Inviting someone to a popup city is an asymmetric act.
It might only take you a minute, but it could lead to the creation of a new project, company, or relationship. You will likely have more impact, directly or indirectly, than you initially imagine.
At Edge City, we've seen this happen many times. It's amazing what can result from a gathering of kind, curious, and high-agency people in a container focused on emergence. We’ve witnessed the birth of grand ideas, unlikely partnerships, and movements that ripple far beyond our gatherings.
And it all starts with an invite.
On this page, we want to chronicle examples of invites that had domino effects beyond their initial intention. If you have a story like this that is relevant to Edge City, we’d love to hear from you! Please email to info@edgecity.live with the subject “Serendipity”.
Oh, and if you want to make an invite, there's no time like the present. Share Edge City Lanna with someone today.
Note: this is v1 doc and we'll keep updating it over time.
Crypto academic connections
- Feb 2023: Justin Drake invites Mike Neuder to Zuzalu
- Oct 2023: Mike Neuder reaches out to Janine for a coffee at DevConnect; at EthDenver they discuss Mike looking at PhD programs and wanting to spend more time in research
- April 2024: Janine pulls in the Uniswap Foundation research team, who are game to support a crypto research track at Edge Esmeralda in partnership with Mike
- June 2024: The Crypto Academic Track at Edge Esmeralda is a huge hit. There are already two papers and feedback about it being “the most high-signal magic workshop I have ever attended” with many long-term relationships developed.
Progress in cryptography and ZK research
- Feb 2023: Althea and Brian encourage everyone at the 0xParc x PSE Vietnam ZK residency to join Zuzalu
- April 2023: Althea, Vivek and Rachel hack on Zustamps at Zuzalu, which leads to the creation of Cursive
- October 2023: The Cursive team run a ZK treasure hunt in Istanbul during ZuConnect in partnership with Timour. The idea is cemented
- Now: Cursive are creating incredible interactive zk-based experiences including residencies in Japan and big activations at events like Frontiers
Neurotech support
- Feb 2023: Justin Mares invites Mike Johnson to Zuzalu. Mike goes on to attend every experience organized by Edge City since and inspires a focus on Neurotech
- Feb 2023: At the same time, Vincent Weisser invites Juan Benet to Zuzalu, who also supports work in BCIs and Neurotech
- Oct 2023: Justin invites Milan Cvitokvic to ZuConnect; Juan speaks about BCIs
- June 2024: In a tag team effort, a large group of Neurotech researchers and companies join Edge Esmeralda with amazing new collaborations forming. Huge thank you to Protocol Labs (a leader in this nascent field), Inflection Grants, Foresight Institute, and Marley Xiong & Mackenzie Dion.
Inspiring other movements, Crecimiento
- March 2024: In the sauna at Edge City Denver, Juan Benet shares an idea: Argentina's time for crypto adoption has come. James Tunningley and Edge City agree to support
- May 2024: Protocol Labs, Edge City, and Architect Systems take a trip down to Buenos Aires to start conceptualizing a movement called Crecimiento with local partners
- Aug 2024: The popup city Aleph is created by the Crecimiento crew, hosted as a month-long popup to accelerate the movement with 2,000 engaged Argentines and government support
There are countless others that we've heard through the grapevine — we'll add them as we find out.
With love,
The Edge City team