Last week I went to a show for Jack Harlow at the Brooklyn Paramount. It wasn’t very well marketed, and most people I know who love music weren’t even aware that he was in town. But from the moment I heard he was going to be in New York, part of me knew I needed to make it to the show.

For those of you who know me at all, you’ll know that I’m a massive hip hop fan. And not only a fan, but someone who spent years as both a journalist and working in the industry. Even though these days I’m not directly working in the music industry anymore, the one thing I’m always doing is looking out for the next hip hop acts that I can get excited about.

One of the artists I’ve been most excited about since I was introduced to him back in 2018 was Jack Harlow. It was clear to me even back then that he had all the talent in the world. So when his breakthrough hit record “What’s Poppin” came out in 2020, I was all over it. I remember playing it in a Clubhouse music room I used to host with a friend on Friday nights back during Covid lockdowns. And that’s what made finally going to his show at the Brooklyn Paramount that much more meaningful.

Every album he dropped after that was one I was super excited about, up until recently when he released a neo soul album called Monica. And it’s not that I don’t like neo soul, but more that I’d watched him build momentum over the years in a way that made it feel like he could make hits on demand. Sort of like… Drake, which is a comparison I’ve made many times when it comes to who I think has the ability to take the throne of hip hop now that artists like Drake are moving into their 40s. So this is a bit about the journey I’ve had as a Jack Harlow fan over the past few years.

His debut studio album That’s What They All Say in 2020 was filled with amazing records and great features in a way that felt like the start of an incredible career. Then when he dropped Come Home The Kids Miss You in 2022, it felt like his time to take that throne was imminent. Especially considering his track with Drake on “Churchill Downs,” which might honestly be my favorite Drake feature to date, and that’s saying something. It always felt to me like the reason Drake went so crazy on that record was because he needed to do what Jay-Z had done to him over the years: a seemingly hazing session where the established artist lets the up-and-coming talent know who the boss is. But in a playful way.

As a whole, 2022 was an amazing year for him. I remember missing a show he did at Barclays in October 2022 because I had work travel, so I was happy to finally make it to the show he did last night.

It felt like Jack Harlow was honestly on top of the world. Everywhere you looked, he was there. And then just like that, in 2023 he dropped a project called Jackman, where multiple songs gave off the impression that he wasn’t taking well to the fame he’d been working so hard for all those years.

There were songs about insecurity, burnout, the difficulties of adjusting to fame, how his relationships had changed, and so on. There weren’t any playful records that were meant to be hits like “Dua Lipa” and “First Class,” the ones we’d gotten so accustomed to hearing on his projects in recent years. And it felt intentional. Even the album cover was a picture of him shirtless in what seemed like a random alleyway, as opposed to the more clean-cut and well-groomed images he’d been using for everything else that had felt so PR coded.

Everything about the album came off as a rejection of expectations. You see, there had been a lot of conversation around the idea that he wasn’t a real rapper. Similar to the kind of nonsense that Drake has had to deal with for years, despite the fact that anyone with ears can tell you Drake is one of the best songwriters ever. It’s just that he also happens to know how to write hits. And the person who seemed most capable of taking the Drake crown was now facing that same sentiment online, with people saying he was just a pop artist. So he released this project full of immaculate rapping to show those people that he was exactly who he believed he was, and that he could turn that side of himself on whenever he wanted. And then, just like that, he sort of disappeared.

Instead of leaning into the newfound fame and everything he could do with it, he seemed to take a step back. He still released tracks here and there, all of which I enjoyed, but it felt like he was taking a backseat instead of deciding to go full throttle. And for the life of me, I simply couldn’t figure out why, to the point that it was almost upsetting at times. Because it felt like all of this amazing talent was being squandered.

I’d go back and listen to Jackman all the time, as I still do now, listening to tracks like “Ambitious,” “Is That Ight?,” “Denver,” “Blame On Me,” and “Questions,” wondering if maybe that level of fame just wasn’t something he could handle.

I’ve seen it from having worked in the music industry for years. While it’s not something you often hear about or even think about, there are a ton of people who have the talent needed to become the megastars we know. The Taylor Swift and Drake types aren’t nearly as far ahead in talent as they are in mental fortitude. You don’t hear those stories publicly, but behind closed doors you constantly hear about the people who just couldn’t handle it and broke along the way. But I refused to admit that could be happening to Jack Harlow, an artist I’d put so much stock into for so many years.

