​Now Media Podcast

​15+ Years Building Software, 5 Years Inside Crypto: What Actually Happened to Web3

​"Mass adoption in web3 never happened. It never will. Web3 was hijacked."

​That's a strong claim from someone who's spent five years building in the space.

​This episode digs into why he thinks that, and what 15+ years of software engineering across AI, security tooling, and crypto has taught him about the gap between the pitch and the reality.

​Participants

• ​Jeremy White – Host (Now Media)

• ​Ruben Marcus – AI Fullstack Engineer (@rubenmarcus_dev)

​About the guest

​Ruben Marcus is an AI fullstack engineer with over 14 years across Next.js, TypeScript, AI systems, and developer tooling, working remotely from Lisbon on AI-native products, premium web experiences, and production-ready systems.

​He created scanrepo.dev, a security scanner that statically analyzes GitHub repositories for malicious code and vulnerabilities without cloning or executing anything, using rule-based analysis, entropy checks, and LLMs.

​His work spans agent systems, Three.js games, and optimized AI engineering workflows across multiple models and providers, alongside roughly five years of hands-on experience working in crypto.

​Format

• ​Type: Google Meet / Riverside (riverside.com)

• ​Date: August 28th

• ​Time: 3:00 PM UTC

• ​Duration: 35 mins

• ​Tone: Direct, technically grounded, unfiltered

​Topics of discussion

​15+ years of software, the last 5 in crypto
What changed in how Ruben approached engineering once he started working in crypto, and what stayed the same from his broader software background?

​Why he believes mass adoption in Web3 never happened
What's behind the claim that Web3 was "hijacked"? What did Ruben expect five years ago, and where did the industry diverge from that?

​Building scanrepo.dev: static analysis without execution
How does scanrepo.dev detect malicious code and postinstall risks in GitHub repos using rules, entropy analysis, and LLMs, without ever cloning or running the code?

​Who this episode is for

​Crypto veterans and skeptics interested in an honest, insider critique of Web3 adoption.

​Developers and security-minded engineers curious about static analysis tools for supply chain risk.

​AI and fullstack engineers interested in how crypto-era experience shapes AI product engineering today.