Written by: 0xmin&Freya

Edit: 0xmin

In the crypto world, people come and go. Have you ever thought about this question?Where did all the people who left the cryptocurrency circle go??

With this question in mind, we interviewed many former industry professionals and received various answers:Study abroad, get married, have kids, lie down,AIStarting a business, selling insurance, and using technology to grow agriculture...

Leaving here does not mean not holding crypto assets, but not working in the crypto industry. Some people earn enough to retire and live a flat life; some leave due to the bear market; some are still unemployed...

When the gears of the encryption cycle start turning, everyone is swept forward and has no choice.

What are the old folks in the cryptocurrency world doing?

In 2011, an event that had a huge impact on ChinesecryptocurrencyThe major events in the course of history,CommunityBabbitt was established.

The two founders of Babbitt are well known in the industry, Chang Qia and QQagent (Wu Jihan), but there is actually another founder -Financial writer Lao Duan.

In 2011, Lao Duan wrote several articles related to Bitcoin, including "What can appreciate 3,000 times in a year" and "Bitcoin: Great Innovation or Giant Bubble". In July 2012, Lao Duan established the Bitcoin Fund "Lao Duan Bitcoin No. 1", which is also the first Bitcoin fund in China.

A few months later, the Cyprus banking crisis broke out, and Bitcoin soared more than 10 times in 8 months. The surge instead gave Lao Duan tremendous "psychological pressure". Under the pressure of cashing out, in April 2013, Lao Duan chose to liquidate the Bitcoin fund in advance. He believed that the rise of Bitcoin had come to an end.

In November 2013, five months after Lao Duan liquidated the Bitcoin fund, Bitcoin soared again to everyone's surprise. At this time, Lao Duan, who "missed the opportunity", gradually transformed from a Bitcoin evangelist to a Bitcoin critic.

“ The greatest value of Bitcoin at present is that it satisfies the Chinese people's fantasy of "getting rich overnight"."

At this point, Lao Duan parted ways with the Bitcoin world, and then settled in the stock circle, becoming a stock analyst, and published books such as "Investment Magic Book", "Positive Energy Investment", and "Actually You Don't Understand Women Yet".

In March 2021, Lao Duan mentioned "Bitcoin" again.

Lao Duan said that at the most, he had four-digit bitcoins, which are now worth billions of RMB, but most of them were sold after earning dozens of times the profit. However, there are still three-digit "fragments" left, but these bitcoins are all in a bankrupt company.exchangemiddle--Mt. Gox..

Also for Babbitt, after Wu Jihan and Lao Duan left, Changqia found new partners: Song Huanping, Chen Yurong, and Lang Yu.

Song Huanping’s former title was “co-founder of Babbitt”, now, Song Huanping's identity label in the media is,Founder of Happy Tiger Capital, the first angel investor in the catering industry, has invested in Lelecha, Chen Xianggui, Tiger Head Bureau, Jasmine Milk White, and Huzi Chef.

In 2013, Song Huanping learned about Bitcoin in a QQ group, and later met Chang Qian through a friend's introduction. He then joined Babbitt and participated in the commercialization process. However, this journey only lasted for 4 months.

In early 2015, with the first pot of gold earned from the cryptocurrency circle, Song Huanping chose to leave the cryptocurrency circle and turned into the investment circle, targeting the catering industry and established Happy Tiger Capital.

In an interview with the media in 2017, Song Huanping expressed his dissatisfaction with the cryptocurrency circle, and even said that he was "a little sad":

“A round of surge is followed by a new round of attention, which then quickly cools down, until the next time it breaks through a price that was previously considered crazy, it will attract another round of greater attention.”

“Bitcoin is a good thing, but the cryptocurrency world is too dirty."

Since the advent of Bitcoin, it has changed the fate of many grassroots in more than ten years. The former veterans in the currency circle have all "retired" and faded out of the public eye.

An old man who entered the Bitcoin community in 2013 told TechFlow that what he knewThe old people in the cryptocurrency circle either go overseas or return to their families to take care of their children every day. Some are fascinated by "immortality" and invest in peptide-related industries..

Once upon a time, Li Xiaolai, known as the "richest man in Bitcoin", was regarded as the spokesperson of the cryptocurrency circle. Until the recording scandal in 2018, he gradually faded out of the crypto industry.After leaving the cryptocurrency circle, Li Xiaolai continued to write books. The most important thing he did was to "give birth to a bunch of children". As a father, Li Xiaolai now has a new identity - educator..

