Compiled edited by TechFlow
Guests: Imran Khan, Founder of Alliance DAO; Qiao Wang, Founder of Alliance DAO
Podcast source: Good Game Podcast
Original title: On Consumer Crypto | EP 70
Air Date: February 7, 2025
Background Information
Imran and Qiao joined Iljia and Richard from Tensor for an in-depth discussion on consumer-facing cryptocurrency and other related topics, providing entrepreneurs with core cryptocurrency insights.
The main topics are as follows:
Market Analysis
The Strategic Bitcoin Reserve (SBR) is a work in progress - David Bailey
The profound impact of government policies on the economy
The Popularization of AI and Future Trend Forecast
Vine JellyJelly
The future of tokenization in startups
Clout and Tribe
Tensor Team: Richard and Iljas idea
Tokenization strategy as a market entry point
Memecoin and the Attention Economy
Vector’s current growth
Qiaos annual experiment sharing
Developer Migration from Ethereum to Solana
User portrait analysis on different blockchains
The final form of blockchain technology
Coinbase’s strategic layout
Discussion on Blast should have been Hyperliquid
Market Analysis
Imran: There have been a lot of interesting things happening in recent weeks. The market has been on a downward trend over the past month, and I think our sentiment is highly consistent with the markets performance.
Qiao: The market does seem a bit weak.
Imran: Overall, the market is digesting the impact of the major news released by Trump and the subsequent liquidity injection. As for the short-term trend of the market, I cannot give a clear judgment, but in the medium and long term, I am still optimistic about the market.
Qiao: I think the market may remain sideways in the short term. In fact, there have been a lot of good news in the past two weeks, such as the executive order supporting cryptocurrencies, the repeal of the SAB Act, the advancement of the stablecoin bill, and some policy speeches on cryptocurrencies. However, despite so much positive news, the market has hardly reacted. This situation reflects the markets relatively cold response to these good news. However, from a macroeconomic perspective, I think the overall economic situation is still good.
Strategic Bitcoin Reserve (SBR) is in progress
Qiao: David Bailey mentioned that the current performance of the market is misleading. He wrote in a tweet that the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve (SBR) plan is moving forward at todays press conference. This is a top priority led by DJT. They are convening the countrys top officials and plan to develop a complete plan in the next 80 days. It is worth noting that half of the members of the working group are people who have achieved great success in related fields. The SBR plan is being implemented step by step. If SBR is really implemented in the next 80 days, then the current market pricing is obviously seriously underestimated. This potential impact cannot be fully reflected by the existing market mechanism.
Qiao: This reminds me of the launch of Bitcoin ETF. At that time, many people thought that Bitcoin ETF was bad news and suggested selling. But the fact is completely the opposite. The launch of Bitcoin ETF actually opened a whole new door for financial institutions and traditional investors to enter the Bitcoin market, especially those from the traditional financial field and older investors, right?
The situation with SBR is very similar. If the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Program can be successfully implemented, it will mark the official participation of the government level. Not only the US federal government, but also state governments and even governments of other countries may choose to cooperate with the United States, or at least try to keep up with this trend. In this way, a new group of net buyers of Bitcoin will appear in the market, and these buyers are currently completely absent from the market. At the same time, the movements of sovereign wealth funds are also worth paying attention to, because they may become an important force driving this trend.
Imran: In addition, the Trump administration is also planning to create a sovereign wealth fund. It is reported that this fund will be run by Lutnik of Cantor Fitzgerald, who has huge investments in the cryptocurrency field, especially Bitcoin. If he participates in and leads this sovereign fund, things may become very interesting.
From my perspective, the market is a bit confused right now. We just had a huge meme bubble and Bitcoin reached new all-time highs, but at the same time, there is all this extremely bullish news coming out and the market seems to be having trouble reacting to this information.
Qiao: I don’t think the market is really confused. It’s just that the market has already reflected most of the good news in the price.
If the SBR plan does come to fruition, we will see a big rally in the market, but until then, I think the market will likely remain subdued for a while.
Imran: I understand that this should be done in 80 days, right? They should announce it in 80 days. So I think the current market downturn will improve soon.
Qiao: However, for those who rely on OPM (Other Peoples Money), Standard Bank (with $870 billion in assets under management) has predicted that Bitcoin could soar to $500,000 before the end of President Trumps term. What do you think? $500,000? $500,000 is almost one-third of the total market value of gold, or even more than half of the market value of gold.
