@monteluna

Late night thoughts on a topic I've talked about too much but I'll keep it as short as possible: The key points users are pointing out against memecoins: in a closed system where DAU's aren't growing, only value is to enrich snipers and token fee managers, where the only interaction is buying and selling. The reason is the fees become the vig, and are by definition value extractive. The pure mechanics just siphoning value from traders, while traders siphon value from themselves. I can't speak for other people, but the main reason I personally came to Farcaster was to experiment with social products that *add value* to existing business verticals. You can ask me how I morally reconcile this being a @bracky fan who doesn't necessarily like sports gambling, and the answer is simple: Products like Bracky add new community value to the existing vertical of sports betting. Every sports betting product in general has users placing bets. Bracky and tools like @livecaster have actually generated a community around the bets. I don't even bet much, but you can be sure I'll be in the Livecaster every race giving my usual trolling of Ferrari fans, and we now have a little group of people I would have never met, who are likely completely on a different continent as me, interacting with me during races. I actually rarely bet, but Bracky gives me access to a community of extremely great fans of F1 who are actually willing to keep the chat open during races and banter. This is reminiscent to me like IRC back years ago, where channels focused community members on specific topics in a live chat. This behavioral shift from "User X converts to doing Y action" is completely changed with an open social network where users can interact with other users based on shared interests, and that's the main value of Farcaster. Forming a counter argument: To compete with a Tik Tok or Instagram, we need to find interesting ways for users to convert and monetize better than Tik Tok and Instagram. Social and Content coins are a way to do that. Where I don't think that works is major brands like Tik Tok and Instagram command huge ad revenue, and that's the major source of cashflow to pay content creators. Where I disagree is, like any game where your opponent has an advantage, you don't spring their trap and try to fight them in an environment they can win. Farcaster clients may never earn enough Ad Revenue to be able to sustainably pay content creators, at least not in the near term, and getting larger scale content creators to create their tokens to monetize their attention have very questionable histories (Mother, Hawk Tuah, etc) where many of the major creators simply don't want to put their fanbase at risk to monetary losses and lose them. I believe I have said it before but all paths for Farcaster lead to a vibrant ecosystem of client teams experimenting and generating their own feeds, chats, and experiences to drive "communities". Tokens can go up and down, and engagement drops off a cliff when tokens crash. Communities are simply much more resilient to token crashes. Let the communities drive the coins, not the other way around.

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