Author: 0xLeoDeng Source: X, @leodeng08
Meme? Don't touch it, it's all air.
Once upon a time, I was so stereotyped against Meme. Now, either tokens convince people with their rise, or they reflect that existence is reasonable. The more I know about Meme, the more I constantly refresh my understanding of Meme. The following are my thoughts on the development of Meme and the crypto industry:
1. Reality: The continued outbreak of Meme in 2024 reveals the end of the Tokenomics 1.0 era
Tokenomics 1.0, the "VC coin" model in the popular sense, that is, the traditional token economics model, emphasizes technology implementation and long-term planning, and was once regarded as the core of crypto projects. Projects are usually driven by white papers and rely on technical narratives, scenario design, lock-up mechanisms and other means to give tokens long-term value.
However, the market share of Meme coins in 2024 has surged by 45% since the beginning of the year, while most VC-backed tokens have continued to perform poorly. The rise of Meme coins shows that the market's patience with the VC token model is waning - that is, from complex technical narratives to easy-to-understand, emotion-driven Meme narratives.
Tokenomics 1.0 requires long-term ecological construction, and users often have to wait for years to see value, while Meme coins can quickly capture attention without waiting. Take $GOAT as an example, the market value soared from US$5 million to nearly US$1 billion in a few weeks, attracting a large number of retail investors and short-term speculators.
Even the top European and American VCs have positively evaluated this round of Meme craze, and well-known institutions such as Pantera Capital and a16z have also begun to support Meme coins. Paul Veradittakit, partner of Pantera, said that Memecoin is a Trojan horse for cryptocurrency; Marc Andreessen @pmairca, co-founder of a16z, said in a podcast that Memecoin is becoming a "new entrance to the crypto market" and has attracted the attention of a large number of new users.
The rise of Memecoin is not only an influx of funds and users, but also a redistribution of market attention, revealing a new trend in the crypto market: a shift from technology-driven to emotion-driven.
II. Review: The history of the crypto market proves that Meme comes first and then scenarios, without exception
It may be reasonable that the source of encryption is Meme. In fact, from Bitcoin to Ethereum, to Dogecoin, and so on, the development of crypto projects follows an obvious rule: Meme comes first, then scenarios. Before the technology is implemented, these projects first win market attention through simple and attractive narratives.
- Bitcoin's Meme Stage (2008-2013): Bitcoin was first created in 2008, with the core narrative of "decentralized electronic cash", a digital currency that is not controlled by governments and banks. In 2009, the founding block was born, further strengthening the "financial freedom" Meme, attracting early believers who did not trust the traditional financial system. In the first few years, Bitcoin mainly relied on community belief and the vision of decentralization. In 2013, with the Silk Road incident and more public attention, Bitcoin's symbolism gradually transformed into real market value. It gradually transitioned from an idea to "digital gold" with scarcity and anti-inflation characteristics, entering a more mature stage. #BTC
- Ethereum's Meme Stage (2014-2017): Ethereum's initial development was mainly driven by the concept of "world computer" and community belief. In 2014, Vitalik Buterin published a white paper with the concept of "decentralized applications and smart contracts", which attracted developers and early supporters. After the mainnet was released in 2015, although the application ecosystem was not yet mature, Ethereum quickly gained attention with its "future potential" and decentralized narrative. Although the DAO incident in 2016 once triggered a crisis, it also strengthened Ethereum's "anti-censorship" and "trustless" concepts. It was not until 2017 that with the outbreak of ICO and DApp, Ethereum gradually entered the application-driven stage, marking the end of its Meme stage. #ETH
- Dogecoin's Meme Stage (2013-2021): Dogecoin was positioned as a "joke token" from the beginning. In 2013, with the popular Shiba Inu emoji image on the Internet, Dogecoin quickly became popular on social platforms, relying on community consensus and a relaxed and humorous culture to attract a large number of users. It does not have a complex technical narrative, but instead builds an inclusive and active community in a relaxed way. In 2021, driven by Elon Musk's tweets and Meme culture, Dogecoin's market value soared to $75 billion, and this "joke token" became the public's entry to the crypto market. In the end, Dogecoin evolved from a Meme to an asset with actual market value, demonstrating the power of community-driven.
Third, thinking: Can the new Meme culture start the transformation of Tokenomics 2.0?
Today, Meme is not just entertainment or hype, but it hides a profound revelation of token economics. The possibility of Tokenomics 2.0 is emerging in Meme culture.
Traditional Tokenomics 1.0 relies on white papers, technical models and long-term visions, while Tokenomics 2.0 may no longer be a cold technical narrative, but an economic system with social genes, focusing on the core from technology to user emotions and participation. As @BTCdayu mentioned, from the perspective of rigorous academic research: What is the relationship between $DOGE and that dog? What is the relationship between $moodeng and that hippopotamus? These questions are only about communication, emotion, psychology, and speculation.
