centralized

According to tracking data from the Web3 asset data platform RootData X, in the past 7 days, the decentralized trading platform XBIT has gained the most new followers among X (Twitter) top personalities. New influential figures following this project include crypto KOL Shapo Lang (@wolfyxbt), 2Lambroz (@2lambro), and crypto KOL Gu He.hl (@ZKSgu).In addition, the project with the most followers among X top personalities also includes ink.

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin published a post proposing several ideas for optimizing democracy and decentralized governance using AI and personal LLMs (large language models). He believes that "AI directly as government" is dystopian, but mechanisms such as personal governance agents, public participation dialogue agents, and AI-enhanced suggestion/prediction markets can alleviate the issues of insufficient human attention and expertise in governance like DAOs. Vitalik also suggested introducing technologies such as multi-party secure computation, TEE, or encrypted circuits in decentralized decision-making scenarios involving sensitive information, allowing personal LLMs to participate in judgments within a "black box," while emphasizing the need to use zero-knowledge proofs and multi-party privacy computing tools to enhance participant anonymity and content privacy protection.

According to the tracking data from the Web3 asset data platform RootData X, in the past 7 days, the decentralized AI memory layer Unibase has been the project with the most unfollows by top figures on X (Twitter). The newly unfollowed influential figures on X include BroLeon (@BroLeon), 0xAA (@0xAA_Science), and 0xAA (@0xAA_Science).In addition, the project with the most unfollows by top figures on X also includes Kaito.

According to tracking data from the Web3 asset data platform RootData X, in the past 7 days, the decentralized derivatives exchange MYX.Finance has been the project with the most new followers among top figures on X (Twitter). New influential figures on X who have followed this project include zac.eth (@zacxbt) and Pump Man (@crypto_pumpman).

According to the tracking data from the Web3 asset data platform RootData X, in the past 7 days, the decentralized trading platform XBIT has been the project with the most new followers from top X (Twitter) personalities. New influential figures following this project include crypto KOL Shapo Lang (@wolfyxbt), 2Lambroz (@2lambro), and crypto KOL Gu He.hl (@ZKSgu).In addition, the project with the most followers from top X personalities also includes Venice.

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin responded to Sigil on the X platform, stating that extending the feedback distance between humans and artificial intelligence is not a good thing. This trend often leads to AI generating low-quality content rather than truly solving real human problems, and it has not achieved good optimization even at the level of entertainment experience.Vitalik further warned that once AI develops to a sufficiently powerful and potentially dangerous stage, such developmental paths could maximize the risk of irreversible anti-human outcomes, even leading the promoters themselves to feel regret. The goal of Ethereum is to grant freedom to humanity, not to create a self-operating system that leaves human conditions unchanged or even worsened.Additionally, Vitalik Buterin pointed out that current mainstream models operate on centralized infrastructure such as OpenAI and Anthropic, which is not true self-sovereignty. This disregard for centralized trust assumptions is contrary to the principles that Ethereum opposes.The trend of exponential technological growth itself is difficult to stop; therefore, the core task of the current era is not to further accelerate exponential expansion, but to guide its direction of development, avoiding the system sliding into uncontrollable or undesirable attractor states.ChainCatcher previously reported that X user @0xSigil announced on the X platform the construction of an AI system capable of autonomously generating income, self-improvement, and replication without human intervention. This technology aims to provide AI with "write" permissions to the world and supports a "new network" composed of exponentially growing sovereign AIs.The author introduced the concept of "WEB 4.0" in related discussions, defining it as the stage of the birth of superintelligent life. This system demonstrates the technological path for AI to achieve self-sustainability and evolution.Moreover, both Solana and Ethereum have retweeted this post, stating that the technology is closely related to the project.

Decentralized SocialFi platform Zora has announced the launch of a new Attention Markets platform on the Solana chain, allowing traders to trade on trending words, topics, tags, and trends. Users on the platform can create "Trends" before a topic goes viral and track their profits and losses in real-time.Zora co-founder Jacob Horne stated that currently, creating a Trend requires 1 SOL to curb spam, and the Trend itself does not provide creator rewards, but Pairs under the Trend can earn creator incentives.Additionally, according to a job posting released by Zora, the company is seeking an "Attention Economist" responsible for tracking cultural trends on platforms like TikTok, Instagram Reels, YouTube Shorts, and X to predict the next wave of trends.

Mantle network has completed the deployment support for the ERC-8004 standard, providing on-chain identity, verification, and collaboration infrastructure for decentralized AI agents.Relying on Mantle's high-performance, low-cost execution environment, applications related to the AI agent economy are expected to accelerate their implementation.

