Calaxy v1.8 supercharges the chat experience including replies, emoji reactions, audio messages, pinned messages, special content boxes for shared posts, topped with some buttery smooth animations 🧈 and lightning fast performance boosts ⚡.

😄 Emoji Reactions

Now you can add emoji reactions to any chat message — because sometimes a 😂 or 💯 says it all.

And here’s the kicker: standalone emoji messages get the spotlight they deserve. Send a single emoji (or up to 4), and they’ll blow up big and bold for max effect. Go on, spam that 🐸🍵.

🎞️ GIFs

You can now send GIFs straight from the Tenor library. Whether you’re feeling dramatic, romantic, or chaotic — there’s a GIF for that.

💬 Replies

No more lost context! You can now reply directly to messages, complete with a sleek back-reference arm that shows exactly what you’re responding to. Keep convos clean, clear, and connected.

🎙️ Audio Messages

Record and send audio messages up to 5 minutes long — perfect for dropping a hot take, singing happy birthday, or confessing you ate the last slice. Available in both DMs and group chats!

📲 Sharing Posts in Chat

Turn any chat into a party. You can now share posts directly inside Messenger, and they’ll appear with special SEO boxes tailored to the post type. Share a poll? You’ll see the voting options right in chat. Sharing just got smarter — and slicker.

🔖 Mentions & Tagging

Now you can @mention friends directly in chat using the “@” symbol or /tag World names using “/” to link directly to the World. No more FOMO.

⚡ Additional Chat Enhancements

• Edit messages you’ve sent within 30 minutes — typos begone!
• Delete your own messages, whether in DMs, groups, or Worlds.
• Pin important messages to the top-right “Pinned Messages” area so nobody misses the memo.

Plus: Performance boosts ⚡, smoother animations 🎷, and the usual round of bug fixes to keep everything buttery smooth

It finally happened. Well into the second decade of the digital assets revolution, we’ve finally witnessed the approval of the highly anticipated spot Bitcoin ETF. Dubbed by Michael Saylor as “the biggest Wall Street development in the last 30 years”, the launch of the spot Bitcoin ETF is the financial world’s first step toward ameliorating our highly archaic financial system. While there are countless explanations about how impactful the concept of decentralizing money would be for trade, commerce, and financial inclusion, what often goes overlooked are the philosophical and psychological implications of how we redefine wealth and who has it. Essentially, the introduction of the Bitcoin ETF could ultimately be regarded as the single most important catalyst in the widespread adoption and acknowledgment of cryptocurrency’s value in the long term since the conception of money.

The following is an opinion editorial written by Solo Ceesay Co-Founder and CEO of Calaxy, a next-generation social platform redefining the creator-fan relationship. Before co-founding Calaxy with his business partner, Brooklyn Nets star Spencer Dinwiddie, Solo held the position of Securitization Investment Banker at Citi after graduating from the Wharton School of Business.

What Is Money?

Before fiat money, most civilizations used barter and trade in the exchanging of goods and services. What those early civilizations found is that as transactions became more complex, it became more difficult to efficiently trade given transactions could often be out of balance.

For example, say an individual is looking to buy some cattle in exchange for some apples. For this transaction to take place, the person seeking apples must not only source cattle to purchase but also ensure that the seller values apples. What’s more, given there are endless items a person could in theory barter for and equally endless items a person could use as payment, it quickly became clear that bartering is inefficient, tiring, and time-consuming; thus, creating the need for a universal asset that could serve as the financial bridge for commerce and trade or as we call it today, money.

What Gives Money Its Value?

Simply put. Money is valuable because we as people give it value. If you were to ask the average person how ‘valuable’ the earliest forms of currency like beaver pelt and dried corn were, they’d likely look perplexed and question your sanity. This is further evidence that like most things, money’s value and what it means to us is a highly malleable concept that changes drastically depending on the time.

Society eventually moved on to a more refined bartering system that was built around precious metals despite it having real-world utility outside of its aesthetics. As the definition of wealth was established, society collectively enforced the ideology that the more gold you had the better off you were. Precious metals would go on to be what originally backed the fiat money we now use today. Over time, we saw many currencies debase from the gold standard in favor of the intangible trust in its issuing governing body — a migration that wasn’t met with its fair share of criticism. At the same time, it’s not all that different than what appears to be the next step in the evolution of money which is assigning value, wealth, and trust into currencies that have no single point of accountability or control, what we refer to as Decentralized Finance (DeFi). In essence, the development of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies is mankind’s attempt at creating a universal standard and public utility that creates endless opportunities for global trade and commerce ushering in once again a new wave of bartering only this time it’s online and it’s digital. We should view cryptocurrency as digital gold.

That said, the pain and friction we’re experiencing during this migration stems not from anything intrinsic to Bitcoin but rather, from humanity’s expected reluctance to change. When you think about it, human civilization has repeated this cycle time and time again.

So… What’s Next?

For the first time in Bitcoin’s history, institutions (and really anyone who doesn’t aspire to custody their own assets) now have a financial instrument that allows them to utilize Bitcoin as a store of value. Not only will this widely increase the accessibility of Bitcoin but it will also legitimize an asset that is often regarded as the financial backbone of organized crime and illicit activity.

