Good Morning ☕️ 

As 2024 draws to a close, we're taking a moment to reflect on an extraordinary year in the Crypto x AI space.

When we launched Outpost, many dismissed the intersection of crypto and AI as two buzzwords throw together. Yet here we are, watching it become the dominant crypto sector by mindshare and new project launches.

This year we:

• Published 150 newsletters

• Released 7 podcasts

• Recorded 12 Twitter spaces

• Connected with 300+ founders & investors

• Attended 4 conferences

• Amassed over 1,500 subscribers

• Added a third teammate 👀

  … and it’s safe to say that we definitely aren’t leaving in 2025!

Twitter Wrapped! 🐤

Our top tweets! 🙂

I guess we are getting girlfriends? 🥹

C’mon, we just started this year! 😭

Major Hits 🎯

🔥 Grass (March) — covered in our first ever newsletter and repeatedly shared for airdrop farming purposes — had an incredibly successful launch and airdropped to tens of thousands of people.

🔥 On-Chain AI Agents(March) — we have seen this happen in a BIG way over the past few months. Truth Terminal and $GOAT ignited the agent narrative, leading to thousands of AI agents now actively engaging both on social media and on-chain.

🔥 Virtuals Protocol (March) — now a multi-billion dollar protocol and the go-to platform on Base for launching AI agents.

🔥 Decentralized Computing (April) — now showing up in a big way with Akash smashing metrics across the board and decentralized training from the likes of Prime Intellect and Nous Research proving that distributed training is now possible.

🔥 Initial Model Offerings (April) — we saw this as having similar potential as the 2017 ICO boom, and waiting it play out over the past few months has been beyond incredible.

🔥AI companions as the next big thing (April) — see the success of LUNA and platforms like Lush as evidence.

🔥 DePIN is one of the best use-cases for crypto (May) — while still playing out (and has a long ay to go), we are seeing numerous DePIN projects now bringing in considerable revenue and seeing real usage. See Akash and DAWN as prime examples.

🔥 Data as a key component of the Crypto x AI stack (May) — playing out with multiple billion dollar protocols focused specifically on AI data, including Grass and Vana.

🔥Fair Launches are the META (May) — this has played out in a huge way. ai16z is a prime example of a fair-launched token and open-source that has now cracked a billion dollar valuation and has been trending on Github for months.

🔥 Using Mindshare on Kaito as a trade signal (June) — now a go-to metric for many traders familiar with Kaito.

🔥 Autonomous Economic Value Creation (July) — we now have agents transacting on-chain and even allocating capital into trading strategies. Although, it’s fair to say this is in the process of playing out fully and it’s still early days.

🔥 Bittensor (August) — covered around it’s local bottom in August, safe to say that Bittensor has captured the hearts and minds of many interested in Crypto x AI.

🔥 Key Trends in DeAI (September) - Coordination layers, Data and Distributed Model Training, all of which have continued to grow in relevance and mindshare.

Mixed Results 📊

😐️ Artificial Superintelligence Alliance (April) — the three-way merger between OCEAN, FET and AGIX which we were dubious of at the time and so far, we haven’t seen much to give us more confidence.

👎️ Decentralized Inference (May) — While we didn’t make any specific predictions, we haven’t seen meaningful adoption of decentralized inference protocols.

👎️ MOR20 Token Launches (July) — honestly, we thought this would be bigger than it has been. Might just need more time but it appears other fair launch mechanism have taken over.

Emerging Narratives🔭 

A few of our more recent pieces are still in the process of playing out:

⚡️ Edge Computing

⚡️ AI for Prediction Markets

⚡️ Agent Swarms

We also are closely following:

• Agent frameworks

• Trusted execution environments

• Distributed training

• AI’s role in DeSci

• LLM optimization & scaling

• Solana’s proliferating AI ecosystem

• Bittensor (of course)

Events & Releases

📍Vana successfully launched its mainnet on December 16th, accompanied by a strategic VANA token airdrop targeting early DataDAO participants, community builders, and NFT holders from a December 13th snapshot.

📍Web3 startup Fraction AI secured a significant $6M pre-seed investment led by The Spartan Group and Symbolic VC, positioning itself to democratize access to high-quality AI training data within the Web3 ecosystem.

📍AI infrastructure project Mira strengthened its computing capabilities through a partnership with Hyperbolic's GPU marketplace, while demonstrating strong market demand as their Node Delegator program's first tranche reached full subscription immediately upon launch.

📍ai16z released Version 2 of their Eliza framework, introducing critical improvements including a unified message bus and agent wallet system, alongside expanded community plugin support, enhancing the platform's functionality for AI development.

📍Lush AI entered the AI monetization space with their innovative Lush Exchange, a specialized DEX and launchpad platform enabling users to create and tokenize AI influencers, introducing a novel way to participate in AI content creator economics.

📍Alchemist AI enhanced their no-code development platform with a V2 release, focusing on improved scalability and modularity to make AI application development more accessible to users without programming expertise.

📍Hyperbolic Labs launched a verifiable inference service, addressing key challenges in AI model deployment by optimizing performance, strengthening privacy measures, and reducing operational complexity for developers.

📍SQDGN introduced an AI-powered trading platform that combines machine learning with community governance, where SQDGN token holders can vote on trade decisions and earn rewards for accurate predictions, creating a unique solution to AI hallucination issues.

📍UBC launched Agent Academy, a zero-code platform enabling users to create sophisticated AI assistants directly on Telegram, lowering the barrier to entry for custom AI agent development.

📍KIP Protocol initiated a strategic token distribution by airdropping MOCA tokens to their most dedicated supporters, allocating 710,000 MOCA specifically to the top 1,500 KIP token holders.

📍Sahara AI commenced its testnet phase with the introduction of a Data Services Platform, implementing a points-based reward system for users who contribute their knowledge and data to AI training initiatives.

Podcasts

We dropped two podcasts this week!

All-in on Bittensor: Sami Kassab & Seth Bloomberg on Dynamic TAO:

Allora Network: Turning AI Agents into Capital Allocators with Nick Emmons

That’s a Wrap!

As we enter 2025, we're humbled by the community's support and excited about the future of Crypto x AI. Our coverage will continue to focus on the breakthrough innovations happening at this transformative intersection.

Thank you for being part of our journey. The best is yet to come!

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