Zeitgeist 2026

Alfred Hitchcock famously said, "A good film should start with an earthquake and be followed by rising tension". @LayerZero_Core event started with Ray Kurzweil and then followed this advice. For me it resonated exceptionally well as I used to be fascinated with Ray’s work years ago. But at some point this whole thing felt somewhat surreal when @PrimordialAA was moderating a panel with their initial partners. Suddenly it hit me that I’m sitting at a crypto event and I see a crypto founder hosting executives from @The_DTCC, @ICE_Markets, and @citsecurities, casually talking with them about the things they’re going to work on in the near future. How the tables have turned, huh? Of course, as a professional sceptic I will need to wait to see how all of those announcements materialize. But the event was impressive. Hats off, @PrimordialAA. And thank you for inviting me, it was a pleasure to share this day with your team.

TL;DR - this isn’t the time for grave-dancing. It’s the time to help and to prove you can make an impact by supporting your favorite projects. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” Understandably, crypto sentiment is pretty low these days. And if you think it’s low in crypto in general, imagine what it’s like in governance, where things haven’t been bright and shiny for quite a while. That said, I actually think this is the best environment for governance to prove itself useful - and the best time to shine if you want to commit to governance going forward. Because governance, in my view, isn’t about voting on treasury grant allocations, committee selections, or incentives for “doing governance.” Cambridge dictionary says that “to govern” means "to have a controlling influence on something”, and “to control and be responsible for” (something). Governance is about coordination, pushing for positive change and moving the needle. It’s about making a set of individual contributors and members greater than the sum of its parts. Finding synergies and network effects. And not just spotting them, but actually making them work together. That’s where the magic happens. That’s where governance creates value. It’s hard to maintain that focus when times are good and resources feel abundant. Tough times are different - no resources, no incentives, no rewards. Your only “payoff” is the satisfaction that comes from real impact and positive change. But that’s all that matters in the end! That’s why I plan to spend a significant portion of this upcoming weekend reviewing the state of play across the ecosystems where we participate in governance and looking for places we can help. Even if it “only” means amplifying something, talking about it, highlighting why it’s cool or (ideally) connecting a few dots to push things forward. To start with, off the top of my head: 1) There’s an ongoing CCA auction on @Uniswap right now for our friends at @huddle01com. Huddle is a great project building on the @arbitrum Orbit stack, and we covered them in a KYB episode some time ago (link in the comments). I’ll make sure to highlight both the CCA auction model and the Huddle project in the coming days - both deserve extra love right now. 2) Our friends at @tallyxyz are preparing for a token launch and an ICO. @DennisonBertram is documenting the process in a series of video episodes (again, link in the comments). If you take crypto (and governance) seriously, these are must-watch. Hands-on experience delivered in short, easily digestible videos. You can definitely expect me to root for Tally and help them on their road to the ICO. What else should I look at? Where can I/we be helpful? Suggestions appreciated. And stay tuned for more.