Fast forward to earlier this year when he announced he was dropping Monica. I was so excited until I started hearing what he was doing with it, which was not the rap album I’d been hoping for. Instead, it was this strange rendition of something that I had zero desire to listen to, and in the first music video he put out for it he was wearing this super funny hat that I just couldn’t make any sense of.

Then the album came out, and after giving it one listen, I was honestly upset. Maybe Jack really couldn’t handle the fame, and maybe this was how it was all going to end? The entire internet was seemingly mocking him, and friends of mine who knew I was a big Jack Harlow fan were messaging me asking what in the world had happened to the guy I’d spent years saying was the next wonder kid of hip hop.

I was honestly upset enough that when I heard he was going on tour, initially I had no desire to actually go to the show, even if I did quickly snap out of it. All I could think was that I was going to sit through a concert built around an album I’d listened to once and never even wanted to revisit. But then I started to ask myself if I was really being fair.

The biggest question I had to ask myself was this: who am I to project my definition of success onto an artist like that? That’s entirely unfair.

Then I started asking myself why an artist wouldn’t be allowed to experiment if they wanted to. After all, isn’t that exactly what Drake has done multiple times throughout his career, and something that has ultimately contributed to the massive success he has today? Just think back to recently when he dropped Honestly, Nevermind and all people wanted to do was criticize him for it. Who’s to say that this wasn’t Jack Harlow’s version of the same kind of album?

Isn’t what we’re supposed to do just appreciate an artist for who they are instead of who we want them to be? Isn’t it wrong to judge an artist based on the music we wish they would put out rather than the music they actually wanted to release? And bit by bit, the anger subsided and turned into empathy.

Even if Jack did take a backseat from becoming the artist I wanted him to be, nothing says he doesn’t still have everything needed to become that artist. And really, I imagine he doesn’t want to be known as the second Drake as much as he wants to be known as the first Jack Harlow. Just thinking about the kind of pressure it must create to spend your career in the shadow of someone like Drake, constantly being measured against him and people’s expectations of what you should become, sounds exhausting. And maybe that was simply never what he wanted.

Then I started to peel things back a bit further. Instead of being upset about that silly hat he was wearing in the music video for “Trade Places,” I started thinking that maybe this was actually the same thing Jack Harlow has always known how to do so well. He’s an internet-native Gen Z artist who really understood how to use the internet to his advantage when building the brand he did. And it started to make even more sense.

I’m happy to report that I’m really glad I went to the concert. It’s not to say he didn’t play a bunch of tracks off Monica, but he was on stage for almost 90 minutes performing songs from projects dating back to the late 2010s for his earliest fans instead of only catering to the newer ones.

The room was filled with people who were mostly much younger than me. As expected, there were way more women than men, but that’s not to say there weren’t plenty of young men there too. And every time a familiar hit came on, the crowd went crazy. Phones came out left and right to record their favorite songs. This wasn’t an artist who had fallen off. It was an artist with a dedicated fan base that most artists would kill for.

Was the Brooklyn Paramount significantly smaller, from a crowd perspective, than Barclays had been only a few years earlier? Sure. But he looked comfortable up on stage. Going acapella on a bunch of songs you could tell were his favorites. And if anything, you could see an artist who is still learning stage presence, cadence, breath control, and how to deliver certain parts of songs with the same tone they have on the studio recordings. So maybe the reality is Jack Harlow is exactly where he needs to be.

I'm glad the experience reminded me that someone else's artistry isn't about me, even if it can feel that way sometimes because these artists make songs that become so personal to us. It's a blessing that we get to find people who are able to create something out of nothing that resonates so deeply we end up standing in rooms singing lyrics that feel like our own stories, even though they came from someone else's life. I've always been annoyed watching people project their own expectations onto artists, and here I was doing exactly that without even realizing it. It was a good lesson to learn, and one I hope I carry with me. Here's to Jack getting to be exactly the artist he wants to be.

Business development (BD) is a constant topic on Crypto Twitter—debated, compared, and often misunderstood. It’s frequently stacked up against roles like marketing or developer relations, but no matter how it’s framed, BD stays at the center of industry conversations.

