Lukas Seel: 0:00

Welcome everybody. This is Helios Horizons, episode 15, where we talk to people in the Web3 space and outside of it about technology and how it's changing the fabric of our society, and much more. Matt on will talk about a bunch of things, but mainly security, user experience and all the things that Web3 still has to catch up on, and then how they try to do their part with their project called EGLD Heist. Welcome to the show, Matt.

Matt Diaz: 0:41

Thanks, lucas. I want to start by saying how honored I was when Kevin reached out and asked me to be here today. It took me back in time a little bit, early, 21, when I first got my hands on the MyR wallet and staked my first eGold and in fact I think I went across two or three agencies for the first time and one of them was Helios Staking, and so you know, to be invited and come up and talk. You know now, after you know three and a half years of you know story of you know end user, you know becoming builder, you know and everything, and I'm just so appreciative to you guys and you know just all the support and like, seriously, like thanks for having me up here.

Lukas Seel: 1:25

It means the world to me wow, that's very nice to hear what. We're so happy to have you here and and talk a little bit about this journey. And I think this, um you know, community member to builder story is always one of the most interesting ones that we can talk um. But first, let's even talk about the idea of like, how you became the community member because, um, you know a lot of communities in the in the blockchain world to choose. Um, you ended up on elrond. That became multiverse x. But even first get in touch with the technology that is, blockchain and web3. What's the story behind that?

Matt Diaz: 2:14

So that could go several different directions and now I wear a lot of different hats trying to figure out kind of how I fit in. I'd even done an article there for X Alliance about overcoming imposter syndrome because I, because I think everybody you know here now knows, and those listening, you know, in the future you're not going to get, you know, the most technical talks you know out of me. I'm pragmatic, you know, dude with a little bit of life experience and an interesting family history story. So, lucas, I want to ask you first, before I dive in, I would kind of like to walk it back a little more because I think it explains better touching on the family history. And thank you for listening to my dad's story, which is on the bottom of my link tree, they're off my page. I kind of would love to talk about that if we have time for that.

Lukas Seel: 3:02

Yeah, I mean, actually in my notes there is family, background and life as one of them. I expected this to happen. Let's put it this way yeah, talk about. I mean, I think it really informs you know, not just like it really informs the way that you got into this space and what your sort of philosophy is on that. So, yeah, happy to have you walk us all the way back there.

Matt Diaz: 3:28

Yeah, yeah, I probably won't go all in but it'll give some good understanding and context and like to get that understanding of me. You know, there's a pivotal moment in my life in 91, when my father you know he suddenly passed away at the age of 55, and I was only 13 years old and you know it's always heartbreaking to lose a parent, you know. But this moment for you know, my collective family, I guess it's kind of ironic because of his history. And you know, without going too far into his story, because it's long whole story in and of itself, he was a political prisoner in communist Cuba from April May of 1961 until the end of 1962, when the United States essentially saved the prisoners from the failed Bay of Pigs invasion and that would actually be the second time that he exiled from Cuba. And that's why the other story is long and it's probably better, honestly, for the Linktree because it would take some time to go over that. But my family in Cuba, they lost everything and I wasn't alive then. You know I was born in 78. But my family did lose everything and, you know, ultimately, after the Bay of Pigs and incarceration, father comes to the United States and, you know, builds his life back up and you know has plenty of failures and successes along the way but you know, learns the language and plenty of, you know stereotypical, you know jokes to kind of go along the way, like he drove cab and used bus and tables and you know, promoted at work and ended up working for the state and meet my mom and so on and so forth and ended up doing pretty well for himself, uh, kind of through the uh, the Reagan years, you know, mid to late eighties. It was a little bit tougher there, uh, early on in my very younger years. But in the years leading up before his, you know his death, um, in the years leading up before his death, I had a pretty privileged childhood there for a few years, you know, with a lot of good Christmases and we had built a nice home and it was quite an accomplishment and, and you know it kind of reflects with everything that he'd been through, you know, from concentration camp to you know, being one of the most respected accountants. You know, from concentration camp to you know, being one of the most respected accountants, you know, in the greater Cincinnati and farther you know area. And so you know, after he passed away, here we are again. We, you know, essentially lost everything again, lost everything again.

Matt Diaz: 6:28

And this was a pivotal moment because I started working full time almost immediately to alleviate the financial pressures off of my At 13 or something, you were saying, it was at 14. It was the following year and, to kind of dive on that, here's a funny story. So the two of them always wanted, you know, wanted me to have private, you know, Catholic schooling. And she made that promise to him. And you know, now I'm man of the house and you know, only child, the two half siblings from Cuba, but in the second life, so to speak, in the American, you know, home, only child. And so, man of the house, I purposely tanked the entrance exams going into these two amazing Catholic high schools in the area, st Xavier and Moeller High School.

Matt Diaz: 7:20

And you know, I tanked them so bad because we had credit. You know she's going to put on her credit cards, but we had no money whatsoever and I tanked those. And sure enough, st X is like, no way, like this, this kid's not getting in and Mueller, mueller's a pretty sports oriented. They're like, you know what, we'll waitlist him, we'll put him on the waitlist and I'm like, oh my gosh. Like I probably got like a 30% on this thing. I remember like, almost like it was like the Scantron test back in the day. I almost remember like drawing shapes on there. You know, like I totally, you know, wanted to go to the public school with my friends at the time and I was trying to figure all that stuff out. Well, they ended up accepting me and she still ended up putting that stuff on her credit card and I went to the Catholic high school and she's like no, no, you know, like I know we're broke, but this vision forward for you, you know this is what we're going to do.

