The "Marketing Aesthetics" of Crypto

Original Author: YBB Capital Researcher Zeke

1. Celebrity Coin, From Birth to Marketing

Warren Buffett has continued the charitable legacy of his late wife, Susan Buffett, for 23 years, transforming the admiration of a group of business elites into a globally renowned "time auction," creating the most iconic "lunch with a billionaire" model in the history of human charity.

Monetizing celebrity time is not uncommon in Web3, from the ancient Time New Bank to the later Friend.tech, the road of SocialFi has been explored for more than seven or eight years, but in most cases, it has been more of a sound than a rain. After all, in the on-chain world, the importance of speculative trading often outweighs this "fragile social" established by tokens. Most users are not truly interested in the exclusive insights shared by celebrities, but rather focus on the "volume and price" of the celebrities. Conversely, for top celebrities, the profit pool of SocialFi platforms is too small and cumbersome, and for KOLs, placing their already scarce influence in a SocialFi platform that is price transparent and has few users appears both awkward and foolish.

The lack of accumulation makes the path of SocialFi currently unfeasible. Therefore, the monetization path of celebrity value in Web3 needs to be differentiated, transitioned, and then evolved. A paid subscription community, a blue-check X account, these are the accumulative Web2 combinations required by KOLs at the moment. However, the value conversion path for top celebrities has always been less than smooth, like a large enterprise with millions of products waiting to be dumped, where To B is not cost-effective, and To C has no carrier.

From the monetization of time to the monetization of influence is the first successful step in the path exploration, and NFTs have played this role for a long time. But it's clear that NFTs' emphasis on scarcity, fixed-price offerings, and lack of liquidity doesn't satisfy both buyers and sellers. This form of peddling souvenirs has temporarily failed after the BTC ecosystem has gone silent.

The value of celebrities needs a new carrier, and although the answer has long been hidden in the story of Musk and Doge, this matter still needs some opportunities. Last year, the Pump.fun coin craze swept the coin circle, and the meme wave was carried out together with the U.S. presidential election, and various private presidential coins have appeared during this period. The ultra-high price increase and popularity have made some behind-the-scenes traders in the currency circle smell the opportunity, and let the real celebrities themselves issue coins by signing contracts or inducements, while the rest will be operated by them. It sounds a bit like how an MCN agency works with an influencer, but it's violent. FROM CAITLIN JENNER (U.S. OLYMPIC DECATHLON CHAMPION AND ONE OF TRUMP'S NUMBER ONE FANS) TO PRESIDENT MILLEY'S LIBRA. It starts with a tweet and ends with a vertically falling candlestick. The whole process can be as long as a few days or as short as a few hours to complete the harvest. Then the script is often a big V on social media to open an urgent "investigation", the coin issuing team posts and dumps each other, and finally it is over, and the concept of celebrity coins is born in this chicken feather.

But in any case, the path does become very clear, only in terms of initial results, memes are a perfect low-barrier distribution channel, but celebrity memes that lack intrinsic value are gone, and where do they go after PvP is over? The question shifts from the carrier to the eternal existence, the AI Agent can tell you about the future of humanity, the RWA can describe a Hundred Trillion's track, and the celebrity coin can tell what story?

Trump's answer was quite cliché; he wants to offer a "presidential time" to the top 220 holders of TRUMP, while the top 25 holders will be invited to a special VIP tour of the White House the next day. The value support of celebrity coins has once again reverted to "time." In my opinion, this plan can save the urgent need for token unlocking, but it cannot support the long-term growth of token prices.

