Imagine a world where your digital identity is truly your own, where every post, connection, and interaction isn’t locked within the walls of a corporate platform but exists as an extension of your personal autonomy. This isn’t a utopian vision, it’s the necessary evolution of social media in an era where digital sovereignty is a fundamental right.

For decades, we have unknowingly traded our digital independence for the convenience of centralized platforms. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, these platforms have shaped our digital lives, yet they function more like gilded cages. Every post we create, every relationship we cultivate, every conversation we engage in is ultimately controlled by corporations that can modify, monetize, or erase our digital existence with a single policy change or algorithmic decision.

A New Future for TikTok

As TikTok decides on its ownership future, Project Liberty has teamed up with Alexis Ohanian, the co-founder of Reddit and a pioneer in online community building, and Kevin O’Leary, renowned investor and entrepreneur known for his role on Shark Tank, to take the platform on-chain. Why?

At its core, this is about more than just TikTok. It’s about who controls the digital spaces where billions connect, create, and consume information. For too long, the internet’s most vibrant communities have been shaped –and ultimately governed– by a handful of corporations. Project Liberty is leading the movement to change that, ensuring that social networks serve the people who power them, not just those who own them.

The key to this shift is Frequency, a public, permissionless blockchain developed by Project Liberty’s technology team and designed specifically for high-volume social networking, reinforces the foundation of a user-driven internet, prioritizing interoperability, data sovereignty, and resilience against centralized control. Together, these initiatives aim to move social media away from corporate ownership and toward an open, user-controlled model.

TikTok, for all its cultural impact, is no different. As the debate over its ownership and data practices continues, the larger issue remains unresolved: should a single entity, whether a government or a corporation, control the social fabric of a generation? What’s at stake isn’t just who owns TikTok but whether a platform of its scale can operate outside the confines of centralized control. If it is to be reimagined within a decentralized framework, it will require a foundation built on true interoperability, user-owned data, and open governance. This is where Frequency comes in.

From TikTok to Bluesky: Building a Decentralized Future

The question of TikTok’s future highlights a much larger shift in how we think about social media. The need for decentralization is no longer theoretical, it’s an urgent necessity. Bluesky, an open-source social media project, is one attempt to answer that call.

Bluesky is not just another platform, it represents an effort to redefine the relationship between users and their digital identities. But true digital liberation demands more than good intentions, it requires a structural commitment to full decentralization. It offers a glimpse into what a decentralized social web could look like, but key vulnerabilities remain.

Bluesky, for all its promise, still relies on structural choke points that pose a risk to its long-term decentralization. Storage nodes largely remain centralized under the control of Bluesky PBC or 3rd party providers, meaning user data is still housed in locations that could become points of control. Relay and Firehose systems, responsible for data distribution, remain concentrated in the hands of a few. And while it is positive that Bluesky has implemented the W3C standard for Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs), the PLC (Public Ledger of Credentials) directory is also centralized. These may seem like small technical details at present, but history has repeatedly shown how seemingly minor technical decisions can become the very mechanisms through which power is consolidated and autonomy is eroded.

Frequency, the Backbone of a Decentralized Social Web

This is where Frequency enters the picture, not just as a blockchain, but as an entirely new framework for digital identity and social media governance. Frequency isn’t merely modifying the current model; it is rethinking how we interact online from the ground up. Instead of central authorities dictating terms, Frequency ensures that users — not platforms — hold the keys to their digital lives.

Decentralization is more than a technical shift, it’s about restoring fundamental rights. Users must have the ability to grant access to their data, but just as crucially, they must have the power to revoke it. The relationships they build online — followers, connections, conversations — must belong to them, not to a platform that can manipulate or erase them at will.

Decentralization With Purpose

Frequency operates on the principle of minimal, purposeful decentralization which makes long term sustainability of the ecosystem at population scale viable. The only data stored on-chain is what is essential to guarantee individual data rights. This design approach allows for efficient chain optimization focused on core social events, primarily activity related to account, graph, and communication primitives.This focus on core social allows for tokenized incentives to be designed around management of network capacity, with specific incentives for creators, consumers and other more specific actors left to higher levels of the technology stack.

The promise of a user-owned internet is incomplete without robust safeguards that protect personal data. Frequency ensures that users have cryptographic protection over their information, along with granular controls that dictate how their data is shared. At the same time, they should have the flexibility to impose platform-specific restrictions, ensuring that their content appears only in the digital spaces where they want it to be seen. Further, they must be able to delete their content at their discretion. They should also have the power to restrict content to specific platforms if they choose to do so.