Matt Diaz: 8:12

Well, started working and, uh, everywhere, you know, kind of worked at 10, uh, after high school, of course I, I, they would throw more money at me. I was doing well, I was working at a good work, ethic and connected with people. Well, was, you know, nice enough or whatever, articulate enough to continue to do? Well, that it pulled me away from the schooling. So with the you know debt of, you know, the loans for school which is kind of relevant to conversations today you know I went more towards the money and didn't finish my schooling and so it kind of carries, you know, in through into the you know 2000s where I'm working and work my way up finally for a large pharmaceutical company and learned a lot of interesting things through there, kind of behind the scenes, just in regards to billing, and it just speaks, I suppose, to a lot of the greed that we may see in the business world and sort of the zero sum game that is, you know, money and the, I guess, the fear and the greed of people.

Matt Diaz: 9:33

Like I just saw some things that I was uncomfortable with and so I'm going to continue on that path. I meet my wife through this company, on that path, I meet my wife through this company. We have kids, I'm making money and I'm doing well for myself, but from a moral and ethical standpoint, what essentially had happened to me through these years is I was just point blank in why this part is important. I was losing the connection with with kind of God and the politics behind the things that were sort of ingrained to me through by circumstance, not like indoctrination, but more just ingrained to me as family values, was losing sight of those things, um, through those years and it was affecting me kind of like I don't know, like working for the man, like I just I saw and knew some things I really didn't like and you know, it still kind of affects me today and I've talked about it a little bit, but I tread lightly on some of the things there.

Matt Diaz: 10:43

But there, you know, maybe some parallels on some things that I know and I'm familiar with, that were challenges through the COVID years, parallels between my life, my family's history, decentralization, free speech, freedom, you know, finance, the timing of everything, you know, history rhyming, the human nature, you know, and things like that. And I think that's why I wanted to kind of start off and address those things, because I didn't really, you know, three and a half years ago, even two and a half years ago, even most of the last year, you know, I didn't talk about this that much because I wanted, you know, I didn't want to use any of that as leverage for, like you know, street cred or you know, whatever in the space, because it matches, you know, so well with the ethos. I don't want to use that. I wanted, you know, my work and who I am as a person to kind of, you know, speak for itself first, and then now I'm starting to bring this more, you know, to the surface, because I think that it's important and there's some.

Matt Diaz: 12:03

I get some wisdom or some great takeaways. You know that not just explain, you know my situations, but also just I just I really like to talk about the fact that you know we're so polarized and get locked into these blacks and whites that we forget the whole nuance and complexities of you know everything in between and I think that that vibe there speaks very heavily to, for example, the trilemma you know, which we'll be talking about today, that it's not finite. You know you can't get your hands on decentralization right and same things with balancing privacy and security. There's that forever. You know give and take. Well, our humanity needs to be the same. We can't dig our heels in, you know, and how.

Matt Diaz: 12:53

You know relevant is that statement to what's happened here in recent days. You know action, reaction and I'm kind of going on tangents, but you guys know me well. You know how damn passionate that I am about this and you know most people in the space like sure, like I came, you know, for the money to check it out. I was never even that attracted financial markets because of you know the money that drove them. And then I realized with this technology that you know? Wait a minute, this could be a whole different story.

Matt Diaz: 13:28

You know, we can actually like start to talk about this fear and greed and start to talk about human nature and start to challenge. You know, can we? You know, then that's where the conversation would, you know, go into governance and everything. But I'm just trying to kind of put a quick take on all of that, because it certainly isn't my tech mind or education, you know, that got me the lovely invite to be here today, but more so, just you know the hard work and conviction and the ethos and the vision you know, and just my passion for it that did so. I hope that gives you know some good insights for anybody that didn't know some of that stuff. Thanks.

Lukas Seel: 14:14

Yeah, some good background. So you know, working at this pharmaceutical company, do you remember the first time I mean, you were there for a long time, I take it Do you remember the first time hearing about crypto, hearing about Bitcoin and all these things, and your first reaction and then what kind of attitude you had to it and, if it changed at all over time, how was that first touchpoint?

Matt Diaz: 14:43

So those times were challenging because of the financial crisis. You know I had. Actually, I bought my first home at the age of 27. It was in 05. And then in 08, I find myself, you know, upside down on it and you know, seeing neighboring houses available for much, much cheaper than what I paid. You know luckily I was doing, you know well, for myself. I had outworked, uh, I'd actually met my wife in, uh, in an accelerated training program and uh, here's where it's funny. You want to talk overlaps and layers. She grew up like eight streets down from JDD Vance OK, maybe you know, possible future vice president of the United States of America.

Matt Diaz: 15:46

Jd Vance those familiar had a very, very difficult childhood and my wife's is very similar, in fact, the story that I understand. It is a watered-down version of what my wife went through and I'm a little bit hesitant because it usually wouldn't be something I talk about, but the thing is overcoming the type of child abuse that she overcame, that JD Vance overcame it's, and sorry, I know I'm kind of going off, but I'll circle back on things here that shapes people and so her progress and, you know, just being able to communicate and not shut down, and the mother and the wife that she is. She's an incredible hero and I'm so blessed to have her by my side supporting me while I'm, you know, buying monkey JPEGs, right, cause she understands and and gets that, and so, like it's just a huge shout out to her, cause without her, like I'm nothing. And it's just so interesting, you know, with with JD Vance, like that's the hillbilly elegy story. It is on Netflix right now. If anybody wants to check that out, watch that.

Matt Diaz: 17:07

And while I've certainly got my family history, you know that shapes us what you'll see, there is a watered-down version of what my wife survived. And so we met, you know, for this company and out of the people who were, there's 30 people in the accelerated class, her and I were two of the first three to be promoted and move up through the company. I'd rather not say the company's name, but Foy Docs, the LinkedIn's, all there, you know, dive in. So after the financial crisis, I did hear about Bitcoin in those years that I was still with that company and I didn't really think much of it. And that's where, like I think, looking back, I kind of I didn't realize, like how normie, normie like I had sort of become Not that it was bad.

