Crypto's Shift: From Revolution to Reinvention of the Middleman

The current state of the crypto market is precarious and alarming. In over a decade of involvement in this space, the conditions we're experiencing now are unprecedented, even in the most bearish cycles. Individually, these signals would be concerning, but collectively, they indicate a potential crisis. The focus on utility and onboarding the next billion users seems to have been forgotten. A significant concern is the decline in smart contract audits, a standard procedure before launching any decentralized application. This isn't due to a lack of importance but rather the absence of new dApps. Builders, including developers and founders, are either waiting for the environment to improve or abandoning the crypto space altogether. They're not interested in creating simple applications or replicating existing ones, such as financial applications or tokenized funds. Instead, they're discouraged by the lack of support, encouragement, and funding from investors for utility applications, which are more challenging to build and often require more time. Unless an app promises a substantial return in a short time frame, typically through some DeFi scheme, it won't receive funding or support. This forces builders into a corner, making it impossible for them to succeed. Currently, investments in the crypto space are focused on short-term profit, such as memecoins, insider knowledge manipulation, complex DeFi protocols lacking transparency, and over-leveraged trading. As a result, attention is drawn away from blockchain-based products and use cases, and towards headlines about ETF inflows and outflows, trading tips, and DAT performances. This confuses and deceives retail investors, who are buying into these delusions without understanding the malicious behavior behind the scenes. Unfortunately, many industry leaders are perpetuating this focus on profit over meaningful blockchain-based use cases. They could be advocating for the migration of the global monetary system to blockchain for increased efficiency and transparency or promoting the use of blockchain and crypto to improve societies, such as incentivizing sustainable actions or healthier behaviors. However, they're embracing a new, more dangerous breed of middleman instead. These middlemen and their financial products have introduced harmful complexity and obfuscation to our previously transparent markets, unlocking a new level of greed and theft. Consider the recent liquidation on October 11th, where retail investors are still bearing the cost while those in power negotiate their recoveries. Cryptocurrency and blockchain were created to eliminate financial oligopolies and democratize access to a new era of the internet. Instead, we've allowed the reinvention of manipulative middlemen, welcoming them back as potential 'saviors' of Web3. Web3 was named as such because blockchain represents the next generation of the internet. When used correctly, AI can increase productivity, and blockchain can improve relationships between parties without barriers. Together, they could reshape the world as much as the internet did. However, we're stuck watching DATs, ETFs, trading leverages, and DeFi liquidations, while a small number of people make enormous profits from the misery and loss of millions of others. Crypto has yet to fulfill its promise of matching the radical transformation of the World Wide Web, with decentralized principles at its core. As the months pass, I'm reminded of a scene from The Big Short, where investor Mark Baum says, 'What bothers me isn't that fraud is not nice. Or that fraud is mean. For fifteen thousand years, fraud and short-sighted thinking have never, ever worked. Not once.' He's right; every cent of profit gained from exploiting the crypto ecosystem only drives builders away and halts the progress of this technology. In exchange for short-term gains, these crypto middlemen are destroying the value of the underlying asset they're speculating on. Ultimately, everyone in the industry will pay for this, including those who believe in the potential of this technology. For those of us who want to use crypto to make the world better, we need to call out this behavior for what it is: short-sighted, selfish, and unwelcome greed. We must act to save our industry, focus on building real utility, and create innovative applications for the next billion users, as well as support projects and protocols that deliver on the undeniable potential of Web3. Let's fight for utility while we still can.