This approach directly addresses the fundamental roadblocks that have prevented previous attempts at decentralization from scaling. Frequency ensures that no single entity — not even its own node operators—has the power to alter or censor user data. It provides a decentralized backup of Bluesky’s Firehose, ensuring that user-generated content remains accessible beyond the control of a single party. Its architecture is designed not just for ideological purity but for practical sustainability and scalability, offering minimal latency and cost-efficient operations to ensure the system remains viable for mass adoption.

Achieving Digital Self-Sovereignty

The internet was meant to be open, interconnected, and free. But today, we stand at a crossroads: either we continue to rely on corporate-controlled social media, or we take the necessary steps to create a more open, user-owned digital future.

Bluesky is a step forward, but without addressing its remaining points of centralization, it risks becoming just another walled garden, perhaps a slightly more open one, but still one where users lack true control. TikTok presents an even bigger challenge. The debate over its ownership is missing the point. The real question isn’t who should own TikTok, but whether any social media giant should be owned at all in the traditional sense. Decentralization offers a new way forward, one where platforms are built around user sovereignty, rather than corporate control.

With Frequency, we are moving one step closer to reclaiming the original promise of the internet. True digital liberation requires breaking free from the data monopolies that have defined the social media era. This isn’t just a technological upgrade, it’s a necessary shift in power.

Attendees clapped and cheered when Paolo Ardoino, the public face of perhaps most influential company in crypto, entered the stage at the Cantor Fitzgerald Global Technology Conference in New York on Wednesday.

Ardoino stood out from the crowd, not for his wealth but for his choice of attire. While others dressed to impress, he opted for a laid-back look — a light blue Ralph Lauren polo and gray khakis — despite likely having the deepest pockets in the room.

“This is my first trip to America,” he started off saying. “It’s beautiful. I feel very welcomed.”

Ardoino indeed avoided the country for a long time. The Italy-born computer scientist until recently mainly focused Tether’s operations on developing regions, with financial freedom as the stated goal.

Another reason could be that Tether has been under scrutiny from industry leaders as well as U.S. authorities for some time, including the Department of Justice (DOJ), the Commodities and Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYFSD).

That’s changed. Ardoino has been on a tour of the U.S. over the past week, posting photos of himself on the U.S. Capitol Building steps in Washington D.C. on Thursday and participating in a fireside chat with Strike CEO Jack Mallers at a Tuesday event organized by the Bitcoin Policy Institute.

The company, which according to Ardoino is run by only 150 employees across 50 countries, settled charges with the CFTC and an NYDFS inquiry in 2021. There have been numerous reports of an ongoing Department of Justice investigation into the stablecoin issuer as well over the past few years.

“We’ve been through hell,” Ardoino told attendees at the conference. “People were saying that if I came to the U.S. I’d be arrested … They will try to scare you off.»

«We’re still here, right?”

After a rundown of Tether’s previous success in the stablecoin business — the company reportedly made a $13 billion profit in 2024 and its stablecoin, USDT, holds over 60% of market share among stablecoins — Ardoino went on to present current projects that the company is working on, including its efforts in education, AI and real-world asset (RWA) tokenization.

“The outlook for this year is wonderful as well,” Ardoino said.

Ardoino’s U.S. journey came at a time when the U.S. legislature is moving forward to regulate the $200 billion and rapidly growing stablecoin market. Tether is dominating the asset class with its $143 billion USDT cryptocurrency, followed by U.S.-based competitor Circle with its $58 billion USDC token.

While Tether is an offshore company — it recently announced its intention to establish its headquarters in El Salvador — and has yet to show interest in formally entering the U.S. crypto market, its ties to the U.S. are multifaceted.

The firm is one of the biggest buyers of U.S. debt, holding nearly $100 billion worth of U.S. Treasuries and government-backed securities as a reserve asset for its USDT token. If it were a country, it would be among the top 20 U.S. debt holders. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said during a White House digital asset summit on Friday that stablecoins are key to preserving the U.S. dollar as the dominant reserve currency in the world, a line of argument that Ardoino touted multiple occasions before.

The company also gained a powerful ally in the Trump administration in Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, former CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, the Wall Street investment firm that manages Tether’s U.S. Treasury holdings. The Wall Street Journal reported that Cantor is also invested in Tether’s holding company, while Lutnick said during his confirmation hearing that Cantor holds Tether convertible bonds but has no equity stake.

Ardoino, in an interview with CoinDesk last year, said that the firm also onboarded U.S. agencies such as the FBI and Secret Service to its platform in an effort to combat illicit activities.

On the investment front, Tether became a major shareholder with a $775 million investment in U.S.-listed video sharing platform Rumble, popular among U.S. conservative and right-wing users. With Tether’s backing, Rumble CEO Chris Pavloski laid out plans to introduce a crypto wallet and support payments with USDT, BTC and Tether’s gold-backed token XAUT.

