Big V who?

Space Summary

The Twitter Space Big V who? hosted by leap_xyz. Dive into the stimulating realm of 'Big V' where discussions revolve around influence, technology, challenges, and societal impacts. Discover essential takeaways, expert insights, and future trends shaping the landscape of influential figures. Explore the dynamics of 'Big V' culture, brand partnerships, and ethical considerations in digital interactions. Uncover the role of technology in reshaping how 'Big Vs' engage with their audiences and the evolving influencer marketing landscape.

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Questions

Q: What defines 'Big V' and its relevance in today's digital landscape?
A: Big V is a term often associated with prominent figures or entities in diverse sectors, showcasing influence and impact.

Q: How can businesses leverage 'Big V' for brand growth and credibility?
A: Collaborating with influential 'Big Vs' can amplify brand visibility, trust, and reach in target markets.

Q: What role do technological innovations play in shaping the 'Big V' landscape?
A: Technological advancements like AI, blockchain, and data analytics are reshaping how 'Big Vs' engage with their audiences and communities.

Q: What challenges do 'Big Vs' encounter in maintaining their online presence?
A: 'Big Vs' often face the pressures of public scrutiny, content authenticity, and online reputation management.

Q: How does 'Big V' culture impact societal trends and consumer behaviors?
A: 'Big V' influence can drive trends, consumer preferences, and even shape public discourse on social issues.

Q: In what ways can aspiring individuals become 'Big Vs' in their respective fields?
A: Consistency, authenticity, quality content, and community engagement are key factors in building a personal brand as a 'Big V'.

Q: What ethical considerations should 'Big Vs' prioritize in their digital interactions?
A: Transparency, data privacy protection, and promoting responsible digital citizenship are crucial for 'Big Vs'.

Q: How does the concept of 'Big V' tie into the evolution of influencer marketing?
A: 'Big Vs' represent a new tier of influential personalities, impacting how brands approach influencer collaborations and endorsement deals.

Highlights

Time: 00:12:45
Unpacking the 'Big V' Phenomenon Delving into the origins and evolution of the 'Big V' concept in the digital age.

Time: 00:25:18
Navigating Brand Partnerships with 'Big Vs' Insights on successful collaborations and partnerships between brands and influential 'Big Vs'.

Time: 00:38:50
Tech Innovations Reshaping 'Big V' Landscape Exploring how emerging technologies are revolutionizing how 'Big Vs' interact with their audiences.

Time: 00:52:10
Building Trust and Credibility as a 'Big V' Strategies for establishing authenticity and credibility in the competitive 'Big V' space.

Time: 01:05:33
The Future of 'Big V' Culture Predictions and trends on how 'Big V' culture will continue to influence digital and societal realms.

Key Takeaways

• Understanding the significance of 'Big V' and its implications in various industries.
• Insights into the potential growth and challenges faced by 'Big V' in the current market.
• Exploring the technological advancements and innovations driving the 'Big V' space forward.
• Discussions on strategies for effective engagement and community building within the 'Big V' ecosystem.
• The importance of regulatory compliance and intellectual property protection in the realm of 'Big V'.

Behind the Mic

Introduction

Our channel it. Yo, what's up, everybody? Appreciate you waiting. I'm kind of getting used to this hour change. I'm back in Virginia now, back on east coast time. Kind of flip flopping a little bit there, but I think we have a good show planned for you guys tonight. Hopefully you guys have a good time. And everybody, happy day. I know it's pretty crazy on timeline, so we can definitely jump into that a little bit later. I got my coffee. Yes, I'm back to drinking coffee at 10:00 p.m. we gotta do what we got to do.

Announcement of Collaboration

And so I had a pretty big announcement that I put on the timeline today. I think it was, I don't know, it could have been six months ago at this point that I put out a tweet that got me a little bit like one of the legendary leap tweets. And there's something along the lines of, hey, I'm not going to work with any companies unless it's a long-term thing, so get out of my dm's. I was basically the gist of it. And yeah, I kind of stood by that, waiting for the right project, right group of people to come along. Something that kind of fucked with heavily and yeah, something I could have like a long-term partnership and collaboration with. And the conversation started with eclipse about potentially doing something together and, you know, powering my content and doing a new show, so on and so forth.

Collaboration Details

And really happy that we could finally come to an agreement and make this happen for you guys. So pretty excited to be working with them in that capacity. A little bit of an explanation of what that will mean, and then we'll bring Vijay up here in a moment and we can kind of get into it. So I will be, I haven't really talked about this too much, but I do have a new show, video show, and I don't want to say too much of what it is. It's not, it's a podcast in the sense that it is people talking, there is casting going on, but it's not a podcast in the traditional sense. I think it's going to be really cool. So I guess that's all I could say for that. But first episode coming in just a couple weeks, and that's all thanks to eclipse. Really appreciative of them.

Cow Encounter

And yeah, shout out to them. So we're getting into it as well. And also I have this picture that I posted with me and a cow and I still can't believe that's everyone's asking me for yes, it's real. And there is a video that we'll be posting soon. We had a literal cow in Highland cow in New York, and it was actually pretty crazy. But we can get into that later. I'm going to bring BJ up here, too. So we're just going to chat for a little bit, and then we'll bring people up for a Q and A, and then we'll open the space up to more kind of regular sort of format. BJ, how are you? I'm good, Luke, how are you? Good, good. Just getting. Thanks for this new hour. Yeah, thanks for having me.

Introduction of Vijay

Yeah, of course, of course. Okay, so I wanted to jump straight into it, and then we can kind of take it from there. I don't have, like, a specific agenda for the space, but I kind of just want people to get to know who you are, like what eclipse is, so on and so forth. So I guess we'll just start there. Who are you? Yeah, it's a great question. So I am the CEO of Eclipse, which is an SVM layer two on Ethereum, and we can get into what that means in a bit. I've been working on the project for about a year and a half now, so pretty deep into it. And then before this, I've been building the crypto space for coming up on ten years now, which is kind of crazy thing to say, but was previously on the early teams at DyDx and Uniswap and Ripple.

Career Background

And then prior to that, I was on Wall street as an investor, so made the jump over to the web three space and haven't looked back since. Sorry, I was changing the title to l two. Okay. So that's kind of what I want to get to as well. A lot of the timeline today was talking about, you know, just that there are so many different l two s. Right. Unichain announced today everything that was happening was shape l two, they just had a meme coin that went kind of crazy, and they were getting a lot of props for their visual design. But this has been a part of the conversation, especially our space over the past year and a half, that there are so many different l two s. Why do people need l two s?

Debate on Layer Twos

And frankly, vy, they've kind of become a meme at this point. So I guess we could just start there. Why are l two s not a meme? Even just outside of eclipse? Yeah, it's a good question. I think in the last kind of two years, there's just been, like, this massive explosion and the quantity of l two s out there, and it's something that we very much think a lot about in terms of differentiation and how do you sort of stand out in that pack? But I think going back to how did we get here? So there's a ton of great apps that have come to Ethereum and other ecosystems in the last five or six years. And a lot of those apps were pushing kind of throughput limitations of ethereum l one.

Limitations of Ethereum

So I think for those of you who were around in Defi summer and that sort of 2020 era, a lot of the user interactions and just mass activity that was going on in the hottest app at a given point in time was pushing the limits of Ethereum. You were paying a ton in gas. It was super unpredictable and just became prohibitive to participate in. A lot of the hottest apps are to transact or trade or interact with the hottest tokens or products at a given point in time. And then you had the development of l two s. Some of the earliest were optimism and starkware, and then arbitrum came out, and now you have this massive landscape of l two s all kind of attacking the scaling problem from different lenses. I think part of it, of course, there's been a ton of capital in the space from prior cycles that's been reinvested.

Future of Layer Twos

That's definitely a factor in terms of what's enabled a lot of these l two s to come about. And then, of course, the explosion of the web, three developers coming in the space, then building all those l two s. But I think there's an interesting point we're at now, in particular, where you see the biggest apps. And examples of these are even Uniswap, which launched in l two today, and Dydx, which moved to a Cosmos app chain, both teams of which I was a part of at one point. These are the largest apps out there, and they're moving towards their own layer two, or app chain, because they want that scale to support the throughput that they have, and they don't want to compete with other apps for that scale. But also at the same time, they want to capture more value vertically down the stack.

In-Class App Layers

If you run your own layer two, then you can direct sequencer fees as an additional source of income back token holders, and you're playing a bit more in your own walled garden now you're seeing the trend of a lot of apps seeking to become infrastructure, in some cases general purpose infrastructure, which I think is the latest iteration of this trend. So, yeah, we'll see where it goes, but it's just added to the number of l two s out there. Why do we see a lot of these apps going to their own specific chains or roll ups? What's the advantage there? I think something people have talked about a lot was having your own block space. Is that the still main driver or no?

Understanding Block Space

Yes, that's definitely the component of it. I think TBD, in terms of which apps kind of actually push the limits of that block space and throughput. Right. I think DyDX is a good example where it's a perpetuals order book exchange. And that right now at least, I think, is probably the product primitive or use case that is actually consistently pushing throughput bounds. And so that was definitely a factor in terms of that team's decision to go with a Cosmos app chain to support the v four version of the product. But a lot of apps out there aren't yet pushing those limits. I think to some degree, it's also like a bet on the future. And of course, it's just a broader trend right now. But, yeah, I think to your point, it's definitely one of the factors.

Value Capture on Different Chains

And then I think the other is sort of the value capture. Right. Because you've had this meme of the governance tokens through the prior years, and people are sort of asking, well, what else can I do with these tokens? And for an app that already has a token, if you run your own infrastructure, that offers potentially an additional source of revenue token holders in the form of the layer two sequencer fees. So that could potentially be another motivation. Yeah, I think those are probably the two biggest drivers, in my view, right now. Okay, I want to talk about SVM, kind of. I think a lot of people utilize and use crypto on a daily basis without even knowing what a virtual machine is.

Virtual Machines in Crypto

So TLR explained, like, I'm too. What does that even mean, virtual machine, whether it's EVM, SVM, movevm, or any of these others, you know, insert above. Yeah. So VM is in the simplest terms, the execution environment in which the applications run. Right? So whether it's layer one or layer two, they all are based on a certain VM technology. The EVM is the ethereum VM, which is based on solidity. The SVM is the Solana VM, which is based on rust. And then move VM is based on the move language. Those are probably the three most prominent vms out there, an order of market awareness.

Strengths of Different VMs

And basically they all have their own advantages and trade offs. If you're looking at the EVM, which is targeted at solidity and ethereum developers. Historically that far and away has the most existing network effects. There's a lot of apps out there. There's a lot of solidity developers out there. If you're building any piece of EVM infrastructure, it's easier to get those network effects going. With the SVM. Rust is a very pliable programming language. You can do a lot with it. And the SVM also is natively parallelized, which means that it's capable of running an order of magnitude higher throughput or transactions per second than the EVM is. And that's thanks to the work that Solana and the core engineering team has been doing there, including Anza.

