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Welcome to Vrbish #005, where we hear how a former Silicon Valley Tech Bro ended up off the grid, building a sustainable future through community and crypto.
This Week in Vrbs - Building a meritocracy with proof of impact, Animators getting to work
Builder Spotlight with Cool Beans - How Crypto and Sustainability complement each other
Vrbs.build gets an important update this week with Profile Pages. These pages give builders another way to show their work. Ultimately those that are most effective will have a higher impact, and as impact increases, more community support becomes available. This flywheel effect is a meritocracy in its purest form.
Animators have a unique opportunity to establish a character brand to capture the attention of people everywhere. In the examples below you can see the wide range of styles and stories being told by these artists. This resonating content is how we connect with people on a deeper level.
Here are some more Vrbs animations you should check out!
You might have seen Cool Beans picking up trash in his recent YouTube videos for the Vrbs Local Impact Grant. Something about his personality and the way he spoke had me curious. I had to learn more. What the heck is Solarpunk'n? Why does he live out in the wilderness? How did he get involved in Crypto?
Initially I assumed he was just a weed-smoking, vegetarian, hippie. And while I still haven't uncovered whether or not he eats meat, I left the conversation inspired, informed, and optimistic.
Like me, Cool Beans started life in the Bay Area of Northern California. In early life he appeared to follow the path of many other intelligent and motivated Californians, working in Silicon Valley.
This little region of the world is entirely fascinating, and I speak from experience. It's like society is running a science experiment in the Bay Area. It's a petri dish of culture and beliefs that somehow fuses seemingly contradictory traits into genius. After learning about Cool Bean's story, I probably would have guessed he's from San Francisco, and as it turns out, he is.
He grew fruits, vegetables, and herbs next to his driveway and shared them with neighbors. He worked on the hardware and machine side at prominent tech companies. He spread positivity and love through public art installations, or as he described it, "I was really into making art on other people's walls..." These public creations grew enough support and following that he was able to host various art shows in the city, teaching him valuable lessons about using meme culture to leave an impact.
Somewhere in the mix Cool Beans discovered crypto. He began trading and stumbled across DAOs and NFT projects that analyzed different ways to use technology to better the Earth. They called it Solarpunk'n, using tech where appropriate in order to promote sustainable living.
If you need a translation like I did, this could look like using sensors to monitor soil moisture and temperature for better crop yield, using a solar-powered StarLink for internet services, or buying second-hand recycled technology like phones and computers.
This lifestyle was perfect for the community garden-growing, Silicon Valley tech-building person that Cool Beans was.
After achieving significant success in trading, and feeling the burnout of working in Silicon Valley, Cool Beans and a few friends decided to leave it all behind. They packed up and moved off the grid with the goal of building a hydro-powered Bitcoin mining facility. His new community had no police station and no restaurants. Just a general store and post office. The one bar in town closed years ago, something about not having any customers, ever.
That about catches us up to how exactly Cool Beans ended up living in the mountains, picking up trash, and being an active builder in a blockchain-based DAO.
But that's enough from me, you need to hear the rest from Cool Beans first hand:
[Curtis] Can you tell me more about your efforts utilizing the Local Impact Grant?
[Cool Beans] On the surface, what I'm doing now is pretty easy. Trash pickup, river cleaning, and native planting. Behind the scenes I'm trying to organize the local community to tackle bigger initiatives. For now, they are very wary of Web3, but the eventual goal is to educate them and let the community council take over.
[Curtis] It's great that you're working to make this community-run, and I can clearly see and hear your passion for this mission in your videos. After you hand this off to the community council, do you have other initiatives you plan to tackle?
[Cool Beans] Yes, in reality this is a thriving national forest and trash pickup is fairly minor. I believe I can benefit the Earth more by working in an area that's not thriving.
[Curtis] Let's dive into that more, can you give me an example?
[Cool Beans] What's the opposite of a thriving forest? A barren desert. Once I can spread the Vrbs mission here and pass the baton I'll move to the desert. I already purchased a plot of land to solve one of society's biggest problems.
[Curtis] What is society's biggest problem?
[Cool Beans] Affordable Housing. I'm going to build a sustainable and affordable neighborhood in the desert. What if I told you that you could buy a house for $10,000?
[Curtis] I'd say that's unbelievable. What's the catch?
[Cool Beans] We should be aiming for the unbelievable. How we make the unbelievable possible should be the question. How would I build a house as cheap as humanly possible in the forest here? I wouldn't ship a bunch of wood across the country from Home Depot. The cheapest is what's available locally. Here in the forest we have an abundance of trees, so using wood would be the cheapest and most sustainable. This is called Bio-Regionalism. So now, how would you build a house in the desert with bio-regionalism in mind?
[Curtis] Maybe I could make bricks for the walls?
[Cool Beans] Bricks could work! But having to shape, mold, and dry each brick individually? That's a lot. The solution is dirt in a sandbag. Way more solid than the flimsy houses and apartments that we live in now, it's literally bullet proof. All you need are sandbags, some wood for the roof, windows, furniture, septic, solar power, and shovel for the sand. Roughly $10,000.
[Curtis] Now you have me questioning everything I know! What's your timeline for this new project?
[Cool Beans] I already own the land and even put it onchain. Right now I'm just focused on building trust. I want to prove that I can collaborate and build community support. I'm extremely privileged that I'm able to do this, and Vrbs is pushing me to learn and improve every day. The best thing I can do is document the process through my vlogs, and inspire others to do more and leave an impact.
[Curtis] I think you're definitely demonstrating that. In your vlogs you often talk about re-watching your videos and trying to improve each and every time. More people would benefit from this work ethic! What's next for your vlogs?
[Cool Beans] I'm really just experimenting and trying to improve! I just bought a chest mount so I can record as I pick up up trash. I'm also planning to add voiceovers so I can discuss important topics that I might not be prepared for while recording live!
[Curtis] I look forward to watching your journey! I want to give you the final word. Do you have any closing thoughts you'd like to tell the people that will read this?
[Cool Beans] Everyone should say, "Everyday is the best day of my life." This one simple habit will change your life and change other people's lives around you. I always tell myself that I learned from yesterday's mistakes and won't repeat them. If everyday you learn, everyday is the best day of your life so far. And it's not lying if you're genuinely trying. Even if you're not trying, say it anyways.
Thank you for reading!
Vrbish has one mission: To amplify Vrbs and the creators that support it.
Please share this with a friend and help us share these stories. We could all use some more good in the world.
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