Interview with Polkadot Creator Gavin Wood: What Misunderstandings and Setbacks Have You Experienced for Being Too Ahead of Your Time?

'I started writing Ethereum code in December when I only had £500 left, and my rent was also £500 a month. At that time, I had already started two startups, but neither was making progress. I even thought about getting a job at a bank. And at that moment, he gave me £1,000 a month to continue working on Ethereum. I wanted to see if this white paper could really be realized, so I started writing code. A few months later, I became a co-founder of Ethereum.'

Gavin Wood, co-founder of Ethereum, creator of Polkadot, and promoter of the Web3 vision. In a three-hour interview last week, he revealed the mysteries of the future of blockchain technology. PolkaWorld will release it in several parts, and this article is the first part!

Before we officially start, let's take a look at some great insights and conversations!

You created the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) and founded Polkadot. In your opinion, what is Ethereum's greatest achievement so far? — Ethereum is the project that has created the most millionaires in history.

So, how does a great idea come about? — A good idea is one where you can clearly see the path to realization.

What is the real view on meme coins? — Pure nonsense.

What is Polkadot's greatest achievement? — Achieved a secure sharded blockchain.

So, what is Polkadot's biggest challenge right now? — It is precisely its sharding design.

Your childhood doesn't seem to have been easy; can you talk more about it? — I grew up with my single mother, who had a violent husband. I clearly remember that period, filled with a sense of abandonment. This has made me appreciate having a safe environment now.

People often say 'being too ahead of your time equals being wrong.' As an inventor, you always foresee trends early. Have you experienced misunderstandings or setbacks because of being 'too ahead of your time'? — Did Howard Marks really say that?

Please continue reading and enjoy the wonderful content brought by Gavin!

Starting with small talk.

Kevin: Thank you very much for accepting this interview, Gavin. Are you drinking Japanese whiskey now?

Gavin: Yes, Yamazaki 12 years.

Kevin: I heard you like whiskey and Japanese culture.

Gavin: Yes! Cheers! Kampai!

Kevin: Is Kampai Japanese? I thought it was a Chinese expression.

Gavin: Kampai is Japanese for cheers.

Kevin: Do you speak Japanese?

Gavin: No, but knowing a few basic phrases can help.

Kevin: Do you live in Japan?

Gavin: Now I have a house in Japan.

Kevin: Why?

Gavin: Just because I like the culture here. It may not be suitable to live here all year round, but Japanese culture is really unique, and living here is very interesting.

Kevin: What do you like about Japanese culture?

Gavin: Actually, it is very different from other parts of Asia. The service is really great, and all the details are carefully considered, which is very obvious. It's completely different from the UK.

Kevin: So what do you think of the UK?

Gavin: You know, I grew up here, I'm British. So for me, this is a kind of... not exactly a strong desire to spend all my time here, but I have a house in Cambridge, and I enjoy living here. I also really like certain elements of British culture.

Kevin: Like what?

Gavin: For example, British Indian curry is fantastic. I love traditional pubs, ales, and cheese. And pies, which are always delicious. Also, fish and chips and Sunday roast are very good. The UK is one of the countries that emphasizes etiquette, which I appreciate.

Kevin: Yes, but for someone like me, if you are not a British native, especially if English is not your first language, like I come from Switzerland, it can be difficult to understand what British people really mean, especially their sense of humor, right? British humor is really hard to understand and very special.

Gavin: Yes, I think humor is a great way to communicate. You often find that jokes contain a lot of meaning. In some places, humor has become part of communication, allowing people to express meaning in a slightly indirect way or find some common ground that everyone can relate to, rather than stating things bluntly. It is a very natural way of communicating.

Kevin: I have heard that Japan is like that too. I heard that people from Osaka (or possibly Kyoto, but definitely not Tokyo) are more casual and have a better sense of humor.

Gavin: Yes, it feels very different from growing up in Tokyo and then going to those places. In Tokyo, the way of communicating is usually more formal, but in Osaka, people are naturally inclined to joke, and humor becomes part of their communication. The difference becomes very obvious when one person is accustomed to communicating with humor while another is not.

Kevin: Do you think humor is more related to culture or to a person's intelligence level? For example, in understanding humor?

Gavin: I think humor largely relies on shared cognitive points, shared ways of perceiving, and a common understanding of the world. Therefore, it is not necessarily directly linked to intelligence. But to some extent, intelligence can indeed serve as a tool for creating humor and establishing resonance between both parties in a conversation.

