Crypto Moats

Crypto’s network effects can create unbelievably fast-growing businesses with moats.

Like Web 2.0 platforms, a well-designed crypto network is a live, running service, and it too can be the basis of strong network effects that create switching costs. Given that crypto networks rely on open source code, it’s true that they can be more easily copied (or forked). But while replication of code may be free, the social cost of coordinati... See more

The Three Components of Crypto Success: Product/market fit, Community participation, Sufficient decentralization (community ownership)

The need for product/market fit is obvious. Without a product people want, there are no users, no business, and it will be difficult to sustain a community for long. Community participation and decentralized control

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In web3, the situation is different.  New marketplaces can aggregate all existing NFTs. New social networks can surface all on-chain activities regardless of whether users ever signed up. How can a moat develop?  A potential answer is tokens.

If the blockchain and AI take hold, those moats will no longer be data and content creation. Which seems like a bad thing–but what’s left? From my perspective as a nascent entrepreneur, future moats fall into three broad categories: proprietary technology, supply chain innovations, and media that can’t be replaced by AI because it comes from a stro

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