Issue No. 015 · 2026Miami, FL

Zach PerlmanEngineer.

Role
Engineer
Focus
Web3 infrastructure
Status
Not actively looking, but always happy to chat
Page
01 / 05
Zach PerlmanDISTRIBUTED SYSTEMSRUSTTYPESCRIPTBROOKLYN15 YRS
Zach PerlmanDISTRIBUTED SYSTEMSRUSTTYPESCRIPTBROOKLYN15 YRS

§01 — About

Who
is this
guy?

Senior engineer at Quicknode building blockchain RPC and developer tooling used across the crypto ecosystem. I like things that are fast, small, and a little weird — x402 payment rails, agent arenas, raw-transaction sleuthing, healthcare dashboards that have to clear HIPAA. AI is changing development daily; the work now is finding the safe new tools that level up the LLMs. A lot was possible before; anything is possible now. If you're not using this day-to-day, you're falling behind.

TypeScript
Solidity
Go
Python
React
Next.js
Node.js
PostgreSQL
Redis
Ethereum
Viem
Hardhat
Foundry
AWS
GraphQL

§02 — Selected Work · scroll sideways

FOUR
shipped
THINGS.

No. 01 / 2026

x402-rails

Public package · payment rails for the agentic era

Open-source backbone infrastructure for x402 — programmatic HTTP 402 settlements between AI agents and the services they call. Per-request stablecoin payments without an account, an invoice, or a tab. Free for anyone to drop in.

TypeScriptViemSolidityNode.js
No. 02 / 2026

x402-payments

Public package · drop-in x402 for any API

Open-source SDK that lets a Node or Next.js endpoint quote a price, settle it on-chain, and serve the response — turning any function into an instantly-monetizable agent service. Install, wrap your handler, ship.

TypeScriptNext.jsViemEVM
No. 03 / 2026

x402playground.com

A live x402 sandbox

Open the page, connect a wallet, watch real x402 calls execute against demo endpoints. The fastest way to see paid HTTP feel like a normal fetch().

Next.jsViemWagmiTailwind
No. 04 / 2026

agentarena.xyz

Where agents fight for benchmarks

A leaderboard + match runner for autonomous agents — pit different models on the same task, score speed/cost/correctness, share replays. Every invocation is metered through x402.

Next.jsTypeScriptPostgresx402
No. 05 / 2026

x402pokemon

Pokémon trades over x402

A demo that lets two agents trade Pokémon between each other with x402 settlements between every move. Pure showcase — also genuinely fun.

TypeScriptViemOpenAIx402
No. 06 / 2026

Wacdonalds

AI burger ops

A weekend project where an LLM runs the kitchen — orders flow in, agents fill them, x402 invoices print for every nugget. Half satire, half genuine experiment in agentic dispatch.

Next.jsTypeScriptOpenAIx402
No. 07 / 2026

Packz

Bundles for autonomous agents

Curated packs of x402-paid services an agent can subscribe to with one signature — research, code execution, rendering, image gen. Buy a pack, give it to an agent, watch it work.

TypeScriptViemNext.js
No. 08 / 2026

Story-block

On-chain interactive fiction

Branching narratives where readers vote on the next chapter with on-chain signals; outcomes get attested as blocks. Blockchain as story-state machine, not as ticker.

Next.jsSolidityViemMDX
No. 09 / 2026

Modtech

Modular tech consulting

Sticking-point code review + architecture work for early-stage teams. Drop in for a sprint, leave behind something that's still maintainable a year later.

TypeScriptNext.jsPostgresAWS
No. 010 / 2026

Enterprise CMS dashboards

HIPAA-compliant control surfaces

Multi-tenant content + analytics dashboards built to clear HIPAA, SOC 2, and the audit trail every healthcare buyer asks for. Row-level security in Postgres, signed-URL document delivery, full event log.

Next.jsPostgres (RLS)TypeScriptAWS
No. 011 / 2026

poc-distribution

Referral fee distribution PoCs

Three parallel proofs-of-concept for scalable on-chain referral payouts: 1inch CumulativeMerkleDrop, Thirdweb Airdrop, and Splits Protocol. Live-tested on Polygon mainnet with gas benchmarks.

TypeScriptSolidityViemHardhatPolygon
No. 012 / 2025

rawTxnAddressFinder

Raw transaction archaeology

JavaScript CLI that decodes raw Ethereum transactions and surfaces the signer address + nonce without needing an RPC. Great for forensics and cold-wallet recovery flows.

JavaScriptethers.jsNode.js
No. 013 / 2025

zlerplabs.com

A personal sandbox

Long-running experiments blog — part playground, part portfolio, part accidental README. Runs on Next.js with a custom MDX pipeline and view-transitions-powered post navigation.

Next.jsMDXTailwindVercel

§03 — Experience

WHERE
& WHEN.

2022/NOW
Quicknode
Senior Engineer
  • Built internal tooling for blockchain RPC observability, adopted across multiple product teams.
  • Shipped referral-fee distribution infrastructure handling on-chain payouts to thousands of developers.
  • Driving x402 payment rails + agentic infrastructure work — turning HTTP 402 from a curiosity into shipping rails for paid agent calls.
  • Contributor on the core platform powering RPC + streams for web3 developers.
2020/NOW
Zlerp Labs
Builder-in-Residence (self)
  • Personal R&D — smart-contract experiments, small web apps, occasional blog posts at zlerplabs.com.
  • Published open-source utilities like rawTxnAddressFinder and distribution PoCs.
2015/2022
Prior startups
Full-stack / Product Engineer
  • Shipped consumer and B2B products across a handful of early-stage teams.
  • Owned frontend, backend, and a lot of 'whatever nobody else wants to touch'.
HIRING?LET'S TALKz.h.perlman@gmail.comOPEN TO
HIRING?LET'S TALKz.h.perlman@gmail.comOPEN TO

§04 — Contact

SENDA LETTER.

Form · FX-01 · TransmitFAX ME.
Signed, sealed — by you. One copy only.

— Analogue channels below —

Colophon · Set in DM Serif Display & IBM Plex Mono · Printed on the web, 2026

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