A Journey Into A Decentralized Ecosystem by The Bus – OPED

(Disclaimer: The opinion expressed here is not investment advice – it is provided for informational purposes only. Every investment and all trading involves risk, so you should always do your own research prior to making decisions. We do not recommend investing money you cannot afford to lose.)

Today I will take a deep dive into the vibrant and dedicated community known as “ShibArmy”. How did a vision become reality? How did an idea turn into the new status quo? Let’s explore together everything you need to know about the Shiba Inu Ecosystem and the future of decentralization through community, for the people, by the people.

THE VISION

The journey begins on August 2, 2020 when a unique and mysterious article was uploaded to allhailtheshiba.medium.com titled “ALL HAIL THE SHIBA! (an experiment in decentralization)”. The author addressed themself as “Ryoshi” and went on to describe what many are calling “Ryoshi’s Vision”. The experiment from Ryoshi was to see if a decentralized community could grow from seed and be truly 100% community owned, possessing no leader and typical business structure. This idea was much more than just a cryptocurrency project, but a test to push the limit of the status quo, allowing a global community to have the power of the project. Ryoshi also stressed the importance of having equal distribution and ownership from the beginning. This priority would restrict any original developer and/or project member of having an advantage of ownership over the community. Three simple rules are as follows: First rule was Ryoshi spent zero capital on the project, because Ryoshi wanted “to know if something can start from zero from someone with zero.” Second rule is there is no “team token” or “admin token” so if Ryoshi wanted to own some, Ryoshi would have to buy it from the free market just like anyone else. That rule applies to anyone involved with the project and that leads to rule number three. Ryoshi and the team can not “pay anybody in ethereum or shib for influence or exchange listing.” To summarize Ryoshi’s ethos of interacting and promoting the project to the investment community, Ryoshi simply states this quote.”Thank you for your interest in $SHIB. We are an experiment in decentralized spontaneous community building. The team and admin are all volunteers here and have had to market buy the tokens the same as everybody else, so there is no bucket of tokens or funds to pay to anybody or anything. If you wish to help the project you certainly can and work with us to find a way to make your efforts the most valuable. We believe through the power of collective decentralization we can build something stronger than a centralized team ever could create. ALL HAIL THE SHIBA!”

ORIGINS

Up to this point are you wondering how the team did it with no money? Ryoshi explains meeting a “fren” at DEVCON in 2019 who has significant influence in the crypto community. Ryoshi explained the vision and he offered to help. Many have speculated this “fren” to be Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin. The “fren” developed a token contract which involved one quadrillion tokens and placed half of those tokens onto Uniswap with 10ETH pair. The “fren” disposed of the liquidity keys which restricted the ability of the ethereum or the tokens to be withdrawn. That day forward $SHIB token was made with half of the supply being locked into a sale contract and the other half sent to a burn wallet owned by Ryoshi.

WOOF PAPER

Eight months later the Shiba team released their White Paper named Woof Paper v1, dated April 29, 2021. Cryptocurrency projects release what is called a White Paper in order to educate potential investors about the project’s technology and to express the reasoning behind it. A White Paper is comparable to a business plan. The Shiba team’s Woof Paper starts out by reiterating Ryoshi’s vision. It is the vision of the collective effort of everyone involved that is most important. With that core value in mind the team began to develop the complete Shiba Inu Ecosystem.

KEY INGREDIENTS

The first key ingredient to the ecosystem is indeed the ERC20 fungible token known as Shiba Inu. It is considered an altcoin that runs on the Ethereum blockchain. However, it is actually a token because it does not operate on its own blockchain. The Ethereum network was chosen because it is a name brand top notch player in the cryptocurrency game that has earned credibility among the whole industry. It delivers security and peace of mind because of its well known experience. It offers a true position in decentralization to those who join forces. Ryoshi needed to make sure it was safeguarded from regulation in order to stay decentralized. These qualities that Ethereum carries is what also makes it a prime candidate for ShibaSwap.