Matt Diaz: 18:01

I had a beautiful wife and, you know, creating an amazing family and everything like that, but I just I was eating the wrong food. You know I wasn't taking care of my body. You know, I was just going along with you know things because I wanted society to accept me. I turned my back on my Christianity. I even turned my back on politics because I just wanted to disconnect. And if you listen to my dad's story, the message in there is that you have to participate, that you can't just be complacent.

Matt Diaz: 18:33

And so through these years and I think it's why it just felt so empty. But I was making money, y'all. I was living better then than now. You know the money was coming in, but because of my amazing wife and you know the the sacrifices that we've made for each other, you know I'm just going to continue to work towards the vision because it matters, because I can't handle the thought of my kids and then their kids based on what their grandfather went through already.

Matt Diaz: 19:06

I cannot bear the thought of capital controls and oppressions happening again. The human suffering is caused by other humans' greed and fear, and nobody's ever going to convince me anything else. You know very far outside of that. But of course I am always, you know, willing to listen. So I emphasize it again, lucas, just because you know. You know that is what's in my heart. But I knew of Bitcoin. I wished I would have looked, you know, closer at the time, but it wasn't quite my time yet because I still needed to, you know, figure some things out. I needed to. I didn't go looking for technology that would line up so well with my family history and who I am as a person. I kind of it just feels like I found it by accident, because no one really from the outside has an understanding of a lot of the things and the impact of the technology that we're talking about here today.

Lukas Seel: 20:10

And then very interesting. And then, when did you end up exploring that space a little bit more? Because I think at one point or another, all of us heard about Bitcoin. At one point or another, all of us dismissed the idea of Bitcoin, heard about Bitcoin. At one point or another, all of us dismissed the idea of Bitcoin. And then it's interesting when you first, you know, really take that leap and you know, buy a bit of something and in my case it was Bitcoin I'm not sure what it was for you. What was that first experience for you? And perhaps also how does that inform your work now?

Matt Diaz: 20:50

Bull run, lucas 2017. What better marketing than higher prices begets higher prices Something I didn't understand fully at the time, but I do a lot, know, a lot more now, and so you know we're we're kind of uh hopeful for similar, you know right Um to to happen in the future. But it was 2017, uh, you know Coinbase and you know watching, uh, watching a few videos of, uh, uh, brian Armstrong and his uh partner I forget his name, his name and you know I started buying a few of the top ones I think there were five or six on coinbase at the time. If that you know, you're talking like bitcoin, ethereum, litecoin, you know uh, deller, that was yeah, there you go my first ones.

Lukas Seel: 21:39

Yeah, I don't know. I haven't heard of them in a long time. I saw them on some recent event sponsorship but yeah, I remember those early Coinbase days.

Matt Diaz: 21:51

So yeah, and so it's interesting because here I am now. So basically, we're talking two and a half, three cycles. It's crazy to think that it's becoming that long, but it wasn't all in, right. It was just kind of a financial vehicle on some stuff that the price goes up. I know what it was. It's such a similar story, right, and so I ignored it for a while.

Matt Diaz: 22:16

You know, looked at it occasionally, I remember. I remember looking at it frequently and I know, I know every single one of you know what I'm talking about here where you go from looking at it every day because you're excited, to then, when you get through the bear and you check it in, maybe, you know, once a week, and then then, all of a sudden, two or three months go by and you've almost, like, forgotten it was there. And so then, when you know 2020, 2021 hits and that number's higher, you know, gosh, I wish I would have known that. I, you know, should have been buying. But you know, we all know it's with the markets like right now, and you know, sure, stock market's all time high. It's great, wonderful, everybody's, you know, throwing their money into, you know, overvalued assets to protect against inflation and we have no cash and everybody's broke. So even though had I known it was probably tougher times to those years, I probably wouldn't have had the capital to deploy.

Matt Diaz: 23:12

We've got to learn these lessons. We've got to teach these lessons as new people come in. When they come in with their liquidity and our bags are way up, who do you think we're going to be dumping on? But the very people who are showing up for guidance and education. That is very important to me. They're not going to listen, you know, and they're going to go 100x leverage trade and get wrecked and everything like that. But I'll be damned if I'm not shouting from the rooftops the lessons that we've all learned and if anybody's not, if they're only just out there shilling. I don't want those people in my network.

Lukas Seel: 23:47

I mean, that's a harsh statement, but that's just kind of how I feel about it. Yeah, and then you know you ended up on a small chain, a romanian chain, very far away from your, your hometown, your, your dad's hometown. Um, tell us the story how you, how you learned about alvarand and started becoming more involved in that ecosystem.

Matt Diaz: 24:09

So layers, right, lucas? You know trying to get comfortable and trying to understand. You know the difference between just the financial, because you come in you have these centralized exchanges and again it's just number go up, number go down. So I was trying to understand and doing some research and I don't remember specifically how. It just must have been a day of research. I was working a little bit with my nephew who was creating some content and had a Discord and everything like that. By the way, my Discord is from 2015, from retro video game playing and nerding out, but anyway, I don't remember exactly how.

Matt Diaz: 25:05

But when I went into the due diligence on it and I realized they were in Romania, I had remembered a little bit of. I was like, wait a minute, isn't or wasn't Romanian? Weren't they communist? And so then I started looking and brushing up a little bit on that history. I started looking and brushing up a little bit on that history and you know it's kind of like I was just willing to pay attention to the signs and so then as I dove in, I liked what I saw and when I compared, you know whether it was for the knowledge I had at the time you know, tokenomics, vision, or or you know the really the philosophical nature of, you know, benjamin, every time, and even still to this day, even though it has its ebbs and flows, I still feel more and more convinced, with more and more conviction, even through, you know, a difficult bear market.

