Table of Contents:
Crypto Twitter
Podcasts
Data/Research Tools
VPN
For Developers
Books
Crypto Slang
Crypto Twitter
Twitter can be a terrific place to get news, insights, find early projects, read hack explanations, etc. If you follow the right people, that is. Many of the smartest people in crypto use Twitter on a daily basis, and following them can help you learn things that you can’t find in a book or anywhere online. A word of warning though: don’t take everything at face value. People obviously aren’t always serious with what they post. Here’s a few that we recommend:
- Hsaka @HsakaTrades - Great trader, helpful for predicting/watching market trends
- Hasu @hasufl - Helps out at Paradigm and Deribit, great for in-depth analysis of various crypto topics
- GCR @GiganticRebirth - One of the best crypto traders out there, good to understand market psychology
- Adam Cochran @adamscochran - Writes about all things crypto, obviously understands the market/industry extremely well, great threads
- Su Zhu / Kyle Davies @kyled116 - Co-run Three Arrows Capital, tweet about the market in general, good philosophical posts, also joke around a lot
- Cobie @CryptoCobain - Been in crypto for a long time, smart but also hilarious. If anything, follow just for the fun of it
- CM @ConvexMonster - Follows and participates in the changing narratives, helps you keep up to date on latest trends
- 6529 @punk6529 - Lots of great NFT/metaverse threads
- Avi Felman @AviFelman - BlockTower co-PM, macro stuff and good retweets
- Sam Trabucco @AlamedaTrabucco - Head of Alameda trading, posts good content related to big trading news and market structure
- Robert Miller - Helped start Flashbots, an MEV service. He tweets a lot about interesting transactions, MEV (see DeFi Basics education), and how blockchains works in detail
- Raoul Pal @RaoulGMI - Hedge fund macro trader turned crypto bull, good macro market analysis
- Girolamo @INArteCarloDoss - Macro market analysis, lately been watching for market crashes and tweeting out analysis about it, good to see bearish cases. Mostly non-crypto.
- Emperor @EmperorBTC - Trading tips/tutorials, market insights
- Sell When Over | 9000.eth @sell9000 - Tweets about certain crypto setups using TA and insider knowledge. He writes great threads as well
- Sam Bankman Fried @SBF_FTX - A crypto legend, everyone should follow him
- Balaji Srinivasan @Balajis - Angel investor. He was previously CTO of Coinbase and a General Manager of a16z. He writes intellectual tweets about BTC and other crypto.
- Zero Hedge @zerohedge - Provides news, rumors and gossip surrounding the financial industry. Not solely crypto.
- Chris Dixon @cdixon - General Partner of a16z. Great tweets about web3, crypto itself, and occasionally NFTs. Solid threads as well.
Podcasts
Podcasts are another way to learn about crypto topics more in depth. Here are some we recommend:
- Uncommon Core
- UpOnly
- Unchained
- The Delphi Podcast
- The Scoop
- Epicenter
- Zero Knowledge
- Real Vision
- The Wolf Of All Streets
- Bankless
- The FTX Podcast
- Blockcrunch
Data/Research Tools
Data on Specific Tokens
- Messari: Lots of data for nearly every token you’d want
- LunarCrush: Social data on tokens
NFT Data
- Solanalysis: Solana NFT data
- Opensea: Data for Opensea, the currently largest NFT exchange
- Nansen: Paid, but in-depth NFT statistics and lots more on-chain metrics
News
- CoinDesk
Simple Market Data
- TradingView: General charts, indicators, can configure custom alerts
- CoinGecko: Quickly view data for a token (if available) such as supply statistics, market cap, etc
- DeFiPulse: DeFi dashboard (only includes certain projects) for a quick overview
- TokenTerminal: Explore specific tokens/chains
- Dune: Custom dashboards for many projects
- Bitcoin PnL: Interesting chart on unrealized profit/loss
Advanced Market Data
- Coinalyze. Indicators like open interest, liquidations, etc
- Bybt: Open interest
- Bybt: Funding rates
- Bybt: Orderbook aggregator with depth
- TensorCharts: Interesting charts, still exploring this one
- TheBlock: Futures data
- Deribit: Options metrics
VPN
- NordVPN: Under $5 a month if you buy a longer-term plan, and if you use it every day it's worth it
For Developers
For any developers interested in learning Solidity (the programming language used to build smart contracts on Ethereum and some other blockchains), a highly-recommended tutorial to get you started is Crypto Zombies. It teaches you principles of smart contract creation, testing, and other aspects of decentralized application development by walking you through the process of creating a zombie-based NFT game. You can save your progress, so no need to do it all in one sitting.
CTFs are another great way to get a deeper knowledge of Solidity. These are challenges where vulnerable code is presented to you, and you have to figure out the vulnerability and exploit it. They're very fun once you get to the point that you can do them; Damn Vulnerable DeFi is a great one focused on flashloans (which you can learn more about in the DeFi Basics education article). As you get more advanced, there’s more CTFs and other things to learn from. Here’s another general supplemental resource.
I will note that Solidity is not the only language you can learn for smart contract development. Solana uses the Rust programming language, Starkware’s zk-rollups (see Layer 2s in DeFi Basics education) uses Cairo - their own, custom language - and there are many others out there as well. Solidity is just currently the most common for dApp development, and I view it as a good way to get started.
Books
- Cryptoassets by Chris Burniske and Jack Tatar
“I would personally recommend this to anyone that wants to learn about the world of crypto. It covers the basics and is an easy-read book, even if you don’t have a strong foundation of crypto knowledge. They do a fantastic job at explaining everything.”
- Block-Chain Revolution by Don & Alex Tapscott
“Gives a great foundational knowledge on blockchain technology. Blockchain is what drives crypto so understanding it will be very beneficial.”
Crypto Slang
1) FUD
Explanation: Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt
2) HODL
Explanation: It is a misspelling of "hold" but is used by people within crypto daily
3) Shill
Explanation: It basically means to advertise/explain a crypto project Used in Sentence: "Let me shill you this new project I was told about last night"
4) BTFD
Explanation: "Buy The Fucking Dip”
5) Whale
Explanation: A buyer/seller that owns an extremely large amount of the specific token 6) Bag
Explanation: Large quantity of a cryptocurrency
7) DYOR
Explanation: "Do your own research"
8) Moon
Explanation: Used when a token skyrockets in price. "To the moon!"
9) Weak/Diamond Hands
Explanation: Weak Hands is when you sell out of a project early. Paper Hands is a similar translation. | Diamond Hands is used when you are holding a project forever. You are NEVER selling.
10) Rekt
Explanation: This means "wrecked" but in crypto talk. It is used when someone loses a large sum of money in the crypto space.
11) Vaporware
Explanation: A cryptocurrency project that has never actually been developed
12) Pamp
Explanation: This means "pump" but in crypto talk.
13) DD
Explanation: Due Diligence
14) WAGMI and NGMI
Explanation: "We are gonna make it" & "Not gonna make it"
15) HFSP
Explanation: "Have fun staying poor"
16) Wen Token
Explanation: "When will the token become available?" This phrase is commonly used when a crypto project does not have a token live to the public yet
17) Devs
Explanation: This is short for "Developers," which are the the creators of a specific crypto project