Digitized | Monthly (1/3/25)
crypto, curated by collab+currency
gm folks.
Welcome back to another edition of Digitized Monthly. We’ve done our best to separate the signal from the noise, providing you with the top news, product updates, and research across the crypto landscape.
Thanks for being here. Hope you enjoy the read.
Until next month,
SEC Commissioners / “We Have a Big Toolkit” — The SEC will operate with a reduced team of commissioners after Inauguration Day, with only Hester Peirce and Mark Uyeda remaining until new appointments are confirmed. Both anticipate significant shifts in the agency's crypto policies, emphasizing the need for more public input and collaboration with the industry — more
New Appointments / Presidential Council for Digital Assets — President-elect Donald Trump has appointed Bo Hines as executive director of the Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets, chaired by David Sacks. The council aims to foster growth in the crypto industry, aligning with Trump’s pro-crypto agenda — more
Pudgy Penguins / PUDGY Token — Pudgy Penguins launched its PENGU token on Solana on December 17, 2024, with 25.9% of the 88.88 billion supply set aside for ecosystem members via an airdrop. The token aims to expand the brand's reach and align millions of fans, with plans to expand to Ethereum and Abstract — more
Aptos CEO / Steps Down — Mo Shaikh, co-founder of Aptos Labs, has stepped down as CEO after three years of leading the L1 blockchain. Under his leadership, Aptos raised $400M in venture funding — more
Topology / $75M Raised — Topology, an early-stage venture firm “dedicated to frontier technology”, raises its first fund — more
Plume / $20M Raised — Plume, a modular Layer-1 blockchain focused on Real World Asset Finance (RWAfi), raises Series A from Brevan Howard Digital, Lightspeed Faction, Haun Ventures, Galaxy Ventures, Hashkey, Laser Digital, and others — more
Rumble / $775M Raised — Rumble, a video-sharing platform and cloud services provider, “entered into a definitive agreement for a strategic investment” with Tether — more
Avalon Labs / $10M Raised — Avalon Labs, the issuer of the BTC-backed stablecoin USDa, raises Series A led by Framework Ventures, with participation from UXTO Management, Presto Labs, and Kenetic Capital — more
Usual / $10M Raised — Usual, a decentralized fiat-backed (RWA) stablecoin issuer that redistributes value and ownership through the $USUAL token, raises Series A led by Binance Labs and Kraken Ventures, with participation from Galaxy, Ondo, and others — more
Fraction AI / $6M Raised — Fraction AI, a startup aiming to democratize high-quality training data for AI, raises pre-seed round led by Spartan and Symbiotic, with participation from Borderless, Anagram, Foresight, and others — more
Lens / $31M Raised — Lens, an Ethereum-centric social network, raises strategic round led by Faction, with participation from Borderless, Circle, Caliber Ventures, Wintermute Ventures, and others — more
BoxBox / $2.5M Raised — BOXBOX, a web3 platform focused on Formula 1 fan engagement, raises round co-led by Volt Capital and Initialized Capital, with participation from SALT — more
Fantasy Top / $4.25M Raised — Fantasy Top, a platform on Blast that allows users to bet on their favorite X influencers, raises seed round from Dragonfly and Manifold Trading — more
Sphere / $5M Raised — Sphere, a global payments network, raises strategic round from Coinbase Ventures, Kraken Ventures, Anza, Anagram, Pyth, Temporal, and others — more
Hyperbolic / $12M Raised — Hyperbolic, a provider of GPU resources and AI services through a cloud platform, raises Series A led by Polychain Capital and Variant — more
From Science Friction to Science Finance: A Community-Driven Revolution in Biotech / Paul Kohlhaas — “By stacking DeSci solutions (via BioDAOs) under BIO’s (🤝) top-level coordination (launchpad, funding, liquidity, meta-governance), the scientific and pharmaceutical industry’s toughest challenges can be tackled in a community-driven, transparent, and continuously liquid environment.” — more
Blockchains vs. Bureaucracy: The Costs Of Curtailing Innovation / Squads (🤝) — “This research report analyzes the realities of debanking and quantifies its costs. We focus on the negative externalities of increased banking regulations, especially anti-money laundering (AML) laws, and show that the costs of such AML enforcement outweigh the amount of bad actors caught.” — more
