A brief discussion on the experience of Dubai Token2049 conference: heavy rain, compliance, AI and the right to speak

This is my first time to participate in Token2049’s event. As a Web3 learner (yes, I have always felt that this identity suits me best), I have two purposes for attending the conference:

1. To experience the atmosphere of Web3 up close. In Web3, atmosphere is something that is hard to explain but is particularly highlighted.

2. Understand the current cutting-edge topics or narratives discussed in the industry, which is especially important in an industry that is changing rapidly.

The main conference of Token2049 is held on April 18-19, but there have been various side events, small activities and parties since April 15. As someone who has worked at Web2 Internet Company, the atmosphere of participating in this conference is completely different. Generally speaking, Web3 activities are conferences, but more like parties to meet friends. You can listen to the speakers sharing their insights in the venue, or you can grab a drink and chat with people from different countries and regions around the world. Of course, if you have time in the evening, various organizers will hold different parties, and you only need to grab a glass of beer to meet new friends. An atmosphere of casualness and freedom pervades the entire Web3 event.

In addition to casualness and freedom, when it comes to my feelings about the city of Dubai and this Token2049 topic discussion, I think it can be summarized with a few keywords:

Keyword 1 : Heavy rain

If you are a participant in this industry, you must have seen the news about this rare heavy rain in Dubai from social media/moments. On April 16, Dubai experienced its largest single-day rainstorm since 1949. A large number of luxury cars were submerged in the water and the public transportation system was paralyzed.

Dubai has always been known for its luxury and prosperity. Until April 18, the entire city was still partially or completely shut down in public functions. A heavy rain tested the sewers of this city where human beings have abundant material life, and also exposed the fragility of a wealthy city.

If extended to the Web3 industry, this rainstorm is also very instructive:

1. A sound system needs to take into account any low-probability risks and make plans for this, even if The probability of happening is really low. For example, when we are working on a Defi project - will we be aware of a very small risk, but just because the probability of it happening is small, we choose to turn a blind eye with a sense of luck?

2. A sound system must also be prepared for the emergence of black swans at any time. Now that we are in a bull market, the overall atmosphere and sentiment will tend to be optimistic, but we need to remain vigilant at all times, because in this industry, it is impossible to determine when a black swan event will arrive and how it will appear. Cautious optimism is always better than blind optimism.

Keyword 2: Supervision and compliance

Supervision and compliance are the words I heard the most in Dubai this time. The first Panel event at the main venue on April 18 was about regulation and compliance - Binance CEO Richard Teng and Bloq co-founder Matthew Roszak and other guests discussed their views on global regulation of the encryption industry. At the same time, when I communicate with different project parties, I can invariably feel that they value industry supervision and compliance. For project parties, issues they are generally concerned about include: ①Which countries/regions have friendly regulatory and compliance policies; ②How to obtain corresponding compliance licenses in these countries/regions, etc.

My feeling is: everyone has a consensus on the need for supervision and compliance in this industry. The differences discussed are nothing more than the method and rhythm of supervision. After all, the supervision of each country and region The policies are different.

At the same time, this also made me think about a question: Is there a conflicting relationship between obtaining high returns and the industry becoming more and more compliant? For example, in the early stages of blockchain, due to the lag in supervision and compliance, many projects and individuals received huge returns. So as the industry develops and becomes more standardized, will there be a situation like the past? Is it a myth that individuals or projects can quickly become rich?

Keyword 3: AI

In addition to supervision and compliance, AI is another hot word I heard during this Token2049 event. At the main conference of Token2049, guests including IIIia Polosukhin, co-founder of Near Protocol, and Ahmad Shadid, founder of io.net, discussed what can be done by combining AI and Web3 in decentralized intelligence. Similarly, among the projects I discussed outside the venue and at parties, about half were related to AI, including AI distributed storage and computing, decentralized GPU, intent-based AI applications, AI social networking, and creator economy, etc. The popularity of AI Web3 narrative is evident.

An interesting discovery is that when discussing Web3 mass adoption in the past, everyone usually pinned their hopes on GameFi and SocialFi, but this time my feeling is that now everyone thinks that Web3 needs mass adoption. , AI has greater hope.

Keyword 4: Chinese right to speak

The Token2049 event was held very close to the Hong Kong Web3 Carnival Summit. The comparison between the two activities has also become an interesting topic. After communicating with some Chinese practitioner friends, I found that everyone has two common feelings: ① The concentration of Chinese participation in the Token2049 event is not as high as that of the Hong Kong Carnival (this is understandable, after all, Dubai is far from Greater China); ② Discussion topics There are differences in emphasis. For example, at the Hong Kong Carnival event, the topic of Bitcoin ecology was very popular, but at the Token2049 event, the discussion on this topic was relatively less popular.

Everyone is very curious, does it look like two worlds?

This question is difficult to answer, and there is no way to determine it now. My opinion is:

From a practical point of view, Chinese people will definitely have their own discourse system in Web3.

On the one hand, many Chinese project entrepreneurs and investors now have good backgrounds, can speak fluent English, studied and worked abroad, and have global thinking. At the same time, the Chinese themselves have the "dare to venture" genes, so in the next ten years, I believe that more and more Chinese will be active in the global technological competition.

On the other hand, there are now many Chinese entrepreneurs in the Bitcoin ecosystem, which in itself is an effort and proof of building a discourse system.

From a vision perspective, I think the Web3 industry should not be divided into countries/regions, skin colors or backgrounds. Because this industry emphasizes consensus, when the consensus is the same, we are like-minded people, and we will not set restrictions on where you are from, what color you are, your education/work background, etc. So from this perspective, whether Chinese or non-Chinese, the difference in identity should be weakened. After all, the emergence of new things like Bitcoin itself is breaking the barriers of traditional sovereign state boundaries.

The above keywords are my strong feelings from participating in the Token2049 event this time. It should be noted that this is just my personal feeling and will contain subjective judgments. Therefore, it does not represent the thoughts of everyone who participated in the meeting. Secondly, at this Token2049 event, there were many hotly discussed topics, such as Depin, RWA, Bitcoin ETF, Restaking, etc. My above feelings cannot cover these topics one by one. But overall, events like Token2049 can reflect the trend of current hot narratives in the Web3 industry. Regardless of everyone's subjective feelings, I believe that through participation in the conference, we will form a common judgment on the hot topics and narratives in the industry.

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