WELCOME TO THE BORED APE YACHT CLUB.#
(Welcome to the Bored Ape Yacht Club!)
[Note: This article is the second piece in the mfers universe article relay series — from mfers to BAYC and even the whole world, the contributor of this idea is myself @wenser, the first article in this series is a discussion on the CC0 topic: The CC0 Fog of NFTs by alittle.bit]
TL,DR:
1. What did BAYC do right? — A breakdown of the success factors of NFTs from a personal perspective;
2. BAYC's endless ambition — to be the project that leads the trend rather than follows it;
3. The significance and future of BAYC — a series of chain reactions and impacts after empowering people.
In 1987, French businessman Bernard, with a strong hand, pushed for the merger of the Louis Vuitton brand and the Moët Hennessy luxury goods group, thus creating the "LVMH" group, a "luxury empire" that has been inherited to this day.
Today, the LVMH group includes 75 brands, with total revenue reaching 64.2 billion euros (approximately 440 billion RMB) in 2021.
Fast forward 35 years to today, coincidentally, in the crypto field and at the forefront of the NFT race, a unique brand has emerged that can rival the "superior status of the LVMH group in the luxury goods sector" — BAYC (Bored Ape Yacht Club) and the team behind it, @Yuga Labs, who are the "protagonists" we are going to talk about today, having recently stirred up a tremendous wave in the NFT field, the Crypto world, and the entire web3 ecosystem.
1. "The Stone Monkey is Born": The Past and Present of BAYC#
All seemingly great successes originate from a small beginning.
a. The Origin of BAYC#
Like all cliché stories, the beginning of BAYC was also a somewhat fortuitous arrangement.
On February 1, 2021, Gordon, one of the four gentlemen of @Yuga Labs, received a text message from his friend Greg, simply stating — "Let's do an NFT together!" Before this, the two were just ordinary people among thousands, and after entering the cryptocurrency field in 2017, their contributions to the crypto space mainly included three aspects: 1. reading a lot of books; 2. making some money and spending some money; 3. losing everything. Doesn't that sound somewhat similar to your and my experiences? But in the crypto world, this might be a norm.
Prior to this, although Gordon and Greg had heard of the CryptoKitties and Cyberpunk NFT projects, it was clear that they had their own understanding and different ideas about NFTs.
At the beginning of 2021, the The Hashmasks project was launched, which is an art project mediated by blockchain and NFT technology. It seemed unremarkable but, to some extent, inspired BAYC, which is now the "undisputed king series project in the NFT field." From this project and subsequent NFT projects, technology was no longer a decisive factor; culture became the "winning rule" of NFTs. And this marks an important "paradigm shift" in the NFT field.
Subsequently, Gordon and Greg, who were already "surfing the crypto world," brought in two software engineer friends, Sass and Tomato, and the "four gentlemen" of @Yuga Labs officially debuted. In their interactions, their understanding of NFTs deepened, and they became incredibly confident in the infinite possibilities it brought — just like I mentioned earlier, NFTs (non-fungible tokens) are a "mysterious thing" that is very suitable for carrying many things, even meaning.
The meaning that the "four gentlemen" assigned to the series of NFTs they were about to create was — in a future where crypto changes the world (about 10 years later), when all liquidity mining has come to an end, cryptocurrency traders have achieved unimaginable success beyond ordinary people's imagination. But after that, what they fell into was endless boredom, dullness, and monotony, just like the old man sitting under the big locust tree at the village entrance, who would always sigh — "Life is indeed as lonely as snow." Then, these cryptocurrency traders who called themselves "apes" would play a graffiti game on the secret club's bathroom wall in the depths of the swamp, where "each person can only draw a pixel every 15 minutes," with a collaborative art experiment nature.
From the perspective of narrative economics and semiotics, everything is narrative, and symbols are power.
Under the extreme operations of the "four gentlemen," the entire BAYC project began to operate at high speed —
OG (Original Gangster) team:
@allseeingseneca (basic character design - took 4 days), @migwashere, @thomasdagley, and two other unnamed artists (created various expressions, clothing, and accessories, as well as the design of the club itself - took about 1 month). After that, for the mutant series NFTs, the main creators included @thomasdagley and @lovans (mutant ape illustrations), @1800seandotcom (serum art).
Timeline:#
2021.4.18 The official BAYC Twitter account began promoting, the 10K private membership club officially debuted, and the split began, emphasizing from the start that all NFTs were uniformly priced below 0.1e, which was completely different from the pricing strategy of NFT projects at that time that adopted bonding curves (to better care for early supporters) (for more information on bonding curves, see → When Bonding Curves Meet NFTs - Tencent - 2021.4.12). In simple terms, bonding curve pricing allows early minters to buy in at a lower price, facilitating subsequent sales, but is very unfair to later buyers; therefore, BAYC made it clear from the beginning: all beings are equal and emphasized "Bonding Curves are a ponzi."