State of Vertex (🤝) Q3 2024 / AJC x Messari — “Vertex's main value proposition is bundling three of the most sought-after DeFi services — AMM, perpetual DEX, and money market — into a single DEX.” — more
In Conversation with gmoney / OpenSea — “Founded in 2022 by gmoney, 9dcc (🤝) '“simultaneously reinterprets centuries-old traditions of house codes and offers a fresh take on fashion for a digital-first consumer, whose views on fashion and design align with gmoney's own vision of timeless style.’” — more
State of Lit Protocol (🤝) Q3 2024 / Jake Koch-Gallup — “Lit Protocol is a key management and compute network that makes decentralized infrastructure and privacy tools easily accessible to developers.” — more
Tribute Brand (🤝) Acquires Draup, to Launch New Digital Fashion Platform Fashion.Fun / Rhonda Richford — “Digital fashion pioneers Tribute Brand and Draup will be joining forces in the real world and beyond. On the one hand, Tribute has acquired Draup for an undisclosed sum, a move meant to strengthen Tribute as a leader in the space amid both the luxury business slide and cooling of metaverse hype.” — more
2024 Onchain Users Report / Flipside (🤝) — “A broad overview of onchain user activity & growth through 2024 via a more actionable, multi-variate metrics that offer a new way to evaluate onchain user health heading into 2025.” — more
Why Virtuals Protocol is a Decacorn in the Making / LongHash Ventures — “By the end of 2024, it is now obvious that for the cycle of 2025, the new vertical is AI agents, and the funding primitive is the bonding curve popularised by pumpfun with memecoins. Within this newborn vertical, Virtuals stands as the first mover with critical mass, which we believe will continue growing and dominate.” — more
Meet Willow, our state-of-the-art quantum chip / Hartmut Neven x Google — “Our new chip demonstrates error correction and performance that paves the way to a useful, large-scale quantum computer” — more
2024 Developer Report / Electric Capital — “We analyzed 902 million code commits across 1.7 million repositories to create the 2024 Developer Report.” — more
The Year Ahead for AI + DePIN 2025 / Delphi Digital — “If 2023 was the year AI broke the Internet, then 2024 was the year AI broke financial markets.” — more
The Crypto Theses 2025 / Messari — “Pens down, pods complete. All The Trends You Need to Know for 2025” — more
OpenAI o3 Breakthrough High Score on ARC-AGI-Pub / François Chollet — “OpenAI's new o3 system - trained on the ARC-AGI-1 Public Training set - has scored a breakthrough 75.7% on the Semi-Private Evaluation set at our stated public leaderboard $10k compute limit. A high-compute (172x) o3 configuration scored 87.5%.” — more
The Convergence of AI & Crypto will Catalyze the Deinstitutionalization of Science / Triplicate Research — “The convergence of artificial intelligence and decentralized systems will change how science is conducted, shifting research from traditional academic institutions to distributed networks of researchers.” — more
A Framework for Classifying Bittensor Subnets / Crucible Labs — “…we’ve developed a framework to evaluate subnets along two key axes: one that defines their overarching objective and another that captures what is being coordinated.” — more
Designing Onchain / RM — “Great design isn’t just a luxury good; it’s what separates noise from signal. For me there are three pillars: identity, experience, and strategy. This isn’t just theory—it’s what I’ve learned the hard way.” — more
Web4 / goodalexander — “Web3 was a cool ideology but Web4 will be a survival mechanism.” — more
Blockchain Innovation Will Put an AI-Powered Internet Back Into Users’ Hands / Chris Dixon — “In 2025, blockchain alternatives will offer more choice, open source innovation, and community-controlled options. They will carry the torch of the open internet.” — more
PHDegens, It’s Time for a DeSci Update / Chris Davis x Messari — “In this DeSci update, we’ll explore the sector’s growth and performance, highlight key events and funding developments, and analyze emerging trends to better understand the current stage and direction of DeSci's journey.” — more
