When new highways are built, who captures the tollgate? Whenever a new technology emerges, people tend to ask the same questions. “What can we build with this?” “What should we build to get rich?” These aren’t wrong questions. But if you look at the pattern of technological history, a more profitable question always sits underneath: “Who stands at the point where money flows through this system?” 1. Railroads • Railroads made the world faster. Everyone assumed railway companies would make the most money. • But railroads were capital-intensive, heavily regulated, and ultimately margin-constrained. • The real money wasn’t in the tracks themselves, but around them. • Logistics, distribution, and urban hubs won. 2. Cars and Highways • When automobiles took off, it seemed manufacturers would dominate. • Reality turned out differently. Roads became public goods, and manufacturing turned into a margin game. • Value shifted to oil, insurance, finance, and retail. • And more importantly, to those who designed the rules of the network. 3. The Internet • Early on, many believed network owners would control everything. • But connectivity itself quickly became commoditized. • The real value emerged not in infrastructure, but in the gateways. • Search, advertising, marketplaces, and platforms defined the winners. 4. Mobile and App Stores • With smartphones and app stores, developers looked like the new kings. • But the real tollgate belonged to Apple. • The 30% fee is not a business model. • It is control over who gets to pass. 5. Card Networks • @Visa and @Mastercard are not consumers, banks, or merchants. • Yet they consistently capture value. • The reason is simple: • Transactions are optional. Passing through the network is not. • And because a single monopoly would become a point of failure, a strange equilibrium persists. The pattern repeats: 1. A new path opens 2.Everyone builds on top of it 3.Competition erodes margins 4.Value concentrates at the point of flow Now: Blockchains and agent economies Today, as infrastructure meets markets again, people ask: “Should we launch an L1?” “Should we issue a token?” “Which chain should we build on?” "Should our company start using @openclaw?" But the better question remains the same: “Where does the money enter, and where does it exit?” A simple analogy: • CBDCs resemble highways built by states • Stablecoins resemble alleyways that emerge organically This is not a question of construction capability. Both are necessary for the system to function. So where is the money? Not on the highway. Not in the alleyways. It materializes at the tollgate that connects them. - In a world where both highways and alleyways are being built simultaneously, people will always find a way. If one path is blocked, they will climb mountains or cross oceans. One thing is certain: even the person crossing a strait on a raft, or hiking through remote terrain, can now transact - thanks to global connectivity layers. So the question collapses into one: Where is your tollgate?

Set your reminders now for this week's Meet at the Clubhouse. Coffee on the West Coast. Afternoon in Europe. Prime time in APAC. 🇯🇵 Tokyo: 10pm JST 🇰🇷 Seoul: 10pm KST 🇸🇬 Singapore: 9pm SGT 🇬🇧 London: 2pm BST 🇪🇺 Central Europe: 3pm CEST 🇺🇸 West Coast: 6am PT See you Thursday, June 4th. x.com/i/spaces/1oKMvvgrkrkGQ…

Start your AI journey. @virtuals_io 🫶 @AskVenice

bored ape yacht club

gm from seoul the first thing I see on the korean portal site @official_naver is an ad saying "happy 10/10 day" lmao I shrinked more like no one wanted to jinx it but we did survive the buddha beam day which was yesterday here's to the crypto market that's on the brink of becoming an actually robust, infrastructure-based, coherent market where the open web and the real world are finally meeting in the middle we were so early for a long time and now we're so early at another nearing boundary ready for the new world wagmi, lfg, and gazua have a great one ahead frens 😉

Still early. Back to work.

korea is built different we build things out of nowhere then we are something together always different yet the same at heart and soul @virtuals_io wins