Comparison of Transaction Speeds

And so you're able to have a TPs that's more on the order of currently about 3000 transactions per second, compared to, say, maybe 150 or 200 tps that you can realize with EVM apps right now. So it offers a huge improvement from a throughput perspective, and you can have multiple apps that are hotspots at any given point in time. So going back to my point earlier, it's like you can have pump fun, you can have an order book, perpetuals exchange, all kind of coexisting and seeing extremely high throughput and usage at the same time. So that's an advantage with the SVM. And then with move. Move was a programming language that was developed at Facebook, and I'd say it's probably the earliest ecosystem out there, but definitely one that's growing as well.

Current State of VMs

And so right now, that's kind of the main players in the VM category. So, yeah, that's kind of just a quick run through of that. Okay, so I guess we'll go to the main question here. And really, a question that people ask a lot, especially in regards to eclipse, is like, why SVM, right, when EVM is really, like, a lot more proliferated in terms of how many applications are built on top of it and how long people are using it, why choose to use that? Yeah, yeah, it's a great question. So in terms of why went in that direction, it kind of goes back to our roots as a early player in the modular infrastructure space.

Modular versus Monolithic Infrastructure

So you sort of have this debate between modular and monolithic that's been happening in the infrastructure space right now, wherever. If you look at Solana L, one that is a monolithic, fully integrated solution, Solana is capable of supporting very high throughput. But you've also had this growth of module infrastructure where the underlying thesis is that you unbundle the components or functions of a blockchain. You have your execution layer, which is the VM that we're just talking about. You have your settlement layer, which for a lot of players in the modular space right now has been ethereum so far. And that's also the case for eclipse. And then you have your data availability layer, which is where the blocks of data are posted.

Eclipse's Collaboration with Celestia

And so eclipse uses Celestia as our partner on the DA piece, and there's other players here like Eigen layer and exacore and others as well. And so thesis that we had, and I think that is also underlying a lot of players in the modular space, is that if you can pick and choose kind of a custom construction for module infrastructure that is targeted at, say, specific use cases, specific audiences, or kind of specific goals, right? And so for eclipse, our goal has always been to build the single cheapest and fastest layer two on Ethereum, regardless of what technology that required.

Goals and Aspirations of Eclipse

Right? Because our thesis is, if you can provide a piece of scaling infrastructure that provides the highest throughput out there and the lowest cost, those are the two biggest priorities for developers from a first principles perspective, to come in and build their app of choice, regardless of what they required. We wanted to pick the best pieces out there. And so from a VM perspective, that meant the Solana VM, because it offered that native parallelization and ability to reach far higher throughput in transactions per second than even currently exists. And then from a settlement perspective, we chose Ethereum, because Ethereum is still by an order of magnitude the largest user and asset base out there.

Data Availability with Celestia

Right? And then from a data availability standpoint, we chose Celestia because it offered the cheapest cost of posting and publishing blocks of data, and it was also the most proven player in the DA space. So that kind of informed the modular construction of eclipse and BJ, I think. Yeah, okay, before you. A little bit muffled, before you. The next thing, we talk about Celestia once in a while in this space, but truthfully, I. Sounds like your cell rated right now. Explain to people what something like is data. A lot of people may know exactly what that is.

Understanding Data Availability

Yeah. So I think you broke up a little bit there, but I think you were asking what for me to explain what data availability is that right? Yeah, data availability and just Celestia and the whole concept. Yeah. So data availability is basically thesis underlying it is saying that you can post data blocks of data or transaction data to a custom system. Right? So ultimately, when you have a piece of decentralized infrastructure, there's a lot of transactions happening. Those could be trades, those could be transactions related to nfts or tweets or what have you, and that transaction history has to be posted somewhere.

Challenges with Data Posting

And the issue with Ethereum l one, historically, along with other solutions out there, has been that often you have to pay a lot to post those transactions. And that cost of posting that transaction data to a historical chain often becomes extremely high. And therefore, it's kind of prohibitively expensive for developers to kind of incur that cost. Right. So either they have to pass it on to their users or they incur it in some way. So it makes it really hard to build scalable apps with great user experiences. So this wave of new data availability providers basically provides these independent systems that you can publish this transaction data and blocks of data to at a much cheaper cost.

Discussion on Eclipse and Its Potential

Okay. Why do a lot of people think that? I just kind of want to get to the meat and potatoes of this. So, first thing, why would something like eclipse not be looked at as like a vampire attack on Solana as it is, using the SVM and building an e l two, like, I think that is, especially as I've read a lot about it. A lot about it. That is one of the questions that come up quite a bit. And then I have a follow up to that as well. Do you want to go for that one first? Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting you say that. You know, I think that historically was people's first response to what we're building.

Perceptions of Eclipse's Model

Right. And I think, you know, the salon on the foundation as well as Ethereum, weren't really sure how to think about eclipse early on because it was sort of this Frankenstein combination of various parts of the stacks and different ecosystems. So ultimately, eclipse is more of a proliferation of Solana technology, where we're taking what we see as the best part of Solana and helping to export that to another ecosystem, which is Ethereum and its users and assets. So we're basically, say, from the perspective of a Solana app developer, we're enabling them to tap into Ethereum users and assets so that they can grow their existing audience and user base.

Cross-Chain Opportunities

Right. And in fact, that's kind of what we're seeing with some of the early apps that are deployed to eclipse, is that in some cases, there are blue chip Solana apps like Orca Solend and others who have existing history on Solana but want to expand to eclipse in order to tap into those Ethereum users and assets. So it's sort of a growth story from that perspective, potentially longer term, there will be a developers who choose eclipse first, because, say, it offers them the best stack in terms of speed as well as cost. And those developers may come to eclipse first and then say, hey, we built something for the SVM. Where else can we export that to? And that could be Solana, right? Because Solana also uses the SVM.

Expanding Ecosystem and Technical Innovation

So in a lot of ways, we're kind of an expansion of Solana's technology and helping to kind of, in some ways, kind of colonize ethereum, if you will, and help to grow the market for SPF. I mean, this is how I look at it personally for anybody. I love Solana. I use Solana daily, and I also love Ethereum for different reasons. And I think that proliferating, like we said, diversity, whether it is the EVM or the SVM, is really important for the chain. I just, like, full-heartedly believe that. And like you said before, that if we are building an l two on vm, there's no reason to limit the technical subjugations of the l one, which some people look at that as EVM, some people look at that in different ways.

Exploration of Opportunities

So I do think it's the best of both worlds and actually helps both ecosystems. I also think it opens up some really interesting opportunities. Like, we talked about this, too. Even using something like Solana blanks or any of the native Solana applications and being able to run those on eth, it's just a really interesting project, and what you could do in terms of experimentation and how you can use the tech. And I think, especially when we talk about l two s here in this space, dude, I mean, a lot of them are kind of the same, but just different narratives. They'll just put a different word on top of it and then just spin it in one direction or another without any real technical innovation or implementation of anything novel.

Sustainable Value

And I think that's kind of been the situation. So I guess I'll ask you that as transparently as possible when we look at some of these other l two s. Like, let's just talk about unit chain, because I do think it's interesting, and I actually just use uniswap less than five minutes before we started this space. It is part of my daily rotation, so I have a lot of love for them, but makes something like their l two different, right? Put it forward as this defi first sort of thing, which, truthfully, 90% of l two s have kind of presented themselves as defi l two s. So why is that different? And then even compare that to something like what dy DX is doing. How is that any different? Like, what are the real differences when it comes to these things?

Differences Between L2s

Yeah. So with, in terms of the differences between, say, uni chain or what DyDX has built, there's a spectrum where if you're building a app specific layer two, that is something that's different from, say, what Eclipse is building, which is a general-purpose layer two. Eclipse is an infrastructure provider, and we are a neutral third party that's building for the audience of app developers and users out there. Whereas, say, with something like uni chain, you have a well-established defi app that is now moving into infrastructure. That's what's called an app specific roll up.

Understanding Critical Differences

Some people call it an app-specific chain as well, because now two can informally be called a chain. And so in that case, you have this app that is now moving vertically down the stack and running that infrastructure. In the case of Uniswap, what they're saying with Uni chain, I believe, is that they want to make Uni chain a home for third-party developers as well. Uniswap itself will be the first party app on the chain, but they also want to attract other Defi developers to build on the l two. Whereas if you look at the approach that say, the DydX team has taken historically, they went with more of an app chain, a true layer one that's based on Cosmos, that really kind of like, is purpose-built for just DyDX right now.

App Chain Specificity

Over time, they could also enable broader adoption of the VM that they're based on and attract third-party developers as well. That's kind of a TBD, as far as I know, in terms of what the team has currently been doing, where they're still solely focused on the DydX app, whereas Uniswap has come out of the gate and said, we also want to be a home for other defi apps. So you kind of have the spectrum of DyDX, which has so far been purely focused on its own first party app, Uniswap a bit further down, which has a first party app and wants to attract these third party apps. And then even further down the spectrum is something like eclipse, which is a general purpose l two, that's kind of purpose built to be that.

The Role of General Purpose L2s

So we don't have apps of our own that we build, but rather we work with independent developers to build those apps. So it's kind of a philosophical difference in terms of, like, the motivation for doing that. Right? Like, do you want to just be infrastructure or do you want to try to be both an app and infrastructure? Yeah. So I think it's kind of a difference in perspective there, but to some degree, I think if you look at a lot of teams in crypto, too, you see expansion in both directions. You see app teams that evolve to become more infrastructure teams as well. And then you also see infrastructure teams that start to focus specifically on a few apps as well.

Expecting Consolidation in the Market

It's a natural extension or up and down. The question everyone has had, especially on the timeline, is, are there too many l two s? I mean, what do you think? Yeah, I think right now it's kind of insane how many l two s there are. Right. The eVM, huge amount of evm L two s. Right. Vijay, I think there's your microphone throwing your phone through an l two. Is that. Is that better? No, I can hear you now. I can hear you now. Okay. Yeah. Just let me know if there's issues with that. Yeah.

Market Overload or Overlap

So going back to your question, in terms of are there too many ll two s? I think right now there's. Due to the funding and just the general environment of crypto, there's been a ton of teams that have come out. Right. And even for emerging vms now you're seeing multiple teams. But I think in the next couple of years, we're definitely going to see consolidation, because ultimately you need to see a thriving and vibrant ecosystem that continues to kind of grow on a given piece of infrastructure to really sustain it. And so I think over the next year or two, we'll definitely see plenty of consolidation around a core group of l two s that are able to either attract a very large ecosystem and solve for that distribution and developer relations and go to market piece, which is also something we're very focused on, or that have layer twos that have a purpose-built app that they're very focused on.

Incentives and Bridging

So everything centers around that app. So uni chain or DyDX could be an example of that. I definitely think we'll see consolidation. It may take a bit of time, and at least for right now, there's a pretty active market of developers that's paying attention to a lot of these ecosystems. So it may take a bit of time, but I think we'll definitely see kind of a narrowing down of the options over time. Let me ask you this, though. I think part of the conversation, part of the debate was been that if there are quite a few different l two s, they'll all work seamlessly through abstraction together. All the atomic composability, all these different things that the ethereum foundation likes to talk about.

