Ambassador Stories, Journal #16 : Chris & Malick

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Ambassador Stories, Journal #16 : Chris & Malick

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Welcome to the 16th journal of our “Ambassador Stories” series! :star_struck::tada

New stories will be shared with you, whenever new ambassadors join our ranks and provide their stories.
You’ll be able to enjoy the various, unique stories of our Cardano Community Ambassadors: what motivated, and still motivates them, to be part of this amazing and wonderful community?

The Cardano Community Team would also like to thank the Ambassadors for all their continued efforts and participation in sharing their stories with us. :writing_hand:

Please read all about Chris (@chris-graffagnino) down below! :open_book:

Part 1: Chris, Ambassador Content Creator:>

Chris has been quite active within the Cardano community, providing value and knowledge to those that seek it, in particular for the stake pool best practices community and on github. Chris runs his own pool, too. He has greatly helped the Cardano ecosystem! Keep up the great work and thanks for joining the Ambassadors!

1) Tell us a little about yourself. What is your background?

Hi from Nashville, Tennessee! My name is Chris Graffagnino and I am an independent software engineer. I play guitar… once upon a time I even recorded/toured with a few artists you might have heard of. It was a fun way to spend my youth, for sure. Ten years ago, I became obsessed with learning Python and web-development, and never looked back. More recently, my focus has been blockchain, and in particular, Cardano.

2) How did you get interested and involved with Blockchain/Crypto?

I was curious about bitcoin back in 2010. I’m still kicking myself for not buying when the price dropped to $2. Talk about a missed opportunity!

3) Why Cardano?

I look at the cryptocurrency space through the lens of how the internet developed. Initial growth driven by speculation, followed by a bust, then finally a slow rise to adoption. I have been so impressed with how Charles has chosen to build Cardano. Software using formal methods is a big step forward - it will be what sets us apart from the rest.

4) How are you contributing to the Cardano Ecosystem as an Ambassador?

I help people set up and troubleshoot their nodes. If you want to run a node, and are committed to learning, check it my “Stake Pool Guide for Newbs”. You can do it, too!

5) What is your future vision for the Cardano Ecosystem?

Trust is the basis for all our relationships, and even society itself. Cardano will redefine the ways we trust each other. This is so fundamental to our lives that I don’t think any of us can fully appreciate how massive the implications are.

6 ) What is your personal message to the Cardano community?

Invest in your fellow community members. We win together, or not at all.

Don’t forget to like, follow, share Chris’ hard work! He can be followed on the Cardano Forum, Twitter or on Telegram!

—The End of Part 1.

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Part 2: Malick (@psychomb), Ambassador Translator:

Malick has been invaluable to the Cardano project’s grassroots, as well. He helps translate content since the Ambassador Program early days, among other things. He also runs his own pool, with great enthusiasm.
We want to thank him for having joined our ranks! The Cardano community is happy to have you!

1) Tell us a little about yourself. What is your background?

I am a European citizen from France. I lived a tiny bit in the Netherlands, a bit longer in Senegal and also England. Back to France for now, but who knows what’s next ? Father of two little girls. I introduced them as early as I could to the joy of music in general and rock in particular.

Apart from that, I am a plant scientist by training and I work in academia. I love molecular biology and can spend hours playing with tiny tubes filled with colorless substances.

2) How did you get interested and involved with Blockchain/Crypto?

Since I first touched the “Atari Amstrad CPC” of a friend living next door (I was about 10ish and we played Double Dragons all night), I have always been attracted to computers. Once connected to “the internet” many years later, I installed every piece of software I could find, from Napster to eMule and one of the first software for distributed computing: Seti@Home. For those who don’t know this one, it was a collective effort to find intelligent life somewhere else in the universe.

One day I came across a news article describing some weird electronic cash and found it interesting enough to download a client and play with it. I did not know what to do with it at that time, so I deleted everything afterwards. It was during the first year of Bitcoin…

In 2017, I was having an Xmas beer with a good friend and he was constantly checking his mobile. I asked him what that was and he showed me his portfolio app, with a lot of green candles at that time. He mentioned Bitcoin of course. We finished the beer and I went straight back home, desperately trying to find a way to recover anything from my old hard drives, without success. Anyway, the bug was back.

3) Why Cardano?

I started reading about anything crypto-related. And I came across Cardano. The scientific approach developed by the Cardano team echoed the one I have been following and trained for in my scientific career. Sound and solid science is hard and slow, and there is no way around it. Surprisingly, the Cardano team was probably the only one acknowledging that fact, not selling numbers and making impossible claims. They seemed to progress with method and were straightforward about the difficulties encountered. I liked that.

4) How are you contributing to the Cardano Ecosystem as an Ambassador?

After a while, I wanted more action than just reading reports and papers. Maths and code are not my area, I decided to translate Cardano content in French. I started by translating “Why Cardano?”. I continued with IOHK Blogs and the CF Newsletters (I still do from time to time but had to reduce due to a time blackhole called Jormungandr) and got invited to translate the Yoroi wallet for the french speaking community.

I always had in mind that these translations could help French speakers from the African continent. I am very pleased to finally see some members from this part of the world coming on the forum lately and reading them!

The last six month or so, I have been busy playing with Jormungandr, the Rust codebase for the node. I always thought running a pool would be too technical for me. However, with great people around to help (The Stake Pool Alliance - Official docs were not out yet !), it turned out possible. I now run a pool together with a friend of mine, Alexey.

5) What is your future vision for the Cardano Ecosystem?

I am not quite sure. I wish for crypto in general to be something else than a cash grab even if, ironically, I was drawn back to it out of anger due to my lack of foresight regarding Bitcoin!

I anticipate or wish for some massive effects with DIDs, fighting tax evasion (weird - isn’t it?), as well as empowerment for the least fortunate on earth. Closer to me, I would be really interested by local currencies and the role blockchain as a whole might play there.

If all of that or even part of it becomes a reality, Cardano will have a place of choice. I have little doubts about it, for the only reason that good work always pays off.

6 ) What is your personal message to the Cardano community?

The openness of this ecosystem allows anyone who wants to be involved to actually play his part. As said earlier, I do not code and I do not understand maths beyond the four basic operations. But as an enthusiast, I have found a way. I hope I am not being patronizing here but my take home message would be:

If you feel there is something right about the Cardano project and you want to participate but are not sure yet how, don’t overthink it and do YOUR thing.

Don’t forget to like, follow, share Malick’s hard work! He can be followed on the Cardano Forum, on Twitter, or the Unofficial French Cardano Telegram chatroom!

—The End of Part 2.

We are truly blessed with such motivated community members we have in our ecosystem! Thank you all for reading, and don’t forget to leave your comments/likes and give our Ambassadors some Cardano community :heart: and follow their work!:100::muscle:

Until next time, with new people and new Ambassador Stories! :wave:

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The Atari was actually an Amstrad - a mistake and an important correction :slight_smile:

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It is very strange how craisy I saw myself in your story, even thinking, damed how does he know. Nearly the same first name, similar roots… Netherlands, England, France, Africa (Ivory but not Senegal), Academia, playing double dragon with the neighbor, did you play monkey island on an i386 a bit latter and enjoy riding your VTT ? Anywayl, I’m glad to have you as an ambassador.

I’m going back to Ivory coast tomorrow and I’m still trying to get in touch with Cardano African director. I’ll welcome your help if you can get us in touch.

Also, I’ve just upgraded my VPS so I could also host my node. I’ll keep you updated.

Sheers !

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DM me a short message you’d like him to have. I’ll pass it around to our channels but I cannot tell you for sure it will reach destination :slight_smile: