Devconnect Istanbul 2023
Devconnect was a whirlwind of events, talks, workshops, hackathons and community bonding. Aave Labs are grateful to have been part of this important week for the web3 ecosystem. The team managed several DAO-sponsored events, including ETHGlobal Istanbul, the ETHGlobal Hackathon, a several side events (see breakdown below), and rAAVE Istanbul, which was the must-attend event of the Devconnect week. Additionally, with DAO support, Aave Labs developed an initiative to promote GHO adoption, the first GHO Passport and as a result was able to return $30K to the DAO treasury.
GHO Passport
GHO Passport was introduced as an onchain pass for IRL events. Each Passport was a unique soulbound NFT and included special perks for those attending Devconnect, who purchased a GHO Passport, such as exclusive GHO swag and tickets to rAAVE as well as a GHO VIP lounge at rAAVE.
rAAVE
rAAVE Istanbul was by far the most anticipated event of the week, a celebration for the Aave community and Devconnect participants. Over 1,200 people attended. With the support of the Aave community, Aave Labs created additional ways for people to participate via livestreaming on Rad Radio and Livepeer, where 1283 people participated – maximizing the ROI. We are excited to bring innovative ways to integrate GHO into future rAAVEs and to further improve this brand-building, community event in the future.
Ticket distribution
Tickets were distributed to different targeted diverse groups. rAAVE tickets were allotted to BGD, Aave Chan, Aave Grants and SheFi, among other key communities, who distributed them to their members. The night was full of good energy - with the crowd chanting “rAAVE rAAVE rAAVE.” Thank you to everyone who helped plan, attended and participated in this Aave DAO-sponsored community event.
Aave DAO sponsored – ETHGlobal Istanbul Hackathon
ETHGlobal Istanbul was one of the largest events during Devconnect with over 2,000 hackers. The Aave Labs team mentored hackers during the hackathon while also giving out highly coveted Aave merch – with lines out the door to claim merch. On behalf of the Aave DAO, Aave Labs DevRel, DefiSpartan hosted a workshop on “How to build DeFi applications with Aave & GHO,” which was packed (standing room only) with eager-to-learn GHO hackers.
25 hackathon projects were built on Aave and $10,000 was awarded to four of the best projects. The prize winners were…
Best DAO Tooling prize recipients:
PePay a peer-to-peer mobile payments app inspired by Pepe’s vision of a world without payment related middlemen.
Stabilan which is a Decentralized Trustless Insurance Protocol. We present a use case where users can protect their assets from price crashes or stablecoins from depegging.
Best GHO Stablecoin integrations prize recipients:
AAtomato which enables you to automate complex actions based on triggers and conditions in a safe way by remaining in custody.
Themis: ZKML Loyalty is is a framework for improving protocol incentives and optimizing for long-term loyalty through data-driven analysis. It delivers those improvements in a trustless manner using Zero-Knowledge Proofs over the Machine Learning model results (ZKML).
Side Events: The following side events were sponsored by the Aave DAO:
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L2 Days, the largest conference dedicated to Ethereum scaling solutions, hosted by Scroll.
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notDevcon, an event focused on the possibilities and societal impact of Ethereum technology, hosted by ITU Blockchain (the first university blockchain society in Turkey).
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The unStable Summit
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Certora x Aave meet-up
Through speaking opportunities, the Aave Labs team supported these and a variety of other events, reinforcing the Aave Protocol through, GHO and decentralized finance. For example:
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Pragma, where Stani Kulechov spoke with Maker DAO Founder Rune Christensen on “The Future of Algorithmic Stablecoins.”
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Hyperlink by Consensys, where Stani spoke about “What’s New in Decentralized Technology.”
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Chainlink, where Stani discussed the opportunity of “Cross-chain GHO.”
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The unStable Summit, where Stani spoke about “The Opportunity Driving Stablecoin Adoption” and in a separate presentation, Emilio spoke on “Navigating liquidity challenges, Stablecoin Collateralization, Liquidations, and Bridging.”
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Avalanche House, where Emilio Frangella spoke about Institutional DeFI.
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Certora x Aave meet-up where Emilio, Aave Labs VP of Engineering, spoke with the Certora team about “Formal verification on Aave Protocol”.
From reinforcing brand awareness and meeting with developers unfamiliar with Aave, Aave contributed to the success of Devconnect week. Thank you for your support, which successfully met the goal to reinforce Aave and GHO brand awareness and encourage development on the Protocol.
