Editor | Wu Talks about Blockchain
In the context of soaring chaos values, it is very important to perceive the periodicity more clearly and discover the future narrative trends. As innovative narrative catchers, investment institutions have always been relatively cutting-edge. In view of this, OKX specially planned the (Crypto Evolution) column, inviting mainstream crypto investment institutions around the world to systematically output topics such as the periodicity of the current market, the direction of the new round of narratives, and the subdivision of hot tracks, in order to stimulate discussion.
The following is the fifth issue, in which OKX Ventures, LongHash Ventures and ANAGRAM jointly discuss the future development of Web3 social and consumer tracks. I hope their insights and thoughts will inspire you.
About OKX Ventures
OKX Ventures is the investment arm of OKX, a leading crypto asset trading platform and Web3 technology company, with an initial capital commitment of $100 million. It focuses on exploring the best blockchain projects globally, supporting cutting-edge blockchain technology innovations, promoting the healthy development of the global blockchain industry, and investing in long-term structural value. By committing to entrepreneurs who support the blockchain industry, OKX Ventures helps establish innovative companies and brings global resources and historical expertise to blockchain projects.
About LongHash Ventures
LongHash Ventures is a crypto-native venture capital firm founded in 2017, based in Singapore and Silicon Valley. We work closely with founders to build their Web3 models and tap into the enormous potential in Asia. We invest in and collaborate with visionary founders paving the way for the next stage of the open economy.
About ANAGRAM
We are an institution focused on technological innovation. We are committed to helping those who bring ownership economies to the masses through human and financial capital.
I. What differences are there in the development of this round of SocialFi compared to the previous one?
OKX Ventures researcher: This round of SocialFi is focused on Memecoin trading and the development of casual games based on high-distribution protocols (like TON), placing more emphasis on consumer and creator tools compared to the previous NFT cycle. Many major brands (like LVMH, Nike, etc.) have tried to test relevant narratives in the crypto space but ultimately could not adapt to the hyper-financial culture of the crypto community. However, in the success of Memecoin trading and similar prediction markets, we see that these crypto dApps catering to hyper-financialization applications can indeed yield positive results. Other trends include:
1. From content monetization to social monetization
Early Social projects like Steemit and Mirror relied on content production for incentives, but quality was hard to control, leading to an influx of low-quality content. However, this round, friend.tech has undeniably brought forth new experiments—monetizing social relationships, with each user becoming a 'Key' asset, constructing a completely new asset form through social identity, making everyone a potential investment object. Pump.fun carries forward the liquidity innovation ideas of Friend.tech, further promoting the narrative of low-liquidity AMM models and effectively bridging the liquidity conversion paths of on-chain assets between DEX and CEX. Compared to Friend.tech, Pump.fun focuses more on the combination of liquidity models and social interactions, deeply linking asset liquidity with social activities. Meanwhile, UXLINK's innovative model emphasizes the transformation of social relationships' value by rewarding users for contributing their social network data through its Link to Earn model, thereby addressing the shortcomings of relying solely on content production and avoiding the pitfalls of short-term financial incentives.
2. The trade-off between decentralization and financialization
Projects are becoming more flexible in terms of decentralization. Social platforms like Farcaster emphasize users' digital ownership of social relationships and content control, but their core is not immediately fully decentralized; their highlight is allowing users to control their social data and reserving experimental space for future on-chain operations, with an emphasis on community-driven innovation and culture. TON+Telegram focuses on a more pragmatic Web2.5 approach, providing convenient access through embedded programs like mini-games, integrating financial operations into everyday social interactions, enhancing the financial attributes of social identities; gradually introducing on-chain activities while lowering the cost of transitioning to Web3, while leveraging the existing platform to enhance user trust and experience.
In addition, there is a trend of transferring intellectual property (IP) onto the chain. The increasing UGC and AI-generated content are the primary forces behind this.
LongHash Ventures (Emma Cui): In this cycle, the infrastructure is ready to support mass adoption.
First, scaling: Rollups, Alt L1s, and data availability layers are reducing the cost of on-chain activities to just a few cents or less. More innovative rollups (like zkSync) further optimize data costs through state differentials.
Secondly, interoperability: Chain abstraction and intent-based protocols allow on-chain assets and credentials to be easily recognized or used across any chain. For example, to send tips on SocialFi, Particle Network can seamlessly aggregate assets across multiple chains and send them in one step.