Matt Diaz: 26:05

But essentially, lucas, you know, just because of the layers and the signs and whatever, or bias right, maybe my bias, but it's, it was, it's Romanian's country history and just the, the, the beautiful culture, you know, that that led me, led me there. Um, just, I don't just like that, like that's what it was Like, I guess. In a way it spoke to me and felt like it was where I was, you know, supposed to check things out, and I didn't understand that or couldn't explain that at the time. But now, with as much as I've fallen in love with the community and with you know, the people and what I know of the culture, like I cannot wait to go there, you know, for the very first time, you know. So, yeah, it's basically that man.

Lukas Seel: 26:59

Yeah, very, very cool. I'm going there in a few days. I'm excited to actually see the countryside, not just Bucharest. But let's talk about the, let's say, the feel and the user experience that you had, because, you know, buying coins and all this stuff was kind of an okay experience as long as you kept everything on Coinbase right, but then it becomes infinitely more complicated to move these coins around from a wallet to another wallet and all of this stuff. Was this something because we're kind of talking about the heist and wallet security and all of this stuff and user experience was that something you noticed right away? Was that something that you felt really off-put by? Was that something you could deal with because you had this gamer experience, so you were a little bit into figuring this stuff out? No-transcript.

Matt Diaz: 28:04

A great question and yet, right off the bat, metamask, that was a garbage user experience. It was very off-putting and at the time I didn't fully understand why approve, revoke and everything like that. And even to this day, a lot of educational point, pain point, pains, pain points on what you know could be. You know how much better things could be. So, yeah, like it's, it's, it's so difficult and the learning curve, you know, was and is, you know, so long to to get over that hump. That is a very difficult way to onboard people into the space. And you know, it's really cool that you know for this episode that there's kind of the combining of UX and security, because we usually talk about these things independently where, like as I laid out earlier, you know, I believe that all of these elements are a lot more connected, you know, than they are separate, and so there's some give and take. But with UX and security, you know, you don't necessarily have to have any give and take there. You can have the best UX in the world and the best security. You don't have to sacrifice, you know, ux for better security, ux for better security, and that excites me, you know, for the future, because certainly I don't know.

Matt Diaz: 29:32

Looking at prices, right, nine people out of 10 leave. You know what I mean. Like that, I don't know, I'm just kind of making that up because of 90% price corrections, but nine out of 10 who come in and check things out, you know, leave For whatever reasons. I didn't. I think it's just because you know, leave for whatever reasons. I didn't. I think it's just because you know the period of time I was in my life and you know the time through COVID and just my, you know, I took the time to look into what else was out there, like, well, because you know, it was like five cryptocurrencies on Coinbase in 2017. And then there's like hundreds and thousands. I'm like, well, what's the difference? Like I need to start learning, and I knew there was something here, something there I just needed to understand, and that kind of kicked off the you know long journey of education in the space, which will never ever, you know, stop because. Which will never ever. You know, stop, because I mean there's just so much to learn and you know, so I'm just continuing to try to absorb everything I can, but then also contribute in any way that I can. And so, you know, bias aside, I think you know, like I said earlier, with me being up here as end user, you know, turn to builder-ish. It speaks to the potential of the technology.

Matt Diaz: 30:52

And then when we enter in the conversation about you know real world type things, whether that is, you know, payment rails and direct to market, or just fear, fear surrounding uncertain times, that, oh, I kind of lost my train of thought there. That across with all of those points factored in that it would make sense that this will improve over time, not that this, you know, that this technology is a scam or that it's crap. You know, which I kind of get the feeling too many people do, which is why we have still so much to do in regards to education, which is why it's so important to vet and network. And I just want to say, on a side tangent, something that I've been thinking about the more people that dox themselves, the more real it becomes, and that in no way is a pressure to anybody. I want to make it very clear that I'll never tell anyone, you know, in a decentralized world, what to do, what to say, anything like that. That's not my place.

Matt Diaz: 32:07

But I do believe that the more people that are able to dock themselves and do it brings more credibility into the space, because it's very hard in real life to. You know, go and say and actually I almost wrote these words, actually shout out to subject number two for the response yesterday, your response Maybe I will do a full response on what we were talking about. Uh, last night this morning, uh, was this exact point that the. You know I can't go into my regular world and say, oh, say so. Hey, who's in your network, you know, and say, oh, yeah, like my boy. Subject number two you know what I mean like, and that's no shade at all, or anything like that. There's a lot of people in this space that cannot dox their government, like it is too scary for them to dox, right, I respect that, I would never pressure that, but I think it's important to highlight that point. The more people that do dox, the more real you know the whole uh, the whole ethos you know, the more credibility it gives it.

Lukas Seel: 33:15

I think that's an interesting point. This idea of like the trustless technology does not eliminate the need for human trust and you know like you can have as many you know anonymous mechanisms and code to really be this trust machine, in some sense like saying, you know, if this condition is met, then something else happens and we don't need this middle man that we trust. But peer to peer, this need for trust isn't eliminated. It's actually an interesting thing, like if you think about the bull market versus now, very few of us were doxxed, it was all just all of these NFT and PFPs and this stuff. Versus now here I am no longer chessucation, but there's my actual picture and my actual name very much out there, and I think that's an interesting development too, and I think, yeah, very true.

Lukas Seel: 34:18

I think as the technology matures, it's also going to become easier to actually dox and say this is who I am, this is the technology I want to explore, that I'm working with in all of these things or that I'm investing in, and it's going to be seen as less and less sketchy.

Lukas Seel: 34:28

But let's get back to the sketchy stuff, because I do want to talk about scams and all of this, all of the dangers of Web3 that perhaps don't really exist in Web2 in the same form. Was there a moment, like you know, one tell us about the first time you got scammed, one tell us about the first time you got scammed, and two, because that's always fun um, and then two like, did that immediately kind of set off, um, this wish to improve something in that space specifically? Or um, how did that, you know, trying to lead us towards, uh, egld, heist, and while the security, all these things did that already do something with you, where you thought, like, okay, education on these issues is important, but then also, how do we really showcase or improve the security features that exist or that need to be built in Web3?

