This blog post was written by community members bug and Rick Sazarov
Frogs! Now that DefiPulse has integrated Linkswap, lets take a moment to study how that happened. In DeFi it’s essential for projects to get integrated/connected widely. Getting onto these sites might seem like a given, but behind every integration there are people making it happen.
In addition to DefiPulse, Linkswap has connected with: CoinGecko, CoinMarketCap, Cryptofees, DeBank, Nomics, DuneAnalytics, Zapper, DefiYield.info, DefiLlama... and many others!
For Linkswap, the bulk of the work of connecting has been done by community frogs. Two frogs especially have been contributing towards getting Linkswap connected. Just regular frogs who wanted to help.
This is not a giga moon announcement, just some lore about how community members can join a DeFi project to start contributing.
Quest: Connecting Linkswap to the DeFi scene
Back in the fall of last year, I, bug, was a baby coiner looking for pumps around the cryptosphere. Destiny lead me into Linkswap’s telegram chat, and I asked: ”wen linkswap?”. After getting to know the project, chatting on Discord and making some waffle memes, I was getting comfortable in the community. The topic of the Quest For Connections came up, and it was then that the legendary rising DeFi-star senator Morty297 asked me if I’d be up for the quest? I didn’t have any idea what I was getting into, but a respected community member had just asked me if I’d be willing to contribute – Yes! I’ll do my best! Thank you for this opportunity, senpai!
One OG marine provided the initial list of 4 quest items; 4 ranking sites and wallet projects we should contact for integrations. A little googling (keywords: ”defi dashboard”, ”defi ranking list”, ”defi wallet”) extended the list to 8 items. The most critical integrations (CMC, GC) were managed by Linkswap’s more experienced community members, while I was to handle the rest.
The items were all a bit different. Some had FAQ-sites explaining how to apply for an integration, with easy to fill forms. Some could be contacted in their Telegram and Discrod chats. Some required Linkswap developers to build smart contract adapters for integrations.
And so emails were sent, integration application forms filled and submitted, admins DM’d. While I was waiting for replies from the projects (and re-sending emails to ask ”wen??”), members in our community were suggesting other projects to contact for integrations. All the suggestions were added in the to-do list for the Connections Quest. Thanks to everyone making those suggestions btw!
Now there’s been contact with 40+ projects about listings and integrations. Every admin from these projects has been friendly and helpful. The experience has opened my eyes about how crypto is made of people, not just smart contracts; people unified by a shared excitement about the technology. There’s no better opportunity for self-realization today than the planetary revolution of Decentralized Finance, and nowhere are the doors as open for participation than in grass-roots level community projects.
At Linkswap many contributors have been bootstrapping from the ground up, starting as level 0 tadpoles, and through storm and fire in the last few months have evolved into level 99 battle toads. One such shining star of a developing frog has been Rick Sazarov, who has been building the smart contract adapters for Linkswap’s multiple connections and integrations, as well as picking up my slack with the comms related to the quest.
Rick Sazarov’s story, written by Rick Sazarov
DeFi summer 2020, caught up in all the crazy yield farming APYs, Uniswap gems, Chef Nomi drama and rise of NFTs like a rabbit (or banteg, if you will) in headlights. What a blur it was! My origin story and transformation from tadpole to frog began shortly after, lured in by the intrigue of the Chainlink community and #4IR.
Yearn was on my radar pretty early on, just before its epic run from $3-43k, but being a poor student Linklet I daren’t risk my precious linkies... that is, until YF Link. I took a gamble and it paid off, in so many ways! I managed to make it out of farming mostly unscathed, with a little $YFL back in return – little did I know about the incredible initiative of this community in innovating next-generation products and setting the precedent for a true decentralised financial ecosystem that would soon follow.
Fast forward, hodling strong through the meteoric rise up to $2.2k and then all the way back down to $300 (multiple times - cope), I gradually became interested in the wonders of governance and the true vision of Linkswap thanks to a variety of community initiatives. I come from a background of physics but have always felt a strong affinity to the software engineering world. My first job in the field had proved particularly challenging, however I remained resilient and started digging into the Linkswap contracts to help answer some community questions. Before long, the skills I had started cultivating the previous year now meant I was well positioned to actually contribute to the Linkswap ecosystem!
I started with simple requests to harmonise branding across our sites which gradually developed into fully fledged contributions, notably including a fix to our wallet connectors and the notorious issue in displaying CEL rewards due to it being a 4-decimal token. It was around this time that I noticed bug and Morty working hard on getting integrations moving, which certainly seemed to be a mammoth task, and realized that I could in fact (with a little help from our amazing developers and partner teams) take on some of the load!
Since then, I haven’t looked back. I remain committed to ensuring the success of this community in being a hub for all things DeFi and equally as amazed by the strength we have managed to foster. Not convinced? Just take a look at our completely community-driven integration of $renDOGE on Linkswap (thanks Linkie & co) which I had the pleasure of helping coordinate and took less than 14 hours from inception to delivery!! Wow.
Who knows what we’ll come up with next? I can however assure you that it will be just as exciting! On the integration front, keep an eye out for news on Crypto Fees, Zerion and InstaDapp, all of which I am currently working on now. OK;LG.
Special thanks to Linkie Link, Tec, Yolau, Leeren, 6PathSage, Theoretical Trading, Behemoth for supporting my foray into blockchain/dapp development and Roy, Cole, Palis, Morty, Bug, Zman, inPlanB, Mintle and all the other legends (you know who you are) I’ve been working with on a daily basis who have helped make me feel at home in this awesome community.
P.S. You can keep up with me and other developments on Twitter and GitHub. The Rick Sazarov pseudonym is a fun one which (aside from being a nod to our supreme leader SN = SN) I will continue to go by despite having successfully served its initial purpose of giving me the confidence to participate in this colourful world that is DeFi; one in which I hope to continue working for a very long time!
Also feel free to donate to us community members through the addresses listed on Inartin’s donation wall.
Invitation: you too can contribute to the community
Read the blog posts, discord chats, ask questions, learn the names and avatars of other community members. Find in your heart the confidence to start contributing. You too can become an active community member. You have infinite potential, pls share some of that beauty within yourself with the frogging communities of DeFi & Linkswap :3
Let's build it!
#LinkswapYourLinktoDeFi
Homepage:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/YFLinkio
Discord: https://discord.com/invite/nQWEx88
Blog: https://blog.yflink.io/
Telegram: https://t.me/YFLinkGroup
Facebook: https://fb.com/groups/yflink
Governance forum: https://gov.yflink.io/
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I’m bug, and when I’m not off getting fried between logics circuits, I get waaay in over my head in the crazy world of DeFi.
DISCLAIMER: This article does not reflect a shared vision of Linkswap team members, developers, or moderators. Contributing as a community member in a community project can be weird like that – you can have a platform to type your thoughts and still not represent the platform at large.