TechFlow news, January 20 — The Lens Protocol announced it has completed its initial mission of validating the feasibility of a user-owned, decentralized social network. Its focus will now shift from protocol and infrastructure development to building true consumer-grade applications and driving user adoption. Mask Network is seen as the torchbearer for this next phase of Lens, aiming to advance decentralized social networking from a technical experiment into everyday usage.
Lens founders Stani and Avara will continue supporting Mask founder Suji Yan and his team as advisors. Both parties believe that over the coming years, social networking and DeFi will increasingly converge within the economic layer of the internet. Suji Yan stated that Mask has evolved into a "Tencent of Web3," with its MaskDAO social matrix integrating multiple decentralized social products, including Web3.bio, Firefly.social, and Orb.club—the most active social application built on the Lens network. "Mask remains committed to making decentralized social experiences more accessible, intuitive, and suitable for everyday users—an objective fully aligned with the next chapter of Lens," said Suji.
Lens has successfully laid the foundation, proving that decentralized social networks are viable at real-world scale. Mask’s role is to build mature products atop this foundation, grow the user base, and drive decentralized social networking into the mainstream.
