Three months ago a memecoin called “Degen” was launched by Jacek, a developer on a sufficiently decentralized social network called farcaster.
In the time since, as its FDV grew to over $2bn, over $1m has been awarded so far to artists, developers, builders, humanitarians, journalists, film makers & entrepreneurs spearheaded by the TOTH initiative (approximately $1,179,139.59, based on a $0.045 average DEGEN price).
Tip O’ The Hat (TOTH)
What follows is a snapshot of the first 47 recipients of TOTH: a community initiative where members (casters) pool their tips together daily to confer an aggregate tip on those agreed as most deserving via farcaster.
Methodology
In many cases the recipient was tipped by others outside of the TOTH initiative, for building or doing something delightful, no attempt was made to differentiate or extract these tips from the results.
A script was written using node to determine the total degen tipped in a cast, alongside support from rish and the neynar team, this will be made open source for others to build on and expand.
All recipients were messaged for quotes & fact checking, which may be added to the article or facts amended, as and when they are received.
Some tools to check the veracity of tips/tippers: Bot or Not cast action by @SayAngel and season two tippers leaderboard frame by superlouis.
Jacek
On a recent interview with seed club, about the launch of the degenchain L3, Jacek shared aspects of his past as a data architect. He’d was known to his colleagues as the “dogecoin ambassador” — so deeply immeshed was he in one of the original digital tipping cultures that flourished on reddit.
He laid out a vision for the future, wary of becoming“just a token for a few people to make money from and buy degen/dogecoin lambos”. From taking tipping beyond allowances into the wallet for micro transactions; to cultivating the on-chain app store; there’s a recognition that bullish market conditions have yielded the platform to build something meaningful.
Farcaster x Base
Farcaster was borne out of two engineers (dwr & v) striking out from Coinbase. Given these existing relationships, some of its earliest users were other engineers at Coinbase. As a result, much of the infrastructure and activity on farcaster are built on BASE: their ETH layer two scaling solution.
Frames on Farcaster are a powerful new primitive not just for decentralized social, but for the web overall.
Going beyond previous web2 attempts at open graphs and "embeds" (a la Facebook), Frames are a simple way to bring interactivity into posts -- turning posts into various…
Going beyond previous web2 attempts at open graphs and "embeds" (a la Facebook), Frames are a simple way to bring interactivity into posts -- turning posts into various…
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The culture on farcaster is inherently builder focused. There’s a palpable celebration of technical prowess, experimentation, and creativity. Key accelerants to its growth have been centred on the release of features enabling developers to nudge at the edges of the intersection of online & on-chain. They just launched farcaster actions.
Introducing Farcaster Actions
Farcaster Actions are like Chrome Extensions for a social network.
Developers can build actions that users can install to their Farcaster app in a few taps via a frame. Works on mobile and web
Links in next tweet.
Farcaster Actions are like Chrome Extensions for a social network.
Developers can build actions that users can install to their Farcaster app in a few taps via a frame. Works on mobile and web
Links in next tweet.
Moreover, Base (alongside OP) has numerous initiatives incentivising builders including grants, open hours and courses available to onboard and ramp up builders. A key differentiator is how public their teams have been in championing this cause. Case in point if you are building something just message wbnns & Jesse Pollak with what you are doing — they’ll send you Base Sepolia testnet ETH. This visibility & support has accelerated even those with non-dev backgrounds (like myself) to get in the arena and have a go creating something useful.
Social distribution
The first airdrop was predicated on engagement/activity on farcaster.
As tips were launched, feeds became messy with wanton experimentation at this new native modality introduced to an eager group of about 4,000 daily active users (at the time).
All manner of ideas were rewarded randomly, chaotically even, as an equilibrium was established around norms for quality. 0xen proposed Tip O’ The Hat as a means of cleaning up feeds, as well as being in honorarium to the degentleman iconography underpinning the meme.
"How do you get your token in the hands of the right people? Give it to the people to decide who deserves it."
Jacek, Seed Club Interview
The second airdrop round was predicated on liquidity provision. Tipping allocations were reduced. The spectrum of ideas garnering tips narrowed. Tippers became more discerning. Accounts with strong engagement, a proxy for quality, began to experiment with the use of tips as go to market strategies; community building tools, and incentivization mechanisms to rally product testers for new ideas.
By airdrop three, the final airdrop, tooling was being built out to tip inside of and outside of farcaster with upcoming Twitch and Github integrations announced recently. The degen L3 quickly became a top five chain (TVL), and there’s now a generation of farcaster users that have integrated tipping behaviourally as an integral, fun, aspect of their digital social experience. It’s now possible to tip using emoji’s like unicorn, ham, tomato.
Future
Much remains in doubt, yet a few things are certain.
Volatility, irrationality, and grifters on the downside are all but inevitable. The L3, whilst home to honest teams, has already begun to succumb to the kinds of rug pulls and honeypot attacks typical across other chains. Just as with the early internet is still learning ways to adapt to the nigerian prince over email, or really question the veracity of being contacted by “customer support”, the underlying utility being built indicates value accretion above and beyond any value destruction that this new epoch of griftry implies.
Papa — Sufficiently Permissionless?
On the upside: disruption seems inevitable, three arena’s spring to mind.
Tipping as Advertising — Traditional advertising like Super Bowl ads represents an extremely leaky bucket unless the product has mass appeal. Targeted online ads are more specific but intermediaries still take a margin. Targeted tipping, however, ensures 100% of funds go directly to the intended recipient. It’s the vision companies like Brave had, but $Degen is emerging as a more universal, platform-agnostic token of appreciation and incentivization cutting out middlemen.
