Technical Glossary
Plain-English definitions for the technical terms used across OYM articles. Every entry has a short definition, a real-world analogy, and deeper context in the linked detail page. Built for readers who are new to crypto, AI, or both.
72 terms and growing as new articles introduce new technical language.
A
- Airdrop Distributing tokens for free to eligible wallets, usually to reward early users, bootstrap a community, or decentralise token ownership away from a small group of insiders at launch.Tokenomics
- AMM Automated Market Maker. A type of decentralised exchange that uses liquidity pools and a pricing formula to enable token trading without an order book. Anyone can deposit tokens into the pool and earn fees from trades.Crypto
- API Application Programming Interface. A structured way for one piece of software to talk to another. In DeAI, APIs let applications request inference from a model without running the model themselves.AI / ML
- ATH All-Time High. The highest price a token has ever reached. ATH is usually quoted as a reference point for how far the current price has fallen (or risen) since the peak.Tokenomics
- Attestation A cryptographic proof that a piece of code is running on a specific hardware enclave in an unmodified state. Attestation lets remote users verify that a service is genuinely running what it claims to be running.Privacy
B
- Block A batch of transactions added to a blockchain at a set interval. Each block cryptographically links to the previous one, creating an append-only chain that can't be rewritten without redoing all the work since.Crypto
- Bridge A protocol that lets you move assets from one blockchain to another. Bridges typically lock the asset on the source chain and mint a wrapped version on the destination chain. Bridges are notoriously the most-attacked component in crypto.Crypto
- Burn Permanently removing tokens from circulation by sending them to an address that no one controls. Burns reduce total supply, which (all else equal) makes each remaining token worth more of the network's value.Tokenomics
- Burn-Mint Equilibrium A tokenomics model where network fees burn tokens while new tokens are minted and paid to suppliers. The system tries to balance burns and mints so circulating supply stays roughly stable when usage scales.Tokenomics
- Buyback Using protocol revenue to purchase tokens on the open market, usually to burn them or return them to a treasury. Buybacks convert business income into upward pressure on the token by reducing circulating supply.Tokenomics
C
- Circulating Supply The number of tokens currently in circulation and tradeable on the open market. Differs from total supply (which includes locked or unvested tokens) and max supply (the upper limit, if there is one).Tokenomics
- Cliff A waiting period at the start of a token vesting schedule during which no tokens unlock at all. After the cliff ends, tokens begin releasing according to the vesting schedule.Tokenomics
- Confidential Compute Hardware-enforced computation where data and code are encrypted in memory and only the authorised application can access them. The machine's operator cannot read what the application is doing even though they own the machine.Privacy
- CUDA Nvidia's parallel computing platform. The software layer that lets AI workloads run on Nvidia GPUs. Almost every serious AI model is trained and served through CUDA, which is why Nvidia has a structural moat in AI compute.AI / ML
D
- DAO Decentralised Autonomous Organisation. A way to coordinate decisions and manage a treasury using token-weighted voting instead of a traditional company structure. Token holders propose and vote on changes directly.Crypto
- DeAI Decentralised AI. An umbrella term for blockchain-based projects that build AI infrastructure (compute, data, inference, models, agents) without a single central provider controlling the system.Crypto
- DeFi Decentralised Finance. Financial services like lending, trading, and yield farming built on smart contracts instead of traditional banks or brokerages. DeFi protocols are usually permissionless and global.Crypto
- DePIN Decentralised Physical Infrastructure Networks. Protocols that use token incentives to coordinate real-world physical infrastructure like GPU compute, wireless networks, storage, mapping sensors, or bandwidth.Crypto
- DEX Decentralised Exchange. A trading venue where token swaps happen entirely through smart contracts, with no central operator holding user funds. The largest DEXes are Uniswap, Aerodrome, Raydium, PancakeSwap, and Curve.Crypto
E
- Embedding A numerical representation of a word, sentence, or image as a list of numbers (a vector) that captures its meaning. Similar things have similar embeddings, which makes them useful for search, clustering, and recommendation.AI / ML
- Emissions New tokens created and distributed by a blockchain protocol over time as rewards to validators, stakers, or miners. Emissions fund network security and participation at the cost of diluting existing holders.Tokenomics