While one could argue that the Bitcoin ETF has done wonders for legitimizing the asset as a reputable store of value on a global stage; much like bartering with apples for cattle, an ETF is still not a viable medium or bridge for trade and commerce. Despite the ETF solving why the broader investment community doesn’t have exposure to Bitcoin, transacting with and holding the asset is still significantly more difficult than the personal banking solutions that exist today. This in turn drastically increases the switching costs to a point where many won’t bother with the technology no matter its promise.

It should also be noted that these ‘switching costs’ vary depending on where a person might be located globally. For instance, people located in emerging markets might already see those ‘switching costs’ as negative given they might not enjoy the same benefits that those located in more developed nations enjoy.

Conclusion

After dozens of rejections, the launch of the Bitcoin ETF signals the next chapter in the ever-changing tale of digital assets. Just as society once accepted physical paper and coins as currency holding great value, we are now witnessing the emergence of the next chapter where digital currencies are becoming integrated into our lives. With the SEC’s ruling, Bitcoin represents a new opportunity for the masses to gain access to wealth, which was previously inaccessible. Those who couldn’t feasibly access measures of wealth in the past can easily access the digital gold that Bitcoin represents.

Following years of persecution, gaslighting, and placation, the powers that be have finally granted us the tools to take Bitcoin and the entirety of crypto to new heights both in terms of price action and broader adoption. It is mission-critical that the entire industry comes together to address the usability concerns that hinder Bitcoin’s ability to sufficiently serve as modern currency, to truly make real wealth available to anybody.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Every once in a while, the seemingly uncalculated gambles of your not-so-sane cousin pan out in their favor. That degenerate, underground internet chatter they volunteered at the Thanksgiving dinner table over the past couple of years seems to be no longer “underground” or “chatter.” Bitcoin is approaching 150% YTD returns, the asset’s largest political voices profess Bitcoin’s importance in our future, and the catastrophe that was FTX is a distant memory in the fast-paced news cycle of the internet.

With understandable FOMO and confusion, I’m sure you’re wondering if this is another case of “just my luck” or if you should reshape your entire understanding of money. With the job market stable yet uninspiring, you’re not sure if Corporate America ever goes back to what it once was, and rollercoaster inflation has divided America’s wealth and spirit — aka life kind of sucks right now. You can’t afford [all puns intended] to miss out on ‘easy money’. Unironically, I’m here to break it to you that this is a good news, bad news situation.

It’s clear that things have changed, and there’s no going back — your chances of ever buying BTC for under $60,000 appear to be very slim. But the good news is that although you might be “late” by your cousin’s standards, you’re still early in the grand scheme of things.

Related: Crypto in 2025: From Ease of Regulations to dApps for Real-world Problems

Why not owning Bitcoin is making you poor

Times have changed, and money isn’t what it used to be. Bitcoin has not only reached but surpassed $100,000, and we are living in a new world. College isn’t what it used to be and the supposed job that awaits you after completion no longer exists. The last 20 years have seen Americans progressively accept a lower quality of life in exchange for unrealistic upfront investment — both non-financial and financial. Wage growth has stagnated over the last decade while the cost of both living and education seemingly appear in competition with each other for the title of “ greatest nuisance” to today’s common man.

The timelines of Americans under 35 are saturated with anecdotes and horror stories about the plight of raising a young family in today’s world. What started as comedic remarks and edgy humor became utter despair and hopelessness. The sharp, explosive views of small cohorts of Americans, measured against the general population’s apathy about the future and political state of affairs, show how little of that early-2000s childhood pride remains in our hearts.

It’s the outcome Satoshi predicted. Unlike those before him, he saw through the U.S. Dollar’s weakness and, what’s more, created Bitcoin in anticipation of the burning building we’re all eager to escape. Bitcoin represents the hope that our governments promised us but could never practically receive.

Wealth is more than money

If you were given all the free time and access in the world, would you still pursue money? While it’s not the case that everyone hates what they do for a living, a substantial amount of Gen Z seem apathetic about joining the Corporate America dumpster fire.

Growing up, we were taught that success would mean freedom, time, and good money, offering a better life for you and your loved ones. The American Dream was to find your life partner, start a family, pursue a career, and retire with your earned fortune. Somewhere down the line, the money stopped “money-ing,” and in what feels like a few generations, money became a requirement to combat today’s problems versus the investment in tomorrow’s future it was designed to be.

As the world indulges in frivolous spending, countless individuals are fighting for survival. Inflation is a cruel tax, and the economic policies of the powerful have stripped the middle class of their hard-earned gains. The rich, however, grow richer still.

Related: What Tax Strategies to Use for Bitcoin & Crypto Trading

Bitcoin is the currency of the digital age. It represents universal value and the complete freedom to access said value without dependency on any centralized authority or government. Sure, maybe Bitcoin’s not a great store of value in the short-term, but over the time horizons that ultimately matter, it’s by far the best. To be frank, it’s the average Joe’s best chance to build wealth and ultimately buy freedom in his lifetime.

It’s hard to see it now, but we’re witnessing a modern-day California gold rush unfolding before our eyes. Right now, you have a chance to have your future self look back and be proud that you paid close attention to the world forming around you or potentially miss out on one of our generation’s greatest historic events. Either way, Bitcoin’s price, relative to the U.S. Dollar, will continue forever. Bitcoin’s mission of hope for the individual is forever.

Originally published at https://www.entrepreneur.com on January 16, 2025.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

After nearly two decades of growth following the 2008 financial crisis, it appears America is reluctantly entering a highly-necessary economic correction. Rising compensation in leading industries like financial services and tech has finally stalled, luxury goods prices are falling off a cliff, and the outlook of the average American hasn’t been this bleak in quite some time, which comes as little surprise.

