Webx2024 Special Observation: Japan's Crypto Market Poised for Growth

Original author: Lorraine

lolo's Japan #Webx2024 Conference Guide

1. From many questions to many expectations

- The Japanese Crypto market has always been judged as closed and conservative, with strict regulations and slow efficiency, but government officials from the prime minister have expressed their support for various Web3 conferences. This contrast and separation always makes me very curious and want to know the future development direction.

- Sony Chain—Soneium, which has been brewing for more than a year, was finally officially announced two weeks ago. Combined with Astar's many years of operating experience and technology, and backed by Sony's rich IP resources, there is a lot of room for imagination. But the possible pain point is that if the final product of "Sony Web3 Ecological World" is still a "selective application of blockchain technology as a marketing gimmick, and the core is still the traditional approach from top to bottom" and cannot achieve more innovative breakthroughs, it may hit the creativity of the Japanese crypto industry even more. (I'm really curious about how many interesting answers Sota can write on this highly anticipated answer sheet in the future)

2. Different cultural soils, different logic of behavior

- For example, many Chinese people regard the micro-style of Astar, a Japanese old public chain, as a "failed uprising", but for local Japanese people, its publicity is successful: Sota and politicians approach various publicity to make $ASTR the most recognized local Token; a friend asked the bus driver if he knew Astar, and the driver directly replied that he was the holder. Regardless of the comments from the outside world, the information communication bridge from the project end to the user end has been built, which is a good start.

- Using the global perspective, comparing Japan with the current status of other mature crypto markets is a harsh criticism of dimensionality reduction. Public opinion is a sharp sword, and the overall crypto market is still turbulent. Instead of making mistakes by messing around, Japan might as well not create too many subversive things that have never been seen before, and be a conventional bystander and recorder.

3. Japanese projects in the Chinese market? Not yet.

- It is not difficult to see from the types of projects in the past two years that IP-oriented content is still the main focus of Japanese project parties, and the corresponding NFT and GameFi projects have always been the characteristics of the Japanese crypto industry. Even if Japanese IP culture is popular all over the world, the growth environment and cultural background are still invisible barriers. Instead of spending a lot of time/money to educate overseas people, it is better to make the small domestic ecology good and refined first. To some extent, it is also a continuation of the consistent spirit of craftsmanship, having confidence and passion for their own IP, carefully crafting high-quality content, and not wanting them to rush overseas and become a wave of products without being prepared.

- Although the content seems to be less rich and lacks vitality, for the current market, hot money is not in the coin circle. If there is a lack of liquidity in the world, what is the point of increasing the efficiency of production capacity? It is not cost-effective to do this now.

- The update and iteration speed in the Web3 field is extremely fast, and dApps that can accelerate the expansion of the circle also rely most on infra built on a good technical foundation. However, there is a shortage of excellent IT talents in China, and technical barriers have led to a limited ceiling for innovation.

4. Side events, establish deep connections between people

- Compared with watching the host read the script of the panel guest in the main venue, the side events with closer vertical communities make the connection between people more real. This year, Gate's Tokyo Tower event is very fancy, and the location of Monad X Backpack's Zen & the art is also particularly memorable (Zen means Namaste).

- The local crypto community and DAO members in Japan brought the rigorous and responsible work to the chilling Web3 atmosphere. This remix combination made people see the small flames of firm belief ignited in other places in foreign countries when the market was cold and people around them were generally impetuous. They were passed on to different people little by little during the activities.

*I found that in the community I like, I feel energetic and happy from the bottom of my heart. Armani is really energetic(Highlight again: @BlockBeatsAsia is also a media service brand that Backpack deeply binds and cooperates with)

Inheriting the genes of a media person, I always want to ask people of different roles in the field about their views on the Japanese crypto market. Almost most people will say "Emmm" and frown when answering. At first, I was also curious. Why do some people choose to give up exploration directly under the heavy fences, while others still come here to open up wasteland and cultivate.

In the past few days, I have felt that the people of this small country were also the first to embrace cryptocurrency. Due to the early hacker attacks, the government supervision intervened early. Since then, in order to comply with the heavy compliance, the project party has a very low risk appetite and a conservative mentality that leads to a slightly closed behavior paradigm.

However, with a new round of upward cycle in the crypto market coming, and more and more capital turning its attention to Japan's blockchain industry, be more patient, the future is still worth looking forward to. All the best equipment and resources are being quietly prepared in the trough, waiting for a gunshot from the future.

PS: (The 5s earthquake on the night of landing was amazing. My favorite merch items are the green $MEW and Solana hats. Sol eco rules the world!) I am very grateful to my Internet friends who finally met me for all kinds of help and mutual referrals. The kind interaction between people is indeed a good medicine to maintain mobility.

That's all.
Everyone is welcome to discuss with me! !

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