How AIUGC & Web3 Reshape the Entertainment Economy.
Authors:
Jessica Feng, Investment Manager of Hash Global BNB Fund
Henry Yang, Investment Partner, Head of Hash Global Secondary Market Funds
I. After the Bubble: The Reboot Moment of “Web3 Entertainment”
In the previous cycle, the gaming & entertainment track once ignited a frenzy in the crypto world.
In 2021, GameFi and X-to-Earn innovatively combined financial incentives with entertainment scenarios, opening the first explosive year of Web3 application adoption.
However, the tide quickly faded. Most projects collapsed shortly after the noise: token prices crashed, users left, and communities disbanded. Narratives such as GameFi, X-to-Earn, Metaverse and NFTs - once extremely popular - have gradually faded from community attention. The market began to doubt whether entertainment ever really needed Web3.
We disagree with this conclusion. The failures of early projects were not due to the model itself, but because of the lack of content, lack of real users, and the excessive use of financial instruments. “Entertainment” was reduced to a speculative shell, while the true value Web3 could bring to the entertainment industry was ignored.
We believe Web3 technology can reshape the value distribution structure of cultural entertainment, and we are particularly optimistic about the biochemical reaction produced when “Web3 Finance” is infused with “Influence / Impact”. Therefore, in November 2024 we clearly stated: “Mass Adoption of Web3 will begin with cultural entertainment.”
The entertainment sector naturally has high traffic, strong community attributes, and mature business models with strong monetization. Once Web3 discovers the real integration breakthrough point with entertainment, entertainment will become the key entry point for Web3 mass adoption - and Web3 will push the entertainment economy into a new era. We define this as Web3 Entertainment.
Under this system, Web3’s “assetization of everything” will no longer serve financial speculation, but become the foundation of underlying value distribution. We believe token economies will still remain the core engine of Web3 Entertainment - but the focus will shift from Fi (Finance) to Economy - shifting from short-term incentives to sustainable economic circulation.
In the year since proposing and pushing forward Web3 Entertainment, we are pleased to participate in and witness, represented by MEET48, a new group of Web3 entertainment projects that are - following our guidance - adopting BNB’s token economic framework as reference, and putting into practice the blueprint we envision. The core elements include:
Build on real users and high-quality content, using Web3 to connect and unlock ecosystem value;
Center on a sustainable token system with both value and utility, constructing an economic circulation mechanism;
Improve token economics in phases, increasing token utility as the ecosystem grows;
Ensure ecosystem-generated value flows back into the token system, forming a two-way cycle between assets and ecosystem value.
Based on over ten years of accumulated experience in social gaming and idol development, MEET48 has already formed an initial model with verifiable results.
II. Web3 + AI + UGC: Web3 Entertainment Will Open the Era of Co-Creation Economy
What makes this cycle unique is that the boundaries of technology are being completely broken.
Generative AI is lowering the barrier to creation at unprecedented speed, making mass creativity possible. The new generation of models represented by Sora2 is reshaping the underlying logic of content production and social interaction. As platform-dominant content models (such as Youku, iQiyi) gradually decline, AI will further accelerate the shift of content production toward user co-creation (UGC / AIUGC).
In the AIUGC era, content assets will experience explosive growth - and the structural flaws of the Web2 model will become increasingly exposed: the inherent conflict of interest between platforms and users makes fair value distribution an eternal paradox.
Content production has long been decentralized - but the revenue is still firmly captured by platforms: users create value, platforms capture value.
The future of UGC must be built on a more open and more equitable value circulation system. Web3 will become the foundation of this system, providing mechanisms for ownership confirmation and value transfer, while absorbing the productivity unleashed by AI. Combined, they will push UGC to evolve from “User Generated Content” into “User Co-Creation Economy.”
We believe Web3 Entertainment is entering a new growth cycle. As Web3 and AI technologies mature, the production and distribution paradigm of the content industry is becoming something that can be redefined.
III. When Disruptive Technology Meets High-Quality Content: MEET48 Is Reshaping the Industry Landscape and Moving Toward Becoming the “Netflix of Web3”
Technology is never the end-goal - it is merely a tool to unlock the value of content. The true game-changers are not platforms that “talk about technology,” but teams that actually use technology to produce high-quality content and achieve mass adoption through content.
MEET48 is one of these leaders. This giant vessel originating from the traditional entertainment industry once created Asia’s top idol IP - SNH48 - and the phenomenon-level rhythm dance game “Audition.” Today, it is taking the most emotionally bonded and user-sticky part of entertainment - the idol economy - and leading it into the fusion era of AI + Web3.
MEET48 has already become a breakout hit in the BSC ecosystem, with over 3.8 million active users and 500,000 on-chain wallets, surpassing 100 million on-chain interactions, and ranking long-term at the top of BNB Chain’s social application charts. The project has been selected into BNB Chain’s MVB program and received strategic investment from YZi Labs. In June 2025, MEET48 completed the TGE of the $IDOL token, launching simultaneously on Binance Alpha, PancakeSwap, Bitget, Gate, and MEXC; as of November, the project’s FDV has exceeded US$164 million. From breakout application to ecosystem builder, MEET48’s vision is to become the flagship project of Web3 entertainment and to build the next-generation entertainment infrastructure for Web3.