More than 48% of Americans earning $100,000 or more live paycheck to paycheck, while that figure still sits at a staggering 36% for $200,000 income earners. The times are tough.

Millennials and young adults are disproportionately affected. Despite being more educated and skilled than previous generations, more than 75% of millennials live paycheck to paycheck. Younger generations are also less likely to own property or start a family due to rising interest rates and inflation.

Sure, help’s on the way given Jerome Powell’s recent remarks at Jackson Hole; however, it’s unlikely that loosening monetary policy will stimulate the same opportunities for wealth creation that boomers experienced after the financial crisis. We are reaping the consequences of the shortsighted desire to unsustainably inflate markets. This has created the mess we see today.

Because interest rates have been low for so long, most homeowners are likely sitting on substantial wealth financed at rates they may never see again. For them, the past few years have been a few seconds of turbulence on a flight to financial freedom and prosperity. Meanwhile, young people are confused about what to do next. To put it bluntly, boomers aren’t selling their homes, the dollar is losing value as we speak, and America is slowly becoming the land of diminishing returns, a far cry from opportunity. In essence, this is the birth of America’s dual-economy.

Related: Inflation’s Next Victim Will Be Your Freedom

Why “six figures” is no longer the flex it used to be

Working up the corporate ladder into upper-level management represented the pinnacle of success for as long as the millennial-aged adult can remember. It epitomized the privileged yet growing “successful” phenotype that originated around America’s peak. The millennials reading this know all too well the times I’m speaking of — peak nostalgia.

In what feels like a time more short-lived than the relevancy of an early 2000s MTV reality show, $100,000 suddenly became not that much money. Don’t get me wrong: $100,000 is still a lot of money. Truthfully speaking, $100,000 is enough to provide a modest life for a growing family in more than 75% of American cities, give or take.

Parallel to the insatiable growth experienced by different industries, American culture has developed a similar ambition for never ending, unsustainable growth. Globalization and the proliferation of social networking broadened the horizons of what luxury looked like for even the well-traveled, privileged elite. This coupled with capitalistic greed created a hamster wheel of inflated expectations. The goalposts on what is considered to be “success” have been moved dramatically. Unfortunately for all of us, the definition of success appears to be far greater than $100,000.

Related: Don’t Blindly Follow the Herd — 5 Reasons Why Entrepreneurs Must Chart Their Own Course

Capitalism… Markets… Regulation… and Incentives

Millennials witnessed what felt like 90% of America’s growth unfold over the course of our lifetimes. We saw the birth and adolescence of the personal computer and the iPhone. We saw the introduction of entirely new technologies like blockchain, AI, distributed marketplaces, gig economy ecosystems, and more. Can you imagine telling your childhood self that you’d be able to pick up a device half the size of a Game Boy and order virtually anything to your door within minutes? Of course not.

What came of this acceleration of innovation was the creation of millions of jobs uniquely suited for the tech-savvy millennials entering the workforce. You could liken the endless cushy tech jobs appearing overnight to the California Gold Rush. America created the most ambitious yet materialistic generation of twenty and thirty-somethings we’ve possibly ever seen. All of them had money in their pockets and were looking for a good time. Corporations saw a perfect opportunity to monetize this new segment of the American population, but regulators struggled to keep up.

Related: Breaking the Bank: America’s Multi-Trillion Dollar Banking Problem

Sure, some young people may need to take personal responsibility for their bank balances being too tight at the end of the month. Not everybody can or should buy a $50,000 depreciating asset, nor should it be commonplace to max out your credit card to finance that summer trip to Europe. But most people aren’t living their lives that way. The government is responsible for ensuring that the staples of life, like home and care ownership, remain within reach and are life goals worth working towards. In many parts of the world, this is not a controversial opinion. It is similar to how pressure from whistleblowers and the U.S. government has forced social media companies to take steps to protect the safety and well-being of their users.

Americans’ expectations have changed, social media platforms have grown, and so have Americans’ expectations of how to protect their users’ safety and well-being. As these platforms grow, expectations of social media show many Americans that it’s similar to whistleblowers and the government. Media companies have had to take steps to ensure that their platforms protect the safety and well-being of their users as these platforms continue to grow.

From price gouging fueled by Black Swan global emergencies to Wall Street’s unimpeded access to the supply of homes, the whiplash and disillusionment that younger generations face has underscored the wealth gap that’s inevitably set to bifurcate the lived American experience.

Conclusion

In the context of human civilization, rule #1 has always been: don’t die. Humanity, in essence, is about survival. Central to our survival are love, prosperity, friendship, and the countless characteristics that separate us from the other creatures on Earth. Generations come and go, but the human experience is constant.

Today, America is at its most apathetic point in history. Don’t get me wrong, America’s still great. For the foreseeable future, it appears to be one of, if not the best, places to live. But that’s down to the pride of its inhabitants. It’s the expectation that future generations must bear the torch and push America to new heights.

Declining birth rates should be viewed as a proxy of what the survivalist spirit of America will be in generations to come. Our lineage is what motivates us to keep going. The fact that society has unraveled to the point where future generations question whether they want to bear that honor and if it’s even responsible for doing so is worrying. Meanwhile, the more fortunate side of the economy eagerly awaits the Federal Reserve’s tardy rate reductions so that the next leg of economic growth they’re financially exposed to can add to this already staggering wealth divide.

