Why didn't Trump mention Web3 in his speech?

Author: Meng Yan’s Blockchain Thoughts

Trump’s 50-minute speech at the Nashville Bitcoin Conference on July 27 was hailed as another milestone in the crypto-asset industry. However, someone did some statistics after the meeting and found that Trump did not mention Ethereum, blockchain, or Web3 at all, and the only time he mentioned Vitalik was that he later found out that he had misheard.

Why doesn’t Trump mention Web3? Of course I don’t know the exact reason. I can only ask the guy who wrote Trump’s speech, which is said to be David Bailey, CEO of Bitcoin Magazine. But if you look at this matter within the larger framework of the entire crypto industry, it is actually not difficult to understand.

In short, Trump’s speech basically reflected the views of the progressive Bitcoin supremacists.

Bitcoin and Ethereum are the two leading players in the Crypto industry and are often compared together. But in fact, the two are completely different. It can be said that they represent two completely different schools of thought: Bitcoin is a "useless use" and Ethereum is a "useful use."

Bitcoin’s goal is to serve as digital gold, the value benchmark of the digital world. It has no other use, especially no use value. Precisely because it has no use value, you cannot analyze it from the perspective of utility, and you cannot use indicators to measure its value. Therefore, Bitcoin is invincible because you cannot think of the logic to defeat it. But on the other hand, Bitcoin leaves little room for application development and ecological construction, and it is difficult for you to build anything on it. There are many Bitcoin fans who continue to claim that Bitcoin is the first and should be the last blockchain application. Bitcoin has fully utilized the reasonable value of the blockchain and can do everything that the blockchain should do. Yes, what Bitcoin doesn’t do is what blockchain shouldn’t do. All other blockchain innovations except Bitcoin are all pretentious. These views are typical of fundamental Bitcoin supremacism. This is of course the ultimate admiration for Bitcoin, but it is also a surrender to Bitcoin’s inability to serve as infrastructure to support greater value.

Ethereum is different. Its original goal was to be a global computer. Now it is a digital economic settlement layer and a dedicated computer. It is a useful thing and has appeared as an ecological infrastructure from the beginning. This is Ethereum’s strength, but also its weakness. Since it is useful, its usefulness can be broken down and measured based on some indicators, such as performance, TVL, number of users, throughput, etc. Because Ethereum is useful, in theory, if you make a blockchain that surpasses Ethereum in all aspects, it will be a more useful blockchain and can beat Ethereum. Since 2017, countless Ethereum Killer public chain narratives have emerged, some of which once achieved very high valuations. This is the logic behind them.

So it can be compared like this, Bitcoin is a big ball, perfect on its own, but you can’t build the superstructure on it. Ethereum is a slab, which provides you with good basic conditions for building a superstructure, but it itself is more fragile than Bitcoin.

Although Trump talked a lot in this speech, it was actually just a repeated spiral strengthening of Bitcoin logic around Wall Street, that is, recognizing the value of Bitcoin digital gold, expressing confidence in its value, and providing policy guarantees after being elected. One wave after another, but that's all. It does not involve other aspects, and it does not involve the topic of blockchain changing the Internet application paradigm at all.

Bitcoin and Ethereum provide different promises. Bitcoin is firmly in the position of digital gold and continues to increase its market value. Ethereum is laying the foundation to provide support for applications such as DeFi, Web3, and RWA.

I think Trump’s understanding of this industry cannot be so specific, so his speech mainly reflected the long-term consistent position of the people at Bitcoin Magazine, which is that we finally put Bitcoin as an asset It has been established as a mainstream compliant asset. Now we can explore all kinds of businesses and derivatives that can be done around this new asset in the mainstream financial circle. What was available in gold in the past is now added to Bitcoin. Wall Street prefers this narrative. As long as the client likes to trade, there is a commission to be earned.

On the contrary, creating new technologies, tools, platforms, and application paradigms is what Silicon Valley likes to do. Therefore, for things like creating DeFi, Web3, RWA or industrial blockchain on Ethereum, we cannot expect Wall Street to be particularly active. We still have to do something good first, and then Wall Street will join in.

Of course, this does not mean that Trump’s statements, if implemented, will have no meaning in terms of DeFi, Web3, and RWA. The significance is still great. First of all, if a large amount of money pours into digital assets, it will also affect these superstructure areas. On the other hand, Trump’s point about replacing the SEC is very intriguing. Because although Gensler is hated by people, to be honest, he basically gave the green light to Bitcoin during his tenure, without too much embarrassment. If we just look at Gensler from the perspective of Bitcoin, even if it is not a high score, it is still very passable. Gensler's true conservatism is reflected in his strong opposition to the Ethereum ecosystem, especially Web3. Especially when Hester Peirce's "Token Safe Harbor" proposal has been drafted, it has been shelved for a long time, seriously hindering Web3. development of. So replacing Gensler actually doesn't mean much to Bitcoin, but it may be good for Web3.

If the United States wants to become a paradise for Web3, the attitude of the SEC, not Wall Street, is more critical. Only by allowing Web3 projects to use tokens for user incentives and governance in a natural and reasonable way, and at the same time implementing effective supervision and resolutely cracking down on those who use coins to cut leeks and fraudsters, can Web3 gain a longer development cycle and actually grow a business flywheel. . Only in this way can the industry truly escape the cycle of ups and downs.

I don’t know how deeply Trump understands this issue, but it seems that He Jinli will not move in this direction. The more someone thinks he represents the direction of history, the more he infringes on personal freedoms and rights. No scruples. So this US election is indeed about the interests of the Web3 industry, let us wait and see.

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