At the early stage, the team adheres to a content-first and user-first principle, entering from its strongest advantage - the idol economy - and deeply integrating its multi-year idol development system with AI technology and Web3 mechanisms, injecting into Web3 Entertainment a content ecosystem with real participation and user stickiness.
Under the wave of digitalization, idol culture is also entering a new stage of virtualization and intelligence. AI technology breaks the boundary of physical performance, giving virtual idols the ability to accompany 24/7, interact deeply, and expand personality beyond what real humans could achieve. The commercial potential of virtual idols is rapidly being verified: Japan’s Hatsune Miku and China’s Luo Tianyi have already become top cultural IPs; and with breakthroughs in generative AI, traditional entertainment giants are also joining in: Korea’s SM Entertainment launched virtual idol Naevis; Netflix also launched virtual groups HUNTR/X and Saja Boys through the animated film K-Pop Demon Hunters, breaking multiple real-artist streaming records on Spotify and other platforms. As pointed out by a16z, virtual idol development is becoming a massive track with trillion-dollar potential.
However, all of these still belong to the centralized “platform-controlled star making” model. MEET48 is the first among major entertainment players to break out of the Web2 framework. Armed with sharp industry insight and nearly two decades of content operation and tech development experience, MEET48 is democratizing the “right to create stars” through AIUGC combined with Web3 mechanisms.
Backed by a fanbase of 30 million users and over 40,000 licensed music copyrights, MEET48 has built a complete system for creation and value circulation:
AIDOL Producer: A one-stop AIUGC toolkit supporting character building, stage creation, performance content generation, etc.;
Mars Protocol: A tokenization solution for content assets that provides monetization models;
Metaverse: An immersive social and creative space that enables long-term user and asset accumulation.
At the same time, based on deep industry understanding and model experience, MEET48 has proposed a new Web3 model for the creator economy:
Proof of Creativity (PoC): Replacing computation or staking with creative value. Content value is certified by community members and fans through governance token voting;
Virtual World Assets (VWA): Virtual characters, works, and content become part of the tokenized circulation system, providing the foundation for assetization and commercialization of the creator community.
PoC gives content creation value consensus, while VWA gives content economic form - together they form the foundational pillars of the AIUGC era.
When the platform is no longer the monopolizer of value but instead becomes an empowerment tool - when creativity is unlocked, content can be owned and incentivized - only then can value truly return to users, and only then can the true potential of the creator economy be activated. This is the unique opportunity given by AI + Web3, and it is also the inevitable evolutionary direction of the content industry.
Catching the wave is only the beginning - the ability to execute is what determines success or failure. Unlike most Web3 entertainment projects that remain stuck in conceptual narrative stages, MEET48 possesses the rarest systematic execution capability in the Web3 field:
Technical: MEET48 has unique data + algorithm moats. Two decades of accumulated music and dance data provide a natural advantage for model training; a 500+ R&D team spans 3D virtual humans, music/dance large models, AI entertainment agents, and metaverse social tech - forming a systematic tech architecture that fully upgrades the “idol development” model in the age of intelligence.
Operational: The team created phenomenon titles such as Audition, and built the SNH48 ecosystem covering 5 sub-groups, 300+ artists, and 30M fans - an execution foundation that is extremely difficult for others to replicate.
Traffic: In the cold start phase, MEET48 will put the SNH48 voting mechanism on-chain to inject early traffic into the AIUGC platform; it will launch the Web3 virtual idol game AuditionsGO and co-produce the world’s first AI Idol competition show with Tencent Video - pushing the product into mainstream recognition.
Entertainment and content have always been the sectors with the strongest penetration across the internet. And the virtual idol track empowered by AI has the highest possibility to achieve mass adoption first. MEET48 is precisely aligned with the timing - leveraging four major advantages: model experience, tech system, operational capability, and traffic foundation - moving first into the center of this transformation.
Just as Netflix captured the internet wave and reshaped the rules of content distribution, MEET48 is now using AIUGC and Web3 to rewrite the logic of content creation and value circulation - reconstructing the global entertainment industry - and bringing the “Netflix legend” to the blockchain era.
IV. From Application to Infrastructure: Building the Web3 Entertainment Empire
MEET48’s ambition goes far beyond being just an application.
At the initial stage, MEET48 is the “idol-making dream factory” of the Web3 world - breaking centralized production barriers through AIUGC and returning the right to create back to the users. But looking toward the future, MEET48 is marching toward a much larger endgame - becoming the Web3 entertainment infrastructure that reshapes the fundamental rules of the industry.
Surrounding this vision, MEET Labs has already incubated a lightweight gaming platform GamingFi, forming an initial cross-content ecosystem matrix. And this is only the beginning. MEET48 plans to develop an EVM-compatible Layer2 PoC sidechain within the BSC ecosystem, forming a closed-loop across users, assets, technology, and applications:
• Technically, an EVM-compatible Layer2 is no longer a technological barrier;
• On the application & user level, MEET48 has a massive fanbase and mature product deployment capabilities;
• On the asset level, AIUGC solves the supply side of content assets (VWA), while the PoC mechanism establishes the value consensus and ownership verification system.