Pavloski repeatedly called Ardoino while he was on stage Wednesday.

Welcome to The Protocol, CoinDesk’s weekly wrap-up of the most important stories in cryptocurrency tech development. I’m Margaux Nijkerk, CoinDesk’s Ethereum Reporter.

In this issue:

Ethereum’s Holesky Testnet Finalizes – Finally

Starknet to Settle on both Bitcoin and Ethereum

From Ethereum’s Engine Room to Wall Street: Danny Ryan’s New Mission

Japanese Tech Giants Sony and LINE Join Forces

This article is featured in the latest issue of The Protocol, our weekly newsletter exploring the tech behind crypto, one block at a time. Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Wednesday.

Network News

ETHEREUM HOLESKY TESTNET FINALIZES — FINALLY: Ethereum’s Holesky testnet achieved finality nearly two weeks after the Pectra upgrade, overcoming a client-software configuration bug that had prevented finality since Feb. 24. The achievement comes as Ethereum developers held off on deciding when Pectra would go live on the mainnet blockchain, thus delaying the big upgrade. — Shaurya Malwa Read more.

STARKNET TO SETTLE ON BITCOIN AND ETHEREUM: One of the foremost projects aiming to increase the speed of the Ethereum network is ramping up its work on the world’s original blockchain: Bitcoin. Ethereum layer-2 Starknet, in partnership with BTC wallet Xverse, is aiming to deliver a «full DeFi experience to Bitcoin users.» Xverse said it will «achieve Bitcoin’s DeFi take-off moment,» through integrating with Starknet in Q2 2025, in an emailed announcement seen by CoinDesk. The Starknet Foundation has published a new Bitcoin Roadmap, which described how Starknet would remain fully active on Ethereum, while «becoming Bitcoin’s execution layer,» with the goal of scaling the network «from 13 TPS to thousands.» Developers have been increasingly exploring how to tap the security and deep reserves held in BTC to empower the broader DeFi and blockchain world. The challenge has been how to address Bitcoin’s relative lack of programmability compared to Ethereum and others. — Jamie Crawley Read more.

FROM ETHEREUM’S ENGINE ROOM TO WALL STREET: DANNY RYAN’S NEW MISSION: Danny Ryan, previously a key researcher at the Ethereum Foundation, left the EF in September but entered talks a few months later to rejoin the organization as its new leader. In January, Ryan «ended up mutually parting ways» with the foundation, and in March he announced he would be joining Etherealize, an organization focused on bringing Ethereum to Wall Street. In a candid interview with CoinDesk, Ryan said he made the move because he believes Ethereum is at a technological inflection point: «Ethereum is much bigger than the EF. It’s not just a couple of changes at the EF that are going to make or break Ethereum at large.» — Margaux Nijkerk Read more.

JAPANESE TECH GIANTS SONY AND LINE JOIN FORCES: Sony’s blockchain division is bringing Japanese social media giant LINE into the Web3 world, with plans to adapt several popular mini-apps onto Sony’s Soeneium network, the company announced. LINE reports approximately 200 million active users across its platform, and the agreement will bring four LINE-based games, or «mini-apps,» to Soneium: Sleepagotchi, Farm Frens, Puffy Match, and Pocket Mob. The integration is meant to facilitate features like in-game rewards and purchases. Soneium went live in January, and at the time, the team said that they hoped to bridge Web2 users into the Web3 space. The blockchain is a layer-2 on top of Ethereum that uses Optimism’s OP Stack technology.— Margaux Nijkerk Read more.

In Other News

The U.S. House of Representatives struck down an IRS rule that would have imposed information collection rules on decentralized entities. The vote, supported by a bipartisan group that included 71 Democrats, is a big win for DeFi. Nik De reports.

We may have to wait a little longer for new crypto ETFs in the U.S. Applications have been filed for a string of new entities, including for XRP, Solana (SOL), Dogecoin (DOGE) and Litecoin (LTC). But a decision on these isn’t likely before President Trump’s pick to run the agency, Paul Atkins, is confirmed by the Senate. As yet, no hearing on that has been scheduled. Helene Braun reports. 

In a huge systemic win for the crypto industry, The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) said that federally regulated banks can engage in various cryptocurrency activities without prior approval. The OCC has also withdrawn a requirement for banks to report liquidity risks related to crypto. Sam Reynolds reports.

Calendar

March 18-20: Digital Asset Summit, New York

April 8-10: Paris Blockchain Week

April 30-May 1: Token 2049, Dubai

May 14-16: Consensus, Toronto

May 20-22: Avalanche Summit, London

May 27-29: Bitcoin 2025, Las Vegas

June 30-July 3: EthCC, Cannes

Oct. 1-2: Token2049, Singapore