Lefteris Karapetsas: Rotki – From Ethereum Devcon 0 to Building Rotki

We are, arguably, still early in the crypto industry, but some people were really…really early. One of them is Lefteris Karapetsas, who joined EthDev in 2014 and contributed to building the Ethereum ecosystem, since before the genesis block. His crypto journey is one for the history books, as after EthDev he joined Slock.it, right around the time of The DAO raise…and hack. Lefteris remained a core supporter of decentralisation and an active member of the Ethereum community, being involved (and delegated) in multiple projects’ governance. More recently, he founded Rotki, an open source portfolio management app that aims to preserve user privacy. 

We were joined by Lefteris Karapetsas, true Ethereum OG, to discuss his 10-year long journey through the Ethereum ecosystem, from joining EthDev (pre-Devcon 0) to founding Rotki.

Topics covered in this episode:

• Lefteris’ background
• Ethereum’s beginnings
• Joining Slock.it
• The DAO r(a)ise and hack
• Ethereum classic hard fork
• Brainbot & Raiden Network era
• Founding Rotki
• Crypto accounting privacy
• The challenges of building a local app
• Rotki membership tiers
• Upcoming portfolio management on Rotki
• Future roadmap for Rotki
• How Ethereum’s culture evolved over time
• Ethereum public good funding. Optimism governance
• Hopes and fears regarding Ethereum’s future

Episode links:

• Lefteris Karapetsas on Twitter
• Rotki on Twitter

Sponsors:

• Gnosis: Gnosis builds decentralized infrastructure for the Ethereum ecosystem, since 2015. This year marks the launch of Gnosis Pay— the world's first Decentralized Payment Network. Get started today at - gnosis.io
• Chorus One: Chorus One is one of the largest node operators worldwide, supporting more than 100,000 delegators, across 45 networks. The recently launched OPUS allows staking up to 8,000 ETH in a single transaction. Enjoy the highest yields and institutional grade security at - chorus.one

This episode is hosted by Friederike Ernst. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/533