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Opening: Purple light, old ghosts
Fort Lauderdale is not London, and that was particularly apparent when I compared the London Blockchain Conference to the Blockchain Futurist Conference, which ran essentially back-to-back for me in late 2025.
- The Blockchain Futurist Conference
- Kurt’s first Blockchain Futurist experience
- The state of Bitcoin during the pandemic
- Blockchain Futurist Conference’s comeback
- The people in the blockchain space
- Behind the noise
- Eric Trump’s presence at the conference
- Exploring the Hard Rock grounds
- What stays
In South Florida, the humid air wraps you like a damp towel as you step out of the Hard Rock Guitar Hotel into a night pumped full of purple light. My mind flips back to 2018, the first time I walked through a Blockchain Futurist Conference and felt that same violet glow on my face. The show then was all about lasers and promises. Today, there is still spectacle, but there are also wrinkles of wisdom.
A city built on tourism and trade feels an affinity with an industry still trying to define itself.
2018: Utility or bust
I showed up in 2018 wearing the “Bitcoin expert” badge for a trading community called Crypto Traders Pro.
Larry King held court behind his suspenders. Kenn Bosak’s laugh cut through the noise. Kyle Kemper’s smile seemed to reflect the neon. The branding was unforgettable: bright purple and pink motifs, neon strips along the walls, lasers strobing above the crowd. The vibe screamed fun and fortune.
On stage, I delivered a plea: if we do not use Bitcoin for everyday transactions, it will devolve into a pump-and-dump scheme, nothing more than a speculative asset to be taxed and banned. I warned that regulators would treat it like a stock, not a cash system, unless we proved its utility. A merchant adoption presentation in Chicago’s “Loyalty Live” with the “Futurist” brand later that year explored similar themes.
Yet back then, speculation and hype drowned out those conversations. I left with a pile of business cards and the nagging feeling we were chasing pyrotechnics over purpose.
The years that went missing
Fatherhood and a pandemic will change your orbit. In 2019, I became a father; in 2020, the world closed its doors. My conference calendar shrank to almost nothing. I watched as crypto events became carnival barkers’ dens: booths selling lottery tickets disguised as tokens, panels about “community” that hid the absence of products. I retreated to places that still felt serious: general tech conferences, as well as the CoinGeek and Global Blockchain Conferences, which at least insisted on proof-of-work (PoW) and legal compliance alongside presentations that were hopeful about what Bitcoin could do for the world.
For nearly six years, I didn’t consider doing another show with the Futurist brand. I missed the friendships and the travel, but I couldn’t stomach what most of the blockchain economy had become during the pandemic: saturated with memecoins and other scams.
Home game, new mandate
Then the show came to my backyard. Sunny South Florida would host the Blockchain Futurist Conference of 2025, and CoinGeek wanted coverage. The assignment had three parts: a standard news overview, live social updates, and a deeper video piece on “utility vs speculation” that will be published soon. I said yes. How could I not?
The venue was the Hard Rock Guitar Hotel, itself a temple of bold design and tribal enterprise. I assembled a crew (my brother Karl as director, Chad handling camera, and Steve managing my audio and light) and we set out to tell a different story.
People first
Tracy, Laura, and Mahyar, the family behind the conference, were waiting at the registration desk. We embraced like cousins at a reunion. We swapped stories about the “good old days” and counted how many kids we had between us now, and my old friend Kyle Kemper’s grin was unchanged. But there were so many new faces too: young developers fresh out of university, women leading panels on regulation, investors with no crypto tattoos asking real questions. We connected over coffee and sandwiches, over the Florida heat that forced us all into shade during the day, and then celebrated the comfort of a November evening that only South Florida can offer.
I was also excited to meet Jerry Qian from the Bitcoin Cash community, who called me out from the stage when he saw me walking by. He was giving a presentation on covenants on BCH, and he used me as an example of one of the only people at the show who knows what Bitcoin is capable of.
Those conversations reminded me why I loved this circuit in the first place. Events are an excuse to spend time with people you might otherwise only DM or interact with on X.