Last week, Nitro by Hashed hosted its first public Demo Day at the Hashed Lounge in Seoul — marking the official debut since rebranding from Hashed Vibe Labs. Over an 8-week deployment sprint (Mar 3 – Apr 24), four teams shipped relentlessly alongside 20 fellows spanning open source, data science, cybersecurity, product, finance, and creative. Selection wasn't based on decks — it was based on shipped product, iteration speed, and user signal. Investment closed within a week of selection. Meet the cohort: 🔹 Elyn — AI character companion 🔹 GPTO — B2B solution for AI Answer Engine Optimization (AEO·GEO) 🔹 KYRO — gamified running app 🔹 GGUI — generative UI protocol for AI agents The afternoon closed with a panel — "Building in the Age of the Agentic Economy" — and a few takeaways from @simonkim_nft's keynote that we keep coming back to: • "Everything you can see is now open source." With frontier models, a screenshot becomes a working clone in 30 minutes. Building is no longer the bottleneck. • What matters now is the taste to know what to build, and the network to build it with the right people — at global scale from Day 1. • The new definition of a VC isn't who writes the check. It's who builds at the same altitude, in the same language, alongside the founder. Nitro is our bet on that thesis: a small, obsessed group moves fastest. Huge thanks to the founders, fellows, and friends who shipped, showed up, and pushed each other. More to come.

kaito always wins

ADGM’s Financial Services Regulatory Authority (FSRA) has granted @hashed_official Global Management Limited (HGML) a Financial Services Permission (FSP), enabling HGML to conduct regulated activities in or from ADGM, including advising on investments or credits, arranging deals in investments, managing assets, and managing a collective investment fund. This milestone reinforces ADGM’s position as an international financial centre with a forward-looking regulatory environment supporting innovation, fintech, and digital assets, and reflects growing momentum as leading global firms choose ADGM and Abu Dhabi to establish and scale regional operations. Read more via: adgm.com/media/announcements… منحت سلطة تنظيم الخدمات المالية (FSRA) في أبوظبي العالمي شركة Hashed Global Management Limited (HGML) تصريح خدمات مالية (FSP)، مما يتيح لها مزاولة أنشطة خاضعة للتنظيم داخل أو من خلال أبوظبي العالمي، بما في ذلك تقديم المشورة بشأن الاستثمارات أو الائتمان، وترتيب الصفقات في الاستثمارات، وإدارة الأصول، وإدارة صناديق الاستثمار الجماعي. ويعزز هذا الإنجاز مكانة أبوظبي العالمي كمركز مالي دولي يتمتع بإطار تنظيمي متقدم يدعم الابتكار والتقنيات المالية والأصول الرقمية، كما يعكس الزخم المتزايد مع اختيار شركات عالمية رائدة لأبوظبي العالمي وأبوظبي لتأسيس وتوسيع عملياتها الإقليمية.

1/ Most of you know me from my 7 years in crypto. What most of you don't know: my obsession with TCG started long before any of that. Over the past decade I've been to more card shows than crypto conferences. Which is why this one means a lot.

Big announcement: Hashed Global Management Limited (HGML), an entity within Hashed(@hashed_official) group, has received its Financial Services Permission (FSP) from the Financial Services Regulatory Authority (FSRA) of ADGM (@ADGlobalMarket). With a regulated presence in Abu Dhabi, we look forward to deepening connections between Korean and Asian innovation ecosystems and the broader UAE & GCC ecosystem. Grateful for the trust and partnership of the ADGM team as we take this step forward. adgm.com/media/announcements…