In fact, I would not be surprised if Bitcoin really rises to $500,000. On the contrary, the price of gold may fall to a certain extent as funds may flow from gold to Bitcoin.
Imran: Have you seen how gold is performing today or yesterday? What do you think is driving this? Do you think its just the uncertainty of tariffs around the world?
Qiao: Gold has hit a record high. I feel it is mainly due to the huge uncertainty surrounding Trump. During Trumps first term in office, it can almost be described as chaotic. He started trade wars with all countries, including the United States allies. Gold is not only a tool to hedge against chaos, but also used to hedge against the huge debt risks of the United States.
The profound impact of government policies on the economy
Imran: I did some simple math. The U.S. government is projected to reduce its fiscal deficit by about $1 trillion per year. The current annual deficit is about $2 trillion. If you can reduce it by $1 trillion, in the long run, the countrys fiscal deficit will gradually decline, which will have a profound impact on interest rates and inflation, and this is even without the direct intervention of the Federal Reserve.
Qiao: And the Fed may be rethinking their strategy because all these influences from the government will change the pace at which they cut rates.
Im glad Powell didnt cut rates - Trump
Imran: Trumps recent change in attitude is also very interesting. A few days ago, he tweeted that Powell needed to cut interest rates immediately, and even said he had to cut interest rates no matter what. But a few days later, he tweeted again: I am glad Powell did not cut interest rates, I respect his decision very much. This change in attitude is really intriguing, but I am not sure what the deep meaning behind it is.
Qiao: In the short term, the reduction in government spending may bring deflationary pressure because it actually takes some money out of the economy. Government spending is an important part of the economy, which is basic common sense in macroeconomics. But at the same time, tariff policies will bring inflationary pressure. If they restore tariffs, it will undoubtedly drive inflation.
Imran: I think this is more of a negotiation strategy for Trump. He used similar tactics in 2017 to force the parties to renegotiate the agreement. For him, these news are just tools. He has secured 20,000 law enforcement officers from the Mexican government to strengthen border control, which in theory can reduce the influx of drugs and illegal immigrants. Now there are 10,000 law enforcement officers from Canada deployed at the Washington border. At the same time, I have also seen news reports that Canadas drug smuggling management is relatively weak, and many drug cartels have reorganized in Canada and transported drugs to the United States through channels there. These measures are undoubtedly beneficial to the US economy. So, I think Trumps goal is always to get his deal through pressure.
He imposed tariffs on China, and China said, Were going to impose tariffs on you, too. So, the U.S. Postal Service has stopped serving platforms like Temu and companies like Alibaba. This has caused the stock prices of these companies to fall by 2% to 5%. In my opinion, Trump is just using these means to force the other side to do what he wants. Although this strategy may bring market fluctuations in the short term, in the long run, he often achieves his goals.
Qiao: I don’t recommend trading based on these short-term news. No one outside of Trump’s inner circle can really take advantage of this information.
The Popularization of AI and Future Trend Forecast
Imran: I think that in the future almost every startup will use crypto and AI in some form. These technologies may be embedded in the product in various ways, so companies no longer need to specifically emphasize that they are crypto startups or AI startups. They will just be called startups and these technologies will become one of the core features of the product. This trend also opens up more possibilities for startups to innovate in the fields of AI and crypto. In fact, many of the startup applications we receive are not even related to crypto at all, but are focused on AI.
What do you think is driving this? I read an application the other day where someone said, “We’re an AI startup, but I see some potential applications for crypto and want to explore it.” I found it very interesting that he knew nothing about crypto but still wanted to try it. This seems to validate our point: every startup will find that crypto and AI are ultimately just a feature in their core product.
Qiao: In the past two years, many people have tried to predict the integration of AI and encryption, but many of the assumptions seem far-fetched. For example, some people hope to use encryption technology to train AI, or use AI to solve some problems in the field of encryption, but these attempts do not have much practical significance. I think the more realistic situation is that people will develop some products that use large language models (LLMs) in some functions and introduce encryption in other functions. This integration is natural, and the technology will be hidden in the background, and the end user does not even need to know that these features exist. They just need to enjoy a better user experience without knowing whether the product is AI-driven or encryption-driven.
Imran: There are two mainstream views on AI. One is that AI will become authoritative like China, and the other is that AI will completely replace human jobs. But in fact, no one has really considered the middle path: how AI can improve our efficiency and optimize our business model in our daily lives. Similarly, technologies such as AI and encryption will gradually become part of product features rather than separate selling points. They will improve the user experience tenfold, but users don’t even need to know that the technology exists. This trend made me realize that we don’t need to deliberately distinguish between crypto startups or AI startups. Their essence is a tool to improve productivity. People always tend to go to extremes, but in fact, the future is more likely to be in between.
