Exploring the Narrative Nature of the Crypto Market

In the previous text, we predicted and analyzed the demand-side growth that may be brought about by the clearing tide, and attempted to explore what the true encryption narrative should be. The world of encryption originates from a utopian-like idea, a collective creation that is continuously passed on due to belief. Belief can bring infinite passion, and we need an infinite belief to discover amidst the fractures.

What kind of narrative does the crypto market need?

After the clearing wave, the crypto market is like a wooden barrel that is still leaking everywhere.

We have discovered the charm of donation governance, while the treasury has become a private vault for the team, and the incubation plan has turned into a conveyor belt for capital.

We are starting to expand our incremental users, while facing countless Ponzi schemes and zeroing projects.

We focus on the security audit of contracts, while countless assets are stolen, projects run away, and liquidity dries up.

We want to improve product retention rate, while facing countless nested dolls and locked positions for new users, which is "true retention".

We shouted the slogan of the metaverse, the market exploded, and everyone claims to be working on the metaverse.

The project team is not doing things, but rather composing poetry.

Too much blood has been shed here, and industry insiders prefer to call it the "dark forest."

It seems like a new order is proclaiming, "If you want to pass this way, leave your toll behind." Encryption will fully financialize, showcasing the power of the free market to the world. This power allows things to heal and evolve quickly, possessing antifragility. At the same time, a large number of projects and entrepreneurs rapidly perish in the cycle of free competition and fast iteration.

Being in this "crypto community", I feel excited, but also somewhat confused.

"Grand Narrative"

Jean-François Lyotard introduced the term "meta-narrative" in his work "The Postmodern Condition." A "meta-narrative" can explain everything and points to the future of all social issues. In short, it critiques the legitimacy and rationality of science in narratives.

Lyotard illustrated his phrase concept by using the example "This cat is white." He stated that the speaker is the addressor (, the listener is the addressee ), the cat becomes the reference (, and "is white" represents the sense ). Once the word is spoken, the four elements are immediately caught together, constructing the phrase universe (.

So the question arises. In what context is this statement made, and to whom is it said? If this cat is black or another color, does the speaker still insist "this cat is white"? Or is it not a cat at all but a pig? The meaning of this statement varies in different contexts such as a classroom, casual conversation, a courtroom, or a mental health facility. It also means different things to people who have or have not raised cats.

What is reflected behind the language is not only the above context but also the ideological structure and power.

In a market-driven global economy, the value of postmodern knowledge lies in its efficiency and profitability. "Postmodern knowledge" here can be simply understood as many hype stories from modern history, and perhaps the "metaverse" is one of them.

In fact, this kind of criticism is hidden in every corner of the market; every judgment we make is an analytical choice of the "meta-narrative." We question what true demand is and what false demand is. We are clear about what is a story and what is achievable. All these details are constantly reflected in the token prices of the crypto market.

Today, we do not prescribe a remedy; we choose to expose those things that cannot be perceived by mainstream discourse and give a measure to these silent phenomena. Only after this can we calm down and reflect when the market experiences FOMO. What we need to do is:

"Find yourself."

![Glimpse into the Crypto Narrative from Lyotard])https://img-cdn.gateio.im/webp-social/moments-441cae960feb65d241d1fc55dd09986b.webp(

Narrative Above the Narrative

It seems that, due to capital operations becoming the main form of human social development, "knowledge" is gradually being reduced to a form of capital.

In such a state, the authenticity of "knowledge" itself is significantly discounted. When knowledge is no longer credible, the "narratives" people use in social interactions also lose their credibility.

This criticism is not intended to replace the outdated order, but rather to attempt to find a crack that allows individuals to restore the truth (ensuring that Web3 practitioners can remain clear-headed), and to ensure that a new order is not chaotic (ensuring that the narrative of the crypto market is a true endogenous demand).

If we are completely unaware of the society in which "knowledge" exists, we cannot understand what "knowledge" is, let alone the problems it faces in its development and dissemination today.

Just like Satoshi Nakamoto published "Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System" in 2008.

Satoshi Nakamoto expressed what "knowledge" (Bitcoin) is in just 9 pages of text, indicating that this "knowledge" exists in the society it inhabits (the genesis block also contains the message written by Satoshi Nakamoto: "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks." This message serves as a timestamp, referring to the newspaper headline from January 3rd.)

As of today, 14 years have passed, and encryption has stepped onto the global mainstream stage. The whole world is watching this monster, and as more and more capital flows in, we should be more clear-headed and calm, thinking about what our "knowledge" really is?

From the blog of the Ethereum founder, it can be seen that his mindset has been changing. Do the vast majority of decentralized believers still remember what our "knowledge" was, and what position "knowledge" holds in society now?

"Knowledge" has already become a commodity, a resource, and a war, but Lyotard breaks it down into scientific knowledge ) scientific knowledge ( and narrative knowledge ) narrative knowledge (. For example, mathematics must count, but why count? In fact, it is unnecessary to know; mathematics only cares about counting. We are educated that mathematics can lead to truth, mathematics can become Code, Code is Law.

