderate and I feel like there's an educational gap like a lot of people coming to understand what three is and odd. So I keep shouting about I think if I go back my tweet in 2018 I spoke about education like 20 times I can't do this without education. Anytime I talk about adoption, education is missing and all of those things and I work in this group uh with this project IDRO.

We launched a project that crashed at night like so we launched so everyone at like a particular amount of air drop on their wallet. So like it's like custodial wallet a wallet that I forgotten that's it has it's a gasless wallet where we pay the gas like in 2018 actually like that and I was just a community managing the community. So we launched the program, the developers were hired from Upwork. So everybody just was cool and cool and launched the program on Saturday night around 10:00 p.m.

And I think 10:30 when I woke up, the project crashed. Developers were nowhere to be found. Everybody was disappeared. I was a community guy. So a lot of people were lament.

I was like I was there managing everybody for like almost 7 8 hours and then when we were trying to like work the project, I was now the one interfacing between the community and developers. So I end up becoming a I I was moved to become a functional C at that point because when developers were done testing I have to test before push to production. So I start doing testing and all then we had a problem there's no developers to like do this in three. Then in Africa's contest there were like little no developers like very few guys were doing development work and I was always shouting to train we need to train until 2019 when defcon 5 was when I just saw I was following up on Twitter and I saw Joseph Lubin's tweet that we need to 1 million developer I like oo nice I made comments Africa has the intellect and the population to achieve this and I went to bed somebody reached out forum the network and I was like oh this is a good one do you have a proposal I'm a Nigerian we live we propose in our head like proposal we started was online strictly online no planned for onsite you had the first program was school we had over 180 persons but 70% were web two guys were not developer at all so like they want to get into web 3 but they were not developers they didn't have background of tech and all so we struggled with the class we had about five seven guys that from that second one which was good then covid came and all the mentors who were there like we had very amazing guys from the first one like nei guys from consensus were also part of the mentors but now there's co nobody's ready to do anything everybody's just like trying to mind their business and all then one of the guys from court one came out like we could do something so we started with cryptozie and ethanot so we used that like train c three I remember it was 8 weeks at the time then the following cord was a lot of these guys wanted to learn but then they were busy in their lives and all and they hardly come to class we couldn't finish the program sometimes some of them are presenting their program their project from inside the commercial bus in Los know how crazy that is like you present change me and it's like I remember I was call the call and a lot of background noise like no it's time to go on site let's experiment you then wanted to go to the island because like everybody go on the island right but I was like so whatever friend we had came from our friends from the network um my present co-founder and the one I had we put it together as well. So if we put this money in and we don't get another money and we stay on the island, we'll die.

Then also if we get a space for classes and we don't have a residential place, the program will die. But like the plan is to like see people leave whatever they do come lock in here. And so we got this building the first one gradually gradually then 2023 we started the construction of that new building. waiting the first time let's try and see how we can like increase the numbers because I feel that if you don't if you can't increase the numbers it's going to be limited by we have online students but then the experience is for you to like lock in for 16 weeks so once like increase the number and yeah fast forward fast forward now we have four facilities now on the other side we can now ask 200 developers now then they all that we are launching at the end of this month to like increase the numbers and that's our story like how does the numbers this work out like as a business like what's the difference just so you know ours have an idea of scale um so we started from 15 on site I think the entire course started with 18 cuz I remember there were three students online then uh now we do 150 do 70 150 for each of the course now uh last course we had 150 students so the vision is actually designed to ensure that students actually can learn by themselves So we follow a path. Uh everybody can run at the same pace but then you must we have a standard you cannot drop below.

If you below that standard just go home by yourself because we want people to like learn together work together and we have a rule during eviction no one must be evicted on site. If we ever anybody onsite take away lunch for 2 weeks so the rule is that to ensure that while you compete for yourself you also collaborate. So the classes are usually between 4:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.

m. every day, Monday to Saturday, like minimal 5 hours like classes. Then you see them spending nights learning because nobody must be evicted. Why does it start at 400 p.m.?