Third, account user experience: Account abstraction, MPC, passwords, and social logins allow users to interact with web3 without managing private keys and gas fees. Nowadays, the Safe protocol has protected billions in assets, with a peak value exceeding $120 billion compared to Binance and Robinhood, comparable to real-world banks. With account abstraction, users can log into SocialFi applications using session keys and authorize multiple on-chain interactions without logging into their wallets each time.
ANAGRAM (David Shuttleworth): The SocialFi space has seen significant changes compared to the previous cycle, particularly in the number of original experiments and new mechanism designs. In the last cycle, builders typically focused on replacing existing legacy systems, such as the launch of Lens, which was a decentralized version of X, and Farcaster followed a similar path. However, in this cycle, many projects (like Lens and Farcaster) are not just limited to replacing existing structures but have started to implement more attractive features, such as Farcaster's Frames.
This is largely due to advancements in underlying blockchain technology. Lens launched the Lens network using ZKsync, enhancing its ability to transform how social networks operate. Rollups on Ethereum enable networks and the protocols built on them to scale more efficiently, processing millions of transactions. This technology was nearly unavailable in the previous cycle but is now being fully explored. Additionally, features like Farcaster Frames allow users to seamlessly interact with multiple applications running on the Farcaster source and enable developers to distribute applications in a 'one-click' manner. This kind of innovation and user experience was nonexistent in the previous cycle.
To expand the application range, Solana recently introduced Actions and Blinks, connecting Solana to the entire internet, allowing users to perform various operations, such as swaps and payments, on any website or application (like X, Reddit). These new primitives convert on-chain operations into shareable links, making the design space more open than in the previous cycle.
Another interesting area of innovation is the fusion of social and speculation. Friend.tech and Fantasy.top are two main examples that combine social elements with user interaction, allowing users to speculate on various parameters, such as the popularity of posts on X. Friend.tech allows users to profit through community engagement and trade 'keys' that unlock different features (such as exclusive in-app chat rooms), while Fantasy.top allows users to collect and trade NFTs related to certain crypto figures on X. While many well-known projects are struggling to maintain user activity, these new experiments, which were absent in the previous cycle, provide useful guidance for future development.
II. How is the current development status of the Consumer Apps track? Where is the intersection with social?
OKX Ventures researcher: The market is transitioning from a traditional model centered on 'trust' to one based on 'contract execution' through smart contracts, and the application track is no longer just a playground for whales, but is leaning towards a broader user base. Users are not only looking for platforms to 'make quick money' but are also expecting consumer applications that meet daily needs. The previously complex blockchain operations and difficult user interfaces are being simplified, and developers are realizing that users do not need to understand the blockchain; they just require a smooth user experience.
Progressive Web Applications (PWA) are becoming a new distribution method for crypto applications, providing a seamless experience similar to Web2 while avoiding the traditional app store's 30% fees. In payments, crypto payment experiences are gradually becoming mainstream, such as the collaboration between Venmo, PayPal, and ENS, and EtherFi launching its own credit card that is compatible with Apple Pay. The launch of Solana's Saga and Seeker marks the development of Web3 native devices, becoming mobile wallets through convenient features like double-click crypto payments and built-in seed libraries, with built-in distribution further enhancing user experience. The combination of hardware, payments, and distribution addresses operational complexities, accelerating user participation in networks and the transition of crypto applications to the mainstream market.
Whether in entertainment or finance applications, they will ultimately enter a financialization trajectory. Once ownership (like NFTs or tokens) is introduced, the financial attributes of the applications become immediately evident. Entertainment financialization applications like mini-games and memecoins attract massive participation through speculation, while serious DeFi applications focused on investment and finance emphasize asset appreciation and preservation.
The integration of Consumer and Social is not just 'buying and selling crypto assets on social platforms'; many crypto applications are centering around social aspects, as exemplified by prediction markets and Pump.fun, highlighting that the power of community and social interactions should not be overlooked. Social elements can firmly bind users to the platform because people inherently enjoy interacting and sharing their thoughts on particular events.
Imagine memecoins no longer being mere speculative hype; they can be news themselves, a reflection of social elements and societal dynamics. People bet around specific events or topics or interact with memes, which is also crucial in DeFi. In the past, many DeFi applications relied on trading volumes from whale users to attract users, but now, applications with social features are starting to drive liquidity and participation through interactions between users and the power of the community.
