Last Thursday, ThreeFold co-founder Florian Fournier joined SURGE TANK by Surgence Labs, as they explored the topic of DePIN. He was joined by Rykz and Vinh from Surgence along with Léonie, co-founder of Kaisar Network, and KaizerGaming88, head of biz dev at Aethir. (Full broadcast link at the bottom.)
Florian opened with a clear vision for DePIN’s potential:
“DePIN has the chance to finally bring what was the initial promise of blockchain. It was to … bank the unbanked and connect the unconnected. Not only to accelerate those who are already connected that are maybe just looking for faster ways to get into … the AI arm race.”
He emphasized ThreeFold’s continued efforts to build resilient infrastructure from the ground up:
“The way we’ve been approaching that momentum is just to keep building very strongly. That’s what we’ve been doing. The full intention of ThreeFold is to recreate all the blocks and pieces for enabling a truly resilient Internet.”
Léonie from Kaisar had praise for ThreeFold:
“I think that ThreeFold is a very very interesting project and they are the right people to talk about the infrastructure of the Internet … You really see how the Internet was built back then and now what the world needs when it comes to Web 4.0, a new Internet infrastructure.”
The discussion touched on the broader implications of DePIN in today’s digital world, where Florian highlighted both opportunity and urgency:
“So in a certain way, whatever is happening right now in the world, for us has been something that is negative, but extremely positive for accelerating the awareness around what it takes to create the right infrastructure layer for a new Internet and for a new interconnected world from the bottom up.”
All panelists agreed: DePIN is not a bubble – it’s essential.
“It means everyone has access.”
The conversation then moved into the challenges of adoption, including security, bandwidth, and trust. For Florian, one major barrier lies within:
“I think the biggest barrier that we have is convenience. For me the biggest enemy is actually within ourselves in that case…”
He didn’t shy away from critiquing the current Web3 landscape:
“And I want to call out the bullsh!t here in the Web3 space. I see so many projects that don’t give a sh!t about decentralization to be honest.”
“And I think the biggest blocker right now is the lack of understanding of what is really at stake. What is happening at the security level, what will happen, because right now what I see is that it’s all going very fast. And people are literally dancing and singing on the Titanic while things are sinking in terms of security and everything – because it’s not decentralized. And because it’s not decentralized at the physical level. It’s an idea of decentralization where people think it’s decentralized but it’s really not. And the reality of things is when it’s gonna shake, most of the projects won’t be ready for that.”
The session continued on the topic of triggers for adoption, which included cybersecurity, shifting perceptions in the need for local infrastructure at the country level, as well as with refugees, diasporas, and communities (e.g. network states).
To close the session, panelists were asked for a final reflection. KaizerGaming88 offered this:
“For me, continue building what you build. Stay focused. Whatever is happening in the market right now, just stay aside. Don’t be involved … Just continue building, that’s it.”
And Florian left the audience with a powerful reflection:
“We had a very important conversation about DePIN today. I would just ask everyone of us and every one of the people who are listening to this podcast, who are listening to that message to think about … whatever you’re doing in that space, how much are you committed to bring things further and closer to what was the original promise of blockchain, and what was the original promise of the internet. And if you’re doing something that is actually not aligned with that, you should just stop doing it. Because it’s creating noise and it’s creating whatever is not necessary for the world and for what is actually needed to happen in the tech space. That’s a very important message for me. At least if your energy is not going in the right space or in the right direction, just don’t give that energy to anything. Just do nothing. That would be helpful. So, thank you very much.”
Preach, Flo. Preach.
The broadcast lives exclusively on X. Watch it in full here.