Matt Diaz: 35:25

Okay, okay, a bit to unpack there, let's see. So as far as scan, there's definitely far more. You know, rugs. I think when I've shout out to NFTs because you know NF sent me learning more or understanding better, you know being able to see and just understand the why behind the UX and security issues surrounding approve and revoke functions. But what's that other part of your question, lucas? There's a lot in there, sorry.

Lukas Seel: 36:13

Well, no, no, no, it's very understandable. One was the first time you got scammed. Or, if you want to tell some scam stories can be on different chains, and then perhaps also how that differentiates maybe multiverse X from what's possible on other chains, that is not on MVX, but then also this idea of getting scammed. Did that set off any alarms or the wish to be part of the change, of making this space more secure?

Matt Diaz: 36:50

Okay, actually, I think I consider myself a little bit lucky because, due to the timing of when I was doing more off-chain things, prices were high and Ethereum was bottlenecked and transaction costs were so high that I wasn't doing a ton of them and I was never compromised on that end, but I was rugged. And so then, as I was rugged, that sent me down, you know, to learn and I forget it was like a Shiba, something you know, and it was kind of a partner project through another, uh, through, I think, through the discord with my nephew or something like that. Like it just it's crazy with what you're. I mean, we're talking, you know, three, three and a half years ago, I think, feels like 10 or 20. But it was that where I think I was lucky. And then in that same time, I started finding the alt L ones and looking into that, started learning you know deep, hard on the financial side about you know Bitcoin, dominance and money flow, and that's actually like, even though I was a part of Elrond at the time, in those early days I wasn't as socially visible because I was doing more general you know things and finance and I was putting in so much work to get up to speed on finance and tech. I remember there my wife's amazing, but you know 20 through 21,. I mean I was probably putting in, you know like like 80 to a hundred hour. You know weeks just of charting and and and tech education, just so that I could at least one day be able to carry on a conversation and sound like I know what the hell I'm talking about. You know that plays into the, you know imposter syndrome, that that I've kind of struggled with, and and the, the one of the reflections I think that I've sort of learned.

Matt Diaz: 38:44

These last few years have been of tremendous personal growth for me and spiritual growth because it's been very fulfilling, but also a lot of challenges I have had. You know ridiculous like next level things in IRL between my health and my mom and things at home. It's just been such a fascinating time and my mom and things at home that it's just been such a fascinating time so like, and I'm so thankful to be able to find this technology and bring value into the world. You know from from home and it speaks a little bit in my mind. I don't know if I can articulate this properly, but you know when I grew up, it was when I was growing up, when a lot of us were growing up. It was, you know, when I grew up. It was when I was growing up, when a lot of us were growing up. It was, you know, sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.

Matt Diaz: 39:35

And you know, now, today, with this technology, we're also interconnected, that we, I do believe that we've got to be more careful with our words, which is why I try to approach all interactions, you know, with a kind heart and with empathy and understanding, even when I feel attacked.

Matt Diaz: 39:53

You know, like if someone you know tries to shoot someone that maybe I'm voting for, that can evoke a lot of emotional response and it's very concerning and scary to me. You know that people could, how different the world could be in a matter of an inch or a split fraction of a second, and so I'm just appreciative to the power of this technology. But if you, you know, if you hand a man a hammer, one man's going to go build a house. Another man, a hammer, he might smash someone in the the head, and same can be said for this technology. And so I just, you know, want to be that, that source of you know of good, like to use this technology for good, for what it's, what it's capable of, and so just continued learning, and I couldn't have found a better technology and better people and community to align myself with for that mission.

Lukas Seel: 41:00

Well, now let's talk about the mission and let's talk about this sort of community-led or community-organized initiative, and especially in this education thing, I think it's very important that things really come from the people and not from the top right. I think it's probably also an interesting thing that kind of reflects back to your life. But you at some point, together with Drew, your partner in EGLD Heist, had this idea for basically demonstrating what the technology on Multiverse X, the Guardian technology on the exporter wallet and the 2FA on-chain security measure is capable of but there was a whole backstory to it is capable of, but there was a whole backstory to it. So talk us through this you know the initial idea, perhaps the background, and then how you guys started putting this initiative together and also tell us what the initiative is, because I don't want to give it away.

Matt Diaz: 42:03

Well, of course, real quick. You know the e-gold heist. For anyone that doesn't know, the initiative is essentially leaking a public, you know seed phrase, you know taking the private keys and making them public right, leaking that and we had a lot of fun doing that and it's still. There's still funds in that wallet, you know, still post. We haven't been talking about it as much because we, you know, did what we set out to do, but it is, you know, still there and we're just kind of slowly wrapping things up. Drew's had a bunch of IRL stuff to holding him up but, you know, all is good.

Matt Diaz: 42:37

I consider it very successful and absolutely could not have been done without the support of an amazing community that understands a lot of things we've talked about today and the importance you know, this technology and the education, um, but in regards to drew and I, we've actually only known each other since, I want to say, february, february, maybe, march, maybe there was some social interactions in february and actually started talking in March. We were in an X spaces with DB, crypto and Rad Recy. There's some giveaway for X Fabric access, beta, x Fabric access, you know, and I'm like, oh my goodness, like think about that. You know, from my perspective, right as a end user, you know, trying to figure out how to build and contribute the idea of having an operating system to create my own dApps like mind-blowing right. This is, like you know, one of the first things to give insight into what the future could look like, like WordPress for Web3. I'm like I got to get my hands on that, so I did whatever I had to do for the giveaway.

