Hello from Florida, I am Chris and I have enjoyed blockchain since BTC was 6$. Having never learned truly how BTC worked until Ethereum came along. I learned about smart contracts and how decentralization of programs was a thing. Then after making a profit on Ethereum and learning from BTC true power & wealth, I invested in a lending program called lend connect and falcon coin(ugh). I was ripped off for 18k but still came out with a profit from the Ethereum going up to 1200 but still… I learned the hard way why trusting a protocol that allows for ICOs of scams and bugs that cost people when hackers find out how to drain the main wallet using a simple function call, and lack of updates. I still kept with smart contracts as I could see the power they have over transactions and replacing the middle man.
I tried the EOS ICO and luckily I wasn’t scammed initially. Although after a while I became eery on the subject that the block producers hadn’t changed position for a long time… so I was forced to believe this protocol was centralized, and this is what taught me how centralized blockchains really are and other proof of work chains being mined by companies that control the hash rate. I was in a state of peril when I remembered that there was another 3rd generation blockchain out there that I shouldn’t forget, that being Cardano(and others that seem interesting but lack of community). When I learned that the block producers would be randomly selected in a pool of Staked coins, and users be given a chance to earn a reward from the block based on their Staked coin, as well as having throughput that exponentially increases as users exponentially increase their Staked assets, driving the price up and helping the system run faster, as well as side chains and paper wallets, and all this cool stuff I haven’t mentioned, I was like oh man if this is what they say it is, then having a chance to mine the next block in Cardano would be amazing. I have been learning how to develop code since May of 2018 and have received some schooling on the matter, In hopes of helping this ecosystem and making some $ to pay off that trip to California I regret taking but enjoyed having seen my family, haha its not that much debt lol. I learned about the code heavily in California though and love to learn if anyone needs some assistance on anything to let me know!
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Thanks for posting and welcome!
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Hello Smurf, welcome to the Forum 
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Hello from Korea!
Welcome to the forum.
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Hi @smurf123444
Welcome to the Forum!
(Not sure where in Florida you are, but thought I’d share that the IOHK Summit is happening next month in Miami - lots of discussions on Cardano will happen! Details here: https://iohksummit.io)
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Thank you everyone for the warm welcome!, and thank you Maki for your hard work, i have purchased a gold ticket and am excited to join everyone at the summit to learn all i can about the Cardano community and blockchain! <3
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That’s great to hear!! See you there!! 
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