DeepSeek
Imran: We discussed the potential impact of DeepSeek a few months ago when it was first launched. But it has received more attention recently, such as the news that they claimed to have completed a project with only $6 million. However, different people have different opinions on this matter. Some people think that it is impossible to achieve this with only $6 million, and DeepSeek may have more resources behind it.
Qiao: In any case, one thing is clear: the cost of AI reasoning and model training is falling rapidly. This is good news for application layer development.
There is a similar trend in the cryptocurrency space. We have noticed that as infrastructure costs decrease, the crypto industry is also gradually shifting from the infrastructure layer to the application layer.
Because whether it is AI or cryptocurrency, the reduction in infrastructure costs is driving more innovation at the application layer.
Talking about the recent Vine JellyJelly
Imran: Vine and JellyJelly are two of the most interesting things that have happened recently. This also proves the potential of tokenization again, which may become an important opportunity in the crypto field in the future. I call it application token or Meme, which are a sub-type of tokens.
There are two interesting stories recently. The first is that after Trump launched his personal token, people began to see tokenization as a novel marketing method. The founder of Vine sold Vine to Twitter for $30 million in 2018.
Elon Musk has been discussing whether to restart Vine on Twitter for years, and has launched a related vote every few months. Recently, an external team of Vine launched a token project with the theme of Bringing Vine Back. According to their plan, 5% of the Vine token supply will be donated to Twitter. If Vine can successfully return, there are currently more than 145,000 token holders. Since the launch of the project, they have rekindled peoples interest in Vine through the spread of Meme culture and tokens.
Whats more interesting is that Vines social media activities and private Twitter groups have begun to form a kind of community energy. For example, some people will graffiti Vines logo on the streets, or print Vines logo and stick it on the wall. This phenomenon is driving Vines return. I think this case is very interesting.
Using App Tokens for Ad Spend
Imran: I think tokens, or application tokens, are essentially a form of advertising spending. As more and more people become interested in it, this phenomenon may be related to who the founder is or other factors. Through tokens, you can attract users and even occupy a certain market psychological share. In my opinion, there is a correspondence between advertising spending and virality. Meme is a form of token, while application tokens are more like a tool to promote virality. There may also be a concept behind this that is similar to the user acquisition funnel. The JellyJelly team has tried a similar approach.
JellyJelly
Qiao: How is the token issuance of JellyJelly going?
Every time they launched the token, I was sleeping. They always launched at 9 p.m., and I have a habit of turning off all screens two hours before bed. So I missed it every time. Trump token was 9 p.m., Vine token was 9 p.m., JellyJelly token was 9 p.m., and I probably missed out on about eight figures.
Imran: These are just experiments that are happening and I think it will get better and better over time.
Qiao: Now everyone’s consumption habits have changed. Issuing tokens has become so common that it is no longer surprising for anyone to launch a token, and it all started with the launch of $TRUMP.
The future of tokenization in startups
Imran: I think that almost all startups will use tokens in the future, both as a means of self-financing and to acquire users. This is my judgment on the future trend. I have discussed this issue with many people on Twitter, and some people do not agree with my point of view.
They always say, Oh, thats not okay. And then his extreme supporters will like his tweets like crazy. This is completely different from the previous world, and I can understand that this change is hard to accept. Obviously, these innovations may happen on some blockchains that you dont like. But because of this, this is the real soil for innovation.
Clout and Tribe
Imran: We talked about startups and app tokens before, now lets talk about Clout and Tribe. I think the idea of Creator Tokens is similar, and the core assumption is that its cheap to get followers. You can easily attract a lot of followers. But the question is, are people willing to pay for social capital? In other words, in an environment where followers are flooded, can social capital be a measure of whether a person is truly influential?
We are currently trying two very different experiments. One is a more user-friendly platform where anyone can easily buy and hold tokens, with simple operations and low barriers to entry. The other is more crypto-oriented and provides a new way to interact with creators. For example, users can participate in creators live broadcasts with tokens, interact with them in real time, and support creators through a subscription model. So these two experiments represent two different experiences we are exploring.
