Whenever I write an article about AI+Crypto, there are always voices saying, does AI need Crypto? What else does Crypto have besides Gambling? It is hard to imagine what it means to a person who firmly believes in "technical narrative + long-termism" to hear such seemingly correct but meaningless words.
1) I don’t want to fight back or refute, because if based on the logic of “money-only theory”, not only AI, but also many narratives such as DeFi, NFT, Gamfi, Metaverse, etc. that appeared in previous cycles have failed to achieve the expected results, and the basic hype is far greater than the actual application value. So you said that AI does not need Crypto at all, or even that all narratives are for Gambling, I really can’t refute it.
2) AI is a historical leap forward in human Internet technology. It has completely changed the way users and the Internet interact, from keyboard input to the need for active prediction of natural language understanding, greatly expanding the upper limit of human productivity. Therefore, AI is a historical opportunity for all industries such as web2+web3+traditional tracks. Why are everyone rushing to AI, but not Crypto? Moreover, Crypto's combination and reorganization of production relations such as computing power, algorithms, and data can indeed meet and supplement the natural deficiencies in the AI web2 environment.
It can only be said that AI is still in the innovation and exploration stage, and AI Agent applications have not yet become a necessity in the lives of the general public. Therefore, the "optional" innovation has just begun, and the optimization of production relations contributed by Crypto is too advanced, giving people a sense of being useless. But this is not the case. Some vertical AI Agent applications involving privacy still need to be driven by Crypto.
3) I have always called for AI Agent to be the collective redemption of all the old narratives of Crypto history. Why? The fundamental core is that AI Agent is directly aimed at applications, just like the many online to offline modes conceived in the era of Internet portals, which only truly released their potential after the popularization of mobile Internet phones.
In my opinion, AI Agent is the moment when Crypto's "mobile Internet application terminal" bursts out. Only when AI Agent is fully popularized, the visions of Crypto, such as various distributed data contributions, distributed computing power aggregation, distributed traceability incentives, and distributed DePIN edge computing, will be truly realized. At that time, many old narratives such as ZK, modularization, chain abstraction, BTCFi, layer2, etc. will really be useful.
Because if the rent-seekers in the chain infra block are AI Agents fine-tuned by everyone, the chain's decentralized, transparent, and secure consensus architecture can truly bring into play the value of AI Agents' interoperability, which is a height that cannot be achieved by AI technology innovation at the web2 level alone. Just like even now, some people still criticize that decentralized consensus is meaningless, but everyone can see the little penetration of Crypto into institutional and national power in tracks such as DeFi and RWA, and there is no need to discuss anything anymore.
I fully agree and understand that the diversity of the Crypto world, whether it is short-termism or long-termism, is just a different pursuit between you and me. Of course, the way of getting rewards and punishments is also different. Although, in the short term, long-termists are hurt, even a ridiculous, chaotic and highly PVP market needs a group of Ah Qs who are well versed in the method of spiritual victory.
Because the market always needs the presence of idealists.
