CZ’s Warning to Web3 Leaders: Adapt Now or Get Obsolete by 2026

Web3's survival hinges on ruthless adaptation—slow movers will join the crypto graveyard.

The Darwinian Shift

Binance's ex-CEO isn't mincing words: decentralized projects clinging to 2023 playbooks are already dead men walking. The chains that thrive? Those slashing legacy baggage and deploying AI-powered smart contracts like VC-funded mercenaries.

Liquidity or Liquidation

Market makers who ignored CZ's 2024 'modular blockchain' memo now hemorrhage TVL to nimble Layer 3 upstarts. Meanwhile, TradFi dinosaurs still lobbying against DeFi just funded their third 'blockchain research lab' with shareholder cash.

Adaptation isn't coming—it's already rewriting the rules. The question isn't if you'll comply, but whether you'll still matter when the dust settles.

In brief

• CZ, former CEO of Binance, sends a strong message to the crypto community : ‘change will come with or without you.’
• This message aims to remind that innovation is constant in the blockchain ecosystem, and adapting has become a necessity.
• Through this statement, CZ warns against stagnation and calls for active support of sector transformations.
• He also advises crypto developers and entrepreneurs to focus on the intrinsic quality of their products.

A message of disruption

After his backflip on his request for presidential pardon, Changpeng Zhao comes back strong and addresses the crypto community once again with an unambiguous statement, in a message posted on the social network X on July 31, 2025 : “Embrace change. It will happen with or without you, but better with you.”

Embrace change. It will happen with or without you, but better with.

For the founder of Binance, now operationally retired, this is not a mere philosophical adage but a call for lucidity. In a market marked by profound technological, regulatory, and structural transitions, CZ emphasizes that evolution will wait for no one.

Bitcoin, DeFi, or NFTs are the most obvious historical examples: breakthroughs that transformed the financial landscape, often despite initial disbelief from traditional observers.

Through this message, CZ reminds that the status quo is no longer an option. To better understand the significance of this statement, here is what to take away :

• Acceptance of change is not optional but a necessity : CZ mentions the idea that it is better to “accompany the change” than to oppose it, at the risk of being left behind ;

• A message to investors, developers, and entrepreneurs : all are concerned by this dynamic of change, whether passive or proactive ;

• A global vision of progress within the ecosystem : although his message remains brief, CZ reminds that major crypto innovations (Bitcoin, blockchain, DeFi) were born of change, not comfort ;

• Stagnation as a brake on progress : not evolving in this sector means marginalizing oneself.

This message fits into a series of stances from CZ, who continues to influence the debate within the industry, even after leaving Binance’s management. Rather than commenting on price trends or regulations, he chooses to disseminate a strategic vision focused on adaptability.

His stance reflects a willingness to prepare the community for upcoming upheavals, whether technological evolutions or profound transformations in Web3 economic models.

Strategic advice for Web3 builders

Following this general warning, CZ also specifically addressed developers and entrepreneurs in the ecosystem. In a message posted this week, he recommended they refocus on the essentials: the product.

“Focus on the product itself, not on its appearance. A good product stands on its own,” he writes, urging project leaders to abandon style effects in favor of substance.

He also insists on clarity in idea presentation, suggesting synthetic supports based on “bullet lists and histograms.” The message must be clear because faced with more demanding investors, efficiency and readability now prevail.

These advices are not trivial. They address a generation of developers evolving in a context very different from that of 2017 or even 2021. The era of grandiose pitches and vague roadmaps seems gone. CZ, by providing these indications, appears to anticipate a new era for crypto: that of maturity. A phase where only solid, understandable, and useful projects will survive the next natural market selection cycle.

These recommendations reflect a strategic evolution in the way innovation is conceived in blockchain. They reveal a future where value will no longer be measured by speculation, but by real use. If industry players take these warnings seriously, it is likely the next bullrun will crown crypto projects able to meet concrete needs, with readable, robust products integrated into the real economy.

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