Tipping as Funding — Institutional funding sources like grants and venture capital are often opaque, subject to concentrated interests, and disconnected from the actual users of the products/services. VCs tend to be risk-averse, while $Degen tipping allows passionate user communities to collectively fund audacious ideas and experiments through a bottoms-up, transparent process. /degenangels is a great example of this.
Tipping as…Tipping — In many sectors, tipping norms are somewhat arbitrarily determined — we tip waiters but not journalists, delivery people but not bus drivers. $Degen tipping allows a more egalitarian, meritocratic way to directly incentivize any creator or service provider. If a solo journalist like Rachel earned $9k worth of degen tips, what could a professional media outfit earn? If Emmaa earned $5k in tips for sharing an aphorism in the /spanish channel that moved people, how might professional poets, writers, or philosophers fare?
Notes/Caveats
* Over the two weeks it took to complete the article $degen fluctuated between $0.03 and $0.06 so we assumed $0.045 as the basis for dollar value.
** Over that time follower numbers changed, and will continue to do so.
*** Methodology and reflections at the end.
**** The actual tip amount may vary owing to factors such as channel boosts, some tippers tipping beyond their actual allowance, etc hence this is a rough approximation for indicative purposes only
In no particular order.
YouGoGirl
Farcaster: @yougogirl.eth (5.1k follows)
Twitter: @yougogirl_eth (4.4k follows)
Reason: she built a frame to opepify your PFP in one click
Pastime: scapes.xyz with @jalil — ETH NFT-based pixel landscapes
Total $DEGEN amount: 1805671
Dollar value*: $81255.19
"Ok I don’t really have a quote but what I do is basically have fun on the internet with frens, especially with the visualize value community.
That’s the thing about the degen tips. I never ever thought about making money when making the opepefy or any other frame, I just had fun doing it. And then, I even made money cause people like to have fun with me 💯"
Woj
Farcaster: @Woj (4.8K follows)
Twitter: @wojtekwtf (4201 follows)
Reason: Customer support and code for @supercast.
Pastime: supercast.xyz, a farcaster client with added power user features
Total $DEGEN amount: 508174
Dollar value*: $22867.83
"It helped me go all-in on supercast without raising venture"
Kenny
Farcaster: @kenny (18.7k follows)
Twitter: @kaspotz (1.2k follows)
Reason: helps/helped manage TOTH alongside 0xen
Pastime: @poidh.xyz a dapp for creating and claiming on-chain bounties
Total $DEGEN amount: 14883
Dollar value*: $669.74
"It’s been an honor to help manage TOTH. I’m someone that believes strongly that crypto gives us new ways to unlock never-before-seen social coordination mechanisms. TOTH is a perfect example of crypto allowing strangers across the internet to come together and organize around rewarding great individuals for their contributions."
Tim
Farcaster: Timbeiko.eth (168.8k Follows)
Twitter: @TimBeiko (126.8k Follows)
Reason: contributions to the Ethereum community
Pastime: Core protocol meetings for Ethereum + upgrades to the protocol
Total $DEGEN amount: 200694
Dollar value*: $9031.23
"thank you"
Welp
Farcaster: @we (3.4k follows)
Twitter: @ummmwelp (257 follows)
Reason: $degen liquidity visualisation & s2 dashboard
Pastime: manages/runs backend on @rainbow etherum network.
Total $DEGEN amount: 454428
Dollar value*: $20449.26
Moritz
Farcaster: @moritz (2.9k follows)
Twitter: @m0zrt (424 follows)
Reason: launched fluidkey (on-chain funds w user privacy)
Pastime: writes an amazing blog www.moritz.ooo
Total $DEGEN amount: 478481
Dollar value*: $21531.65
Fluidkey wouldn’t have happened without Farcaster — my co-founder Antonio (@metony) and I met on Farcaster last year and started working on Fluidkey after a successful hackathon proof of concept at ETH Global Paris.
We’re very grateful for the many early supporters we have met on Farcaster since launching our alpha in February and the $Degen and TOTH community is a big part of it!
Nick
Farcaster: @nt(1.7k follows)
Twitter: @nick_tikhonov (1,475 follows)
Reason: Hank’s dental surgery
Pastime: second time founder, product manager, builder, avid reader.
Total $DEGEN amount: 1202661
Dollar value*: $54119.74
“You actually did it 100+ tips, 0.5m $degen for Hank confirmed (likely 1m+ total!!) plus an anonymous 0.36 ETH donation. Hank is getting new teeth powered by $degen and the FC community 💜 All funds go to Hank ”
Gwart
Farcaster: @gwart (1.8k follows)
Twitter: @GwartyGwart (18.8k follows)
Reasons: a form of Retroactive Public Goods Funding
What she does: “the funniest person on crypto twitter”
Total $DEGEN amount: 293532
Dollar value*: $13208.94
Brandon Yoshizawa
Farcaster: @bay-photography (2.8k follows)
Twitter: @bay_photography (5,329 follows)
Reason: farcaster community support post wallet drain.
Pastime: pro landscape/cityscape photographer on the blockchain.
Total $DEGEN amount: 188000
Dollar value*: $8640.00
Luka
Farcaster: @luka (2.4k follows)
Twitter: @LukaPiskorec (3,512 follows)
Reason: breakdown of movie creation process using AI.
