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Detailed explanation of Binance's latest Launchpool project Memeland: The great migration of a 200 million people meme empire.
Author: 0xLaughing, Rhythm BlockBeats
BlockBeats Note:
On October 27th, according to an official announcement, Binance has launched the 39th new coin mining project - Memecoin (MEME).
The literary movement was first written in March of this year, when memeland had already caused a craze in the NFT market.
Memeland Initial Worldview
At the beginning of 2023, Memeland became one of the hottest projects in the NFT market with the release of its latest NFT series. Throughout the past year of development, there have been many noteworthy milestones in the history of this project:
• The flagship product MVP series completed its sale in June's Luna thunderstorm aftermath through "blind bidding" at a high price of 5.3 ETH;
• The second Potatoz series of the ride-hailing platform "Free Mint Quotes" completed a 10k sale with the help of the wind, witnessing the collapse of FTX, but still able to stabilize the floor price above 1 ETH in the bear market in the long term. Recently, it even surged to more than 3 ETH at one point.
• The latest Captainz series, despite controversy over its initial high price of 1.069 ETH, sold out in less than 12 minutes on the day of casting, meaning the team raised over $12 million solely through this sale...
There are too many NFT projects that were once famous in the crypto world but gradually disappeared in the bear market. The slogan "underpromise and overdeliver" has turned into "underpromise and underdeliver". However, Memeland's three sales have become more and more amazing, establishing a loyal and reliable community and gradually gaining a foothold in the NFT market. This article will attempt to interpret how 9GAG is gradually transitioning from a Web2 content company to Web3 with the help of the Memeland NFT brand.
TL;DR
Memeland Overview
• The first NFT series "YOU THE REAL MVP" was released in June 2022 through a "blind auction" method, with a total of 420 units and a final price of 5.3 ETH. The current floor price has risen to 44.4 ETH. The series can be found at https://opensea.io/collection/youtherealmvp.
• The "The Potatoz" series released 9,999 tokens using Free Mint in July 2022. The floor price briefly surged above 3 ETH and has since slightly declined. The secondary market trading volume has exceeded 18,900 ETH. The series can be found at the following link: The Potatoz.
• The "The Captainz" series will be released in January 2023 within 12 minutes, with a team revenue of approximately 9801 ETH. This series is a PFP collection with a total of 9,999 units. The series can be found at https://www.memeland.com/captainz.
• Participants in "The Captainz" series of casting events will receive Treasure Mapz, and can earn Mapz through soft staking during the Captainz unveiling phase.
• Earning Treasure Mapz requires a combination of the Captainz and Potatoz series, while MVP will be helpful in this process;
• The official revealed that Treasure Mapz is related to $MEME, valuable NFTs, and special utility programs.
• Owning Captainz NFTs allows you to participate in the governance of Memeland DAO and grants you priority access to Memecoin and Treasure Islands.
• Memeland revealed clues about the follow-up Token system, metaverse land, creator economy, and staking system on its official website, but there is not much information available at the moment;
• The 9GAG behind Memeland NFT was founded in 2008 and is an online entertainment content platform that mainly shares funny pictures and videos. The official website claims to have 200 million users on social media platforms such as Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, and Tik Tok.
• Memeland has a strong lineup of advisors/investors, including Gary Vaynerchuk, founder of VeeFriends, Kevin Rose, founder of Moonbirds, Nathan, founder of Kaiju Kingz, and Keung, a well-known name in the NFT industry.
Started from the online entertainment content platform 9GAG
23-year-old Chen Zhancheng (second from the right) and his younger brother Chen Zhanjun (far right), university roommates, and two aNobii colleagues started a part-time business together.
The founder of 9GAG, Ray Chan (now known as 9gagceo), studied law at the University of Hong Kong. After graduation, he worked in the legal department of a bank, a television station, and a internet company. The boss of the internet company he worked for was under 30 years old, which inspired Chan to start his own business. At the age of 23, Chan started a part-time business with his younger brother, Chen Zhanjun, college roommate, and two colleagues from aNobii. They had previously worked on a cosmetics evaluation platform, a home appliance evaluation platform, a photo sharing platform, and an online karaoke platform, but all of these platforms ultimately failed.
9GAG completes $2.8 million Series A funding
In 2011, with the mentality of "playing the best basketball should go to the NBA professional league, seeking the best technology entrepreneurship training should go to Silicon Valley", they decided to go to the United States to participate in the startup program of 500 Startups. After being guided by a Google senior product manager mentor invited by 500 Startups, they found that the project 9GAG, which started in 2008, had the most potential, and later they made it the focus of their development. At that time, social platforms like Facebook were not yet popular, and they founded this website to provide a way for netizens to share funny pictures and videos. 9GAG subsequently received favor from Y Combinator, First Round Capital, Greycroft Partners, and True Ventures, and completed a $2.8 million Series A funding.
9GAG has over 58 million followers on Instagram
In the following years, 9GAG grew rapidly and became one of the most popular online entertainment communities worldwide, covering various topics including humor, anime, gaming, movies, music, travel, sports, and more, attracting a large number of young people. According to the data from website research company similarweb, 9GAG ranked second in global humor website click-through rates in December 2022, and its average browsing time, page views, and bounce rate all performed well.