Having done BD in Web3 for years—and in other industries before that—I felt it was time to weigh in with more than just a tweet. The truth is what makes someone good at BD isn’t unique to Web3. But what is unique is how often the industry lacks one essential trait: a baseline level of professionalism.

So what does professionalism actually look like in business development? It’s not flashy pitches or knowing the right people—it’s about consistently showing up and executing the fundamentals. That means being prepared, following through, communicating clearly, responding in a timely fashion, and building trust over time. These are basic principles in any industry, but in Web3, they’re often overlooked.

In my time in Web3 alone, I’ve closed between $35 million and $40 million in business. That spans raising capital for my own companies, helping others secure funding, securing grants for builders, and closing deals that directly generated revenue for the organizations I’ve worked with. These deals have involved Fortune 10 companies, Web3-native organizations, high-net-worth individuals, major nonprofits, and NGOs.

Without being exhaustive, some of the partners I’ve worked with include Shell Oil, UNICEF, American Cancer Society, Mercy Corps, Coinbase, Binance, Optimism, Protocol Labs, OKX, Bitget, Gnosis, zkSync, Lens, and individuals like Vitalik Buterin, Juan Benet, and Stefan George.

Whenever my work comes up, I’m often asked about the secret sauce behind closing these deals. The truth is, there isn’t one. It all comes down to mastering the fundamentals of business development—skills that apply across any industry. The difference is that in Web3, basic professional standards aren’t upheld as consistently as they should be.

This gap in professionalism isn’t just a minor issue—it’s holding the industry back. Nearly every leader I speak with brings up struggles with this inside their own organizations. Those who don’t are usually talking about how much deliberate effort they’ve had to put into hiring just to find people who understand the basics. Deals fall through, partnerships stall, and promising projects struggle to scale because fundamental business practices aren’t taken seriously. Web3 is maturing, but its approach to business development needs to catch up—and fast.

This is usually the part where articles list out the numbered steps or bullet points on how to “fix” business development in Web3. I’m not going to do that. The basics are straightforward, and I respect that readers don’t need to be spoon-fed what should already be common sense.

What I will say is this: we need to talk about how this issue came about—and why it feels unique to Web3.

Back in the summer of 2021, I was a Venture Fellow at LDV Capital. Most of my work focused on helping develop part of an upcoming thesis report titled “Content & The Metaverse are powered by Visual Tech”, specifically covering DAOs, the metaverse, blockchain, NFTs, and more.

When I first spoke with the fund about the role, they told me something that stuck with me. A venture partner mentioned that they typically filled this position with MBA students who had just finished their first year of grad school. But this time, they couldn’t find MBA students who understood these emerging topics.

Instead, the only people who did know about the space were 19-year-olds—plugged in, sharp, and deep in the industry, but lacking basic professional skills. They didn’t know how to properly respond to emails, show up to scheduled calls, or even use a calendar.

That gap between deep industry knowledge and basic professionalism wasn’t just a hiring issue in 2021. It’s a pattern I’ve seen play out across Web3 for nearly four years now.

The root of the problem is that many people in Web3 roles lack experience in traditional work environments. Most have never held jobs outside of this industry, so their understanding of work is skewed. It’s shaped by the belief that they deserve high six-figure salaries, can juggle multiple roles, don’t need to respond to messages promptly, should travel the world on the company’s dime, and can somehow print magic internet money out of thin air.

That’s not to say this industry isn’t exciting or full of opportunity—it is. But that mindset has been tolerated because Web3 has been in its early stages. Now, as governments worldwide recognize that this industry isn’t going anywhere, this immature approach won’t cut it.

For Web3 to mature, the people driving it need to grow up too. Because here’s the reality: every deal that falls apart, every partnership that stalls, and every promising project that flames out isn’t just a missed opportunity for one company—it’s a setback for the entire industry. Web3 is supposed to be about rewriting the rules, but if we can’t get the basics right, how are we supposed to convince the world we’re ready to lead?