Nitro Seoul Game Day 🏁 ​8주 전, 5팀이 같은 출발선에 섰습니다. ​피치덱은 없었습니다. 프로덕트와 트랙션만으로 선발했고, 선발과 동시에 투자가 집행되었습니다. 자료가 아니라 이미 움직이고 있는 것을 보고 판단했다는 뜻입니다. AI가 공동 창업자의 자리에 앉은 시대, 생각의 속도와 실행의 속도가 같아진 환경에서, 몰입한 소수가 8주 안에 어디까지 갈 수 있는지 확인해보기 위한 실험이었습니다. 창업의 문법이 다시 쓰이는 지금, 이 팀들은 그 문법을 가장 먼저 자신의 언어로 바꿔낸 사람들입니다. ​Hashed Vibe Labs는 이번 Game Day를 기점으로 Nitro by Hashed로 새출발합니다. 저희가 설계한 8주 스프린트의 본질, “소수가 가장 빠르게 간다”는 믿음을 이름에 담았습니다. 넓게 지원하는 대신, 깊게 가속합니다. 규모로 줄 세우는 프로그램이 아니라, 가장 빠른 팀들이 서로의 속도를 끌어올리는 환경을 만드는 일에 집중합니다. ​Nitro Seoul Game Day는 그 8주를 함께 달려온 5팀 중, 이번 무대에서 자신들이 만든 것을 직접 보여줄 준비를 마친 4팀이 서는 자리입니다. 각 팀의 호흡과 리듬은 다르고, 무대에 오르는 시점 또한 팀마다의 판단입니다. 유저가 실제로 쓰고 있는 제품, 실제로 쌓인 지표, 그리고 8주라는 시간 안에서만 드러나는 팀의 결정과 전환의 흔적을 한자리에서 확인하실 수 있습니다. 이 시대의 프로덕트가 어떻게 만들어지는지 가장 먼저 들여다볼 수 있는 자리이기도 합니다. ​당일에는 팀별 피치와 라이브 데모, Agentic Economy 시대의 빌딩을 주제로 한 패널 세션, 그리고 파운더들과의 오픈 네트워킹이 이어집니다. 바이브코더, 창업자, 도메인 전문가, 그리고 이 변화의 한가운데에 서보고 싶은 분들이 함께하는 자리입니다. ​개발자가 아니어도 좋습니다. 특정 도메인의 깊이를 가진 전문가, 고객의 언어로 사고하는 분, AI를 도구 삼아 직접 무언가를 만드는 빌더 — 지금 이 변화에 자신의 자리를 만들고 있는 모든 분들을 환영합니다. ​일정: 4월 30일(목) 오후 2시 ​13:00 – 14:00 현장 등록 ​14:00 – 15:00 팀별 데모 ​15:00 – 16:00 패널 세션 ​16:00 – 17:00 오픈 네트워킹 luma.com/a3u6l9o5

AI agents, tokenized markets, and digital settlement are no longer parallel conversations. @hashed_official and @ADGlobalMarket – ADGM, Abu Dhabi's leading, award-winning, International Financial Centre – have published a joint policy report synthesizing discussions from the Web3 Leaders Roundtable at @ADFinanceWeek. The report was co-authored by ADGM Emerging Tech and Hashed Open Research, Hashed's research think tank. The roundtable brought together senior participants from @ADGlobalMarket, @DMCCAuthority, @BlackRock, @The_DTCC, @FTI_US, @circle, @Consensys, @SolanaFndn, @NEARProtocol, @AvaLabs, @dfinity, @Grayscale, @StoryProtocol, @tether, @FalconXGlobal, @dbsbank, @LaserDigital_, @EntEthAlliance, @jito_sol, @GSR_io, @GoKiteAI, @Sharplink, @9BlocksCap, and @openmind_agi, alongside representatives from ADIA, the European Commission, the Government of Liechtenstein, Further Ventures, and Brevan Howard Digital, to examine two core questions shaping the next phase of digital asset adoption: what infrastructure an AI-native economy will require, and what policy barriers still stand in the way of institutional scale. Hosted by ADGM's Dmitry Fedotov and Hashed's @simonkim_nft, with framing remarks and moderation from @HenriArslanian (Nine Blocks Capital), @baekkyoumkim (Hashed). The broader implication is that institutional adoption is no longer a question of whether demand is coming, but whether policy and infrastructure can keep pace with it. Read the full report: assets.adgm.com/download/ass… News Coverage: adgm.com/media/announcements…

As someone who's loved crypto research for years, I always wondered if our work would actually resonate globally. This round feels like the answer. 600 reports, 100 protocol collaborations, 3 years in. And research will stay at our core as we expand into institutional validators and advisory. Grateful to everyone who's been part of the journey. More to come.

also @HyperliquidX mentioned probably nothing gm from tokyo