I posted a MEME, this is what I learned from it

Author: Aaron Elijah Mars

Compiled by: ShenChao TechFlow

I have been working in this industry for four years, invested in over 30 startups, and collaborated with the biggest Web2 and Web3 IPs. However, I have never launched my own token or NFT. It’s time to change that (no, I won’t be dropping any surprises at the end of the post).

One hot topic this year is the debate about "Meme coins" versus "utility coins." @MustStopMurad put it well: "Utility tokens are just upgraded versions of Meme coins." It’s an interesting perspective, but is it true?

Are Meme Coins Fairer than Venture Capital Tokens?

I have been involved in many Meme coin projects, but most of the time, the team's performance has been poor. Why is that? What’s so hard about launching a token? Well, I will share my insights on this industry and the Meme coin market.

To be honest, I haven’t launched my own token yet (at least not yet) - I operate a token revival project (CTO) with my team of about 10 members. I love the idea of CTO, which is to revive a forgotten token. You don’t have to take on too much responsibility, you can leverage existing brand recognition, and you don’t have to start building a new project from scratch. I think there’s a lot of potential in this, with many very good but overlooked tokens.

We accumulated a lot of tokens for CTO and started creating content, developing a strategy to revive the community and try to build a team.

It took off quickly, increasing 100 times in a day. It was simply unbelievable.

We made many mistakes, and I will be very frank about it.

The first mistake was that we didn’t take any profits. We had an idealistic vision of building a loyal community with a long-term goal of reaching $10 million. The problem is, if marketing is a money game, then Meme coins are a highly challenging game.

Those key opinion leaders (KOLs) are not your friends and are unreliable. They will call a token a "new paradigm" and then dump it within 30 minutes. This pump and dump game always ends with a crash.

You quickly realize it’s very similar to traditional advertising, where you get a customer acquisition cost (CAC) and customer return on investment (ROI). It’s a competitive game, and you have to battle with your ad networks and users.

In this game, if you don’t take profits, you will be surpassed by your competitors. It’s a very harsh way to describe this industry, but it’s true. It’s either you or them.

When it comes to community, it’s hard to build something reliable in this market. Attention spans are very short, and if you don’t post something for a day, people will sell at a 90% loss.

NFTs have many drawbacks, but they can indeed build communities. This is very difficult for Meme coins under $10 million.

Now, I see Meme coins as a testing ground for building utility tokens (and overall skills). You can be the best candidate for content creation (FWOG or using @merv_wtf ), the best candidate for community building (Retardio), or the best candidate for collaborating with KOLs. But ultimately, if you succeed, you will build a real product.

This is also a great way to build top teams, as it’s an environment full of challenges and opportunities, accompanied by a lot of pressure. I was shocked by this pressure, especially during price surges. And the frustration it can bring during price drops.

I am amazed by the Meme coin and utility coin communities, who are still able to continue building in such a turbulent environment. Frankly, you have to experience it to understand.

We have also seen the limitations of Twitter for cryptocurrency projects, but I’m not sure if Farcaster can solve this problem. Ultimately, the best Meme coins are those that have an existing audience, who pool their influence and resources together.

This excites me about social decentralized exchanges and project launch platforms that hold people accountable for their actions and reduce the impact of bad behavior.

I also believe there are many innovative opportunities in this space:

• I am excited about Flaunch / Baseline, and the way to earn returns by providing liquidity for projects and passing the market volatility risk back to users.

( Tweet details )

( Tweet details )

• Case studies/documents are nonexistent. There may be some articles missed, but I haven’t found a good article like mine on the internet about Meme and how to do a proper launch + manage a community; we are still far from it.

• There is space for new types of venture capital, market makers, and products dedicated to managing Meme coins. Because it’s very similar to startups, the buyers before your seed round face the most risk (but they are not locked in).

• Pump is really a casino. If you are a serious team, you don’t need a pump, but you will lose a lot of revenue.

I don’t know if I’m being a jerk trying to regulate/beautify something unnecessary, but I genuinely believe this space can be more fun and responsible.

The debate about utility tokens versus Meme coins is unreasonable. I would rather buy tokens from 16z than bundle 10 wallets for $5,000. Until we lower this risk, we won’t really have fun, because it’s a zero-sum game.

I love the vision of Meme, building community has never been more important, and I do believe they will succeed, but we need better tools to achieve that, and the VC model isn’t that bad; I want early users to buy my tokens, but I don’t want them to only make 10% after a day.

I also think venture capital funds have too much nonsense; they will never make money and will not create a lasting community, so we might need a hybrid model.

Ultimately, I think it’s all about community building, where Meme coins serve as an attention mechanism. Just like Pudgy Penguin. Or Milady.

The best Memes win the internet.

But I also wonder how useful community building really is when you can automate Meme creation: text ( @truthterminal / @luna virtuals ) or visually ( @mervwtf / @luna virtuals ). Is cryptocurrency just a framework that transforms humans into AI agents through economic incentives?