We’ve all seen it firsthand teams missing critical deadlines because no one bothered to confirm deliverables, deals falling apart because follow-up Telegram messages were ignored, or partnerships dissolving because expectations were never clearly set. I’ve been in meetings where founders couldn’t articulate their value proposition or showed up unprepared to answer basic questions. In traditional industries, these slip-ups would be deal-breakers. In Web3, they’re often shrugged off as part of the culture.

This kind of behavior doesn’t just hurt individual teams—it damages the industry as a whole. When deals fall apart or partnerships fail due to unprofessionalism, it erodes trust with investors, slows down product adoption, and makes it harder for Web3 to gain mainstream credibility. Institutional players and traditional businesses hesitate to engage when they perceive the space as chaotic or unreliable. And you can’t blame them for it either. Web3 has the potential to reshape industries, but it can’t do that if it can’t be taken seriously.

It’s time for Web3 leaders to raise the bar. Professionalism can’t be optional if this industry wants to mature and scale. Whether you’re a founder, investor, or team member, the responsibility to build a stronger foundation starts with you.

That means showing up prepared, following through on commitments, and treating every deal—big or small—with the seriousness it deserves. It means setting higher standards when hiring, mentoring younger talent, and holding teams accountable. If we want regulators, investors, and the broader public to take Web3 seriously, we need to start taking ourselves seriously first.

Web3 was built on breaking rules and challenging the status quo—but not every rule is meant to be broken. We’re a trillion dollar industry now. The next phase of growth won’t come from hype or shortcuts. It’ll come from discipline, accountability, and treating this industry like the serious business it is.

Because the future of Web3 will be built by those who can deliver, not just those who can disrupt.

For those unfamiliar, Shariah law is a cornerstone of the Islamic faith, offering guidance for living a fulfilled and religiously meaningful life. The term "Shariah" literally translates to "clear path" and represents interpretations of God’s values rather than a singular, rigid legal code. These interpretations vary, influencing how different Islamic laws are established. At its core, Shariah law aims to protect and promote human welfare through six fundamental principles: life, reason, religion, honor, family, and wealth. These principles provide Muslims with a broader sense of purpose and a framework for upholding values that safeguard individual and communal well-being.

Islamic finance refers to financial activities that adhere to Shariah compliance. It exists as a distinct system because traditional banking often involves practices deemed unethical or haram under Islamic principles. The most widely recognized example is the prohibition of usury, or riba, which is the act of lending money and charging interest. In Islamic finance, money cannot be used to generate more money without being tied to a tangible asset or societal benefit. For instance, transactions must be backed by assets like gold, ensuring they serve a clear and beneficial purpose. Transparency between parties is essential, and instead of lending money directly to a borrower, the bank purchases the underlying asset and resells it at a higher, pre-agreed price. This structure allows the bank to earn a profit while maintaining Shariah compliance, making the transaction halal.

Imagine you wanted to buy a car with borrowed money. In conventional finance, you’d apply for a $100,000 loan with the agreement to pay back $120,000, including interest. This arrangement is haram in Islamic finance because the lender profits regardless of the borrower’s financial burden, with no shared risk or accountability. In contrast, Islamic finance takes a different approach. The bank would purchase the car outright, making it the owner. Then, it could sell the car to the borrower at a higher price or through fixed-rate installments, ensuring the transaction is halal.

Why is this method permissible? First, the profit comes from the sale of a tangible asset, not from interest-bearing loans. The bank earns its profit because it assumes risk—buying, storing, and reselling the car—while sharing that risk with the borrower. Second, the borrowing aligns with Islamic finance’s core principle that all transactions must have a positive societal impact. In this case, the car facilitates transportation and livelihood, making the transaction not only halal but also purposeful.

Risk-sharing ensures that both parties are less vulnerable to economic shocks. By adhering to a moral foundation and requiring transactions to be backed by tangible assets, Islamic finance also limits the accumulation of excessive debt.

Currently, the Islamic finance industry is valued at approximately $4 trillion—a remarkable achievement for a sector that didn’t exist 30 years ago. By 2026, it’s projected to reach $6 trillion, reflecting an impressive 50% growth rate in just two years.

This rapid growth isn’t just transforming traditional finance—it has significant implications for crypto as well. The principles that underpin Islamic finance, such as risk-sharing, transparency, and societal benefit, align closely with the ethos of blockchain technology. With crypto’s global accessibility and efficiency, it offers a unique opportunity to address gaps in Shariah-compliant finance. While discussions around this synergy have existed since Bitcoin’s inception, achieving true Shariah compliance in crypto has only recently begun to take shape, albeit with challenges along the way.

