The Web3 Summit is organized around a single rallying call: to create a fully functional and user friendly decentralized web.

Computer technology is on the verge of providing the ability for individuals and groups to communicate and interact with each other in a totally anonymous manner. Two persons may exchange messages, conduct business, and negotiate electronic contracts without ever knowing the True Name, or legal identity, of the other… The technology for this revolution — and it surely will be both a social and economic revolution — has existed in theory for the past decade… And the next ten years will bring enough additional speed to make the ideas economically feasible and essentially unstoppable.

This excerpt from The Crypto Anarchist Manifesto was written in 1988 — exactly 30 years ago — by Timothy May. His prediction that the 90s would fulfill the promise of a more free and fair web has not been achieved — instead five corporations control our online commerce, social media, and data. A small number of internet gatekeepers has rendered us as individual users vulnerable to the surveillance and manipulation scandals that have dominated headlines so far this century.

The need for a decentralized, distributed, and trustless web is stronger than ever. The time to deliver on the promises of Web3 is now.

For three days in October, we invite devs and researchers working on lower level protocols to join us in Berlin for an immersive and collaborative gathering focusing on the Web3 Tech Stack. These are the foundational technologies and protocols required to build the mainstream decentralized applications of the future:

P2P protocols and networking

Platform neutral computation languages

Data distribution protocols

Blockchains

Transient data/messaging

Encrypted storage

Protocol-extensible developer APIs

We intend the Web3 Summit to mimic the ethos of Open Source: a fully collaborative congregation that is built, modified, and enhanced by those who participate. Our hope is to co-create a Summit that is not only focused on deeply pragmatic and technical problem solving, but one that is also really fun.

We invite the community to participate in an inclusive program where *you* have the freedom to host, build, and create. You want to see a workshop on mixnets? We’ll help you host one! Do you have research you’d like to present on ring signatures or decentralized governance mechanisms? Hell yeah, we’re here for it! Keen to host a boozy evening session of White Paper Karaoke? (Consider this a personal request/plea). We’ve rented enough space for many different teams and individuals to contribute to the Summit, and we’re looking forward to hearing your ideas.

Web3 Summit will have ample space available for workshops, both intimate and large scale presentations, AMA sessions, chill-out rooms, and most importantly — a 350 person hackerspace open 24/7 where you can camp out, host a hackathon, whiteboard some ideas, present to other teams, and collaboratively get real work done.

In line with the Berlin-spirit (and because we know how to throw really awesome parties) Web3 Foundation will organize evening entertainment all through to the early hours of the morning. So if you need a break from building, we will make sure you have plenty of outlets to unwind and relax.

In the coming weeks we will release further details on programming, workshops and tickets. Speaking of tickets — we’ll work to make them as affordable as possible for independent devs and researchers. So stay tuned for updates.

We’ll see you in Berlin!

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Do you have a burning desire to submit a workshop idea? Want to contribute in some other way? Have a really funny joke you wanna share? Feel free to email us: participate@web3summit.com