Whitepaper Reading Club: ETHGas & Crypto × Rural Japan
This month we're bringing together two very different questions: how Ethereum's infrastructure is evolving, and what happens when new technologies meet the realities of rural Japan. Door Open - 9:30 AM ☕️ 10:00 AM - Crypto × Rural Japan: From Technology to Community What can Ethereum and other emerging technologies actually change outside the crypto ecosystem? We'll explore how AI, blockchain, and incentive design intersect with regional economic circulation, population decline, and sustained community participation—and what it means to treat communities as living laboratories rather than passive recipients of technology. Kesennuma is a fishing town of 55,000 on Japan's northeast coast, losing roughly 1,000 people a year. Hikari has spent the past years running Hackatsuon there as a part of Women's Eye, a local NPO with 20 years of practice. Hackatsuon is a two-week hackathon and residency co-organized with the city, starting four days after this session. 🔗 Learn more about Hackatsuon Hikari Igarashi is a Japan-based social entrepreneur and community builder exploring how emerging technologies can enable more regenerative and participatory communities. She currently leads Hackatsuon (hackatsuon.com), a civic-tech hackathon and residency in Kesennuma, Miyagi, bringing technology builders and local communities together to co-create solutions to real-world challenges. She has also spoken at the Regen Hub at Devcon 7 SEA in Bangkok, and works across Web3, civic tech, and social innovation. Paper / source: coming soon 11:15 AM - Rethinking block building & MEV (ETHGas) A technical discussion on how Ethereum block building is changing—from traditional PBS and MEV infrastructure toward preconfirmations, programmable blockspace, and realtime execution. Using ETHGas as a case study, we’ll examine what happens when sequencing rights and blockspace become explicit markets, and what this means for builders, validators, searchers, applications, and Ethereum’s MEV landscape.