Relying on a complete technology system and the support of the BNB Chain ecosystem, MEET48 aims to become the benchmark of Web3 Entertainment - integrating and attracting more entertainment IPs, content, and applications transitioning into Web3, co-building the EVM + BSC ecosystem, and driving the ecological and long-term sustainable development of the Web3 entertainment industry.
Just as Binance started from an exchange, built BNB Chain, and became the financial infrastructure of Web3 - the “On-chain NASDAQ” - MEET48 is moving along a similar path: using AIUGC as its engine, Web3 as its foundation, reshaping the entire chain of content production and value distribution, and creating the “On-chain Netflix.”
As the ecosystem expands, the value created within the system will continuously flow back into the foundation layer - opening up the first stage of tens-of-billions-of-dollars growth potential for MEET48.
V. The Only Carrier of a Multi-Billion Dollar Ecosystem: IDOL Is Repeating the Value Acceleration Path of BNB
IDOL is the core value carrier of the MEET48 ecosystem, analogous to what BNB is for Binance. Its value capture mechanism is also highly similar to BNB, and can be understood from two perspectives:
Functional Attribute: As a utility token, IDOL carries multiple core functions within the ecosystem, including voting, purchasing virtual goods and services, etc., forming stable usage scenarios and token holding demand;
Asset Attribute: Through burn mechanisms, IDOL is directly tied to ecosystem growth.
BNB formed a deflationary effect through quarterly auto burns and fee burns, while IDOL similarly uses a dual burn mechanism:
• Voting Pool Burn: A fixed proportion of IDOL generated from SNH48 (and future virtual idol) voting pools will be periodically burned;
• Transaction Fee Burn: Daily on-chain activity within the ecosystem continuously reduces circulating supply of IDOL.
Deflation on the supply side + expanding demand on the usage side = a healthy token circulation mechanism, enabling IDOL’s value to grow in sync with the ecosystem.
We believe the current IDOL is similar to BNB in 2019 - on the eve of explosive growth, with the market not yet fully pricing in its potential upside. In the future, as Web3 entertainment expands at scale, IDOL will become the core value carrier of a multi-billion dollar ecosystem.
VI. Conclusion: MEET48 Leading the “On-Chain Netflix Moment” and Driving the Next Wave of Web3 Entertainment
Just as Netflix reshaped the global content distribution landscape with its streaming model, MEET48 - through deep experience in content and product operations, combined with systematic breakthroughs in AI and Web3 - is reconstructing the production and value distribution paradigm of the content industry, opening up a Web3 Entertainment era centered on empowering the co-creation economy through value-functional token design.
As the pioneer of this wave, MEET48 has already validated the feasibility of integrating Web3 and entertainment. On top of a massive fan economy, mature business models, and monetization structures, MEET48 enables value consensus and revenue sharing between IP and fans through Web3.
Going forward, MEET48 will continue to explore and build - using its own successful practice as the leading case, using the PoC Chain as the incubation base - enabling more projects to accelerate along the Web3 entertainment pathway, co-creating a new decentralized entertainment economy structure, and opening the “Netflix Moment” of Web3 Entertainment.
VII. Announcement: MEET48, Hash Global, and Partners Jointly Launch the “Web3 Entertainment Alliance”
On November 4, 2025, Hash Global held a closed-door work meeting in Hong Kong focused on “Web3 Entertainment,” inviting MEET48, OFFGRID (Web3 ticketing and Fanvestment IP incubator), Innow (Japan KOL & idol platform), IPDex (Hong Kong Cultural Copyright Exchange Center), JCube (Copyright holding & ecosystem operation for Culture/Sports/Entertainment IP), ENT (end-to-end music entertainment assetization & distribution platform), BitX (the first UGC social prediction platform), Sortes (on-chain lottery & raffle platform), and other teams, with the purpose of sharing experience, sharing traffic, aligning resources, and forming a unified Web3 Entertainment consensus.
Taking the release of this report as an opportunity, all participating parties jointly announced the formation of the “Web3 Entertainment Alliance”, hoping to attract and connect more Web2 and Web3 entertainment projects and resource partners, and collectively drive the co-construction of the decentralized entertainment economy ecosystem and the mass adoption of Web3 Entertainment.
In the future, the Web3 Entertainment Alliance will serve as a platform to jointly explore key topics such as (examples):
• How to build on real users and high-quality content, using Web3 technology to unlock ecosystem value;
• How to construct an economic circulation model using a sustainable token economy system with both value and utility at its core;
• How to onboard and convert real Web2 users while attracting Web3-native users, connecting mainstream entertainment audiences with on-chain users;
• How to use Web3 to build a unified global user system and enable precise multi-industry traffic routing.
The Alliance will hold both online and offline activities on an ongoing basis, promoting exchange and collaboration among members, and advancing the integration and co-development of Web2 and Web3 entertainment industries.
