$100,000

Be Curious,
Not Judgmental.

Sergiy Dybskiy · DevEx @ Sentry

01
My Path
2007
Ukraine → Canada
2015
Startup
CTO (the only dev)
2021
Coinbase
Senior Dev
2025
Sentry
DevEx
2013
University
Dropped out
2019
Shopify
Eng → Senior FE
2023
SeaPeople / Acctual
Founding Eng
Month 1 at Shopify

“How could you
message Tobi?”

Shopify DevDegree PR — shh, don't tell anyone
You miss 100% of the shots you don't take — Wayne Gretzky — Michael Scott

Assume positive intent.

Expect nothing back.

The cost is zero.

“ah you’re doing some crypto shit, not interested”

// What I was actually building
const { data: tx } = useQuery({
  queryKey: ['tx', invoice.txHash],
  refetchInterval: (data) =>
    data?.confirmed ? false : 3000,
});

Nobody asked what I actually learned.

Acctual — stablecoin invoice payments

Be Curious,
Not Judgmental.

Your turn.

Something you’ve been curious about but haven’t explored yet

QR code to submit
be-curious.serg.tech/submit
02

Do these sound familiar?

“JavaScript doesn’t count.”
“Front-end devs aren’t real developers.”
“If you use a framework, you don’t understand the fundamentals.”
“Real devs don’t vibe code.”

Syntax Theo Y Combinator The Way of Code

“VIBE
CODING”

Bolt World's Largest Hackathon

I almost didn’t enter
because I judged it first.

128,624
participants
9,575
projects
2nd
place
Weight Coach — 2nd place, World's Largest Hackathon

It’s not about giving up control.
It’s about picking where you spend it.

Experienced? Be curious about new tools.

New? Be curious about the fundamentals.

Show how you actually work.

AI resumes. Gamified GitHub graphs.
How do you stand out?

Be Curious,
Not Judgmental.

03
Up movie poster

University dropout.
Solo CTO of a startup that went nowhere.
The crypto bro.
Doesn’t write code anymore.

Every time I stopped worrying about being a “real developer,” I got closer to becoming one.

It’s not just about tech.

The person sitting alone might be
the most interesting person here.

Be Curious,
Not Judgmental.

I wouldn’t be here if my friend Henri hadn’t been curious enough to ask me to share this story.

Ask someone you don’t know what they’ve been curious about lately.

@sergedottech · Twitter  ·  @serg.tech · BlueSky

Speaker Notes