- Enclave An isolated region of CPU or GPU memory protected by hardware. Code and data inside the enclave are inaccessible to the operating system, the hypervisor, or even the machine's physical owner.Privacy
- Epoch A fixed-length period in a Proof of Stake blockchain during which the validator set is stable and rewards are calculated. Epochs are the natural unit for staking rewards and network state changes.Infra
- ERC Ethereum Request for Comment. A numbered standard that defines how a specific type of smart contract should behave. Common examples are ERC-20 (fungible tokens), ERC-721 (NFTs), and ERC-4626 (tokenised vaults).Crypto
- Escrow A contract that holds tokens on behalf of a user under a defined release condition. The tokens are not destroyed and not freely tradeable. They sit locked until the condition is met (a burn, a time elapsing, a counterparty action).Tokenomics
F
- Fair Launch A token launch where everyone has the same access from day one. No private sale, no insider allocation, no VC discount. Tokens are distributed by mining, staking, or open public sale at a single price.Tokenomics
- FDV Fully Diluted Valuation. The market cap a token would have if every token that will ever exist were already in circulation. FDV is what the project would be worth if all locked, vesting, or unminted tokens were trading today.Tokenomics
- FHE Fully Homomorphic Encryption. A cryptographic technique that lets you compute on encrypted data without decrypting it. The result is also encrypted, and only the data owner can read it. FHE is the strongest form of computational privacy.Privacy
- Fine-tuning The process of taking a pre-trained model and training it further on a smaller, more specialised dataset to adapt it to a specific task, domain, or style. Fine-tuning is much cheaper than training from scratch.AI / ML
- Fork A point at which a blockchain or its software splits into two separate paths. Forks can be temporary (two valid blocks compete and one wins), planned (a software upgrade), or contentious (a community split into two chains).Crypto
G
- Gas The fee paid to a blockchain to process a transaction. Gas is denominated in the chain's native token and varies with network demand. Sending a transaction without enough gas means the transaction fails and the gas is still consumed.Crypto
- GPU Graphics Processing Unit. Originally designed to render video game graphics, GPUs turned out to be exceptionally good at the massively parallel math that AI models need. Modern AI training and inference runs almost entirely on GPUs.AI / ML
- Gradient In machine learning, the direction a model's parameters need to be adjusted to reduce its prediction error. Training is a long process of computing gradients and nudging the parameters in the direction the gradient suggests.AI / ML
- Gradient Compression A family of techniques for shrinking the size of gradient updates exchanged between GPUs during training. Gradient compression makes decentralised AI training feasible by cutting bandwidth by 100-1000x with small accuracy losses.AI / ML
H
I
- ICO Initial Coin Offering. A token sale where a project sells tokens directly to the public, usually before any product exists. ICOs dominated 2017-2018 funding and are now mostly replaced by airdrops, IDOs, or fair launches.Tokenomics
- IDO Initial DEX Offering. A token launch mechanism where the initial sale happens directly on a decentralised exchange, with built-in liquidity pool funding. IDOs replaced ICOs as the standard launch model for many projects after 2018.Tokenomics
- Inference Running a trained AI model to produce an answer. Inference is what happens when you type a prompt into ChatGPT and get a response. The model takes your input, computes a best guess, and returns it.AI / ML
- Inflation The annual rate at which new tokens are created and added to the circulating supply. Most networks use inflation to pay validators, stakers, and infrastructure providers from freshly minted tokens rather than real revenue.Tokenomics
L
- L1 Layer 1. A base blockchain that runs its own consensus mechanism, executes transactions, and settles its own state. Bitcoin, Ethereum, NEAR, and Solana are all L1s. Anything built on top of an L1 is technically a Layer 2 or higher.Crypto
- L2 Layer 2. A blockchain that runs on top of an L1 to provide cheaper or faster transactions while inheriting the L1's security. L2s batch many transactions and post compressed proofs back to the L1.Crypto
- Liquidity How easily a token can be bought or sold without moving the price. High liquidity means you can enter or exit large positions quickly at the quoted price. Low liquidity means even small trades can swing the market.Crypto
- LLM Large Language Model. A neural network trained on vast amounts of text to predict the next word in a sequence. Modern LLMs (GPT, Claude, Llama, Qwen, DeepSeek) generate human-quality text and are the foundation of most modern AI products.AI / ML
M
- ML Machine Learning. The branch of AI where systems learn patterns from data instead of being explicitly programmed with rules. Modern AI (LLMs, image generation, recommendation systems) is almost entirely machine learning.AI / ML