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CORE OF THE ECOSYSTEM

The backbone of what molds this ecosystem is their native Decentralized Exchange (DEX) and Decentralized Ecosystem (DECO) known as ShibaSwap. ShibaSwap was released in July of 2021 with the goal of providing a secure outlet to trade crypto while prioritizing decentralization. This leads us to the tokenomics of ShibaSwap. The product lineup consists of three ERC20 tokens while ERC stands for Ethereum request for comment. One of which I already mentioned is Shiba Inu, $SHIB token. The second token is the Leash Dogecoin Killer, which trades under $LEASH. The last but definitely not least is the token named $BONE. Each token has their own individual role, but all three thrive off of each other’s success. All three tokens offer equal contribution to the ecosystem. As a user of ShibaSwap you can purchase any three tokens, but wait there’s more. You can SWAP owning one token to another. You can BURY/STAKE any of the three tokens. You can even DIG for BONES ($BONE). Now all three processes develop “Returns” that are allocated to the Puppy Pools (liquidity pools). Likewise rewards are also given to those holders who partake in those processes. All three tokens provide unique incentives that play off of each other and to get a better understanding of the exact details, check out shibaswap.com. Certain Puppy Pools have the potential of giving out double or even triple returns. Next, I will discuss the second token added to the ecosystem which is $LEASH. It was originally designed to be a rebase token tied to the price of Dogecoin. The Shiba team later changed its purpose by turning off its rebase function to unleash its full potential. $LEASH was developed to have a total supply of 107,647 tokens. The third token added to the ecosystem was $BONE and is the Governance token which allows for the community to vote on proposals for 2022. $BONE holders also get to decide which token pairs would be added on ShibaSwap. The biggest holders of $BONE ultimately have the upper hand on voting proposals for future plans. There were 250,000,000 $BONE tokens originally minted. ShibaSwap then launched a two-week liquidity event which called for holders to bring over their liquidity from Uniswap and/or Sushiswap in order to receive ten times the normal rate of $BONE returns. $BONE was allocated to the developers, admins, and the marketing team as compensation for the work they have done up to the launch of ShibaSwap and to assure future salaries for years to come. 6,250,000 $BONE was also placed into a Shiba Inu Ecosystem Development Fund to ensure future success of the ecosystem. According to the first version of Woof Paper, future plans of the team’s roadmap included the launching of an NFT project, which was their Artist Incubator and releasing ShibaSwag. Future endeavors also included new token pairs being added to ShibaSwap and introducing their Doggy DAO, which stands for Decentralized Autonomous Organization.

RELEASING AN NFT

The next aspect and key ingredient to the Shiba Inu Ecosystem is the launch of their NFT project and public offering to purchase Shiboshis NFTs. The sale of these rare NFTs started on October 14, 2021 and offered 10,000 unique NFTs that an individual could purchase exclusively off of ShibaSwap. The key detail to this NFT market release was the first 24 hours were specifically reserved for $LEASH holders and could only be bought using $LEASH. This also incentivized the $LEASH holder with a cheaper price as the sales were offered in three tiers. The entire 10,000 supply was sold out in an astonishing time of 35 minutes. What’s even more special is each Shiboshi NFT is different and possesses unique qualities. Renaming your Shiboshis also contributes to $SHIB token burns. Owning a Shiboshi will grant the holder the ability to utilize their NFTs in a highly anticipated NFT Shiba game.

LIST OF EXCHANGES

The decentralized exchange called Uniswap was the first to allow trading for $SHIB. Shortly after, coinmarketcap.com and coingecko.com followed suit. On May 8, 2021 OKEx became the first major exchange to add $SHIB. Popular investment platform eToro added $SHIB July 29, 2021 due to heavy demand. Trading platform Webull allowed for trading of $SHIB sometime in Q3 of 2021. Coinbase Global listed $SHIB on September 16, 2021. Binance and Kraken added $SHIB on their respective exchanges in November of 2021. The list goes on and on showcasing total global support for this phenomenon. Meanwhile holders of the $SHIB token passed the one million mark. Officially there are over 100 exchanges that have either listed and/or plan to list $SHIB in the near term. We are still patiently waiting for Robinhood to list $SHIB and hopefully, once the implementation of their wallets go according to plan, we will hear an official announcement.