From what I understand, I have thought a bit about humor. Humor usually hinges on this idea: when you say something or do an action, the target (the interlocutor) can interpret it in two ways, while other observers may only interpret it one way. This hidden interpretation is the reason for the sense of humor.

What makes it interesting is that the target audience realizes that they can interpret the statement in two ways and knows that others can only understand it one way. At the same time, they also know that the speaker is aware of this. Therefore, a special and exclusive understanding forms between the two parties in the conversation, and this understanding is something others cannot participate in. This unique resonance is the essence of humor.

Gavin's childhood life.

Kevin: Do you like to analyze many things?

Gavin: Of course.

Kevin: Who are you?

Gavin: This is the question that the Borlans asked Duran in Babylon 5, and that episode took an entire episode to answer.

Kevin: So let me also start from this question.

Gavin: However, I prefer another question: 'What do you want?' This is the question that the Shadow People asked Duran.

As for 'Who am I?' I don't know, I consider myself a bit of a free spirit. I try to avoid labeling myself because the way of defining 'who you are' is often based on your relationships with the world around you, people, and institutions. I don't like to answer this question with simple answers because if people hear them, they tend to interpret them too much, which is not what I really want to express. Broadly speaking, 'who a person is' cannot be summarized clearly in one or two sentences. It is something that can only be gradually felt through observing a person's words and actions or through interviews like this.

Kevin: What is your mission?

Gavin: What drives me? This question, I don't know, there are several different factors, and there are some things I want to achieve. For example, happiness, that should be a good goal, right? Like satisfaction, being a good father. And there is a sense of responsibility—responsibility for some things I am involved in, which is a personal mission. Besides that, there are also some childhood dreams, those things I know that can make me happy and possibly make others happy too, which tend to lean towards areas like art and music.

Kevin: You mentioned childhood dreams. A few months ago, I was discussing with Kia Wong from Alliance DAO on a podcast, where they believe that two traits are crucial when looking for star founders in the future crypto space. The first is a certain degree of 'autistic tendency' that helps people think independently; the second is a kind of childhood trauma that gives a sense of 'I need to prove something to the world.' As a very successful founder in the crypto space, do you resonate with or possess either of these traits or both?

Gavin: I am not qualified to diagnose whether I have 'autistic tendencies.' However, my childhood was indeed not easy. So, I think I might resonate with the idea of 'childhood trauma.'

Kevin: Would you like to talk a bit more about childhood trauma?

Gavin: I grew up in a single-parent family, with only my mother around. This was largely her choice. But she had a violent husband at the time, who was also my father, and that lasted for a while. I don't remember being hit, but I have very deep memories of that time, mainly a sense of abandonment. I don't know if this can be considered a type of trauma or what specific type it falls into, but I think it has given me a special deep appreciation for a 'safe environment.'

Kevin: More and more people are trying to understand their relationship with their childhood. I have discussed this topic a lot with people like Jesse Pollack and Mike Novogratz. Many people will seek to understand the origins of their behavioral patterns through some form of psychological therapy. This is not just to explain, 'Oh, that's why I do this,' but more for self-improvement because we all want to be better. Have you done something similar, like feeling that your childhood helped you in some ways but not in others, so you want to learn more to understand yourself?

Gavin: Like you mentioned earlier, I am indeed someone who likes to think and analyze things. So I have not been without deep reflection on the experiences of this stage of my life and how those experiences might influence my current way of thinking or interpersonal interactions. But if you ask me whether I have done specific psychological therapy or hypnosis, no.

Where do all those great ideas come from?

Kevin: You are a co-founder of Ethereum, created the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) and the Solidity programming language, providing tools for developers to build smart contracts on Ethereum. You also founded Polkadot. How did you come up with these big ideas?

Gavin: I don't know either. I think the ideas just popped up by themselves.

Kevin: Interesting. So, you don't have to deliberately do anything; they come by themselves?

Gavin: Yes.

Kevin: So will you start from a goal or a plan?

Gavin: No.

Kevin: Or do you wake up one day and suddenly feel, 'This is what I want to do'?

Gavin: You could say that. Although 'must do' might be a bit exaggerated. But indeed, one day when I was thinking about something, like going for a walk, or taking a shower, or just thinking casually, for some reason, the 'pieces' of these ideas gradually came together.

