Some of the sharpest explanations of reality come disguised as storytelling and satire.

Consider HBO’s Silicon Valley, a comedy about startups, venture capital, and what happens when ambition outruns reality.

Few shows have illustrated as clearly how market incentives shift from one moment to the next.

Across the show, a startup called Pied Piper labors on a real technical problem—a breakthrough compression algorithm.

Real math. Real tradeoffs.

The kind of tech that actually changes how the internet works. Explaining it takes time, diagrams, and patience.

Meanwhile, one episode centers on a founder’s cousin and his app, “Bro.”

Bro does one thing… 

You press a button. Someone else’s phone buzzes. It says “bro.”

That’s it. That’s the product.

While Pied Piper’s advanced algo struggles to gain traction, Bro trends, raises money, and gets treated like a breakthrough—despite having nothing underneath it.

And the most absurd part is… Bro isn’t even that absurd.

We’ve all seen Bro-like “tech” hit insane valuations while actual breakthroughs pine for attention.

Bro represents a specific phase of an emerging market: when the water is high and the novelty floats faster than substance.

But what happens next is the most important piece nobody talks about (largely because looking back on the opportunities missed is too painful)….

I’m talking about when the water recedes and the Bros of the world collapse. Then, only things built to stand on solid ground keep moving.

That’s the difference between “tide” and the “terrain”…

And this has everything to do with where we are in crypto.

Tide vs. Terrain

First, let’s stick with the mobile app explosion era of 2008 to 2015 for a moment…

Because it paints the picture pretty well.

When the App Store first launched, everything worked. You didn’t need a strategy. You didn’t need retention curves or CAC math. You just needed to ship.

If your app cracked the Top 25—even briefly—users flooded in. Revenue followed almost accidentally. The charts did the marketing for you.

That was a tide.

Developers would swap stories about how fast downloads spiked after a feature on the front page. Entire portfolios were built around the idea that apps were the trade. As a consequence, “Bro” apps were given insane valuations.

Then, quietly, it changed.

Top charts became more static. Discovery got harder. Users stopped downloading everything new.

Two apps could launch in the same category and have completely different outcomes—one compounding, one flatlining.

Nothing broke. Mobile didn’t fail. But the water receded. And what emerged?

Terrain.

Suddenly, distribution mattered. Retention mattered. Unit economics mattered. A great icon and flashy marketing stopped being enough.

Crypto is at the early beginnings of its terrain.

The Difference

A tide lifts everything. It rewards exposure over judgment. Timing over understanding. Participation over precision.

In a tide market, correlation is high. Assets move together. Being early matters more than being right. Most outcomes look similar because the water does the work.

But terrain works differently.

Terrain creates separation. Some paths climb. Others stall. Many look stable until you realize you’re losing ground.

On terrain, outcomes diverge:

• Small advantages compound

• Mistakes persist and reflect

• Structure matters more than narrative

Tides hide weaknesses. Terrain exposes them.

So far, crypto has spent most of its life in the sea. Liquidity blurred distinctions. Tokens rose together because capital was chasing the category, not the system. As the market filled in, the water receded.

What’s visible now is land:

• Revenue vs. circulation

• Distribution vs. discovery

• Durability vs. hype

This is why the market feels harder. Nothing is broken.

The lifting mechanism changed.

And while it looks like crypto’s lost momentum, what it’s really beginning to lose—bit by bit—is uniformity. And once a market becomes terrain, it tends to see a mass dislocation between the “Bros” and pros.

Why I Love Terrains

In many markets, the largest, most durable and broad fortunes were made after the tide ended…

Once the terrain was exposed and most had already lost interest.

Amazon, Google, and Apple didn’t create most of their value during their breakthrough “tide” moments, when the themes were loud and capital was flooding in.

They compounded after the excitement faded—when execution, distribution, and system position mattered more than novelty.

The same is true of Visa, Mastercard, and energy pipelines. Payments and oil weren’t insanely hyped before the biggest fortunes were made. What mattered at that point was owning the rails—the toll collectors that kept working regardless of headlines.

Again and again, the lasting money appears after the rush, when markets stop caring and structure starts paying.

Tides heave in and out. Terrain works slower.

On terrain, mistakes don’t wash away. If something isn’t compounding, you feel it. If an advantage isn’t real, it fades.

That’s why this phase feels harder, quieter, and slower. There’s less water doing the lifting.

But the money that lasts tends to be made after the tide goes out—by owning the things that climb without needing a new story every week. By holding systems that still work when the tide pulls in.

If crypto feels less forgiving now, you’re right.

And yet…

That doesn’t mean everything’s breaking. It means the market is becoming real. And real markets reward what works.

Bros build for the moment. Conviction prepares for what comes after.