Vitalik Buterin criticizes celebrity memecoins for lack of real-world value

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has expressed strong disapproval of the recent trend of celebrities experimenting with crypto by creating memecoins.

In a June 5 social media post, Buterin pointed out that most celebrity-backed memecoins lack practical utility or a specific use case backing their creation.

He added that financialization — or the process of turning something into a tradable asset — is only justified if it serves a purpose that brings value to society, such as improving healthcare, supporting open-source software, and promoting art.

Buterin believes the primary goal of any project should be to provide a sense of accomplishment or satisfaction to participants, even if the project eventually fails or the tokens become worthless. He added:

“The north star should be: to have a project where even if eventually all tokens involved go to zero, the average person who participated is happy to have done so. Regular businesses and charities accomplish this goal all the time! It’s a low bar, but things we build should meet this bar as well.”

Approval criteria

The Ethereum co-founder provided a set of criteria that a celebrity crypto project should meet to earn his respect.

First, these assets must serve a public good beyond merely enriching celebrities and early adopters. He cited the example of Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis’ Stoner Cats NFT collection as being “vastly more honorable” than other memecoins launched by celebrities this year because the project funded an actual show.

Buterin further suggested that celebrity memecoins should feature engaging mechanics like Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) activities, which would promote community participation and help the tokens grow beyond mere trading.

Additionally, he emphasized that these tokens should be designed to last more than ten years and not just trade for a few months and be easily forgotten.

Celebrity memecoin

In recent weeks, celebrity memecoins have become a new fad in the crypto industry, with superstars like Caitlyn Jenner, Iggy Azalea, and Davido launching several tokens via the Solana-based Pump Fun application.

While the results from these experiments have been varied, blockchain data shows that the assets have mostly benefited early traders who accumulated a substantial position in them. For example, blockchain analyst Lookonchain reported that an address associated with Nigerian record producer Davido made a profit of more than $470,000 in just 11 hours.

Meanwhile, Iggy Azalea’s Mother Iggy token continues to generate interest after soaring around 500% over the last seven days, based on CryptoSlate data.