A Brief Discussion on How Lorebuilder Leads the Cryptocurrency Renaissance: The Need for Myth Creation Over Marketing Personnel

04/23/2025

Technical Evolution Cannot Save Lost Souls: The Industry Needs More Than Marketing, but to Rediscover Meaning and Myth

Crypto KOL DeFi Dave recently published a lengthy article titled “Reject Marketing, Return to Lorebuilding,” directly addressing the deep “story crisis” facing the crypto industry. Despite rapid advancements in blockchain technology, cultural progress has stagnated. He believes that to save the industry, it is essential to abandon short-term marketing thinking and instead invest in a more fundamental cultural project: “Lorebuilding.”

The Cultural Predicament of Cryptocurrency: Gloomy Clouds and Overcast Skies

Dave points out that in recent years, apart from Bitcoin and Solana meme coins, the crypto industry has nearly stagnated in attracting new participants. This lack of growth has created a pervasive sense of negativity within the industry, particularly evident in the Ethereum ecosystem. The root of the problem lies in the industry’s failure to tell compelling stories, relying too heavily on short-sighted marketing strategies while neglecting deeper cultural resonance.

He emphasizes that marketing alone cannot solve the problem; the real way forward is through “Lorebuilding,” creating a shared myth framework for the community that encourages participants to co-create and continue cultural traditions.

What is Lorebuilding? Creating Living Myths to Unite Community Souls

Dave defines “Lorebuilding” as an art of dynamic storytelling that involves observing contemporary issues, extracting resonant memes and symbols, and creating a culture that invites people to engage and co-create. Rather than merely a storytelling exercise, it is a process of incubating a cultural community: Lorebuilders act as cultural apostles of the era, not directing the narrative but listening to the community and respecting its evolution, weaving fragmented imaginations into a powerful mythological system.

Three Levels of Lorebuilding: An Evolution from Attention to Co-Creation

Dave divides Lorebuilding into three levels, revealing how it guides the community to deepen participation gradually:

Attention: Users first encounter and pay attention, without yet establishing an emotional connection.
Emotional Identification: Participants begin to engage and establish identity connections with the narrative.
Co-Creators: Deeply engaged participants start to create content, such as memes, internal jokes, narrative rituals, or significant events, attracting more people to join.

Lorebuilding cannot be faked or bought; it must be realized through genuine participation and experience. Ultimately, it can transform repetitive actions into a shared culture, allowing people to feel a sense of belonging and pass it on to future generations.

Case Study of Legends: The Mythical Foundations of Bitcoin and Ethereum

Dave uses Bitcoin and Ethereum as examples to explain how Lorebuilding operates within the crypto industry:

Bitcoin’s Origin Myth and Cultural Rituals

Bitcoin was founded by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008, closely linked to the backdrop of the financial crisis. The embedded newspaper headline in the genesis block, “The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks,” establishes the core spirit of Bitcoin’s resistance against centralized finance. Subsequently, the persistent spirit of the “HODL” meme, Bitcoin Pizza Day, and the lesson from Mt. Gox’s “Not your keys, not your coins” gradually built a unique cultural system for Bitcoin. Figures like Bitcoin Jesus Roger Ver, Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht, and Michael Saylor, who led Bitcoin into Wall Street, have added new chapters to the Bitcoin legend.

The Multi-Layered Narrative Evolution of Ethereum

Ethereum was founded by Vitalik Buterin, with the core idea of “programming sovereignty,” often hailed as the “world computer.” Its genesis block also references Bitcoin’s genesis message, symbolizing the spiritual connection between the two. Ethereum’s legendary system is more diverse and open, having undergone phases such as the ICO boom, DeFi Summer, NFT frenzy, and DAO revival. Early efforts like ConsenSys, founded by Joe Lubin, provided the necessary cultural and technical foundation for the Ethereum community through tools like MetaMask.

Perilous Waters: When Marketing Replaces Lorebuilding

Dave warns that in recent years, Ethereum’s cultural energy has significantly diminished, primarily due to L2 expansions and emerging public chains diverting the original community focus: “Current L2s are spiritually more like independent L1s.”

At the same time, the industry has overly relied on short-term incentive activities such as large-scale fundraising and TGE (Token Generation Events), leading to Lorebuilding being replaced by marketing tactics, devolving into a short-sighted “data game”: We treat users as data rather than souls, which is a mistake of the crypto industry and the root of the “burnout and disillusionment” vicious cycle.

A Call to Rediscover Meaning: Returning to the Essence of Narrative and Community

Finally, Dave calls on the entire industry to return to “Lorebuilding,” awakening people’s passion and participation in crypto culture. He believes this is the “spiritual infrastructure” that unites the community and inspires creation. The vision for the future is to have more Lorebuilders co-creating and sharing stories, turning cryptocurrency into a movement that advances both technology and culture. We are forgetting our original intent, but as long as we are willing to start telling stories and listen to each other, we can once again welcome a renaissance for this era.

Risk Warning

Investing in cryptocurrency carries high risks, and its prices can fluctuate dramatically; you may lose your entire principal. Please assess the risks cautiously.