One company that has stood out to me recently in this space is Inshallah.fi. Although I’m not affiliated with the team, I’ve been engaging with them on Twitter over the past few months. They were part of an AllianceDAO cohort—a strong endorsement, given the caliber of talent emerging from AllianceDAO these days. Beyond that, I’ve observed them steadily making strides in the space, building innovative solutions and contributing meaningfully to the conversation around Shariah-compliant crypto.

Staking is a process in blockchain networks, particularly those that use proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanisms, where participants lock up their cryptocurrency to help validate transactions and secure the network. In return, they earn rewards—often a percentage of the staked amount. While staking has become a popular way to generate passive income in the crypto world, its alignment with Islamic finance principles depends on how those rewards are earned and their sources.

To get more involved, I recently reached out to the team to join their Solana staking program through Goldsand. While I’ve committed a modest amount of funds, their premise is compelling: finding ways to earn competitive rewards in staking without relying on interest-based profits. The rate I got was over 7%, which is competitive with what Jito and Kamino are offering, which are other platforms I can stake my Solana. This also gave me a chance to try out the Inshallah.Fi platform and I was definitely pleased with the ease of the experience.

Their core argument is that staking can sometimes involve activities deemed haram. Since staking validates transactions and earns profits in return, there’s a risk that some of those transactions may originate from haram sources, such as interest. By working with their program, however, you can be assured that all activities are halal, allowing you to participate with peace of mind.

Next, I plan to start staking some ETH. The only reason I haven’t yet is that my ETH is stored in cold storage, which I don’t have easy access to at the moment. As a practicing Muslim, this approach to staking feels intuitive and aligned with my values. I’m genuinely excited to see more products emerge that allow me to confidently engage in crypto in a way that adheres to what’s deemed permissible.

Shariah-compliant crypto has the potential to unlock vast, untapped markets while adhering to ethical financial practices. As the space continues to grow, I’m excited to see more innovative solutions that align with Islamic principles and broaden access to the on-chain economy. If you’ve come across projects working toward similar goals, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Fundraising in crypto isn’t just a skill—it’s a survival tool for builders navigating one of the fastest-evolving industries out there. When I first wrote this piece for CoinDesk, the goal was to distill the nuances of raising capital in Web3 into something actionable. Since then, the feedback has been clear: these lessons are as relevant today as they were when the article first went live.

I’m republishing it here because the principles still apply, whether you’re planning your first raise or looking to scale during uncertain times. It’s evergreen content that deserves a wider audience, and Substack feels like the right home for it.

This article was originally published on Coindesk on June 14th, 2024. It is republished here with permission.

There is one topic among entrepreneurs that I’ve found never seems to get old despite countless articles, interviews and talks given on it. That topic is fundraising. As someone who’s collectively raised somewhere between $40 million and $50 million across different projects in the past few years, and with years of experience in venture capital myself, I hope that you find some value in it.

After recently announcing the $20 million seed round for Morph, an Ethereum layer 2 using a hybrid optimistic/zero-knowledge rollup and decentralized sequencer, I’ve had countless entrepreneurs reaching out to me asking how I did it. And so I thought it made sense to summarize some key understandings I have about fundraising itself in a more scalable way. Below are some common themes to understand when looking to fundraise that may help you, regardless of the kind of market you’re in.

The first thing you need to learn is what a venture capitalist does. It’s actually pretty boring. VCs invest money their limited partners (LPs) give them and look to make sizable financial returns. LPs are individuals or entities who provide capital to VCs in the form of an investment.

In other words, a VC’s job is to take money they’re given and turn it into more money for their LPs. In a literal sense, VCs are just middle men for much richer individuals or organizations looking to allocate funds to a riskier part of their portfolios for higher returns.

Now that we have established that a VC is just a money broker for wealthier people or organizations, you need to start to craft a narrative to achieve a similar outcome. A shared story takes you from facing the VC on opposite sides of the table to metaphorically sitting with them collaboratively trying to create a shared outcome together.

