01 / The Engineer
I trained as an electrical engineer (BS EE, RIT, 2022) and went into automation. At PCC Structurals I led a $1.5M robotics project and pushed throughput up 7x. Traditional coding felt rigid to me. Then blockchain showed software could move value directly between people, and that reframed everything.
02 / The Bear-Market Builder
I came into web3 during the 2022 to 2023 bear market. The worst possible timing, which turned out to be the best: the people still building were serious, no tourists. I started ZTalent Agency, then pivoted it into The ZAO (ZTalent Artist Organization) in 2023 and turned toward creator infrastructure.
03 / The Problem
Streaming pays artists about $0.003 a play. Labels keep 80 to 85% of the revenue. Platforms own the audience, the social graph, and the algorithm, so when a platform shuts down, artists lose everything, because none of it ever belonged to them. The tools to fix this already exist. The gap is distribution and community.
04 / The Builder
So I built The ZAO. Not a platform, an ecosystem. WaveWarZ for onchain music battles. Two festivals produced, in NYC and Miami. ZAO OS for the Farcaster client, governance, and a research library. 400+ daily newsletter editions, 80+ open-source repos, and 100+ fractal governance meetings over nearly two years.
05 / The Connector
Then I moved to rural Maine: rich arts culture, almost no blockchain exposure. I connected with local musicians who have been building the scene since the 1980s. ZAOstock is the result, a real music festival in Ellsworth this October, not a web3 conference. That is the throughline now: I bring the right people together.