I’ve thought a lot about the concept of creator coins and where their values are derived from.
There have been many attempts at creator coins where the central concept is around trading creator tokens, giving creators a means to earn from transaction fees or holding/selling their tokens. This has been attempted several times on different chains over the past few years. Evidently, this is not a model that is meant for the long run. Platforms rely on hyped release and any garnered attention is focused almost solely on initial token launches, where traders find their exists as quickly as possible. Creators are hounded by token holders to boost visibility, pressured to never sell.
The creator token concept hasn’t evolved. Content coins haven’t either. If the only function of a token is that it exists to be traded, then there is really no gathered value over time of any creator’s token. When designing Odyssey, we intentionally flipped this around. Token trading is a natural part of the interface, happening in the background as part of a useful function in the app ecosystem.
Every user account on Odyssey is a smart contract (on Base). Each room created is another smart contract, tied onchain to your user contract. When you join a room, you’re purchasing a preset number of tokens at a set cost, based on a step-curve bonding system. When you leave a room, you’re selling that same batch of tokens. In the user interface, you are not tasked with understanding the tokenization or transaction logic. There is no place to just buy tokens for the sake of buying tokens.
But I also understand the importance of the culture around simply trading in the trenches. At some point, we’re going to introduce the user token (our “creator coin”) interaction in-app, and it will serve a similar conceptual function of trading to unlock a feature. Given all the types of creator coins out there, Odysseys’ are actually designed for the long term trade, ironically because their purpose is not designed to be traded. And yet, for those who want to do that, you’ll be able to because this is all built permissionlessly onchain. Plus, as user tokens are traded, users will see fee shares come up as claimable rewards in-app, giving them the capital to join more rooms. Perhaps we’ll build an interface dedicated to this, perhaps someone else will.
I’ll be posting more in depth about the smart contract protocol we designed soon. In the meantime, you should try Odyssey at its bare minimum now and watch it evolve.
Odyssey MVP is out!
This is a project @Jebus and I have been working on full time for the past year, bootstrapped and mostly self-funded (along with a few generous angel checks 🙏).
I'm proud that we've dedicated ourselves to building something real, with full conviction, during a time in this industry where it feels like capital is constantly being burned with little to show for it.
In the past year, almost every consumer crypto startup and attempt at decentralized social has either failed or pivoted to some form of zero-sum token markets/gambling. This isn't to say many of those teams weren't brilliant. Building applications, especially in consumer, is difficult and experimental in nature.
If you ask someone for advice, they'll probably tell you not to pursue consumer. It's the hardest path, nearly impossible to raise funding for (especially right now), and asks founders to attempt the lofty goal of creating something that's useful to a lot of people, not just a few.
And yet, here we are. If you want to see consumer crypto succeed, you should try Odyssey. This is an app you can onboard your normie friends into, that doesn't ask you to gamble away your funds, that integrates crypto in a way that makes the product better.
💜 @OdysseyAILabs
Join the Odyssey Public Alpha, available now for iOS and Android!
Use your unique activation code to begin your journey. Create rooms, join discussions, and earn rewards for your participation.
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When ppl claim this I always wonder how they think it happens, or have unrealistic expectations on how much $1bn actually is.
I joined crypto with $200. If I held my initial bitcoin since then and never traded, I would have ~$300k.
If, instead, from that moment I sold the top and bought the bottom of every crypto cycle on Bitcoin, and never paid any taxes, I would have ~$6m USD.
If I put my entire net worth into the Ethereum ICO and never touched it, today I would have ~$150m pre-tax.
While it was definitely possible to have made >$1bn with the opportunities in the market, these versions of reality would also require me to make no mistakes, and have no need to spend $ in real life, or take excessive risk via leverage.
In reality, I grew up in a working class family. I didn’t have a trust fund and I had to pay off my student loan myself. I had a job at Tescos while at high school. After university, I needed to pay rent and fund cost of living and eventually buy a place to live.
I worked at startups for relatively little $ salary, and while a couple have done okay, they still are illiquid and worth nothing until some exit.
Perhaps if I erase a couple of dumb mistakes and drawdowns, or if I had a lil more grind, then my answer would be different today. But it is easy to say this with perfect hindsight vision. It’s easy to see where you could have optimised better, and decisions you made look dumb when the past makes things so obvious.
The truth is I have always optimised for enjoying my life and not going to 0. I never felt like I had a safety net, so it was never possible for me to do anything in any other way. I would probably have less money if I had tried to add more risk or chased $ harder, because being all-in with your entire livelihood is a mental battle and I feel I only win that battle when the stakes are lower.
In writing this, maybe I do understand why CT folks believe this, because modern CT sees crypto as a late-stage lottery ticket farm, where the optimal strategy is to 5x leverage up your portfolio in a hope of catching a good 20% move and then leaving. Or, literally going all-in on the next coin they heard Ansem is buying. So perhaps to them, looking back at the charts, of course that’s what successful folks did.
In reality, I use leverage close to never (and typically to reduce risk rather than add risk — have used it to add risk maybe 3 times in the last 5 years, and maybe 15 times ever). I never go all-in on anything, have only ever done that on BTC and ETH before in the last decade. When I buy other things, I limit risk to tiny amounts, because I treat it as a 0 until proven otherwise (so, always <1% liquid portfolio). Liquid portfolio is also a smaller % of overall portfolio to future-proof against my own fuckups.
Obviously I made a lot of money, I have been here 12 years! CT doesn’t want to hear about “getting rich in a decade” though. I am happy with where I am and have never really cared or optimised for maximising $ earnings, but instead having a nice life that lets me enjoy the game we play together.
It’s 2025, the golden bull run is here.
ETF approval gets everyone’s panties wet, $pengu pumps into oblivion in a single god candle straight to ATHs
Which then parlays into the flip that other dog coin (which will not be mentioned. No free advertising) narrative.
After walking doggo #2, a smol teeny tiny little crab. Pengu is pudgy so he needs a breather and some water.
Then the flight to claim our rightful crown of #1 meme of all time begins.
Pudgy party is the #1 on the Apple App Store. Pudgy World has found PMF. GIF views reach the gazillions. Pengu mania sets in.
Foxy and Aaron have successfully conquered all of the east. Luca marches west to begin his reign over Europe.
Global peace is in our reach, utopia is near. World Penguin domination is so close we can taste it.
The doorbell rings in your 88th floor penthouse apartment, your free unlimited sushi deluxe meal arrives in time for lunch as you watch the $pengu chart print another lambo.
Hyperpengu.