Signals in the noise
This year’s expo hall was a mixed tape. On one end, bright booths hawking meme tokens and “Doginals” communities peddled the same pump‑and‑dump dreams I railed against in 2018. Influencers and even a celebrity rapper gave talks about “community” that were more about selling hats than building systems. Yet if you moved past the noise, there were projects that were trying to do real work. “Peace Through Trade” Blockchain (PTT) stood out. Their team collaborates with the United Nations and the Singapore government on a blockchain designed for real-world assets and compliant smart contracts, rather than speculation. I spent an hour with them discussing legal frameworks and supply chain integration.
The conversation around blockchain is changing. It’s less about speculation now and more about creating lasting infrastructure. @kurtwuckertjr finds it exciting to see the builder mindset taking over, and it feels like the crypto bro era might finally be coming to an end.… pic.twitter.com/inUrkXwuqy
— CoinGeek (@RealCoinGeek) November 5, 2025Nearby, developers demoed simple payment applications, tokenized solar energy platforms, and (because it is crypto, after all) tokenized cats from the “Shiro Neko” community.
Not all of them will last. But I felt a shift: the scam carnival has not left entirely, but builders are claiming space.
The Eric Trump moment
Day two featured a talk by Eric Trump. He is the co-founder of American Bitcoin Corporation (ABTC) (NASDAQ: ABTC), a publicly listed company on the Nasdaq. ABTC was created in 2025 through an all‑stock merger between Gryphon Digital Mining and American Bitcoin, a subsidiary of Hut 8 Corp. (NASDAQ: HUT), which supplied most of the mining equipment. The combined entity, majority-owned by Hut 8, positions itself as a patriotic BTC accumulation and infrastructure company; Gryphon’s shareholders retain approximately 2% of the new firm. In his presentation, Eric spoke not about memecoins but about mining economics. He described how controlled power costs determine viability, how Bitcoin mining could stabilize energy grids, and how he and his brother were debanked simply for having the last name Trump.
He railed against inflation and praised the American work ethic. I disagreed with his thesis that Bitcoin is “digital gold,” but I appreciated his candour and the way he connected personal experience to larger policy issues.
Listening to him, I realized that as the industry grows, it will attract more people from outside our usual circles. We should be prepared to engage them on substance.
Night shots, wrist shots
Away from the stage, we roamed the Hard Rock grounds. The hotel’s guitar‑shaped tower glowed blue and purple; from above, it looked like a playable instrument. Seminole hospitality ran the place with precision; reminders of indigenous sovereignty were subtle but present. In the VIP lounge, I watched entrepreneurs pitch investors over drinks. I also had fun pretending I was “hardly working.”
Karl, Chad, and Steve moved like ghosts with cameras, capturing it all. After hours, we explored the mall attached to the hotel, a glossy labyrinth with perfume scents and polished marble. We laughed, trying on Hublot watches that we couldn’t afford.
And speaking of watches, I met the sister of the greatest timepiece YouTuber (Tim Mosso), and his sister Kate is carving her own path in “new media” as a blockchain industry reporter. We shot a nice interview, I’m excited to share it soon.
We took pictures in front of guitars autographed by Steve Vai and Bruce Springsteen. At 1 am, we devoured late‑night buffalo wings in the shadow of neon palm trees. Those moments balanced the seriousness of our reporting. They made the week feel lived rather than merely documented.
What stays with me
After being away for so many years, I expected to be either disillusioned or vindicated. Instead, I was reminded that the blockchain world, like any industry, encompasses a multitude of perspectives. The con artists are still there. The breathless marketers still sell FOMO. However, there are also builders, regulators, artists, and activists trying to harness this technology for something more than just lines on a chart. I hold on to the image of the PTT team patiently explaining compliance requirements while Doginals fans shouted over them with gold-grilled teeth.
I picture Eric Trump’s earnest face as he described his bank accounts being frozen. I remember Karl crouched in the corner, posting live updates across CoinGeek social media. I recall the warm welcome from old friends. These are not the images you see in recap videos. They are the moments that sustain you on the road.
We left Fort Lauderdale with sunburns, full camera cards, and a renewed sense of mission. Utility still matters. Stories still matter. People always matter. I hope our coverage will show that. Until then, thank you to everyone we met.
To those I couldn’t talk to, I’ll find you next time. I’ll be at the Hard Rock bar with an espresso and a notebook, ready to listen.
Watch: How do you build a successful ecosystem? Bring blockchain to the builders!
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