Additionally, 9GAG has accumulated a large number of users on various social media platforms, with a significant following:
• Instagram: 5815 million
MVP
The Sneak Peak of Captainz initially displayed on the official website
On January 5th, 2023, Memeland officially launched the Captainz series, with a total of 9,999 units and a sale price of 1.069E. According to the official announcement, this sale was not open to the public, and holders of Memelist, Potatoz, and Waitlist were divided into "guaranteed casting" and "non-guaranteed casting" based on their respective priorities for purchase. At the same time, an unconventional "payment separation" sale was adopted, where participants first deposit ETH for casting, and will receive a Captainz airdrop 24 hours after the end of the sale.
Within a few minutes of the start of the sale, the official announcement was made that over 9,999 deposits had been received, declaring the end of the Waitlist minting (referred to as "non-guaranteed minting"). "Guaranteed minting" is not affected and can be completed within 48 hours.
Captainz triggered a Gas War during the release period.
The release of Captainz has also triggered a Gas War. According to data from blocknative, Gas Fees during the minting period once exceeded 80 GWEI.
Treasure Mapz
Additionally, all participants in the sale will receive Treasure Mapz in proportion to their deposit amount. These Mapz are not yet NFTs and therefore cannot be transferred or traded. The official has revealed that there are 5 types of Mapz, related to $MEME, valuable NFTs, special utilities, etc. They can be obtained by forming Questing (soft staking) with up to 1 Captainz and 3 Potatoz, but information is currently limited.
Through the release of the MVP, Potato, and Captain series, it is not difficult to see the shadows of many projects: "Proof Elite Club" to Moonbirds, corresponding to MVP and Potato; Potato's release coincided with the Free Mint trend led by Goblins at that time; the revelation of the 5-stage changes, at that time there were variable NFT projects such as Moonrunners and "Shi Guai" for reference; not to mention the staking rewards, many projects such as early NANOPASS staking and Moonbirds' "Nesting" have adopted them.
9GAG CEO said in an interview that he has spent hundreds of ETH since January to buy NFTs from various well-known projects. "Many project founders have not bought enough NFTs to understand the bias from the perspective of a holder," and this "bias" can only be experienced after truly "skin in" the game. In addition, they have adopted a "micro-innovation" strategy, which is simply to learn from the strengths of NFT projects and do more integration and improvement based on them. Now, the successful launch of the Captainz series also marks the success of this strategy, and the founder's continuous learning has enabled Memeland to innovate and progress, gradually transforming it from a "follower" to a "leader".
From Memeland Map Overview Speculating on Next Steps
Memeland Official Overview
Memelands' official overview map displays the content they offer, including treasure-filled islands, unknown seas, giant sea monsters, pirate crews, launchers, and more. Each element in Memelands is presented in a fashionable and visually appealing image form.
Memeland Map Overview
According to the information disclosed by the official channels, the current content can be roughly divided into 10 sections, sorted by their respective priorities at present:
• MVP: Memeland's top-level Pass card in the ecosystem, with the highest priority for obtaining rights within the ecosystem, and also beneficial to other NFT series participation.
• Captainz: Represents the top membership qualification of Memeland.
• Potatoz: Basic membership qualification to enter the Memeland ecosystem.
• Treasure Mapz: As a reward middleware for the subsequent staking system, the randomness represented by the 5 types makes the operation of the subsequent staking reward system more playful.
• Memecoin: Not yet launched, but the official hints that it is different from the common NFT matching ERC20 Token system.
• Treasure Islandz: Not yet launched, but the official hints that it is different from the common NFT paired metaverse land system.
• Petsland: Not yet launched, the official only revealed "limited to pet lovers".
• Stakeland: Not yet launched, the official only revealed "make cryptocurrency staking fun".
• Holders.com: Not yet launched, the official only revealed "Web3 Journey Advisor".
• GMGM.com: Not yet launched, the official only revealed "Web3 OnlyFans".
The official website shows that MVP NFT can be beneficial to every key utility of Memeland NFT.
• (Optional: If there is an MVP, then "turbocharged")
• Mapz can be exchanged for $MEME Token or possibly for Treasure Islandz in the metaverse.
• $MEME Token participates in the creator economy ecosystem of GMGM.com.
Twitter posts often have millions of views
9GAG's official website has prominently placed entrances to Memeland and Potatoz at the top.
Backed by professional advisors and investors
Why is 9GAG entering the Web3 industry? Opportunity, luck, and fate.
Memeland has witnessed Luna's thunder and FTX's building collapse in the past year. It has tried to survive the bear market and the most important thing is to "stay alive". Although the team's "micro-innovation" operation strategy is stable, it is also questioned for its lack of innovation. However, the flaws do not hide the merits. If Memeland can transform 9GAG's 200 million platform users in this "traffic is king" and "content is king" era into new Web3 traffic, this may benefit the entire NFT market and even the crypto world. At the same time, it will also be a great migration of the meme empire.
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