Reunderstanding meme coins: The social cornerstone of Crypto
Meme coins are not just a fleeting trend, but an important component of the cryptocurrency space, reflecting the complexity of internet culture and human interaction.Author: Luccy
Original Title: "Meme Coins, Social Infrastructure For Crypto"
Original Author: Meow, R89
Original Translation: Luccy, BlockBeats
Editor's Note:
The author Meow has served as the chief advisor for Instadapp, Kyber, and Blockfolio, is a co-founder of the largest wrapped token wBTC, and is also one of the founding contributors to the Handshake project. Currently, Meow is the founder of Raccoons Labs, developing the Solana liquidity aggregator Jupiter, the Solana liquidity protocol Meteora, and conducting multi-chain research, with a keen interest in social infrastructure.
This article is co-authored by Meow and R89, co-founder and CEO of MonkeDao, providing an in-depth analysis of the role of meme coins in the cryptocurrency ecosystem, emphasizing their importance as social infrastructure. The article explores various aspects of meme coins, including cultural resonance, community building, narratives and symbolism, simplicity and usability, and betting under network leverage, revealing their profound impact on shaping the future of digital currency. BlockBeats compiles the original text as follows:
We live in an absurd world, and this absurdity increasingly inspires more interesting memes. The wilder and scarier the world becomes, the funnier memes get, and we need them more than ever. We find resonance through humor, coping with terrifying events by creating memes, always preserving those historical moments forever in internet memes.
Whether it’s a geopolitically significant event like the Trump election or something as specific as the Harambe incident, memes are a compact and powerful way to revisit our shared memories.
Setting aside those big and famous memes, they are essentially just simple communication tools. The entire conversation is often interrupted by various stickers and GIFs. Memes have their own language and are an indispensable part of the internet. They are often where we find resonance, where people form communities to share, appreciate, and acknowledge the cultural significance of these memes.
Memes Are Crucial for Cryptocurrency
In internet culture, there is nothing more central than memes. Since cryptocurrency is essentially an internet currency, why wouldn’t memes be equally crucial to cryptocurrency?
It makes sense that they often dominate the conversations and imaginations of market participants. The market is basically memes, constantly driven by the most compelling narratives of the day, week, or year.
Cryptocurrency simply elevates this situation to another level. We spend a lot of time in this industry discussing why things have value and how to measure the value of these assets. Why is a token valuable? Ultimately, it’s just collective belief, and people believe in memes. We grew up with memes, understand them, and cherish them. They matter to us.
You can build a community around a meme coin, which can facilitate formal collaborations among very talented individuals. If done well, they can ultimately become one of the best ways to attract users, as opposed to reading a complex DeFi token whitepaper, which users either don’t read or don’t understand, but they can immediately grasp these memes. Therefore, you can incentivize them to use the product on the network through collaboration and incentives.
Historically, meme coins have seen tremendous surges during bull markets. This narrative is deeply rooted among market participants, who generally believe these coins can do amazing things. Memes have existed, and teams should accept this. Ordinary investors do not enter this market because you performed some mathematical operations they cannot decipher, or because your decentralized exchange (DEX) routes orders better. However, they might enter the market because a meme coin is skyrocketing, they can buy millions of them, and it features a cute animal picture, and then trade using your DEX.
Social coordination, narratives, trust minimization, and shared incentives are integral parts of cryptocurrency. If memes are a language universally understood by internet natives, and cryptocurrency is set to become an important component of the future internet, it is reasonable to infer that meme coins will be a lasting part of the new parallel economy we are building. You cannot stifle memes on the internet, nor can you stifle meme coins. Therefore, we should start viewing them as very powerful tools and a fundamental aspect of cryptocurrency beyond technology and financial infrastructure, taking them more seriously.
Essentially, meme coins are social infrastructure.
On the other hand, we also believe that meme coins are the purest embodiment of our three core beliefs:
New currencies mean the formation of new social systems.
Value is generated simply because people want something.
Symbols have immense cohesion.
This is true for all successful coins—Bitcoin became a global giant because it successfully created a global social system with many people wanting it, becoming a symbol against centralized systems.
Meme coins fully showcase the extremes of these beliefs, as the only element constituting meme coins is the social system they successfully build, creating sufficient demand for them. Crucially, in the points we emphasize—the core of community unity is the symbol itself, not the technology or financial system.
Thus, they can become one of the most important social layers in the network, bringing teams and users together around something fun, rather than being as heavy as some projects that aim to change the world.
Meme Coins Matter
In summary, meme coins are important for several reasons:
Cultural Resonance: They leverage the universal language of memes, making them easy to understand and engaging.
Community Building: Meme coins foster strong, passionate communities around shared humor and interests.
Narratives and Symbolism: They embody engaging stories and ideas that capture the public imagination, transcending technical or financial utility.
Simplicity and Usability: Their simple nature makes them accessible to crypto newcomers, serving as an entry point into the broader crypto world.
Betting Under Network Leverage: Meme coins can serve as high-risk, high-reward investments, often seen as leveraged bets on the popularity and user adoption of their underlying networks, reflecting how community support and network effects greatly influence their value.
Role in the Crypto Ecosystem: Meme coins add a social layer to the crypto industry, balancing the technical and financial complexities with aspects of ease and entertainment.
Symbolic Power: They unite communities, nurturing social cohesion and collective action around symbols and ideas, highlighting the importance of symbolism in crypto.
Meme coins are not just a fleeting trend; they are an important component of the cryptocurrency space, reflecting the complexities of internet culture and human interaction. By encapsulating the essence of internet humor, the gathering power of symbols, and the unifying force of shared beliefs, meme coins reveal the profound impact of social dynamics in shaping the future of digital currency.
As we further explore the process of building this parallel economy, let us not forget that the power of community and the influence of shared narratives are just as crucial as technological and financial innovations. Let us embrace these unique resources and recognize their role as pioneers of a new era of digital connection and cultural expression.
