Paragraph’s best shot at long-term success is to find a way to encourage ongoing, meaningful commerce between readers and writers. In that light, the central question around coins is whether readers will actually buy coins on Paragraph, either at a writer- or post-level, or in a way we haven’t considered.
Because human nature is stable, the reasons people buy things tend to stay the same over time. Let’s explore a few reasons why a reader may want to buy coins on Paragraph (or elsewhere).
A few things to keep in mind as we go through the various motivations:
How much better suited are coins (or other blockchain-enabled commerce) to enable each motivation compared to what exists today (e.g., paid subscriptions, sponsorships, etc.)?
How speculative is each motivation? In other words, how likely is each motivation to lead to a large, sustainable economy around great writing?
Utility & Access
Utility is usually the most obvious and logical starting point. People will pay to access paywalled posts, gated discussions, and member-only events.
Often, the underlying motive is to gain insights that will help them make more money, like becoming a better engineer, a better manager, or a better investor. Many of the top performing writers on Substack, mostly across tech, finance, and business, lean into this dynamic (e.g., Lenny’s Newsletter, The Pragmatic Engineer, ByteByteGo, Doomberg).
Could coins be used to gate posts, events, or functionality (like commenting)? Absolutely.
But don’t paid subscriptions already do this pretty well?
Unless coins offer something better than a simple paywall or gating function, they’ll likely feel like a roundabout way to do something that already works. This may be part of why token-gated writing and NFT memberships didn’t gain much traction on Paragraph.
So while utility-based monetization has low speculation (there’s plenty of precedent for it), it’s not yet clear how coins would outperform paid subscriptions in this use case. That doesn’t mean we should ignore utility, but it probably shouldn’t be the only motivator, or even the primary one we focus on.
Patronage
Sometimes, people spend money simply to support creative work they admire or want to see more of in the world. It may be less common than utility-based spending, but it does happen — and when it does, it can be powerful.
Some of the highest-earning writers on Substack, like Letters from an American and Popular Information, don’t paywall anything. Similarly, many top Patreon accounts rely on patronage alone, offering little in the way of gated media or tangible benefits.
We’ve seen this dynamic on Paragraph, too. While far less common than speculation-driven collecting, some readers collect posts purely to show support for a writer.
As long as the experience isn’t hyper-financialized (like, say, pump.fun), coins could offer a simple and clear way to say: “I appreciate this work and want to see more of it.”
Patronage isn’t speculative — there’s plenty of precedent for it — but it’s still unclear whether coins provide a much better way to support patronage over what exists today (perhaps especially open edition NFTs!). It’ll come down, in part, to how coins are framed in the product and how the incentives and payouts are designed.
Still, there’s real potential here. If we get the product experience & incentives right, coins could make patronage feel more personal, more visible, and more rewarding, for both writers and readers.
Identity, Self-Expression, and Finding Friends
This is where things get more interesting.
We’ve barely scratched the surface on how owning digital assets could help people express who they are and, on the flip side, find others that share their interests.
At Crunchyroll (where I worked for 7+ years), this was central to why people formed such strong emotional bonds with the brand (and why they paid for our products). We saw a steady stream of fan art, waves of fans coming to conventions, and even the ultimate sign of devotion: Crunchyroll tattoos. But more importantly, we saw fans coming together through Crunchyroll — we were helping turn total strangers into friends.
We’ve seen similar motivations drive profile picture projects (CryptoPunks, BAYC), the broader NFT boom in 2021, and modern media brands that lean into self-expression & community (Doodles, Pudgy Penguins).
But there’s still so much opportunity to help people show off the music they love, the writing that moves them, the videos that take them to different worlds. To help people create their home on the internet, their internet bedroom.
Coins — maybe paired with limited edition NFTs — could open up new, meaningful forms of self-expression and (on the flip side) help folks find friends on the internet.
From the examples above and beyond, there’s lots of precedence for self-expression and finding like-minded communities. And here I actually think digital assets (coins, NFTs, etc.) can far outperform what exists on the internet today.