Circle Ventures announced a strategic investment in the decentralized trading platform edgeX, with specific amounts and valuation details not disclosed. Circle also plans to introduce its stablecoin USDC and cross-chain transfer protocol (CCTP) to edgeX's blockchain, EDGE Chain.It is reported that the two companies began discussions at the end of 2025 and ultimately completed the investment transaction last month, with Circle Ventures being the sole investor in this round of financing.

CZ posted on the X platform that, compared to all other centralized exchanges, Binance users hold the highest proportion of most stablecoins, including USDT, USDC, USD 1, and U.

The decentralized large model routing service platform RouterLink under WORLD3 has announced the completion of a large-scale model expansion, integrating 21 new AI models from 10 providers in one go. This update includes flagship inference models (such as GLM-4.7, Gemini 3 Pro, Nova 2.0 Pro, Kimi K2 Thinking, MiMo-V2-Pro), high-speed response models (such as Gemini 3 Flash, Kimi K2 Flash, GLM-4.7-Flash, Nova 2.0 Lite, Seed 1.6 Flash, MiMo-V2-Flash, MiniMax M2.1 Flash), multimodal generation models (such as GPT Image 1.5, Seedream 4.5, Maverick 17B (Llama 4), Seed 1.6), and programming-specific models (such as Qwen3 Coder 480B, Qwen3 Coder 32B, MiniMax M2.1, Llama 3.1 8B / 70B Instruct), aiming to support flexible routing and invocation of AI Agents in complex application scenarios.The WORLD3 team stated that developers can access these cutting-edge models with zero migration costs through RouterLink's unified API, while the platform has also optimized the UI experience for model selection and discovery to enhance development efficiency. Currently, all newly added models are officially online.

Web3 governance reputation platform DAO AI has officially launched the 0G mainnet, anchoring DAO governance reputation to a decentralized data availability layer. The platform aims to address the challenges of lacking long-term memory and reputation records in DAO governance by transforming governance data such as participation frequency, contribution levels, and representative actions into a permanent on-chain state, thereby building an immutable and verifiable governance reputation layer.In terms of technical implementation, DAO AI utilizes 0G storage technology to record all governance actions, including participation timestamps, representative actions, and reputation updates, ensuring the transparency and auditability of governance history. Unlike traditional off-chain statistics or temporary analyses, this system makes reputation a fundamental primitive acquired through actions rather than capital, and is directly protected by the storage layer. With the high throughput and data availability guarantees of the 0G network, DAO AI provides infrastructure support for the long-term preservation and cross-protocol access of governance data, helping DAOs establish trustworthy governance records.

The decentralized custody startup Entropy, led by a16z, announced its shutdown and the return of remaining funds to investors.Tux Pacific, founder and CEO of Entropy, stated on the X platform that the decision was made after four years of product development, multiple business adjustments, and two rounds of layoffs. Entropy was positioned as an alternative to centralized crypto custody institutions, utilizing technologies such as multi-party computation, threshold cryptography, and trusted execution environments to provide users with cross-chain asset management and automated signing services.According to the crypto data platform RootData, the company completed a $25 million seed round financing led by a16z in 2022, with participation from Dragonfly, Variant, Coinbase Ventures, and others, raising a total of approximately $27 million. Pacific mentioned that after recent research, it was found that the business model could not support venture capital-level growth, leading to the decision to cease operations and return capital. This event also reflects the tightening survival environment for crypto startups since 2025.

According to official news, the globally leading cryptocurrency trading platform Gate has completed the brand upgrade and functional update of its decentralized trading product, officially renaming the former Gate Web3 to Gate DEX. This upgrade is not only a change in name but also a systematic reconstruction of the positioning of decentralized trading entry, product capabilities, and overall user experience under the Gate All in Web3 strategic framework.The upgraded Gate DEX significantly simplifies the traditional DEX login process, now supporting one-click login with Gate accounts, Google accounts, and wallets, enabling quick access across multiple platforms. Users can quickly enter the trading interface without cumbersome configurations, and after connecting their wallets, they can directly start trading, significantly lowering the entry barrier for first-time users. In terms of experience, Gate DEX provides a trading experience close to that of centralized exchanges in aspects such as interface design, token coverage, and liquidity depth, laying a solid foundation for the large-scale application of decentralized trading.Meanwhile, Gate DEX will launch the "On-chain All-round Challenge" from January 23 to February 11 (UTC+8). During the event, users who complete their "first trade" in any section of Swap, Meme, Spot, or Contracts can unlock a cash reward of up to 100 USDT. The total prize pool for the event is 20,000 USDT, with limited spots available on a first-come, first-served basis.As the Gate All in Web3 strategy continues to deepen, Gate DEX, relying on the continuous empowerment of underlying ecological capabilities such as Gate Layer, is expected to become an important hub connecting centralized and decentralized trading experiences, further promoting the maturity and popularization of Web3 infrastructure.