Tensor team members’ perspectives
Imran: I think this is exactly what is happening in the entire speculative crypto market right now. In the token space, the Tensor team has a lot of unique insights, especially in consumer transactions. We invited Richard and Ilja, the two founders of Tensor and Vector, to share their thoughts today.
Consensus mechanism and the development direction of Vector
Imran: What are your views on the consensus mechanism? What is the current product direction?
Richard: Our team built a very good mobile native trading experience for Meme. We were one of the first teams to try this model. Projects like Moonshot are also a worthwhile example. Now, more and more teams realize that it is feasible to build a high-quality trading experience on mobile, such as integrating wallet functions directly into the application. The users logical deduction is: Can all these professional Meme trading functions be moved to mobile phones? These platforms provide complex statistics and trading charts. In other words, we can achieve a Tensor-like experience on mobile, but focused on Memes.
However, starting from the first principles, we need to think about a question: Will professional traders really choose to complete complex transactions on mobile devices? Maybe, but from historical experience, mobile devices are more suitable for scenarios that require quick operations anytime and anywhere. For example, someone may complete a transaction quickly on a train, during work breaks, or during a break, instead of staring at the screen for four or five hours of in-depth operations all day long like on the desktop. Therefore, fundamentally, we believe that the goal of the mobile terminal is not to provide professional-level trading functions, but to create a trading experience that is easier to use and more suitable for retail users. At the same time, we will also consider developing desktop applications to achieve seamless connection between the two.
At present, the professional trading market on the desktop is already a red ocean. There are many teams developing almost identical products, and the competition is very fierce. So we decided to focus on mobile products for retail investors first, and then gradually consider the development of the desktop. We also deliberately avoid adding professional features directly based on user feedback, but hope to provide users with some new experiences and let them realize that these features are unique to mobile. For example, the mobile terminal can achieve real-time reminders through push notifications, or quickly copy transactions and other functions, which cannot be done on the desktop. This is exactly the differentiated experience we hope to create in mobile native applications.
Photon
Imran: I think Photon has some really cool features. You also offer features like Meme Scope, which gives users early access to some upcoming token projects. I noticed that users love sharing trading ideas and interacting with each other through the platform. How do you see the differences between these markets? Is your goal to skew the product more towards social interaction between regular consumers, or focus on the needs of professional traders? How do you balance these directions?
Ilja: Trading is a very complex and multi-dimensional game, which is also its charm. The more complex the game, the greater the challenge, and the more interesting it is. Different users will participate in this game in different ways. This is an important realization when we were developing our second trading product.
When we entered the NFT space, we found that most people were participating in transactions in a single way. So we developed a series of professional tools to help users participate in more diverse ways. In this new product, our direction is almost the opposite. In the past, people were used to participating in Meme token transactions through quantitative analysis and professional tools, and we hope to introduce a new way of playing - an interactive experience based on social signals.
vector.fun
Ilja: Good startups often change the industry landscape by redefining the market rather than simply competing with existing companies. They tell users that what you paid attention to in the past has become irrelevant.
Our goal is the same for Vector. We are not simply telling users to use Vector because it provides faster and more efficient trading tools. Instead, we want to tell everyone that fast trading tools are no longer so important. We make all this irrelevant by providing richer signals, more interesting content, and an experience that can be consumed anytime and anywhere. For example, you can quickly browse and participate in transactions on the bus or even in the bathroom. This experience may not have a ready-made market, may not have anyone interested, or may even be a bad idea. But we believe that the answer will not be known until we try it. From the current user feedback, we do find some needs.
Users really like to share their trading results with others in a broadcast way. This is also the core concept of Vector. Just like the core of Twitter is to allow users to tweet, the core of Vector is to allow users to share trading dynamics.
Richard: For example, someone shares a trade saying they made $2 million today. This trade was done with a token that was launched on the Pump Fun platform. The developer actually did their first trade on Vector, almost as an advertisement. They may not be sure about the future of the project, but they decided to buy the token of their project with $500. If the project is successful, this will become a viral story. In fact, this is exactly what happened. Users took screenshots and shared the results of this trade. So the developer used the Vector platform to effectively promote the project, and once the project is successful, it will attract widespread attention.
Comparative Analysis of Vine and JellyJelly
Qiao: What do you think of Vine and JellyJelly? These two tokens attracted a lot of attention when they were first launched, and their prices soared quickly, but then fell quickly. What do you think we can learn from them?
Imran: JellyJellys popularity has faded, while Vine is performing relatively well.
Qiao: Vines price trend is relatively stable, while JellyJelly is like a Christmas tree.