Also because we have people who are also like work who are online. Okay. Then also we have students in other African countries who should Nigeria work our clothes by 4:00 or 5 by 4 to that every other person online can join the class. So left to us the on guys can start any time the online guys we are like considering the time for them so they can start by 4 for East Africans they close by 5 so that 400 p.m.

6 p.m. time. So they already in rested they can't join the class. For us we do not play number games cuz I believe in depth.

So like I grew up hearing a story of the Chinese bamboo. I don't know how true that because I've not been to China. But then there's a story that says oh Chinese bamboo when you plant them they spend 5 years growing roots before they actually started growing out. Now I think they are one of the best bamboos in the world because of that. Like they flexible enough because they have enough roots.

So what we decided to do is to like take the depth approach but like we don't do the numbers. If he's 70, if he's 40, we are sure that when they out, they working with you, you sure that they're from web to the bridge. And like I tell him every time, they are the ambassadors of web to the bridge because I can't be everywhere. Uh I don't have the to be everywhere, but I believe that anywhere you see one of them, you actually have seen when you get there's a picture in my office that that tells the story better. Like I see them moving around the world.

I see as a tree that has a root in Africa where that drops fruits everywhere in the world. So they go everywhere anywhere they get to they take root and become bridge. So now we do less advertisement because for everybody you see almost all of them are defined by one alumni or the other because they passed through. I have families that have that like three generations now. Like the elder brother was here, the younger one and the younger one like Yes.

Because like my life was good here. You go, you go get better with your life. Like some like I'm sending my brother to come and get better. Send to come and get better. Like okay, send them over to us.

Then apart from classes, we do a lot of therapy by the side. Yes, actually I love therapy by side. Like you see a clinic. So in case you are sick, you come to the clinic. But personally, I don't I don't know how to write code developer.

So my job is to ensure that when you hit the wall, you have someone to talk to. And I listen to all rubbish, all good things, all all troubles. Like I've had the good, the bad, the ugly, the worst. So like that's that that alone. So like when you then the mentors and the staff are trained to see people who are getting depressed by the by the stress stressful like you are you don't you have less sleep you have all of this like during the class mentors can just like come talk to us and like this person this person it seems to be going off so we invite them to like come have a conversation let's talk then when the class is becoming too stressful out like distress the class we put them on we take them out to the beach do paintballing we do internal practice to make sure that okay let's let's relax the stress then we'll go back to it again.

What what's been some the some of the biggest kind of insights and learnings from running web 3 bridge for 5 years? uh I believe that uh opportunities are not evenly distributed but we can actually create opportunities like I've met a number of developers at their worst for us one of one of the one of the challenges we've seen is that everyone in Africa's one major problem everyone is struggling economic wise and all of those things and a number of persons lose their confidence because of these things and I believe that one of the things we we are doing is like help you find yourself let you know that it's not impossible. I'm not a developer, right? I I had done a lot of pet jobs in my life. I've sold like jugs like I remember I was I sell promotion at some point.

I s I opted mango at some point. Yeah, actually I did opt oil at some point and I feel like if I could get here with web three, every other person could. And that's why we keep working to make sure that we are making opportunities for everybody. So for I've seen like I said I've seen I've seen the worst of people. I've seen people who were not doing badly when they came like I know a number of person that came here and they resigned from their job just like let's resign and let's see what happens and they're doing well I think one of our experience doing masters in a presently so like they everywhere now they starting their own program they starting their own stuff there's going to be challenges I believe we started with having front challenge but at some point I decided to take that off it's not as if we are completely sustainable at this point I believe that nothing is impossible at this point and we I've gotten to a point where it can't go wrong anymore.

It used to be wrong, but it can't go wrong anymore. At least we we've sustained to this point and and a good point. And I'm happy that anytime one any of them like one of the things I also like is that every alon can reach me anytime whether it's convenient or not. My job is to listen to them because I feel like for every time they successful, I'm more successful. Is it to want to come to web come talk to IO because they are the one that carry the success and like I just like provide support for them like uh sir s I just got a new job.

Yeah, we celebrate. Like I do celebrate it a lot. Like yeah, we party. I post it about all. Oh, like there was a guy there on a day some one of them got arrested by the police and I was like let me talk to the officer like and him like so I just want to be able to like be available for them as best because also there's no way we can document metrics of their success except they open to come talk to us.