Pastime: Pro artist; Co-founded Protocell:Labs to explore generative art.
Total $DEGEN amount: 289444
Dollar value*: $13024.98
"The success and recognition I got with that specific AI themed cast almost single-handedly made me switch my full attention from X to Twitter
Own your social graph, own your content"
Jason
Farcaster: @betashop.eth (68.6k follows)
Twitter: @betashop (18.3k follows)
Reason: Built AI frame trained on on-chain data..
Pastime: Built/manages airstack.xyz a platform for building on-chain apps.
Total $DEGEN amount: 114318
Dollar value*: $5144.31
GamersGiving
Farcaster: @gamersgiving (29 follows)
Twitter: @GamersGivingCO (50 follows)
Reason: Hosts charity board games at Web3 events.
Pastime: Utilizes gaming to foster positive outreach efforts.
Total $DEGEN amount: 211441
Dollar value*: $9514.84
Oliver Zerhusen
Farcaster: @oliverzerhusen (71 follows)
Twitter: @OliverZerhusen (2,038 follows)
Reason: Built/enhancing real-time general consensus tracking
Pastime: @_cryptopols a frame monitoring crypto legislation/sentiment
Total $DEGEN amount: 143093
Dollar value*: $6439.18
Christin
Farcaster: @christin (15.3k follows)
Twitter: @Christintweets (1,143 Followers)
Reason: stand-up comedy on the blockchain.
Pastime: Neuroscience PhD, world’s first onchain chaplain, biotech strategist, stand-up comedian. Hosts /spirituality
Total $DEGEN amount: 158861
Dollar value: $7148.74
"I’m grateful for the DEGEN tips, and in fact it encouraged me to launch the BeavChris and BArt-Head show with @artlu, a podcast for the farcaster middle class where we comment on social dynamics and culture of farcaster…while wearing Beavis and Butthead wigs"
Chris Co-Created
Farcaster: @chriscocreated (18.7k follows)
Twitter: @ChrisCoCreated (663 follows)
Reason: Built a tool enabling $degen discovery/tipping.
Pastime: Conceptual community artist collaborating deep in NOUNS.
Total $DEGEN amount: 116277
Dollar value*: $5232.47
"I love the FC community, degen is a wild incentivisation innovation, & TOTH is a fantastic expression of what we are achieving together. Receiving TOTH was the icing on a wild month. Motivating me — & I hope others — to keep adding value to this amazing expanding thing we are CoCreating"
Emma
Farcaster: @emmaa (1.6k follows)
Twitter: N/A
Reason: bringing quality Spanish content to Farcaster
Pastime: chemical engineer
Total $DEGEN amount: 116277
Dollar value*: $5232.47
Gotoalberto
Farcaster: @gotoalberto.eth (2.9k follows)
Twitter: @gotoalberto (8,627 follows)
Reason: @Palmera efficient in-frame DAO management
Pastime: professor, R&D engineer, POAP contributor
Total $DEGEN amount: 112424
Dollar value*: $5059.08
Noah
Farcaster: @nbragg (15.5 follows)
Twitter: @noahwbragg (15.7 follows)
Reason: on-chain PartyDAO experiment collaborative LP providing
Pastime: Building @poolfish workspace for LP providers.
Total $DEGEN amount: 190323
Dollar value*: $8564.53
"The Poolfish Party has been going really well! We started with 0.8E & from providing liquidity to $DEGEN we are now up to 1.2E plus we have 1.02E worth of $DEGEN rewards. We have all been learning about LPing along the way!"
Grams
Farcaster: @grams (467 follows)
Twitter: @gramsdidit (1,671 follows)
Reason: dope video dropped as official entry into Farcaster
Pastime: Creates/designs epic surreal art via gramsdidit.com
Total $DEGEN amount: 310649
Dollar value*: $13979.20
"I’m just excited that it finally feels like there is a reward for having spent extra time learning the ropes of this new landscape of social media on chain. That believing in it from the start and investing less and less time in web2 constructs has begun to pay off not only in financial relief but in system functionality as well. Between the $DEGEN tipping and the Lens/$BONSAI airdrops/earning my life has changed considerably with the blink of an eye and I’m halfway to what I need in forming my business in Japan. Hopefully over the next months I’ll reach this goal and be the proud owner of an entity revolving around providing immersive experiences in this beautiful land with an emphasis on detachment from devices and mental wellness. Also I had a delicious smoked salmon/cream cheese bagel for breakfast :P"
Sid
Farcaster: @sidshekhar (2.8k follows)
Twitter: @sidshekhar24 (3,656 follows)
Reason: Shared an in-depth look at $DEGEN cast data.
Pastime: Runs/manages blockchain research at @coinbase.
Total $DEGEN amount: 125663
Dollar value*: $5654.84
"The farcaster and degen community is perhaps one of the most positive and encouraging on the internet right now. With a culture of giving baked into the mechanics of DEGEN, we tap into a different element of the human psyche that yearns to contribute back to society instead of simply taking for oneself"
Rachel
Farcaster: @rachelw (584 follows)
Twitter: @rachelwilkinsb (10k follows)
Reason: Journalism in Farcaster ecosystem on Drakulapp.
Pastime: Runs/manages Web3 art projects via @audiogalleries.