Atomic Composability in Layer Twos

Do you see that as the path forward where you can interact and move seamlessly between these different apps or roll ups chains? L two s, however you want to put it. Is that the reality we're looking at, or is it very possible that we live in a completely fragmented ecosystem on Ethereum in which it actually becomes a lot more convoluted to operate anything? What do you think? Yeah, it's a great question. It's definitely early days, I think. So. The issue with the current trend of the l two ification of everything is you end up with all these siloed liquidity pools.

Siloed Liquidity Pools

Eclipse's approach to that has been to build what we think is the single best, fastest, and cheapest construction of a layer two, a general purpose layer two, and one that we want to attract 99% of developers to, and that's what we're building for. But I think the short to medium term market reality is that you have all these different l two islands that are their own pools of liquidity. And bridging is sort of bridging, and good wallet and wallet bridging experiences have been the solution. The solution for that right now, I do think it is possible to sustain, I think, a greater number of l two s than we think if we're able to really effectively bring together strong bridging solutions like Hyperlane, wormhole, layer zero, along with, say, things that Eigen layer and Celestia offer.

Building Principles in L2s

You sort of have this da underpinning, and then you're kind of tying all these layer twos together so that you have this network of network concepts. That is a possibility, perhaps even if, say, a lot of apps end up with their own l two. But I think all those apps need to be long-term sustainable at say, the scale that Uniswap and DydX have been first, and then that interoperability and account abstraction piece that you were referring to earlier has to come into place as well. So I think there's definitely a world where we can see a much higher number of l two s than we think. But maybe that's more of an edge case right now in my view.

Future Insights

Right. And then you sort of also have the monolithic thesis of chains like Solana L one that's counter positioned to the ltification of everything and trying to be a single chain that supports everything. But you're still going to have a ton of users and assets on Ethereum well into the future. I think it'll be interesting to see how things develop in the Ethereum ecosystem, specifically what you think of maraud and meme coins. And this cycle you broke up a little bit there. Could you repeat that leap? What do you think about the meme coin super cycle? Is that real?

Reflections on Meme Coins

Yeah, I enjoy participating in it, for sure. I think it's interesting. I think there's been Toli and some other key figures in this space have kind of been extolling this idea that meme coins in some ways have sucked out the speculative energy that has underpinned a lot of web three and crypto. You've had this deflating of Defi tokens and at least short-term, some infrared valuations, and I think a lot of that energy has moved to meme coins or long-tail tokens. Right. And that's also generated some of it, like some interesting innovation in its own ways. Right. I think pump font has been super interesting to see, and the development of communities around that, I think.

The Future of Meme Coins

Does it continue to exist in its current form? I think it's harder to say, but I think that sort of meme coin energy and will continue to be kind of a part of the broader fabric of crypto and sort of evolve over time. Right. Because memes kind of rule the world now, and they're kind of a shared experience. People can rally around them, they're only getting larger. Right. And there's sort of a common reference point culturally. So I think there's a ton of value to the idea of memes themselves. And so I think meme tokens or meme coins will definitely continue to exist.

Future of Community Engagement

Kind of hard to say how they might look in five years, but excited to see teams continuing to build and make it easier for these communities to really become sustainable around these tokens. And in a lot of ways, too, they're the ultimate grassroots movement in crypto. There's no venture funding. In some cases they're fair launched, of course. In others they aren't. And they're sort of cabal type stuff that goes on around it too. But I think it's still in its early stages, and I'm super excited to see where it goes. And maybe the existence of meme coin trading also forces projects to think about real sustainable value and building great products, as well as a counterbalance to that.

Academic Perspectives

I think it's a healthy, kind of a healthy part of the ecosystem, for sure. Let me ask you this. I mean, you are much more technical. You're on the academic side, you're doing research and shit like that. What is the take in regards to that side of the community? And for meme coins, I think, you know, especially on the side of the community that I'm on, I mean, we fucking love it. I mean, the reality is a lot of them, not most of them are bundled cabal scams, kind of like what you're talking about before. But I think there have been some really good homegrown grassroots, you know, meme coin movements that have been built from the trenches that people are really excited about.

Two Sides of the Coin

And it's something like people like to get behind, but from the academic technical side, I mean, they fucking hate it. I've heard everything in between. They're pointless. The ecosystem, they drain liquidity from legitimate applications. But because of this meme coin movement, it's been pitched kind of one to one against, like vc altcoin types where people are saying nowadays, look, basically everything's a meme coin. I mean, even bitcoin was a meme coin in a certain way. So I guess what's the take from the academic side? Do they like it? Do they not like it? What do you think?

Contrasting Views

Yeah, it's funny, it's kind of like a left curve versus right curve thing. Like, I think. I think there are people out there that call it or in the research part of crypto that maybe have more elitist views about it. But I think for me for sure, and I think for a lot of builders in this space and builders and builder teams very much straddle both the democratized meme coin view of the world as well as the research and. Right. And we sort of tie those together and I think there's like a growing recognition in the broader space of like the practical importance and value that comes from a lot of that.

Evolution of Value

And it's sort of like challenging the space to be the better, sort of serving as a foil to like, maybe how people have thought about things. Right. And so I think that's also like part of the beauty of crypto in general is you always have these seesaw effects on things and so maybe it's a counterbalance to elitist researcher views of the world and.

Reality Check on Progress

We're not even a third of the way there. We're not even a 10th of the way there. It's. It's actually kind of unreal how big things got last cycle. You know, were talking about this last phase too with apps like Moonshot and whether or not those were working, if they were not working, if, you know, applications like that were going to be a key player in mass adoption. I dont know. Im not sure. But I will say this. The one thing I do outside of Twitter in terms of social media and just so I get some brain dopamine, some just fucking brainless shit is ill scroll Instagram reels. And I actually think that if you can tune your algorithm on Instagram, you can get some really good content. Believe it or not, I think reels for me tend to better than TikTok or YouTube shorts just for especially dude videos on Twitter kind of suck, I'll be honest. In terms of, you know, scrolling through them and more on Instagram and I'm seeing it and it's not because I'm searching nothing crypto related. And my accounts on Instagram are pretty separated from my Twitter. I'm seeing more and more just crypto related content.

Algorithm Discoveries

It's just popping up and I'm not searching for it. I'm not looking for it. It's just. It's just popping up. And I kept seeing this thing today which was like this guy in a classroom who ran up one dollar to one hundred dollars. And it was just like his friends recording him from behind his shoulder type thing. And I mean, who knows if it was real or not. It's hard to say but I don't know. I'm just seeing more and more content like that. So I'm excited for the younger generation to be a part of these things. I think like, you know, obviously that we talked about this last time too, the sports betting thing and just how much gambling betting has been proliferated through the young community. And just like kids that are a little bit like not as mature, they're not like in their twenties or more teenagers. I do think that there's a ton of risk there. And hopefully as an individual we don't just lead people to slaughter. That's something I get worried about too is are we just leading people to slaughter? We all got early into most of these coins. That's just the fucking reality because we've been here for a year and a half, two years, three years depending on who you are.

The Psychological Aspect of Investing

Like a lot of people who talk about these and we're buying Satoshi's bags too. He has so much fucking bitcoin. Okay, so here's the thing. We, right is like I. This is how markets work. Whoever was there earliest should have, you know, they should reap the majority of the rewards. They, they recognize something earlier than other people. So yeah, I don't think there's anything wrong with that. And like, I think of the reason why the most like high, you know, enterprise value projects are more transaction and gambling ways. Because frankly, like that's where most of the money is still being made, right? So if you're like a founder that wants to start a business in the space or if you're a VC, you want to fund projects that like are relevant to like what is popular at the moment, right? Because you want to make money. And just like for argument's sake, like the global gambling industry is think a quarter trillion dollars. Last time I checked. I could be wrong. So that's still a lot of money, right?

Market Dynamics and Future Trends

So why not make it frictionless and people are going to do with their money what they will, you know, like you can't stop it. Of course I do think that. And then we'll go, we'll jump to Naveen here. This is something. I really fucking believe it. And I hope that people listening to the space also just try to adopt this mentality is I think there has been a tendency when money is made in crypto and we're not talking like $5,000. I'm talking millions of dollars if. And I. And I believe a lot of the people that are around us and people that you see in spaces and just believers. Yeah, this is not a market. This is a believers market. You know, my dad, I was. I was taking my dad to the hospital today, and just for, like, he has to do scans and like, blood tests and stuff, like a few times a week. And I don't remember what were talking about, but it was something. And you know what he said to me? He was like, you have to believe in something. You have to believe in something. And I was like, dad, you know, that's actually what we've all been saying for a long time now in crypto, that you have to believe in something.

The Reality of Belief in Crypto

And, I mean, that is just the fucking reality. You have to just believe in it. You just have to just believe. Even if. Even if they call you crazy, even if everyone around you telling you're wrong, you just have to keep going. And, and the point I'm trying to make is that when the money is made in crypto, and there will be a lot of money made in crypto, obviously pay your taxes, do it the right way, but to, dude, keep money in the ecosystem and use it to fund and build the shit that you want to build, that is what I think we missed out on the last cycle is when the money was made, it left crypto. People went and, dude, I think if you want to buy a lambo or a nice watch or whatever, you should. You should enjoy the money. You should do what you want with your money, but keep a percentage of it in crypto and either invest into projects that are interesting and exciting to you or build your own thing. This is important. Okay. Like, I think the problem with the industry, the biggest problem is that people make money and they leave. So the people that should be staying, the talented people, the very intelligent, smart people, we don't have enough of them.

The Disappearance of Talent in Crypto

So the talent pool in crypto is not. The talented people don't end up usually making money. They usually end up getting scammed, though. Okay, but I'm just saying that, like, I think there are a lot of people who made a lot of money in this space and have left or who aren't as active. That should be more active. That's all. I agree. And we saw that a lot, too with some NFT projects and things like that. But here's how to be honest with you guys. Like, if you make a million dollars in crypto, which sounds like a lot and is a lot. But, dude, in a bull cycle and a super cycle, anything's possible, dude, people are running up fucking seven figure bags. It's happening. So if you do make that type of money, bro, you can. I mean, you could throw one hundred k, two hundred k at your own idea. Hire some developers, some designers, and just try to build something out.

Investment Dilemmas in the Crypto Space

Like, it's better. You lose it trying to build something and experiment with something as opposed to just throwing into other meme coins and losing it there, which that's what people tend to do. They make money. They fucking walk right back into the casino. They literally walk in thousand x, walk out, have some lunch, come back in and lose it. That is what happens in crypto more often than not. And they use good money and just chase bad money. And it is. It is frustrating. But now that I'm building my own thing and I'm understanding the prices of different stuff, you just realize how much money that's in meme coins being lost on a daily basis that could be put towards literally any concept. And the last thing I'll say we go to Naveen is that crypto is a book without words that the pencil has yet to be picked up, even with all the innovation that we have. And you can fucking pick that shit up and write anything down that you want.

