Is culture the "hard currency" of the public chain?

Written by:13300RPM, FourPillarsFP Researcher

Compiled by: zhouzhou, BlockBeats

Editor's note: Competition in the crypto industry is shifting from technology competition to cultural resonance, and culture chains have become a new trend. Technology is "good enough", and the key to the future is community atmosphere and resonance. Investors should focus on believers, internal jokes, and community culture, rather than just code performance. Culture chains provide exclusive ecosystems for fans and creators, but they also face challenges such as excessive speculation and dispersed liquidity. A successful culture chain requires a strong community, open construction, and composability to truly become the core track of the next cycle.

The following is the original content (for easier reading and understanding, the original content has been reorganized):

Imagine a blockchain whose killer feature is not a disruptive consensus algorithm or amazing TPS, but atmosphere. On this chain, people gather not for lower gas fees, but for internal memes, common identity, and meme culture. Sounds ridiculous? But the crypto world has proven time and again that culture often trumps technology.

Think about $DOGE (and a dozen other similar coins), a complete joke, born from a meme, but inexplicably soared to a multi-billion dollar asset without any technological innovation. Bitcoin's early development relied more on cyberpunk beliefs than the code itself. Ethereum's most loyal users often say: "I came for the technology, but I stayed for the community." Events such as ETHGlobal hackathons and global Devcon have long surpassed the code itself and become a cultural bond between developers.

The crypto world has evolved into an arena where participation itself is the product — an immersive social game that merges finance, ideology, and culture.

Welcome to the era of cultural chain: the core of blockchain is not what it can do, but who it is for.

1. Culture is the product

Cultural Chain is a new vertical SaaS for fan economy

Simply put, Culture Chains is a blockchain with a cultural spirit - it is tailored for a specific community, subculture or movement. Unlike general-purpose L1 (trying to meet all needs) or Appchain that only runs a single dapp, Culture Chains occupy a unique middle ground. They are playgrounds designed for people who share the same atmosphere or goals, accommodating multiple applications and serving specific communities.

From this definition, it can be said that each blockchain has its own culture. Ethereum is a fusion of cypherpunk and institutional thinking, emphasizing decentralization, programmability, and neutrality. Solana is full of speed, chaos, and financial speculation, shaped by its high-throughput, low-cost architecture.

But the difference is that these cultural identities are more of a byproduct of technical design rather than a deliberate result. General-purpose blockchains tend to spontaneously form a unique culture, while the core of cultural chains is that they are born for cultural economy at the protocol level. The real difference is intentional.

Imagine a blockchain where every dapp serves anime art collectors, hardcore degen players, RPG game enthusiasts, or fans of a specific NFT ecosystem. Users use the same jargon, rush to the same hot spots, and laugh at the same memes. This is more like a digital city-state running on the blockchain.

If the general public chain is more like a diverse but chaotic international metropolis, then the cultural chain is more like a theme park or a Renaissance fair - highly customized and precisely matching the needs of a specific group of people. By focusing on a niche circle, it can be fully optimized in terms of technology, governance, token economy, etc. to better serve the values and needs of the community.

They are blockchains designed for cultural monetization, expansion and protection

This design can take many forms:

• Infrastructure optimized for specific creators or media streams

• Built-in revenue sharing or tokenized copyright sharing mechanism

• A governance model adapted to the creative community

• Incentives for fans to engage, fund, and discover new content

In essence, cultural chains are an evolution of the concept of "vertical blockchain": they do not try to be all-inclusive, but focus on a niche area. Their goal is to become the "preferred blockchain in field X", where X represents a community or application scenario with cultural cohesion. The assumption of this idea is that focusing on a certain cultural circle can more effectively gather like-minded users and developers than general public chains, forming a stronger network effect. Their power comes from focus.

2. Code can be copied, but atmosphere cannot be copied

In the crypto world, community is more important than technology. When choosing a chain, pay attention to the number of believers on each block, not just TPS.

Is culture really more important than code? Many tech geeks scoff at this. After all, blockchain infrastructure involves mathematics, cryptography, engineering, game theory—hardcore technology. But while code is law, in the crypto world, culture is king. Ultimately, it is the social layer that determines which "laws" (codes) will actually be adopted.

A perfect protocol is doomed to fail if no one believes in it; but a rough Meme coin is enough to move the market if it has a group of fanatical believers.

In essence, crypto networks are social networks with banking functions, and human nature is the core driving force of adoption: FOMO, tribalism, identity, and faith. These things cannot be directly forked using GitHub.

