Rodeo's Big Bet
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Rodeo, one of the more promising onchain culture apps on Base, just made a significant shift: it’s dropping ETH pricing in favor of dollar-denominated credits.
Collecting a post there now costs a flat $0.25, rather than 0.0001 ETH.
Rodeo now runs on dollars! 💵
— kayvon (@saturnial) April 18, 2025
This dramatically simplifies the Rodeo user experience. 🪄
1. Prices are stable.
2. Everyone in the world understands what a dollar is.
3. You can talk about Rodeo without needing to explain crypto.
This is a huge unlock. I explain why below. ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/uG9xFNLhGs
The reasoning makes sense. Rodeo is already laser-focused on streamlined UX, e.g. one-tap collecting and logins via email or Instagram. And ETH introduces friction, math, and volatility when onboarding non-crypto users.
In contrast, dollars are stable and universally understood—important traits for an app that wants to feel like Instagram but run onchain.
Some crypto-native users might wince at the “no crypto bullshit” marketing here, to be sure, and there are fair questions about how dollar pricing fits into the broader composability of the onchain ecosystem.
Yet the tradeoffs seem worth exploring. Rodeo isn’t a DeFi app—it’s trying to build a social network for creativity. In that context, UX simplicity is arguably the most important thing to hone in on.
Rodeo is still onchain, of course. This shift is just an attempt to better mask complexity so users can focus on their content. It’s a bet that better UX will lead to broader adoption, and in that sense, it’s a valuable experiment worth keeping an eye on!
Other news this week...
📰 General news
- Reservoir is sunsetting its NFT API
- SHILLR introduced Runtime, its new creative studio
- Vitalik: An Ethereum Story is now available on Apple TV and Amazon Prime
🎨 Cryptoart
- Sarah Meyohas released her Infinite Petals collection
🏆 Digital collectibles
- Anime.com unveiled its new anime database
- CyberKongz announced its SEC investigation was closed
- Moonbirds released its Community Story Guide
- Pudgy Penguins announced a collaboration with Lotte
🎮 Decentralized gaming
- MegaETH introduced Crossy Fluffle, a real-time onchain game
- Treeverse launches Season 1 gameplay today
- Wolf Game is halting its 2.0 release
📱 Onchain social
- Bonsai released its Smart Media suite
- Farcaster launched its Snapchain data network
- Warpcast may rebrand to Farcaster
- Zora added support for text posts
🪙 Memes & NFTfi
🌐 Virtual worlds
- Decentraland announced its latest wearables contest winners
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