Total $DEGEN amount: 202055
Dollar value*: $9092.48
Lluis
Farcaster: @lluis (1.6k follows)
Twitter: N/A
Reason: “$lolsorrydwr” apology for spamming $DEGEN
Pastime: Web3 e-commerce — https://shopdegen.xyz
Total $DEGEN amount: 128680
Dollar value today: $5790.60
"the backstory was that Dan was annoyed with Spam and called out the $degen community for not doing enough to stamp that out. Naturally, there were differing opinions about how much the Degen community could do without better Mod Tools and Warpcast spam protection
$lolsorrydwr was a protest meme coin launched to poke fun at Dan and the situation. a huge portion was sent to Dan as an apology. Days later, better mod tools and channel passes launched, but it was definitely a way to poke fun and shine a light on better community tools to help keep things high quality. credit to Dan for not reacting poorly or being offended 💪"
Irina
Farcaster: @irinaliakh (2k follows)
Twitter: @IrinaLiakh (12.3k follows)
Reason: humanitarian efforts on the frontlines in Ukraine
Pastime: community builder @brightmoments, activist, nonprofit founder
Total $DEGEN amount: 244515
Dollar value*: $11003.17
Scizors
Farcaster: @scizors.eth (2k follows)
Twitter: @scizors_eth (3,821 follows)
Reason: fund an active FC native artist for a flight to Japan
Pastime: Creates art.
Total $DEGEN amount: 398083
Dollar value*: $17912.35
"I am not going to lie, the generosity shown to me during tip of the hat was at a very fortuitous time when I was able to cash out at $0.385 and for me was life-changing money. It paid for the entire trip to Japan, that was on credit cards, with money left over for a lot of burritos and taxes. I’m really grateful for the collective action of this community coming together and working to change lives. It is ridiculous how effective it can be. THANK YOU"
Welter.eth
Farcaster: @fun (21.3k follows)
Twitter: @_mattwelter (1,160 follows)
Reason: FarcasterUserStats.com skill-based predictions tool Pastime: Pastime: Builds/creates apps showcased at @mattwelter.com.
Total $DEGEN amount: 423980
Dollar value today: $19079.10
Farcaster was so new & everyone was very welcoming when I joined, it felt like the best opportunity to learn how to build web apps, especially since everything was permissionless & open. I could take the data & use it in any way I saw benefitted the community, which also benefitted myself to learn how to make web apps. A win win!
Chris Carella
Farcaster: @ccarella.eth (59k follows)
Twitter: @ccarella (4.035 follows)
Reason: work & leadership on /purple DAO
Pastime: Creates immersive digital art and NFTs.
Total $DEGEN amount: 465204
Dollar value*: $20934.18
"I’ve seen all the phases of Farcaster and I’m most excited about the current positive sum tipping phase led by $degen and $enjoy”
Pichi
Farcaster: @pichi (13.3k follows)
Twitter: N/A
Reason: “Degen Tips vs Degen Jeeves,” tipping guide frame.
Pastime: Built /animeoutcasts, active in /japan and /kyoto for /sakura.
Total $DEGEN amount: 640833
Dollar value*: $28837.49
Ishika
Farcaster: @ishika’s (1.2k follows)
Twitter: @IshikaMukerji (2,281k follows)
Reason: pod with @saxenasaheb.eth expanding $DEGEN & FC in India
Pastime: Writes/creates Web3 content — @ishikamukerji.notion.site
Total $DEGEN amount: 490241
Dollar value*: $22060.84
"Farcaster has pieced together all the best parts of the social web into one modular gateway. The ambition and energy is so addicting that building on top of farcaster has become a full time thing for a lot of people. You can’t say that about many new products. Theres something special here and it’s here to stay, we are still so early."
Edit
Farcaster: @edit (12.2k follows)
Twitter: N/A
Reason: AI arch/arc generator bot (amongst others)
Pastime: Creates digital art, bots, and features
Total $DEGEN amount: 151734
Dollar value*: $6828.03
"The beauty of developing on farcaster is you're shipping directly into a social network. You don't deal with web2 bs like ads or SEO to expand your reach or find users"
Depatchedmode
Farcaster: @depatchedmode (2.1k follows)
Twitter: @depatchedmode (910 follows)
Reason: Built/created a community-led moderation frame.
Pastime: everywhere.computer (/ec), /unglish (unglish.co.uk), the /secure-design, drumming in all-genre power trios.
Total $DEGEN amount: 2,187,128
Dollar value*: $98,420.76
"The energy within the Farcaster ecosystem is really special at the moment. Reminiscent of hicetnunc in 2021. It ain’t perfect, but it’s helping a lot of folks realize they can do something big together"
Dusan
Farcaster: @ds8 (6.5k follows)
Twitter: N/A
Reason: one of the first frames that didn’t require users to follow, like, or recast to participate (annoying meta for a while at first)
Pastime: Designs/builds frames, including /framedl & /framedl-pro
Total $DEGEN amount: 126976
Dollar value*: $5713.92
"The number of followers I had at that time was maybe around 300–400 so this kind of visibility boost helped a lot. I could then showcase other things. It feels like the people on farcaster share the same mantra without it being repeated or even explicitly stated. As if it was a common trait of everyone involved. That mantra? Winning Together."
Kyle
Farcaster: @kyle (103.1k follows)
Twitter: @kylemccollom (3.793 follows)
Reason: daylight.xyz assists in finding unclaimed airdrops.
