{"id":5892,"date":"2026-01-22T07:58:43","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T07:58:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cryptonews.uk.com\/?p=5892"},"modified":"2026-01-22T07:58:43","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T07:58:43","slug":"vitalik-buterin-vows-full-push-into-decentralised-social-media-in-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cryptonews.uk.com\/?p=5892","title":{"rendered":"Vitalik Buterin Vows Full Push Into Decentralised Social Media in 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

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  • Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin intends to recommit to decentralised social media in 2026, saying that if society is to improve, we need to develop better \u201cmass communication tools.\u201d<\/span><\/li>\n
  • Buterin said any new decentralised social platform needs to do more than simply add a speculative token, arguing the entire system needs to meet users\u2019 long-term interests, rather than incentivise short-term engagement.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

    Everyone knows the internet is a swamp filled with misinformation and malicious actors. But Vitalik Buterin plans to change that by making \u201cnew and better forms of interaction\u201d possible through decentralised technology.<\/p>\n

    The co-founder of Ethereum said he\u2019ll recommit to decentralised social media in 2026, driven by a belief that the key to improving society is better mass communication tools that reward high-quality content catering to a \u201cuser\u2019s long-term interest\u201d rather than click-bait designed to maximise \u201cshort-term engagement.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Posting on X, Buterin said that there\u2019s no easy solution to the problem of creating a system that supports this kind of higher-quality social media content. However, he suggested that more competition, driven by a decentralised social data layer, would lay a firm foundation.<\/p>\n

    \u201cThere is one important place to start: more competition. Decentralization is the way to enable that: a shared data layer, with anyone being able to build their own client on top,\u201d Buterin explained.<\/p>\n

    Buterin explained that when he talks about decentralised social media, he doesn\u2019t simply mean something like Twitter with a speculative token attached. \u201cCrypto social projects has often gone the wrong way,\u201d Buterin said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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    Too often, we in crypto think that if you insert a speculative coin into something, that counts as \u2018innovating\u2019, and moves the world forward.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

    \n Vitalik Buterin, Co-founder of Ethereum <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

    The Ethereum co-founder said he isn\u2019t against monetising social content, pointing to the subscription-based social platform, Substack, as an example of how it can be done in a way that incentivises high-quality content.\u00a0<\/p>\n

    He cautioned that market-based models involving tokens have repeatedly failed to reward quality content and have instead rewarded creators with \u201cpre-existing social capital,\u201d creating bubbles around these creators, which almost inevitably crash back to zero.<\/p>\n

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    Over the past decade, we have seen many many attempts at incentivizing creators by creating price bubbles around them, and all fail by (i) rewarding not content quality, but pre-existing social capital, and (ii) the tokens all going to zero after one or two years anyway.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

    \n Vitalik Buterin, Co-founder of Ethereum <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

    Buterin also lashed out at people making what he described as \u201cgalaxy-brained arguments\u201d that a market-based approach is inherently good because it \u201celicits information\u201d when those same people create social media products clearly intended to co-opt people\u2019s attention and algorithmically manipulate them.<\/p>\n

    \u201cThat is not Hayekian info-utopia,\u201d Buterin said (referring to the liberalist theories of economist Friedrich Hayek), \u201cthat is corposlop.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Decentralised social media, Buterin argued, should be run by people who care deeply about the \u201csocial\u201d component and \u201care motivated first and foremost by solving the problems of social,\u201d rather than those more focussed on the monetisation component.<\/p>\n

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    We need to move beyond everyone constantly tweeting inside a single global info warzone, and into a reopened frontier, where new and better forms of interaction become possible.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

    \n Vitalik Buterin, Co-founder of Ethereum <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

    Related: Yakovenko vs. Buterin: Solana\u2019s Constant Evolution Meets Ethereum\u2019s \u201cWalkaway\u201d Ideal<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Shake-Ups at Leading SocialFi Platforms Coincide with Buterin Post<\/h2>\n

    Two leading SocialFi platforms have seen major shake-ups in the past few days, with one being acquired and the other having a major leadership change.\u00a0<\/p>\n

    On January 21, Dan Romero, the co-founder of Farcaster, announced on X that the platform had been acquired by ecosystem infrastructure provider, Neynar. Farcaster had been widely hyped as the future of decentralised social media a few years ago and is one of the few decentralised SocialFi apps to have seen solid adoption so far.\u00a0<\/p>\n

    In his announcement, Romero explained that \u201cafter five years, it\u2019s clear Farcaster needs a new approach and leadership to reach its full potential.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Meanwhile Lens, a decentralised SocialFi protocol and layer 2 network, announced January 20 that leadership will transition from the decentralised finance protocol, Aave (which also created Lens), to the Mask Network. The announcement characterised the leadership makeover as a change in \u201cstewardship\u201d rather than a sale or acquisition.<\/p>\n

    Related: Vitalik Buterin: Ethereum DApps Can Shield Internet From Outages and Centralised Failures<\/strong><\/p>\n

    In a statement, the founder of Aave and Lens, Stani Kulechov, said the new Mask Network leadership team will focus on \u201cadvancing Lens at the application layer,\u201d while he and others at Aave will remain active as \u201ctechnical advisors.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

    Decentralized Social,Social media,Vitalik Buterin#Vitalik #Buterin #Vows #Full #Push #Decentralised #Social #Media1769068723<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin intends to recommit to decentralised social media in 2026, saying that if society is to improve, we need to develop better \u201cmass communication tools.\u201d Buterin said any new decentralised social platform needs to do more than simply add a speculative token, arguing the entire system needs to meet users\u2019 long-term interests,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5893,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[774,565,1624,1324,890,572,847,1623],"class_list":{"0":"post-5892","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bitcoin","8":"tag-buterin","9":"tag-decentralised","10":"tag-full","11":"tag-media","12":"tag-push","13":"tag-social","14":"tag-vitalik","15":"tag-vows"},"yoast_head":"\nVitalik Buterin Vows Full Push Into Decentralised Social Media in 2026 - 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