In the 14 years since the birth of crypto culture, the most important thing in the crypto circle is controversy. Optimists such as Musk see cryptocurrencies as a more advanced form of trading, while pessimists such as Charlie Munger have publicly expressed "the hope that cryptocurrencies were never invented."
Regardless of the arguments between the two sides, there is no denying that crypto culture is subtly influencing the development of the mainstream world, and the digital shock is now stronger than ever.
For a time, the encryption technology led by NFT became the new darling of brand marketing, and the battlefield of Nike's clothing war with Adidas shifted from cotton to string, LV, and Gucci scrambled to release NFT to land in the metaverse, which is a movement that mixes technology, economy and culture, and is not dominated by arrogant Wall Street elites, but by "crypto elites" scattered around the world.
This is a new elite group supported by virtual assets.
You can easily identify the financial elite in the crowd: combing your hair into a standard 37-point oil head with hair oil, a custom Tom Ford big-name suit, paired with a Patek Philippe that truly explains that time is money...
▲ Image courtesy of NYmag
Similarly, the line of a qualified crypto elite can be traced: a pixel-style NFT avatar with a note after the name ". eth" suffix, add a DAO organization that only insiders understand in your profile, and don't forget to add the popular Yat connection (a string of emoji that belongs only to you)...
Unlike Patek Philippe, this outfit is not in the brilliant office buildings and exchanges, but on Twitter, Reddit or Discord.
Social account = resume
Before the popularity of NFTs, avatars on social media were just windows for people to show their personality and style, and there were also some "avatar analysis" that were similar to the constellations: those who like animal heads were very loving, those who loved to take selfies had a strong sense of self-awareness, and those who often changed their avatars should be very idle...
Most of these general statements with a strong Barnum effect are unfounded, but if a person uses well-known NFT series avatars such as Cryptopunk and BAYC (Boring Ape Yacht Club), you can probably analyze that he is very rich.
Rather than NFT avatars, crypto elites prefer to call these "unique digital collectibles" Avatars, their "avatars" in the virtual world.
NFT series with explosive potential often employ limited-edition sales strategies, such as BAYC's sale of only 10,000 different ape-man heads, which makes each ape-man unique.
The New Yorker mentioned in the article "Why Bored Ape Avatars Are Taking Over Twitter" that NFT Avatar is a projection of personal image on the Internet, but also a proof of recognition of community culture, and to some extent it has become a symbol of identity and status.
Is the NFT avatar the Swiss watch of the crypto elite? On some levels, the two do have a lot in common, they are just as expensive, as scarce as they are, and most importantly, they are just as popular with the plutocrats.
But unlike the precision Swiss watches, you will find that the most well-known NFT avatars often have a forward aesthetic that is contrary to the mainstream, in short, it seems to come from the rough design of Windows's own drawing software, and the uncertainty randomly generated based on AI algorithms, because the encryption elite is more yearning for "personality" than the "beauty" of the rules.
In the view of Jimmy Chang, product manager at Aave, an expensive NFT avatar can send two signals: One, I'm rich; and two, I've accepted a concept of being ahead of your time.
Noah Davis, head of NFT at Christie's auction house, believes that social platforms are the LinkedIn of the crypto elite (LinkedIn), and there is nothing more convincing than using an NFT image as an avatar.
If an crypto person uses the image of a real person, I will doubt the authenticity of his identity.
Just like carefully choosing a pair of leather shoes before entering the bank, changing into a randomly generated NFT avatar before stepping into the crypto circle is a recognition of the consensus of the value of the circle, and it is also a religious baptism before entering the "worship of digital religion".
.eth, the business card of the encryptor
For the crypto elite who have been wandering around social networks for many years, nicknames are no less important than their real names. In addition to making it easy for more people to remember you and understand you, a good nickname can even make people "pay" you.
Vitalik Buttern doesn't use an NFT avatar, he doesn't need an NFT to prove his "uniqueness"
ENS (Ethereum Name Service) domain names are a popular nickname choice in the crypto community, and you'll find crypto elites including Ethereum founder Vitalik Buttern adding ". eth" as the ending, which looks a bit like ". com」「. tv" and other website domain names.
In fact, Eth domains such as Vitalik.eth are not a valid website, and pasting them on Chrome's address bar won't take you any magical places, because it's based on links that use encryption technology, and Eth domains are actually the addresses of Ethereum wallets.
Ethereum's address is like the card number of a bank card, through which you can initiate transfers and transactions, more complicated than the bank card, the Ethereum address starts with 0x, a 48-bit string of numbers and letters, almost readable, if you accidentally enter the wrong or missed characters during the transaction, your digital assets are likely to be lost.