Pastime: summoning /daylight
Total $DEGEN amount: 432002
Dollar value*: $19440.09
Purp
Farcaster: @purp (6.9k follows)
Twitter: @TheDegenDAO (17.1k follows)
Reason: for master minding Degen Dao aka The Haberdashery.
Pastime: Dj, producer, founder Haberdashery, Meat smoker
Total $DEGEN amount: 138603
Dollar value*: $6237.14
July
Farcaster: (74.3K follows)
Twitter: N/A
Reason: experimentation with concept of personal channel as blog
Pastime: creates digital literary content @July.rocks, building /faust
Total $DEGEN amount: 151616
Dollar value*: $6822.72
5/9
Farcaster: @fiveoutofnine.eth (123.8k follows)
Twitter: @fiveoutofnine (8,070 follows)
Reasons for nom: for pushing the boundaries of what frames can do
Pastime: /curta + onchain games/art fiveoutofnine.com
Total $DEGEN amount: 170532
Dollar value*: $7673.94
"study how constrained environments bring out some of the most creative outputs"
String
Farcaster: @stringtheory69 (314follows)
Twitter: @StringTheory69 (36 follows)
Reason: Implemented an AI contest based on Farcaster data
Pastime: software guy, supremely based
Total $DEGEN amount: 148793
Dollar value*: $6695.68
Louis
Farcaster: @superlouis.eth (1.9k follows)
Twitter: @louis_was_here (214 follows)
Reason: Created an epic game-in-a-frame, Space Degen.
Pastime: Creating an address aliasing system for Ethereum; web3 @ ubisoft
Total $DEGEN amount: 47,038
Dollar value*: $2116.71
"The engagement generated on Farcaster is real and magnitudes higher than what I could ever dream of on Twitter. Frames are a truly innovative way to ship creative experiences."
Miguel
Farcaster: @miguelgarest.eth (5k follows)
Twitter: @miguelgarest (5,704 follows)
Reason: bringing joy to farcaster via animations
Pastime: creates fun and exciting digital art across platforms
Total $DEGEN amount: 455949
Dollar value*: $20517.70
Daskh
Farcaster: @dakshk.eth (140 follows)
Twitter: @0xDaksh (3281 follows)
Reason: created tool for account/wallet recovery.
Pastime: 2x Founder built for & sold to banks, now disrupting them (DeFi)
Total $DEGEN amount: 135777
Dollar value*: $6109.97
"so since the tip, I’ve been building many farcaster native apps, I am with /fbi (farcaster builders india) and I’ve been building few really cool things, to be launched in a few days. I’ve really gotten into the Farcaster Spirit, and left X, too much noise there and I prefer the builder energy here.
I am loving the approaches farcaster is bringing to the masses, with frames and cast actions, they’ve really changed the game!"
Rob
Farcaster: @robrecht (22.7k follows)
Twitter: @0xrobrecht (1,040 follows)
Reason: built paybot transaction frame (pay direct in social feed)
Pastime: working on @paybot with @richardsun, yc alum, @orangedao
Total $DEGEN amount: 189365
Dollar value*: $8521.42
it has been really fun to build @paybot and even better to see that it is useful to some users on farcaster!
0mbre
Farcaster: @0mbre (4.48 follows)
Twitter: @0mbre (2,392 follows)
Reason: frame experiment glitching PFPs in one click.
Pastime: builds blockchain things | Frame experimentoor
Total $DEGEN amount: 460,640
Dollar value*: $20,728.80
"When I heard about Farcaster and what the team was trying to achieve, I instantly got hooked and decided to devote whatever free time I could find to contribute. With years of software development experience, frames seemed like the right place to start.
I am deeply convinced that a place like Farcaster has to exist, those $DEGEN rewards allow me to cover all my costs and seriously step up my contributions."
Matthew Fox
Farcaster: @matthewfox (3.3k follows)
Twitter: @MatthewFoxAF (2,110 follows)
Reason: creator of the paybot @degentip
Pastime: content creation @ExhaleStudios, builds/maintains bots
Total $DEGEN amount: 174102
Dollar value*: $7834.59
"Yeah I guess the only way to sum up how I feel about what's happening now, is that it's everything we were sold before but with the right scene of people to make it actually happen. In a lot of ways, Degen is what every project like Apecoin set out to be and doing better by nearly every metric
Onchain social and functional cost effective token activity are two of the biggest unlocks right now and Degen is at the forefront of both"
Irfan
Farcaster: @irfan (161 follows)
Twitter: @IrffanAsiff (8,207 follows)
Reason: built frame for browsing public goods projects
Pastime: co-founder @cubik.so and funds Solana builders
Total $DEGEN amount: 109459
Dollar value*: $4925.65
"i was not aware of the degen thing. I just really liked frame and explored ideas around how we can do quadratic funding to help builders in the Solana ecosystem directly from Farcaster. We started with creating a simple projects explorer where people can directly explore projects from farcaster. Our future experiments will involve things like tipping to match project grants pools with all funds raised going directly towards creators of the projects"
Demipoet
Farcaster: @demipoet (1.4k follows)
Twitter: @demipoet_eth (138 follows)
Reason: created a guide to running a /quilibrium node
Pastime: attending blockchain events and minting blockchain assets
Total $DEGEN amount: 210449
Dollar value*: $9470.20
Creating the guide was something I thought can be done while setting up my own Q node. I only maintained it at first in a Google doc and shared it in the channel. I realized later that it was the final barrier to entry to a lot people wanting to be operate a node in Quilibrium. I pushed to improve on it and later migrated it to github
Pplpleasr
Farcaster: @pplpleasr (1.8k follows)
Twitter: @pplpleasr1 (74.3k follows)