Richard: This is really interesting. I feel like we are experiencing a paradigm shift, especially in the way we look at assets. In traditional financial markets, like the U.S. stock market, there are about 30,000 stocks available for trading, plus some assets like bonds. In the cryptocurrency and decentralized finance (DeFi) space, while some assets are limited in number, it is becoming increasingly difficult to launch a token with sufficient liquidity. On a platform like Pump Fun, there are probably only about 100 tokens that most people are really paying attention to. But through the mechanism of the bonding curve, the market has opened the flood gates of token issuance, allowing for almost unlimited launches of new tokens.
This also means that we need to look at these tokens in a whole new way. The speculative cycle of each token may be very short, but similar opportunities will continue to emerge, with different asset types. Therefore, instead of holding a certain asset for a long time (such as Bitcoin or Solana), it is better to switch flexibly between different assets.
Tokenization strategy as a market entry point
Imran: Some people outside the crypto space are entering the crypto market by issuing tokens. It can be said that this has almost become a new marketing strategy - using tokens to attract attention and acquire users. For example, the founder of Vine launched a token to arouse the interest of the Twitter team in redeveloping the Vine client. Someone even painted the Vine logo on a wall in New York to express their expectation for Vines return. In contrast, JellyJelly also tried to adopt a similar approach, but I think there may be some problems with their issuance strategy.
Qiao: What is the specific problem? If it were you, how would you improve it?
Imran: I think the problem is that everyone rushed into the market at the same time, resulting in a highly speculative bubble in a short period of time. In such an environment, it is difficult for projects to break away from this hype atmosphere and must strive to establish a more organic and sustainable growth model. This is a problem that needs to be faced.
Another problem is so-called “snipers” who buy up 5% to 10% of the tokens in the first few minutes of a token’s launch and then quickly sell them off, a challenge faced by almost all token launches.
However, from another perspective, this may not be unacceptable. Those short-term speculators will eventually exit the market, while long-term investors who truly believe in the projects vision will stay.
More importantly, this phenomenon shows that by issuing tokens, an application can quickly attract market attention and users without relying on traditional PR activities, media coverage or venture capital support. Just launching tokens can trigger topics and then use this heat to build a community.
When I first heard about Vines token, I thought it might be a scam because its market cap was only around $1 million at the time. But then I saw that Russ, the founder of Vine, released a video proving his identity. Since then, the community has taken over the project and now there is a group of more than 8,000 Vine enthusiasts who discuss the future of Vine every day.
The future of tokenization
Imran: I think we are entering a whole new era where almost everything will be tokenized.
Qiao: Yes, for example, Ondo is tokenizing stocks, bonds, etc.
Imran: They are building a platform that allows anyone to tokenize stocks, bonds, and ETFs. And as the policy environment changes, the process of tokenization is accelerating.
Iljia: Looking back at the early blog posts in the crypto space, the initial discussion was focused on two points: first, you can own assets in a decentralized way, which was not possible before; second, tokens can be used to launch networks.
But it’s important to note that a network is not just about liquidity, it’s also about attention. When you’re just starting out, you may have nothing and need to drive a two-sided market, like on the Vector platform, with callers on one side and traders on the other. At this point, tokens become a great tool to incentivize a cold start of a network. It can bring momentum and heat, attract users’ attention, and promote the formation of network effects. If you can build a truly popular product, users will naturally stay.
I also noticed an interesting phenomenon. Over the past few years, due to policy and regulatory reasons, many people have believed that the only use of tokens is as a security or asset. This has led us to almost forget the original intention of tokens - they are not intended to be securities, but to help launch the network.
Now, with the change of policy environment, some smart entrepreneurs have begun to re-recognize this and use tokens to build new products. I believe that in the next two to three years, this trend will become more and more obvious, and tokens will be everywhere.
Two main tokenization models
Richard: I think there are two main tokenization models. The first is the tokenization of traditional financial instruments, such as converting equity or future cash flows into tokens, which is closer to securitization. The other is the tokenization of real world assets (RWAs), such as digitally expressing real assets or commodities through blockchain.
However, recently we have seen a new trend, namely meme tokens. The value of this category of tokens is mainly driven by supply and demand and market consensus. In other words, people buy these tokens because they believe that others will also buy, thus pushing up the price. This model makes perfect sense in a bull market, as there is a lot of capital flowing in the market and investors want to profit through speculation. But I wonder if these attention-based tokens can survive multiple market cycles, especially in a bear market, and whether they can still attract investors attention or exist only as a short-term speculative tool.
