Time;Teacher;Course

Time; Title; Moderator; Speakers; Description 9:50 AM ET; This Halving is Different; Mod: Natalie Brunell (CoinStories Podcast); Maksim Balashevich (Sentiment AG), Rena Shah (Trust Machines), Matthew Sigel (VanEck); Bitcoin's fourth halving takes place in a very different world from the one Satoshi Nakamoto published his white paper in. This is the first halving with broad-based retail and institutional adoption of Bitcoin through U.S. spot ETFs the first halving occurring outside a zero-interest rate policy environment and the first halving taking place alongside serious geopolitical events. Our panel will delve into the data, the markets forces, and the technologies that set this Bitcoin halving apart from the others. 10:10 AM ET; From Digital Gold to Cloud Casino: Will Runes Bring Degens to Bitcoin?; Mod: 0xDima (SatScreener); Akshat Vaidya (Maelstrom), Jason Lau (OKX), Rafael Cardenas (Hiro); "Runes were built for degens and memecoins," the protocol's creator, Casey Rodarmor, said in a recent Twitter post. That's a good thing... right? Runes may be a less clunky alternative to BRC-20s but many of them will be shitcoins through and through. And certainly a departure from the "digital gold" narrative favored by BTC diehards. This panel of builders and observers will weigh the costs and benefits of introducing tokens to the original blockchain. 10:30 AM ET; What Can Bitcoin Do Better?; Kyle Ellicott (Stacks); Meltem Demirors (Stacks Foundation), Ryan Selkis (Messari); Bitcoin L2s are driving the original blockchain into territory previously trod by Ethereum and its L2s. What lessons do those chains offer that bitcoin builders can learn from? This crew of seasoned heavyweights will survey the landscape and offer their takes on where the Bitcoin community excels and where it needs to up its game. 11:00 AM ET; Fighting Fragmentation: Why Bitcoin UX Needs a Level-Up; Mod: Ren Crypto Fish (Electric Capital); Nick Sainato (Gamma.io), Kevin Kim (Phantom), Mark Hendrickson (Leather); This talk explores the pressing issue of fragmentation in Bitcoin user experience (UX) and argues for an essential upgrade. It delves into the challenges users face when navigating the Bitcoin ecosystem, from understanding wallets to conducting transactions. 11:20 AM ET; Bitcoin for a Billion Users; N/A; Illia Polosukhin (NEAR Protocol); NEAR Co-founder Illia Polosukhin connects the dots between Bitcoin and AI in this talk. He'll explain how chain abstraction is the missing link between the two technologies and why it's key to onboarding the next billion to Bitcoin. 11:30 AM ET; Why Bitcoin Matters in the AI Era; Mod: Charlie Spears (Blockspace Media); Brittany Laughlin (Stacks Foundation), Margueritte De Courcelle / Coin Artist (Blockade Labs), Illia Polosukhin (NEAR Protocol); Description to come. 11:50 AM ET; It's Time for Bitcoiners to Start Thinking About Interop; Mod: Will Foxley (Blockspace Media); Robinson Burkey (Wormhole Foundation), Ahmad Alkabra (Rootstock Labs), Alex Miller (Hiro); This panel of builders will discuss the latest in cross-chain connectivity as Bitcoin's growing L2 landscape drives the need for more bridges. 12:25 PM ET; Muneeb Ali in Conversation With BOB's Alexei Zamyatin; Kyle Ellicott (Stacks); Muneeb Ali (Trust Machines), Alexei Zamyatin (BOB); It's a meeting of the minds between two key players in the Bitcoin L2 conversation. Muneeb needs no introduction as the creator of Stacks and the leader of Trust Machines. Alexei is the co-founder of BOB, a hybrid L2 that combines Bitcoin's security and Ethereum's programmability. We'll hear from him about why a Bitcoin renaissance is imminent. 12:45 PM ET; Bitcoin Semantics Session: Rollups; N/A; Janusz Grzegorz (Bitcoin Layers); A talk on rollups in theory and in practice. What are the limitations with current designs? 12:55 PM ET; Rollups and Sidechains: What's the Difference?; N/A; Janusz Grzegorz (Bitcoin Layers), Andre Serrano (Stacks Foundation), Elena Giralt (Hiro Systems); With the whirl of upgrades happening on Bitcoin, it's easy to get lost. So let's get back to basics with this session. We'll go over Bitcoin layer categories, from consensus to data availability. Then we'll explore the tradeoffs between rollups and sidechain designs. Finally, we'll cover a little Stacks history and look at where the project is headed. 1:10 PM ET; Bird's Eye View on Nakamoto; Mod: Andre Serrano (Stacks Foundation); Kenny Rogers (Stacks Foundation); A rapid fire session that lays out everything that's coming with Nakamoto. We'll discuss how to get apps ready for the release, what a healthy validator ecosystem looks like, and explain the benefits of Nakamoto. 1:30 PM ET; Smart Contracts: Build, Test & Integrate With the Hiro Platform; N/A; Leah McBeth (Hiro); Web3 development can seem daunting, but with the right tools, anyone can get started. In this session, dive into the process of writing and testing a Stacks Smart Contract, empowering you to bring your Bitcoin dApp ideas to life. 2:00 PM ET; What the Halving Means for Bitcoin DeFi; Mod: Tycho Onnasch (Zest Protocol & Stacking DAO); Hadan Esperidiao (ALEX), Dylan Floyd (BitFlow), Jakob Schillinger (Hermetica); The halving is here, but how does that impact Bitcoin DeFi? From yield farming to perps, what's different about the fourth halving? We've gathered the best players in the ecosystem to hash it out. 2:20 PM ET; Building on Bitcoin Hackathon; Mod: Adam Haun (Stacks Foundation); Dom Kwok (EasyA), Phil Kwok (EasyA); Hear about the latest Building on Bitcoin Hackathon: 'The Halvathon Hackathon'. We're getting together IRL again as we host our first Stacks hackathon of 2024 in Boston with EasyA at Harvard University. Two key upgrades are coming to Stacks which will for the first time ever bring true programmability and speed to Bitcoin itself. It's a once in a lifetime opportunity. One you definitely won't want to miss. Register here: https://stx.is/halvathon