Matt Diaz: 43:41

It was Drew and I that won, and so then we just got to chatting and find out a little bit about him, you know, and his sovereign nomadic life and his backstory, and he reached out to me and you know y'all know how that goes. You got to be careful, but it's very helpful that you know he's a longtime known single node operator, you know, on Elrond now Multiverse X, so that helped with the vetting process and he said a lot of really nice you know. There were some nice compliments in there as far as things that I've been talking about now for a long time about these values surrounding decentralization. It turned out that we are very aligned, you know, and he left Canada and went to Mexico, you know, to maintain his sovereignty issues from you know, through COVID and things like that. I resonate with that. You know, agree or disagree. Facts are that people are on, you know, different sides of different topics and we can either decide to fight forever. We can open up our hearts and, you know, decide to understand where other people are coming from and communicate and educate so important. And so we got to work together.

Matt Diaz: 45:04

And he's like hey, I got this idea, remember when the team you know did their giveaway, but I think, if I remember right, it was the test now which, and it was cool, like for $20,000, if you hack the account, you know, then you'll get the funds sent to you and he basically pitched me the idea. He's like what do you think? He's like I'm? He's like I'm kind of quiet and don't say a whole lot on socials, but uh, it was. Uh, this is where he told me and shared screenshots with me that back in the early like not early days validator chat, but back probably somewhere maybe around the ride launch validator chat, maybe somewhere around there. Uh, he's a big voice for for 2fa and caught a bit of resistance on it and there is a little bit of nuance and confusion there whether it's actually on-chain technology or if it's Google's technology, because of the 2FA authenticator function and through, just kind of, the way he is, you know, relentlessly communicating and pushing, I can vouch for him. His heart is absolutely in the right place and I'm thankful for that, because that pushing brought us the Guardian, which then was able to bring us, you know, eagle Heist, which then ultimately allows me to be able to come up here and, you know, talk about things that are very, very important to me, and I'm appreciative for that.

Matt Diaz: 46:29

And so, uh, he pitched me the idea and he's like, hey, you got a little. You know, you seem like someone that I would, you know, like to know. Like he opened up to me. He, like you know, saw things I was saying and and opened up to me and, you know, let me in. And I'm like, yeah, like I might be able to, you know, tap the network a little bit and explain what we want to do here and we might be able to get some traction. And he said, well, he's like I was going to do it myself and even if it's just me putting the money in, you know, if you want to throw in and we just run it on ourselves, perfectly fine, with that. I said, let's do it. And then I got to work and that's where I guess I can pat myself on the back a little bit in the amazing community. I reached out to a lot of people that I'd established relationships over the year.

Matt Diaz: 47:23

Lucas, you know yourself, through on-chain smok leaked one of the key words. You know, peppy security friend I made back in 21 on Ethereum Leet. He did. You know Rad Stephanie from Geek Mark Yusko he was probably the largest follower. Count on X that leaked the seed phrase. That was such an exciting, you know special moment that he agreed to do that.

Matt Diaz: 47:54

Cause it's not like I know market that well, you know we've spoken, we've talked, he's been on Craig's podcast and so I was just able to cash in some of the, that social currency. You know of the, that social currency. You know of the years of, you know networking and talking strategy and getting rugged and investing in this person or that person. And you know trying to do my own projects and initiatives and getting you know hurt by, uh, founders and partners and everything like that. And you know, through all that, not quitting. And you know, just keep it on. We're able to do that. And then, for reasons unknown, you know that tweet must have the tweet with the full leak seed phrase must have gone through some circles of some kind of hacker, dark web thing or something Cause. Like overnight it shot up from like 160,000 or 200,000 views up to 5.4 million views, and so when that happened, you know, I feel like everybody you know kind of like, oh yeah, like we like Matt, matt like Matt does stuff.

Matt Diaz: 49:05

But then when that happened it was like, oh crap, like okay, this ended up, you know, actually a pretty cool marketing campaign and it was all kind of done and Lucas, like you and I even remember on the early days, cause you were you were so meticulous and amazing, you know, at your approach and the way you do things, and I did a little bit more on the fly and just sort of leaked seed phrases here and there and it was just really raw and just real, you know, and just fully like like organic, you know, and the way it all ended up, you know, coming to fruition, I'm like super proud of like it couldn't have been better. And then when you reached out with the idea um, I don't know if it was yours or if it was someone else's to pass out the seed phrase, you know, in person at a proof of talk, that was like that was really really cool, that was fun.

Lukas Seel: 50:00

Yeah, that was fun to do too, because it's like it's very weird to any blockchain person that somebody comes up to you with their seed phrase and just hands it to you, because that's obviously an insane thing to do For those web toolers out there. A seed phrase gives you access to the wallet and there's the famous phrase not your keys, not your coins. And you're never supposed to share that seed phrase with anyone. Put it in a very safe place, preferably not even save it anywhere online, but just have it on a piece of paper or carve it into some stone. Old school and then keep it forever and keep it safe, because if you don't, um, your funds are gone.

Lukas Seel: 50:50

Except now, let's talk about this, this, um, protective technology of the guardian. Um, how does it work? And, um, how were you able to leverage that to kind of like show, show this technology to people? And also, what kind of difference does it make in a space that's already very, let's say, dangerous to interact with sometimes, because if your money is gone, there's no bank or insurance you can run to and say, hey, this was my money and now it's gone? Um, you know what does change in in terms of ux and user security and usability of the of the technology.

Lukas Seel: 51:28

I know that was a lot of questions again.

