Interview: Isabella Yang, co-founder of dappOS
Interview: 1912212.eth, Foresight News
The cryptocurrency market has continued to rise after the Fed raised interest rates, and the issues that were hotly debated in the past have been put aside. Putting aside does not mean forgetting. Some unresolved issues often plague the entire industry over and over again. Therefore, it is still meaningful to continue discussing. What is the reason why VC projects do not take over each other? The sharp drop in the tokens of high FDV projects after they were launched has caused widespread dissatisfaction in the community. What is the problem?
The root cause is a series of stories and narratives that are constantly packaged, leaving only listing, selling and falling prices. No project really considers how to solve the pain points for users. If the industry development and exploration stagnate for a long time, it will bring huge negative effects, the wealth effect will become increasingly sluggish, and the community’s opposition to the project will be aggravated, and the voices of doubt inside and outside the circle will intensify.
This time, Foresight News invited Isabella Yang, co-founder of dappOS, to explain the concept of "intention" and her thoughts on the development of the industry. The so-called intention is a clear result that users are willing to pay for. The concept of intention is broader and more comprehensive than chain abstraction. Yang said that the current state of confusion among industry practitioners is also a reshuffle. In the end, projects that only hype concepts and have no real value will be eliminated, while projects with real users and solving real industry problems will stay and go further.
Foresight News: Due to the poor performance of the coin prices of many projects that received large amounts of financing in the first half of the year, many practitioners have recently been pessimistic about projects that have received multiple rounds of institutional financing and have high valuations, and even downgraded these "VC-type projects" to "VC disks." DappOS has also experienced multiple rounds of financing. What do you think of this view of the industry?
Isabella Yang: dappOS is indeed a VC-type project that has received multiple rounds of institutional investment. However, we don’t care that much about this concept. We usually focus on user needs and acquire real users through product iteration and improvement in order to achieve longer-term and more sustainable development.
The reason why many retail investors don’t like VCs nowadays is that many projects are just hyping up concepts, brushing data, rushing to the exchange, and then selling coins. They don’t solve the pain points of user needs at all, and even PUA users in return. This set of gameplay may have worked before, but now users understand this routine and don’t buy it. After chatting with 2049 this time, many practitioners were confused. In the final analysis, this set of gameplay no longer works, and everyone doesn’t know what to do.
We have always disapproved of the tactics used by many VCs. dappOS has always focused on meeting the needs of real Web3 users, lowering the user's operating threshold and improving the user experience. In order for Web3 to truly enter thousands of households, we must make Web3 products as easy to use as Web2, or even better. Although industry practitioners are now confused, this is not a reshuffle. In the end, projects that only hype concepts and have no real value will be eliminated, while projects with real users and solving real industry problems will stay and go further.
Foresight News: We have seen that the TPS problem that was criticized in the last cycle has long been solved, but Web3 has not really reached the masses, and the user experience is still criticized by people. What do you think is the reason for this, and where is the solution?
Isabella Yang: I think that although the TPS problem has been solved, user experience is not just about TPS. Even now, the threshold of Web3 for the general public and new users is still very high. This can be divided into the following three aspects:
1. Too much knowledge required for operation
Using Web3 products requires a lot of basic knowledge, especially technical details related to blockchain, which is not easy for ordinary users. For example, when users withdraw coins from exchanges to wallets, they need to choose the right chain. Beginners may be confused or even transfer to the wrong chain. Another example is that users sign a transaction but find that it is not successful. At this time, they may need to understand the relevant knowledge of gas fees and blockchain networks. These technical barriers make the entry experience of Web3 not friendly enough.
2. Lack of clear guidance makes people give up easily
Many Web3 products assume that users already understand some professional concepts, such as gas fees, slippage, etc. But in fact, the products often lack friendly beginner guidance and easy-to-understand documentation, which makes it easy for users to get stuck during use, or even give up using them in the end.
3. High cost and slow speed
When new users start to get started, they will find that Web3 operations are often more expensive and slower than Web2 products. For example, during peak periods, ETH gas fees may be as high as several dollars, and Bitcoin miner fees may even exceed a hundred dollars. Swap operations on some on-chain decentralized exchanges may result in a loss of several dollars, and some products require more than 7 days to withdraw funds. These inconveniences give users a negative impression after trying them, and eventually they give up on continuing to experience them in depth.
dappOS hopes to make Web3 easier to use and allow more users to easily enter this world. The goal of dappOS is to help users simplify operations through a Web3 operating system, reduce user operating costs, and improve execution efficiency. Users only need to clarify the results they want to achieve their goals simply and quickly, without having to gradually understand the complex technical logic of the blockchain. In this way, the user experience will be closer to Web2, and in most cases there will be no long waits or high fees.