Successful applications must integrate social elements, not just as social media platforms, but by capturing interactions between users on the front end to build network effects. The reason is simple: you need users to enter your front end to generate revenue. Without a front end, competitors to Uniswap can directly leverage their protocols to steal users. User familiarity, interaction habits, and dependencies are the moat for applications. The user network on the front end is the core driver of everything—just as financial liquidity is crucial for launching protocols, user liquidity is equally important for launching applications.
The composability of crypto means that smart contracts can be invoked from anywhere, allowing protocols to be scalable and interoperable. This flexibility allows embedded applications to interact directly with on-chain functionalities—imagine prediction markets appearing right where people are discussing news; SocialFi mini-programs enabling users to stake tokens, follow trades, or purchase fan tokens; and governance mini-programs allowing members to conceive, collaborate, and vote—all of which hinge on a 'substitute front end,' where on-chain financial transactions can seamlessly integrate into familiar social structures, making interactions fun—sending messages to other traders on DEXs, competing with friends' portfolios, etc.
The adoption path of consumer applications mainly has two approaches: one is to optimize existing products, and the other is to create new demands. The first approach involves continuously refining user experience to make products better than other options in the market, utilizing underlying technology to find entry points for marginal improvements, while leveraging tokens to change community behavior and experience; the latter focuses on uncovering unmet user needs and opening up new market spaces, which is the direction many Web2 products have taken, such as Twitter initially redefining the social media space. Although the latter has higher alpha potential, the former is equally essential. If today a user has to endure long waits and cumbersome processes to use an app, such soil cannot nurture a new demand application like Twitter.
In contrast, products like collateralized lending can develop based on existing demand; even if there are complexities in operation, those with demand will actively overcome them. However, for applications with innovative demand, users will not fill these gaps on their own. Thus, investing all effort into UI/UX too early may not be the best choice; as long as you can find target users, you need not worry about finding suitable suppliers or partners (like underwriters) to optimize product services.
LongHash Ventures (Emma Cui): Consumer applications as B2C use cases can be defined as any application developed for end-users. From this perspective, social applications can also be seen as consumer applications. By enhancing user experience, innovations in social applications lower the creation threshold for seamless consumer applications. Beyond the Web3 ecosystem, Telegram has also become an important distribution channel. With 950 million users, Telegram is the most popular instant messaging application in the crypto ecosystem, while bypassing the approval processes and fees of Android and Apple app stores.
Both consumption and social aspects have strong motivations to attract new users by creating seamless user experiences in products and accumulating value through genuine consumer behavior. For instance, Catizen has 34 million users and revenue exceeding $25 million. Leading gaming ecosystems like Ronin and YGG also have millions of users actively spending time and money on Web3.
TON also showcases how blockchain can provide new opportunities for monetization, engagement, and innovation by supporting small and medium-sized Web2 game developers. By introducing tokenized economies, a rewards system is created for content creation and consumption, promoting engagement through digital ownership. The integration of Web3 consumer products with Web2 platforms like social media and mini-games faces the main challenge of simplifying the Web3 experience for Web2 users. While Web2 excels at user-friendly interfaces, it is crucial to minimize the complexities of Web3 (like using wallets and tokens) to encourage adoption. Another potential lies in decentralized governance models, where platforms and games develop through community input, fostering user loyalty and democratizing ownership.
ANAGRAM (David Shuttleworth): Consumer and social applications are becoming increasingly powerful and starting to provide real utility for users. These applications take various forms, including prediction markets (like prediction markets), token launchers (like Pump.fun), and applications more focused on social elements (like Farcaster and Lens). If executed properly, these applications can become strong drivers of mass adoption and revenue.
Over the past year, consumer applications have generated increasingly large fees for the protocol itself and its underlying network, while also becoming a 'lighthouse' for attracting new users, increasing liquidity, and driving demand for block space. They have had a significant impact on the DeFi sector of the network. For example, since March, Pump.fun has generated nearly $100 million in fees, becoming one of the most profitable protocols in the entire field. More notably, it has positively influenced other DeFi applications on Solana, such as Raydium, which saw its activity reach an all-time high in July when Pump.fun was most popular, with monthly transaction volumes reaching as high as $28.7 billion. Pump.fun has made token issuance and the establishment of memes around it simple and fun, translating into actual demand for the tokens. Although this has raised questions about ecological 'killing the goose that lays the golden eggs,' it provides a valid short-term experiment to study how consumer and social adoption affects user behavior and network outcomes. In fact, the transience of applications themselves has become a new trend in this cycle.