Memecoin and the Attention Economy
Qiao: Actually, attention assets are not a new concept, and they have appeared in multiple market cycles. For example, in the early days, colored coins on Bitcoin can be seen as a form of attention assets. Similar ideas have been around for more than a decade. In the last market cycle, NFTs became mainstream, and these are basically attention assets. And now, what we are seeing is the rise of memecoin. Although these tokens have different names, they are essentially attention assets, just in different forms. If we had a sufficiently cheap and efficient blockchain in the last cycle, memecoin might have become the dominant form rather than other speculative tools. Therefore, unless a new form of token emerges in the next cycle to carry attention, I think the popularity of memecoin will continue.
Richard: We are very optimistic about the future of attention assets, which is also the core concept of our Vector platform. We have observed a trend from NFT to memecoin, and these tokens reflect the sentiment and state of the market. In bull markets, they perform well, but in bear markets, they may be more susceptible to market fluctuations than those tokens based on real assets (RWAs). Iljia:
Its really interesting. When we try to bring a new idea to market, we often use old models or product logic to apply it. I cant remember the name of this phenomenon, but it illustrates a problem: people still tend to think of the crypto industry as a financial industry. Although crypto is indeed closely related to finance, its potential is far more than that. Crypto is actually a manifestation of the attention economy and can even be seen as a new form of advertising. But many people dont fully understand this yet.
I think there are two very exciting categories of products worth exploring in the crypto space. The first category is stablecoin products designed for developing countries, which can solve real economic problems and are very socially significant. The second category is some extreme long-tail products, such as attention assets with a life cycle of only 13 seconds. Although these products seem crazy, they are full of innovative potential. And the traditional products in between, such as putting equity on the blockchain, I don’t think are so attractive. Because this is not a breakthrough innovation that can bring 10 times improvement. In my opinion, the most successful companies in the future will be born in these two extreme areas.
Vector’s current growth
Imran: How is Vector scaling at the moment? I noticed that your transaction volume has crossed $1 billion.
Iljia: At our peak, the total transaction volume for the year was close to $9 billion, and the average daily transaction volume was about $25 million, which is about $9 billion per year. I believe we have a chance to reach our previous peak again. Products like this take time to perfect, and we are constantly optimizing and fixing problems during the launch process.
As for the current situation, we currently have 20,000 active users, of which 5,000 are active traders, with a daily trading volume of between $5 million and $15 million. It should be emphasized that this product has only been online for two months and there is still a lot of room for improvement.
Qiao: And the platform is still in the testing phase. Is it only available to whitelisted users?
Iljia: Yes, the current users are mainly whitelist users in the testing phase. We hope to be more cautious in product promotion because this is a product that relies on social communication. Users who join through friends’ invitations usually have more trust and are more likely to accept the product. The invitation mechanism is designed to encourage users to invite their friends to join.
In addition, this approach has another benefit: since the product is not yet fully polished, when new users encounter problems during use, they can directly ask the friends who invited them for help, such as Why doesnt this function work? or What does this operation mean? This hands-on support can greatly improve the user experience. If users are directly introduced to a product that is not yet perfect, they may give up using it due to poor experience. And once users give up, it is usually difficult for them to try again. Therefore, we hope to gradually optimize the user experience through this cautious promotion method.
Qiaos annual experiment sharing
Qiao: Well, I did my annual experiment and sent a tweet saying “Solana is the final form of blockchain” just to see the reaction.
The reaction this year is much better than last year. Last year, every Ethereum fanatic came to attack me. But this year is different because many people just experienced some crashes two weeks ago. So this years discussion is relatively rational.
Imran: Speaking of this, I think this is related to the issue we talked about earlier today. Alliance, as a neutral startup accelerator, is currently investing in multiple projects, including about 100 Layer 1 and Layer 2 projects, as well as some emerging platforms such as Mega ETH, Monad, Abstract, Story Protocol and Hyper Liquid, etc.
The list is constantly growing, and we receive thousands of applications from startups, but the quality of projects we see on Base and Solana is truly unique.
But the problem is that there are so many Layer 1 projects being launched that I can’t even keep up with them. Blast was a success, but users reported that their opinions were not taken seriously and they felt they were being “ripped off.”
I was a bit surprised by Abstract’s performance. Although it launched well, their more consumer-focused strategy didn’t seem to be popular and many users started to churn. I think this frequent rotation of launches has caused user fatigue and the liquidity flowing into these Layer 1 projects has gradually decreased.
