The idea of the “family” culture that so many companies strive for is seeping deeper into the crypto world, as communities are molded on a sometimes toxic, cultic stance to staunchly support the projects they are invested in.
Don’t get me wrong, some parts of the crypto community are great – I’m part of a few communities myself – but if abused it can lead to the blind leading the blind. Sometimes off a cliff.
Last month, Do Kwon, the founder of Terraform Labs (TFL) – the organization behind the now-dead algorithmic stablecoin TerraUSD (UST) and cryptocurrency Terra (LUNA) – urged patience and support from his community of “LUNAtics” as a team rushed to create Terra 2.0.
Even as the Terra/LUNA situation unfolded and imploded, the “LUNAtic” community surrounding the comatose project supported the cause and ignored the risks highlighted by other investors. Some LUNAtics still support the relaunched LUNA 2.0, even after everything that happened to the original project.
Of course, that wasn’t the only time a crypto project reached out to hands that supported their efforts to keep them afloat.
Confirmation bias galore
When you’re involved in a disruptive space, it can feel lonely when the mainstream world doesn’t understand or care, so people will often work together to support each other, Matt Hougan, chief investment officer at Bitwise Asset Management, told Marketingwithanoy.
“There is a tremendous amount of bias in this space,” said Mike Alfred, board member at Eaglebrook Advisors and Iris Energy. “That affirmation bias leads people to attack others who raise issues that would have saved them money because they would rather continue to support the decisions they’ve already made rather than investigate what outsiders do. [the community] say to be careful.”
While “community” is an open-ended concept that can be used to support many things – from cryptocurrency to founders to a project – a significant amount of value is automatically attached to a project when it has a huge following.