But it’s hard to get this right. We'll need to give people digital assets they actually want to show off, and then find high-trafficked and/or high-signal places where those assets are shown (this is why the PFP was so effective — they were all over Twitter).
There’s a lot more details to figure out, but helping people express themselves and find new friends through digital assets feels like one of the most exciting, high-upside bets for onchain apps.
Being Early with a Pinch of Speculation
I’ve gone on quite the journey in how I feel about speculation in the context of onchain apps. My initial instinct was that most plays on speculation were too zero-sum-y, too vulnerable to rug pulling & malicious behavior, and generally unsustainable.
For products that aspire to be more than betting apps, I still think leaning too hard into speculation is risky — it can give teams a false sense of traction and lead to near-term cash grabs. But I'm open to the idea that speculation can be a source of differentiation relative to what exists on the internet today and help products gain early momentum.
In my opinion, the key is to support speculation in a way where it’s not the primary motivator, but perhaps a secondary or tertiary motivator. For example, if you believe in a writer or an idea early on, you might buy the corresponding coin early. If others come to appreciate the work later, your coins may become more valuable.
But I think for this motivation to become sustainable, the financial upside should feel like a bonus — not the primary reason for buying coins.
Making speculation a tertiary motivator is where thoughtful product design is critical. Language, framing, and UX design must clearly prioritize primary motivations like community, identity, or genuine belief. Financial upside, if present at all, must remain in the background. Otherwise, we risk creating another short-lived, zero-sum crypto game.
I especially like the idea of coins at the writer or publication level in enabling speculation. When I was working at Substack, I started a paid newsletter as a way to dogfood our product. Seeing people actually pay for what I was writing was so much more meaningful then the actual dollar amount. It’s hugely motivating and gives writers confidence that they’re on to something, helping them battle through the early slog of writing on the internet when virtually no one cares.
With paid subscriptions, early supporters provide enormous value to writers, but don’t necessarily get anything in return (other than gratification). If there were a way to do the same thing — provide support to early writers — but also have a small chance of upside if the writer does well, would that lead to more people supporting early writers and, by extension, a larger economy around writing?
Coins as a Way to Combat Slop
I’ve been chewing on this one since listening to Jackson Dahl interview with Jacob Horne, which I strongly recommend checking out. One of the points they discuss is how coins could serve as a way to value ideas, media, art, and so on, and drive discovery. And how that becomes incredibly important in a world with mass-produced media and “AI slop”.
Having readers buy coins to drive curation and discovery feels more speculative than anything above. Will people help drive signal for others with their hard-earned dollars? Are they actually bothered by AI slop?
BUT, the more I thought about it, the more it felt familiar. On Substack, there are cases where readers pay to amplify a writer’s work and turn up the volume on ideas they care about. Again, Popular Information is a great example — there’s no paywall, and Judd frequently leans into readers helping him increase the impact of his reporting.
Coins could offer a much stronger signal layer than paid subscriptions. When someone buys a coin because a post or writer resonated with them, that purchase becomes more than support — it becomes a visible marker of value in the marketplace of ideas and media, something paid subscriptions can’t do.
Will people buy coins?
We know the current internet restricts the ecosystem & economy around great writing:
Paywalls limit reach & slow growth.
Ads & sponsorships dilute authenticity and distract from creative work.
Platforms maximize ad impressions, not discovery, quality, or thoughtful discourse.
Subscriptions force writers into full-time publishing — a path many can’t or don’t want to take.
As far as I can tell, the open edition meta hasn’t really generated a sustainable business for any onchain apps, and it hasn’t really expanded the economy for creative work on the internet. So we need to find something better.
Coins will not be a panacea and there’s plenty of reason to remain skeptical that people will buy coins for creative work. But coins feel like a worthy experiment, a way to explore new ideas and better understand what truly resonates with readers and writers.
Hopefully it’s the first step of many toward a better internet — one that values creative work more deeply and makes it easier for readers and writers to find each other, support each other, and build something lasting together.