A good enough meme should emphasize emotion and narrative rather than empowerment. The value of celebrity coins is not the celebrity's opinion and time, but the celebrity's story and the emotions behind it. Trump's dinner offer is more like selling an ultra-expensive version of Social Token, and when the presidential time is over, everything will dissipate. How to market TRUMP, the crypto team behind Trump may be able to ask Secretary Doge, who is tied to Musk with SpaceX and Tesla. To The Moon is still a slogan engraved in the hearts of users in the cryptocurrency circle, the people's currency makes holders believe that 1 Doge = 1 U, challenging traditional finance in line with the genes of crypto, in fact, every point is Musk is using his own power to sell emotions to the public, even if most of these stories have not yet come true. There is still a long way to go in the marketing of celebrity coins, and the memeization of personal influence should not be as crude as just a tweet and a benefit. It's not an abomination to come to the currency circle to make money, but at least you have to understand the currency circle first.

2. Evil Dragon

The Blur project has seldom been mentioned lately; I remember the last time it was discussed was when the Blast points system was launched.

With the narrative of NFTs fading away, many stories have become part of the past, but the imprint left by Pacman in this circle will not disappear. Blur was able to defeat the dragon that was OpenSea back in the day through a combination of "Points + zero fees, royalties + social fission," completing a rural encirclement of the city in a PDD-style approach. The orange logo filled Twitter on the day of the airdrop, and I think no NFT player will forget it. From a marketing perspective, Blur's strategy is invincible; it not only triumphed over competitors that other NFT platforms wouldn't even dare to imagine, but also encouraged many users who had never played with NFTs to join the score-boosting army, breaking multiple records in just a few months. Almost all Web3 projects after Blur have regarded this marketing template as a bible.

At that time, NFT players who had been suffering on OpenSea were all cheering, but Blur ultimately transformed from a dragon-slaying youth into an evil dragon. To start with the minor details, Airdrop 3 was my first experience of aversion to Web3 incentive activities; Blur adopted a self-destructive strategy to exchange for TVL and trading volume. At the beginning of the entire event, I mentioned that NFTs would accelerate their demise. The Bid For Airdrop mechanism encourages users to place orders without actually purchasing, leading to false demand and a spiraling price decline. The mechanism attracts arbitrageurs rather than genuine buyers, and once the value of Blur's token collapses, all blue chips will be buried together. From my perspective, the death of NFTs was initiated by Blur's Bid incentives, while the launch of Azuki's Elementals series marked the end. Of course, more fundamentally, it can be attributed to the fact that NFTs have never found a suitable path (excluding Pudgy).

Later, Pacman successively launched the NFT lending protocol Blend and the Ethereum Layer 2 Blast. The play style of these two protocols basically continues Blur's underlying strategy. Blend uses a lending points reward mechanism, and users can get airdrop points for participating in NFT collateralized lending, continuing the logic of "trading is mining". Blast adopts the "deposit points + invitation points" model, and users can stake ETH or stablecoins to earn Blast's native income and airdrop points. The income logic of the former is based on common income methods in the lending market, such as loan interest and liquidation arbitrage. The latter is to stake ETH into DeFi protocols such as Lido to earn interest and achieve income. Pacman builds a self-circulating crypto bank with ETH locked in the three, but the returns to users are unequal. In addition to Blur's lucrative early days, the incentives for subsequent projects basically announced the end of the airdrop era. Centralized points make all incentives a dark box, the rules are self-set, and the spontaneous gameplay of points is criticized by users.

What are the other consequences of the points-based system? The first is false prosperity, where users will lock their assets into various protocols when the rewards are visible, just in exchange for project tokens. However, the project party can use these fake user data and ultra-high TVL to raise funds everywhere and negotiate with the exchange, while VCs, who are accustomed to measuring value by data, have suffered heavy losses. The second point is to hinder innovation, the project is not as good as the activity, and the project that really has technology but does not understand marketing is buried. The third point is the fragmentation of liquidity, where truly valuable assets are locked in various protocols, just to play this game that is thought to be a loss. The fourth and most important point is that when the point system is introduced, a large number of studios, retail investors, and whales pour in just to compete for a small piece of the cake. Either fight for quantity or capital, and the per capita allocation of retail investors is so small that it is difficult to make up for gas from time to time, and the era of airdrops is truly over.