It’s profoundly perplexing that America does not realize that wanting everything will ultimately cost us everything. Now more than ever, America must rescue itself. If not, the next 20 years are likely to be even more challenging than the last.

Originally published at https://www.entrepreneur.com on September 17, 2024.

“What’s next for the average American?” is the million-dollar question, when we’re thinking about the future. I’d go as far as saying the answer has been underneath our noses since long before the current feelings of anxiety and hopelessness started to weigh on our population, most specifically younger generations like Millennials and Gen Z. There are added pressures from historical precedents and dreams that motivated these generations in their early years that have now been reduced to fabled dinner-time stories of yesteryear’s past from out-of-touch Boomers.

Unfortunately, Americans are scratching their heads wondering when, or in more severe cases, if they’ll ever truly reap the benefits of their unwavering nationalistic pride. As a former banker and graduate of Wharton School, I have a deep understanding of how the debt crisis is reaching new heights, social security is eroding in front of our eyes, and fancy degrees and certifications no longer guarantee a $100,000 income. Even so, $100,000 still isn’t enough to comfortably raise, feed, and house a family in most places. That doesn’t even take artificial intelligence (AI) and its impact on jobs into account! As a former banker and graduate of Wharton School:

We’ve finally made it to the closing act of the ‘American Dream;’ however, all’s not lost.

Work Harder?

Not once in America’s history has there ever been a more talented workforce. More than 37.5% of U.S. adults are college educated, nearly 5x the 7.7% figure we saw in 1960. Over the same period, the percentage of high school graduates more than doubled as well. During this time, we soared to unprecedented heights through decades of economic prosperity. Rising demand for goods and services accompanied by technological advancement fueled demand for skilled workers — the perfect foundations to sell incomprehensibly expensive college educations. But what happens at saturation? What happens when companies struggle to innovate? Simple. Layoffs. Some gaslighting. Followed by more layoffs.

It was reported in 2023 that 20% of Harvard MBA graduates were jobless three months after graduation despite unemployment hovering around the Fed’s goal of 3.5%. The rise of AI and consolidation at the world’s leading consulting and technology companies has narrowed the playing field, but it’s almost laughable that society’s come to accept this as the ‘new normal.’ Companies like McKinsey have gone as far as paying current employees nine months’ salary to leave to maintain the facade of nonstop growth and expansion. This is a far cry from the recent past when companies begged MBA summer interns to forgo their final year of school in hopes of stopping top talent from reentering the job market. Time’s ticking.

Historically, Americans have been told the secret to success is education. Over the past few decades, this was more or less true. However, in recent years the benefits of a traditional, formal education have become harder to prove. Education is no longer about enriching an individual and subsequently boosting their earning power. Now, the American college system is geared more toward sustaining the system of higher education, itself. The powers that be appear to want more students to blindly invest in a system that yields fewer rewards over time. There’s a reason for this: If the merits of higher education are challenged at scale, financial lenders, universities, and countless other stakeholders will lose a lot of money and governments might lose the trust of their communities.

So What Happens Next?

America was built on the ideology that anything is possible. We were told that hard work and dedication were all anyone ever needed to manifest the life of their dreams. On the back of this simple yet powerful narrative, America became the world’s most powerful country — the land of the free as we like to call it. The U.S. dollar became synonymous with safety and security while countless emigrants fled their homelands in hopes of a better life. Decades later, even the most privileged Americans are struggling to make ends meet, let alone purchase a home — the most prominent staple of that fabled dream. It’s been reported that more than 30% of millennial and Gen Z homeowners received down payment assistance from their parents.

The Rolling Stone Culture Council is an invitation-only community for Influencers, Innovators and Creatives.

To understand what’s next, one must understand the incentives of all relevant stakeholders. In this case, that’s the average American, financial institutions, corporations, the government, and various other parties. As the average American grows more hopeless, I believe the risk of economic turmoil grows dramatically. Should there be a large exodus of people who choose to seek opportunity elsewhere, America’s foundation, which always has been built on the back of its people, will increasingly show signs of instability. In many ways, America’s growth was a leveraged bet funded by borrowed funds that went wrong at the expense of future generations. Poor monetary policy and the short-sighted pursuit of unsustainable growth influenced by poor incentives and self-interested political agendas created what we see today. Ultimately, augmented and less ambitious iterations of the American dream allowed the top 1% to extract as much value as possible from the middle class over time. But maybe I’m wrong. Maybe that third degree they suggest you get will rid us of inflation and create demand for more jobs.

In Conclusion

It’s hard to say how everything will play out. One thing’s for sure, nowadays anything is possible and within a matter of seconds, everything can change. It has never been more important to question every move you make.

During times of euphoria, it’s easy to follow the trends, and a lot of the time it works out. However, that still doesn’t change the fact that one should only invest in an asset after getting comfortable with it. Similarly, today’s reality isn’t one where the average person can live on autopilot.

We must learn, criticize and assess the situation in front of us if we plan on beating the odds. That may well mean pursuing alternative forms of education or potentially learning a new language and finding work elsewhere. As I said at the beginning, all’s not lost but I’d be willing to bet that future generations won’t get very far doing what their ancestors did.

Originally published at https://www.rollingstone.com on July 25, 2024.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Prior to the industrial and technological revolutions, social mobility was a concept that colored the most ambitious, aspirational and fictitious tales. No matter the time or location, an individual’s social class was almost always irreversibly determined by the conditions and lineage they hailed from.

