Why Telegram is the cradle of crypto adoption

Author: David Zimmerman, K33 Research; Translator: BitpushNews Mary Liu

If you sit in on any crypto podcast or conference, you’ll hear crypto natives talk about the upcoming “killer” app, the one crypto adoption tool that will kill it all and become a huge hit.

But what if it already exists? We believe that Telegram and a handful of independent developers have made more progress in getting the masses into cryptocurrency than the $100 billion in venture capital that has poured into the space since 2014.

Cryptocurrency adoption has been hampered by (i) poor user experience, (ii) limited real-world utility, and (iii) poor distribution. By supporting and integrating The Open Network (TON), Telegram is addressing all of these issues and more.

From a Crypto Enthusiast's Perspective

In its early days and until recently, cryptocurrencies focused on niche technology development, primarily serving crypto speculators and lacking real-world utility. With the advent of spot ETFs and firms like BlackRock opening funds focused on asset tokenization, it's time to evolve.

Telegram combines its messaging app with 800 million monthly active users, a blockchain that provides rails for TON cryptocurrency adoption, and a native wallet bot called Wallet. Many crypto pitches vaguely romanticize the idea of ​​"melding Web2 and Web3," and Telegram is actually doing just that.

With this combination, Telegram solves three core problems that have held crypto back.

In my opinion, stablecoins are the greatest product crypto has ever seen. Since April, with the advent of native USDT on TON, seamless P2P transfers of value have become a reality. Users can send crypto to friends as easily as sending a message on WhatsApp. This is a smoother user experience than neo-banks like Venmo or Revolut, and light years ahead of traditional banks.

However, the opportunity to attract hundreds of millions of people to cryptocurrencies may well come from Telegram's Mini Apps - an open platform for businesses to build and deploy crypto-friendly applications. This will enable crypto teams to distribute their products to non-crypto native users without the end user necessarily knowing that they are using a crypto product - whether it's a fun mobile game or a DeFi protocol.

From the perspective of crypto natives

Telegram has long since cemented its position in the cryptocurrency space. It is a popular platform used by crypto natives to stay in touch or share ideas, and is often the first social media channel established by new cryptocurrency projects along with their X accounts.

Things have become more than that for on-chain traders lately. A new generation of Telegram trading bots has forever changed the UX of cryptocurrencies, and perhaps even on-chain trading, forever.

Buy/sell, set limit orders, scan new projects, preempt new launches, and copy “smart money” trades, all made simple with a single command.

With Telegram bots, I’ve completely escaped the most frustrating UX issues of on-chain trading, which has been refreshing. It’s one of the very few times a crypto product has made me say “wow, this is awesome.” However, it has certainly made altcoin trading more competitive and spurred what I consider to be the “altcoin surge.”

Does this mean that altcoin trading/investing is dead? Far from it. The ease with which newbies can interact with smart contracts now is simply a world away compared to when they first started. Combined with distribution and increasingly useful applications, this means there will be a wave of new capital flowing into crypto over the next few years.

Exciting, but there is still work to be done

The improvements we have made in the user experience cannot be overstated. I say this because I personally have made non-crypto friends through TON’s wallet. Before Telegram’s current infrastructure, I sighed at the thought of teaching a friend how to use crypto. Now, thanks to Telegram, I don’t see how it could be easier.

Have Telegram and TON won? Not exactly.

The improvements in user experience and distribution are a huge leap forward, but we have yet to see full-blown consumer-facing applications.

Mini Apps are in the works, and game developers have a big incentive to build a fun Telegram game that will capture the attention of its massive user base. It’s a shame that what exists now is more meme-based than utility-based. Regulation also remains an issue, but that’s an ongoing industry problem that isn’t limited to Telegram or TON.

Telegram and TON still have a lot of catching up to do, but I’m confident they’ll succeed. The market seems to be pricing this in now, as TON has already made it into the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market cap. Much of TON’s rally has been driven by the kind of frenzy of speculation we’re all too familiar with, but there are real fundamentals behind its growth.

Most of us want to see a future where cryptocurrencies are widely used by the masses. This view is also held by Pavel Durov, co-founder and CEO of Telegram, who is also a major advocate of Bitcoin. TON’s mission statement is to “put cryptocurrency in everyone’s pocket,” and in short, Telegram has more potential than any other project in this growing industry to be the first to achieve this goal.