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There was a point in time that I was confident utility was the future of crypto. I was an aggressive promoter of utility projects and have less regards to projects that offers nothing in terms of utility. As I took a step back to assess my investment process, I thought I had it figured out. Look through the charts, find the reason for the project, look at the team, understand the ‘problem’ they set out to fix. It was so logical, it all made sense, it felt structured. But an investor's greatest teacher - the market - had other lessons for me. 

The market did not care about my analysis. People were not buying because something had utility. They were doing so because something moved, in other words, because people talked about it. The crowd became the most crucial part of any success.

I used to make fun at meme tokens and dismiss them from serious investment consideration. I watched in amazement as they consistently outperformed every "real" project I respected.  Meme tokens had no roadmaps, no teams to view, and no white papers to consider. They had attention, and their attention proved to be more a reason for growth than utility ever could.

The staying power of meme tokens speaks to something fundamental about market psychology. Part of this may be that memes are simple, believable, and easy to share. Utility is dependent upon understanding, analysis, and technocracy. Memes just want you to feel. Memes reach humans with an emotional appeal that utility projects often cannot reach.  

Understanding this doesn’t render utility useless, it means it just not enough. A token might end world hunger and drop to zero if no one cares. The brutal truth is that utility only matters after attention, not before. Meme projects understand this instinctively. They focus on getting loud first and building liquidity second, while also possibly evolving into something greater. Utility projects often follow the opposite direction - build something great, and wait for someone to pay attention to it. In fast moving markets like today, waiting can be deadly.

Reflecting on those projects I invested time in and held onto by believing I was just too early, it's painful to realize that early does not matter if nobody else shows up. The best technology, the best use case, the best team, without anyone watching, who cares? 

The crypto-ecosystem has grown well beyond the debate of utility versus speculation. You need both attention and utility to be successful. The future belongs to the projects that can stir imaginations while delivering actual value. Until then make peace with this, in crypto sometimes the meme may come before the utility. 

The market has made its point clear - never underestimate the power of attention, No matter how we feel about it, this is now the reality of crypto investing. The challenge becomes, how do we develop utility while making sure we catch the most attention? 

Posted Using [INLEO](https://inleo.io/@thelastdash/between-attention-and-utility-a-crypto-investing-lesson-you-need-to-learn--fck)