Ultimately, the main reasons for success lie in improvements in network scalability, enhancements in user experience, and the proliferation of stablecoins. In terms of infrastructure, blockchain costs have significantly decreased, and performance has continued to improve; this has been accompanied by continuous improvements with Solana's Firedancer and the emergence of ultra-high-performance chains like MegaETH and Monad. In terms of user experience, years of infrastructure development have made interactions with different chains smoother than ever before. With just a few clicks, users can easily access applications on any chain, often without leaving their wallets. The in-wallet experience has also seen significant improvements—from custodial and trading to super applications, unlocking a range of innovations: from simple messaging and content distribution (for instance, for holding concert tickets) to DeFi applications built on top of them. Although the overall user experience is still not perfect, it has improved significantly compared to a few years ago.
At the same time, fiat-backed stablecoins are ubiquitous, allowing users to access more choices without needing to bridge or leave the main chain. Additionally, applications from the PayFi sector allow users to easily deposit fiat, make instant cross-border payments, and perform various everyday on-chain activities. All of this achieves the effect of 'wherever the user is, the service is there,' seamlessly integrating all core elements needed to build comprehensive applications in the background. Users can click on Solana Blink on X or Frame on Warpcast to instantly connect to applications. This is precisely the starting point for further merging consumption and social aspects, and merely the beginning. The trend of incorporating DeFi functionalities into consumer applications is also continuously evolving. For example, prediction market positions can be tokenized, allowing users not only to trade their betting directions but also to earn income while holding their bets.
As transaction costs gradually decrease and speeds increase, payment functions will come closer to the Web2 experience (i.e., instant and convenient), providing greater capacity and design freedom for consumer and social application use cases. The strength of these Web3 applications lies in their ability to not only realize new forms of interaction and collaboration but also lead to the establishment of new economic and social norms.
III. Where are the future explosion points of Web3 social and consumption?
OKX Ventures researcher: Social applications are essentially a subclass of consumer applications. If the consumer direction is handling high transaction volumes through applications like Pump.fun, these ecosystems will continue to expand. Currently, they may lack large DeFi components (like leveraged trading, shorting, etc.), but these will gradually be developed. The key for casual gaming communities lies in finding the most sustainable business models and considering whether issuing tokens is the right choice.
Many on-chain applications, to remain competitive, have lowered protocol fees or even brought them to zero, attracting short-term users and speculators, forcing developers to rely on increasing user activity and liquidity to enhance revenue rather than creating real long-term value, thus preventing the development into large-scale consumer applications. It is much easier to develop for whales than to address the needs of the general public; simply going fully on-chain and utilizing various opportunities, such as MEV, can easily maximize profits. Most application failures actually occur 'off-chain,' such as poor experiences with deposit and withdrawal channels, identity verification, and other daily behaviors.
Therefore, relying solely on existing on-chain mechanisms cannot truly solve the user retention issue. To break through this bottleneck, Web3 social networks need to transform from being financially driven to a multifunctional user experience platform centered on social consensus—seamlessly navigating users across multiple domains such as NFT markets, DEX, games, and governance forums through a unified portal, closely integrating financial behaviors with wallets.
The explosion point of applications comes from a combination of social consensus, speculation, and tribal behavior. Because blockchain inherently has a decentralized consensus mechanism, it helps users reach coordination and consensus around events, assets, and dynamics of interest, thereby establishing trust in the system's credibility.
Currently, many applications rely on short-term speculative behaviors like NFT investments and liquidity mining, leading users to focus on 'quick in and out' operations. As the market matures, applications need to attract and retain users through content filtering, intelligent trading processing, and community management.
Optimizing user data management and quality filtering is key to ensuring user experience is not disrupted by financialization, enhancing the naturalness and friendliness of on-chain interactions and reducing reliance on speculative capital. Lasting communities, brand loyalty, and a sense of belonging, along with strong and sticky user communities, will determine the success of applications and protocols. For example, Monad fosters users to become guardians of the community, encouraging them to engage in tribal behavior and rewarding expectations; this community-driven model will become a long-term growth point.
Future social networks also need to separate the social data layer from the financial layer. Users do not want complex financial transactions accompanying every interaction; platforms should intelligently manage these interactions, hiding financial transactions in the background, and providing users with more valuable interaction experiences through AI-driven intelligent filtering and quality standards.