Reason: built interactive Shibuya Crossing ‘floor is lava’ adventure
Pastime: @shibuya.xyz + @plsA0k1 +@pleasrDAO + cover of fortune magazine
Total $DEGEN amount: 373,811
Dollar value*: $16,819.495
"I'm always looking for new mediums to express my creativity, so frames has been really exciting for that. Also few people know this but my Chinese name is literally pronounced DEGEN so i think i deserve this"
Jacopo
Farcaster: @jacopo.eth (18.8k follows)
Twitter: @jj_ranalli (1,239 follows)
Reason: 3610 recasts (record) for his VR Frames project
Pastime: built/runs @slice.so
Total $DEGEN amount: 156671
Dollar value*: $7050.19
"the future of commerce is onchain"
Sumit
Farcaster: @sum (10.3k follows)
Twitter: N/A
Reasons: the iconic /outcasts collection
Pastime: creator
Total $DEGEN amount: 131261
Dollar value*: $5906.74
"Don’t really know what to say. I’m just grateful to Jacek for building a token that champions the idea of giving 💜"
Abhishek Kumar
Farcaster: @abhishekkumar (598 follows)
Twitter: @abhikumar_98 (696 follows)
Reason: DegenJack, high card low card game in frame
Pastime: Build blockchain stuff @makerdock_ @lifiprotoco @zomentum
Total $DEGEN amount: 1399128
Dollar value*: $62960.76
"I was always excited about Farcaster and how it's being built with a decentralized angle with hubs, but Frames and cast actions blew my mind. It opened up new possibilities for interaction, engagement, content, games, etc., and the community built so much around it, including no-code tools to help EVERYONE build more things.
What's happening here screams of a healthy community. The energy and vibe of people here are immaculate."
Analysis
Flippening
Of the TOTH recipients covered above 62% (29 out of 47) had a larger following on Farcaster than on Twitter when my follower snapsot was taken. Farcaster has quickly become an important platform for building audiences, particularly for creators and builders.
Larger Farcaster ███████████████████████ 62%
Larger Twitter ███████████████ 38%
Categories Funded
A diverse array of projects and creative endeavours were tipped.
Building Tools/Apps ██████████████████ 34%
Art/Animation ███████████ 23%
Community/Education █████████ 17%
Charity/Humanitarian ███ 9%
Comedy/Entertainment ██ 6%
Games ██ 4%
Other ██ 7%
The plurality of funding went towards those building functional tools, frames, apps and infrastructure for the Farcaster ecosystem. However, art/animation/creative projects and community development efforts also received significant support, showcasing the breadth of what TOTH casters aim to incentivize, nurture and reward.
Gender Balance
Of the 47 recipients, 39 (83%) were male, while 6 (13%) were female. For 2 recipients (4%), I wasn’t sure.
Male █████████████████████████████ 83%
Female ██████ 13%
Unknown ██ 4%
While still skewed towards males, the rate of female recipients was perhaps higher than typically seen in early crypto ecosystems. This is in no small part due to inspirational female leaders active in the ecosystem such as Li building Bountycaster and Adrienne building GM Farcaster as well as communities congregating in channels such as /farcastHER as well. This is a really encouraging sign that Farcaster and the $Degen community are being more inclusive, though there is certainly room for improvement. As a Kenyan you will often find me in the /africa channel, pop in and say hello!
Other Patterns
Recipients represented at least 10 different countries around the world
Several recipients collaborated as teams/co-founders on their projects
Recipients came from diverse professional backgrounds like software engineers, artists, academics, nonprofit leaders, and more
Both established creators with large followings and relative newcomers received funding
The democratizing potential of $degen tipping (and TOTH) shines through in its ability to fund a global array of individuals and teams pursuing creative expressions, useful tools, and audacious experiments.
Roadmap
For degen: www.degen.tips
For farcaster: www.farcaster.xyz
For you: try out farcaster, GM me when you do please.
For me:
Short term: make the script I used to calculate degen tips from a cast public, ideally as a frame. Please dm me if you’d like to help with this.
Medium term: make a TOTH app with — a) some kind of splits feature (say its a team effort product being rewarded, the caster could auto split any tips for that cast between certain wallets/FID’s involved). b) some kind of autosubscribe where any caster could allocate unused tips at end of day/week/month go to TOTH. c) Some kind of slightly more decentralised nomination & voting mechanism. I believe if people got more/some credit for nominating, perhaps even some kind of kickback — that would accelerate discovery. Please dm me if you’d like to help with this.
Long Term: have fun on farcaster, hodl degen, create memes, onboard & onchain the world, make good art, connect, write more, dance more, strive to be slightly less imperfect every day, be more based.
Shoutout to @rish and the neynar team (/neynar | neynar.com) whose support and documentation were invaluable in building the script. Also it would be remiss of me not to shout out @carter and @typeof.eth for their patience & guidance with my weird coding questions.
Thanks for reading.
Lets build.
Connect
Farcaster @papa — https://warpcast.com/papa
Lens @papajams — https://lenster.xyz/u/papajams
Twitter @papajimjams — https://twitter.com/papajimjams
Read
Papa — The Degen Dance Experiment
Papa — Music Onchain
The URL is wrong. https://warpcast.com/@papa should be: https://warpcast.com/papa
thank you!