Announcing the Bored Ape Yacht Club! 🐵⛵️ 10,000 unique #NFTs where each Ape doubles as membership to a digital club with member-only benefits. For a chance of winning a Bored Ape: 1 - Follow @boredapeyc 2 - Retweet This 3 - Like and Comment on this tweet. #NFT #nftcollectors
Bonding Curves are a ponzi. All our Bored Apes #NFTs will be priced 0.1 ETH (or less, TBD prior to sale on 3/24). BAYC Membership costs the same for everyone! #NFT #NFTcollector
2021.4.19 BAYC emphasized its scarcity and rarity: promoting "unique NFTs, 172 traits, generated using ERC-721 contracts, and stored on IPFS," and announced a pre-sale opening on 4.23;
Each Bored Ape #NFT is unique and programmatically generated from 172 possible traits, stored as an ERC721 token on the Ethereum blockchain and hosted on IPFS. All Apes are rare, but some are far rarer than others. Pre-Sale begins 4/23. boredapeyachtclub.com
2021.4.22 BAYC officially launched the NFT pre-sale website and again adopted a split operation method, giving away a BAYC in a lottery, with a Twitter user ID @yourstruly_nft becoming the lucky one (later he also minted bayc#27).
LOCKDOWN IS OVER, THE CLUB IS OPEN! The BAYC Homepage is now LIVE. Get in here, apes. boredapeyachtclub.com ☠️🐵⛵️ Pre-Sale Starts 4/23 To Win a Bored Ape: - Retweet - Like - Comment #NFTs #NFTart #NFTcollectors
Congrats @yourstruly_nft you won the last giveaway before our Pre-Sale starts tomorrow! ☠️🐵⛵️ We'll DM you for wallet info. Cheers.
LOCKDOWN IS OVER, THE CLUB IS OPEN! The BAYC Homepage is now LIVE. Get in here, apes. boredapeyachtclub.com ☠️🐵⛵️ Pre-Sale Starts 4/23 To Win a Bored Ape: - Retweet - Like - Comment #NFTs #NFTart #NFTcollectors
2021.4.23 BAYC officially launched a week-long pre-sale, with a minting price of 0.08e (approximately 220 USD at the time), and the BAYC team specifically chose an afternoon at 5 PM (Eastern Time) with relatively low gas fees to start the pre-sale, emphasizing afterwards: BAYC is not just a collectible NFT, but a club that includes exclusive member benefits: collaborative art experiments, treasure hunts, member-only stores, and NFTs that can breed and mutate (i.e., the later mutant apes).
The Bored Ape Yacht Club #NFT Pre-Sale is now LIVE! Gas is cheap. Come ape with us. ☠️🐵⛵️ (Update your cache if it doesn't show up for you.) boredapeyachtclub.com/#/home
However, like many NFT projects today, BAYC's sales were not ideal at the beginning, with only about 500 sold in the first week. At this time, the efforts made during the early operations began to pay off! This is now a common tactic in the NFT field — "Influencers driving sales"!
First, @evantan, as the last buyer during the pre-sale phase, became the "whistleblower" driving sales after the official launch; his endorsement was crucial; subsequently, under his influence, @j1mmy.eth was the first to enter, buying 100 BAYC in 20 minutes; after that, @pranksy also joined in, directly purchasing 250 BAYC and quickly increasing his holdings to 500, making him a "consumption fanatic." The subsequent frenzied buying by these two whales successfully ignited the strong FOMO among NFT players for BAYC, and with the previous goodwill from many influencers, nearly 10K BAYC were sold out instantly, and its contract quickly topped the Ethereum network!
A year later, as time flows, looking back at that crazy night, it has now become a milestone worthy of being recorded in the history of NFTs.#
Here, I believe that every influencer who has contributed to BAYC, to some extent, deserves to be recognized (the following list is compiled from @Metascan.Pro):
@screentimes, @0xtuba, @hasufl, @cyrptonaut, @girldadNFT, @CL207, @AnonymouslyObv3, @ABigThingBadly, @dis0ri3nted, @marenaltman, @waifusion, @CryptoPapi10, @steven_schill, @loomdart, @youngalgy, @evankeast, @gmoneyNFT, @shroom_daddy, @DeezeFi, @HsakaTrades, @beaniemaxi, @evantan, @c0inalchemist, @0xMaki, @ledgerstatus, @ratwell0x, @inversebrah
At this point, the 10K BAYC finally achieved its first "small goal" — officially sold out! The journey they are about to embark on is the next checkpoint for NFT project teams — executing the RoadMap. Fortunately, they did well.
