JOHN
RUBISOFF.

I make complicated technology easy to understand. Community, content, brand, and the words that have to land in public, for the people building hard things.

ENTER SYSTEM TALK TO MY AI

04 // Community & Ecosystem

Building communities around hard technology.

Five years leading community and ecosystem communications for deep-tech networks, from global payments to zero-knowledge cryptography. Growing engaged, technical audiences and guiding them through high-stakes moments.

DOMAINSWEB3 · ZK · PAYMENTS

EXEC SUPPORTCEO / C-SUITE

REACHGLOBAL

SDF

Stellar Development Foundation

Led community and ecosystem comms for a global open-source payments network. Advised the CEO on high-stakes communications, including prep for live televised testimony before Congress, and guided the community through UN humanitarian aid for refugees of the war in Ukraine.

Community Lead · 2021–2023

TOPOS

Toposware

Communications and ecosystem strategy for a zero-knowledge cryptography research company, later acquired by Polygon. Ran activations, events, and grant programs that drove developer education and recruitment.

Community Lead · 2023–2024

FLARE

Flare Network

Set comms strategy for a full-stack layer-1 built for data-intensive use cases. Wrote plain-English explainers of oracles, asset bridging, smart accounts, and on-chain governance for users, partners, developers, and policymakers.

Head of Communications · 2024–2025

Programs & Activations

Stellar · SDF

Stellar Community Fund

The community-governed grants program for builders on Stellar and Soroban. As Community Lead I helped grow and communicate a fund that has awarded 42M+ XLM across 656+ projects, with allocations decided by community vote.

communityfund.stellar.org ↗

Stellar · Rome, Italy

Meridian 2022

Stellar's flagship annual conference in Rome, themed "The Urgency of Doing." I supported community and ecosystem communications around the event, where the UN Refugee Agency, World Food Programme, and Ukraine's Deputy Minister of Digital Transformation took the stage on crypto and humanitarian aid.

stellar.org / meridian ↗

Flare · Community

Flare Discord

Flare's primary community hub, home to 45,000+ members. As Head of Communications I set comms strategy across the network's public channels and community spaces.

discord.gg/flarenetwork ↗

Flare · Creator Program

Content Creation Bounty

A $10,000 FLR creator program (Jan–Feb 2025) launched during my time as Head of Communications, rewarding educational videos, writing, and infographics that explained Flare to newcomers over a four-week run.

flare.network / bounty ↗

Toposware · ZK

Topos Builders Program

A learning-and-funding program to grow the first ZK-native ecosystem, launched with the Topos testnet. As Community Lead I ran activations, events, and grant programs that drove developer education and recruitment.

builders.toposware.com ↗

Community Events

01 // Content & Video

Content that travels.

Narrative strategy and content for technical clients, including work that has pulled in millions of organic views across social platforms while staying on-message.

ORGANIC VIEWSMILLIONS+

FORMATSSOCIAL · VIDEO · LONG-FORM

CLIENTSFINTECH · WEB3 · AI

Brand systems for frontier tech.

Visual identity and creative direction for technical companies, turning complex products into clean, confident, consumer-grade brands.

Featured · Ambire Rebrand

Ambire is a self-custodial Web3 wallet (formerly AdEx) built around a simple promise: a wallet that just works. As Creative Director on the rebrand, I led the brand and creative direction, translating a complex smart-account product into a bold, approachable identity.

CLIENT AmbireROLE Creative Director

Brand book ↗ ambire.com ↗ Brand kit ↗

More Brand Work

Featured · Path (LI.FI)

Path is LI.FI's standalone deposit product: any asset, from any chain, into any smart contract in a single transaction. Powered by $30B+ in routing across 600+ partners. I named the product and led the brand, landing on one line that says it all: any asset, any chain, one deposit. The deposit experience for DeFi.

CLIENT LI.FI / PathROLE Naming · Brand · Comms

li.fi ↗

03 // Strategy & Writing

Strategy & writing.

Naming, positioning, messaging, and the technical writing that makes complex products legible, with documentation I've contributed to plus a case study.

Technical Writing & Documentation

I write developer-facing documentation that makes hard systems usable. Public docs I've contributed to:

Stellar

SCF Handbook

Program documentation and guidance for the Stellar Community Fund.

stellar.gitbook.io ↗

Flare

Flare Dev Docs

Plain-English explainers of oracles, bridging, and on-chain governance for builders.

dev.flare.network ↗

Toposware

Topos Docs

Developer education and guides for the zero-knowledge Topos ecosystem.

docs.topos.technology ↗

Case Study · Path (LI.FI)

The challenge

LI.FI needed to turn its cross-chain routing into a standalone checkout product with a name and story any developer or enterprise could grasp instantly.

What I did

Named the product "Path," wrote the brand proposition, and built the full communications strategy: positioning, messaging pillars, tone, and a phased go-to-market.

The idea

I shifted the positioning. Deposit, not checkout. This product starts the user journey. It doesn't end it. Then I shifted the value prop: the best competitive options are gated, and the open options don't perform. Path claims that gap. A platform open to anyone, with AAA quality, built by an established and trusted team.

PILLARSSIMPLICITY · OPEN · BATTLE-TESTED

GTMARRIVAL · PROOF · DEFAULT

SCALE$30B+ ROUTED · 600+ PARTNERS

Messaging Pillars

Radical Simplicity

One widget. One click. Every asset. Reduces the deposit journey to its irreducible minimum.

Open by Default

No gatekeepers. No access codes. Self-serve for everyone, from hackathon projects to blue-chip protocols.

Battle-Tested

LI.FI's proven routing repackaged as the cleanest deposit experience. $30B+ routed. 50M+ transactions.

Revenue Engine

Every deposit button is revenue left on the table. Credit card, CEX balance, or any crypto. Every user has a way in.

05 // Featured Project

Ponder.

▶

Ponder is a voice, chat, and streaming app with an arcane twist: you and your friends are all wizards. Take Discord's soundboard and turn it into an actual spell book. The spells modify your friends' mic outputs with voice modulation and their text with crazy effects. Tired of getting cursed by your friends? Pop a ward spell and bounce their next curse back at them with 3x the pain. Or just fight fire with fire and turn them into a frog so all they can do is croak. I designed and built the whole product: the brand, the UI, the web app, and a desktop client with global push-to-talk. One account works across every realm you're invited to.

ROLE Design & BuildSTACK Web + DesktopSTATUS Live

orbponder.com ↗

06 // Other Apps & Experiments