Setback in Project Upgrade: Reflection on Current Coin Listing Standards

Recently, our project is undergoing brand and mainnet upgrades, while also conducting a coin swap operation. As a project that has been building since 2017, we are quite familiar with these standard processes. In addition to the necessary compliance procedures and code audits, the main considerations are market budget, acquiring new users and traffic, as well as how to benefit existing users. This is a mutually beneficial cooperation between the project team and the trading platform, where both parties get what they need, and this is perfectly understandable.

However, after engaging with certain trading platforms, we encountered some confusing situations. Following the initial business communication, the research department raised several potential issues that could prevent us from listing or require an increased budget. Here are a few aspects worth discussing:

Firstly, they believe that our data popularity is insufficient, especially in terms of social media and on-chain data. They also compared us with other projects in the same industry. This made me puzzled; as a professional research department, can't they discern the authenticity of the data? Some projects have obviously abnormal social media data, and the on-chain data also shows unreasonable trading patterns. Especially in the field of AI data annotation, high-quality data processing has its barriers, and large-scale annotation actions are unlikely to occur unless costs are completely ignored or there are ulterior motives.

Secondly, they emphasize the importance of endorsements from investment institutions. However, as a project that has been established for more than 6 years, we have always relied on our own funds for development and have never accepted external investment. In our view, this purely community-driven model without institutional control is more worthy of appreciation, isn't it? Unfortunately, in the eyes of the research department, this has become a symbol of lacking "orthodox" endorsements and popularity.

The third question involves the circulation and valuation of the tokens. Our tokens have all been unlocked, and the market capitalization is equal to the fully diluted valuation, with nearly 70% locked in validation nodes. The research department believes there is considerable selling pressure, but this view seems to overlook our long-term stable community foundation and the experience of being listed on major trading platforms. Moreover, compared to projects that are valued at $1 billion right after launch, our AI data layer project, which has actual business, products, and customers, has a market capitalization of less than $100 million, making it more worthy of attention.

These experiences have made me reflect on whether the current listing standards have deviated from their essence. Traffic fraud, data fraud, project skin-changing, and even the so-called "founder skin-changing," along with various airdrop operations, seem to have become the standard practices for projects to get listed. This trend is concerning.

Looking back at the ICO era of 2017/2018, although resources were scarce, the community atmosphere was pure. Everyone discussed substantial topics such as how to improve efficiency, enhance security, and promote the market. When facing hacker attacks, the entire industry would unite to respond together. At that time, cooperation was more out of a spirit of mutual assistance rather than for kickbacks or referral fees.

As veterans of the industry, we have witnessed the alternation of bull and bear markets and understand the difficulty of maintaining our original intentions. However, it is precisely because we have experienced the storms that we are more committed to our principles. We choose not to engage in operations that may harm the interests of retail investors, deviate from the essence of the project, or affect the healthy development of the entire industry.

In this rapidly changing cryptocurrency world, we long for the pure ideals and passions of the past. Despite facing challenges, we will remain true to our original intentions and continue to contribute our strength to the long-term development of the industry.