Matt Diaz: 51:31

You might have to guide me through some more because my thoughts will often tie into others, but I think it's interesting. With such advanced tech and trying to sort of redo a lot of the existing tech that users are used to, we're trying to, you know, basically agree on certain standards in order to build bigger and better into the future and sort of where we find ourselves right now, like everybody's building different roads to head towards, you know, a hopeful utopia. You know tongue in cheek, but you know what I mean. So there's a lot of nuance and it's hard sometimes to set the right language and terms on a lot of the tech talks and oftentimes I'm glad and thankful that I don't have, you know, like expert understanding of. You know the intricacies of the tech because I see the confusion in terms even while I'm reading through or listening to. You know dev speak that leads to, you know, confusions and just the translations there, you know, and trying to figure out how to build. But there's, I guess there's a little, there's a little nuance with, for example, we caught a little bit of crap for leaking a seed phrase, not a lot, but a little bit because of how perceived reckless it is, and it just is very interesting, uh, speaking to everyone's different you know experiences and why it's important to understand you know from a human aspect and for communication and education, to understand where people you know are coming from.

Matt Diaz: 53:20

So when I first heard that, I was like I didn't expect that, like I didn't think somebody was going to be mad at me for what they said was miseducating users and making them think that they can post their you know seed phrase. But I understood in their position where they could see that is reckless, you know, and so, like it didn't hurt my feelings, if any, you know, I didn't like feel bad or ever think for a moment we were doing you know the wrong thing. But also there's that possibility that it was, you know so threatening you know, to their bags that they were extra offended to it, you know, and wanted to FUD and then so the same kind of nuance with the tech. I believe, if we and Lucas, you and I have talked about this and you know going to be, I believe, if we and Lucas, you and I have talked about this and you know going to be addressed, we're again, we are, you know, trying to agree on how to, or trying to agree on how to Google, for example, and they see me out there saying, yo, check out this amazing multiverse X tech and they're like that's not multiverse X tech, that's Google. You know 2FA authenticator.

Matt Diaz: 54:47

Well, you know, again, we're having disagreements, you know, over tech and so, again, like, even with the people within, there's confusion and educational, you know, pain points. There's a lot of confusion like and some of it's very tech, heavy, heavy, like a lot of people, you know the devs, they know that when you create a wallet, you know whether it's X portal or or MetaMask, that you have access to all these other chains, right, well, you don't have private keys for each of those chains. You have the one, you know, master key to access those, those chains and it is essentially created behind the scenes. You know the child keys to access those other chains and you know addresses. Like that's some tech heavy stuff, you know, and that stuff I learned. I didn't learn that I had never even thought about that or considered that until you know someone came in, you know, and started, like you know, sort of flooding you know the process and that it kind of led me down, you know, and started, like you know, sort of fighting. You know the process and that it kind of led me down you know the path of understanding that more, because I was trying to understand exactly you know kind of how the 2FA works and even to this day I wouldn't be able to, you know, explain it properly.

Matt Diaz: 56:07

But I can say that it doesn't use any Google products. It just so happens that Google has such a you know, basic monopoly. I mean, is that not why we're here, right? But it is like the educational standards. You say Google 2FA and people assume, ok, google 2FA, we can use YubiKey, you can use. You know, it's like and I kind of said it a little funny to you, lucas, in Telegram you know that all Gmail is email, but not all email is Gmail, and so, when it comes to this, you know technology, it's not you know Google tech, it is multiverse X tech.

Matt Diaz: 56:51

Now, in regards to when you use the invisible guardian on X portal, users will notice that it actually lists itself as being more secure than the external guardian, which is quite a claim 2FA, and how it is verifying on the native device and why the team decided to put the 20-day cool down in in case something was ever compromised. At least you could take some action and still have control over your own wallet. And so that technology is fascinating to me because essentially it's like we've walked into Times Square, taken a debit card and the pin number and stuck it on an ATM machine and walked away and the people keep coming by and try to take out the funds and they can't. It's provably more secure than a bank, kinda, kinda. And I say think kind of, kind of.

Matt Diaz: 57:52

And I say kind of with that caveat, because there's the accountability and, like we said earlier, the give and take between the trilemma, you know, between security and convenience. There's that personal accountability. With the personal accountability, you know the proper uh web, three standards of past and moving forward with new technology. With that um, uh, with that accountability, your friends, funds are provably safer than even at your own bank yeah, very, very interesting and a very interesting um analogy.

Lukas Seel: 58:29

I think think that is quite intense, right? Like, if this is possible with this technology but it's not with traditional banking, then what the hell are we still doing with traditional banking and what the hell are all the other chains doing not implementing the same technology that actually keeps your money and funds safe, even when there is a problem with a compromised thing, which can always happen in this space. There are so many ways this can really happen without users doing dumb things, and then again you always have to assume that users do dumb things because that's just how that works as well. That works as well. So it's very important that we put a huge premium on technology that keeps users safe by default and not just as like a fancy, cute feature. That should be the baseline for technology. We're at the hour mark, so I'm going to open it up.

Lukas Seel: 59:33

If anybody wants to come up on stage and ask Matt a question, now would be the time to request. You mentioned the future of technology and UX and security and I'm curious your two-minute take on. Where do you see the space going in terms of that? Do you think Web3, the Guardian technology and technology like the Guardian, will be the standard, and how will people you know start interacting perhaps a little bit differently now that there's more people coming into the space again, that the technology is more widely available? What do you think the security standards will be, or will have to be to get that next wave going?

Matt Diaz: 1:00:15

It's a very interesting question and immediately I can't help but think about how, you know, the whole landscape of Web 2 changed with the creation. You know smartphone right, and so you know there's a quote and I always forget the author's name every time, but it's that you can't change someone's mind, but you can build the tools to change their way of thinking. That's always stuck with me, even though the daggone author's name I always forget it. Um, but you know, I think, moving forward, you know, assuming that we, you know, remain on the smartphone standard, I think that you know it needs to be smaller, uh, smaller changes over a longer period of time. You're going to see what the innovation so you need to bring.