Following the Great Depression of the 1930s, our nation’s leaders dreamt of making America the ruler of all on the back of a stupidly simple yet compelling ideology — the American Dream. America vowed to be the land of opportunity where any individual could become whatever they aspired to be. No matter what. Social and vocational mobility pushed America to new heights — but most importantly — it set the stage for what would become decades of parabolic growth and the birth of the highly lucrative, meaningful entertainment, financial, and sports industries.

Fast forward a bit further, and to your surprise, you might mistake yourself for having gone into the past. In today’s post-American Dream world, many people operate within class constraints, similar to the 19th century. The realities that plague us today are inescapable: they’re embedded into poor monetary policy, a growing disdain from other world powers and the remnants of capitalism.

Our parabolic growth has not only paused, but it feels as though we have turned the clock back a few years. All that’s different is that we have things like the iPhone and Uber Eats. With the last few years of inflation, these luxuries have become readily accessible, while the cost of necessities like bills and rent have put the nation in a chokehold.

Related: Breaking the Bank: America’s Multi-Trillion Dollar Banking Problem

Damned if they do.. Damned if they don’t.

According to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s most recent Household Debt and Credit Report, Americans have more than $1.1 trillion of credit card debt. The days of due balances trending negative on the back of those ‘life-saving’ stimulus checks couldn’t be further behind us. All that’s left are today’s problems fueled by yesterday’s solutions.

Sure, it’s widely documented that COVID-19 relief reduced economic hardship; however, it can simultaneously be the case that those same checks could be partly responsible for the inevitable erosion of the Average Joe’s spending power — a prime example of how the powers that be aren’t immune to making poor, shortsighted decisions despite how critical it is for proper decisions to be made.

This, in combination with accelerating corporate layoffs, the everyday impact of debt servicing for auto and mortgage loans given tougher monetary policy, and much more, contributes to the reality that life feels unbeatable now.

1. The Fed has made minimal progress on inflation despite higher interest rates
2. Even higher rates would put the entire economy at risk of systemic failure
3. Aggressive monetary policy might backfire and force the Fed to drastically pivot entirely and cut rates

While none of the above comes as a surprise to most, what’s been a growing concern is the uncertainty of what might happen should apathy and hopelessness overtake the overall sentiment of the American population. Utter chaos is likely to ensue should the average American realize that even the most prestigious jobs and degrees won’t afford us the lives we’ve spent decades working toward.

The value of a college degree plummeted in the span of a few short years following the pandemic while simultaneously having any material amount of debt became crippling. Sure, you’re ‘smarter’ than most, but the life that a college education affords you is no longer something to brag about.

Month-long excursions to Europe, luxury shopping sprees and tacky McMansions sound good on paper, but they are now more or less out of reach for the overwhelming majority (despite social media sometimes convincing us otherwise). That said, 2024 marks a new age of the new normal, although, ironically, this new normal is quite often the norm elsewhere.

Related: Why the American Dream is Dead

Conclusion

Life’s hard — it’s always been. However, it’s not meant to be this hard. Nor was there any real indication that the prosperous times of our past wouldn’t somehow find a way back to us again. What we’re experiencing now is the American Government’s best effort to move the goalposts for what the American Dream entails. That way, the American machine can continue churning, given how challenging times are.

And for what it’s worth, even if Jerome Powell could halt inflation by waving a magic wand, do you think the elite would want that? Inflation is Average Joe’s worst enemy but the rich man’s best friend. On the way to becoming rich, poor people might have to pay 45% in capital gains tax or something, right? Again, the game’s impossible.

These are the virtually inescapable impacts of late-stage capitalism. Everyone’s highly skilled, well-connected, and looking for work, all while work is becoming increasingly difficult. All the while, everything’s getting more expensive. Perhaps the most difficult obstacle to overcome is consumerism. Our desire for more, our obsession with opulence in American culture, and how we can’t seem to escape it all due to our entrenchment in social media is deeply worrying.

I worry that we’re not too far from a world where the ‘no’s,’ ‘can’t do it’s,’ and ‘maybe next time’s’ start to become the norm. And yes, recessions and economic hardship are a necessary part of life; however, this is not that. This is a distinct shift in American history where many of the luxuries that motivated us to work in the first place slowly fall out of reach, and it’s only a matter of time before something truly breaks.

Originally published at https://www.entrepreneur.com on June 24, 2024.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

February was nothing short of spectacular for Bitcoin. On the back of BlackRock and its constituents, we’ve seen the fabled Bitcoin ETF smash previous ETF inflow records, surprising even the biggest BTC advocates.

For the first time in Bitcoin’s brief history, Wall Street and all its clients now have unfiltered access to the best-performing asset of the past decade in a world where outsized returns are increasingly difficult to come by. What’s more, Bitcoin’s scarcity, in combination with its convexity to the upside, makes it very difficult to acquire during upswings. Essentially, when prices appreciate, potential sellers are less inclined to reduce exposure, creating even stronger upward tailwinds.

Related: Infographic: Bitcoin Enters its 15th Year

The perfect recipe at the perfect time

A lesser explored aspect of what increased Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency adoption is how it’ll impact our relationship, both socially and politically, with money. The best way to describe this is to imagine a dystopian world without fiat currencies as a result of another World War. In such a world, it becomes rather simple to define wealth; namely, those with legitimate, tangible assets become wealthy overnight while those who have, now valueless, paper money would not.

