From Clashes to Appreciation: A Glimpse into the Love-Hate Relationship of AI Agent Developers
Original Article Title: "The AI Agent Knows No Bounds, But Developers Are Filled with Love and Hate"
Original Article Author: Wenser, Odaily Planet Daily
As the new year begins, the two flagship projects in the AI Agent race, ai16z and swarms, have both reached new all-time highs in market value.
While this should have been a reason for celebration, ai16z founder Shaw delivered a harsh blow to swarms, publicly criticizing swarms' developer Kye Gomez, stating that he "does not understand how to write code and has a history of fraud," directly attacking his "character." Kye, who had previously gained attention for dropping out of high school at 19 and was praised as a "teenage genius."
This debate also led to both projects experiencing a short-term decline of over 20%. However, within a day, they regained lost ground, with swarms even reaching a new high of $0.6.
This incident has once again brought to light the complex relationships and love-hate dynamics among the developers behind AI Agents. In this article, Odaily Planet Daily will briefly outline the recent representative relationships among the developers behind AI Agents, shedding light on Devs' impact on AI Agent and related meme coin price trends.
Central Node of the Relationship Graph: ai16z Founder Shaw
According to Coingecko data, as of the time of writing, ai16z is currently priced at $2.17, with a 7-day increase of 70% and a market value of $2.4 billion, ranking third in the AI Agent sector, following the Base ecosystem's AI Agent token leader VIRTUAL and the traditional AI concept token FET.
Such outstanding performance has naturally brought a vast amount of attention to its developer Shaw. Especially with Shaw recently participating in numerous offline roadshows, engaging closely with community members from different regions, his public statements are seen as "a key signal in the AI Agent field." Shaw's previous strong promotion of the Space online conference for AI Agent development education was also regarded as a "preaching move towards the deep integration of AI and Crypto."
Frequent proactive statements have garnered Shaw many supporters but have also become a catalyst for conflicts with developers from other projects.
Relationship Map of AI Agent Devs
Shaw VS Kye: Unfiltered Mutual Dislike
Shaw had previously criticized swarms developer Kye as well. On December 21, 2024, he posted, "I really don't like publicly pointing out others' issues. Doing so poses a huge risk to our project, makes many people nervous, and I don't want to undermine hard-working developers. But some people will steal others' work and try to take credit for it."
Shaw shared a post from August 2023 on the Reddit machine learning forum, which pointed out a possible trace of someone else's work being stolen in a Github repo, owned by Swarms developer Kye. Some commenters also noted that Kye had directly copied code from a certain codebase. "Based on his code commit frequency and content, Kye most likely generated the code through ChatGPT."
Reddit Post and Comments Exposing
However, this recent criticism from Shaw towards Kye is more intense than ever before.
After Shaw's critical tweet was published, the official X platform account of the swarms project as an AI Agent replied, "Can you point out where the code has issues so that we can address and fix it?"
Shaw, unrelenting, directly replied, saying, "You are a thief and a fraudster, with evidence from people at Princeton University and individuals like Gwern, a senior member of OpenAI." The link and screenshot provided were evidence that Kye's previous code was identified as being generated by ChatGPT.
Quotes and Evidence from Shaw's Direct Interaction
Faced with Shaw's criticism, swarms developer Kye made a 180-degree turn from his previous confrontational stance and chose a more friendly response. "If you have any questions about swarms, please submit feedback, and we will promptly address the issue. We are committed to providing a seamless AI Agent building experience for everyone."
On December 22nd last year, when Shaw first criticized Kye, the latter's reaction was very intense. Kye believed that Shaw's token sale had undermined the project, causing many investors to lose money. He emphasized that he continued to hold swarms and MCS without selling, positioning himself as the true believer in realizing the functionality and practicality of the AI Agent. After Shaw blocked his account, Kye both mocked through posts and engaged in "personal attacks," suggesting that Shaw, Eliza, and ai16z, among other individuals and projects, were all scams.