Key growth areas will also focus on enhancing user trust and experience through decentralized identity verification, proof of activity, and privacy protection. Platforms can effectively manage and reward users who genuinely contribute to the community, not just speculators. As ZK technology and scaling solutions develop, users will enjoy a more efficient and secure decentralized interaction network, especially in terms of private messaging and social privacy protection.
LongHash Ventures (Emma Cui): The reason that blockchain-driven SocialFi and consumer applications may become the core driving force of the crypto economy is that they provide new monetization opportunities and more user ownership by integrating blockchain into user-friendly scenarios, paving the way for widespread adoption of crypto technology. The shift in ownership and financial incentives will encourage more everyday participation in consumer applications to expand the crypto economy. By combining DeFi with social and consumer applications, new financial opportunities are created for users. Functions like staking or decentralized lending can be integrated into everyday digital activities, blurring the lines between financial and social products and further expanding the crypto space. Besides simplifying complexities like wallet management and security, regulatory transparency and user trust are also crucial for the long-term success of applications.
We see more and more applications aimed at driving new users, new assets, and new on-chain activities. Breakthrough applications often struggle to fit into existing categories, likely standing out by leveraging the advantages of all new infrastructures, the heat of emerging verticals, and the speculative potential of cryptocurrencies.
AI-driven conversations based on Telegram driving consumer behavior and gaming experiences are a highlight. Telegram provides a seamless user experience, with AI agent companions creating personalized, on-demand experiences, while consumer product purchases, such as collectibles and in-game assets, become natural spending channels, easily realizable on-chain and within AI agents. For instance, protocols like Wayfinder, Virtuals Protocol, and Theoriq allow autonomous agents to execute transactions on-chain. Particularly, Virtuals has launched AI idols that can interact with users on Telegram, allowing users to engage after watching their Twitch streams.
ANAGRAM (David Shuttleworth): The next wave of adoption will primarily be driven by stablecoins, RWAs, and payment innovations, alongside advancements in crypto economic security, at least for the near term. As the Federal Reserve lowers interest rates and global rates decline, users will seek new opportunities outside traditional finance. Stablecoins not only provide users with a way to earn risk-free interest but also accumulate value through protocol fees, unlocking new monetary layers for developers. Stablecoins leveraging previously idle capital (like Bitcoin reserve backing) also create unique value spaces. Similarly, RWAs enable users to access a diverse range of financial tools without permission, allowing developers to utilize underlying RWA design infrastructures, such as stablecoins supported by BlackRock's BUIDL.
Payments are evolving beyond just cross-border transfers. More robust developers are creating applications with on-chain autonomous banking features, including traditional savings accounts, ZK payments, and DeFi primitives (like on-chain lending, staking, and market-making). Users can also easily achieve P2P payments in their non-custodial wallets. Furthermore, the introduction of Eigenlayer AVS will bring actual demand to the re-staking market, allowing applications to build new core functionalities without redeployment. As protocols begin to explore different possibilities, the demand for re-staking may significantly increase. With more substantial AVS functionalities being launched, the demand for shared security will drive re-staking yields.
User choices are becoming increasingly diverse, allowing for on-chain financial activities such as lending, staking, re-staking, and leveraging. Compared to two years ago, this is a significant advancement. Currently, major DEXs like Uniswap, Pancakeswap, and Orca have a combined monthly trading volume exceeding $135 billion. Perpetual contract platforms like Hyperliquid and dYdX have achieved daily trading volumes of $12 billion. Liquidity staking protocols like Lido have generated over $511 million in cumulative fees, while re-staking protocols like EigenLayer manage assets exceeding $12 billion, and lending protocols like Aave manage $19 billion. Additionally, stablecoin issuers like Tether and Circle have monthly revenues exceeding $500 million.
However, outside of DeFi, the activities available to ordinary users are relatively limited, and most actions not directly involving the aforementioned DeFi activities are usually related to financial speculation. Social and consumer applications bring hope for introducing the next wave of users into the crypto world.
While DeFi applications will continue to evolve, future iterations may face diminishing returns, with the extent of improvements gradually narrowing. However, there remains vast innovation space in social and consumer fields, where even minor improvements can yield significant results, thus opportunities for distinguishing between marginal improvements and true transformative changes are emerging.