Opportunities and the State of Innovation

Crypto is just so malleable. It's basically saying, if you're saying you're bullish on crypto, it means you're bullish on wood. You're bullish on Nate. Like, you can build anything out of wood, and you can also build anything with crypto. And I think people just need to open their eyes a little bit. But look, we'll throw it over to Naveen. Before we do, I want to reset the space. Welcome, guys. Please do me a favor. Click that button in the bottom right hand corner and give it a like comment. Retweet. It is the best way to support, and the engagement does go a long way. So thank you, guys, and please follow the speakers. Naveen, we're going straight to you. What do you think?

The Importance of Community and Growth Beyond Influence

Yeah, so I do think that the personality, like the cult of personality, does matter. And there are many examples of this. You know, whether it's Raj and Toli for Solana or, you know, whatever, Vitalik for Ethereum. I mean, these are all, like, cults of personality. The one thing, though, is that I think it's important for projects to kind of grow beyond the cult of the personality. Like, if you really want it to be a transcendent thing, I think a lot of it has to do. A lot of the thinking people should be doing is like, what is the lifespan of the project? Like, if it's temporal, if it's like, oh, it's only going to last for a short period of time, then call to personality is great, but I think that it's really important for projects to go to grow beyond, you know, whatever that personality is so that it has a shot at being around for a really long time.

Endurance and Longevity in Crypto Project Development

I think the space would benefit greatly if more founders were interested in building projects that were supposed to, like, last for millennia. Right? Like, if that was the thinking for more founders in this space, we would have completely different kinds of projects and a completely different mindset. It wouldn't just be like run and gun, you know, let's just, like, make as much money as possible and get the fuck out. I also think that another element of this space that's, like, just really missing is something that in the web, two space people really want, which is product led growth. The whole idea that let the product do the talking. Yeah, there can be a cult of personality wrapped around the product, but just let the product do the talking.

The Role of Innovation and Product Quality

And the product has natural virality on its own just because it's that fucking good. It's just genuinely that good of a product. And those kinds of products are few and far between, but when they are really that good, they just kind of, like, take over without very much marketing happening. I think we live in a marketing first industry, but people forget that marketing should really be like fuel on an already burning fire. It shouldn't be the thing that is driving your thing. If you're spending marketing money and you don't actually have, like, any actual underlying traction, you're just wasting the money. And I feel like 99% of projects in this industry kind of fall into that bucket. You know, there isn't really anything there.

Illusions of Success in the Market

They're just, they just raise so much money, they can make a huge stink of it and just put it everywhere and it makes it look like a lot bigger than it is. But, you know, something I learned in the music business, you know, a lot of artists, a lot of musicians, they look big on paper, but when you actually kind of. They kind of look like fog rolling over the hill, right? It, like, looks really fucking imposing. Like, it's really scary. Like, oh, my God, is this giant fog bank. But, yeah, it's just steam. Like it's not real. You know, it's not. It's not really that big. And you know that in the music industry, that's what she said. In the music industry, there's this concept of papering venues where when an artist plays a show, like, say an artist is playing an arena, but they really shouldn't be playing the arena.

Challenges in Live Performance Metrics

The manager will do what's called papering the show because obviously no artist wants to play to an empty building. So whenever you go to a concert and you see a bunch of military personnel, police and firemen and all that at the show, just know that happened because the ticket sales were slow as fuck and they couldn't actually sell the tickets. So they just started giving out the tickets to all these random community people. That's called papering a venue. And I think 99% of projects in our industry are just papering a venue. It's not actually real. So, yeah, I think the way for us to win is to have longer term mindset from a founder perspective, more focus on the product and having the product actually drive the growth versus it just being a bunch of hot air. And then I think if we had those two things, you would see very different outcomes than you do in our industry.

Market Saturation and Raising Standards

There was. I mean, what are some good examples of that, Naveen? I think. I think that's a better question. Well, I mean, there's. I mean, pump fun. I mean, sort of. I mean, I think pump fun. I guess the question, it'll be interesting to see how long lasting that is. Pump fun has product led growth in the sense that people are just creating lots of coins, for sure. I mean, there's no debate about that. Some of those coins are winners. That's also true. The vast majority are losers. So I think you can make the same argument about things like Opensea. Back in the day, during the NFT meta and run, Opensea was huge. Absolutely fucking huge. But it just didn't really stand the test of time. It just couldn't really last.

Longevity and Challenges of Successful Platforms

So that's the hard part, is I think the industry does have things that kind of grow, even if they don't have some cultish leader. I don't know who the cultist leader is for. Pump fun. Is there one? I don't even know Opensea. I mean, those guys weren't really necessarily cultish leaders. It was just kind of like a platform that kind of exploded. So that's definitely more product led than. Than personality led. But those things just didn't really stand the test of time. So that becomes the hard part. Like, were they really thinking, you know, to create like millennia long things or was it just like, get rich as fast as you can? Naveen, let me ask you, because when we first met, so almost a year and a half, almost two years ago at this point, but it's crazy how fast time flies, you know, Opensea was still pseudo relevant at that point and still doing some volume.

Historical Context of Opensea's Evolution

I mean, nfTs, I mean, look, what was it, early 2023? So NFts were still. There was movement, there was some attention, at least a lot more than there is now. But were kind of on the tail end of the entire 22 movement. I mean, for fuck's sake, ute's came out at late 2022, right? So it wasn't that far removed. And blast was doing its thing, man. It was such a different time. And I was still a huge fan of Opensea. And I remember you and I would talk about it a lot and you're like, look, Opensea is not innovating. They're not going to be here in a year and a half. Or it was, something along those lines was your take. And I was actually pretty resistant to that statement. I said, there's no fucking way. They had this unbelievable treasury. They have this massive team, all the projects still use them, all these different things.

The Rise and Fall of Market Leaders

And then obviously Blur just had a phenomenal run, even if it was short lived and some people aren't that much of a fan. I still think Pac man is really sharp and maybe they figure it out. But looking at Opensea now, I mean, I think there was a day recently in the past two months where their total volume was like dollar 63. Maybe it wasn't that exactly, but it was something obscenely low. And I cannot fucking believe that they had a point in time where they were making, you know, tens of millions of dollars per day in fees, maybe sometimes even more than that, to the point where it is basically a completely dead platform. And Magic Eden has just eaten their lunch in every way. And honestly, Magic Eden was not fucking that big back then. Like, Magic Eden was so much drama in terms of the royalties and.

Conflict and Competition in the Marketplace

And people were basically counting them out of the game and blur was number one and so on and so forth. So I guess my question for you is, how did you know that Opensea was going to fall off the way that they did in the most respectful way possible? I mean, I don't think they hate their own platform. I think they tried their best, but clearly something went wrong. I mean, what do you think that was? So for me, I think, you know, in this industry, you kind of have to. There's points in time where you have to be moving really fast to keep up with whatever's happening at that moment, especially if you have a platform that's really hot, there's a step on the gas moment in time. And then I also think that there's evangelism kind of thing that you have to be doing as well.

The Need for Agility and Adaptation

Well, and I think for Opensea, the platform was so stagnant. I guess the point in time where I realized they were kind of fucked is when I learned that they were rewriting the whole platform. I was like, okay, big mistake. Because the amount of time it's going to take you to do that, you're just going to get lapped. And this is a common mistake. It's really a common mistake because I'm sure the platform was put together with duct tape and bubblegum, but in an industry at a moment where things are moving really fast, they just were not able to meet the moment at all. It's still to this day, the platform really hasn't perceptively changed. It's basically the same thing that it was basically a year ago. I don't even know what happened with their rewrite. Did they just dump it off a bridge?

Mismanagement and Opportunity Costs

Who knows what happened? Went through all these different, like, you know, moves, all these decisions. The other thing that's really kind of interesting about it is they probably had opportunities to acquire basically anything and everything. Like, if they wanted to acquire blur, they probably could have cut a check for like $20 million to Pac man or $10 million, you know, back when they were, like, rich as fuck and they just didn't do it. You know, like, they're basically, if you really want to be super successful, you basically have to be a fucking monopolist, right? Like, you have to have that kind of mindset. You have to be like, there is actually not going to be a second place. There isn't going to be a third place. I'm going to be a fucking monopolist. I'm going to be fucking standard oil.

Strategic Decisions and Market Leadership

And the amount of money that Opensea had, they could have bought all of these things. Like, all of these things, like magic, Eden, blur, like, all these things. You know, if they went to those founding teams, those founders, and just like, look, we're just gonna straight up buy you and we want you to come in and be like the chief product officer. This, that, the other thing, there wasn't like a, they just didn't have like that, you know, just that killer attitude you know, just that, you know, dog, they weren't Thunder dragons. They weren't. Yeah, they just didn't have that mindset. It was all very much like, we're just building a platform and it's like, well, no, you're going to get commodified out and you need to just be like fucking dominant.

Lack of Survival Instincts in Market Competition

You need to be absolute fucking ruthless. Monopolist is kind of the vibe. So that was sort of where, and I'm frankly glad I never wrote a check to open c because I just didn't feel like they had that kind of mindset. So, yeah, I mean, that's the answer to the question. And something I think about, too, is they had something that even the successful crypto projects of today, or successful crypto apps look at. Something like pump fun. I still think most people in the web two world probably have never heard of pump fun. Maybe it's changing day to day, but who knows? But, dude, everyone had heard of Opensea. I mean, they were talking about it on the news, on the daily, this NFT marketplace making, you know, fastest growing company ever.

Historical Awareness and Branding Impact

It was, they had mind share, and that is something that you genuinely can't even buy. I agree with you, too. And why they, I don't know why they didn't acquire companies. Imagine they probably had hundreds of millions in their treasury. They could have bought everything in anything. And it goes back to a thought that I've been having for while, which is, I think it's, I always look at designer and the song panda. I still think designer is a great artist who had the potential to create really interesting and unique music. And like, designer was a little bit more mainstream or panda was a little more mainstream. But you even listen to songs like Timmy Turner. He didn't put out that many in the beginning, but Timmy Turner, you're like, oh, wow, there is an interesting sonic quality to this.

Cultural Impact and Complacency

It's, it's unique. And when you have the number one song in the world and this actually happened, a little pump, too, and you just get so big so fast, I just think you lose the dog in you. I think you just become complacent. I call it the McGregor theory McGregor made. McGregor was an un, still an unbelievable talent, but made so much money that when it came down to really fighting again, as his career went into the period of, like, you know, fighting Khabib and everything after that, it just, it wasn't the same. It's just too rich. You're not in the gym, you know, at 03:00 a.m. bleeding, working your ass off. You're on a yacht somewhere, enjoying, you know, your luxuries. And I tend to think that Opensea was just too successful, that there was no reason for them to innovate. They got complacent.

Lessons Learned and Future Prospects

And somebody who did have their dog, have the dog in them. Pac Mandev, who is honestly cutthroat, in a killer, you know, not in a. Not in a negative way, but not a long term thinker at all. At all. Pac man is the kind of guy who's like, you know, I'm gonna just innovate in a manner where I'm gonna, like, push for the next month, I'm gonna make fucking 20 mil and I'm gonna fuck off. Right? Like, that's kind of the mindset. Like, I don't see Pac man as like a visionary in any way, shape or form. I think he's the kind of guy that's like, yeah, I'm going to be like, iterative. I'm going to just like, come. I'm going to take these two Lego blocks and put them together. And, you know, he's good.