So like that's why we create a room for them to always be able to come talk to us like oh I just win this today. Now also it's easy to want to listen to wins and not listen to losses. Sometime say I just like we have not heard from this person how are you doing I'm not doing very fine things are not going well are you sure you're okay send me your account number okay take some now it's not always convenient but then it's part of how communities are built that's how everyone can like say oh your parents are always coming back yeah I'm always creating a home for them to come back to just like you having a parent who always tell you if things get bad outside you know you can always come back right so that's what I do that's why we call the I know why everyone calls you daddy. Yeah. Ah, it it's tough actually at first.

Make me look old at first because I'm Jenzi myself. How old are you? What? My point is right. Believe it or not, that's for you to believe on us.

Like, it's so hard doing stuff on your own, right? And it's so hard doing something so like tactile like building a building and like painting walls and talking to alumni like how how do you do it kind of like who do you lean on for like support? Like everyone leans on you for support when they you know get arrested and whatnot. Like who do you lean on? Yeah, I I I can see I have one of the best teams.

Uh fortunately unfortunately a number of them don't want their face in the public. Like I was talking some I was talking about my co-founder earlier and was like I never heard of him like just don't want to be in the public like I have a lot of people behind the scene that actually get the job done like there was a time I used to like do everything like I used to be like everybody everything but now I have people who I don't need to actually like move around I just need to like make a call like they are in their own space looking for solutions in their own space saying like last year I think I traveled about 14 times that was the first time I actually did that and I was not worried. The calendar was running on its own like the operations guys were doing a good job. The facility guys were doing a good job. The media guys like everybody now does their so they my go-to person when things like gets like stuck and I'm tired.

I like okay guys this is it. I'm bonding to them. Then they're like oh s this this this. Then also thankfully I am grateful to have a very good partner. My wife is like somebody I could like whine huge sometimes like when we don't talk about no job walk I like sorry I just need to this burden I just like so like I have a very wonderful team and honestly they've been very careful they make the job so like when I fly like no no no it's not just about me there people behind the scene that actually doing the work and they're doing amazing like they just like okay we're doing this and I stop worrying about Just think of how do we move from A to B to C to D like three amazing guys.

Just want to confirm you're not actually in your 20ies right now. Okay. of the record before now you heard about web no before you get to know these details like what was that thing that you add that make you curious about interacting with territory you know um I think what's important when you enter a new space is it's like in crypto there's a lot of noise you know there's a lot of people building and from the surface everything looks shiny and everything looks great Um I I was fortunate enough like in school we're fortunate enough that we have many advisers that help us like guide us and navigate the space. Uh and uh web three bridge you have built a name that now has punctured outside. it has reached places where not just us like Chris on the team uh you had a phenomenal experience and uh and your students you don't know that but I actually interacted with your students we have given them grants because they do phenomenal work um and uh and obviously told me uh and so I think that what made us reach out to web3 bridge is people that we trust said no this is the community to engage with the iOS is I know like I think it's a great sign of leadership that you're saying that it's not you it's the people like when I first got my first management management job I was like okay like what does how am I successful and my mentor told me your success is just a reflection of the success of the people who work for you are not important anymore uh and I think that you reflect that very well so I think now you're in a phase where your work is speaking for you and so and the proof is in the time and then that's something that we are experiencing.

I mean today like I I think I said it before I'm speechless at you and I joke around but I mean serious I understand why people call you daddy. So I think it's I see a lot of similarities in the vision that we have at scroll and I don't want to talk about that too much but I think that I told you before the discipline and the program the infrastructure we're thinking about mechanisms as well. like how do you provide it for there's a lot more than just capital needed you need a lot more and you you're thinking about everything something I like to call connecting the dots uh and and mentorship comes in many ways and so I think uh your work is speaking for you uh and and I think that that's also through au authenticity you know there's a genuiness and I can sense that in everything that you're saying the way that you're saying the way you've hosted us yesterday was phenomenal and uh I think that Yeah, I'm I'm I don't know. I don't think I'm more excited than you, but I'm definitely excited. You know, bridges uh the point you're going to build.