What is it about the thing you’re building that holds so much promise? Sure, a VC will want to hear about why what you’re proposing is a technically sound idea, but for the most part VCs aren’t technical people. Many come from more traditional finance, banking or consulting related jobs.

In other words, VCs are people looking to hear a compelling narrative about why it is that your company will be able to succeed in the sea of other companies saying they can do the same. Your ideas for Go-To-Market (GTM) really need to be fleshed out because that is what they’re going to grill you on.

It’s really all about storytelling. Steve Jobs once famously said the most powerful person in the world is the storyteller. He was right so tell that story. If you’re not able to articulate this then you need to go back to the drawing board because you’re likely not ready to raise funds.

If you are in a position to articulate this then it’s time to put together a simple pitch deck. In reality, most VCs spend a few minutes, at most, reading this document, oftentimes never reading it because they expect you to go through it when you pitch to them. Because this is the case you need to be able to keep it concise.

The deck in total should be no more than 10-15 slides. In those few pages you need to introduce your idea, why you’re building it, how big the market is, who would want to pay for it and why is it that you’re the team to do it. Again, if you can’t succinctly do this then you’re not ready to raise money.

Once you’re in a position to raise money you need to understand which VC funds are even the ones that invest in ideas like yours. Different funds specialize in different verticals. Do your research. Don’t be the person who goes to a fund that invests in consumer products trying to pitch them an artificial intelligence company.

The next part of this is how exactly do you get in front of VCs? Well, it’s easier said than done, but still can get done. After all, it is the job of a VC to speak to startups, but you still need to take into account how human interactions work with trusted networks. Legitimacy is the scarcest resource so find a way to create legitimacy.

The first principle to take into account here is to understand that warm introductions are almost the only way you’re going to have a VC take you seriously. Unless you’re in a position where you have a product that’s doing excellent in the market already, your objective is to find a way to get warm intros.

Reach out to people you’ve researched asking to tell them about your idea and ask if you can get an introduction. At the end of the day, the best introduction to a VC will either be another VC or the founder of a company they have already invested in.

One last interesting caveat in this process is that you’re likely never going to get outright rejected by most VCs if you’ve done the above steps correctly. What you’ll often hear them say is that they will pass for now, but they’d like to hear what kind of progress you’ve got a few months down the line. That’s because they know they are playing a relationship game to always get access to deals. Because maybe tomorrow your company will be the talk of the town.

Just understand that raising money takes time, and your follow up game is of the utmost importance.

Originally published on CoinDesk on June 14th, 2024.

The purpose of starting this Substack is to give both the general and specialized audience a resource where they can follow and understand what’s happening in this space. As the industry matures into something undeniable, it’s crucial for people from all walks of life to grasp it—even if only a little.

I’ve been in this space for a while. Back in 2013, I wrote my first article about Bitcoin for the Huffington Post. In 2014, I launched my first project—Kim Coindashian (yes, really). And yet, even with all that time and experience, I often find myself frustrated with how difficult it is to find clear, concise content. Since I’ve always been told to “be the change you want to see,” here I am.

Why should you subscribe? Here’s the pitch: I’ve been in the crypto/Web3/blockchain industry for over 11 years. These days, I’m the cofounder of a blockchain that raised $20 million from top-tier investors in 2024. I’m also a consultant to the UNICEF CryptoFund (yes, that UNICEF), a venture partner at a $400 million fund called Foresight Ventures, and I’ve helped distribute tens of millions of dollars to thousands of builders in Web3. I’ve done deals with some of the biggest brands, won multiple awards, and been featured in countless media outlets for my work.

And when it comes to writing? I’m a columnist at CoinDesk, a contributor at Forbes, and my bylines have appeared in Entrepreneur, Huffington Post, Forefront, and FWB. I’ve spent years not only becoming an expert in this space but also mastering how to explain it in a way that makes sense.

What can you expect here? Weekly pieces to start, with a goal of building up to daily content. Some weeks I’ll write more, some less. Topics will vary, and so will the length. You won’t just see long, drawn-out essays—some days might just be a quick paragraph. I’ll also republish articles I write for other publications to ensure you don’t miss out.

If you’re convinced (and you should be), hit that subscribe button now. And why not become a paid subscriber while you’re at it? Let’s build something great together.