However, the whole reason fiat money was created is because bartering was, and remains to this day, often arduous and impractical due to market inefficiencies. More specifically, in a transaction between Person A and Person B, Person A must ensure that Person B values their ‘money’ similarly to themselves, which in this case could be gold or apples, for instance. What’s more, various parties will value all money differently, making it difficult to truly assess how wealthy any individual might actually be.

Fiat money was created to be the financial bridge that solved market inefficiency. However, in our highly divided world, we have endless forms of fiat currencies. This was reasonable when fiat money was backed by a legitimate asset like gold, but that is no longer the case. Instead, modern money’s value is worth whatever its issuing government says it’s worth. Ultimately whether or not that’s the case depends on whether the broader population agrees. This, in combination with rising geopolitical tensions, started to weigh on the long-term viability of fiat money being a safe store of value given how volatile our relationship as a society with government has changed over time. Argentina and El Salvador are perfect examples of this.

Bitcoin is the best modern solution or proxy for ‘money’ that exists today, and Wall Street knows it. On top of this, Bitcoin is the closest thing to a more practical version of gold. It’s verifiably scarce, no one controls whether or not its holder has it, and it’s ‘relatively’ easy to trade in exchange for a good or service.

Related: Are NFTs Back? Why NFTs Will Make a Comeback in 2024

Bitcoin’s hot girl summer?

While I remain incredibly bullish on Bitcoin, especially as we approach the upcoming halving event, I also maintain that corrections are probable and necessary as we progress toward all-time highs. That said, additional market factors and technicals, on top of increased accessibility to Bitcoin, make a strong argument for price appreciation throughout the rest of 2024.

The biggest difference between this current and previous bull runs is that because of the Bitcoin ETF, countless institutions are now active players in the space. Presently, daily ETF inflows are more than 12x the network’s natural supply. What’s more, portfolio managers (PMs) at asset management firms rapidly acquire Bitcoin but aren’t doing so to trade the market heavily. And why would they? Given Bitcoin’s track record, nearly all long-term portfolios can and shouldhave exposure to the world’s greatest-performing asset. Beyond that, this transformative technology has a market cap smaller than many of the world’s largest companies — it’s still very early!

Additionally, retail investors have yet to return to the market despite reaching new highs. For context, Coinbase was the #1 application in the iOS App Store during the last cycle’s peak. Presently, Coinbase remains outside the top 100. As a result, the upward pressure we’ve seen has been relatively uninterrupted except for Grayscale’s GBTC outflows. However, price action should get whippy as retail and additional leverage enter the system.

Lastly, over-the-counter (OTC) desks are running low on inventory, which is applying even more upward pressure on prices, given that firms are now being forced to pull supply from the market. With 80% of Bitcoin’s supply classified as ‘dormant,’ there are only a handful of routes to acquire the asset. HODL on tight!

Related: How Cryptocurrency Transformed My Small Business — And How It Can Do the Same For You

Conclusion

Before I forget to mention, none of the above should be considered investment advice, and should you wish to get involved with cryptocurrencies, only do so once you’ve done the appropriate research simply because asset prices can be volatile.

However, we’re at what could potentially be the single most transformative revolution of our lifetime. If you’re reading this, understand that you’re early and that there will almost certainly be ups and downs, sometimes more downs, on our pathway to a freer, more financially inclusive world. In the meantime, brace yourself for the turbulence ahead!

Originally published at https://www.entrepreneur.com on March 21, 2024.

Over 15 years ago, Satoshi invented the world’s first independently managed, self-operating financial system through cryptography. He aspired to push us all into a financial renaissance where our aging financial system would be replaced with one that favors no one entity or being. A fully transparent financial system that’s open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, so that anyone can track fund flows on the blockchain.

And while this value proposition alone is more than sufficient to migrate from our legacy financial systems, Satoshi’s greatest breakthrough with the invention of blockchain and crypto is how a user accesses this network: a non-custodial wallet .

With only a mobile device and an internet connection, anyone can safely view, send, and receive value, which is the closest we’ve been to a financially inclusive world.

That being said, the blockchain industry, which can be more eloquently referred to as web3, has reached an inflection point where the next wave of adoption will likely come through entirely different channels than generations past. In other words, there are only so many new entrants that would have the inertia to deal with the operational headache of engaging with web3 technologies, given the relative return or utility of the technology is largely not there for the next generation of users. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong alluded to this on stage at the All-In Summit this year.

To be frank, market standards for an acceptable web3 user journey must improve if we want greater adoption amongst discovery audiences. The wallets attached to those user journeys need to do more than hold internet money if we expect those people to use them.

Why It Matters

The term ‘web3’ refers to the third iteration of the internet, which is built on the concept of digital, verifiable ownership. Contrary to the web2 paradigms, web3 users maintain and own all their information, financial assets, digital collectibles, and more, while ‘Big Tech’ holds this dear information in the web2 universe.

This ownership is achieved through non-custodial wallets where this information is only accessible by the owner of said wallet. The wallet owner can grant ‘read-only’ access to any internet protocol that might want to access the wallet’s contents, but again, it’s purely at the owner’s discretion.

In the words of the one and only Gordon Gekko, “ The most valuable commodity I know of is information,” and depending on where you live, your willingness to share that information may vary. In the developed world, the average person has the luxury of robust banking and money-transmission services. Moreover, a certain level of implicit trust makes them feel secure with ‘owning’ nothing.

