zeronikun
8.5K posts
zeronikun
@zeronikun
art driven. ai fueled. web3 native.
Katılım Temmuz 2010
825 Takip Edilen398 Takipçiler
I don’t care when an NFT project says “we’re building a brand” anymore.
Everyone says that.
Show me where the IP goes when the wallet is closed.
That is the real filter in 2026.
@pudgypenguins is not just doing “toys” anymore.
They are moving into normal household loops: PlayMonster party games, Licensing Expo, retail, cards, products your non-crypto friends can understand without opening OpenSea.
@Azuki is not just saying “anime brand.”
They are pushing the TCG into the actual hobby loop:
physical cards, local game stores, organized play, tournaments, collectors, players.
That matters more than another trailer.
@Claynosaurz is getting very good at something most collections still miss:
traits as product language.
- Toxic Skin Pattern.
- Desert Color.
- Blind boxes.
- Licensing.
- Gaming.
- Kidscreen.
That is not metadata sitting in a filter.
That is a character system learning how to travel.
@ChimpersHQ is doing the same from another angle.
The Kawaii update gave 5,555 Chimps names, stories, regions, and character groupings.
That sounds small until you realize what it means.
A collection stops being a set of token IDs.
It starts becoming a cast.
@BoredApeYC is still the big complicated one.
But the 2026 reset is interesting.
- New CEO.
- Garga into chairman.
- More focus back on club identity, holders, merch, meetups, Otherside, and the actual feeling of being a Bored Ape.
Less empire sprawl.
More “why did people care about this club in the first place?”
And I would not leave @Memeland out.
Memeland sits in a different lane because it came from @9GAG.
It already understands memes, distribution, and internet behavior better than most NFT teams.
The interesting 2026 signal is the wider 9GAG / @MemeStrategy orbit moving into cards, collector infrastructure, and tokenized Pokémon card exposure.
That is not a normal NFT roadmap.
That is meme culture touching collector infrastructure.
Different playbook.
Same direction.
The projects worth watching are not trying to make NFTs louder.
They are making the IP easier to touch, play, wear, collect, trade, laugh at, and remember.
Most collections will not make it.
A lot of them were only floor charts with mascots.
But the serious ones are slowly becoming weirdly normal.
- Toy shelves.
- Card shops.
- Party games.
- Blind boxes.
- Licensing events.
- Character lore.
- Collector habits.
- Retail products.
That is where the next market forms.
Not only on the floor.
In the parts of culture that do not need to know what a floor is.
English
@SpikePersona So this is like an trained LLM made specially for Persona styles?
English
That's what fine-tuning a diffusion model looks like.
Train, generate, compare, improve, repeat.
Hundreds of dataset changes, hundreds of generation matrices to compare.
I'm on the 10th version of our Valley Diffusion model and still learning.
It's unlike anything else I've worked on, you can't go faster than training, so it's a lot of patience and a lot of micro-iterations.
In the end, dataset and captioning are king. Nothing else comes close.
I'll keep sharing versions and progress as training continues since I want to build this one in public as much as possible.
Latest version is live on Imagine for anyone to try!
English
Full transparency:
I'm currently in discussions around a potential acquisition of BEANZ
@BEANZOfficial is an OG anime collection in our space, I'd be honored to continue building on one of the greatest IPs in the game.
English
@graildoteth @hytopia So sad to see one by one goin down, and i have all those nfts too in most of web3 games
English
Thanks for playing, @hytopia community.
Anyone who entered this ecosystem over the past 5 years and stayed around through the three paid mints and at least three token pivots has literally lost their shit.
The team has been fumbling around blind for years, trying to figure out how to build utility into multiple NFT collections around a token that never had any utility around an unfinished gaming platform that never had any users.
I was once the largest holder here with 1.5M 'invested' into the NFTs. I exited with about a year and a half ago, 65% down. I still have 600 nodes I minted a year and a half ago, only to find out the team 'rugged' all utility by removing the token vesting (which was the selling point).
But at least I got something out; most didn't.
Sadly, most gaming communities have just been used as a human farm to extract capital from.
Buying an NFT and joining a community does not make you anything but a resource.
The original NFT World mint was free.
The other three were not.
Three token name changes, 3 pivots in 3 years, 99% of all the NFT utility from each mint replaced with diminished versions or no utility at all.
Let's take away what you paid for, rename it, give you far less, and tell you it's for the good of the community and project. And instead of just releasing the tokens, no, let's find further ways to increase the supply, while restricting the NFT vesting that was paid for via mints.
Sounds like a familiar strategy used by teams who rug?
I'm not saying this was the classic raise money and vanish into the wind kind of scam.
The team legit put the treasury into trying to build out an open gaming world. I do not dispute that.
But what was built was an unfinished open-source Roblox wannabe game engine that sort of worked, but never worked enough to actually build real products on. With zero working web3 layers, which was kind of the entire original premise.
From the Minecraft metaverse to a Layer 2 gaming chain to an AI-vibe-coded Roblox copycat, @hytopia has tried to do anything and everything.
Alas, none of it had any chance of working.
The team drew a nice living salary for five years.
