Cryptocurrency Can Accelerate Artificial Intelligence Adoption by Helping AI Startups Onboard Users

Cryptocurrency can help accelerate the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) by assisting AI startups in onboarding users, according to Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal.

During a panel discussion at the LONGITUDE by Cointelegraph event, Nailwal highlighted the unique capabilities of crypto in engaging users.

"You can use crypto incentives and disincentives to onboard users to onboard the ecosystem players," Nailwal explained.

"We might be able to build a better AI because you have this incentive engine that brings in developers," he added, emphasizing the potential of projects with effective onchain incentive structures.

Cointelegraph’s LONGITUDE is an event series that brings together leaders and innovators from the blockchain and Web3 space for exclusive discussions.

Joining the panel, Illia Polosukhin, co-founder of the Near Protocol, expanded on crypto's long-term synergy with AI, predicting that crypto-native AI agents could replace traditional web application front-ends as the primary user interfaces for Web3.

"We don’t need applications or websites anymore. Your AI becomes the interface to computing and the internet," Polosukhin asserted.

However, Nailwal issued a note of caution, pointing out that the influx of AI-related tokens onchain has also brought opportunistic scams.

"We know that 99% of those projects are literally token scams, but very few projects are actually trying to have some meaningful AI project," Nailwal said.

The era of Web3 AI agents

The role of AI agents in decentralized communities is expected to become more prominent, as highlighted by J.D. Seraphine, co-founder of Web3 developer Raiinmaker, in a recent interview with Cointelegraph.

According to a report by VanEck, over 1 million AI agents could enter the market in 2025, many of them tied to decentralized finance applications. These agents are already autonomously reshaping the digital economy, building decentralized applications, launching tokens and interacting with humans.

"AI is an extremely centralizing force. A few companies could become the warlords of the world," Nailwal stated.

"That’s why crypto-native, peer-to-peer AI solutions are so important—they enable privacy-preserving innovation," Polosukhin added.