Deanna Hood spends her days writing code to instruct robots on how to print skin for surgeons helping burn victims or to enable miniscule imaging devices to scan human arteries. So it was a bit of a surprise when the roboticist took a left turn into writing code for crypto. 

She wanted to challenge herself with writing new types of code for applications outside the medical field, but ran into a common problem for people accustomed to web2 applications: learning a crypto-specific code language like Solidity under the pressure of a hackathon is daunting. That meant her initial foray into the world of crypto at a hackathon in Amsterdam was too hard, but it didn’t deter her. 

Determined to try again, she applied to the ETHGlobal hackathon in Lisbon, which was where the penny dropped. This time, she was able to make a decentralized application, or dapp, with the same software language she uses in her everyday work. 

She built ChainGPT, a decentralized and verifiable chat artificial intelligence (AI) bot that placed in the top 10 projects at the hackathon. 

“What had changed in the crypto community between the Amsterdam and Lisbon hackathons is that Cartesi had ‘opened up’ the application space and made it possible for non-crypto developers to write programs in Python and C++ software,” she said to me in a recent interview. “These are ubiquitous web2 languages and what I usually write in as a roboticist.”  

The difficulty in building crypto projects has long been the need to know the Solidity coding language so devs can create smart contracts themselves, Hood said. That’s not for everyone. “But now, web2 people can write code like they normally would and leverage the blockchain as a feature, like I did in Lisbon,” Hood said. “I was able to focus on the interesting use cases, rather than having to learn crypto-specific code.” Her project was also judged the best use of Cartesi at the Lisbon hackathon.  

The message Hood wants to get across to people new to web3, especially women, is that what’s required to learn how to write crypto code isn’t as big a leap as people think. 

Blockchain not a bro’s game 

Hood, the Australian Young Engineer of the Year 2022, admitted she had to psyche herself up to partake in the hackathons, which she was used to doing as a woman in STEM. 

It was normal for Hood to be the only woman in the room. She’s built the muscle of advocating for herself, but worries women in other industries aren’t exploring web3, assuming they’re not experienced enough. She emphasized it’s not about skills, but rather, the perception of compatibility. 

“It’s easy to say women aren’t applying for these opportunities or jobs because they’re not confident, but it’s more nuanced than that,” Hood said. “It’s rule-following. It’s the feeling of belonging. It needs to be propagated first at the emotional level before any hard skills come into it.” 

Hood believes it’s possible to move into web3 and make something groundbreaking with the tools and libraries you already know. Blockchain concepts are much more important to understand rather than seeing blockchain as a big scary thing. This means having more “look before you leap” opportunities to explore and socialize, to bring more diverse people into web3, she said.  

“I got interrupted in my ETHGlobal talk for a round of applause when I said, ‘hey this isn’t what I do. I’ve come from my day job of helping people with technology. I want to see if there’s a way to blend what I do with what you guys do every day.’ That was a recognition of wanting more of that,” she said. 

A proud finalist at ETHLisbon

She encourages people, but particularly women, to update their perception of the space. “There are rich personal, intellectual and financial gains to be had in web3,” said Hood. She suggested going through women’s crypto networks and technology groups to find safe places to learn and avoid the sense of identity and self-worth being threatened. “Community is usually the smoothest route into web3,” she said. 

Hood has spent her career challenging stereotypes of women in technical fields. She believes every technical space is suffering because it only attracts already-technical people. She hopes her win at ETHGlobal as an outsider and bringing in her external industry knowledge will inspire women around the world. 

“With hackathons, it’s just as much about learning new things as it is about knowing those things,” Hood said. “That’s how these careers start. Just by seeing what happens and where the learning takes you.”