Thoughts on the next Binance Launchpad: STEPN (GMT)
Well... it hasn't been so long since the last Binance Launchpad, and here we are with another one. This is a bit of new and unusual one in that it isn't a fan token one which has been the bulk of the last launchpads. So, this does make it a little bit more interesting for me, as it means that it needs a little bit more thought than the previous launchpads which were easy decisions to dump most of the incoming tokens and to only hold a small moonbag just in case.
So, what it s STEPN other than a really horrific mangling of Stepping? In true crypto style, the STEPN project is aiming to gamify and add an economic incentive to exercise and fitness. Namely, the act of going out for a walk or a run. I do wonder about the wisdom of these sorts of things... does financial incentivisation actually lead to behaviour change, or is just a sort of thing that encourages short term benefits without long-term investment in the actual underlying behaviour? Sort of how diets work... the changes are really great in the short term, but without longer term structural changes to your lifestyle choices then it can lead to a useless and potentially harmful yoyo effect.
So, to start off with... that is my first reaction to the concept of a health and fitness app that places NFTS and crypto rewards front and centre of the experience. Now... I have other reservations as well, but I will talk about those things later.
First thing to note about the STEPN ecosystem is the fact that it is a two token ecosystem, with he Green Satoshi Token (GST) being the game rewards token and in-game currency whilst the Green Metaverse Token (GMT) serves as the "real" project token with governance, protocol profit sharing, and staking rights.
To be perfectly honest, I'm not particularly keen on the names... with the attempt to associate "green" with the walking? Plus, using the current hot-corporate-words of Satoshi and Metaverse? I'm not sure why there needs to be a Satoshi reference in there, and I definitely think that Metaverse would not have been there a year ago! So, all of that smacks of heavy handed marketing there... Plus, I'm not sure that those names really convey the utility purposes of the two tokens and could lead to confusion... however, marketing is more important in many crypto projects than the actual logical naming of the tokens. Sadly...
I would wager a guess that the GST (in game currency) will be the main ongoing revenue stream... with the GMT tokens being able to alter the printing rate and thus the overall market cap/price of the token, with some of that feeding back to the team.
There is the basic "game", where your phone will start tracking your movement and giving you tokens as rewards for your exercise. It is like Pokemon Go... without the fun game part! Now, here is the part that I'm a little bit wary about.. well, personally. I'm sure that most people will just see the incoming crypto and leave it at that.
Now, I'm not particularly keen on introducing tracking apps on my phone that will have location access. I'm not paranoid or anything like that... but if I don't need to have it, then I won't install it... even if it is going to pay me for the privilege of storing and tracking my location. I'm quite aware that there are many apps that are hard-baked into the OS that will collect and on-sell my location details for advertising and all of that, and I know that there are many other trackers across the internet as well. However, that doesn't mean that I would advocate allowing even more tracking!
The crypto ecosystem, and the ability to control the supply of the in-game GST should give the development and investment teams more than enough revenue WITHOUT needing to on-sell user tracking data. But let's not kid ourselves, if it is possible, I think that they will sell it. I don't believe in altruistic projects... and especially not ones that are monetising a regular part of human life!
Anyway, cranky old man gripes aside... there are other aspects to the "game". You can spend crypto tokens on owning and levelling up your NFT sneakers. Sigh... I think I'm really out of touch with things here. I have one pair of everyday shoes, and one pair of concert shoes. I don't pimp them out in real life, and I prefer to have non-descript functional shoes... so, I'm sure that this part of the game wouldn't appeal to me, even if it was real shoes. However, the existence of gaudy and over-designed sneaker shops proves that I'm definitely in the minority there...
... and therein lies key thing. I'm not convince that this project is aimed at people like me... but it doesn't have to be. All I want out of this is the ability to make a nice profit off this Launchpad. So, I have to put aside my personal thoughts on the underlying project.
So, apparently... when you put a mother shoe and father shoe together and light a romantic fire with crypto tokens, you get a baby shoebox and some new baby sneaker as well! This is a common gacha game mechanic... I'm not hooked, but it is an addictive game loop that has hooked many people with mobile and casual games all around the world. It works... even if I hate what it has done to my beloved gaming pastime.
A NFT marketplace is pretty standard for crypto gaming these days. And that box is ticked here... I'm sure that there will be fees and prices denominated in the in-game currency. That lock-in part is something that I'm not keen on... it allows the project team to maintain a tight control of the economy and reward themselves as well... but it really goes against the open ethos of crypto.
... but they have included as swap portal from Binance. So, that is a definite plus that there is an easy way to exchange out (or into) of the game. Of course, I'm sure that there will be a cut or a fee payable in GMT/GST to help maintain the gatekeeping.
The Binance Launchpad is the second bite of the pie... the first round went to private investors at 0.005 USD per token, and the retail round is at 0.01 USD per token. This might excite people as it means that the token numbers in the allocation will be big sounding (unit bias). As usual, this will be denominated in BNB at the time of the launch.
The allocation of the GMT tokens to the private sale is much larger than then retail allocation on the launchpad... which could be a bit of a concern, but...
... you can see that the private tokens unlock much much later than the Binance launch tokens. At listing, hte Binance launchpad tokens are the bulk of the circulating supply with some from he treasury as well. The private sale tokens at the much cheaper price don't unlock until a year or so later, after the tokens from product use are unlocked and being distributed to players.
Additionally, the team tokens are also locked until a similar time, with the project running on ecosystem and private investment funding. Definitely a better thought out distribution schedule, if the project runs on the projected timeline.
I see that the team seems to be a bit marketing heavy... oh well, that sort of counts for something at this stage of things.
So, wrapping up... I'm not convinced that this is the app for me. A health and lifestyle app that rewards you for doing exercise and includes a NFT marketplace and all of that. It all smacks of marketing heavy buzzwords that has been cobbled together into a crypto app/ecosystem. However, making money of these launches doesn't rely on what I personally think about the project... it only depends on what other people think about the project.
Having the backing of Binance through the launchpad and listing is no small thing... there is exposure and a large liquidity pool ready to jump in to fill the order books. Personally, I do think that I'm going to recover my initial investment pretty easily, and I think I will trading (selling) about half the allocation in that crazy early spike in price... then, I will hold a moonbag of around half the allocation. People might like this sort of thing... I wouldn't have it anywhere near my phone, but I think that people might be see this as way to "earn" free crypto, get a bit of exercise, and then cash out to other crypto. Might be a good gateway drug?
I can also be found cross-posting at: Hive Steem Publish0x
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