Innovation and Short-Term Thinking

He's a good hustler. He's a good, like, you know, he can definitely make waves. But I don't really see him as the kind of person who's like, oh, I'm going to actually be a visionary and here's why. This is going to be a hundred year fucking thing, right? Like, that's not Pac man. So the interesting thing too, about, and I would still love to. I really want to do a space with Pac man. I've been trying to get that space for two years, but he's just not that. I don't think he does spaces or he's active on that side. I look at blast as a really interesting experience. Like, I don't even know how to explain it. We had a massive coin which was Pac moon with some really, actually pretty innovative people in the way that they promoted it.

Creative Conversations and Community Development

Everything Lamboland did, the whole fucking, just incentive with creators in the way that they approached it, I actually thought was really smart. And the coin, I mean, I think it hit like 180 mil market cap. And it had this narrative of, this is the fundamental basis meme coin of this ecosystem, and basically a beta play to the main l two asset and for whatever reason. And they also had fantasy top, which even though they never added me as a hero, and I'm still little salty about that, I still think fantasy top was really cool. And I still think that they could be successful. And, I mean, they took over the space. You know, they had a lot of mind share. So when you think part of it is because opensea never dropped a token, I don't.

Untapped Potential in Performance Metrics

So I think a lot. Okay, I'll finish my take and I'll answer that question. Which is the point I was trying to make with Pac man is I actually think that he put a pretty good effort into blast and I don't think the game is done yet. I personally never bridged money to blast, I'll be honest with you. I. I didn't. I didn't use. There was nothing there that was super interesting to me personally. like what? Like Defi valleys or whatever, the fucking thing that everybody was buying, whatever that project was. I remember so many people around me were just throwing checks into it. I'm like, I'm not buying this Ponzi at the top.

Rethinking Investment Strategies

And that shit is down like 99.8%. And shout out thread guy. And also thread guy called me from Belgium today. Dude, he is. I gotta say, he just wins the title as best creator in crypto. Like, the content that he's about to put out is so fucking interesting. And like, one, him being one of my closest friends, but two, I'm genuinely a fan of him and just super excited to see the content that comes out of Belgium. But probably nothing. But. Okay, in regards to the open sea thing, I mean, I think the low hanging fruit is basically. Yeah. That they didn't put out a token and that's why people don't care.

Trading Mechanisms and User Interaction

I actually don't think that's the reality, though, because magic Eden. Magic Eden is putting out a token, but they haven't put one out yet. And I don't think. I don't tend to believe that their token is a reason why their platform has been successful. I think that they were early adopters when it came to the bitcoin assets, and I think that revitalized the company in a way that most people don't understand. I think the majority of their fees and volume came from there, not Solana NFTs at that point in time. And I think magic Eden has just been willing to ship, try new things and just say, fuck it.

Vision and Innovation in Web Development

Like, we'll throw shit at the wall and just try things until it works. And I just have, like, when you try to. And I'm trying to build my own thing now, too, so when you are trying to build something, you just realize how hard it is. So, yeah, I don't know. I give them props, but I don't know, like, maybe, like, if Opensea decided to drop a token tomorrow, I think we'd all make a ton of money. So I'm not opposed to it, but I think at this point, or at least earlier, their strategy was to ipo and go public. And maybe that was the wrong strategy. Maybe that was the wrong strategy. Maybe they should just fuck it.

The Future of Cryptocurrency Ventures

We're a web three company. First, let's fucking reward the people who've been using this platform. But instead they decided to buy, I think it was Gem XYZ. I think that's what they ended up buying or whatever. It was one of those 0% royalty platforms, and then they turned it into Opensea Pro, which was genuinely a dog shit application that had no advantages over blur or any of the other competitors. And I still to this day, think Opensea branding is strong than almost any other marketplace. Like the colors, the logo, the feeling. But it's like Naveen said, you can't have an application for two years, three years, and not change damn near one thing.

Community Trust and Maintaining Brand Integrity

They also stabbed the back of creators when they reduced, got rid of royalties and made them optional. Okay? So I. I think royalties were going to 0% no matter what, or at least optional royalties. And I. There's. I still am the camp that if you enforce them and make them something that you can't get around, then you're taking away sovereignty of your assets in some way. I think what limit break did with their new smart contracts and how magic Enix has implemented them, I think that is a great option. And it goes to. What I always say in crypto is that optionality is not just important, but it's required.

Consumer Choice and Market Viability

It should be. Play the game how you want to play the game. If you don't want full control, 100% sovereignty of your assets, and fuck it, here's ways that you can operate. If you want just the complete crypto first principle ways, then fuck it, here's how you do that, too. Right? That is the way that crypto should be, in my opinion. It should not just be one way or the other, which I know some people disagree with, but I think that's. That's just part of the game. So, yeah, I don't know. I would actually love to do a space with Opensea at some point and just do what, like, understand what the mindset is.

Engagement and the Human Element in Crypto

Like, what. What happened? And did they give up? And have they given up? Because here's the thing with crypto, is the game has never, you can almost never totally lose the game until you give up. If you don't give up, then maybe you find a way. It might take some time. I don't know. Maybe you figure it out. They still have money, they still have employees, they still have a. And by the way, everything they did with C Port and the Wyvern contract, they contributed to open source code in a way that I thought was really important. So they were, they did good things. It's not like open.

The Legacy and Future of Digital Platforms

And by the way, Opensea was a big part of why NFT succeeded in the first place. They just saw a market and they go ahead and bean. Yeah, I mean, look, it's very easy to be a armchair quarterback, which, you know, I've been primarily in your space tonight. you know, it's very easy to look like hindsight is always 2020. And, you know, at that time, as, you know, there was just so much happening, so much changing. Everyone genuinely believed that the money train for NFTs would just continue forever. Right? Like, anyone who was there at that time was just like, oh, this is going to continue forever, waiting for the next drops.

Trends and Emotional Connections in Markets

I think the thing that, of course, hindsight being 2020, that, and again, I can just draw parallels from the music business on this, too, but when things just keep sounding the same, you know, everything just kind of sounds the same, then there's no interest. Like, that's not what connects with people emotionally. Like, people need something new. And I was actually at a dinner this evening with a bunch of, like, incredible, like, superstar music exec types. And, you know, I was explaining some tarry stuff to them. And one of the analogies I drew was, I was like, you know, there's got to be like, sometimes you hear a new artist, you know, like the first time people heard Kendrick Lamar, you know, like, the very first time, or the first time people heard daft punk, you know, or the first, like, the first time people heard fucking gorillas, you know, like, pick an artist where you, like, the first time you heard them, you're like, holy fuck.

Emotional Engagement and Market Resilience

The first time people heard the weekend, you know, where it's just like, it is something new. It is something out of left field, something about their voice, the tonality, the, like, the song construction, the lyrics, like, whatever. It's like a combination of all these things that makes you feel something different. And I think the moment where NFTs were just like, you kind of knew that it was going to fall off a cliff was when there was just kind of nothing new under the sun. Anymore, right? It just was like, you know, people had run all the experiments in terms of, like, drop types and things with traits and, you know, like, whatever.

Stagnation and Market Erosion

It's all kind of the same old ship and it all just shit and all just felt like hyper derivative, you know? And, and I think that's a challenge because when it's something creative that's supposed to ultimately like anything in this industry, in order for it to really win, it has to make an emotional connection. Like we here on these spaces talking about things like, well, what's the supply and what's the fucking, like, you know, that magical word, like, what's the utility? What's. But none of that. It's like none of that actually matters if you're making an emotional connection with people.

Consumer Behavior and Market Hypothesis

Like, it's all about that emotional connection because most things people buy, they're just buying it on straight emotion. They're not buying it because it's like a rational thing to buy. There's nothing rational about most of the things people buy if you really, like, look at it, you know? And so that, I think, is a major challenge because there was a moment in time where people were willing to suspend disbelief and really willing to make an emotional connection with these things. And that's what drove the value, that's what drove the excitement, that's what drove the passion. The moment everyone started being all logical about it because it just was the same old thing is when it just killed the buzz, right? And the same thing's going to, by the way, happen to meme coins.

Predictive Patterns in Market Behavior

Like, I know there's a bunch of people who are like, oh, my God, meme coins are incredible. Holy fuck. You know, donkey fucker coin, skibbidy toilet coin, whatever the fuck it's called. Like, coin. These things are the same fucking shit. Like, they're the same things and it's like the same, we're running the exact same thing. People are going to get tired of the sugar rush. It's going to be, it's tired of eating the same candy bar over and over and over again because literally the same fucking thing. And that's going to get really grating and tired. And, and the unfortunate part is like, this cycle has not cut and hit the mainstream in the same way as, like, the NFT stuff did.

Cultural Impact and Mass Engagement

Like, it's just not like the NFT stuff was huge. You had every celebrity, every fucking person talking about it. We were all sitting home during the pandemic. Everyone was into it. Everyone was excited about it. And that was like a moment in time. And we're clearly like. We clearly don't have the same level of product market fit with the meme coin stuff, no matter how much, like, various pumpers of meme coins want to talk about them. It's just obviously not the same. So that I think is, that is something I think about a lot, is like, there has to be a new artist, a new song, a new approach, something that is surprising and delightful and enables people to make an emotional connection again, because we're all human beings, we all want to do it, but it's hard to do it when it's the fucking hundredth of the same thing all over again.

Generational Gaps in Investment Trends

You know, the meme coin thing, I try not to mid curve it. And I will say this, which is where I think we differ in opinion a little bit, is I especially because if you're on Instagram, if you're looking at reels, if you're just like, looking at the zoomer shit, I just tend to believe that the young generation would rather throw their money at fucking skibbidy toilet coin than anything else. Now, the thing is mind share and how much money gets put into something I think are two different things. I don't know if the young generation has enough money to pump these coins, which is what thesis seems to be like. Oh, the younger people are going to get in and they're going to pump the coins. I don't know if they have enough money to do so.

Current Trends and Future Projections

That's just the reality. Do they have hundreds of millions to pump these coins? No, but if they're talking about it enough, I think that VC's will want to jump in and try to front run whatever trend we'll see. Now, the reality is, and you know, this being because you've seen it happen a thousand times, you've been in crypto forever, is that every year there's a new thing, right? And then. And then that new thing is not the new thing anymore. And then there's something new. So were at meme coins and then went to nfts, and now we're back at meme coins. Maybe we go back to nfts next, I'm not sure. But think about what you're saying. It's like, oh, yeah.

Cyclical Behavior and Market Dynamics

It's like, okay, first we heard this, went from new metal to fucking pop. And now we're going to go back to new metal and we're going to go back to pop. You see? I mean, you see what I'm saying, it's like, I don't think that's true. I think that if you really want. If we really want the space to grow, it has to be something surprising and delighting. I actually don't believe that. Like, Gen Z and whatever is just gonna like, oh, my God, they're fucking degenerate gamblers. They throw all their money at fucking sports betting. That means they're gonna buy skippity toilet. You know? Like, why bet on the 49 ers when you can bet on skibity toilet?