GLOBAL ADOPTION

As we watch exchanges, both decentralized and centralized add $SHIB we also see a community band together to do whatever it takes to expand to every way of life. Every day new acceptance and utility is gained. Merchants from numerous industries offer $SHIB as a form of payment for products and services. From healthcare to sporting events and entertainment to even utility bills, the merchant list grows exponentially. Acceptance and adoption is unstoppable. There are multiple payment gateways that have applied $SHIB to its business strategy. NOWPayments.io has been a major supporter of the Shiba Inu Ecosystems’ worldwide expansion. BitPay has also paved the way for the $SHIB utility to grow. Flexa added $SHIB and thanks to that addition, $SHIB can now be used as a form of payment at more than 40,000 merchants just from Flexa alone. Shopping.io just like NOWPayments was an early adopter of $SHIB. On July 5th of 2021 $SHIB holders could use their tokens for purchases on Amazon, Ebay, Walmart, and Home Depot, among many others through Shopping.io. CoinPayments, CoinGate, and most recently Singapore-based PayBolt add to the list of payment gateways that support $SHIB as an acceptable form of payment at a vast amount of merchants across the globe. Every day the list grows and it is truly hard to address the exact number of merchants as countries, villages, communities, and everybody in between continue to adopt $SHIB.

BURN BABY BURN

The next aspect to the project and what the majority of investors prioritize most is the fact that all three tokens are considered deflationary. They have a limited amount and tokens do get burned. This also creates a perfect recipe for a supply and demand theory. As supply gets burned, which is just another way of saying tokens that get sent permanently to a dead wallet address, demand for the rest of the supply increases. This as a result will appreciate the value of the remaining supply. A dead wallet address is one that is inactive and in our case the keys to the wallet are unobtainable. The biggest burn to date came from Vitalik Buterin on May 16, 2021. In which he sent approximately $6.6 billion dollars worth of $SHIB, in total token count of exactly 410,241,996,771,871.894771826174755464 tokens permanently removed from existence, according to etherscan transactions. It’s important to note that any holder can burn tokens, as long as you hold them in a wallet. Many holders do partake in burning and all burns are recorded and tracked by shibburn.com. This website even participates in burns thanks to ad revenue they receive on their site. Shibburn.com is also the most reliable source for current circulating supply, staked total, and total supply. The burn efforts from the community is where you find unity. The website called shibsuperstore.com offers three games that a person downloads and plays and 100% of ad revenue goes towards $SHIB burns on a monthly basis. They offer a wide range of products from “Shiba Treats” which are dog treats to “Shiba Suds” which is a beer drinkers delight. Shib fanatics can find apparel, household, food, and novelties all Shiba Inu themed. Shiba Coffee Company sells Shiba Inu themed coffee and offers a variety of blends. All the products can be purchased using $SHIB as well as a few other cryptocurrencies. 100% of profits go towards buying $SHIB, while 10% go towards burns of $SHIB. NOWPayments also contributes and supports burns of tokens. Expressiffy, Shib Army Movement, Green Juice Systems, ShibaInuCafe, and Shiba Swag is an early list of NOWPayments partners who not only accept $SHIB as payment but burns a percentage of their profits. NOWPayments on top of that also contributed 3% of its total profit gained from $SHIB transactions once a month. NOWPayments has raised the bar even higher with its most recent announcement. Through every purchase using NOWPayments, the company has elected to burn 9% of $SHIB and 1% of $LEASH. Recent “partnershibs” include legendary fashion designer John Richmond. This marked the first collaboration between the fashion industry and crypto. The “partnershib” will include 10,000 NFTs of JRxShib apparel to be showcased during Milan Fashion Week at the John Richmond x Shiba Fashion Show. Another “partnershib” that was introduced that has implemented NOWPayments is Shiba Inus blockchain-based fast food chain called Welly’s. Welly’s was rebranded to fit Shibs vision and technology. They are expanding and so far to date have received thousands of franchise applications. $SHIB token is not only accepted as payment and 9% of each purchase transaction goes towards burns, but once Shibarium is online there will be even more burns.