Sure, they can view and access the bank account balance shown on their account, but they technically ‘own’ something that’s continuously being lent out in exchange for crumbs. What’s more, users completely rely on a bank’s good faith to perform any action they wish to perform. This model is deeply flawed and hardly works here. Still, as you venture into the lesser-developed parts of the world, the overwhelming distrust of traditional banking systems has left much of the population unbanked.

It All Starts With the Wallet

We’ve made significant strides over the last decade and a half regarding developing, using, and adopting decentralized technologies. Additionally, regulatory clarity and legal recognition from governing bodies worldwide have recently accelerated, with Shanghai, most recently, recognizing as a digital currency. That said, it’s still painfully difficult to access and move value that’s on-chain, given that the interfaces that connect us to the technology are shockingly underdeveloped compared to the sheer size of the industry.

Currently, crypto wallets don’t allow you to do anything you couldn’t otherwise do with traditional banking products. Because transmitting value within this framework is arduous, Bitcoin’s battle to establish itself as a reasonable means of payment has been thwarted. Instead, crypto wallets are more or less an easy way to individually secure your (way more volatile) funds.

Furthermore, it’s never been more difficult to garner the attention of the general consumer. Popular media, short-form content, and a little bit of ADD have made it excruciatingly difficult for companies to reach target consumers. Because of this, the most successful technologies provide a utility that introduces extreme convenience or consolidation in one’s life. Take TikTok, for instance — beyond being a means of creative expression, it also serves as a social network and, increasingly, a search engine.

By serving multiple purposes, the value proposition for installing and spending time on the platform is strengthened because users enjoy the luxury of not jumping from platform to platform. In 2023, the average has about 80 applications installed on their phone, nearly 2x more than a decade prior.

Because of this, we’re now entering a new era in tech in that new products and applications will need not only to solve a problem but also introduce convenience — a wallet is no different than that. This isn’t all that dissimilar from when Apple put a phone into the iPod all those years ago.

The Future

To unlock all of crypto’s potential, we must innovate from the ground up and ensure that an unnecessarily archaic user experience doesn’t obstruct its value proposition. We need to push paradigms and challenge established conventions to ensure that we spend the majority of the next 15 years building a new, free world instead of struggling through teaching our friends and loved ones about public and private keys.

Originally published at https://cryptoslate.com on March 10, 2024.

The last few decades have seen unprecedented innovation and progress in how we connect, interact and socialize with one another. The further we push into the future, the more difficult it becomes for the platforms we use every day to both grow and retain their existing user bases. Amid the chaos that erupted following Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter (now renamed X), we’ve seen countless clones spawn. Most notably, we have Instagram’s new Threads app aiming to capture what appeared to be market share that was up for grabs.

But there’s a clear problem nowadays related to the acquisition of market share. Few platforms are willing to explore uncharted territory. Instead, consumers are continually pushed to adopt products that lack any sort of novelty or utility. When leaders in the space do take a risk and start exploring something new, there appears to be a fear of commitment. Case in point: the shutdown of Reddit’s crypto rewards program, effective today. Reddit attributed its decision to sunset its Community Points program to concerns about the current regulatory environment for digital assets and business consolidation. While all those things might be true, the most critical issue that ultimately closed the curtains for Reddit’s crypto rewards program is that it seems to have been engineered solely for profitability, rather than usability.

Utility matters

There’s a huge opportunity for crypto to revolutionize how we transmit value and collaborate within shared worlds. But this potential can’t be realized until we have valuable real-world use cases. The non-fungible token (NFTs) boom of 2021 was a brief moment that showcased just how transformative this technology can be. Despite continued progress within the ecosystem and increased regulatory clarity, we’ve struggled to apply the technology in other meaningful ways.

The pursuit of money and growth naturally enticed many to enter the space, with the hopes of securing staggering financial returns. Unfortunately, because this technology was looked at through the lens of expanding revenue streams above the utility of the technology itself, an opportunity has been missed. Reddit’s crypto rewards program, which the company plans to shutter on Nov. 8, is the latest example of this.

This is best evidenced by the fact that the rewards program was significantly more performant than the one that eventually replaced it, due to the scalability concerns surrounding the Ethereum blockchain on which it was built. Reddit ultimately migrated to Arbitrum to address these concerns, nearly two years later. This is disturbingly late — considering discourse around the need for scalable blockchains (and alternatives) dated back to well before then.

To be frank, these concerns pre-date this program altogether, signaling that Reddit’s foray into crypto might have been premature or at the very least, uninformed. Even the most casual of crypto fans know that a seamless user experience would be challenging to achieve in this context. If anything, Reddit’s blunders show that big brands are quick to hop on new tech trends without conducting proper due diligence. And that’s despite having near infinite resources to get smart on said technology.

One step forward, two steps back

The pressures of nonstop innovation and financial growth often drive enterprises to make rash decisions, but there are always implications that need to be carefully considered prior to any move taking place. In the specific case of Reddit, the sunsetting of its crypto rewards program not only imposed great financial hardship on its closest supporters (who spent hard-earned money supporting the program) but it also bears heavy weight on crypto’s long term growth adoption trajectory.