Qiao: This is indeed a question worth exploring because it is very important for both investors and startup teams. We have information that is difficult to obtain in other fields because we are directly involved in the early stages of startup products.
A year ago, I didn’t pay much attention to the differences between Ethereum Layer 2 and Solana. But after watching the startups we work with perform in both ecosystems, it’s now clear that Solana is the better choice. We’ve seen many cases where the same product had almost no users on Ethereum Layer 2, but ran smoothly and attracted a large number of users on Solana. I’ve encountered so much evidence that I would be irresponsible not to recommend that founders build on Solana at this time. This conclusion has become very clear.
Developer Migration from Ethereum to Solana
Imran：I noticed that some Base supporters have switched to Solana. What do you think is the reason behind this?
Qiao: The reason is actually very simple. It is easier to attract users on Solana. Although it is not easy for developers familiar with EVM to switch to Solana. They need to learn a whole new set of tools, and master the Rust programming language and Solanas unique development framework. This may take one to two months, but even so, they still feel it is worth it because Solana provides a better user base and ecological support.
I actually held Ethereum since the genesis block. But I sold it last year, and I had held it for a full 10 years. You can imagine holding an asset for 10 years and then suddenly thinking, Its growth potential is almost over. It really is over.
User portrait analysis on different blockchains
Imran: I think Base’s strategy is actually very good because they have a strong distribution channel. Jessie’s strategy is “I want to help developers go viral.” The idea itself makes sense. But the reality is that many developers do not attract enough users and lack the necessary liquidity when they release applications on Base. I call this phenomenon “speculative liquidity,” which is the liquidity support that applications need for normal operation. On Solana, users seem to be more inclined to speculate and are more willing to try new applications rather than stay on Base.
Qiao: When we say speculative, we dont just mean those traders. These users are very open to new things and are willing to try various new applications.
Imran: So from the user portrait point of view, there are indeed big differences between Base and Solana. Is this because of cultural differences?
Qiao: I think it has to do with both culture and product design. For example, there is no EVM wallet that can compare with Solanas Phantom.
On EVM, the user experience is very fragmented. New users often feel overwhelmed when faced with so many wallet options, which is a psychological burden for them. On Solana, there is only one mainstream choice for me at the moment, which is Phantom. This single choice actually reduces the decision-making cost of users.
The final form of blockchain technology
Imran: Although I am reluctant to admit it, the development of Solana has shown a winner takes all trend. What I mean is that although there are some emerging projects, this competition is far from over and may last for decades. For example, Hyperliquid is a very interesting startup that is built on Solana and has a very attractive narrative logic. SUI and Aptos are also projects worth paying attention to. What do you think blockchain will eventually develop into?
Qiao: In my opinion, there will be four or five blockchains that will eventually stand out and become the main force in the industry. Solana is obviously the current leader with a very obvious advantage. In addition to Solana, I think SUI, Aptos and Monad also have potential. These chains make full use of modern hardware technology to maximize transaction throughput while maintaining a certain degree of decentralization.
In contrast, Ethereum focuses more on achieving a high degree of decentralization and attempts to resist government intervention, but sacrifices a lot of scalability for this. From a practical application perspective, this theory is not competitive enough when dealing with high transaction volumes.
On the other hand, there are some chains that increase speed by centralizing nodes but sacrifice decentralization. This model may be more friendly to market makers because they can collaborate with nodes in centralized data centers. However, this model has not been verified in practice because these chains have not yet been officially launched. Therefore, we need to continue to observe. I think they have a 10% to 20% chance of being able to fight Solana, but Solana currently has a very strong competitive barrier in terms of user throughput.
Double Zero is also very much in favor of high-frequency trading (HFT). Their DNA is in fast communication. This is exactly what high-frequency trading is good at. Hyperliquid and DeepSeek also come from the field of high-frequency trading.
Imran: There is a pattern here. In fact, when Anatoly first conceived Solana, he positioned it as a NASDAQ on the chain, which was the application scenario he originally wanted to achieve.
Qiao: In my experience, NASDAQ’s technology is indeed the most advanced among all centralized exchanges. Compared with NYC and CME, NASDAQ has the lowest latency and the most stable matching engine. For this reason, market makers prefer to trade on NASDAQ.