After 2022, Li Xiaolai launched the "Family Growth Annual Community" (1999/year), and in 2023 launched a new course "Li Xiaolai Talks about Family Education in the AI Era" on Getui, which received widespread acclaim.

Miners lying flat

Once upon a time, miners were considered to be at the top of the cryptocurrency food chain. With the "ban", Bitcoin mining has completely "broken up" with China.Where do all the miners who no longer mine go??

Former miners interviewed by TechFlow told TechFlow that the mining group is also extremely complex. For example, large and small miners have different decisions and ideas.

Some large miners choose to go overseas with mining machines and physical bodies to continue to participate in mining, while others choose to transform to AI, providing other companiesHashratesupport.

Most of the respondents mentioned the same words:I have savings and don't want to work, so I eat, drink, have fun, travel and stay healthy..

Miner Wang Lei is now in a state of lying low. Having suffered losses in the cryptocurrency circle, he has become extremely cautious. He does not make venture investments, does not contact people in the cryptocurrency circle, and uses ETH for Staking to obtain a risk-free annualized return of nearly 4%. The annual income of nearly 80 ETH can fully cover his daily expenses.

This is already a good "ending". After a bull market, countless small and medium-sized miners have gone bankrupt.

"In the last market, many small miners got carried away and failed to cash out in time. Some of them went from driving Porsches to driving Didi when the market was over," said Li Xiaoming, a former miner.

Many miners invested blindly during the bull market and were trapped by various primary and secondary projects. At the same time, they encountered the collapse of FTX/PayPal, making miners also part of the rights protection army.

In Yunnan, Liang You, a female miner who joined the Bitcoin community in 2012, chose to engage in organic technology agriculture after the "mining ban".

She enjoys raising shrimps, other seafood, and orchards.

Shrimp raised in pomelo

After some research and thinking, Liangyou believes that in the current domestic economic environment, agriculture is a relatively stable and long-term business. In addition to science and technology agriculture, Liangyou will also invest in other real industries.

Although former miners like Liang You no longer mine, they still pay attention to trends in the crypto market. They have a common goal - to hoard coins.

After the entrepreneur leaves

Before entering the cryptocurrency circle, Saul had been investing in the Internet.

In the summer of 2021, the emergence of STEPN made Saul pay attention to the fact that blockchain games may be a direction for the future development of the gaming industry.

This time he did not invest directly in a company, but chose to start his own businessCompared with young entrepreneurs who have been exposed to the encryption industry from the beginning, he believes that his advantage lies in having gone through a complete cycle and having richer product and user experience.

So, Saul launched a similar movement to earn project with reference to STEPN, and obtained investments from several industry VCs.

In the hot small cycle of "x-to-earn", Saul's project gained wide attention in the early stage by virtue of various operational activities and linkage with some public chain ecosystems. The sales of NFT props were gratifying, but like the fireworks in an instant, the beauty is always short-lived. The collapse of STEPN running shoes brought the entire "x-to-earn" track into a cold winter.

Saul's project failed to survive the crypto winter, and after a year, Saul disbanded the team.

Saul attributed the failure in part to "cycles". "Web3 startups have obvious cycles, which are shorter than traditional finance. Web3 is a more retail and irrational market. The more important problem is that it is difficult for Web3 to acquire and retain real users, especially when the market is not stable. User growth is slower than expected."

After liquidating the project, Saul left the cryptocurrency industry and chose to join the hot AI wave and continue his entrepreneurship.

In Saul's opinion, the crypto industry and AI are two completely different industries, and the underlying logic of the services they provide is different. The AI industry is more technology-driven, while the crypto industry is still mainly capital-driven.BlockchainThe product still does not solve real life problems well.

However, he will continue to pay attention to the crypto industry in the future, because he feels that there are many areas where AI and the crypto industry can be combined, especially in areas such as games. One day in the future, he may even return to the cryptocurrency circle with a new identity and attitude.

“Life is an experience. If I could start over again, I would definitely choose to start a business in the cryptocurrency world."

Saul is just a microcosm of the "Web3 to AI" wave in the crypto bear market, said Will Wang, partner of Generative Ventures, "Up to now, all the mobile Internet portfolios that I have invested in before, which have shifted to the so-called Web3 direction, have now all returned to the AI team.. ”

In June 2023, Babbitt, the oldest encrypted media in China, announced its full shift to the AI track. Babbitt founder Chang Qia also changed his identity and title to the founder of Wujie AI, becoming the Chinese version of Midjourney.

A new question arises:When the new round of encryptionBull MarketWhen the new coronavirus comes, will the entrepreneurs who left come back??