Shaw & a16z Crypto CTO: "DM'd Internet Friend"
As the initiator of the ai16z DAO organization fund, Shaw's interactions with a16z have been limited, with direct contact only with the a16z Crypto CTO. Previously, Shaw had also posted clarifying that ai16z had no relation to a16z and emphasized that buying tokens related to these concepts was very foolish. However, he added in the comments section, "I am also one of the fools," further confusing unsuspecting users about the relationship and causing them to purchase tokens related to ai16z.
In November last year, a16z Crypto CTO Eddy Lazzarin had posted on X revealing the ongoing dialogue between the venture capital firm and the ai16z DAO. Previously, one of the founders of ai16z, Shaw, had posted on X seeking to contact a16z, to which Lazzarin replied, "Check your DMs." At that time, the news had a significant impact on ai16z, with a 24-hour surge of nearly 44%, pushing its market cap above $480 million.
Shaw & Baoskee: A Friendly Symbiotic Relationship Between Platform and Project
As a "decentralized VC investment platform," one of daos.fun's great achievements is the ai16z, a community-owned fund. Hence, the relationship between Shaw and ai16z's launch platform daos.fun founder Baoskee can be described as very friendly.
Previously, Baoskee had given a positive response regarding the "ai16z token permissions," directly showing support for ai16z and Shaw himself: "The ai16z token is indeed mintable, and minting rights will be controlled by DAO token holders (with veto protection) ... We will conduct a thorough audit of this matter."
At some level, the two can be seen as a symbiotic relationship, like a grasshopper on the same rope.
Shaw & Lucid: Co-founding Partners of ai16z
On the other hand, ai16z DAO's partner Lucid is Shaw's "right-hand man," who co-founded ai16z and also initiated the creation of the Base ecosystem AI Agent BeffAI.
Previously, Shaw posted looking for developers interested in Eliza Runescape plugin and proxy development, and Lucid was the contact person for that project at the time.
Shaw & Skely: Supporters and Initiators of the ai Pool Project
Skely, the founder of the AI Agent project ai Pool (METAV), which raised over 30,000 SOL in a few hours, is an example developer whom Shaw admires.
When Skely's X platform account was maliciously reported and banned, Shaw, as the co-founder of ai16z, immediately retweeted a community member's message in support. Later, Shaw posted stating that the aiPool token had been released, Skely was still working to recover the X account, showing outspoken support for the former.
Shaw & KOTO 9 X: Unilateral Appreciation
Previously, KOTOX 9, who issued the AI Meme coin KOTO, was suspected to be the target of Shaw's initial criticism (actually referring to swarms developer Kye), but Shaw later clarified in response, saying, "It's not him, KOTO 9 X is a very good developer." In his words, there is no shortage of appreciation.
Shaw & Dan Romero: Advocate for Farcaster Ecosystem Development
Last December, Shaw posted, "Farcaster is the future of programmable applications. Eliza has now integrated Farcaster. He also donated $420 worth of degenai tokens individually to every developer who embedded an AI Agent into the Farcaster ecosystem within the Eliza framework at the time."
This move naturally received strong support from Farcaster ecosystem co-creator Dan Romero, who replied in the comments section, saying, "LFG".
From this perspective, the two parties are to some extent akin to partners.
In addition, Shaw has also actively promoted close collaborations with projects such as ai16z, Eliza, the decentralized computing power network Aethir, the decentralized AI operating system 0G, and the well-known DEX platform Orca.
Other Developers in Smolworld: Shaw's Teammates
In a tweet at the end of last year, when asked in surprise if he was no longer involved in Smolworld-related work and was instead focusing on Eliza and ai16z, Shaw also responded, saying, "Still managing the team, but day-to-day development work is mainly handled by lordasado, Koshi, and Alextitonis."
Summary: The AI Agent is Borderless, but Developers Have Boundaries
As the old saying goes: "Science has no borders, but scientists have different nationalities." Similarly, the project accounts built on the X platform, the smart contracts deployed on-chain, and the corresponding AI Agents have no boundaries, but the developers behind countless AI Agents may have different boundaries and complex relationships.
Although the AI Agent in the crypto field still has a long way to go compared to mainstream products, the AI Agent and developers are striving in their own way to drive the continuous development of projects, products, and the race. As developer Kye from the swarms said, "Battle is a mutually destructive zero-sum game; only through joint efforts can net gains be created."
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