So, we can first pose a question —
b. What did they do right?#
A year later, looking back at the early actions of the BAYC team, it is no exaggeration to say that BAYC raised the operational level and execution standards of NFT project teams by more than thirty floors:
1) Early seed user screening and interaction with more blockchain users (thanks to the team's deep understanding of the crypto field);
2) Innovated the lottery split operation method of liking, retweeting, and @ more people, which has since become a standard for NFT project operations;
3) Gave out 1/1 exclusive honorary member avatars to influencers with a large following and significant impact, not counting towards the 10K NFTs;
4) Puzzle reward-based operational activities to increase community member stickiness, activity, and loyalty, and serve as promotional materials;
5) Valued everyone's (especially influencers') social network, not missing any opportunity to promote themselves! (The following tweet shows the BAYC team's emphasis on early potential supporters.)
6) Meme: Used monkeys (orangutans) and related expressions, memes, GIFs, etc., to bridge the communication gap between the official Twitter account and different followers and Twitter users, enhancing meme influence.
7) Pricing: On the basis of a uniform price of 0.08e, it greatly filled the market gap — low-priced NFTs with high liquidity.
8) Design: Although the time spent was not long, the design and aesthetics of BAYC were clearly online, and the recognition was very clear.
9) Rights: The BAYC team clearly defined the holders' ownership of the NFTs and the corresponding rights to commercial use. (This point will be elaborated in conjunction with the CC0 agreement later.)
(PS: At this point, I want to emphasize that these are my personal summaries of the successful aspects of the BAYC NFT project operations based on past information. Don't nitpick and say I'm "playing hindsight" or "having a retrospective effect." If you don't want to read, don't!)
c. BAYC Milestones#
The following milestone information is referenced from: "Let's make a NFT" (official article by Yuga Labs), and the table information is organized and compiled by @wenser.
Timeline of BAYC (Upper/Lower Part) —
d. BAYC Ecological Niche
Reference Articles:
A Breakdown of BAYC's Path to Success
[The Origin of the $4 Billion Story by Yuga Labs: "Let's Make an NFT"] (https://www.theblockbeats.info/news/29874?search=1)
2, @yugalabs VS @Larvalabs#
Since BAYC burst onto the scene in May 2021, the entity behind BAYC, @yugalabs, and the entity behind Cryptopunks, @Larvalabs, have been regarded by many NFT players as the "Twin Stars of the NFT Field."
a. Rights granted to holders
b. Power boundaries of projectors
c. Responsibilities and rights of members
Reference Articles:
CryptoPunks Controversy: Creators Apologize for 'V1' Ethereum NFT Sales
Understanding Why CryptoPunks Lost to BAYC from the "V1 Punks Controversy"
- Evolution in the NFT Field
a. GameFi
—— CryptoKitties
b. PFP
—— CryptoPunks
c. Membership
—— BAYC
d. Pass Cards
—— Proof
e. Others.
Patterns —
-
Rotation of NFT sectors
-
High inclusivity and strong extensibility of NFTs
-
Artistic value of NFTs: NFTization of artworks + Artisticization of NFT works +
-
The next era has already arrived
4.1 Building a three-layer growth flywheel
a. BAYC — NFT/GameFi/Metaverse
b. Yuga Labs — Marketing brand, behind-the-scenes driver
c. Apecoin — FT/Liquidity/DAO organization
4.2 What does BMW mean?
a. Blockchain: Underlying technology
b. Metaverse: Application scenarios
c. Web3: Next-generation internet
- Starting from BAYC: The Pan-Lifestyle Application of NFTs
a. Daily life
b. Work and labor
c. Multiple social interactions
d. Time and space travel
5.1 CC0 Agreement
5.2 Rights of Holders
5.3 Infinite Potential of NFTs
5.4 Integration or Micro-Innovation?
5.5 Building a Successful Pathway System for "Community, Product, Culture" in Web3
- Starting with the end in mind, where is the limit of imagination? (Is IP a good business?)
a. @BoredApeYC = @Disney?
b. @BoredApeYC = @Pixar?
c. @BoredApeYC = @Nintendo?
d. @BoredApeYC = @LVMH?
Interview video with Yuga Labs CEO
Or, you can see a brand new world appearing before you —
Here, you fully own your money, rights, and land, of course, not excluding the possibility of centralized authoritative governments using laws to restrict or centralized institutions to ban (account warnings).
Separator
https://nfts.wtf/bored-ape-yacht-club-goes-boom/
https://www.cnet.com/culture/internet/bored-ape-yacht-club-nfts-everything-you-need-to-know/
Now, like them in the past, we embark on every unknown journey, whether the future is bright or fraught with dangers, we know nothing. But perhaps, each of us is like that arrogant, fearless, and oblivious Don Quixote, charging at those towering windmills like towers, never regretting even if we face death.
A Tale of Two Cities — It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
we are still early.