Imran: You can say that Anatolys idea is to start with the most difficult problem. For example, how to build a trading market or exchange on the chain? If you can solve this problem, then you can build almost any other application. This is why he is so focused on this scenario, because if you can solve this problem on the chain, you can solve all problems.
Projects like Double Zero, Fire Dancer, and more and more applications are entering our ecosystem. For example, the founder of Clout, who was also one of the founders of Monkey (Monkey is one of the largest social applications in Web 2). He took the initiative to build on Solana, which is a good example. He took the initiative to find us, rather than us inviting him.
Qiao: Someone asked me, what is the ratio of founders on Solana and Ethereum? I think it is about 50:50, but if you look at the top 1% of talent, I think the ratio is closer to 75:25. What do you think?
Imran: I feel the same way. This is a big advantage for Solana because founders who find product-market fit will recommend Solana to their friends and colleagues, encouraging them to build applications here. This word-of-mouth effect forms Solanas structural barriers over time.
Coinbase’s strategic layout
Imran: As a pioneer in the crypto industry, Coinbase has always been highly respected, and we all admire Brian Armstrong and his executive team, including Jesse. But from my external observation, Base may not be the best strategic choice for Coinbase.
Qiao: I think Base should try to build their own Layer 1.
Imran: Whether its Layer 2 or Layer 1, I mean, as a big company, Coinbase is politically too tied to Base and its assets, which makes them insufficiently support assets from other ecosystems.
It’s not just political reasons, resource constraints are also an issue. Their resources are limited, so naturally they will prioritize supporting Base. This also makes them unable to support Solana, and they don’t even list many popular memes.
Qiao: I’m not criticizing their choices, but I would point out that Coinbase’s focus on Base has given them a structural and political tunnel vision that ignores important changes happening around things like Solana.
Imran: Exactly. This caused them to have withdrawal times of up to 9 hours on Solana, and they also didn’t list the memes that many users wanted to trade. As a result, emerging projects like Moonshot took the opportunity to capitalize on the Solana meme craze and attracted 400,000 to 500,000 new users.
Qiao: And these users could have potentially entered Coinbase.
Imran: So I think Coinbase is slowly losing the macro vision that they once had, and thats where I see the potential danger.
Qiao: We actually see very fierce competition between Coinbase and Solana. Coinbases Base is in sharp contrast to projects such as Jupiter, Meteora, and Moonshot. Disruptive innovation often starts from the bottom, because there are too many tokens minted and traded on the chain, and centralized exchanges cannot cover all of them, thus gradually losing market share.
Especially when a token is listed on Binance, the community tends to see it as a negative signal as token prices usually drop after listing.
Judging from the data from the app stores, projects like Phantom and Moonshot tend to be more popular than Coinbase, which shows that more and more users are choosing to trade directly on the chain instead of going to centralized exchanges.
Discussion on Blast should have been Hyperliquid
Imran: I think it might be a little late now. Although the competition is still going on, Solana is still in the lead at the moment. Although the lead is not particularly large, I think they are gradually losing market share. Lets talk about Hyperliquid. At least from the discussion on Twitter, a lot of influential founders are choosing to build projects based on Hyperliquid. I feel like they are attracting a lot of EVM Degen users (speculators in the Ethereum virtual machine ecosystem). In a sense, Hyperliquid should have been the role of Blast.
Blast had the potential to be a project like Hyperliquid, but they were too slow to act. I tried the Blast Wallet app, but I couldnt even figure out what the core functionality of the app was. While it offered a 20% yield, which sounds good, the wallet had little other practical use.
So I think they lost the competition to Hyperliquid. Hyperliquid was able to attract the EVM Degen community and build an ecosystem around trading functions. Even if their focus is just trading, this is acceptable. In addition, projects like SUI and Aptos are also developing rapidly. Their TVL (total locked volume) today has reached an all-time high. These projects do have some highlights, and although I am not completely optimistic about them, their potential cannot be ignored.
Qiao: I am open to it. But at present, Solana is still far ahead of all competitors. I am not saying that the competition has been settled, but I think the probability that Ethereums Layer 2 (second layer expansion solution) or other emerging Layer 1 (first layer blockchain) will surpass Solana is less than 50%, and may even be only 10% to 20%.
Imran: Also, the way new Layer 1 projects are launched is critical. So far, other than BeraChain building a large TVL base, other projects don’t really excite me from a narrative perspective. Many of the recently launched Layer 1 projects lack traction and do not have sufficient incentives. I hope this situation will improve over time. Ultimately, it all comes down to what kind of products can be built on these platforms.