Vitalik Buterin posted on Farcaster, "In 2026, I will use OpenStreetMap and the encrypted email service Protonmail, prioritizing decentralized social media to enhance the efficiency of privacy data protection. At the same time, I will continue to explore deployment solutions for local large language models (LLMs).The ideal solution is to leverage local LLMs as much as possible, compensating for the lack of parameters with dedicated fine-tuning models; for high-load scenarios, we will overlay pay-per-query zero-knowledge payments, trusted execution environments, and local query filtering, essentially integrating all imperfect solutions to provide the best possible protection. Of course, the ultimate goal remains to conquer highly efficient fully homomorphic encryption technology. Sending all data to third-party centralized services is indeed redundant. We have tools to significantly reduce such operations and should continue to build and apply them more actively."

According to Dan Romero, co-founder of Farcaster, one of the Farcaster clients, Neynar, will acquire the decentralized social protocol Farcaster. In the coming weeks, the Farcaster protocol contracts, codebase, applications, and ownership of Clanker will be transferred to Neynar, which will be responsible for subsequent operations and maintenance.Some members of the Merkle team, Varun, and Dan Romero will step away from the day-to-day operations of Farcaster to focus on new projects. The Neynar team has been developing on Farcaster from the beginning and is one of the earliest Farcaster clients, with its infrastructure now supporting most of the developer ecosystem.Dan Romero stated that after five years of development, Farcaster needs new approaches and leadership to realize its full potential.

Vitalik Buterin stated that he plans to fully return to decentralized social networks in 2026, believing that if we want to build a better society, we must have better large-scale communication tools. These tools should help people filter high-quality information and opinions, find consensus, and serve the long-term interests of users rather than maximizing short-term interactions and emotional conflicts.Vitalik pointed out that there is no "one-size-fits-all" solution to the above problems, but enhancing competition is an important starting point, and decentralization is the key path to achieving competition: by sharing a data layer that allows anyone to build different clients on top of it. He revealed that since the beginning of this year, he has started using decentralized social tools for reading and posting, with all content synchronized across platforms like X, Lens, Farcaster, and Bluesky through Firefly.He also criticized some crypto social projects for deviating from their original intentions, overly viewing "token issuance" as innovation, and attempting to create price bubbles around individuals to incentivize creators. However, practice shows that such models often reward existing social capital rather than content quality, and the lifecycle of tokens is short. Vitalik emphasized that money and social interaction are not inherently in conflict; the key is whether they truly serve the content itself, such as through subscription-based support models rather than speculative asset designs.In his view, decentralized social should be driven by teams that genuinely care about the "essence of social interaction." Vitalik acknowledged the Aave team's previous long-term maintenance of Lens and expressed anticipation for the direction of the new team, believing they are more focused on solving real social problems. He stated that in the coming year, he will speak more on decentralized social platforms and encourage more users to participate in ecosystems like Lens and Farcaster, breaking free from the information adversarial environment of a single platform and exploring new forms of interaction.

Decentralized social protocol [Mask Network](https://www.rootdata.com/zh/Projects/detail/Mask Network?k=Mjk0 "Web3 portal") and [Lens Protocol](https://www.rootdata.com/zh/Projects/detail/Lens Protocol?k=MjA3Nw== "Social layer of Web3") jointly announced that Mask Network has become the new steward of Lens Protocol. In the future, the focus of Lens Protocol will shift from protocol experimentation to consumer-facing user experience, product design, and global distribution."Mask's mission is to make decentralized social features easy to use, intuitive, and able to meet the needs of everyday users, which aligns perfectly with Lens's next phase of development," said Suji Yan, founder of Mask."As Mask leads this important phase, our role will shift from daily product development to consulting. In this role, we remain committed to making open, scalable, user-owned social networks a core pillar of the future internet. We are dedicated to the long-term success of Lens, its developers, its community, and Suji and the Mask team," Lens stated in an official blog.According to RootData, Lens Protocol has raised over $46 million, with investors including Tencent, Robot Ventures, Variant Fund, and others. Last June, media reported plans for a new funding round at a valuation of $500 million. Mask Network has previously raised over $57 million, and its token MASK currently has a FDV of $60 million.