Essentially, this is not like some people, like Elon Musk, who might explicitly decide, 'I want to go to Mars,' and then start backtracking on what needs to be done: developing batteries, researching rocket science, developing this, that, setting a clear roadmap, whether it's written in their mind or on paper, and then implementing it one by one. For me, this approach does not really suit my style.

My approach tends to be a more incremental kind of innovation. This is not to say that I avoid making any significant changes, but rather that I look for combinations between components based on what I already know, what I can see works, and what I can imagine exists or already exists, to see if I can come up with a meaningful and useful result that, at least in my view, has not been well realized before.

Kevin: I read a book by the famous surgeon and author of Psycho-Cybernetics, Maxwell Malt. This book, Psycho-Cybernetics, actually explains some parts of the creative process. He mentioned that most creativity actually comes from the subconscious. He said that when you clearly visualize something in your mind, your inner creative success mechanism takes over and does it better than you could through conscious effort or willpower. So, for major ideas like EVM or any other big ideas, how much comes from your conscious thinking? And how much comes from having an idea, setting some goals, and then relaxing to let the subconscious do the work?

Gavin: In my view, an 'idea' is not just that I can randomly think of a vision like 'eliminate world hunger' and then I sleep and let my brain or subconscious do the work. Nothing will happen the next morning, right?

Because if the 'idea' you are talking about is a vision or a high-level goal, then it is not really an 'idea' in the true sense. It may be a creative idea for a movie, but it is not the kind of 'idea' in the engineering sense. Therefore, I do not completely agree that the subconscious can provide significant assistance in this regard.

I believe that ideas must be constrained by practical feasibility.

If you don't have the resources to solve the hunger problem, then focusing on an idea like 'eliminate hunger' doesn't make much sense. Of course, you might say, 'We can take an incremental approach, doing this first and then that.' But that is more like a top-down approach, starting from the final goal and then deducing how to achieve it. I think this approach is more like Elon Musk's style. He has vast wealth; I don't know if he is worth hundreds of billions or trillions now, but he can directly say like the President of the United States or the head of the Saudi National Fund, 'Okay, I want to build a city there' or 'I'm going to spend $3 billion to eliminate malaria somewhere.' Then solve the problem in a very programmed, rational, unemotional corporate manner, assessing whether the resources are sufficient to achieve the goal. But as I said, this is not an 'idea'; this is just a 'result.'

A true 'idea' is when you have a path, you have a way to realize something. Maybe you don't know the exact details, but you know it is positive, potentially useful, and could help the world. You also believe that no one has thought of such an invention or has tried to combine existing fundamental elements in this way to create something new.

I believe this is the real meaning behind most people's discussions of 'inventors having an idea.' They refer to the recombination of fundamental elements.

Is being too ahead of your time equal to being wrong? Was Gavin misunderstood?

Kevin: Are you saying that by combining these things, you think it will be useful to the world, right? But the problem with this is that for people like inventors, they may not be understood at all for a period of time, or even for a long time, right? I remember Howard Marks said something like, 'Being too ahead of your time equals being wrong.' As an inventor, you can always catch trends very early. How many setbacks have you faced in life because you acted too early or were completely misunderstood by others?

Gavin: There may be quite a few, but I'm not sure. Can I really determine if others misunderstood my meaning? Is it obvious to distinguish between them misunderstanding you, ignoring you, or just being not smart enough to understand your concept at all—or even forever? I don't know. I suspect there is, but to some extent, I agree with that viewpoint (that being too ahead of your time equals being wrong). But did Howard Marks really say that? It doesn't sound like his style.

Kevin: Then I need to confirm that later, haha.

Gavin: However, yes, I think if you want to build something that can immediately create value for the world, you must explain it in a way that the world already understands. This is also why most disruptive inventions are usually applied to a very simple, even childish use case at first. A classic example is that the internet was initially used to send emails. For example, 'Okay, now you can send messages, and they no longer need to take a day to arrive but can arrive in minutes – assuming people check their inbox every few minutes.'

The internet later had a huge impact on the world, and today, the role of email actually accounts for only a small part of the overall impact of the internet. But at that time, it was necessary because people understood mail, so they could understand that if the speed of information delivery increased by an order of magnitude, or even two or three orders of magnitude, it was obviously an improvement.

So, I would agree that you need to explain your ideas in terms that the market or your target audience can understand.

Of course, the problem is that sometimes building something is much easier than figuring out its specific use.

Kevin: Isn't that the problem for most entrepreneurs? They usually make a product and then look for target users, rather than the other way around. They should ask themselves, 'Am I solving problems for people?' But you could also argue that those who provide solutions to existing problems are actually solving a smaller problem than a completely new invention.

