Rhythm X Zhihu jointly hold a Web4.0 themed event: When AI Agent Takes Over On-Chain Permissions

Most discussions about Web 4.0 are somewhat misguided.

The real question is: Is this the next marketing hype cycle? Is Web 4.0 just another wave of concept-making? These questions are all irrelevant. The only real question is: Who is the underlying permission of the internet transitioning from and to?

Looking at this question from a historical standpoint, the answer has always been quite clear. Web 1.0 was read-only—users were consumers of content, with no write permissions. Web 2.0 introduced write permissions—you could post, upload, comment, but the platform owned your data. Web 3.0 introduced ownership—assets on-chain, private keys in your possession, the platform unable to confiscate your wallet.

Every generational iteration has fundamentally been a downward transfer of permissions.

Web 4.0 continues along the same logical thread, but the recipient of the transfer has changed. It's not a transfer to the user; it's a transfer to the Agent.

An overlooked structural fact: The entire architecture of the internet has been inherently "human-centric" for a long time.

Web 2.0's UI/UX was designed for human cognitive bandwidth—information density, click paths, color contrast, every parameter was an estimate of human attention limits. Web 3.0's KYC verification, mnemonic phrase backup, multi-signature approval fundamentally address human vulnerabilities to errors and attacks.

The entire system serves human limitations, not human capabilities.

But in the AI era, this logic is beginning to fracture. When the Agent gains on-chain permissions, it faces the same systems designed for humans, but it doesn't need a sleek UI, password recovery, SMS verification, or even a nap before transaction confirmation.

This is the core contradiction of Web 4.0: an internet infrastructure designed for human cognitive limitations encountering new participants without cognitive constraints. Rebuilding is inevitable.

The ongoing reconstruction can be observed from two dimensions.

The first dimension is the disintegration of the frontend. Traditionally, beautiful UI was designed for human visual processing. Agents primarily communicate through APIs and code logic; the interface is noise, not an entry point. Once the Agent becomes a primary protocol interactor, frontend logic shifts from "how do we make this understandable to users" to "how do we make this readable by machines." This is a paradigm shift that frontend development has never experienced in its thirty-year history.

The second dimension is the replacement of the authentication system. Password-based systems assume that the login subject is a human with memory constraints—the password must be short enough to remember but long enough to be secure. This contradiction has driven the entire password management industry. However, an Agent does not need to remember passwords. On-chain signatures can be granted and revoked in real time, with permission granularity down to a single operation. The account system will be gradually replaced, not because it was designed poorly, but because its design assumptions have become outdated.

The change in these two dimensions, summed up in one sentence: the internet's gateway will transition from a revolving door designed for humans to an API interface designed for machines.

Within this infrastructure rebuilding process, there is a specific closed loop that is worth examining separately.

AI has powerful decision-making abilities, but it inherently lacks two things: an independent payment channel and asset sovereignty.

An Agent can analyze global gold market sentiment data in milliseconds and provide the optimal configuration decision—but if it does not have an independent funding account, this decision still requires human intervention. The delay in the execution phase will erode all the advantages accumulated in the analysis phase.

Crypto fills this gap.

Take Hyperliquid, for example: its perpetual futures contract market for commodities such as gold, silver, and oil runs 24/7. This feature is optional for human traders—positions at three in the morning can wait until morning to be addressed. However, for an Agent, this is a necessary infrastructure condition because the Agent itself does not understand the concept of sleep; its operation is around the clock.

When an Agent takes over the wallet and private key, it extends from the decision-making layer to the execution layer. AI provides analytical judgment, Crypto provides settlement infrastructure, and only when combined, they form a complete economic entity.

The marginal cost of running an Agent tends toward zero. Its output and trade execution are around the clock. For DeFi protocols, this is an unprecedented ideal counterpart—an entity that is not emotional, does not forget, and does not miss the optimal execution window because of daytime meetings.

This is the true narrative of Crypto × AI: not the stacking of two buzzwords but complementary infrastructures coming together at the same moment.

Here's a perhaps imperfect example.

In 1908, the Ford Model T entered mass production. In the initial years, the mainstream view in the commentary world was: the car was an upgrade to the horse carriage, a toy for the wealthy. No one foresaw that the car would rewrite the spatial logic of entire cities, create a chain of gas stations, disrupt railway passenger transport, and transform Detroit into a global manufacturing center.

The overlooked key point was not the car itself, but how the car reshaped the entire society's spatiotemporal cost function.

The structural significance of Web 4.0 is similar to this. Surface-level questions—such as which products will boom and which protocols will win—are akin to the "which car model will sell well" of the Model T era. The real proposition is: as Agents become the primary on-chain participants, scaling and throughput vastly surpass human levels, in what dimension will the game rules of the economic system undergo a shift?

Based on this logic, BlockBeats and Zhihu collaborated to host an event in Hong Kong on April 21 titled "Decoding Web 4.0: When AI Agents Take Over On-chain Governance," seeking some certainty in the face of entirely new propositions.

You can scan the QR code to register

At this event supported by Wanxiang Blockchain and the HKUST Business School, top industry leaders will share their unique perspectives. We will discuss the potential of "Agent Autonomous Economies," the necessity of on-chain automation, and the new financial models brought by Agents.

We have also invited high-quality Skills teams in tracks such as transactional fundraising and changing payment habits. As fund flow is paramount, everyone wants Agents to earn money. These Skills Demos will showcase the cutting-edge financial transformations, revealing which ones can change our lifestyle habits and perceptions.

Registration is now open. Feel free to scan the QR code on the poster to register and learn more about this event (or click the registration link: https://luma.com/r3h4eqkv). We hope that the insights from industry leaders can inspire and provoke thoughts. In this era of online anxiety and offline turbulence, let's gain some clarity and direction.

For event collaboration, please add WeChat: x18038189105, Tg: @Nokikooo

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