There is no single moment where I decided to "network in Web3". Every connection that turned into real work happened through a chain of small honest actions, a tweet reply here, a cold text on Wellfound there, a friend's referral, a comment on an article. Looking back at Day 55 of this series, the pattern is clear: in Web3, networking and open source contribution are the same activity wearing different clothes.
If you want to keep up with this 60-day Web3 journey, you can follow me on X, on Medium, on Future, and you can join the Web3ForHumans Telegram community.
The connections that produced real paid work in my journey so far: Coinmonks on Medium led to Bitquery, a Wellfound cold message led to the Tether contract, a Twitter follow through a mutual friend led to Tim K's Think Tank, and a friend invited to Fensory. None of these started with a LinkedIn connection request. None came from a job board. All of them started with something small and public.
What Open Source Actually Means in Web3
Most people hear "open source contribution" and immediately think senior developer merging PRs into a major protocol. That picture is accurate but it is only about 10 percent of what open source actually needs. The other 90 percent is documentation, testing, issue reporting, translation, community moderation, tutorial writing, and proof-checking. All of that is contribution. All of it counts.
My first real open source adjacent work was contributing to the Keet documentation for Holepunch, which is part of Tether's infrastructure. I was not the sole author. I was part of a small team of contributors and proof-checkers working on documentation for an app with 10,000 plus downloads on the Play Store. The work was real, the repository was real, and the contribution was real even though I did not write a single line of Solidity.
The Peardoc project went one step further. A decentralized document editor built on Holepunch's P2P networking, with real-time collaboration and secure peer invitations via unique keys. No central server. That came directly from getting deep enough into the Holepunch ecosystem through documentation work to understand what was possible and what was missing.
Where to Start With Open Source if You Have No GitHub
Not having a GitHub profile is more common than the Web3 Twitter timeline suggests. Most early contributors start exactly where I did: with writing and documentation rather than code.
The fastest entry point is finding a protocol you already use or have written about and looking at three things. First, their official documentation for gaps, outdated pages, or confusing explanations. Second, their GitHub issues tab filtered by "good first issue" or "documentation". Third, their Discord or Telegram for questions that get asked repeatedly without a good answer anywhere in the docs.
Any one of those three is a contribution waiting to happen. Write the missing explanation, open an issue describing the documentation gap, or answer the repeated question in the community and then suggest it gets added to the docs. That is how most non-developer open source contributors get started and it is exactly how documentation-focused DevRel careers are built.
The Coinmonks to Bitquery Chain: How One Connection Built On Another
I started writing for Coinmonks on Medium because it was one of the most active Web3 publications accepting contributor pitches. Wrote consistently, built a small track record there, and then texted the admin directly. Not a formal application. Just a direct message explaining what I had written and what I could offer. That relationship led directly to the Bitquery freelance role, which produced two published pieces on prediction market APIs and DEX router slippage.
The chain looks like this: consistent public writing led to a publication relationship, that relationship created a credibility signal, that signal made a warm introduction to a technical platform possible. None of it would have worked without the writing being genuinely useful first. The networking was the easy part. The writing was the work.
This is the most important thing to understand about Web3 networking: the connection is only as strong as the work behind it. A cold DM from someone with nothing to show gets ignored. A cold DM from someone whose writing you have already read gets a reply.
The Wellfound Cold Text That Led to Tether
The Tether connection started with finding a technical lead from Tether who was forming a small team of his own in Bangalore. Found him on Wellfound, sent a direct message, connected, and got the role after passing a build test. No referral, no warm introduction, just a clear message to the right person at the right time backed by enough existing work to make the conversation worth having.
The lesson here is that cold outreach in Web3 works when it is specific and when you have something to point to. The message was not "I am looking for opportunities". It was closer to "I see what you are building, here is what I have done that is relevant, I would like to be part of this".
Wellfound (formerly AngelList Talent) is genuinely underused in Web3 hiring. Most early-stage Web3 teams list there before they list anywhere else. If you are targeting a role at a small protocol or Web3 startup, checking Wellfound and sending direct messages to technical leads and founders is a higher signal activity than applying through a job board.
Tim K's Think Tank: How Twitter Follows Turn Into Real Opportunities
Tim K was working with a mutual friend. I added him on Twitter, followed his work, and came across the Think Tank experiment when he announced it. An oversubscribed competitive MVP-building program with a waitlist. I was one of 14 participants and one of the 3 who actually submitted an attempt.
That opportunity came entirely from a Twitter follow that led to genuine engagement with someone's work over time. Not a cold pitch, not a formal application. Just being in the right digital room because of a real connection through someone both parties trusted.
This is how most good Web3 opportunities actually surface. Someone you know mentions someone worth following. You follow them and engage genuinely with their work. Over weeks or months a relationship forms that would never have happened through a job board. The Fensory platform conversations work the same way: a real friendship that extended naturally into professional collaboration because the work aligned.
What Networking in Web3 Actually Looks Like in 2026
The playbook is different from every other industry and it is worth being specific about what works and what does not.
Twitter and X replies are the highest value networking activity available to someone without a large following. A thoughtful reply to a founder, protocol lead, or active builder is seen by everyone who follows that person. It is a public demonstration of how you think. Do it consistently in one vertical and the right people notice over weeks not days.
Discord and Telegram are where the actual work conversations happen. Being a genuinely helpful presence in a protocol's Discord, answering questions, flagging bugs, contributing to discussions, puts you in direct contact with core team members in a context where they are actively paying attention. Most developer hiring at early-stage Web3 projects happens this way before a job is ever formally posted.
Cold DMs work when they are short, specific, and backed by existing work. Three sentences maximum: what you noticed about their work, one specific thing you have done that is relevant, and one clear ask. No attachments, no long introductions, no "I hope this message finds you well".
The Mistake Most People Make
Networking without contributing first is the most common mistake in Web3. People join Discord servers, add founders on Twitter, and send cold DMs before they have anything to show. The signal that lands is "I want something from you". The signal that works is "I have already been useful in this space and I want to be useful here too".
The 60-day series, the Telegram community, the published articles, the Keet contribution, and the Bitquery pieces all exist before any of the good opportunities arrived. The portfolio came first. The network followed the portfolio, not the other way around.
Tomorrow: Future Trends in Web3 (2026-2030)
Day 56 covers what the next four years look like in Web3: where the real adoption is coming from, which infrastructure is quietly becoming foundational, and what skills will be worth having by 2030. If you want a forward-looking view of where this space is going, that one is worth reading.
If you want to follow along as I keep learning, building, and occasionally changing my mind about Web3, you can find the rest of this 60-day journey on X, on Medium, on Future, and you can join the Web3ForHumans Telegram community to discuss these topics in plain language.
Resources
- Day 54 - Building a public portfolio and ghostwriting for founders
- Day 53 - Feedback loops and Web3 interview prep
- Keet by Holepunch - Open source adjacent documentation contribution
- Bitquery - Freelance role that came from the Coinmonks chain
- Wellfound - Where the Tether cold outreach happened
- My Portfolio - Full work history including all contributions
- Web3ForHumans Telegram - The community that is itself a networking node
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