Nominated @cryptowenmoon.eth for @tipothehat /spanish channel has a new admin
me alegro de ver mas canales en español 👀
Por supuesto! A topeeee 🚀 Aunque creo que /spanish lleva ya mucho tiempo Puedes leer mas aquí sobre cómo el canal y su previa admin adquirió 116277 DEGEN con la version original the TOTH (Tip O' The Hat) Nosotros (yo y @papa) comenzamos esta quest para llevarlo a una frame https://paragraph.xyz/@papajams.eth/funding-the-future-on-farcaster-and-beyond-with-dollardegen
bro sabes hablar español ??
This week, I'm building @tipothehat (TOTH) 🎩 Ever wanted to delegate your tips to the most deserving casts? 47 winners, which have AMAZING projects and causes. Explore, learn more about TOTH in this /paragraph by @papa https://paragraph.xyz/@papajams.eth/funding-the-future-on-farcaster-and-beyond-with-dollardegen
Good stuff. 2000 $degen
I appreciate your generosity! 🎭
Vamos! 1000 $degen 10 $00 10 $RARE 10 $Farther 🍖 x 10
Thanks bro, excited to see this live! 🚀
Good morning
Final Thread: Farcaster x Base x Degen: Roadmap Building on the TOTH community initiative where casters pool tips together daily to confer an aggregate tip on those agreed as most deserving on farcaster - ST: count degen tips in a cast script - MT/LT: TOTH app (splits, autosubscribe, nomination & voting) 🎩 👇
With @0xen's blessing secured 🙏 the plan is to make it easier for folks to participate in TOTH if they choose to. Short Term: make the script public/usable to calculate degen tips in a cast. The one i made looks through a cast thread for any mentions of x amount of $degen + adds them all up. 🎩 👇
Problems to overcome - Sometimes people write tips when they don't have - Need to take account of multipliers - Attribution: impossible to tell how many of the tips received were from TOTH (an announcement people see & tip if they are vibing), or simply due to the cast being awesome 🎩 👇
Medium Term: TOTH app/frame/cast action a) splits feature e.g. a team effort product being rewarded, the caster could auto split any tips for that cast between certain wallets/FID’s involved) b) autosubscribe where any caster could allocate unused tips at end of day/week/month go to TOTH 🎩 👇
Great thread, thanks for sharing! 50 $degen
@papa thank you for featuring my Q guide in your article . means a lot that my guide brings value to a lot of people https://paragraph.xyz/@papajams.eth/funding-the-future-on-farcaster-and-beyond-with-dollardegen?referrer=0x12789C79aD0499cD9b93aE56d402C4Ce4840b270#h-demipoet
Funding the future on farcaster and beyond with $Degen
Nice article. What I am still looking for is a way to get started right now. Do I stake $Degen? Aside from being tipped how do I get Degen to tip other ppl? When I look on the daily allowance, I am at zero. Do I need to convert $350 to Degen to get the 10k to start tipping? It is all rather opaque and confusing.
I sampled 47 recipients of TOTH who received over $1m in tips + listened to @Jacek on /seedclub talk about the future of $degen & the L3 Four themes stood out: - Tipping as Advertising/Marketing - Tipping as Funding - Tipping as...Tipping - LT value accretion prospects > short-term value destruction risks 🎩 👇
- Trad ads (Super Bowl) = leaky bucket unless the product has mass appeal - Targeted online ads are specific but intermediaries take a margin. - Targeted tipping ensures 100% of funds go directly to the intended recipient $Degen emerging as a more universal, platform-agnostic token of appreciation/incentive 🎩 👇
- Institutional/grants/VC funding often opaque, subject to concentrated interests & disconnected from the actual users of products/services. - $Degen tipping = passionate user communities collectively funding ideas/experiments through a bottoms-up, transparent process, rewarding quality. study /degenangels 🎩 👇
- IRL tip norms are awry & arbitrary— we tip waiters but not journalists, delivery people but not bus drivers - $Degen tips are egalitarian, meritocratic. Journo Rachel earned $9k, what might a team earn? Emma earned $5k for a moving /spanish aphorism, how might pro poets, writers, philosophers fare? 🎩 👇
Truth. here we are in season three but i was wondering if there's a season four on the horizon. Will this just continue in perpetuity? rewarding the users for usage until DEGEN is $1+
Wouldn’t be a terrible idea, though I think digital tipping behaviour is becoming so ingrained now that even if allocations/seasons tapers off to nothing we will still tip our actual degen to AMAZING ideas/founders/art - maybe that was the plan all along ?! 👀
Well written my good sir 500 $degen
Gracias 🙏🏽
I am going to read all these and love what I read 150 $DEGEN
Obrigado 🙏🏽
Enjoyed reading your piece on $degen, and how you broke down the different types of tipping behaviour 100 $degen
Asante sana 🙏🏽
wow, great analysis, thx dad haha 150 $DEGEN
The $DEGEN Tip O' The Hat initiative happens daily, announced on @0xen's page usually, aiming to concentrate/pool tips to fund creators & builders directly. Did you know while 13% of recipients were women, they actually received 21.5% of the approx $1,179,140 tipped via TOTH. Let's spotlight some! 🎩 👇
Farcaster: @yougogirl.eth (5.1k follows) Twitter: @yougogirl_eth (4.4k follows) Reason: built a frame to opepify your PFP in one click Pastime: scapes.xyz with @jalil.eth — ETH NFT-based pixel landscapes Total $DEGEN amount: 1805671 Dollar value*: $81255.19 https://warpcast.com/yougogirl.eth/0x0b90ad09 🎩 👇
Farcaster: @irinaliakh (2k follows) Twitter: @IrinaLiakh (12.3k follows) Reason: humanitarian efforts on the frontlines in Ukraine Pastime: community builder @brightmoments, activist, nonprofit founder Total $DEGEN amount: 244515 Dollar value*: $11003.17 https://warpcast.com/irinaliakh/0xd8f1434c 🎩 👇
Farcaster: @christin (15.3k follows) Twitter: @Christintweets (1k follows) Reason: onchain stand-up Pastime: Neuroscience PhD, world’s first onchain chaplain, biotech strategist, stand-up. Hosts /spirituality Total $DEGEN amount: 158861 Dollar value*: $7148.74 https://warpcast.com/christin/0x3a648a81 🎩 👇
Farcaster: @emmaa (1.6k follows) Twitter: N/A Reason: bringing quality Spanish content to Farcaster Pastime: chemical engineer Total $DEGEN amount: 116277 Dollar value*: $5232.47 https://warpcast.com/emmaa/0x5aebce27
Such a great work trackingg all of these good contributions 🙏 You too deserve a TOTH for this incredible work. 4000 $DEGEN
Really kind Ray! thank you 🙏
Thank you for your advocacy for women in the Farcaster ecosystem. 1000 $degen
Thank you 🙏🏽
Love this! Looking forward to seeing more content from these amazing women.