The crypto market is filled with countless "narrative knowledge" and countless "scientific knowledge"; their combination forms a "grand narrative." This "grand narrative" naturally becomes a "consensus," as the distinction between the two is like the saying that many voices can melt gold.

We often say in the primary market which projects can survive bullish and bearish cycles, which is equivalent to questioning which narratives are built upon narratives. Are they truly "scientific knowledge"?

Explore the boundaries of "grand narratives" with "change and information", "critique and skepticism".

![Glimpse of Crypto Narrative from Lyotard])https://img-cdn.gateio.im/webp-social/moments-d3a0829a3b6ef51c09b0eb48b0c74d89.webp(

A founder of a certain blockchain platform stated in his interview:

"Web3 is somewhat similar to the home computer revolution of the 80s and 81s and 82s. People will ask where is AI? Where is VR? But the difference is that the computers we have now are much more powerful than those back then.

Although Web3 has come a long way in terms of computing power, there are still considerable gaps in higher-level elements. These gaps essentially boil down to software, software libraries, software development kits, services, and integration. Integration refers to the integration with services from other parts of the world, whether they are digital or real.

We are making slow progress, but it takes time. This is not something you can just snap your fingers, invest a billion dollars, and expect to get everything done in three months.

It is necessary to let many people understand this; it is an educational issue as well as a technical issue. Everyone must think about what this is.

Just like the 5 or 10 years before the emergence of Web2, many Web2 products could have been built on existing technology, but these products did not appear for a long time. It wasn't until everyone mastered the Web internet that Web2 emerged. It was when people understood the difference between telephone lines and DSL lines, when they understood how to connect to the internet, and the difference between a computer connected to the network and one that is not, that Web2 finally appeared.

In order for Web3 to take root, a lot of foundational education is necessary, and the world must revolve around a new way of doing things.

"Discover the fractures in the crypto market, learn to educate the market"

Recently, a very important criterion in our investment methodology is whether the project and team have the ability to educate the market.

Educating the market consciously through our own products is essentially a glimpse into the "grand narrative"; it is a filtered action. We focus on discovering whether those backgrounds truly exist in the market, rather than simply listing a comparison chart with checks and crosses.

In the past, I held a persistent skepticism towards the high volatility of the crypto market. I tried to find the issues in "Is the over-collateralization of DeFi really the best solution?" I realized that we need a credit assessment model, we also need deconstruction and construction of identity recognition, we need regulation, and we need trust. We need too much.

I previously listed the disadvantages of over-collateralization, but it is still the best collateral model available at the moment. But, why?

Later, I read a sentence by Taleb in "The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable": "Change is information." It is indeed the multitude of changes that gives this market its anti-fragility, with endless information. However, I do not think this tells us that volatility is reasonable. Information provides us with a boundary, allowing individuals to have a space that accommodates a marginalized way of thinking.

In this new order, we need to carry a vigilance similar to Lyotard's towards "grand narratives" so that we can better leverage the "anti-fragility" of the crypto market and the idea that "change is information" to truly construct a new order. Only in this way can we slow down.

Fear cannot change the world; the core of Web3 is not only a technical issue but also an educational issue.

Critiques and doubts of this kind are often criticized as nihilistic and relative, mostly aimed at the untimeliness of their critiques. There was a time when I thought so too. But what lies before us now is a hodgepodge, filled with various fast-paced information in the market. We try to deconstruct it all and uncover the problems and flaws of the old order, re-establishing a new order using marginalized ways of thinking (this is also what most people discuss when asking "What is Crypto Native?").

Lyotard is a person with a firm belief in pluralistic society and pluralistic discourse. Anyone who criticizes him with "What use is your theory to society?" is not discussing issues within his paradigm. He never told us to be a timid turtle that only cares about criticism and the pursuit of the sublime.

What we can do is attempt to give a "name" to those silent phenomena from the warnings, to break the collective illusion, rather than fall into the ultimate indication brought by some discourse structure.

The blog of the founder of Ethereum deeply resonates with me, and I feel fortunate that there is such a person in the crypto world who is constantly exploring the boundaries of the "grand narrative."

Try to identify the fractures as much as possible, rather than focusing solely on tokenization, so that Web3 and the crypto market can be truly accepted by the general public.

We need to question all the current "grand narratives", perhaps there is no such thing as modern and postmodern at all.

Because, in the crypto market, we can discuss finance, history, politics, art, and even the grand fate of humanity, etc. All of this makes up what we call "consensus."

However, not all consensus signifies truth; people assume that the truth of a statement necessarily brings about consensus.

![Glimpse into Crypto Narrative from Lyotard])https://img-cdn.gateio.im/webp-social/moments-c6a2f6287850591b58e18d09afd91281.webp(