Practitioners come and go

The flow of personnel in the crypto industry often fluctuates with the bull and bear cycles. When the bull market comes, they all return, and when the bear market comes, they disperse quickly.

Xiaojun originally worked in a well-known VC in the industry as a post-investment worker. Unexpectedly, she received a "layoff notice" at the beginning of this year. After repeated consideration, Xiaojun did not continue to look for a job in the industry, but resolutely left the cryptocurrency circle and devoted herself to a local medical industry.

For Xiaojun, who comes from a wealthy family, work itself is not that important. She has a more important mission at the moment.Find a partner and get married, but working in the crypto industry seems to cause some trouble for her in love.

There are many people like Xiaojun who have been laid off, changed careers or are unemployed. The crypto bear market from 2022 to 2023 has hit investors hard.walletAt the same time as the balance, there was also a wave of layoffs in the cryptocurrency circle. Whether it was exchanges, VCs or project parties, they all chose to "lay off employees" to reduce costs and survive the bear market.

Antoniayly runs a Web3 job search and recruitment community, and she has a clear sense of the unemployment wave in the bear market of the cryptocurrency circle.

"The job pool grows by about a dozen people every week, but it's good if there's one new job posting a week. I check overseas recruitment websites every week, and there aren't many companies hiring. Most of them are big European and American companies posting job requirements, but it's hard to say how many of them are real HCs."

Leo, an entrepreneur who has posted recruitment information, told TechFlow, "As soon as I posted the recruitment information, I received a large number of resumes, some of which had excellent resumes and backgrounds." In his opinion, this is not a problem unique to the crypto industry, but the overall environment is not good. He also received a large number of resumes from people with backgrounds in large Internet companies.Many of them want to join Web3 because the Internet industry is more tiring and competitive..

Whether it is Web2 or Web3, everyone is looking for a way out amid the wave of layoffs.

Xiao V, who majored in journalism, once wrote financial technology reports for a leading technology media. In 2018, he joined aBlockchainAs the chief writer for a media outlet and accidentally "entered the circle", Xiao V had no illusions of becoming rich overnight, he just found this a new field that interested him.

At the end of 2019, at the invitation of a large Internet company, Xiao V chose to "quit" the cryptocurrency circle and went to an Internet company to "change the environment" and engage in brand marketing-related work. Xiao V soon felt the unfriendly environment of the Internet workplace. First, the overall downward trend, and second, the 35-year-old age crisis.

"In a big company, I feel like a screw in a machine. I don't have much room to develop myself or feel valuable, and I don't have the freedom I have in the media."

In mid-2023, amid the layoffs in large companies, Xiao V took the initiative to receive the "optimization gift package" and began to embrace a new field -Insurance Broker.

"From my observation, I feel that this is a very promising industry. Once a country's per capita GDP reaches a certain inflection point, the overall insurance depth will increase. Some young people in China now have a completely different view of insurance than before."

Another reason for choosing to be an insurance broker is that Xiao V believes that experience accumulated in the insurance industry itself is very helpful for career development. Today's insurance products are complex enough, involving not only knowledge about the product itself, but also knowledge related to law and medicine. This industry is not as age-discriminatory as the Internet, and many successful insurance brokers take insurance as a lifelong career.

Recently, Xiao V will join another large Internet company and make it his main job, while continuing to work as an insurance broker as a side job.

Coincidentally, the author noticed thatMany Hong Kong friends who used to work in the cryptocurrency circle have entered 2023, and their friends have started the "Hong Kong Insurance" sales model, orfull timeJoin an insurance company or become a licensed manager.

In 2023, with the resumption of customs clearance, Hong Kong's new Web3 policy, and the relaxation of the High Talent & Outstanding Talent Scheme, a large number of mainland personnel and funds have poured into Hong Kong. Applying for Hong Kong identity, starting a business in Hong Kong, and buying Hong Kong insurance have become the "To Do List" of many crypto practitioners in 2023, and have also spawned a wave of wealth opportunities.

At the end of the interview, we usually ask a question, "Are you willing to return to the crypto industry?? "

Almost everyone answered yes, and most of them talked about the most attractive point of the cryptocurrency circle, distributedRemote work gives individuals more freedom.

Coco left the cryptocurrency circle in 2019 and joined a large Internet company, and returned in 2022. In her opinion, the crypto industry is much easier than working in an Internet company, so that she has time to start a side business. Secondly, the crypto industry will also change a person's mentality and expectations.

“Losing money doesn’t matter. Once you make a little quick money, it’s hard to leave completely,” Coco said.

The article comes from the Internet:Where did all the people who left the cryptocurrency circle go?