The community goes to the soup kitchen.
It's how most of these gaming stories end up.
Not the first, and by far not the last.
A lot of things went wrong here, and the team kept on fumbling to build any sort of working ecosystem.
Every solution they came out with required yet another NFT mint and a complete pivot.
When you see a web team renege on promises and rejig tokenomics, start running for the door.
Sadly, those who stuck around, minted and held assets, and trapped themselves in this dying ecosystem over the past 5 years can take comfort in knowing that their sacrifice has not been in vain.
You will have helped contribute to the 1-line paragraph in the founder's new LinkedIn update.
It's kind of ironic that they survived a cease and desist from Microsoft by building an NFT-powered gaming platform on Minecraft without permission, yet are closing shop because of an unpaid tax bill.
Sorry, community, taxes and all.
The irony writes itself.
Now watch the team invariably pivot, yet again, but this time out of web3, away from their obligations, and into a new AI startup.
HYTOPIA@hytopia
Hello Hytopians, As many of you know from weekly updates, HYTOPIA is currently waiting on a large tax refund from the IRS. Without these funds, we are unable to continue covering the operational costs required to keep the project running in its current state. We expected this refund to be resolved sooner, especially as we have been in communication with the IRS and have confirmed that the process is underway. In the meantime, our founders, @Temptranquil and @ArkDev, have been personally funding the project's operations for some time in an effort to keep things moving. At this point, we are forced to temporarily pause HYTOPIA's infrastructure while we wait for the funds to be released. This means hytopia.com and other HYTOPIA-related websites and services will be taken offline for the time being in order to reduce hosting and operational costs. Separately, our lack of operational funding has also contributed to an ongoing dispute with the HY Foundation regarding unpaid invoices. As a result, certain token-related deliverables are currently delayed while we work toward a resolution. We are actively working to settle on an amount that makes sense for both parties and to have the tokens released into the smart contracts they were originally intended for. As a reminder, the HY Foundation is a separate entity from HYTOPIA. While we are actively engaged in resolving the matter, there are parts of this process that are not entirely within our direct control. We currently expect downtime to last roughly 1–3 months while the IRS refund process is completed. Once the funds are received, we will provide another update with a clearer plan for next steps. We understand this is difficult news, and we know it may create frustration, uncertainty, and concern within the community. We are doing everything we can to navigate this responsibly and transparently. For now, we ask that everyone take it day by day with us. As always, your support means everything to us. ❤️ Team HYTOPIA
English
Two gaming chains left.
Ronin and Immutable.
Wemix barely counts, they are in their own world repurposing Korean MMOs every month but at least they crime their token pretty good during bullish markets.
Galaxia is the only new one that I'm keeping lookout for since they actually partnered with 50 mobile web2 creators for their flagship game but only time will tell.
Thanks for coming to my Ted talk.
English
@WhiteWhaleLabs learned a lot from you these pas few months and wish you all the best bro
English
Earlier today I made a big move in anticipation of this announcement. In a single transaction, I locked 500 million coins...forever.
A movement does not belong to the person who lit the match. It belongs to the people who carry the flames.
As I’ve mentioned publicly, I’m dealing with an ongoing family crisis involving my children. It has taken a real toll on my mental health. On top of that, the daily pressure of “do more to pump our bags” - when I’ve already done more than any person leading a CTO in this space ever has - is disheartening at best. And beyond all of that, I’m losing some of my passion for crypto in general.
For $WhiteWhale holders: yes, there is a continuity plan. While permanently locking $13 million worth of supply should be the greatest parting gift I could give you, I know the @WhiteWhaleMeme page needs to stay active and keep producing fresh, creative, and funny content. My dear friend and loyal companion @vincenzomaiett has agreed to selflessly take on that responsibility. DEX LP operations will also continue under one of the sharpest LP minds I know, with my ongoing oversight behind the scenes.
When you look at my record - with millions given to charities on-chain, millions distributed to members of CT, and millions more spent accumulating a more proper supply structure for $WhiteWhale - the reality is that, since 10/10, I have officially given more to crypto than I’ve taken from it. I’m okay with that. I believe in karma. I don’t believe good deeds should be performed with the expectation of reward, but I do believe the universe provides in due course.
I came into crypto deeply passionate about what I believed it represented: the original promise. Permissionless finance. Decentralization. True financial freedom.
Ironically, the reason for my prior success in this space is the same reason I’m now losing my passion for it. Before 10/10, I had accumulated nearly $100 million in PnL from a trading thesis that began with a very simple assumption: everything is manipulated. From there, my thesis evolved into this: a trader’s job is to identify the signs of manipulation and move in harmony with the Apex Predator class, rather than becoming its prey.
Eventually I had to confront the contradiction in that.
How can I be passionate about free and open finance while operating under a thesis that says, at its core, it’s all a lie?
That kind of cognitive dissonance has a cost. It shows up as stress, guilt, shame, and anxiety when your actions no longer align with your beliefs.
