[Editorial] The "Linux Moment" of Cryptocurrency: The End of Ideology and the Victory of Pragmatism

The massive foundation supporting the internet world is “Linux.” Most servers worldwide run Linux, and the core of the Android smartphones we use every day is also Linux. However, ordinary users may not even realize they are using Linux. They don’t need to know. As long as the network speed is fast and applications run smoothly, that’s enough.

Today’s turning point in the cryptocurrency market is precisely this “Linux path.” In recent years, the crypto industry misjudged the public’s willingness to follow their values. They believed that concepts like decentralization, self-sovereign identity, and radical transparency would change the world.

But this assumption is wrong. As previously diagnosed in this publication through editorials, the pain and initial forms of integrating the crypto market into the mainstream financial system were not driven by grand ideals. The public chose pure “pragmatism.”

Recently, the way institutions and mainstream applications have incorporated cryptocurrencies is highly enlightening. They completely exclude the “culture” of cryptocurrencies and only adopt their “technology.” This may be an unsettling truth for crypto fundamentalists, but from an industry perspective, it is an unavoidable outcome.

Today, cryptocurrencies are entering the mainstream as infrastructure rather than culture. Like Linux, they are seeping into various fields as a dull, intangible, and unbranded underlying technology.

Stablecoins are replacing payment networks, public blockchains are becoming tools for value settlement, and on-chain systems are significantly reducing remittance costs. But 95% of users do not realize they are using “cryptocurrency.” They just want cheaper, faster, and more reliable results. That is true innovation.

The early market success of companies was precisely because they became “less crypto-centric.” They abandoned obscure industry jargon, abstracted the complex wallet creation process, and boldly introduced centralized front-end solutions. They optimized not the philosophy but “liquidity” and “usability.”

We are moving from the world of hoodie-wearing developers to the era of suited finance—what is called the “white-collar” era. In the next decade, the dominance of the crypto market will not depend on inventing new foundational technologies but on whether these technologies can be seamlessly integrated with existing legacy systems.

The deciding factors will be: the ability to enable purchases even if buyers do not believe in the philosophy of cryptocurrency; and the ability to translate crypto language into business language.

The market no longer rewards illusory “hype.” Instead, it rewards clarity, positioning, and practical liquidity. Like Linux, cryptocurrencies can only achieve true success when they disappear from the public eye and operate silently in the background. The real future of cryptocurrency lies in the place where the grand slogans fade away.