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Metaversal Issue

The Scenecoin Meta

gm Bankless Nation, let's talk about scenecoins, the Farcaster Index and more!
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Apr 9, 20245 min read
The Scenecoin Meta
Published on Apr 9, 2024
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Sponsor: Mantle — Mass adoption of decentralized & token-governed technologies.

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NFT NEWS
Meet $NFTFI
  1. 🪙 $NFTFI rollout. NFTfi Foundation, stewards of the NFTfi.com lending protocol, just introduced the design and distribution details of their new highly-anticipated native token.
  2. 🔥 Ordinals risers. Two Bitcoin NFT collections, Runestones and NodeMonkes, temporarily rose into the top 3 NFT collections by market cap behind only CryptoPunks.
  3. 🌐 Zora's HTML support. NFT creator suite Zora just added support for minting HTML compositions, a feature that will prove huge for net-based artists.
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ANALYSIS
The Rise of Scenecoins
Bankless Author: William M. Peaster

There’s a new trending meta on the onchain frontier: scenecoins.

According to Li Jin’s recent Taxonomy of memecoins, scenecoins are “community-first memecoins” that “launch as a schelling point for distributed communities with shared values and missions.”

A through-line in the surge in these bottom-up, grassroots coins? New onchain stacks that make coordinating in crypto easier than ever.

For example, a huge pillar here is Warpcast, Farcaster’s leading app and the current darling of the crypto social scene. 

Thanks to its in-built wallet support and composability with other resources like Zora NFT mints, Warpcast has become fertile ground and home base for a new wave of community-driven memecoins like $DEGEN (/degen), $HIGHER (/higher), and $ENJOY (/enjoy). 

Another rising pillar for scenecoins is Party, a platform + protocol combo for streamlined onchain groups. The $HIGHER community used Party to coordinate their token’s launch transparently. 

Of course, without top-down organization, scenecoins all start out embryonically—i.e. as blank slates—and then they gain further focus via churning “hive mind” community engagement. Now, we see:

  • The $DEGEN mission = rewarding great Farcaster content. 
  • The $HIGHER mission = creating an optimistic lifestyle brand. 
  • The $ENJOY mission = curating enjoyable onchain media. 

Each of these missions has an undercurrent of proliferation, similar to how the engine of the Nouns is the flywheel created by backing Nounish projects, from esports teams to short films

And just like how NFT drops on Zora has become a go-to proliferation avenue for Nouns media, so too has Zora become the minting platform of choice for culturemaking in today’s scenecoin communities. 

This is for numerous reasons—Zora’s very easy to use, it offers creator rewards and flexibility, and its Farcaster-friendly. But even more so, Zora’s leaning into scenecoins lately and becoming a hub for them in its own right. 

Indeed, the Zora team recently activated ERC-20 minting, paving the way for creators to sell their NFTs for non-ETH tokens, e.g. memecoins. This new feature, in combination with mint-friendly Warpcast, has led to a boom of scenecoin-themed NFT drops in recent days as these communities continue to bloom out toward the horizon. 

All that said, amid the cryptoeconomy’s ongoing memecoin mania, new onchain stacks like Warpcast, Party, and Zora are redefining how asset creation and community proliferation works. Together, they can channel the energy of memecoins toward the development of scenecoins, focusing them toward productive ends.

Looking ahead, the lasting success of scenecoins will heavily depend on community engagement and bottom-up governance. How these projects navigate and innovate around decentralized decision-making will be a key thread to watch going forward. 

Also, beyond speculation, the long-term value of scenecoins will depend on their adoption and utility within and outside their communities. Pay attention to the integrations and the partnerships to come and the possibility of scenecoins evolving into full-blown product lines.

Can this new niche of tokens maintain momentum and engagement for years to come? And what models will ensure their growth and sustainability without sacrificing community values?

The answers to these questions remain to be seen, but the potential for scenecoins to reshape how new communities can be built from the ground up is already apparent. Keep your eyes on this space accordingly!

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TOOL TIP
Farcaster Index

The Farcaster ecosystem is becoming a major launchpad for memecoin and scenecoin activity.

Accordingly, if you want to stay current and track all Farcaster-native tokens in one place, a great resource to check out is The Farcaster Index. From channel growth stats to volume charts, the platform offers all the basics you need to start navigating Farcaster tokens in style.

Also, keep an eye out for more tokens being added in over time!


FRIEND & SPONSOR: MANTLE

Mass adoption of token-governed technologies. With Mantle Network – an Ethereum rollup, Mantle Treasury, and a token holder governed roadmap for products and initiatives.

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HOT TAKE
Ordinals Sniping? "The Worst"

Yesterday, NFTStats.eth called Ordinals sniping "probably one of the worst user experiences in the space."

Here's what's been happening–someone buys a Bitcoin NFT on Magic Eden, but then a mempool hawk snipes the transaction and forces a higher price on the original buyer.

I totally agree, this UX sucks. NFTStats suggested that marketplaces move toward emphasizing that "an initial purchase is essentially just setting off an auction til the block closes," and I think that would definitely be a step forward.

Until something changes though, look for this to continue to being a pain point for some buyers of choice Bitcoin NFTs. Where there's money to be made, arbitragers will play.

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Not financial or tax advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. This newsletter is not tax advice. Talk to your accountant. Do your own research.

Disclosure. From time-to-time I may add links in this newsletter to products I use. I may receive commission if you make a purchase through one of these links. Additionally, the Bankless writers hold crypto assets. See our investment disclosures here.

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