Steady Progress | November 2021
This month was really focused on making consistent steady progress week over week. Here's what I did this November:
I was able to start collaborating with NeurotechX and Emotiv!
Started to learn Solidity w/ BuildSpace and CryptoZombies.
Consistently went to the gym.
PS: Sorry for the wait, I wanted to wait till after the pitch with NeurotechX and Emotiv to write my newsletter.
Theme of the Month: Do what makes sense.
Last month I said I would build an ML project, create 4+ pieces of content as well as talk to influential people for MiruDAO. Of those goals, only 1 of them made sense for what I wanted for myself in the future: talking to people about MiruDAO.
Creating content is great... but about what? Writing articles is great if you want to structure serendipity strategically. However, I had no idea why I wanted to write articles other than to get more eyes on MiruDAO. If I was successful with getting the word out about MiruDAO, then what? There's so much we have to do operations and strategy wise before we think about content right now.
That's why this month's theme is "Do what makes sense," because I totally wasn't at first. What made sense was to build a Proof-Of-Concept (POC) of MiruDAO's structure as well as get the neurotech community to rally behind us.
Actually doing what made sense was a lesson learned, and a lot of value added to the project. Being able to properly prioritize and revamp my timeblocking was a large boost.
MiruDAO Update
If you don't remember what MiruDAO is, it's essentially a project that I've been building for the past 2 months that's focused on open-sourcing and accelerating neurotech research. Read more about it in my October Newsletter and on mirudao.com
MiruDAO has been progressing really well over the past month. The extra time off of school really helped (I was able to co-op at MiruDAO which gave me a lot of time).
MiruDAO recently met with NeurotechX (NTX) where we received a lot of valuable feedback and support. Afterwards, the co-founder of NTX Services, Adam Sefler, expressed that he really loved the project and wanted to consult us early on in the project to help us patch some holes in our pipeline and thoroughly conceptualize MiruDAO. Super exciting things coming in the future!
Soon we want to build a POC version of MiruDAO to fund a open-source dataset that anyone in the DAO can access. We chose this path because legality and distribution around datasets is much easier, and (we believe) the neurotech industry will benefit much more from datasets rather than open IP.
While we are building this proof of concept, we would also like to get the neurotech community to rally behind us. We've decided that in order to do that, we will sponsor students with BCIs. This is done to lower the barrier of entry for new neurotech enthusiasts to build in the space.
This is where Emotiv comes in. In the same week, MiruDAO met with Emotiv, where I presented to Emotiv's Head of Customer Care about sponsoring students with BCIs in return for publicity, high quality content, and exposure. We're currently finalizing the partnership with Emotiv, but big things are coming on that front as well!
Personal Update
I'm not sure if you've noticed, but in this newsletter there aren't many tweets like the last one. That's mainly because I haven't tweeted at all in the past month. I wanted to see the difference between tweeting everyday, and never tweeting.
Turns out, tweeting everyday is way better for fast results, but for deep focus tweeting everyday doesn't make sense. However, tweeting weekly does. In the future (this month, and probably January since this newsletter is late) I'll be regularly posting on Twitter either weekly, or every other day.
I feel like that does wonders for accountability and transparency. It also helps for writing down my thoughts which I find enormously helps me process life better.
Also, I've been going to the gym more consistently! As of writing, I haven't missed a single day in the past 2 weeks and I'm so proud of myself. I'm starting to see actual progress and it feels great.
Skill of the Month: Machine Learning + Web3
On the side, when I had time, I learned more about machine learning (ML) and web3. I have a lot of fun when I'm diving into new topics I don't know about.
Starting from square one honestly isn't that bad. Learning from scratch feels super rewarding once you start to build some knowledge. There's honestly nothing like the feeling that you get when you understand a difficult topic after hours of research and studying.
This month I focused on learning the math behind neural networks, specifically backpropagation and gradient descent (both of which are starting to make more sense thanks to Sentdex, and 3B1B).
As well as learning about Solidity, and key concepts in Ethereum + web3 (ZK Rollups, L2, transactions, writing smart contracts, etc).
I think that it's probably better to focus on a single topic for now, and save the other topic for fun on Thursday nights when I'm bored of everything else. For now, I want to focus on web3, and I'll save ML for those nights where I need a break from everything else.
Live a life with integrity so you can enjoy it twice.
After watching multiple documentaries and hearing stories about super successful founders, I realize that a lot of them are super... shitty.
Don't get me wrong a lot of these people earned their success respectfully, but there are so many successful people who essentially stole and did shitty things to get power.
I'm not saying that I'll forgo my integrity, but I think that this idea is still something to remember. Integrity is a core value to me, and I doubt I'd give that up since I live with integrity by default. However, in 5 years, who knows what life will throw at me.
What's Happening December?
Hopefully we have a lot to show for MiruDAO's progress in a month as well as my knowledge of web3 and ML:
Build the POC Marketplace for MiruDAO
Build a web3 app using Solidity
Fully understand the calculus behind Backpropagation (explain it to a 6th grader)
I'll see you in December! If you want more frequent updates, follow me on Twitter!