Foresight News: In your opinion, what is the so-called "intention"? Can you explain it with an example? I also noticed that there is another emerging concept "chain abstraction". Do you think they are similar?
Isabella Yang: Intent mainly refers to the result that the user wants to achieve, that is, a clear result that the user is willing to pay for. Related to this is the concept of "intent-centric", which means that when designing the interaction method of Web3 products, let users directly realize their intentions without worrying about the specific execution process in the middle.
Let's use an analogy to look at "intention" and "intention-centric": If I'm in my car now, the intention is where I want to go; then the traditional way of interaction is that I have to find the navigation, shift gears, step on the accelerator and brake, and turn the steering wheel; the intention-centric way of interaction is like I hired a driver, I tell the driver where I want to go, and it will help me drive the car there. As for which specific route the driver takes and how he drives the car, I don't need to care.
When it comes to chain abstraction, chain abstraction is an adjective for a feature, which describes that users do not need to pay attention to chain details such as Gas and cross-chain. Therefore, we can see that chains with chain abstraction, accounts with chain abstraction, and DApps with chain abstraction, which can omit these details, all belong to chain abstraction. Then, products centered on intent naturally include the feature of chain abstraction, because they do not want users to pay attention to the details of the relevant chain; but the details that the intent center wants to help users save are not only related to the chain, such as some abstractions of usage details outside the chain, and how to help users reduce costs as much as possible.
Simply put, the concept of intent is relatively broader and more comprehensive, and it covers the feature of chain abstraction.
Foresight News: dappOS is a good name, simple and easy to remember, and very meaningful. The letter OS at the end is intended to become the operating system for all kinds of dapps? Please introduce the composition and operation logic of the dappOS intention network.
Isabella Yang: Yes, the vision of dappOS is to become the windows operating system of Web3.
Our current core product is intent OS, which allows users to manage their assets and interact with various dApps in different scenarios on multiple chains in a simple and convenient way. Intent OS is supported by the intent execution network. Every task that a user wants to perform in intent OS will be converted into an intent and submitted to the intent execution network. Professional service providers in the intent execution network will execute the user's tasks, and users do not need to worry about the specific execution details. If the service provider's task execution fails, the user can get compensation from the money pledged by the service provider.
In this way, we can enable users to interact with Web3 applications simply and efficiently while ensuring user security. This is what we understand a Web3 operating system should do. We are also constantly expanding the ecosystem, optimizing products, and providing the best user experience.
Foresight News: I saw a very vivid metaphor that described the user experience of the intention asset recently launched by dappOS as "Yu'ebao" of Alipay, which is smooth and smooth. So, what exactly is the intention asset? What is the real advantage?
Isabella Yang: dappOS intent assets can allow users to use them directly on the chain seamlessly like native assets while earning income under the premise of decentralization and non-custody. For example, if a user holds 1,000 intentUSD, he can directly use intentUSD to open a contract on GMX without going through redemption, cross-chain operations, etc. like other interest-bearing assets; if he does not need to use it now, he can get the annualized interest of more than 10% of intentUSD.
You just mentioned Yu'ebao. In fact, the advantage of Intent Assets over some current financial products in the industry is similar to the advantage of Yu'ebao over ordinary money funds. Although ordinary money funds have immediate returns, the money in the money funds cannot be used for direct consumption or transfers. You need to redeem it. There may be a waiting period for redemption, and you may need to make additional transfers if you want to use it again after redemption. The money in Yu'ebao not only has the returns of money funds, but you can also use it to buy various things or transfer it to others at any time. Some previous current financial products that compared themselves to "Yu'ebao" are like money funds. Users need to redeem them before they can use the money in them, while Intent Assets are more like real Yu'ebao. Intent Assets can be used directly on the chain as ordinary assets, just like you use the money in Yu'ebao as the money in your bank card for consumption.
In addition, Intent Assets are decentralized and non-custodial in principle. Users can also mint and redeem Intent Assets in the on-chain contract, without the permission of dappOS. The specific income assets behind Intent Assets are also open and transparent on the chain, unlike some financial income products that are managed by centralized institutions.
