Blocktempo list nearly 40 awardees, including outstanding entrepreneurs, option leaders, and Taiwanese with global influence, compiled into “2022 Taiwan Blockchain Influencers list”, and asked them to share their predictions and trend observations for 2023.
This article you will find a detailed list of the “Global influencer ＆ Politician” and their detailed trend predictions for 2023.
Shortlist：
> Yat Siu / Animoca Brands Co-Founder
> Ppl Pleasr / NFT Artist 、Soul person of PleasrDao
> Kevin Lin / Twitch、Metatheory Co-Founder
> Leo Peng / Taiwan Blockchain Academia(TBA) President
> Chen Mei-ling / Taiwan Blockchain Alliance Organizer
Read Full《2022 Taiwan Blockchain Influencers list》
Yat Siu / Animoca Brands Co-Founder ＆ Executive Chairman
- Animoca has accumulatively invested in more than 300 projects, including Axie Infinity, the popular metaverse project The Sandbox, Decentraland, NFT trading leader OpenSea…etc.
- In September of this year, Animoca’s valuation approached $6 billion, led by Liberty City Ventures, and participating institutions included Soros Fund Management Company and Sequoia China.
Xiao Yi’s 2023 predictions and observations:
Over the past few years a number of high-quality AAA crypto games have been in development and will begin launching in 2023, which is the year when we will see gaming and culture boost the number of Web3 adopters to well above 100 million users.
We expect regulation on cryptocurrencies and digital assets from various governments will become clearer. Improved regulatory clarity will drive more adoption and restore some of the confidence that was damaged during 2022. Asia will lead the way with policies being put in place that will drive adoption, like Hong Kong, which has announced crypto ETFs, and Japan, where regulators have welcomed the new technology.
Some consolidation will take place; we expect to see M&A deals being done not only by metaverse focused companies like us (we recently acquired PIXELYNX) but also by large corporates who need to enter the Web3 space.
Our industry has experienced multiple cycles just within 2022, and we expect that we will continue to see these accelerated micro-cycles. With each cycle the industry will gain in strength and stability. Outside of gaming and sports, which have been quite well covered, we also believe education is a particularly important area.
Our work with TinyTap has demonstrated that educators can build up and benefit from their own equity on blockchain, even when that involvement is based on Web2 content and a Web2 platform. We think that’s very important on every possible level and when it’s more broadly understood it will significantly drive adoption.
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Ppl Pleasr / NFT Artist 、Soul person of PleasrDao
- Launched the decentralized audio-visual platform “Shibuya (Shibuya)” earlier this year, and received a financing of $6.9 million led by a16z and Variant Fund, with a valuation of $50 million.
- Included in the 2022 “Forbes” under 30 elite list, the main representative of PleasrDAO, once bid $5.4 million for the NFT “Stay Free” of the ghost hacker Snowden, and bid 1696.6 ETH ($6.5 million) for Dogecoin’s original Shiba Inu meme.
Ppl Pleasr’s 2023 predictions and observations:
My thoughts for 2023 is that we will spend some time recovering from the FTX scandal, but innovation will continue to shine. The FTX collapse is not good for the industry overall, but I think it just furthers my belief that centralization will always have its pain points and help steward users towards a more decentralized future.
The loss of funds is painful for many but perhaps a valuable lesson of “not your keys, not your coins”. Many jump on the crypto bandwagon without truly understanding what the blockchain or decentralization really means, and this will probably change that for them. DeFi is helping us work towards a more transparent and permissionless future.
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Kevin Lin / Twitch、Metatheory Co-Founder
- Once the COO of Twitch, he promoted the platform to become the world’s largest live game platform, and was successfully sold to Amazon for $970 million.
- Metatheory Co-founder and received $24 million in Series A financing in May this year, led by a16z, Pantera Capital, and Dragonfly Capital Partners participated.
- Launched blockchain game Duskbreakers, the initial series of 10,000 NFTs sold out in just one week.
Kevin’s 2023 predictions and observations:
Finally some good web3 games. Crypto starts over with real utility backing. AI eats the world of content.