Think about Bitcoin Cash, which was forked from Bitcoin. The technology did not change much, but the culture was severely divided (large blocks vs. small blocks), which ultimately determined the outcome. The Ethereum community also forked into Ethereum Classic due to differences in ideas. The code was the same, but the culture was different, and the results were completely different.

Memes and narratives have atomic power in this industry

Remember DeFi Summer? Yield Farming broke out at that time. It was not just smart contracts that drove this wave, but a group of degens shouted "farm and dump" and "all in ape", which ignited the movement together. Let's look at the NFT craze: Why is the value of JPEG on Ethereum soaring? It's not because of how magical the ERC-721 technology is (it's actually very simple), but because a group of digital art collectors, show-offs, and community players have built a unique cultural circle around projects such as CryptoPunks and Bored Apes. Technology provides verifiable ownership, but what really drives the craze is social prestige and community belonging.

The long-term success of a public chain often depends on its community moat. This is the paradox of the crypto world: the strongest moat is not hash power or TPS, but faith. Value exists not only in the code, but also in the culture formed around it.

This unquantifiable "magic" can make people tattoo the project logo on their arms, or hold on to it even when 90% retreats. It can turn early users into evangelists, making a product "inevitable." Based on this insight, Culture Chain bets on the power of a niche fanatic community rather than a general solution for the general public.

3. Stop chasing TAM and start with tribe

General public chains pray for users to come, while cultural chains are born with their own users.

But the key question is: Is this model really feasible? A new blockchain paradigm must be technically feasible and economically scalable to truly survive.

Unlike the "blockchain narratives" that have attempted to subvert entire industries in the past, cultural chains take a more pragmatic approach. They do not require building a brand new infrastructure from scratch, but rather optimize and refine the existing blockchain framework for the cultural economy.

Today, advances in technology (and, interestingly, technology empowers culture) have made it easier than ever to create a new chain. Frameworks such as OP Stack, Arbitrum Orbit, and Cosmos SDK, along with solutions such as modular blockchains, data availability layers (DA Layers), and Rollup as a Service (RAAS), mean that you don’t need a PhD in distributed systems to start a new blockchain.

This means that cultural chains are technically feasible today, rather than a fantasy in the distant future.

Critics often question the market size (TAM) of the culture chain, arguing that focusing on a niche group will limit its growth. But if you zoom out, this logic does not hold up: BTS has an estimated 90 million fans worldwide, nearly three times more than Solana’s highest-ever monthly active users (MAU 31 million).

More importantly, fan groups do not just "exist", they consume, organize, and take action. They are not passive users, but a cultural infrastructure that has not yet been activated.

Stop looking at TAM (market size) and start measuring TAC (Total Addressable Culture).

4. More than just a narrative: real projects, real value

The cultural chain is not just an empty concept, but there are already implemented projects that have attracted users who really care about them.

There are already some early projects implementing this concept:

Story: An open story universe on the blockchain

What if the next phenomenal fantasy universe or comic IP is not created by a single studio, but by an entire on-chain community? @StoryProtocol is betting on this idea.

Story is a new L1 project that aims to become the decentralized IP infrastructure of the Internet - an open platform that allows creators to collaboratively build and remix stories on-chain, and track contributions and ownership through the blockchain.

Its technical core is the traceability mechanism for creative works, but the real highlight is the cultural level. Story attempts to cultivate a storytelling tribe, allowing creators to jointly create a worldview and turn the fan community into a DAO.

If Story succeeds, the next "Harry Potter"-level cultural phenomenon may be the product of decentralized co-creation - memes, fan creations, and community lores will be intertwined, and their authenticity and ownership will be guaranteed by the blockchain.

Story embodies a paradigm shift: it sees blockchain as a canvas for memes, myths, and collaborative creativity, rather than just cold technology.

Xiaobai Navigation

Animecoin: The on-chain link of global ACG culture

The anime culture is huge and borderless, with hundreds of millions of people around the world connected by their love for Japanese animation. Now, imagine what would happen if the entire anime community had a common token to unite their power? This is exactly what @animecoin ($ANIME) wants to achieve.

As a newly launched "cultural coin", Animecoin aims to gather anime fans on the blockchain. Its concept is very direct: transform the existing active subculture into a crypto ecosystem. If you want to know more detailed analysis, you can refer to the two reports "Anime Needs Web3" and "The Future of $ANIME is Yours".

Animecoin can be used for:

• Funding fan-driven projects, such as fan creations, independent animation, etc.