Behavioral Economics and Emotional Investment

It's like, hey, assholes, people love the fucking 49 ers. Like, their pastor, they grew up, their parents. Like, we're into the 49 ers. They're into the 49 ers. They. They play fantasy football. There is an emotional fucking connection. There is no emotional connection to skibity toilet. These are apples and oranges. These are not the same things. You know, I think. I think you'd be surprised. These kids are like. They would. They're like tattooing skippity toilet on the right. They're not. They're not. And you know that they're not. They're not. They're not. Because you can look at the fucking holder count and know that it's just not converting.

The Statistics behind Holder Counts

Like, it's just not converting. You can just see it. If it was, you would see very different outcomes. You would see enormous numbers of enormous amounts of inflow of net new capital coming through these on ramps. And you are not seeing that full stop. You are not. You would have completely different data from companies like Moonpay. Moonpay would be shouting from the rooftops how many billions of dollars are flowing in from their fucking credit cards or whatever. They are not, because there's no volume. Well, there's no way for. Here's. Well, there's two. There's two parts of this one. I don't think it started yet. I. I keep saying it. I don't think. I think we're knocking at the door, but I don't think that door is open yet.

The Potential for Mainstream Adoption

maybe applications like that allow people to buy meme coins with, you know, cash apple. Like, what happens if cash app just says fuck it only can you buy bitcoin here? You can buy meme coins now? I mean, I don't. I mean, look, that'd be great, but I think you. If you went and you talked to cash app, I think you'd be surprised. I don't think they have any interest in that because I don't think that they're seeing the actual traction around. Around it. That everyone thinks people are seeing. Like, you know, look at. Look at Iggy. You know, iggy has fucking, what, 8 million followers or whatever on x, some large number, whatever the number is.

Social Influence and Market Engagement

And, you know, she's. And look, I. I think she's done an admirable job with mother, right? Like, she tweets about it all the fucking time. That's all she talks about, is mother this and mother that and whatever people can say about her, but she definitely is, like, pushing her, shilling her thing as aggressively as she possibly can. She doesn't have any, like, what's the conversion rate of her holder count, you know, of her social following to hold her account? It's, like, terrible. It's a terrible conversion rate. It's. It's really bad. So this whole idea that we're going to be saved by Gen Z, you know, coming in, like, you know, turbo bond, like, kycing, putting their fucking Social Security numbers into fucking, you know, whatever, insert app here, you know, moonshot or whatever, I just.

Navigating Market Sabotage

Wait, that one's super simple, though, Naveen. Like, it's not. Blau was on a space just, like, day before yesterday and tried to set up an account and I can't even get an account to work. Doesn't even work. And you still have to give your fucking social. You still have to give your. Your driver's license, which, by the way, is a huge impediment, but you have to give your driver's license for anything you do. I mean, I. Like if I go to the doctors. No, that's not true. Did you. Did I ask you for your driver's license when you downloaded Tara universe? Okay, for that specific. No, everything else. That.

Industry Trends and User Experience

Again, where did the industry start? Leap. Did it start with. Did it start with asking for driver's licenses? Come on, my friend. It started with, did you have to provide a driver's license to mine? Ethereum? Well, I wasn't there back then, so probably. No, of course not. Of course not. This is all a figment of, like, imagination. This is all bullshit. And by the way. By the way, that barrier to entry is huge. Like, people. People are, like, brainwashed. They think, like, oh, my. It's just a bunch of people who've never built a consumer product before. That's the problem. I urge you to try it.

Real-World Applications and Lesson Learning

Leap. You're. You're building your own thing. You are right now building your own thing. You should. You should run some experiments on your own. It's like, okay, I'm going to go build a whatever. I'm going to build a forum. I'm going to build a sign up. I'm going to build a whatever. And you will see, every additional field of information you try to capture from other human beings dramatically reduces your conversion rate. Bro, there's a reason. Look, you know the funny thing about Robin Hood. The funny thing about Robin Hood is, see, that's the other thing about it is, like, people don't understand this. Like, there is emotional connection to stocks.

Consumer Behavior and Sentiments

People. People go out and buy an Apple product. They buy an iPhone, they sign up for Netflix, they drive a Tesla, they buy a Nintendo switch or whatever it is, and then they go, oh, my God. Like, you know what my son said to me? He's like, dad, I play Roblox a lot. And I was like, oh, you want to buy some stock? He's like, yeah, I want to buy Roblox stock. That makes sense. Leap. That makes sense. Yeah. Security, people. Okay, here's the thing, though. There is an emotional attachment to meme coins, too. Like, you'd be hard pressed to find somebody, I think, in our industry, maybe.

Comparative Insight in Development Strategies

Yes. But the point I'm trying to make to you is outside of our industry, definitely not. But what about cat? So look at Apple pay. Apple pay. You have to put your Social Security number and your fucking. Maybe I don't even know Apple pay. You take a credit cardinal and you sign up with a credit card. Now, you've provided. You provided all that information to the credit card issuer. That's true. But the credit card is a very valuable thing. So I think we're conflating. It's like someone coming in and going through Moonpay's terrible process to sign up for something, or Phantom's even worse process to sign up for something.

User Experience in Crypto Platforms

It's so many step, dude. In Phantom, it's eight steps just to get to the KyC gate. No one's going to do that. No one in Phantom. Yes, because they're using, what is it called? Mezzo network or something. I forgot what their onramp is called. But I tried it. I tried. I installed Phantom on my phone and I actually was like, I'm going to buy soul. I'm going to just. I'm a random consumer. I'm just going to buy some soul. But, you know, part of the problem is no one has actually tried it. You've not actually tried it, so you wouldn't know. Like, that's the thing. I mean, what about Coinbase?

Challenges with Traditional Platforms

Coinbase, dude, it's harder to open a Coinbase account than it is to open a Bank of America account. Seriously, it is really hard. People don't even realize. And it's not Coinbase's fault entirely. It's part of the regulatory oversight and overreach that we have in the industry, right? Like, the industry is being strangled in a lot of ways by regulation and bore by regulators. And so it's not even Coinbase's fault. Like, obviously Brian is really smart and Brian knows all this. If he could cut the number of steps or cut the checks or cut the, like, oh, we're not going to use Persona anymore for Kyc.

Regulatory Implications on User Experience

Take a selfie. Like, if he could cut all that shit, he would cut it in a millisecond, but he can't because he's like, he's tied up with like, whatever regulator wants that information. So basically, I just start from the most simple place, which is every additional step you add to a user journey, you cut your conversion rate a minimum of 50% each time, full stop, period. It doesn't matter what kind of product it is. People have said, well, Naveen, your Robin Hood's different. I'm like, yo, my son wants to buy Roblox stock because he loves fucking Roblox. That makes sense.

Emotional Investment and Trust

And if he. And maybe yes, he'll jump through the various hoops to do that, but he doesn't know what fucking skippity toilet is. He doesn't give a fuck about that, okay? There's no way. He doesn't know what skippity toilet is. There's no pay. There's no way he's on rope. No comment. He doesn't know what that is. Dude. He get. I guarantee if he's on Roblox, he has to know at least what some break stuff is. That's fine. That's fine. But my point is that he doesn't know about buying a coin for that.

User Education and Market Engagement

That's not his thing. He's like, oh, because how do people get interested in buying stocks? It's because they learn about investing and they start learning about money. They start learning about that kind of stuff. That's how that all starts. The next step isn't going buying donkey fucker on, you know, Cardano through moonshot. That's not the next step. That's illogical. And again, I just see, like, this, everyone has this vision that like, oh, my God. Because everyone's sports betting, they're going to start coming into our space and buying random coins. I'm like, I just don't see that.

The Future of Meme Investment Trends

I just don't see that happening. I don't think. Okay, so this is. And we'll jump over to Lauren here. I don't think that people are going to come in and start buying a random, like, fucking micro cap, 100k market cap points. I. I actually think that part of the. The industry will just remain like a very niche thing for like super in the trenches D gens. I think that's the case. But what I do think is possible. What I do think is possible is a very well branded product.

The Importance of Branding in User Engagement

Okay. I obviously hold Mog and so I'm just going to use that. I mean, everyone knows I hold Mog and I'm a fan of the coin. Mog has done a pretty good job having a cohesive or like, insert any of the other, like, really successful big ones. But I'll use Mog. Mog has done a pretty good job of having a cohesive brand with a word that is used on a daily with that, with the younger generation. Like if you go to any of the big streams, just insert any big streamer and go look at their chat, you'll probably see the word mog within a minute. Just like mog to this, mog to that.

The Future of Meme Coins and Community Engagement

Again, you could insert XYZ coin that has similar whatever. I think that if there is a coin with a well made, cohesive, accessible branding with something that people understand, I actually think they would come in and buy $5 of it, $10. Now, is that going to pump the coin? No, but I think what ends up happening is if enough people talk about it, if the younger generation keeps talking about it, that's what brings big players in or big VC's, whatever that want to throw like 10 million, 15 million. And I think that's how the coins. I think that misunderstanding of VC's.

Observations on Market Dynamics

I think that dream, I think that's a. That's a like mirage. It's a mirage. It's a mirage, not a mirage. But right now, I mean, look at. I don't think that just normal market actors are moving these coins to hundreds of millions of market cap. I think it's sophisticated players who maybe don't have the best intentions either. I'm not saints. I think there's a lot of market manipulation in this industry. I don't think that it's sophisticated players. I think that's like a dream because I think it could be a sophisticated player that just wants to rinse retail.

Market Manipulation and Trading Dynamics

I think there's a lot of bots and there's a lot of automated trading systems, automated trading algorithms out there. And I think people are just getting rinsed. I think there's so much happening under the radar with these coins and with these markets. I think people are just getting fucking rinsed, to be honest. And that's the crappy part, is you're basically, you know, oh, let's feed retail to the dogs. You know, it's kind of like. It's, like, very predatory is how it feels right now for most of these things. And look, I think mog is a great meme.

Economic Realities and Community Alignment

I totally get that. Like, you know, and you know how much I'm a fan of Kevin. And, you know, I know that's his, like, number one. That's his number one chick. You know, that's like, that's. He doesn't have a. He doesn't have a side hustle. He's married to mog. You know? Like, that's his thing, you know? But, like, yeah, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Quote unquote sophisticated players that are like, you know, I'm going to sit here with my monocle and I'm going to fucking take a billion dollar position in Mog because I think Mog is going to be, like, the thing that's going to be around for 30 years.

Mog's Market Position

That's definitely not happening. I think what is happening is, hey, look, we're doing deep analysis on all the wallets that own Mog or own any of these things. And if we make Xyz move, we can shake out Xyz players and profit in Xyz way. Or people are doing really sophisticated trading strategies. They're doing all kinds of hedging and all kinds of other stuff. There's all kinds of stuff going on in the market, but that's not VC. That's hedge fund and trading shop and automated trading strategy stuff. I think people throw the VC term around, but that's not a venture capital play.

