Richard Zhang on the Power and Potential of Blockchain: An Insider's Perspective

"Behind the Startup" is a series that dives into the lives of the entrepreneurs and visionaries shaping the future of the technology industry. In this episode, we have Richard Zhang, an undergraduate student at the University of Southern California and the President of Blockchain@USC.

Behind the Startup: A Conversation with Richard Zhang, President of Blockchain@USC

Ishan Pandey: Hi Richard Zhang, welcome to our series “Behind the Startup.” Please tell us about yourself and why you're interested in Blockchain Technology.

Richard Zhang: Hi Ishan, I’m currently an undergraduate student at the University of Southern California. I first came across blockchain, Bitcoin to start, around 2016 when I was in high school through some books and articles. I was intrigued by the technology’s ability to provide more access and equal opportunities around the world by allowing more people to enter a global economy with fewer barriers.

Over time, I studied the power and potential of smart contracts and different applications built on top of blockchain technology. Blockchain’s ability to empower equality and opportunity for all still drives me as I follow and try to contribute to the industry today.

During my undergraduate career, I worked at Dragonfly, a crypto-native fund, as an intern on the investment team, evaluating and connecting with exciting blockchain startups, with an emphasis on crypto access in emerging markets, payment infrastructure, decentralized ownership, and gaming. At USC, I’m the President of Blockchain@USC, the leading university blockchain organization in Southern California.

Ishan Pandey: What is the main idea behind the Blockchain Club at the University of Southern California, Blockchain@USC?

Richard Zhang: Blockchain@USC is a non-profit student organization focused on empowering both crypto-native and crypto-curious people in and beyond the university. Founded in 2018, we host speaker events, publish research articles, teach our own blockchain curriculum, participate in on-chain governance, partner with other organizations and companies, create hiring pipelines, maintain professional network databases, and more. Some previous events that we have hosted include the VanEck Southern California Blockchain Conference; individual speaker and community events with Spencer Noon at Variant Fund, Jesse Powell at Kraken, staff at Chainlink, Dragonfly, Ava Labs, Shima Capital, and more; and bi-weekly whitepaper circles.

Ishan Pandey: Tell us about VanEck Southern California Blockchain Conference and how it is going to help the Web3 industry.

Richard Zhang: The VanEck Southern California Blockchain Conference — or “SCBC” for short — was one of the largest student-run blockchain conferences in the country. The conference happened on November 10th and 11th 2022 and featured keynotes and panels featuring some leading contributors to the industry. Guest speakers included Cathie Wood at Ark Invest, Sam Kazemian at Frax Finance, David Marcus at Lightspark, Jeffrey Amico at a16z Crypto, Zack Skelly at Dragonfly, Andrew Wilson at Makers Fund, and more. The conference was entirely in person, and there were more than 1500 attendees in the audience.

We also invited other university organizations whom we hold great relations with, like Blockchain at Berkeley, Blockchain at UCLA, Stanford Blockchain Club, Cornell Blockchain, and Claremont Blockchain Club. Cornell Blockchain flew some members all the way to Los Angeles from Ithaca, while Blockchain at Berkeley sent more than 20 members from the Bay Area.

During the conference, we tried to cover a broad range of topics, from the ecosystem of multichain development to decentralized finance, early-stage investing, university blockchain communities, and more. We aim to make this conference an annual event, and the inaugural conference was a great start. In fact, many students have told me that they decided to enroll in the innovative “Blockchain” minor at USC after attending SCBC, a great sign of Blockchain@USC’s impact.

Ishan Pandey: Due to the FTX, Celsius, and Voyage debacle, the value of cryptocurrencies has dropped by a massive amount. What needs to be done to rebuild people's trust and give a boost to web3 technology?

Richard Zhang: It’s very unfortunate to see many people at the harm of malpractice, carelessness, and malefaction. My heart goes out to all victims affected by this chain of events. I think these happenings have once again proven the importance of decentralization and trustless infrastructure and protocols. Many breakages occur at the point of trust in one or a few self-governed parties under little supervision. In order for people to rebuild trust, the industry needs to focus on improving and implementing actual decentralized blockchain technologies.

Open-source code is reviewable, but oftentimes people’s actions are not. I do hope and try to remind people to not lose faith in decentralized decision-making and action execution. This is not to say that the world of decentralization is perfect today, either. There are still ample hacks and points of vulnerability that need to be fixed, but I’m more optimistic on this front because there are existing and potential check-and-balance systems at play. Builders should build for the love and benefit of the technology, and not merely for quick monetary gains with little regard for risk management.

Ishan Pandey: Governments around the world are obviously worried that cryptocurrencies will have a widespread impact on the economy and will be misused for unlawful activities. According to you, should DeFi be subject to the law of the land?

Richard Zhang: DeFi has some inherent advantages that trump traditional finance, like inherent transparency and accessibility. It’s quite obvious that TradFi has failed certain countries and marginalized groups. As I mentioned earlier, I became interested in blockchain technology because of its ability to better access and equality, and I do vouch for governments to give room for these benefits to remain and grow.

However, this is not to say that builders and users should disregard or disdain regulations. After all, some countries do introduce regulations with protecting people as the primary goal. I think it’s especially important to accept regulations that govern centralized touchpoints in the industry, such as on-and-off ramps, centralized market makers, and custodians.

Ishan Pandey: What new trends will the blockchain industry witness in the near future?

Richard Zhiang: It’s obviously impossible to predict with perfect precision what’s going to happen, especially in such a fast-moving and unpredictable industry, but I can provide some thoughts on what might happen. Due to recent debacles, crypto users and regulators will require or demand proof of reserves from various types of entities. This will hopefully move us closer to the responsible handling of user deposits and funds. On the infrastructure side, we will see rollups, particularly zero-knowledge-based, gain more traction and launch more aggressively. Diving deeper into L1/L2s, I hold an opinion that not everyone shares: there’s still room for new infrastructure to enter.

We have seen the introduction of MOVE-based chains, but there are still plenty of experiments left unexplored. For instance, people have been intrigued by the idea of “app chains”, and Cosmos currently seems to be a popular destination. But is there room for another chain more specialized for app chain deployment? Perhaps, or at least I’m not counting this possibility out yet. There are more experiments and theses in the infrastructure space like this one, and I’m going to keep an open mind. I’m also excited to see new mechanisms for digital ownership beyond the current profile picture and digital art models.

Now that more people have gotten a taste of on-chain ownership, we may be ready to take on more diverse assets. I’m not sure which exact assets will be next, but most likely it will be ones that incur fewer legal hurdles, so we may still wait a bit before something like decentralized real estate ownership gains significant traction and acceptance. I’ll certainly continue tracking the industry closely and fine-tuning my visions and these as we go along. If anyone has differing thoughts or wants to discuss more, I’m always happy to exchange ideas.

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