Gavin: Yes, usually it is. And many times, they are constraining themselves. They limit their wisdom and thinking space because they have already defined a clear scope. For example, they only focus on making a car run faster or consume less fuel. Maybe they could think of making the car fly, but that doesn't matter because their focus is solely on reducing fuel consumption.

So I agree that if you have pre-defined results before actually starting to think about how to achieve the goal, you may only be able to solve smaller problems.

If your perspective is broader and you are a bit more 'hands-off' about the specific results you want to achieve, such as just trying to find ways to make things more free, efficient, and faster, then you might find some more revolutionary and substantive solutions more quickly.

Kevin: When do you feel you have been misunderstood the most? You mentioned that this situation might have happened many times, right?

Gavin: Well, I think it's quite common when doing JAM. This is the new protocol I'm currently working on. But I think it's normal because it is indeed a complex protocol, and its operation is very different from before. Understanding what makes it different and why it is better is not always easy. A large part of the reason is that people may not truly understand the limitations of existing methods. This is a significant issue in cutting-edge technology development.

Even practitioners do not always have a clear understanding of the state of technology, or that the current cutting-edge technology is not optimal. Only when you analyze deeply and truly understand the existing problems can you better understand why a certain solution might be effective.

Deep understanding of knowledge is the key to driving major breakthroughs.

Kevin: So how did you get started? Because if you follow the classic method, you have a problem and then go solve it. But if your ideas are more abstract, how do you start?

Gavin: If you start from 'I have this problem, and I want to find a solution,' I think this applies to smaller incremental problems.

For larger problems, you may need to be very lucky to stumble upon a solution. Or you could be like Bill Gates and say, 'I will invest my considerable wealth into this problem.' But assuming you are neither extremely lucky nor extremely wealthy, you might just choose to start tackling smaller problems. Because there are many more small problems than big ones, and they are more segmented and detailed, so there are relatively fewer people focusing on them. This means these problems may be easier to solve and easier for you to discover and utilize.

So, I think this 'top-down, first define the result' approach is more suitable for small problems and not for larger ones, unless you have extremely abundant resources or a great deal of luck.

That is why I say you should start from the current situation and analyze the existing 'components.'

When I say 'components,' I mean very abstract concepts, not just things that can be directly used in a literal sense, like the Rust programming language, an Android phone, or a CPU. It also includes the following:

• Various fields of mathematics.

• Different branches of engineering.

• Human cognition of the world.

• Products and services already on the market.

• Projects that have already been deployed.

• Open source software.

All of this can be seen as the 'components' that you can leverage when building something. By combining these components, along with some novelty or creativity in knowledge, you can create something useful that might be used to solve one or more problems. I believe that is the essence of creation.

You can easily achieve this at a lower level. For example, I can write a new program that can perform some kind of pairing and create a trading robot with this program, which might achieve some success soon. This is solving a relatively small problem.

Academic research usually operates at a higher level of abstraction. Scholars still try to solve problems by recombining ideas, adding a bit of creativity and innovation in knowledge, but they are trying to tackle 'larger' problems (even if these problems are not always widely understood or may not seem very important). These problems may not be major issues that many people care about, nor are they necessarily significant problems that need to be solved. However, even so, they are still creating more useful human knowledge, which is inherently a meaningful endeavor.

There are many classic examples, such as some theoretical research from the early 20th century that led to laser theory, and lasers were eventually used to make CDs. Without that theoretical research, CDs could not have been invented. But at the time those studies were completed, no one knew what they would be useful for. For a long time, even decades, they were almost 'useless.' But when they were finally applied, they sparked a revolution in audio technology.

I'm not saying you should lock yourself in an ivory tower and only do those highly abstract, seemingly purely theoretical things. What I want to express is that there is actually a spectrum between immediately practical things and seemingly pure theory. And I myself probably fall somewhere in the middle of that spectrum.

I try to propose some new engineering understandings that do not simply mean 'deploying to increase transaction volume by 10% the next day.' Instead, I hope that after being properly applied, it could become part of the next generation of systems that brings a 1000% or even 1 million percent increase in transaction volume.

Of course, you can't be entirely sure of this because you are not solely pursuing a specific outcome. Instead, you are pursuing a profound understanding of knowledge. I believe that a better understanding of knowledge can lead to great results, and not just one great result, but possibly multiple significant outcomes.