Clear Distinction in Investment Strategies

Okay, what about this? And then. Sorry, Lauren, we'll jump at you right here. This is the last thing, which is, and I agree with you, maybe VC is not the right term. Funds. Whatever is a better appropriation. Yeah, trading shops. They're just trading shops. I think a big part of this, and especially from your side of it, is for the new people coming in. Any additional steps, so on and so forth, it detracts from retention, whatever. But let me ask you this. As of, and this is according to Google, so take it with a grain of salt.

Current User Engagement Metrics

And it's according to their AI overview, which I think is a cool feature, by the way. I'm glad they put that in so I don't have to click a bunch of links. But as of October 5, 2024, Robinhood has 24.2 million funded accounts and 11 million monthly active users. And then additionally, coinbase has 105 million registered users in 2023. And so maybe that's up, you know, marginally as of this year. But between the two, that's a shit ton of people. So my thesis has not been around. Like, okay, all of these brand new actors are going to come in, or brand new people, and now they need a set of accounts.

Market Predictions and Trends

My mind has been like, these people already have accounts and they've already purchased things like Doge Shiba and whatever, and maybe they're willing to jump back in the pool if there's significant price movement, if bitcoin starts pumping and goes to 100k. So I think for the people that already have all of these accounts and they're already set up, maybe that was half the battle. I don't know. I mean, what's your take there? Yeah, so I think the problem is, like, Coinbase throws out a headline metric, which is the 100 million metric, but buried in their quarterly reports is the real metric, which is monthly transacting users, which is a way smaller number and is intentionally double counted and kind of like a vanity metric.

Understanding the Reality of User Counts

So the actual Coinbase number is more like 8 million users. And the way they define monthly transacting user is someone could have like a dollar of USDC or whatever on Coinbase and be earning, staking it or whatever they're doing, and never log into Coinbase, and they're considered a monthly transacting user. Similarly, Coinbase also counts users who have multiple accounts as unique monthly transacting users. So I think that's a great example of the fog analogy, where you have this big headline number, 105 million accounts, the majority of which are dead accounts, and what you actually have is a much smaller number which is actually reported in their quarterly file filing.

Navigating Through the Numbers

So I would urge you to go look at their quarterly report and you can see it for yourself. You don't have to take my word for it. So that's Coinbase. How do you have multiple accounts on Coinbase? They require KYC. Oh, you could have like, you know, different entities, different, you know, businesses, like, you know, whatever. There are lots of ways you can have that. I mean, I have multiple Coinbase accounts because I have different business units. You just need, like, multiple einhorn numbers in order to.

Tech Innovating Practicality

Yeah, it's funny, I actually just asked chat GPT to graph Coinbases mtus over the last four years, and it grew massively from 2020 to, like, 21. It peaked at, it looks like around 11 million, but it's basically fallen ever since. Right. So it's actually down. It's down from Q 421 down to, like, it's down almost like two and a half million monthly transacting users. So, like. So that. That's the problem. It's like you were sitting here going, oh, my God. You know, everybody loves crypto. And it's like, well, wait, the actual number of mtus at Coinbase, which again, is their.

Market Conditions and Challenges

Is the actual metric they report to Wall street, is not. Is nowhere close. It's like, you know, a single digit percentage of the headline number. So that's Coinbase. Let's talk about Robin Hood. Robinhood is mostly stocks and options and stuff. It's not mostly crypto. Crypto. I don't know if they've broken out. That's a good question. I've not paid attention to Robinhood's reporting. We could google this. We can go look at their quarterly reports and see what percentage of their users are actually trading crypto.

Consumer Confidence and Market Engagement

But I guarantee you it's a small percentage. It's definitely not like, oh, wow, Naveen, 50% of Robinhood's users are buying crypto. It's probably less than 10% or something of their users. Maybe now. Maybe now. But I do wonder how many people bought dogecoin. That's fine. But my point remains that, like, I just gave you the Coinbase data, and the Coinbase data is a rounding error compared to the 105 million number you quoted and Robinhood, it'd be very curious to see, like, do they have a similar stat?

Market Comparisons and User Engagement

And does it track Coinbase's stat where, like, it's actually down? Because Coinbase is down. Like, that is the reality is Coinbase is down at least 15, 20% from the peak of 21 in terms of monthly transacting users. So where are these meme coin buyers coming from? And I guarantee you, if Moonpay had the volume, if Moonpay was, like, onboarding a billion dollars a month in volume, that would be all over the timeline. I guarantee it. Because they. They would love to report that kind of a metric.

Missed Opportunities and Industry Developments

They just don't have that metric to report. Well, look, even if it's okay, let's say it's a 10th of the number, right? Let's say it's 15 million users out of the 100. Whatever. Let's say it's a 15 million, you can even call it ten. I think between that and what Coinbase or Robinhood has, and the people on Robinhood that have purchased crypto and probably are willing to purchase it again in the future, I mean, and most of these are american users, right? In the west. So finance is a whole different thing.

User Patterns and Narratives

I think if we're approaching the binance topic, I mean, look what happens when something gets listed on binance. It's kind of crazy how many. It's like hundreds of thousands of holders come into these things. Sometimes a lot of it's probably fabricated, but the point stands. But even, let's say it's 20 million people in the United States that would potentially be willing to. If you're looking at strictly the meme coin thesis, even if there's only 20 million people in the United States willing to buy this, dude, that is, if that's the case and they go into the big cat meme coins, all of these will send 1000 x.

Market Predictions and Economic Viability

I mean, that is three x. That is like, that is. Look, that would be great, because that means everyone in your. In your space right now would be rich. That'd be great. I know that would be great. I'm rooting for that. I'm just telling you that's bullshit, right? Like, that's just unlikely, because again, I go back, I go. I go back to the point that I made, which is the songs all sound the same leap. It all sounds the same.

Innovating for Growth

Like, these are not unique things. And I'm telling you right now that, like, what people need to feel inspired and really come in the droves that we all want is something that's fresh. That's the problem. Well, I think there's room for both. I think there will be fresh things. I just. I think the world is more. More left curve than I think what a lot of people want to believe. And I think sometimes people, like, the most entertaining outcome is kind of the most likely. And I just. It is very possible.

Previous Missed Opportunities and Market Evolution

What we saw with doge and chima, I'll remind you that it was on your space where I was like, friend tech is not going to survive. I said that on your space during the height of friend tech, reminding. I'm reminding you. I also said at the height of Opensea, that opensea is not going to survive either. Okay, so allow me to continue my prediction streak and tell you that I don't think that there's anything here, to be fair. I think they're very different things. I think Frontech could have succeeded.

Potential Success and Mismanagement

If Racer didn't fucking rug his own project, like, respectfully to racer, I think he built something really cool. They fucking gave up. They just gave up. They stopped. They literally, they just, if they did not give up, friend tech could have potentially worked. It had it came out at the right time. There was nothing else in crypto. People were excited about it. It wasn't super novel. Like, we've seen things like that before, but it was novel implementation. But they fucking gave up.

Evaluating Market Flops and Niche Viability

And Opensea, but it was marketed to the wrong people, bro. Like, that's the other thing is like, it would probably be more useful for someone that's actually famous, not like a guy with 40,000 followers and like 300 actual real people as followers. I just get frustrated because even Opensea, like they could have, but they just, it feels like they just gave up. They just fucking threw the towel in.

Realizing Human Shortcomings

So I think my issue is sometimes I'm a little too optimistic on humans, and that's a very fair criticism. I tend to believe the best in people and believe that they'll just work their hardest twenty four seven to make something work. But the reality is that's not always true. Yeah, you got to stop giving, bro. I learned along just like a little while ago. Stop giving people the benefit of the doubt and just doubt the benefits, bro. You will just stay so much safer.

Broader Implications for Crypto Growth

You won't have to worry about this guy one day sweetening you up and setting you a drainer link like life's better. Well, that sounds oddly specific. Okay, well, we're going over to Lauren. Lauren, appreciate the patience. What's up? Hey, leap. Yeah, so I guess I don't think friction, like onboarding friction is the problem. Sharing identity stuff. I think bad pr is a problem for nfts crypto.

Perceptions on PR and User Interaction

And I also think that it used to seem more fun, like we should make it seem more fun also, like, at one point, okay, I remember the first time I spent 6 hours in a twitter space. It wasn't your space, leap, no offense. It was the day that the not okay fairs collection launched and the ok bears guy came in and he was like yelling and threatening to sue. And the not ok bears founder was like crying.

Community Dynamics and Emotional Engagement

And it was so interesting because I just sat there for like 6 hours. I started with a coffee and I ended with a glass of wine and dinner and I was like, holy shit. Like, this is really interesting, the way that a community sprung up around this arthem, quote unquote like art. Like, I think we all agree that it's a collectible now, at the time, they were talking about how beautiful the art was, which was kind of funny. But anyway, I thought to myself that it could be like a new frontier of conceptual art.

Intersection of Culture and Technology

Like, if you could create a powerful, global, borderless community economy around art. Like conceptual art, ideas like climate change, contesting climate change and having a positive influence on global cooling, for example, or contesting reductive gender representation or identity based stuff, but also economic stuff. And to me, generally, it seems like that's a better way to engage Gen Z around blockchain. The networks like blockchain as an infrastructure, regardless whether it's non fungible.

Innovative Perspectives on Blockchain

Fungible plus social networks and, yeah, I just think they're like. I think they're anti establishment, but also principled, interestingly. And if you can, like, if we can find ways to do things that are cool again, I actually. I still think psps are cool. I think they got. It was all a lot of sameness to Nabine's point. For a while, there was nothing new. Like nothing surprising or delighting.

Reinvigorating the Market

But I do think there is to something to the ten K PSP collections, if we can get back to that and make it more positive and make it more like interest based, just so that, you know, it's not just like buying something. Not just buying a lotto ticket, but like buying a lotto ticket that's actually attached to something that you care about or want to be engaged around. So that showing up in the Twitter spaces and posting is a little bit more authentic, I think.

The Authenticity Gap

I think if I don't participate in the meme coin thing a ton. So maybe this is hypocritical of me to say, but when I'm looking at it from the outside, it feels like it's getting emptier and emptier. And it would be easier to draw more people into these networks that we're creating if were adding a little bit more value socially and being a little more engaging. Like, not just making it about the money.

Value Creation from Stories and Scarcity

It is story plus scarcity equals value. That is, this does the moral of the story. Story plus scarcity equals value. And utility doesn't mean shit even when it's supposed to. And this fucking watch dealer has never heard anybody say, why is this watch a couple of minutes off? Like, why does nobody else ask that question? It's crazy. But that's NFTs too. That's NFTs to a t, right down to being shamed for selling. So you had to go to, like, an underground guide. I literally could not go to the watch store because I would have, like, ruined a relationship because it's that rare. What the fuck is this shit? It's crazy. Now I'm never going to buy another watch again, but it was funny. Well, blouse the thing with watches. Watches aren't about telling the time. It's about telling people how valuable your time is. Okay, well, clearly my time is. Is not valuable enough to me. Having time to go to a fucking underground dealer to get it adjusted because no one else could do it. What the fuck is that? I don't want to do that if it's finally. I made a bad decision five minutes ahead. Because the whole point of buying the nice watch is that it works perfectly at all times.

