Hey everyone, Bit here. Welcome to my first post on this odd place called Mirror.
My background
I play games and mess with computers. If you want to see my projects, they’re on GitHub. My personal profile is @jaherron and my org is @littlebitstudios. If you find my Twitter (or other social media) profile, please don’t talk about me being here. Speaking of that…
My friends and Web3
Web3 is the wild west, and my friends really don’t like it. I made a Twitter poll asking people if crypto or NFTs were the problem, and a lot of my friends are saying it’s both.
For me personally, I kind of have hard feelings about NFTs. I don’t know why anyone would want to spend outrageous amounts of money on a random image, but I might try it if some cool free mints appear. I’ll be talking about how Reddit disguised NFTs later.
Learning about Web3
Since I’m speaking on a crypto-native network, I want to talk about some stuff I’ve discovered about the chain and Web3.
It’s easy to get started, just make a wallet. All you need is an app like Rainbow (rainbow.xyz). If you’re a Reddit user, you might have a wallet already.
Connecting your wallet is basically Web3’s “Sign in with Google.” Just like OAuth sign-in, such as Sign in with Google, signing into Web3 apps is as simple as clicking a few buttons. And you get the same benefit of having one account for everything.
Finding some apps you like might be easy. My entry into Web3 was through an app called Yup (yup.io), which is an app for posting across multiple social networks at once. I have it connected to Twitter and Bluesky right now, mostly since their Meta Threads integration is broken. Sadly they don’t work with ActivityPub/Mastodon/Fediverse. Also consider the website you’re seeing right now (Mirror). It’s a really nice-looking blogging app.
Adding devices to your wallet is also simple. Creating a wallet gives you a set of 12 words that’s like a password. Keep this secret phrase safe. To use your wallet on a new device, simply use your secret phrase to import your wallet.
About Reddit…
You’ve probably heard of Reddit. It’s a massive platform full of forums called subreddits, such as r/softwaregore, r/macOS, or r/homeassistant.
Reddit introduced a feature called Collectible Avatars in October 2022. These “Collectible Avatars” are actually NFTs in disguise, and they’re stored in an Ethereum wallet that Reddit calls the Vault.
I ended up with 2 free Reddit NFTs, Button Mashers (promotion by Reddit) and The Champs (Super Bowl partnership). I don’t have as much hard feelings about Reddit’s NFTs since you can actually use them. They honestly made NFTs feel like any other in-app purchase, but you are able to rest assured that your Collectible Avatars are safe on the chain. I will probably never buy a Reddit NFT, but they might do more free drops in the future :>
Connect to Web3 using a Reddit Vault
If you are wanting to enter into Web3 and you’re a Reddit user, open the Reddit mobile app and tap your profile picture followed by Vault. If you can see Collectible Avatars or you otherwise have a Vault already, tap the gear icon followed by Recovery Phrase. This will show you one of those 12-word phrases I mentioned earlier. Copy that and download Rainbow (or another Ethereum wallet app), and paste it where the option to import a wallet is. You should see your Reddit Avatars in there as NFTs.
In conclusion
You probably won’t see me much here because of my friends’ dislike for Web3. Maybe if Web3 continues to proliferate, maybe some of my friends will have a change of mind. But for now, I don’t want to get blocked by everyone. Please don’t talk about my presence here on Twitter, Bluesky, Mastodon, or anywhere else. I may end up being blocked by a lot of my friends.
Want to see more about me? Visit my website, https://littlebitstudios.com.