I hope my life's work will be to make or contribute to a meaningful rise in the global floor and median quality of life. I believe the best way to do this is for the world to build social institutions on top of transparent, efficient, tamper proof ledgers that reduce bureaucracy, exploitation, and waste. I believe the second best way to do this is to build up access to finance, passive income, and financial literacy for as many people as possible. That's why I'm in software. That's why I'm in crypto. That's why I'm on Cardano. And that's why I've built up Sundae Labs as the software company it is. Every day, and nearly everything I do, is geared towards this. It's why my salary is substantially lower than I could make literally anywhere else, lower than the job I left, and exactly the median salary of what my team makes. It's why my net worth (excluding the completely illiquid value of my equity in Sundae Labs) has been flat or slightly declining since I started this journey. It's why I've largely soldiered through death threats and some of the most toxic hateful bile you can imagine. But spending time on Twitter, where I've often enjoyed connecting with an audience, has become a threat to that mission. It's clear that I'm not going to solve the problems I see in the world through Twitter discourse. For a long time I thought it might help: engage in good faith to share my perspectives, break down what I know so others can understand in the hopes that it contributes to their ability to navigate the technological changes that are coming, and serve as the best example I can for effective and thoughtful discourse. But instead, especially lately, it has simply become a drain on my energy and motivation. Even if I engage less, just *reading* the way we treat each other is demoralizing. Even people who I believe have good intentions can't help but contribute to a storm of negativity that is fighting to sweep us out to sea. There is a mob that is so frustrated by the state of the world and the very problems me and other builders are trying to solve that they can't help but funnel that discontent into a... miasma, directed at anything and everything around them. Somehow posts that are "just asking questions" and would, in any other environment be totally welcome, end up as weapons picked up off the bloody ground to be hurled in anger at an unintended target. Somehow close friends grow so embittered with each other they'd rather tear the thing they both believed in in half to spite the other. Somehow legitimate mistakes immediately get brandished as fraud because scorched earth total-war tactics to destroy someone we dislike become the only thing that can hold our attention, the only thing we can think to do in our ineffectiveness against a cruel and difficult world. Somehow some of the kindest and most like-minded builders have their patience ground to dust until they reach their breaking point and they lash out in ways that don't reflect who they are. We're all so fucking tense, or sick to our stomach, or caught up in the sound of our own voice, that it's impossible for us to take a beat and sort out a misunderstanding in DMs before making some public fucking tabloid accusation or insult on the timeline. And again, I don't think (would like to believe, as a fundamentally optimistic person) that most of this is in bad faith. But the medium leaves no other outcome for us. So, for me, Twitter is no longer just a waste of time, it's an active threat to my goals. It's a long drag on a cigarette taken between work calls that no longer even brings me comfort, it's just the thing I do, and it's slowly giving us all cancer. It saps my energy, ruins my mood, and makes me, on darker days, doubt whether any of this is even worth it, let alone possible. I don't want my life's work to amount to being unhappy and resentful of the people I'm trying to help (yes, even if you and I have disagreements, even if we hate each other, I want better for you too). So, I will be trying the nicotine patches yet again. Since there's no "Non Smoking" section of Twitter, I will be dramatically reducing the time I spend on here, and funneling that energy into other, more productive channels. I hope to write more for my blog, 314pool.com. Perhaps I'll get back into live-streaming some of my work on Twitch. If you want to stay in touch and we're not connected elsewhere, the best way is by email. It's just my first name at sundae.fi. (Yes, I know this isn't an airport, and I don't have to announce my departure. I considered just disappearing, as this feels a little bit melodramatic. But in the end, I wanted people to know why I've gone quiet, and how to reach me.) I hope I'm not alone in noticing this trend, especially within our community. If any of this resonates with you, it might be worth looking at what the timeline is accomplishing (or not) for you. And don't worry. Recent weeks have been harder than most, as I'm sure you've all seen on the timeline, but I'm made of tougher stuff. I'll still be here and building, and you'll still see the impact of the work that my team and I do (and boy do they have some exciting things for you soon). I just really really don't think Twitter is the right place for me to fix the problems I want to fix.