How Do Tokens Move People? The Difference Between 'Giving' and 'Showing' (Episode 23 of 'So That's How Blockchain Works')

Episode 23 of 'So That's How Blockchain Works'

In this podcast, Yoshihiko Uchida, who has been involved in bank supervision at the Bank of Japan and the Financial Services Agency and currently teaches blockchain at Shunan City University, Yuya Sakai, founder of a gourmet app who has integrated blockchain into Web2 services to build a Web3 business, and Shinya Otsuka, deputy editor of the crypto media "New Economy," introduce what you need to know about blockchain today.

In this 23rd episode, we kick off the third part titled "Identity Verification × Finance = Incentivization." We reflected on the first part, which viewed tokens as narratives (stories and meanings) added to money, and the second part, which covered stablecoins and DeFi (decentralized finance), and considered how tokens can motivate people's behavior.

This time, we focused on the ways to use tokens by "giving" and "showing." Based on examples of tokenizing graduation certificates and driver's licenses, we explored how demonstrating experiences and qualifications could lead to service utilization and cooperation from others.

We also touched on the issue of who manages the digitized certificates and who the individual shows them to, relating to the topic of data self-sovereignty.

Furthermore, we discussed how combining financial mechanisms with identity verification could expand such motivations.

We presented the example of a DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) that pays rewards based on members' activities from pre-prepared funds, suggesting that relying solely on monetary rewards may not provide sufficient motivation.

The next episode, Episode 24, is scheduled to be released on November 17, 2026. We will consider what we would be happy to see increase as a result of incentivization and what "assets" mean for people.

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Previous Episodes

You can listen to all previously released episodes from the following links.

• Listen to all previous episodes
• Listen to Part 1 (from Ep.0 to Ep.12, including Public Recording Vol.1)
• Listen to Part 2 (from Ep.13 to Ep.22, including Public Recording Vol.2 and Vol.3)

Guests

Yoshihiko Uchida: Worked at the Bank of Japan from 1994 to 2023. Held roles such as planning officer at the Financial Research Institute and planning officer (group leader) at the Financial Institutions Bureau. He has provided insights on risk management and management in financial institutions from various perspectives. During this time, he also worked at the Financial Services Agency, Osaka University, and the University of Tokyo. From June to November 2023, he served as a director at Questory Co., Ltd., and from April to December 2024, he will serve as a director at Cachey, participating as a manager in a web3 startup. Currently, he is a professor at the Faculty of Information Science at Shunan City University (since June 2023) and is also promoting businesses related to digital IDs and electronic signatures as an outside director at Cyberlinks Co., Ltd. (from March 2024) and providing consulting related to blockchain utilization as the representative director of Yuidzumu Co., Ltd. (from October 2025).

X Account: https://x.com/uchida_tomato

Yuya Sakai: Co-founded SARAH Co., Ltd. during his student days. In addition to Japan's largest menu-focused gourmet app "SARAH," he built a big data service for the food industry called "FoodDataBank" for major food manufacturers. As COO, he led fundraising of 1 billion yen and M&A, PMI. Since 2019, he has led the Web3 transformation of SARAH. He developed a layer 1 unique blockchain called "ONIGIRI Chain" focused on data management in food and healthcare and built a token economy. After stepping down as representative director in 2025, he became independent. Currently, he is engaged in consulting focused on the social implementation of blockchain utilization and Web3 businesses with practical needs.

X Account: https://x.com/skyuya03

Interviewer: Shinya Otsuka, Deputy Editor of New Economy

Official X account of 'So That's How Blockchain Works': https://x.com/soublock
Official website of 'So That's How Blockchain Works': https://soublock.com/