HOW TO BECOME A FREELANCE WEB 3 DEVELOPER ?
AUGUST 14th 2022
In web 3, decentralization and trust are guaranteed by lines of code. At the heart of this ecosystem, developers are highly sought after to code Dapps and smart contracts. Let's discover together the job of web3 developer.
This article is taken from the FLEET podcast interviewing Jonathan Baudoin, a web 3 developer.
SUMMARY
What is a web 3 developer?
Why specialize in web 3 development?
What is the impact of web 3 in your freelancer life ?
What training do you need to become a web 3 developer ?
Where to start as a web 3 developer ?
How easy is it to get help from other developers?
How do you ensure the security of your customers as a web 3 developer ?
How do I find my first assignments as a web 3 developer?
What are the "red flags" in a mission proposal ?
Which training/conversion path if to become a web 3 developer ?
What is your opinion about NoCode/LowCode in web 3 ?
What is a web3 developer ?
A web 3 developer is a developer who will work on Blockchain and web 3 projects. He is not so different from a web 2 developer and does not necessarily need to interact with a Blockchain:
Thanks to the arrival of web3 APIs (programs to retrieve data without going to the source to read it), developers can read and write into the Blockchain without interacting with it directly. Today, 100% of web 2 developers have or will work with APIs. It's a classic development tool. So it's not harder to code for a web3 project than in the traditional world.
Developers also interact with SDKs (a software development kit) seamlessly.
Similarly, the blockchain is just a network. We will always need a website to interact with.
So a developer can work on a blockchain project without specific web3 developping skills. It's a relatively easy way in, if of course, you know how to code !
Why specialize in web 3 development?
I always liked to learn new things. It was an opportunity to discover a new universe, to dig into the technical side to understand how it all works.
Essentially, web 3 has given me a lot of freedom. This ecosystem gives the cards back to everyone. I like the web3 philosophy, the system is open and accessible to all, without distinction.
What HAS BEEN the impact of web 3 in your freelance life?
Today we are witnessing a shortage of developers, whether in web 2 or web 3. I would say that one of the major advantages of being a web3 developer is that the ecosystem is much more open worldwide than web2 in full remote.
From anywhere in the world, you can easily work with the US, Asia, Europe. It's still a bit difficult with more traditional web 2 companies. In web 3, it's more common to have international clients.
As freelancers, web 3 developers are very well paid. With a good portfolio, the price per day can be very high.
With crypto payments, you also have the ability to use leverage (up and down).
Getting paid for projects is very easy and fast. Transactions are simplified and instantaneous. This is a great opportunity for freelancers. Plus, everything is traceable.
Let's say a web2 company initiates a wire transfer to pay me on a Friday. The money would only be in my account on Tuesday, or even the Wednesday after. With web 3 and cryptos, a payment only takes a few minutes.
The bonus: as a web 3 dev, we have the possibility to write ourselves a smart contract to get paid. The client pays the project forward and locks it directly in the smart contract: we can choose to release the payment at a certain date or under certain conditions. So we are sure to avoid any problem getting paid on time !
Which training to become a web3 developer?
In my opinion you need to master 2 languages to be a good web3 dev:
Python and Javascript.
To train afterwards, I recommend to all developers the YouTube channel of Ben BK. He makes tutorials on Solidity for the Ethereum Blockchain, how to create a site to mint his NFT etc... It's very good resource to start.
For my part, I'm 37 years old and I've been developing in PHP for 20 years, I was a symfony back-end developer. And then one day with a friend we decided to start. I trained myself little by little to master javascript. With each new project coming my way, I quickly became more and more skilled.
Where to start as a web 3 developer ?
First of all, I advise you to create your own project to understand how it works. It's not rocket science, but it takes time: you have to go through it.
Keep it simple and start with what you know. For example, you don't need to start with javascript if you don't know the language.
Then, work and train yourself. Youtube tutorials and developer communities will be your best friends (NDLR: we like Cryptozombies to learn Solidity in a fun way !)
On my side, I started with a project on BSC with the tools I knew. It was only afterwards that I switched to Ethereum and discovered all the tools I use today.
Is it easy to get help from other developers?
Generally speaking, developers are friendly. Many provide good content for free and will take the time to answer your questions.
20 years ago, finding resources to make sites was complicated. Today, it has never been easier to become a developer !
How can you guarantee the security of your clients as a web 3 developer?
Blockchain's strength is also its weakness. Once a smart-contract is mined on the network, it cannot be modified. There are a lot of examples of NFT projects where money is blocked forever because of a bug. We all remember this project where 34 million dollars in Ether were blocked because the devs let a bug drag on...
This is the big difference with web 2. If we notice a bug on a website, it is easy to correct. In web 3 and especially on a smart-contract, a bug is impossible to recover. This is the inalienability of the Blockchain.
I invite the devs who are starting out to look at the various security flaws that exist. This is very important.
There are libraries of smart-contracts ready to use at OpenZeppelin for example, the community of coders in solidity audits the smart-contracts to make them safe (and free to access!).
Advice : always pay someone to audit your smart-contract. It is necessary to have an external opinion to avoid mistakes because they can be very expensive.
Then there are the good development practices to respect, even if it is not always the case. We had a recent example with Yuga Labs, the company behind the famous Bored Apes Yacht Club. It is the biggest collection of NFT today valued at 5 billion dollars. They released their latest collection without optimizing gas costs: each mint cost between 1 and 3 ETH in gas fees, which is unthinkable today.
web 3 DEVELOPERS: How to find your first GIGS?
With the shortage of developers, it is not very complicated.
With LinkedIn for example, you just need to have "solidity developer" in your title to quickly get contacted with gig offers.
I have been offered many jobs. But I have to refuse because I work on my own projects. I wanted to become my own boss and discover entrepreneurship.
What are the "red flags" in a GIG OFFER ?
For me personally, a client wearing a suit and tie. That doesn't represent the web 3 world at all. Successful people in this environment wear hoodies and have tattoos everywhere! (laugh).
I don't want to work within a strict framework anymore. If the person doesn't understand anything about the ecosystem, I'm not interested in taking that gig. It's a real problem we have today, most people and companies don't understand anything about what we do which makes it complicated when discussing terms.
That's why the FLEET collective is so interesting. By educating web 2 freelancers on web 3, you participate in the training and evangelization of the general public on the ecosystem, while building bridges between freelancers and companies joining that space.
What is the training/conversion path if you want to become a web3 developer ?
I think it is very possible to transition to a web 3 developer role, even if you were doing something else in the past.
If you are really motivated whether you are 20 or 60 years old, you can totally do it. It takes a few hours a day. In 6 months of staying committed, you will have the basics to get started.
Then of course, it will take longer to be able to create an Opensea competitor ! But it is possible to quickly get into real projects and a team to learn even more.
If web 3 was the internet, we'd currently be in its late 1990s stage of development. So if you start now, you will be very early! My advice: go for it, it's all up for grabs. If you are interested in code (and Blockchain) you won't regret it!
Your opinion of No Code / Low Code in web3?
Today, you can launch NFT collections without knowing how to code.
Solution 1 : you upload your images on Opensea but the marketplace gets a big % of all your sales.
Solution 2 : you use a smart-contract. You have to code it, and build a website that allows you to buy NFT. So there is a little knowledge to have.
Solution 3/ there are now all-in-one solutions that will generate the NFTs, the smart-contract and the website to mint. So you can start a collection in No Code, spending very little money (NDLR: have a look at Thirdweb, Unlock Protocol, Bueno…)
My last tips :
Get started
Have fun
Thanks to Jonathan Baudoin for answering our questions!