- Model A trained neural network that takes inputs (text, images, audio) and produces outputs (more text, classifications, generated content). In DeAI the model is the thing that actually does the work.AI / ML
- MoE Mixture of Experts. A neural network architecture where many specialised "expert" sub-models exist alongside a router that picks which experts to use for each input. Only a fraction of the model's parameters are active for any single query.AI / ML
- MPC Multi-Party Computation. A cryptographic technique where multiple parties jointly compute a function over their inputs without any party revealing its input to the others. Useful for shared computation on private data.Privacy
N
O
P
- Parameters The internal numbers (weights and biases) inside a neural network that get adjusted during training. A 70-billion-parameter model has 70 billion adjustable internal numbers encoding everything it has learned.AI / ML
- Prompt The text you give an AI model to tell it what to generate. A prompt can be a simple question, a long instruction, a chunk of context plus a task, or a conversation history the model uses to produce its response.AI / ML
- Proof of Stake A consensus mechanism where validators earn the right to create new blocks by staking tokens as collateral. If they misbehave, the network slashes their stake. Proof of Stake replaced energy-intensive mining on most modern chains.Infra
- Proof of Useful Work A consensus mechanism where the computational effort that secures the network is directed at a useful task (rendering, scientific computing, AI inference) rather than arbitrary hash puzzles. Aims to make PoW productive instead of wasteful.Infra
- Proof of Work The original blockchain consensus mechanism where miners compete to solve computationally expensive puzzles. The winner proposes the next block and earns the rewards. Proof of Work secures Bitcoin and most pre-2020 chains.Infra
Q
R
S
- SDK Software Development Kit. A collection of code libraries, documentation, and tools that lets developers integrate a service into their applications without writing everything from scratch. SDKs are how projects become easy to build with.AI / ML
- SGX Intel Software Guard Extensions. The first widely-deployed TEE technology, introduced in 2015. SGX creates encrypted memory regions (enclaves) where code and data are protected from the operating system and the machine's owner.Privacy
- Slippage The difference between the expected price of a trade and the price you actually get when the trade executes. Slippage usually goes against the trader and gets worse with bigger trades or thinner markets.Crypto
- Slot A fixed time interval during which a single block can be produced on a Proof of Stake blockchain. Slots are the smallest unit of consensus time and group together to form epochs.Infra
- Smart Contract A program stored on a blockchain that runs automatically when its conditions are met. Smart contracts are how blockchains do anything beyond just transferring tokens — DeFi, NFTs, DAOs, and DeAI infrastructure all run on smart contracts.Crypto
- Staking Locking up a cryptocurrency to help secure a blockchain network, usually in exchange for rewards. The locked tokens act as a security deposit that can be taken away if the staker misbehaves.Crypto
T
- TEE Trusted Execution Environment. A hardware-secured region of a CPU or GPU where code runs in isolation, so even the machine's operator can't read what's happening inside. TEEs give decentralised AI inference privacy guarantees.Privacy
- TGE Token Generation Event. The moment a project's token first becomes tradeable. TGE is when vesting clocks usually start, when liquidity hits exchanges, and when public price discovery begins.Tokenomics
- Token A digital unit of value or access rights tracked on a blockchain. Tokens can represent ownership in a project, a right to use a service, a share of future revenue, or simply a tradable asset with no underlying claim.Crypto
- Training The one-time process of teaching a neural network to perform a task by showing it massive amounts of example data and adjusting its internal weights until the outputs are good. Training builds the model; inference uses it.AI / ML
- TVL Total Value Locked. The sum of all assets currently deposited in a protocol's smart contracts. TVL is the standard measure of how much capital a DeFi or DeAI protocol is custodying.Tokenomics
V
- Validator A computer that runs the full blockchain protocol, verifies transactions, and proposes new blocks. Validators are the workers that keep a Proof of Stake network running, and they earn rewards for doing the work correctly.Crypto
- VC Venture Capital. Private investors who fund projects at an early stage in exchange for equity or token allocations. VC rounds are typically pre-launch, at steep discounts to any future public price, with multi-year vesting.Tokenomics
- Vesting A schedule that locks up tokens allocated to insiders, investors, and team members, releasing them gradually over months or years. Vesting prevents insiders from dumping on public buyers immediately after launch.Tokenomics