UPCOMING CATALYSTS

There are multiple aspects to the ecosystem that has yet to be released but are highly anticipated. Shibarium, ShibaNet, ShibaSwap 2.0, SHIB: The Metaverse, $SHI stablecoin, and NFT games are what’s going to keep this ecosystem flowing. Shibarium will be a blockchain-like transaction system that will still sit on top of the Ethereum blockchain. This is considered a Layer 2 solution. Shibarium will bring faster transactions at a much lower cost, with some speculating the possibility of zero gas fees. The Unification Foundation has partnered with Shiba developers to develop Shibarium. Shibarium and ShibaSwap 2.0 will have burning mechanisms built in as well as a burn portal that is being developed. Furthermore, Shiba’s metaverse will run on Shibarium. ShibaNet will be a decentralized marketplace that will allow users to trade products utilizing the Shiba Inu ecosystem. ShibaNet will also run on Shibarium. There are not a lot of details available for this specific addition to the ecosystem. The second edition of Shibas Woof Paper introduced all these upcoming releases, so I strongly suggest looking into it. The third edition is already being rumored to be revealed soon. ShibaSwap 2.0 is also a tight lipped project. Developer “Eric M” has posted in the Shiba Discord that ShibaSwap 2.0 will contain a “full UI/UX redesign”. It is being speculated amongst the community that ShibaSwap 2.0 could include bridges to other blockchains. Team members have suggested a possible release date for ShibaSwap 2.0 as early as Q1 of 2022.

SHIBA INU GAMES

Early December of 2021 AAA gaming studio Playside Studios announced a collaboration with Shiba Inu for a play-to-earn mobile game featuring the Shiboshis collection. Playside in the past has worked with Disney and Pixar as well as other big names. This partnership won’t just be about a mobile game, but Playside Studios will also be involved with a project in SHIB: The Metaverse. Gaming legend William Volk who was the former VP of Technology at Activision among many other credentials has joined the Shiba Inu Games as Alpha Director. The release of the play-to-earn NFT game is set for Q1 of 2023. This release date is reportedly based on the Australian fiscal year meaning we can expect the game to be launched between July and September of 2022.

ECOSYSTEM COMPLETION

Last but not least this look into a decentralized ecosystem ends on the subject of the $SHI stable coin. Stablecoins are designed to counter volatility with the attempt to peg their value to an exterior source. In regards to $SHI, Ryoshi envisioned it to be pegged to one cent. Ideally, it would be launched after Shibarium has been released. The structure at the time was undecided by Ryoshi, but the most straightforward way would involve having collateral locked up to mint $SHI that would always direct the value back to one cent. Ryoshi would ultimately like to see $SHI become a global stable currency and to have $SHI be utilized as both a store of value and a form of payment.

CONCLUSION

All thanks and appreciation are humbly given to Ryoshi for being a visionary. Ryoshi’s experiment with a decentralized community has grown bounds and leaps in less than two years. Ryoshi craved to see this community be self-run by the community. As each day passes by his/hers vision becomes more of a reality. I wanted to be able to pay my respect to Ryoshi and to have this article be fact-based in order to provide the community with the knowledge that is needed to understand the roots of our decentralized ecosystem. Being unaware of the origins restricts the community from respecting the present and realizing the future so I hope this was a way of spreading awareness. Truthfully “We are all Ryoshi”.

[This article was written as an Op-ed by The BUS. The Bus is a Shib Army member. If you would like to contact The Bus you could do so by emailing him at jjeremyccurry87(AT)gmail.com]