• Purchase and trade anime-related digital assets, such as NFT art and virtual collectibles;

• Community governance allows coin holders to vote for emerging anime creators.

But compared to specific application scenarios, $ANIME is more like a cultural banner - allowing global two-dimensional fans to have a common economic identity.

It’s still early days, but even if only a small fraction of the world’s otakus join, it could mean the creation of millions of new crypto users who may care more about Crunchyroll than crypto itself.

Animecoin fully embodies the core concept of the "cultural chain": it does not require people to care about encryption for the sake of encryption, but builds a crypto ecosystem around the identity and culture that people already love.

5. Cracks in the cultural economy: When fans become investors

But the biggest hidden danger of the cultural chain comes from a disturbing question: Can fans really become investors?

Consumer culture and investment are essentially two completely different behaviors. Unless someone is deeply involved in both encryption and a specific cultural circle, it is difficult to assume that these two completely different groups will naturally merge. Perhaps the idea that "fan communities can evolve into investor communities" is essentially just an overly optimistic simplification.

Secondly, the more realistic risk is that when speculative demand overwhelms real cultural participation, the economic system will collapse. This has been verified countless times in past P2E (play and earn) games - when the economic drive is no longer based on actual demand, but is driven up by hype, it is only a matter of time before the bubble bursts. The cultural chain also faces the same threat: if financial incentives replace cultural identity, hype will unknowingly hollow out the entire ecosystem.

Finally, there is the problem of fragmentation and liquidity islands. If each niche culture independently develops its own blockchain, it may recreate the isolation problem that we originally wanted to solve with interoperability. To avoid this, cultural chains must have composable infrastructure and liquidity that bridges the mainstream crypto economy, otherwise they may be trapped in their own isolated world.

6. The moat built by MEME

If you can’t wear this hoodie, don’t bet on this chain. Despite the potential risks mentioned above, I am still optimistic about cultural chains for a simple reason: once they explode, the impact is exponential.

In the crypto industry, technological advantages are often short-lived - today's "black technology" will become standard tomorrow. But social alpha is still one of the few truly sustainable moats. For investors and builders, leveraging culture is not a shortcut, but a strategic "dimensionality reduction strike."

For VCs and investors:

When evaluating a cultural chain, you can’t just look at TPS (transaction throughput) and GitHub commit records, but also ask:

• Does this community have a "soul"?

• Is there a group of true believers who will persist in the bear market?

It sounds a bit "metaphysical", but it is actually an important early signal that can predict whether the project can grow naturally. A project with average technology but a large number of MEMEs may grow faster than a project with top technology but lack of cultural resonance. In other words, investing in cultural chains is more like investing in social networks: you don't look at the efficiency of the code, but the activity, identity and network effect of the community.

For Web3 entrepreneurs:

Cultural Chain gives you an opportunity to accurately match user needs. Instead of blindly looking for users in an unknown market, you directly enter a highly matched community that is eager for the products you provide.

But this also means that you can’t “hide” behind technology—the community’s feedback is immediate and direct. The best way is to build it openly and transparently, allowing the community to participate in the narrative. In addition to technology, you also need to consider “urban planning”: community governance, social functions, event planning, story background... In the cultural chain, social experience (social UX) is as important as UI/UX.

For speculators, creators and ordinary players:

The cultural chain is a playground that can turn your passion from "niche" to "mainstream". If you have been deeply involved in a certain ecosystem but always feel restricted by the general public chain, now you finally have your own stage.

But at the same time, the responsibility of maintaining the community atmosphere also falls on you. In the cultural chain, you are both content and value. If operated properly, you may become the founder of the next early Ethereum community; but if management is out of control, it may be worn out by internal friction. Choose your tribe and bet carefully.

7. The next cycle belongs to the "believers"

From 2010 to early 2020, competition in the crypto world revolved around TPS (transaction throughput) and technology roadmaps. But those days are gone. Today, many public chains are "good enough" on a purely technical level, and the core of the next round of competition will be the cultural density within each block.

In the late 2020s, the public chains that truly stand out may not be those that can theoretically handle millions of TPS, but those that can carry millions of "memes", millions of high-quality interactions, and gather millions of resonators.

So, if you are looking for the next wave of crypto trends, don’t just ask “What can the code of this chain do?”, but ask “What does this community believe in?” Look for places with strong internal jokes, sense of ritual, and cultural atmosphere, because this is the soil for the birth of cultural chains, and may also give birth to the next generation of public chains.

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