The meme coin phenomenon, where communities produce tokens with no other support than a meme behind it, has given rise to opposing opinions. These range from the most positive ones, which regard them as value-affirming elements, to the negative ones, which state that there is no value behind them. Bitcoin.com News examines the views of Solana’s Anatoly Yakovenko, Avalanche’s Emin Gün Sirer, and Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin on the subject.
The Meme Coin Phenomenon Seen From a Crypto Creator’s POV
The meme coin phenomenon, spearheaded by communities that want to assign some value to an idea, is blossoming using cryptocurrency market tools. Creating a token behind an idea using a determined blockchain is helping to determine the support and value this subject has for the wider market.
While meme coins have existed for some time now, with Doge being one of the pioneers, this market segment has become especially relevant given its $68+ billion market capitalization. However, opinions on the actual value of these tokens differ, given the unconventional approach to the fundamentals they offer to their potential investors.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin recently evaluated the popularity of meme coins, and how meme coin issuers could also produce some good out of these projects. Buterin stated that combining these tokens with charity projects could positively impact the communities behind them.
Also, Buterin stated that making games that offer “Robin Hood” dynamics to support these tokens might also contribute to lifting the negative opinion on meme coins. This would include designing measures to protect the most vulnerable investors from financial risk. Taking Axie Infinity, a play-to-earn crypto game as an example, Buterin stated:
If you take the game’s play-to-earn properties into account, on average, the net financial gains were negative for high-income users but might (emphasis on might!) have been positive for low-income users.
Anatoly Yakovenko, founder and CEO of Solana Labs, has a different approach, directly opposing Buterin’s opinions on what meme coin issuers can do for redemption. Yakovenko has a negative take on meme coins, stating that donating to a good cause as “a penance” is a nihilistic take on the problem.
Yakovenko stressed:
I’d rather see people that hodl a memecoin change their behavior and go do something good, like walk dogs at a dog shelter and encourage other hodlers to do the same.
“Personal behavior change towards something good is much more important than financialization of good,” he concluded.
Others have changed their initially negative opinions about meme coins due to observing the social meaning behind these projects. Emin Gün Sirer, founder and CEO of Ava Labs, is one of these.
Last year, Gun Sirer admitted having a change of heart regarding meme coins, going from being skeptical of the value of these tokens to understanding the meaning behind them. In December, he stated:
It took me a while to see the value of memecoins myself. It also took a while for me to see the value of high-end NFTs. But I now understand the cultural importance of coins that are just social signaling mechanisms.
Gun Sirer likened meme coins with social branding, detailing that they “can just be something you own because you like it and it signals to the world that you’re in with your chosen in-crowd.”
The Avalanche Foundation is one of the few crypto organizations that has moved directly to support meme coins by investing in them, putting part of a $100 million fund in previously approved Avalanche native tokens.
Source: Bitcoin