Knowing something academically - and even profiting from that knowledge - is one thing. Seeing how the sausage is made with your own eyes is another. Running a coin opened my eyes to a lot. On one hand, if I ever go back to trading, I’ll be better equipped than ever, with sharper instincts and a deeper understanding of the brutal arena that is crypto. On the other hand, it’s hard to feel excited about magic internet money when you know how much of this space actually works.
The sad truth is that founders and thought leaders in this space know what I know, and many of them know much more. That is part of why we need to break the culture of idolizing founders. We praise them as honorable people building better tools, but underneath it all, they know just as well as I do that much of what they are building on top of is rotten to the core. And yes, I believe a beautiful cake sitting on a pile of dung eventually takes on the taint of dung.
But the reality is that there is not much anyone can do about it. That is one of the consequences of so-called decentralization.
Crypto is global. You cannot regulate an entire planet. A VPN and a protocol hiding behind the letters D-E-X mean that nothing will ever fundamentally change because somebody in power decided it should. If real change comes, it will come organically - when the people stop feeding the machine.
And while those comments are about crypto more broadly, let me say something directly to the trenches.
Pump.fun is a cancer on this space. You know it, I know it, and yet you keep engaging with it. Its entire business model is built on volume and volatility. The trenches are fragile because they were designed to be fragile. I’ve been preaching liquidity design and liquidity shape for months now.
But here’s the harder truth: most of you would not show up for a proper liquidity shape. Because the 1,000x fantasy would be mathematically reduced, even though very generous returns could still remain on the table. You have been sold a dream with odds closer to a national lottery ticket than an investment opportunity. You see the occasional winner and cling to the hope that one day it might be you. Meanwhile, the real winner is the machine that keeps you playing.
Narrative matters far less than mechanics. If narrative alone were enough, Punch would have broken through the way its mindshare deserved. With all that attention, and with all that narrative weight, it still could not break the nine-figure curse even while being actively crimed. Only a couple of coins have managed that in recent history, and $WhiteWhale was proudly the first. Same with Kilroy - the original meme, an incredible narrative, and still: crickets. Because mechanics matter more than people want to admit. (I am not an active holder of any examples I've given).
So this is me stepping away from CT.
Not out of hatred. Not out of self-pity. And not without love. My biggest reward from my crypto journey has been meeting some really wonderful avatars from all across the globe. (Ironically the really nasty avatars are the worst part of all of this)
I am choosing my children. I am choosing my mental health. I am choosing to step back before this space takes any more from me than I’m willing to give. For long ago in life I learned that you're no good to anyone if you're not okay. And right now, I'm not ok. And it's okay to admit that.
To the people who truly believe in me, believe in this movement, and stood beside me through all of it - thank you. I will carry that with me. Always. This was always for you. I trust you'll continue to bear the torch.
And as for the future: I’m not closing the door. Maybe one day, when the storm has passed and the fire returns, I’ll have something left to say. Maybe one day I’ll come back. But if that day comes, it will be because it’s authentic and not because I feel the public pressure to "dance puppet, dance".
In the mean time...take care of yourself, and each other. Protect what's worth protecting, and abandon the things that aren't.
🫡 From the depths —
The White Whale 🐋
English
@AvgJoesCrypto the differ is TCG is web2 market, so if somehow can combine NFT (web3) with web2 then it will work
English
Kinda crazy to me that everyone is writing off NFTs & blockchain gaming when arguably the biggest consumer trend over the past year has been the rise of Pokémon and other TCGs. Especially when TCGs are the functional equivalent of “offchain” NFTs.
It wouldn’t surprise me if somebody is finally able to crack this nutshell and deliver a new TCG game that leverages tokenization and NFTs to deliver a better gaming/collecting experience.
English
We gave so many new networks a chance to deliver meaningful gaming ecosystem these past 6 years.
Ronin, IMX, and Wemix are the only survivors.
For a network to come compete next bull, they better come with products and users.
No more promises.
English
doodles AI beta. next week.
we're building the tools for a new era of dynamic world-building.
it starts with an image model that reimagines anything and everything through the doodles lens.
this is the first iteration of many. as the product evolves, we'll introduce the ability to turn your generations into physical objects. video with sound and dialogue, realtime AR, and gaming are all on the roadmap.
doodles AI aligns us with the speed and scale of the AI industry at large. our colourful world can now be plugged into new tech as it unfolds.
create with us.
English
Azuki started with art. The Azuki TCG continues that. Characters that began as PFPs are coming to life through the cards, and the gameplay pulls you deeper into the lore and world. Set 1 is going into production and it's all becoming very real.
Manga adds the storytelling layer and emotional connection with fans. The story will develop at the pace fans actually want.
And on the tech side, we're doing R&D on PBT. Imagine tapping a physical card with your phone to verify it's authentic (& much more). It's a longer term play, but there are real problems in collectibles that only technology can solve.
Every day that passes, I get more bullish on this strategy. Core to Azuki has always been three things: art, storytelling, and technology. Now we get to go deeper on all three with way more focus.
TCG → manga → anime. The path is clear.
English
One more chance to size into memes that have been moving between the 1M–6M range for the past few weeks.
Market volume is low, yet they keep standing. They bounce with the market, still pull a few hundred thousand in organic volume, and the communities never stop bag working.
English