Original | Odaily Planet Daily (@OdailyChina)
Author | Wenser (@wenser 2010)
On March 2, OpenClaw finally surpassed React to become the most starred project on GitHub, thereby rising to become the most recognized tool among developers.
In just over two months, this AI project focused on automated execution has rapidly taken over global discussions. Almost everyone is straining to “adopt a lobster,” projecting hopes and expectations onto it like devotees making wishes.
When the spring river warms, ducks are the first to know—change often begins with those who have the keenest instincts. At the end of February, prominent figures in the crypto space, including Kong Jianping, founder of Nano Labs, and Sun Yuchen, founder of TRON, along with allies such as CAI under Cai Wensheng of Meituan, launched the "Web4.0 China Tour," a nationwide series of offline events. Crowds flocked to these events, evoking a strong sense of déjà vu from the days when everyone talked endlessly about Web3, crypto, the metaverse, and NFTs.
As an industry observer active at the intersection of AI and crypto, Odaily Planet Daily interviewed multiple on-site participants and compiled selected "post-event reflections" in an attempt to reconstruct this human-initiated "AI counter-encirclement campaign."
Web3 is dead, long live Web4: The AI anxiety ignited by OpenClaw
In the first week after the New Year, a chart circulating across various WeChat groups sparked immediate discussion: Clawdbot ranked first—this was one of the early names for OpenClaw (another was Moltbot).
After a flood of news such as "The 2028 AI Apocalypse" and Block laying off 4,000 employees, internet users quickly fell into a collective "AI anxiety": if you don’t know what a "lobster" is, it’s like not knowing about TikTok, Clubhouse, or ChatGPT back then—you’re already left behind.
Thus, the offline event, framed as "Web4.0 China Tour" and centered on OpenClaw, rapidly gained momentum, with participation and attendance far exceeding expectations, bringing technical concepts such as AI Agent and "crab robot" to a broader audience.
Event scene report: AI has moved from narrative to reality
Photos from the Beijing event released by 1783 DAO show a packed audience; @Wayne, who attended the Beijing event, told us he first saw the information shared by a KOL on X, and within just a few days, he had attended three in-person events after discovering them through Xiaohongshu and Luma.
In his view, the scene showed clear polarization: some had already successfully launched their businesses and earned dollars, while others didn’t even know how to purchase a cloud server; at the same time, “generational differences” were equally evident—young people born after 2005 were entering the scene, entrepreneurs born in the 2000s were common, those born in the 1990s remained the most action-oriented, while older generations came with anxiety about being left behind by the times.
Another participant who helped organize the OpenClaw Lobster Party Shenzhen event, @0xqiuqiuu, offered a different perspective.
As a community operator for OpenBuild, Qiuqiu sees that the current AI-driven wave of cost reduction and efficiency improvement, led by OpenClaw, primarily benefits companies and employers, while also providing more convenient productivity tools for "one-person companies," independent developers, and creators to enhance their output.
In addition, the Shenzhen event saw participation from many elderly attendees with white hair, as well as parents bringing their young daughters and sons—the age range spanned from over 70 years old down to 11 years old. This distinguishes it from previous knowledge-based courses that used slogans like “Pay 9.9 yuan to master AI,” as AI is gradually permeating all demographics and most industries. The best way to alleviate “AI anxiety” is not to sit idle, but to embrace and use AI, countering vague fears with concrete actions.
Regarding the question of whether AI will replace jobs or substitute humans, some respondents provided negative answers.
@CoinCircleMirror, who conducts interviews in the Web3 industry, points out that AI will not replace humans, but instead will create more jobs due to AI. (Similar to the “Jevons Paradox” we mentioned earlier; see 《The War Between Stablecoins and Banking Likely Doesn’t Exist》)
@Wayne, a Web3 industry analyst, also noted that AI will not replace most people, but may reshape over 50% of work structures. Specifically, he believes that replacing "jobs" is not the same as replacing "people"—what is actually replaced are "task modules." AI will prioritize automating the highly structured and standardized portions of these tasks. For example, managers who previously oversaw humans and coordinated teams may be replaced by those who manage AI workers.
By the way, Anthropic’s recently released research report “AI Labor Market Impact Survey” found that occupations previously thought to be least affected by AI—such as programmers, lawyers, educators, artists, white-collar workers, and sales professionals—are actually the most impacted; in contrast, jobs that AI cannot easily perform in the short term—such as construction workers, farmers, mechanics, caregivers, security personnel, and restaurant servers—face relatively less disruption.
In other words, AI is already capable of covering the majority of tasks in programming, education, art, and written work; the impact on live-action films, short dramas, and TV series since the emergence of Seedance 2.0 has been evident; however, manual laborers in physical jobs are naturally less likely to be replaced by AI.
When OpenClaw Meets the Crypto World: The Prelude to the AI Economy
Although Peter Steinberger, founder of OpenClaw, has publicly advised young people to stay away from cryptocurrencies (recommended reading: When the Founder of OpenClaw Advises Young People to Stay Away from Crypto), many industry professionals still believe that AI agents and crypto systems are naturally intertwined.
@CoinCircle直言：“Human wealth is settled in fiat currency, while AI’s wealth is more likely to rely on crypto assets.” (This logic was previously discussed in our article When AI Agents Come to Life, Stablecoins = USD API.)
Many participants expressed a preference for paying event fees with BTC and look forward to earlier integration of Bitcoin payments with AI, rather than stablecoins.
In Wayne's view, when AI agents can autonomously invoke wallets, purchase computing power and data, and complete payment settlements, cryptocurrency will transition from a speculative asset to a medium for machine collaboration and value exchange—becoming a crucial bridge for AI to access the real economy through permissionless settlement networks, on-chain transparency, and incentive mechanisms.
Notably, despite the founder's reserved stance, OpenClaw once recommended the crypto privacy AI platform Venice.ai. Reality once again proves: industry boundaries are defined by products and efficiency, not positions. (Recommended reading: 《OpenClaw Backs Venice.ai, Token VVV Surges Over 500% in One Month》)
Conclusion: What matters is not "having lobster," but "using lobster."
Recently, a complete paid industry chain for "on-site OpenClaw installation" has formed on platforms such as Xianyu, Taobao, and Xiaohongshu; offline installation assistance by Tencent Cloud has also drawn attention. The story shared on the Kazike WeChat public account, "Experience OpenClaw on-site installation for 499 yuan," has become widely discussed.
However, among the majority of participants we’ve encountered, many users remain stuck at the installation stage and don’t know how to truly use the tool. Most people are still using simplified installation versions provided by various AI model companies or platforms. Even worse, some users who finally went through the trouble of queuing in person to have OpenClaw installed by Tencent Cloud’s team end up letting it run automatically due to unfamiliarity with the interface, resulting in an unexpected and modest Token expenditure—only to end up angrily criticizing Tencent Cloud for being greedy.
Undeniably, in the face of new technologies, the opposite of FOMO may be potential security risks and unknown operational hazards caused by excessive permissions.
So, for most people, there’s no need to be overly anxious. What truly matters is never “I also have a lobster,” but rather “Has my AI actually solved a problem and delivered results?”
In the era of coexisting with AI, many people may wake up early, but they will likely still be too late to the party.