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Leo Peng / Taiwan Blockchain Academia(TBA) President
- TBA currently has 30 official club/laboratory/research center members from universities across Taiwan, focusing on four areas: academia-industry collaboration, research and education, career development, and international exchange. It leads thousands of students and members of the public each year to understand blockchain and its applications.
- TBA is renowned for its research group, including Blockchain Financial Law Group, Smart Contract Practice Group, and On-chain Data Research Group. In 2022, the TBA became a member of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its subgroup, YOUNGO, contributing to the promotion of climate action issues.
Peng’s 2023 predictions and observations:
1. The FTX incident has led to a tightening of global virtual asset financial supervision policies. In 2023, regulatory bodies will have a stronger motivation to scrutinize and regulate Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) that exhibit financial industry characteristics with a degree of intensity approaching that of the financial industry, especially in the areas of anti-money laundering, investor protection, consumer protection, and even Web3 infrastructure, legal compliance consulting and technical services will receive more attention.
The dialogue between the development of emerging technology applications and the degree of supervision will be a hot topic in 2023. Debates will continue, and the industry will spontaneously or be forced to form self-regulatory organizations. NGOs will become even more important and will influence the development pattern for the next few years.
2. Despite warnings from the World Bank and IMF that 2023 may see a global economic recession, the expectation in the industry is that 2023 will see a influx of capital, and the turning point for leverage and volatility may arrive in the middle of 2023, with trading gradually becoming more active. Of course, everything still depends on the macroeconomic cycle, the policy trends of various countries led by the United States, and the internal logic of crypto assets.
In 2023, we will see many potential newcomers that were introduced in the last cycle go live on the main network, including the zero-knowledge proof (ZK) based Layer2 solutions: Polygon zkEVM, zkSync, and Scroll; the Lens Protocol, which aims to revolutionize the social network ecosystem and is led by the founder of Aave; and of course, the Sui Network, founded by a former Facebook team, all of which are forging ahead in the Web3 industry despite the bearish environment and continuing to develop and innovate. Oh, and we continue to believe in TON – The Open Network (but this does not constitute an investment recommendation) throughout 2023.
3. The bear market is a time for learning and cultivation, and in addition to trading and investing in crypto assets, more people will enter the Web3 industry in 2023. The demand for Web3 jobs has increased rather than decreased during the bear market, and the supply-demand gap has caused salaries of the same position to be higher in this industry than others. Also, there is a high demand for courses that can provide retraining or cross-skilling.
The TBA has talent cooperation plans with many financial holdings. In 2022, when financial institutions are actively diving into Web3, Cathay Financial Holdings even released the internship recruitment for the second time within a year, reflecting the low correlation between the demand for blockchain talent and the price of cryptocurrency. 2023 will be the graduation season for the DeFi and NFT generation, and more excellent, well-trained, creative, and experienced talents will enter the industry. Let’s wait and see!
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Chen Mei-ling / Taiwan Blockchain Alliance Organizer
- Establish a training system for blockchain development and technologies with multiple incubators and organizations to promote blockchain development in Taiwan.
- Promote Taiwan Blockchain Service Platform (BaaS) and T-Road (cross-machine data transfer service), a project of National Development Council.
- Promote carbon emission reduction regulations and assist enterprises to use blockchain for carbon inventory.
Chen’s 2023 predictions and observations:
From 2021-2022, we had a huge drop, a bull market for one year and a bear market for one year, which really confused many new practitioners and investors, but this has been the “New Normal” for the blockchain industry for a long time.
After the New Normal, comes the New Order! The increased regulation of CEX and stablecoins by governments will make the overall industry environment and development more stringent.
The decentralized governance of blockchain technology, the autonomy of online behavior, and Web3 information security are all on the table, both governments and the private sector must prepare for the rainy days to keep up with the times.
Although the total global NFT market reached $12.5 billion in the Q1 of 2022, and dropped by 90% in the Q4 of 2022. But, NFT technology has attracted more than a thousand major brands around the world to try it out, and a variety of different kinds of empowerment are happening at the same time, making NFT the most widespread application.
We must really focus on applications rather than investment tools, and I believe that cryptocurrency still has a very bright future.