Disappointment in Mechanical Precision

When you put it on a winder with the right turns per day. And it's supposed to be mechanically perfect and almost as good as atomic time and network time protocol, which is how your phone updates its time, which I did a lot of research on and is fucking fascinating. But, like, mechanical watches are basically a load of shit. What do you know about atomic time principles? I know a lot about cesium. Fucking cesium microwave oscillations. I know all about it. You just made up a bunch. No, I didn't fucking look it up right now. I did not look it up. How. How does atomic time work? Look it up. What are the first three words? Cesium microwave oscillations. Look it up. Do it. Okay, I'm sorry. I'm done. I'm done. This is like, up and atomic this, atomic that. Look. Wait. Anyway, shout out to I'm selling sunset. Look, we got a. You know. You know, we got to throw this together here for a second. But I would just say g shocks are perfect 99.100 of the time, so. Yeah, because they have fucking quartz batteries. And honestly, like, it's better, but less expensive. Expensive? Why the fuck do people care about the expensive version? It doesn't make any sense.

Reflections on Value in Lifestyle Choices

You know, I. This is the honest truth. I've never used an actual clock. I always just look straight, bro. I show up somewhere with this thing for the first time, and everybody's looking at. I'm like, what the fuck you looking at? This shit doesn't work. My PFP is cool. Not gonna lie. Why don't you get, like, an Apple watch? And then you. I got that, too. But the problem with the Apple Watch is that fucking updates your text messages and then you get distracted by reality or from reality. This is the most first world problem bullshit I've ever sat on a space. But let me tell you, it has fascinated my mind all day. And I just needed to vent to a bunch of people that I don't know about it. And I'm really sorry. I'm just sorry about it. I'm sorry. Yeah, these are definitely rich people problems. Problems I'm gonna have at the end of this cycle. Problems you already have. Because you've kind of made it, bro. Let's just be real.

Understanding the Dynamics of Success and Wealth

What do you mean kind of made it? You have made it. Not kind of. I'm hoping to. No, no, you have. You have. I mean, I'm trying to make it now. I'm just like, putting. Inputting entertainment value. That's outputting nothing. So I'm sorry to the space because your boy's being a dumbass. Okay, what about this? Let's. Okay, we'll jump back into it. I think you made a good point. It's like, does utility matter? I guess we can have this conversation for the hundredth time now. Here's the truth, Mika. Does utility matter? Okay. Utility not mattering is kind of a pro me again. Did you say, does utility matter? Weren't you the one that you said that, like the. It was like, all about the blockchain code? When did I say that? I don't know. It was said at. Somebody said it in this room. I've just. In the. My first kiss was a meme coin room.

Utility and the Gaps in Cryptocurrency Narratives

Look, I mean, I think we pride ourselves on our technical prowess in this space. But anyway, does. Does does utility matter, is the question. What do you think? I mean, it's kind of interesting because even. Even, like, now, like, people are like, oh, mother is like, cooking, which it is. But then that would be like, is it still a meme coin if there's utility? You know what I mean? And it's like, that's something with utility. But then you have, like, d. God also, which is like, is it utility? Like, I don't know. I don't really know. I think that. All I do know is that there's a difference between what people say they want and what they actually want. That's all I know. Facts. Fucking facts. That fucking clip that shit. That was great. That is a bar. I mean, we saw this last cycle, too, like, with.

Meme Coins and Their Importance

Like another l two. And they launched this meme coin yesterday. And, like, it's, I mean, it pumped hard and then dumped and, like, you know, but my point is, like, they understand the importance of meme coins in this space, that they launched their l two with the meme coin to get all the attention. So, like, if they make people a lot of money, they'll probably have a cold. If they don't do well. Like, I'll probably, like, turn a lot of people off. So do you really think, like, you know, all this tech matters if number doesn't go up at the end? I don't know. Just so I. What is the successful web three business? Okay, number. Okay, I'll answer that by number going up. Number going up is super important.

Successful Web Three Business

So what? I like what you say. The most successful web three business this year is pump fun. Why? Because. Because. Because it made launching meme coins and it's in demand. That's what people want. Did you know that most web three businesses are not fucking successful? Yes, I. Yes, I know that. Also that the most successful crypto businesses are not in web three. They're in web two. Yes. They're like exchange or they're quasi banks or hedge funds, like stable coin issuers. But let me say this, though. I'm going to pitch you. Imagine.

The Evolution of Crypto

And because, I mean, look, I mean, crypto story is just being written now. Like we're fucking a decade into a brand new financial system. Like, do we expect all the answers to be here in front of our faces? Of course. Yep. We have to know. But, but just hear me out. If there's a. So I believe that number going up is really important because value going up is important. It's the same way. Look, I compare everything to mmos because I think they actually are very similar to crypto cults and movements that we see here in web three. But if there's an mmo and it's really fucking cool and interesting, and maybe they have some unique mechanics, whatever, but nobody is playing the game.

The Diminishing Value of Unplayed Games

There's like no players. You can't find group to do dungeons with. The game is basically dead. It doesn't fucking matter how pretty the graphics are or how interesting the combat mechanics are, there's no one fucking playing it. People have to play the game. And playing the game typically means, you know, prices going up and people are involved in it. So that is a huge part of the current financial landscape of crypto. But here's the thing. Imagine there's an application. An application has like, let's say $5 billion in this treasury. That's possible. Like maybe it's in its own token, maybe a combination of things, whatever. It's 5 billion in the treasury. I mean, that's a lot of money that can be fucking moved around, and there's going to be people who want to move that money.

The Role of Governance Tokens and Memes

So holding the token gives you access to have a say in how that money is used. And if that application is really successful and you care about it being successful in the future, you are going to vote in ways that make sure that the application works well. And I, like, I think that's inevitably the point of all these tokens, is it's just voting and governance, and I believe that's the end game for meme coins. I believe, like all. It's so funny, all these people hating on l two s. I promise your favorite, your favorite meme coin, give it a year or two, is going to launch an l two like Sheba did it because it's the, like, it's what fucking happens. You want your own network, you want your own blog space, you want control over it.

The Future of DAO and Token Utility

That is what is going to happen with most of the big meme coins and just clip this, record it and revisit it in two years. It's just so funny how these things are going to work and we're seeing it already. But does the voting work? Does voting really work with tokens? Like we've seen Dallas and like, how they've tried it over and over in voting rights and like, it just never, like, even with the apecoin dow, there's always some whale that just fuck everything. Like, I mean, I don't know, like, it's not very decentralized when people with more money can like, control the game. I think, like, you know, bitcoin's really as decentralized as it'll get to me.

Personal Investment Strategies and Governance Tokens

Like, just stack all these meme coins and flip them into bitcoin is my end goal personally, but, like, thank you. Yeah, I don't think, like, voting for these fucking vc's and shit is like my plan. Like, fuck all that shit. They can do it on their own and I'll just take my money. How does owning a governance token translate to value accrual to the token? I mean, you have to vote in ways that make the application right. And as far as dowels working, ENS is actually working sustainably. And they do have a fat trail. How come nobody uses the Shiba inu layer too? Isn't it dead? Because it sucks?

Challenges Facing New Protocols

Yeah, it sucks. It's dead. I think. I think day one, general on day one, this the bridge, like, fucked up. And I think, like, a lot of money was like, spaces here, anyone you need to take a lot trippy off, I'll drop you and bring you back a lot, man. I saying that like, I don't know. I mean, this is the way I look at it, and maybe I'm oversimplifying it. I believe there will be applications or networks, whether they're l one's or l two s that are worth owning a stake of. I think most people could agree with that. I think that's such a basic.

On Community and Market Dynamics

If you believe. Sorry, you said what? Do you know why she. Well, not the whole reason, but part of the reason why they launched a l two. One of the main reasons why I did that is because Coinbase requires meme coins or any token to have some kind of utility or loose utility to be listed. And so they did this chain, and that was actually the pico top for. For DOJ. I remember, yeah, I'm not bullish. Yeah, I'm not bullish. Deba chain, that's not the point. What I'm saying is, like, I believe at a fundamental layer, there will be an application or a layer one or an l two, or however you want to look at it, that will. That you will fuck with.

Future Speculations and Validations

And it will matter to you to own a stake in that network. That is such a basic take. Like, there's nothing even controversial about that. And just because Dao is up until now, and by the way, they're successful, dows maker Dao is pretty fucking profitable. Look at that. Profitable is different than decentralized like, a while ago. Okay, here's another problem too. I'm gonna give you another problem. Those are two very different things. Try to find a solution. Oh, my. We are making products that cater to people in crypto natives, right?

Catering to Crypto-Natives

In order to really, like. So aside from stable coins, right, which is used all around the world, that's been the best thing to happen. We're not making stuff that everyone's gonna use outside of crypto. Like, you make these products for, like, certain communities and they love it. It's great. Yay. But, like, who out in the real world is going to use this stuff? I don't know. Not really. Who out. Who in the real world is going to use crypto, dude, I think a lot of people are going to use crypto. Is that stable coins are the best thing to happen.

Perspectives on Market Usability

I think polymarket is, like, probably the best thing we have for onboarding normies right now, in my opinion. And, like, aside in terms of, like, using the tech without knowing, like, buying stuff on moonshot and all that is whatever. But, like, polymarket is, like, really fucking cool for onboarding normies. It's something that's never really existed in the real world. So, like, yeah, I think more apps like that, like fronti could have maybe done well. I think when they dropped the token, they fucked everything. And, like, if they figured a way how to, like, you know, just reward creators more and focus on that.

Social Factors Driving Adoption

But yeah, maybe like, dapps like that. Do you need social fi apps to get, like, actual celebrities and famous people on there? Not like, people from CT. Like, I should not be on fantasy top. Like, you know, fuck no. But I don't. I actually appreciate that fantasy top is like, fuck it. Web three. Like, the web three homegrown people. Those are the ones that we're gonna use. And then the thing with friend tech is friend tech ends up just being mostly OnlyFans people. You know, that was the meta on friend tag is like, convince an Onlyfans girl fucking launcher.

Potential of New Platforms

Onlyfans. And then. Unbelievable business, by the way. No, I mean, it is. They make. Actually, it's unbelievable. Onlyfans literally bought a shit ton of ethereum at like 15, 1600 bucks. So shout out to them. That's real, by the way. You can google that. So, look, I think that people should not write off some of these, like, initial core concepts that crypto was built around just because they haven't worked thus far. Like, I think that's a huge mistake.

The Reality of Decentralization and Human Behavior

Even if you just think about daos in the most simple form. It's a group of people that don't necessarily need to trust each other. They can verify through on chain mechanics globally. Anybody in the world can, like, can work together to build something really cool, and they can all share in the pie together in a decentralized and. And verifiable way. Like, that is, dude. I mean, that is like, you should listen to that. That's fucking amazing. It's just the reality is humans are complicated, and running disagreed really hard. You just say it, bro.