The points system remains a mainstream model in Web3 today, with "point mining" promoting rampant speculation, and Point Market amplifying this phenomenon. The incentives from airdrops have distorted the essence of early users and communities; the era of airdrops initiated by Uni years ago was intended for good, as it not only promoted DeFi Summer but also achieved genuine user retention and growth. In this era, every project launch signifies a major withdrawal of funds and the emergence of a "ghost town." If projects cancel this model, they will fall into an even more passive situation. In this dilemma, users can only seek new habitats.

3. Public Chains

Ethereum developed through a reliance on technology pathways and a commitment to decentralization during the primitive era, which later formed such a vast ecosystem. However, the path to success varies in each era. If we were to look back ten years, who would have thought that Tencent couldn't replicate a short video platform, while Taobao was ultimately eliminated by an e-commerce platform with a user interface full of cuts? Similarly, two years ago, I could not have imagined that Solana would one day really trip up the giants. But the fact is, in this era where the application layer is stagnant, marketing and practicality outweigh the so-called technical faith.

Two days ago, the Ethereum Foundation (EF) published three articles reiterating the future vision of Ethereum and the management structure of the foundation. The key information revealed is not complex: first, the decentralization of EF's power, strategically intervening in projects when necessary and proactively withdrawing when not needed. Second, the restructuring of EF's leadership to improve execution efficiency and strengthen communication with the community. Third, maintaining the technical path of sharding scaling, while also exploring RISC-V as an alternative to EVM. Although there is still a bit of a purist feel overall, EF has indeed lowered its proud stance.

But are these the real problems with Ethereum? All I can say is related, but not absolutely. Some of the changes in the appeal are mainly focused on users' dissatisfaction with EF and their reluctance to blend into the world, which is also the root cause of Ethereum's disease, and this person is naturally Vitalik. There's nothing wrong with not understanding and not wanting to understand memes, but the fault is that Vitalik itself still plays an absolute leadership role in Ethereum. A project with a market capitalization of 220 Billion is led by a somewhat willful and idealistic young man, and this person is unwilling to accept the mainstream culture in the current circle, then the loneliness at this time is only a necessity. However, fortunately, there is still a Tinder like Base in the lone Layer 2 that can compete with Solana, and if I were a member of EF, I would definitely apply to CB for some foreign help.

Looking at BNB from a perspective that sets aside conspiracy theories, at least CZ, who also doesn't understand memes, is doing his utmost to accept these concepts. During this period after his release from prison, he has also brought forth hot tracks like DeSci, but the lack of a basic foundation in the West makes each prosperity of BNB seem somewhat fleeting.

Solana's victory lies in its lower profile. After the collapse of SBF, Solana is no different from a child who has lost the protection of its parents. Faced with the giant Ethereum, it must seize every opportunity. Starting from the catalyst Silly Dragon to various super Memes, Dapps, and PayFi that followed. We used to mock Solana as a standalone chain, but in terms of its inclusiveness and support for the ecosystem, it appears to be more decentralized.

It is not Pump.fun that has revitalized Solana, but rather Pump.fun can only be born from the soil of Solana. This is similar to the relationship between Uni and Ethereum from years ago. The core idea of Solana's marketing is that the first chain for non-technical users is Solana, which is aimed at the masses, is user-friendly, and efficient. As Crypto moves towards Western mainstream users today, pragmatism is paramount, and the masses reign supreme. Solana is indeed suitable to become the first chain.

Conclusion

In the story of marketing, I have omitted NFT and GameFi. If both can be revived in the future, I may add them back. The narrative of the crypto world has always evolved in the tug-of-war between technological idealism and human greed. The rise of tokens, the prosperity of projects, and the revival of public chains essentially stem from a successful marketing effort. In the past, we listened to the narrative of technology, but today we must integrate into the mundane.