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One of the great functions of ENS domain names is to simplify transactions, it can transform the original complex "0x5591e55A02eE6b5Ad29E2475EaD6335606e7e714" address into a simple "xxx.eth", becoming an important business card for you in the encrypted world.
Different from the ordinary NFT buy-out system that can be owned permanently after buying, the Eth domain name has a service life, and the buyer needs to choose the required "property rights" before creating, and the longer the occupied time, the higher the price will naturally rise.
Because of the uniqueness of these Eth domains (no one wants to tie their wallets to someone else), some simple, catchy Eth domains have a lot of room for value because of scarcity.
Like .com domains, the more well-known and shorter Eth domains are sold for more than $3 million, such as Nike.eth.
Even on the blockchain, the rich still can't hide from the "beautiful number" transaction.
DAO, the "private club" of the crypto elite
Decentralization is a topic that blockchain can never avoid, which has also spawned various new words such as Web3 and DAO with the concept of decentralization. In the eyes of the crypto elite, decentralized Web3 is the future of the Internet, and DAO is the next form of company and community.
The DAO, also known as the Decentralized Autonomous Organization, is simply like a company without a board of directors and hierarchies, where the RULES and transactions of the DAO are recorded in smart contracts on the blockchain, and each member of the DAO votes on decisions together to decentralize the rights.
To join the DAO as a member and gain voting qualifications, you usually need to purchase token tokens issued by the DAO or sponsor the organization, and these "contributions" determine the weight of DAO members when voting decisions.
Due to the limited number of tokens issued by the DAO organization, the threshold for joining a successful DAO is not low, and the name of the well-known DAO organization that joins is written into the personal file, which is no less eye-catching than the big factory badge hanging around the neck when going to the park blind date corner.
▲ PleasrDAO, who co-owns the same album
Fully transparent, flat management OFDs can more efficiently schedule organizations and allocate resources, which allows them to participate in investment, construction and other projects at a faster rate.
PleasrDAO spent $4 million this summer to buy an unreleased music album by the hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan, which is shared by members of the DAO; FlamingoDAO, which focuses on NFT investments, has participated in hundreds of CryptoPunk deals; and ConstitutionDAO has raised more than $40 million in 72 hours to try to photograph only 13 worldwide One copy of the U.S. Constitution (but ultimately failed).
Usually, the DAO is like a chat group with a shared cryptocurrency wallet, acting together through the votes of "group friends".
Derek Edward Schloss, one of flamingoDAO's founders, said in an interview that the value generated by the Internet should be managed by an Internet organization, and DAOs are the way to meet that demand.
Hippies of the digital age
Obsessed with personalized styling and obsessed with the idea of decentralization, the counterculture movement of the crypto elite dates back to the hippie period.
In the 1960s, a group of countercultural young people gathered in Greenwich Village on the east coast of the United States, dressed in their oldest clothes, to convey their loathing of a centralized political world through a wandering and communal lifestyle, eager to rebuild closer social relationships in this way.
Hippies were the names given to this group of pastoral utopians by the media of the time.
▲ Stay hungery, stay foolish.
In 1968, Stewart Brand founded the Global Survey, known as a guide to the life of hippies, which, towards the end of the short hippie movement, provided young people with the tools and skills to use technology to reinvent society.
The impact of this spirit is profound, inspiring great entrepreneurs like Jobs, important journalists like Kevin Kelly, and countless programmers and hackers.
In 1993, the "cypherpunk" organization composed of cryptographers, hackers, programmers and other members was established, cypherpunk aims to break the monopoly of encryption technology, use digital encryption technology to defend the privacy of citizens, the development of information technology has allowed the once failed idyllic utopia in the digital world to continue, the anti-mainstream spirit in the digital world to form a new liberalism.
In 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto, a rising star in cryptopunk, published an article titled "Bitcoin: P2P Electronic Cash System" based on technologies such as hashing algorithms, public key cryptography, and electronic money B-Money, and launched Bitcoin based on blockchain technology.
The birth of the second generation of blockchain technology smart contracts has brought deFi, NFTs, DAO and other blockchain applications, and the value of blockchain decentralization has been recognized by more people in this increasingly fierce counter-mainstream movement. The future of the Internet, as defined by cypherpunk, only took shape nearly three decades later.
So if you still find it incomprehensible that the crypto elite, who spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on avatars and nicknames, think of it as another awakening of the hippie spirit because of techno-utopianism.
Only this time, can the next Global Survey be born?