For those who are active on Crypto Twitter (better known as CT to most) you may have seen a number of prominent profiles sending out the tweet:
Add me to @2100hq using the Ethereum Address 0x…..
While the project has intentionally been very reserved about its public marketing, 2100 now has close to 150 profiles including well-known individuals such as Robert Leshner (CEO of Compound), Jake Brukhman (Founder of CoinFund) and Richard Brown (Community Lead at MakerDAO) just to name a few.
So, what is 2100HQ anyways?
2100HQ is an Ethereum-based platform that connects social accounts (in this case Twitter) to create unique ERC tokens. In this sense, prominent accounts can leverage a 3.0 incentive mechanism in which fans and/or subscribers can be prioritized according to how much money (in this case Dai) they are willing to stake to any given profile.
As it currently stands today, many are choosing to offer “gifts” as a form of early evangelism of the platform. In practice, you signal your interest to any given individual by staking a fixed amount of Dai. Once staked, you begin “decoding” the gift where the unlock time is relative to the amount of Dai you’ve staked. Simply put, the more Dai you stake, the faster you or more likely you are to receive discounts, promos or gifts from prominent brands, individuals or influencers.
Some examples of this in practice may include:
@dollarshaveclub: Hodl at least 1 $dollarshaveclub and get a free razor every month!
@SnoopDog: Get a backstage pass with 10 $snoopdog
@KDTrey5: Burn 1 $kdtrey5 to get a Kevin Durant collectable
How Does 2100HQ Work?
To get started with 2100HQ, users are prompted to connect their address to a public twitter profile by posting a public tweet: Add me to @2100HQ using the Ethereum address 0x…
Once posted, users are encouraged to add the address to the 2100 contract by being rewarded with a small amount of the newly created user’s unique tokens. From there, users are able to compose a number of different posts, shared directly with those who are staking their tokens.
Seeing as 2100 aims to be an enhanced version of products like the Hollywood Stock Exchange (HSX), Stolen! and Augur prediction markets, the product needs to be inherently consumer-friendly.
As such, Ethereum will be used for non-custodial DAI deposits and for ‘settling’ the Twitter-linked assets as ERC-20 tokens. All other functionality will be transparently orchestrated off-chain (open source, auditable DB) by Citizen Hex Inc. (the company behind 2100), with plans to move ‘on-chain’ if the ‘MVP’ is a success.
In the decentralized version of the app, staking could take place on a sidechain, and a decentralized oracle will likely be used to relay the state of Twitter.
Conclusion
While the system might currently only be applicable to blockchain savvy individuals, the premise of being able to signal interest in a specific profile has an endless number of upsides. Investment or speculation aside, this mechanism provides an interesting way for large profile individuals to directly see which of their fans are most monetarily committed to their future. With this, it becomes much easier to see which followers *may* be prioritized on pre-sales, discounts and exclusive content.
2100 is currently in private alpha and can be accessed here. The team has announced that they will be releasing a public testnet at this year’s Ethereum DevCon happening just next week. Be on the lookout for an announcement via the official Twitter then!
In the meantime, be sure to add me (Cooper) on 2100HQ using the Ethereum address 0x5B93FF82faaF241c15997ea3975419DDDd8362c5
Cooper is the Editor of DeFi Rate and an active contributor to leading DeFi media outlets like The Defiant, DeFi Pulse, and Bankless. He works with early-stage teams through Fire Eyes DAO to incubate governance models and grassroots community development. He is an ambassador to Set Protocol and an author of a weekly publication called Token Tuesdays. To stay up with Cooper, follow him on Twitter.