Matt Diaz: 1:01:10

You know the classic 2FA, because that's what people are used to and even in that scenario, sometimes that's like a newer thing. You know that some of the older people in my life have been, you know, getting to know more. You know through email and whether they get their 2FA through email or SMS. But then you know a lot of us here. You know we're familiar with some of the potential risks and attack vectors. You know, with passing the 2FA information you know over to the right user. So I like the path that we're on and I would love you know to, I'd love to to speculate, you know, and to dream as far as what things you know could look like. And I think the good news is is that we're hitting we're hitting a point that um, not necessarily in the market cause I still think we're a cycle away from from people caring about security and two cycles away from people caring about security and two cycles away from people caring about decentralization. But I think, generally speaking, that we're getting close to where you could almost reverse engineer a perfect world scenario, but it's, of course, going to be impossible because of the give and take across privacy and security. And the reason that I say this is because, look, if I have a lock on the front door of my home, which I do and I use, I also risk getting locked out of my home. And the more security measures that I put on my front door or my you know window in order to remain safe, the more likely of a chance it goes up that I get locked out of my home. And so, like it's stuff like that that I, you know, think about as I dream, you know.

Matt Diaz: 1:03:12

So what would the you know, perfect security be like, well, it'd be that, you know, bank that actually has your money, right, not fact, fractional reserve or or zero reserve, cause, lucas, you asked you know like, well, okay, well, why aren't banks doing that? Well, cause they don't have the damn money, you know, and that's why we're all here, right, and so there's so many flaws there in the system and that driving system of the existing technology that that speaks to the exact, you know, literal, possible life and death kind of things that we're talking about here, as long as the lights stay on, you know, not, definitely not a doomsday or anything, but I'm a light prepper. You know I want to make sureomsday or anything, but I'm a light prepper, you know I want to make sure that I have the things I need. So, as far as speculating forward, you know, I think I think we're getting close to a point where we could you know I made mention of reverse engineering like a perfect world scenario where it's a centralized or it's not a centralized entity.

Matt Diaz: 1:04:13

Right, you're decentralized and you have the utmost security, where only you can ever access your funds and approve transactions, but then, on the worst day, who is going to save you and how, without that centralized entity. That is the tale we're chasing, and damn it. I don't go to my grave, lucas, trying to figure it out, man, like I know. I don't know the tech, you know, but I understand how important that it is and that crypto is an inevitability, as long as the lights stay on.

Lukas Seel: 1:04:52

Yeah, very, we're over time already. So Matt, please a short question and the other, Matt Diaz, a short.

Matt: 1:05:10

GM, gm, matt, oh there you go.

Matt Diaz: 1:05:13

What? There you go what's on?

Matt: 1:05:15

what's on? Yeah, you know I'm a big fan of e-gold heist. Um, I was just wondering I doubt you know whether anyone actually got close. But, um, were the multiverse x team confident in it or did they like have a squeaky bum time and have to make any changes because potentially we may have got close to hacking it? Yeah, just wondering if they had to make any changes themselves off the back of what you've done with the gold ice.

Matt Diaz: 1:05:46

That's a great question. I think in the in the early, in the early days of it, they're like oh geez, here we go, here it goes. You know, I hope this goes well. I hope these guys don't rug like what's gonna happen here. But they, they were amazing. And so, for those that don't know, and I'll just cover it quick uh, got a lot of excitement, got a lot of hype and then, uh, boo, boo, grow bucks from X white hat amazing I'm so glad to have gotten to know him a little bit through these months because he created a brute force attack DAP, where people could go in and lend their IP addresses so that more attacks could come at the Guardian to try to better the odds of a coordinated effort.

Matt Diaz: 1:06:29

And that was so cool. I got to admit, when I first saw it I got a little bit nervous because I was doing a little bit of the math on what this could look like and I started thinking this tech is great and I know nobody's going out posting their seed phrases, but we're starting to see ETFs approved and we're looking at institutional money and if we're going to realize this vision, we have got to get our shit together. And so when he did that. We'd already been talking about the team lightly, about potentially getting in some kind of other layer, whether that's like a second guardian, whether that's, you know, like a second guardian, because I thought, wow, could you imagine if you had invisible guardian with as easy it is because it's automatic, then kick automatically to an external and have to go through you know, both of those like I'm like that would be incredible, you know. So we're kind of lightly chatting about that.

Matt Diaz: 1:07:26

When the brute force attack dap came within 36 or 48 hours, they had a solution where, essentially, when you, when, uh, when, uh, when when the chain or see this, where my knowledge of the tech hurts when, when the attacks would be coming in as a brute force, they were able to set it up so that that it recognized that this attack was coming. So like you run up to the guard outside the door and you punch him in the face right, and he's like no, you're not getting in right. But then five, six people come in and start mobbing that guard. All of a sudden he gets a million times bigger or a million of them pop up. They delivered that within 36 to 48 hours. They were amazing. Thanks for that question.

Lukas Seel: 1:08:12

Yeah, I think really cool to hear that, cornish. I hope that was a good little story.

Matt: 1:08:19

Yeah no, really appreciate that. It was good to hear, and I think what you've done is, you know, lessened any potential exploits. What you've done is benefited the whole MVvx ecosystem.

Lukas Seel: 1:08:33

so fair play to you, bravo yeah, and I really want to emphasize that point. Uh, specifically right, because it's so, so cool how many improvements like this actually are started by the community and they. You know this system. Obviously it's a very strange attack if that would, if somebody would do this deliberately and then also invite the entire world to hack it. It's like there's a possibility that this gets hacked, but then again, to change it, that even if this is the case, it's very, very, very, very hard and very unlikely that it succeeds. That's very cool, matt. Thank you so much for your question. Matt Diaz, thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us. It was a pleasure. Thank you everybody who listened today and everybody who's listening wherever you are right now. This was episode 15 of Helios Horizons with EGLD Heist and Matt Diaz. We'll speak to you next week with more exciting guests. Thank you all so much for tuning in. Thank you all for being here and talk very soon. Bye-bye.