Foresight News: How to ensure the liquidity and security of intention assets? What role does the intention execution network play in intention assets?
Isabella Yang: The security of the intent asset is guaranteed by a decentralized on-chain contract. First of all, the underlying layer of the intent asset is composed of a series of underlying assets, and it is essentially a withdrawal voucher. Users can call the contract to cast and redeem without the permission of dappOS. On the one hand, this allows users to enter and exit freely without worrying that dappOS will not allow you to redeem; on the other hand, even if a single underlying income asset has problems, the impact on users is relatively small. Now our underlying income assets are all listed on Binance and large projects with TVL of more than 1 billion US dollars, such as Pendle, Bouncebit, ethfi, etc.
Intent assets can be used at any time in various scenarios, and they are protected by the dappOS Intent Execution Network. When you redeem or use your intent assets, you are actually submitting your requirements to the Intent Execution Network, and then a service provider will execute your requirements. These professional service providers often have better execution methods than ordinary retail investors, such as obtaining low-cost loans first, advance the funds required for user redemption, and collect certain interest-bearing assets to find the project party to redeem as a large user, thereby avoiding slippage losses caused by low liquidity of on-chain DEX. The dappOS Intent Execution Network is equivalent to empowering users with this institutional-level professional execution capability, so that users have a good experience in using intent assets.
Foresight News: How will your team ensure the long-term competitiveness of dappOS?
Isabella Yang: First of all, dappOS enters the intent track through technological innovation, and technological advantages will always be one of our long-term competitive advantages. Some previous research and discussions on the intent track protocol in the industry all require that the service provider be focused on breaking down clear and specific on-chain execution steps. However, in this way, there is actually not much room for service providers to actively play their own advantages. There are not many execution solutions that users cannot implement by themselves. The speed and cost are not much better than the user's own operation, and there are even disadvantages, and the user's needs are not really solved. In the innovative architecture design of the dappOS intent execution network, the execution process of the service provider is abandoned, and only the execution results that users want are focused on. In this way, the solution space for service providers will be larger, and the competition between them will also allow users to have lower execution costs and faster execution speeds.
In addition, dappOS also has the first-mover advantage of products, accumulating scale effects and network effects. Both the intention execution network and the Web3 operating system have strong scale effects. The larger the scale, the more ecological cooperation projects there will be, and the more service providers there will be. Users will find that they can do all kinds of things they want to do on the chain in dappOS, and the execution speed is getting faster and faster, and the cost is getting lower and lower. This in turn will also motivate various project parties to cooperate with us. Now there are indeed some other projects doing intention architecture that have obtained financing, but they are basically still in the conceptual stage, and there is still a long way to go before the product is launched; and we have not only launched the product, but also established a certain ecological scale. In this way, the gap will only get bigger and bigger in the long run.
Foresight News: AI is also a hot topic in the current industry. What do you think about the relationship between AI and dappOS?
Isabella Yang: The service provider of dappOS can be a person or an organization, or a bot that executes according to certain rules, or an AI Agent.
In fact, the architecture of the dappOS intention execution network and AI Agent are complementary to each other. The problem with users using AI now is that they cannot understand the specific behavior logic of AI, so they are worried about losses and do not trust AI. However, the security mechanism of dappOS only considers the results and not the process, which can ensure that users get pre-defined compensation when AI fails to achieve the user's intention and causes losses. Therefore, users can enjoy the powerful capabilities of AI without worrying about losses. At the same time, when AI is powerful enough, the gap between the capabilities of AI-based service nodes and ordinary users will become larger and larger, so that manual operations will be completely abandoned and turned to the dappOS intention execution network.
Therefore, dappOS will greatly promote the entry of AI into Web3 and will also benefit from the advancement of AI technology.
Foresight News: Can you share your future roadmap?
Isabella Yang: Our future plans will focus on two core directions:
First, we will proactively optimize and expand our products to meet user needs more comprehensively and deeply. We will dig deep into the unmet needs in the current market and launch revolutionary core products based on the intent execution network, such as "intent assets"; in this way, we can gradually release the technical potential of the dappOS intent infrastructure and truly change the user experience.
The second is to strategically expand ecological cooperation and user base, and build a strong scale effect and network effect. We will continue to attract more top projects to join our ecosystem, and at the same time quickly expand the user base, making our intention operating system an indispensable cornerstone in the Web3 world - just like "Windows of Web3", so that every user can't do without it and feel the convenience and efficiency it brings.
