Coin World News report:
Author: Jocy, Founder of IOSG Ventures
Recently, I happened to come across the story of Tian Xingjian, and the Hundred Days’ Reform was vividly in my mind. It is hard to imagine that in the Qing Dynasty, there were still some young people willing to follow Emperor Guangxu at the risk of being executed, advocating the adoption of new laws that were centuries ahead within the dynasty and learning from the West to reform the legal system. Although the ultimate result was a failure, their spirit and actions left a profound impact. These young people and pioneers have become the role models admired by future generations.
The spirit of these young people is equally important in today’s crypto world. Currently, many practitioners are shouting slogans against the “Western powers,” but in reality, they are simultaneously restaking for yield farming and rushing into liquidity pools, while constantly posting memes and dog-related content on Twitter. Everyone knows where the problem lies, but they compromise for their current benefits. Both the Eastern and Western crypto communities are currently caught up in the frenzy of meme culture. Memes, like opium, are an import from the West, and currently, the top memes in the Chinese crypto community come from the West. Entrepreneurs and community builders can easily lose themselves in this noise, and the Eastern crypto community is deeply entangled in meme culture. Many entrepreneurs, after seeing the success of memes, begin to doubt their own entrepreneurial direction and original intentions. I believe that entrepreneurs should resist memes, not shift their entrepreneurial focus towards memes, and engage in meme culture as a routine operation.
We need young people who are down-to-earth and have lofty aspirations, especially those who can shoulder the ideals of the Eastern crypto community, such as entrepreneurs. These young people should not only engage in trading-related activities during bull markets but should focus on building infrastructure and protocols to create a better community atmosphere. Instead of allowing aspiring developers and young people to immerse themselves in stories of getting rich through memes every day.
I want to reiterate that I am not against traders who prioritize memes in this market. Personally, I have been involved in the community since 2013 and have always liked this community. However, I do not want meme traders to become the mainstream in the Chinese community. Since the approval of the ETF, I have clearly felt the rapid emergence of entrepreneurs in the United States and Europe. They have access to abundant capital support from American funds, while some well-known American funds have internally declared not to invest in Chinese Web3 entrepreneurs. It seems that there are significant differences and discrepancies between the Eastern and Western crypto markets, from technology to community. While Western technology continues to emerge, the Eastern crypto community is caught up in the meme frenzy. This is clearly not a healthy development trend.
Meme culture has a certain lottery effect, and the chances of winning decrease as more people join later. Additionally, meme culture, like opium, can create a path dependency for early beneficiaries, leading to more people endorsing memes in the community. The community easily reinforces this money-making path, but it does not make our technology protocols and community more unique and powerful. Early participants may profit from it, but this short-sighted behavior, this gambling game, and the legend of getting rich quickly will eventually lead to the collapse of this bubble and become a disaster for the Eastern crypto market, repeating the NFT story of the previous bull market cycle. I have always believed that most first-tier Eastern entrepreneurs will persist in their entrepreneurship, find their own pieces in the Lego of infrastructure or applications, and keep pace with or even lead Western mainstream protocols.
Perhaps the crypto market should not be divided between East and West; it is a decentralized world. In the past few cycles, we have seen the commonalities of Eastern and Western entrepreneurs: the success of Western entrepreneurs is not without reason. Rune Christensen, the founder of MakerDAO, has been involved in Web3 entrepreneurship for many years. He successfully increased his protocol revenue in the macro high-interest rate and crypto bear market environment in the United States, and in March of this year, he launched the Endgame plan and various SubDAOs, including the Spark SubDAO focused on lending protocols. The founder of EigenLayer, during ETHDenver, was overloaded with daily meeting arrangements, shortening each meeting to 15/30 minutes in order to personally communicate with partners. It can be seen that in this global competitive market, many entrepreneurs are at the forefront. The founder of Uniswap, with an engineering background, self-taught Solidity and created a concise 50-line code, leading the industry’s AMM innovation wave. They have always focused on product design and protocol understanding, striving for a leading position in the industry. Eastern entrepreneurs are the most resilient and powerful group, and we have also seen many outstanding individuals. However, they still need more support and feedback from the community. The Eastern community should be more united and powerful, spending time discussing how to learn from the West to become stronger and recognizing the mysterious power of the Eastern community. When the community and entrepreneurs reach a consensus, it will bring more positive feedback to the protocol.
As a fund originating from Asia, IOSG will invest in and support more Chinese entrepreneurs in this cycle, helping them better enter the Western market and become mainstream. It is unimaginable that in this industry three to five years from now, memes will still dominate the mainstream. As we ride the wave of the crypto era, everyone inevitably becomes a participant, and in the annotation of the era, everyone is insignificant. However, we must not overlook the negative energy brought to the Chinese community by everyone advocating for meme investments.
In summary, we should be more united and face future challenges together. The community needs higher ideals and foresight, and some people need to step forward for the future of the Eastern community. Crypto is not just about memes; there are many opportunities in infrastructure and applications waiting to be explored and discovered, which are the true industry alphas. IOSG will invest in and support young people who are leading the way, driving the long-term development of the industry and community, and helping Eastern entrepreneurs shine in the global market.