It’s important for us to factor in just how impactful big enterprise’s role in crypto’s adoption is. Successful business use cases only help support crypto’s journey through the intense scrutiny that regulators around the world will continually impose on the blossoming asset class. What’s even more impactful than success stories are failures. While it’s far from easy to predict how an initiative might be received by the market, it is fairly obvious that replacing an existing business line with a “new” one that does the exact same thing will never lead to growth in usage. Add in countless, unnecessary friction points and you are doomed. In the case of Reddit, shortsightedness and the fixation on greater profit margins got in the way of the potential to revolutionize the model for rewards programs and potentially crypto as a whole.

Key learnings

Reddit, from its inception, has always looked to innovate, question and do things unconventionally in the name of progress. So this makes its decision to wrap up its crypto rewards program disappointing, and it was likely due to the crypto knowledge gap that informed its strategy. Ultimately, this was the right direction for the business (and the social media industry as a whole). At its core, the rewards program addresses growing concerns of platform equity as users acknowledge that social media companies have built evergrowing empires fueled solely by the individuals that grace them. The vast majority of these platforms offer users very little, if anything in return for their time and the content they contribute.

A world built on the bedrock of digital assets creates endless opportunities to both gamify and drastically improve the barren incentive models that exist in Web2 paradigms. In order to unlock that value, one must truly understand the world of Web3 so that they can properly navigate it.

In the end, one could chalk up the failure of Reddit’s crypto rewards program to the company being a bit early to the game. Despite this, however, Reddit’s efforts need to be commended. As a major industry player with a history of innovative products, it is natural for the public to hold them to a higher standard. More than a distraction, this development should serve to encourage other projects looking to develop novel, utility-based crypto products by leveraging Reddit’s learnings for their benefit.

Originally published at https://forkast.news on November 8, 2023.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Apple’s introduction of its mobile software development kit (SDK) and App Store laid the foundations for the largest technological renaissance of the late 2000s — early 2010s. It gave builders the tools to expose iPhone users to endless utility backed by the innovation of the broader tech community. We have since come a long way. The innovations we witnessed in the earliest days of the app revolution included an optical illusion that made it look like users were drinking a beer from their phones.

A decade and a half later, apps incorporate optical character recognition technology that enables users to take pictures of signs written in Mandarin to translate them to their language of choice. This is technology that is breaking down barriers between languages, enabling everyone to communicate and navigate the world more efficiently.

Somewhere down the line, Apple’s dependency on this outsourced innovation to push broader adoption of its iPhone quickly morphed into an insurmountable vortex of power, enforceable to no end and questioned by no one. With the economic stranglehold that’s enforced on all in-app payments to the unquantifiable risk of being de-platformed, we’re now approaching the point where mobile app builders might be better served forging a path of their own on the web.

Related: Apple Just Announced the iPhone 15 — Here Are the Key New Features and How to Preorder

Why app stores matter

Although Apple and Google’s control over their app store marketplaces has given them outsized oversight regarding what and how innovators build, the app store at inception introduced countless benefits to both developers and end-users. Perhaps most impactful was that App Stores created the public forum necessary for any healthy marketplace to exist. End-users could go to one central location to download new apps and discover new experiences. On the flip side, developers had a public square where they could acquire and monetize end-users without setting up a unique marketplace to encourage downloads.

Because of the rules and regulations imposed by Apple and Google, app stores, perhaps unintentionally, serve as a screening mechanism for the final product an end-user may end up receiving. You could even go as far as saying the app store introduced what could be seen as the most credible peer-review process; any end-user can view and gauge the credibility of an application before ever downloading it, given reviews from end-users are made available to everyone. Whether it’s assessing the build quality of the app itself or just downside protection against nefarious activity, it’s hard to ignore that it’s because of the app store’s original mission that mobile app development is where it is today.

Related: I Downloaded Every App of the Day for 1 Year. Here Are the Traits That Set Them Apart From the Rest.

Why things went wrong

Believe it or not, Steve Jobs was originally against creating open-source development tools as he did not feel that Apple had the resources to properly police app developers. Instead, Jobs was of the opinion that mobile app development should live on the web. Ironically, a little more than a decade later, it’s becoming more clear that with the emergence of new technologies and trends, centralized control over app stores has, at times, stifled growth. What’s more, it goes without saying that for apps that are at all a threat to the core businesses of either Apple or Google, there’s an added risk that that app may never be approved. Perhaps, one of the more apparent industries at risk includes blockchain and crypto.

Apple and Google have strong footholds in the world of payments. Therefore, it’s improbable to think that web3 developers won’t be met with complications when it comes to pushing products in the general marketplace. Most recently, we saw the brief removal of the leading crypto wallet, MetaMask, earlier this month, which sent the broader web3 community into uproar. Crypto influencer and TikTok star Mason Versluis swiftly commented on X, stating that Apple “DO NOT belong in Web3” and that the measure was likely taken because “[Apple] can’t take 30% of every transaction.”

As with all major enterprises, pursuing growth and protection of market share will always reign supreme over innovation.

The path less traveled

In 1983, during a company trip to New York, Jobs was photographed flipping off the IBM logo outside the building. At the time, Jobs longed for a world where anything is possible and innovation is constant. A world that shunned stagnation and rewarded those who think differently. Fast forward 40 years later, and it seems that even his camp needs reminding of its own core principles.

It might take some time for developers to feel comfortable taking the path less traveled and building outside the constraints laid out for all of us by the powers that be. We’re probably a few dozen good use cases away from any material revolution, but given a little inspection, it’s quite easy to see the writing on the wall.

Originally published at https://www.entrepreneur.com on November 6, 2023.