In this episode of Ventures, my guest Chase Thompson (https://www.linkedin.com/in/chasejthompson/) and I talk about the Play-to-Earn space, how to build in Web3 as a product manager and entrepreneur, and his story building https://arena.gl. We dive into topics such as Web3 gaming, token models, DAOs, NFTs, the types of games that can be played on Arena, the next waves in Web3 that are coming for entrepreneurs to take advantage of, and how to practically dive into Web3 to learn more and start building.

You can watch this episode below or listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts (search for “Ventures”).

1:30 - Tee-up and background/motivation for the conversation

1:59 - Chase’s background, story into Web3 and Arena.

5:28 - Introduction to the “X-to-earn” landscape

8:30 - More about Axie Infinity as the major Play-to-Earn player

10:30 - What is the origin story of Arena.gl?

13:04 - Will’s small background in gaming

15:20 - Web3 controversy in gaming - some folks don’t want crypto in their games

18:45 - Who is the target audience for Arena.gl?

19:42 - What problem is Arena solving for the community managers?

21:37 - What’s the pitch from the community managers to the gamers in their communities? What do the token models look like?

24:28 - More about BanyanDAO - training Web2 managers to become Web3 product managers. Lessons learned from Arena.gl.

30:00 - Taking a step back - for those outside the gaming community, what does Arena.gl do? Play to earn for any game.

31:45 - What types of games are applicable?

32:37 - Chess as an example – a sub-battle on Arena.

33:40 - What is the most complex gaming faceoff that Arena has handled?

35:25 - Does it work with card games? Casino gaming? Hold ‘em?

37:18 - What else is in the future for Arena? What’s on the roadmap that Chase is excited about?

39:22 - What does Chase think are the next waves in Web3 where the community could use entrepreneurs to build new products/services?

42:28 - Come check out https://arena.gl/ // https://twitter.com/ArenaGL // Contribute to a DAO (e.g. https://www.banyandao.xyz/) // Learn Solidity from https://austingriffith.com/ // https://learn.figment.io/