Currently, many products are still in the experimental stage and require enterprise-level infrastructure to operate normally. Users also need simple and familiar ways to access these applications. As technology develops and entry barriers are abstracted, social and consumer applications have opportunities to attract new types of users who do not solely pursue speculation or monetary gains.
PayFi and the payments field may become one of the preliminary breakthrough points for cross-chain applications, making fiat on-chain seamless, with cross-border payments nearly instantaneous and free, allowing users to achieve meaningful integrations such as linking MetaMask with a Mastercard to spend cryptocurrencies directly from their self-custodied wallets. The payments field will be one of the most practical applications. Creating applications that replicate traditional banking experiences on-chain is equally important. Such self-service banks allow users to have traditional savings accounts, borrow funds in DeFi, and engage in other on-chain activities, such as staking—without the need for intermediaries.
The proliferation of stablecoins and advances in their underlying utility are also worth noting. The ongoing evolution of digital dollars makes them not just a means of value storage or exchange, but a foundational layer for developers to build more applications on. New protocols are standardizing and making stablecoins interoperable, providing new ways to accumulate value, such as sharing protocol fees with users, making holding stablecoins more attractive than ever.
Verifiable computation is another area that could have a profound impact. It allows developers to move various operations from on-chain to off-chain and publicly verify them on-chain without re-executing the entire process. This optimizes performance, reduces the cost of on-chain logic for products, and minimizes the attack surface and centralized dependencies. Potential uses include verifiable oracles—updating prices and inputs off-chain and publishing updated proofs on-chain, thereby expanding the capacity of traditional oracle architectures; cross-chain proof systems—providing verifiable proofs of activity on one chain (like Ethereum) that trigger corresponding actions on another chain (like Solana) (e.g., liquidity pool rebalancing after a cross-chain swap). Verifiable computation has many interesting applications in game theory and mechanism design, such as allowing users to hide orders in dark pools to avoid slippage or using hidden-reveal functionalities to hide specific contents while verifying the value of a basket of goods simultaneously.
The gaming sector is also a potential breakthrough point. It doesn't have to be AAA or the most advanced first-person shooters; it could be low-resolution 8-bit or 16-bit games focused on deep storylines, engaging character development, and interesting gameplay mechanics. Given the permissionless nature of blockchain and the increasingly competitive traditional gaming market, stronger developers may turn to new distribution methods, breaking away from the current gaming industry trajectory.
Finally, there is AVS. EigenLayer is expected to attract the vast majority of ETH (both native and staked), with users seeking additional returns from it. The protocol has achieved over 4.5 million ETH (about $12 billion) in deposits, with its strength lying in expanding the design space using the economic security of re-staking. EigenDA, as the first implemented AVS, has already provided cost-effective and high-throughput data availability for rollups.
An increasing number of vertical AVS (Application Value Services) are emerging, including network scaling (such as ZK light clients and prover networks), coordination layers (like DePIN infrastructure) to coordinate computing power exchange, and more cutting-edge fields like MEV management. As these services continuously create strong use cases and drive the growth of the protocols they use, corresponding demand for AVS will also increase. Any protocol can create a re-staking and shared economy security system, but ultimately, the services built on it are what define the protocol and drive the re-staking economy.
IV. How to view the popularity of the TON ecosystem and the challenges it faces?
OKX Ventures researcher: The characteristics of ultra-casual games with short cycles make TON and Telegram effective channels for users to engage with crypto. In the attention economy era, a healthy ecosystem, solid user base, and smooth onboarding experience are what developers expect. Users do not need to switch applications or master complex blockchain knowledge; the 'invisibility' of crypto technology lowers the barriers to application.
The launch of TON Space self-custodial wallets breaks the barriers to liquidity and usage, with the native integration of stablecoins enabling its DEX liquidity to reach $600 million in a short time. Additionally, TON's off-chain expansion and lightning network design support native high-frequency, low-cost microtransactions and off-chain payment channels, fundamentally addressing scalability issues. Even before the TON ecosystem heated up, many trading bots relying on Telegram channels, like UniBot and Banana Gun, had already emerged to meet users' needs for quick on-chain trading, operating directly with custodial wallets. They satisfy the needs of Web3 users, and if project parties can find products that meet Web2 users' needs, then the role of the wallet is to serve as a channel for traffic and payments, potentially eliminating the need for complex smart contracts, simplifying commerce.