Thank you very much. I I believe we're we up to something great. Uh we we do appraisal every week. Actually, we've done that for the last 5 years. Every week to be sure that what have we done right, what have we done wrong?

And we are honestly tell ourselves the truth. Sometimes it's hard to actually hear the bad things like I used to have session with the student before they leave the court like say tell me what you don't like about your what has gone wrong like sometimes those words can be thoughtful but then it's actually how you grow I believe you keep hearing only the beautiful things you won't grow so like uh at each point we see failures we tell ourselves okay how can we fix this yeah there's a failure here we don't want to shy away from it there's a failure here from outside might look like a win but internally we know is up to standard we have to fix up and keep doing that. So I think our last word so that we can can we can go over here. Yeah. I think the main thing is that uh ironically and not I've heard of of your work before song to Tony in the car.

I was heard from your work before. It's different being here. So I think that anyone has seen this you should be here uh and experience. It's different. You can hold a fancy presentation at Defcon.

You can do fancy talks online. It's different when you're here. Yeah. To bring everybody. I have a maybe final question for you is that um I think like looking at the next like three to five years um where do you want web 3 bridge to go and also for anyone who's watching this um where do you think um you know anyone can be helpful okay so next 3 to 5 years I see us so I have personally studied like if I've done at all I've studied a studied MIT studed the YC model and all and I see my people coming out.

So I started with thinking Avard and I started thinking MIT because of the environment and the community like I'm happy that the develop the alumni are now coming back to this environment and I see in a way where I have a complete tech city around there we can become like more of a technical like a technical university or technical program that we can actually do technical stuffs because I feel that yeah blockchain might be the future what if blockchain is just going to be another 8 minute javascript in a long time but tech will always remain right so like that's where I see like how do we become that part of tech that everyone have to come here everyone want to come here like everyone is running to go to a MIT today not just because of the learning of the community the network of the alumni and all of those things and I believe we can create something like that here like I was I was joking today and I've told the alumni before I said I believe that in another two years in another one year alumni can work through the bridge as much as $800,000 to a million dollars and at that point we can actually become that point that supports every other programs. Now imagine we have a million fund like uh what do they call this fund call it um endowment fund imaginement fund and is building project and we are the first point of fund they receive now for anyone coming from a MIT they have a license it's not just about the fund because of the environment the network that like building your own introduce you to all of these guys so I'm working to ensure that our become that point of network that everyone can actually rely on. So like I'm not going to the because I want to go and become a developer. I'm going for the experience. I'm going for the network.

I'm going for this. That's one of the things I expect us to have under 3 years. I I don't say I I know that when they vocational school because I believe that this experiment this learns can be replicated in other fields within our economy in Africa like we need to train apprentice the carpenters the brick layers the like I work with them a lot I see their flaws like the engineers I use the builders I use now I actually groom them the first project we did like I brought my friend who were actively in construction to come work with It's like for 6 month you're working with now now they have embedded their approach. So you can't go less than the standard like I believe that can transfer that culture somewhere. So I believe in another 3 5 years I see us becoming big.

I see I see a full city come out of web and everyone that want to work with web we are open. Um we one of the things that we have done well is to give value back to whoever we're working with. Uh and we take feedback very seriously. or if you're not satisfied, we would not shy away from actually listening to that. like uh for if you've ever seen any of our contract like it's very detailed like we tell you we do ABC and when we deliver we bring what we supposed to deliver we side what we have delivered that's how we've always done in the past so you want to work with us you want to train some people like yeah I know the team the guys are going to school they're going to which country are they going to Malaysia so I see that in in long time what in Africa to the bridge are you sure you sure they're in good hands to Like I believe that might cost us a number of say oh somebody from scroll might have to fly down but then what if we don't don't have to move that more than one person and we got a business transform to do to get a business analyst internally because we know that we can't continue to train developers alone but they are not start train developers and developers can be anything they can't be founders they can't start a school they can't start anything but then like I you see we are training primary school students now primary school is the basic now those students can be anything they want to.

They can go to university, they can go to a college, they can do anything. So just want to do that then we can now expand that. So thanks thanks for coming around. Thanks for thanks for having us. Good job.

Okay.