Under this framework, the Meme-driven "attention-resonance-construction" model will become more important. $GOAT's market value soared to $300 million in a short period of time, precisely because it leveraged the power of community-driven and demonstrated the influence of emotions and attention in digital assets. $GOAT is not just a "toy" or a "joke", but a fusion of social culture and economic incentives, which has promoted extensive participation and high-frequency interaction in the market.
The future Tokenomics 2.0 no longer requires a single technical support, but builds a more vital economic model through user experience and emotional resonance.
We are seeing, or will see:
- Smart contract-driven meme supply regulation: Introduce smart contracts to automatically adjust the supply of meme coins, for example: AI automatically issues or destroys meme coins according to specific market conditions, social sentiment, trading volume, etc.
- Project parties begin to issue Meme tokens: By defining meme coins as an extension of project tokens and cleverly associating them with project tokens, they not only maintain the core value of the project, but also use meme coins to attract a wider user base and traffic.
- Investment institutions: Appropriately adjust the investment portfolio to balance long-term technology-driven projects and short-term meme hotspots; obtain returns through short-term arbitrage and flexible exit mechanisms.
- KOL: Project parties may be more inclined to cooperate with KOLs who have the ability to create meme topics. KOLs’ simple shouting will become outdated, and the competition will be about creative content, humorous expression, and the grafting of hot topics.
- Wallet: Launch short-term savings and pledge services for meme coins. Users can put meme coins into the wallet for "light pledge" or "flexible pledge" to obtain some short-term benefits;
- Platform tools: One-click issuance of meme coin platforms, such as http://daos.fun @daosdotfun, through these platforms, quickly create and deploy meme coins, save development costs and time, and quickly seize market hotspots; community operation and management tools (such as community points system, interactive event planning, etc.)
Fourth, Investment: Which field has the most development potential when combined with Meme?
I personally think that in the current crypto market, Meme+AI is undoubtedly the combination with the most development potential (I asked the same question to Chatgpt, and his answer was also AI).
Mike Dudas, co-founder of The Block, believes that Memecoin is a similar and eye-catching asset class to NFT. As the pace of experimentation accelerates, Memecoin will present a variety of different styles; and AI coins will be one of the most important directions.
The emergence of AI has brought about an explosion of creativity, allowing Meme to not only capture hot spots in real time, but also generate personalized content and accurately optimize user experience. With the support of AI, Meme has become more intelligent, not only meeting the entertainment needs of users, but also adjusting narratives at any time to adapt to social trends, keeping the Meme culture fresh and attractive.
I agree with the new trend of "AI + Token + Social Media" proposed by @0xcryptowizard. Imagine that in the future, users holding $GOAT will be more willing to interact with the truth terminal, and users holding $ACT will be more willing to share and even participate in ACT's experiments and research. The community can also donate to support more cutting-edge research combining AI and encryption; the community has a dedicated technical research group, and holders participate voluntarily for free, spend time disassembling related technologies, follow up on various AI agent technology progress, etc. These will all contribute to the long-term development of the project.
In addition, AI also gives the Meme project the ability to evolve itself. Through real-time data analysis and machine learning, the AI-driven Meme ecosystem can quickly adapt to market changes and even predict user needs.
The fusion of Meme+AI not only represents the combination of social and entertainment, but also becomes the convergence point of the new generation of attention economy and technological innovation, with lasting vitality.
The "Meme+AI" tokens that have already taken shape and become influential (both are closely related to a16z):
$GOAT = AI of Bitcoin; Marc Andreessen, the head of A16z, believes that $Goat is the intersection of AI and cryptocurrency, and the first instance of the intersection of AI and cryptocurrency.
CA: CzLSujWBLFsSjncfkh59rUFqvafWcY5tzedWJSuypump
$ACT = AI of Etherum; the only two funded projects by Marc Andreessen, the head of A16z, besides $Goat; focusing on the interaction of multiple AI agents, it is a pioneer in AI agent collaboration.
CA: GJAFwWjJ3vnTsrQVabjBVK2TYB1YtRCQXRDfDgUnpump
#ai16z : AI of A16z; Invest in DAO, use AI agents on and off the chain to obtain market information, analyze community consensus, and automatically trade tokens.
CA: HeLp6NuQkmYB4pYWo2zYs22mESHXPQYzXbB8n4V98jwC
Summary
In 2024, the outbreak of Meme coins revealed the limitations of Tokenomics 1.0, and the possibility of Tokenomics 2.0 is quietly emerging in Meme culture. This change has also brought new opportunities and challenges to all links of the industry chain, such as investment institutions, project parties, and trading platforms.
Through the new path of "capturing attention first and then gradually building application scenarios", Meme coins may open up new growth opportunities for the crypto industry. The combination of Meme+AI is the most noteworthy. It combines the social communication power of Meme with the technological innovation of AI to promote Meme culture to a deeper economic model.
Meme's diamond hand may receive more gifts from the times in this cycle.
Davin
Brian
Hui Xin
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