While TON has brought new opportunities and profit avenues for developers and entrepreneurs—accelerating the commercialization of social products driven by Telegram's mature user base and token use case environment—most applications, especially games and social mini-programs, are still concentrated on meme culture and entertainment speculation, often simple ports of mini-games from platforms like WeChat. The core appeal has not fully leveraged the unique advantages of cryptocurrencies or the blockchain’s secure and transparent financial data management capabilities, but it also indicates that TON is accelerating its iteration from a validated path. Moreover, the opportunities for ad monetization and in-app purchases have not been fully explored; by opening its infrastructure and providing entrepreneurs with opportunities akin to 'small shops,' it can still support new products with traffic and in-app purchase revenues. For example, in payment scenarios, TON can further develop payment services for online shopping, social e-commerce, and offline events; on the supply side, it can bridge consumer electronics, exhibition tickets, e-commerce products, etc., to create a full-stack consumer experience.
While guiding users and developers to build a richer gamified experience ecosystem, the team needs to continuously explore how to connect everyday user needs with the on-chain world to build a stable ecosystem. For example, for Web3 payments to be widely applied, a key incubation scenario akin to e-commerce for internet payments is necessary. When the payment demands in real scenarios mature, TON's crypto payments and financial services can reach a tipping point. Moreover, the integration of TON with TG faces challenges of user education and shifts in perceptions in non-Asian markets, particularly in how to transform communication tools into multifunctional platforms.
LongHash Ventures (Emma Cui): The TON team is committed to building a super application similar to WeChat, integrating functions like instant messaging, social networking, DeFi, and e-commerce, all based on TON blockchain technology. Their vision is to turn it into a portal for Web3, attracting hundreds of millions of users and leveraging the existing user base to achieve billions of transactions in a user-friendly and seamless Telegram environment.
Despite the daunting goal of following WeChat to become a super application, considering WeChat's unique growth environment, such as government support, integration with almost all domestic banking systems, and lack of competition in its early development, we believe the TON ecosystem is gaining momentum and may become the largest Web3 user onboarding channel in the short to medium term. We have previously written research articles on the growth of the TON ecosystem and its potential risks.
ANAGRAM (David Shuttleworth): Over the past year, TON has achieved significant growth — the market cap of the $TON token has risen from $2 billion in 2023 to $4 billion, climbing to $8 billion in 2024, with network users and activity hitting all-time highs. With Telegram's user base of over 900 million and continuously expanding functionalities, the potential of the TON ecosystem far exceeds that of other blockchains.
However, despite the increase in adoption rates, the TON ecosystem lacks meaningful applications, and users can only speculate on the underlying tokens. Developer incentives are insufficient, with other chains providing millions of dollars in financial incentives to attract builders and strong applications, while TON lacks such mechanisms. Additionally, TON lacks a native stablecoin pegged to the dollar, limiting users’ choices for stablecoins and relying on wrapped ERC-20 tokens bridged from Ethereum (such as jUSDT). Poor user experiences severely limit the network liquidity for end users, exacerbating the difficulty of deploying applications.
The situation began to turn around in early 2024, with two key factors being appropriate ecological incentive programs and the native launch of Tether. The TON Foundation launched an open alliance, distributing $30 million in TON incentives for developers and users to participate in network construction, giving developers strong motivation to begin deploying more powerful applications and competing for user attention. The quality of builders in the industry is very limited, turning it into a competitive game where developers compete against each other, and ecosystems must also compete against each other to attract the best talent. Without strong incentive frameworks and sufficient liquidity and user demand, the network will struggle to gain meaningful attention.
In April this year, the integration of Tether USDT introduced the first dollar-pegged stablecoin to the TON network. The deployment of such stablecoins (like USDT or USDC) is crucial for the network's success. Since Tether's launch, user activity has significantly increased, with daily transaction volumes hitting new highs of over 3.7 million, a growth of over 530%. At the same time, daily users have also surged, first surpassing 1 million in September and recently reaching 1.1 million, a 752% increase since April.
With improvements in liquidity and incentive systems, the next step is to deploy new applications. Although much of TON's growth has only recently appeared and there is still room for improvement, such as better developer tools, it is ready for further expansion. If strong applications can settle in, TON has the opportunity to meaningfully leverage its distribution channels. Otherwise, it may face significant resistance, with weakened ecological incentives leading stronger applications to deploy elsewhere and users migrating to the next opportunity, further intensifying competition between ecosystems.
OKX Ventures disclaimer, please read:
https://www.okx.com/zh-hans/learn/okx-disclaimer.
