2026-05-09 –, Grégr Stage
Over the past 10 years crypto's evolution from infrastructure hype to governance tokens and memecoins has eroded the original use case of tokens: fundraising vehicles. The future belongs to businesses with real revenue models and tokens that distribute actual shareholder value—with concrete examples already succeeding today.
I'll walk through the crypto industry’s 4 chapters: the origin of tokens and how the SEC turned us away from profit-tied tokens, the infra era where VCs threw money at protocols, the app pivot that didn't work, and where we are now—good profit.
Easy money in crypto is dead, the only path left is building businesses people actually benefit from.
I'll show a simple formula for building real crypto-powered businesses and share examples of teams doing it right: Brave browser doing token buybacks with ad revenue, Aquari paying gig workers to clean up trash, HairDAO funding hair loss research. These aren't hypotheticals—they're operating businesses today.
You'll leave knowing how to spot real crypto businesses versus the BS.
Kirsten has been building software in web3 since 2018; initially as a consultant for major enterprise blockchain projects, and later as a founder of multiple VC backed web3 startups including Recursive Studio, a dev shop serving Dragonfly Capital, EthersJs and more. Before entering web 3, Kirsten worked as a lobbyist on libertarian and financial public policy initiatives in the United States.