Pulse (🤝) / Pump Science Partnership — Pulse, a next-gen longevity wearable & protocol, announced a partnership with Pump dot Science. The duo is launching the first on-chain wearable study, integrating real-time health data with decentralized science. Starting Q1, studies will leverage verified human biometrics for research and trading insights — more
Sirocco (🤝) / DOTA x WC3 Battleships Game — “After 15 years, we made our DOTA 2/WC3 MOD Battleships into a standalone game: Sirocco” — more
Mona (🤝) x B3 (🤝) x Art Blocks (🤝) / New On-Chain Game —> Super Snowfro: Squiggle Riders — Super Snowfro: Squiggle Riders, a new on-chain hypercasual game, offers a 3D twist on "snake" using Chromie Squiggles in the Marfa desert. Playable on web and mobile, Mona partnered with B3 and Art Blocks to explore a fully on-chain gaming experience — more
Hyperliquid (🤝) / Staking Goes Live — Users can now stake HYPE tokens and collectively secure the Hyperliquid network — more
Wayfinder (🤝) / Phase One Initiated — The Wayfinder experience begins with Phase 1, offering early participants a share of 1% unvested $PROMPT. Future phases will expand with agent interactions and on-chain activities — more
Bittensor (🤝) / Ecosystem Map — “Bittensor Ecosystem Map - Presented in mind map version” — more
Quilibrium (🤝) / Introducing Quorum — Quorum, a Quilibrium-powered peer-to-peer encrypted group messenger, launched its public beta on Christmas Day. Designed for privacy and ease of use, it offers a light client experience, making secure messaging accessible even with low bandwidth — more
Snapchain / Farcaster’s New Data Layer — Snapchain is a new Rust-based data layer for the Farcaster social network, enabling fast synchronization with over 10k TPS. It aims to offer unlimited transactions for a $2 yearly fee with limits on hourly and total transaction counts — more
Modulus Labs / Tools for Humanity Partnership — Modulus Labs is joining Tools for Humanity to create an Applied Research team focused on cryptographic and machine learning solutions for World Network. Their collaboration since 2023 has aimed to advance zero-knowledge proof tech — more
Stanford x Eliza Labs / Partnership — Stanford's Future of Digital Currency Initiative and Eliza Labs are launching an AI x Web3 Lab in Q1 2025. The partnership will explore how autonomous AI agents can transform DeFi, focusing on trust, coordination, and decision-making frameworks — more
Monad / Introducing the Monad Foundation — The Monad Foundation was launched on December 16, 2024, to support the Monad blockchain's growth through governance, community proposals, and ecosystem development — more
Sanctum / Introducing Creator Coins — Sanctum launched Creator Coins on Solana as a secure and liquid token to support creators and build sustainable fan relationships. Starting with 17 partners, it offers creators ongoing support and fans perks through Seeds — more
Zerebro / Introducing Zentients — “We are building Zentients — a consumer-facing launchpad for agents. This is something we have been ideating on for several months, and we’re excited to finally announce it and how it fits into Zerebro” — more
AnaPet / Art Blocks (🤝): re:Fleur — “Celebrating the second anniversary of my inaugural generative art project, Fleur, I am thrilled to announce its continuation and evolution with re:Fleur. This new project not only marks a significant milestone but also reimagines the journey each piece has taken and continues to take since its inception.” Live, 300 pieces — more
9dcc (🤝) / Black Box Mints Out in 45 Seconds
Derek Edws / 404’s (🤝) Bittensor (🤝) Subnet, Accelerate
steven.hl / HYPE (🤝) Launch and Future Developments
Blast (🤝) / Soon™
Clusters (🤝) / PENGU Allocations
Bio Protocol (🤝) / BIO Token Goes Live
Pump Science / Roadmap Update
Zagabond / Azuki Dev Team Creates AI Agent
Flo / Hyperliquid (🤝) Ecosystem Map
Kerim Kaya / Dria’s (🤝) Decentralized Agent Infrastructure
Digitized / Featured x Wayfinder (🤝)
Digitized / Spotlight: Virtuals Protocol
NFTfi (🤝) / Largest-Ever On-Chain Loan Using Real Estate
Hype (🤝) / This Year on CT
Solana / First-Ever AI Hackathon
borovik / Vitalik on Quantum Computing
Sergey Gorbunov / Quantum’s Rise
Tint / Zerebro x ai16z Collaboration
Yano / MicroStrategy Outlook
Small Cap Scientist / Sekoia Makes Fourth Investment
Rui Ma / Short Videos Outpacing Box Office
Marques Brownlee / SORA Review
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Curated by @Collab_Currency x @_cutbank
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