Vitalik Buterin: In 2026, I will fully return to decentralized social networks; competition and decentralization are the starting points for improving public discourse.

ChainCatcher reported that Vitalik Buterin stated he plans to fully return to decentralized social networks in 2026, and believes that if we want to build a better society, we must have better large-scale communication tools. Such tools should help people filter high-quality information and viewpoints, seek consensus, and serve users' long-term interests, rather than maximizing short-term interactions and emotional polarization.

Vitalik pointed out that there is no "silver bullet" to solve the above problems, but enhancing competition is an important starting point, and decentralization is the key path to achieving competition: by sharing the data layer, anyone can build different clients on top of it. He revealed that since the beginning of this year, he has started using decentralized social tools for reading and posting, with all content synchronized across platforms such as Firefly, X, Lens, Farcaster, and Bluesky.

He also criticized some crypto social projects for deviating from their original intentions, excessively treating "token issuance" as innovation, and attempting to incentivize creators by creating price bubbles around individuals. However, in practice, such models often reward existing social capital rather than content quality, and the token lifecycle is short. Vitalik emphasized that money and social interaction are not inherently in conflict; the key is whether they truly serve the content itself, such as subscription-based support models, rather than speculative asset designs.

In his view, decentralized social should be driven by teams that truly care about the "essence of social." Vitalik acknowledged the Aave team's long-term maintenance of Lens and expressed anticipation for the direction of the new team taking over, believing they are more focused on solving real social issues. He stated that in the coming year, he will speak more on decentralized social platforms and encourages more users to participate in the Lens, Farcaster, and other ecosystems, breaking free from the information confrontation environment of single platforms and exploring new forms of interaction.