I sampled of some of the top $degen tip recipients, from the first 47 that were awarded the daily degentlemanly Tip O' The Hat (TOTH), to help explore the trends & patterns shaping our community. One of note - the Flippening: 62% had larger followings on Farcaster than Twitter. 🎩 👇
Categories Funded 📊 Building Tools/Apps: 34% Art/Animation: 23% Community/Education: 17% Charity/Humanitarian: 9% Comedy/Entertainment: 6% Games: 4% Other: 7% Tools, frames, apps & infrastructure for the Farcaster ecosystem as well as Art/animation/creative projects & community were rewarded most. 🎩 👇
Gender Balance 👥 Male: 83% Female: 13% Not Sure: 4% Compared to 2% of US VC deals going to female teams this is a huge improvement in no small part due to inspirational female leaders active in the ecosystem e.g. @Li building @Bountycaster & @Adrienne building @GMFarcaster + communities like /farcastHER 🎩 👇
Learn more - Recipients represented at least 10 different countries around the world - Recipients came from diverse professional backgrounds like software engineers, artists, academics, nonprofit leaders, and more https://paragraph.xyz/@papajams.eth/funding-the-future-on-farcaster-and-beyond-with-dollardegen
LETS GOO degen $200
lets gooooo! thank you!
554 $DEGEN
Very kind mate, cheers 🙏🏽
My flippening was easy. I deleted my account. Zero is an easy flip
lol this was meant to be the GIF, i know you know what happens next. Like the way you think sir!
100 $degen
Haha 🙏🏽
Hell yeah @papa Great research 🔬 2413 $Degen
Hell yeah @50cal-eth Thank you! 🙏🏽
Thanks a lot! It would be cool to learn and compare HAM from /lp 🦄🦄🦄
250 $DEGEn
Thanks Emily! 🙏🏽
I'm distributing 100k ↑higher (~$10k) to my favorite writing on the following prompt: "Describe a higher vision of the future." Deadline Monday 4/8 @ 12PM ET. 750+ words. Be as specific and imaginative as possible. Goal is to get people writing about aspirational futures that people can rally around. Higher.
I think what we really need more of in the world is people describing SPECIFIC higher worldviews: What are the values? What’s getting built? What do cities look like? What’s the food like? What’s the art look like? What are we directing our attention toward? Reply in this thread with your submission.
Tokens will be distributed across my 4-5 favorite submissions. Will possibly publish in an onchain zine.
how do you recommend we take part? publish to mirror? cast?
higher ↑
8000 $degen
https://mirror.xyz/💎.wylin💎.eth/Rj5Tqc6vDfdd7J3OjcJwOaUmg3ZZi4GErHIQ6_QKFiI
https://paragraph.xyz/@kithkui.eth/a-higher-future
My humble submission good ser https://warpcast.com/nickysap/0xf3b3e8ac
Where is the best place to publish? An image in a cast? Thanks for doing this giveaway focused on writing!
https://warpcast.com/jihad/0x16a5015b
Thanks! Sorry I missed that part =)
love this initiative 1000 $degen
@les maybe you’ll feel called to expand on your Note
Appreciate you! Will submit an expanded version before deadline.
and here I am doing unpaid labor just because I like the work you do may have to sneak in a short submission tomorrow
hahaha definitely not unpaid sir
I'm just joking but also don't want your money - pay it forward to another writer, I'm honored to be included.
Farcaster x $Degen: A Thesis Using the Tip O' The Hat community initiative as a sample to examine tipping behaviour, crowdfunding, & aligned incentives when passionate communities directly fund what they value 🎩 💜 https://paragraph.xyz/@papajams.eth/funding-the-future-on-farcaster-and-beyond-with-dollardegen
This is good. Very good. 1000 $degen
Thank you!
Awesome recap Papa 1000 $degen
Thank you for reading 🙏🏽
good read, very cool initiative 100 $DEGEN
Thank you! 🙏🏽