Friend Tech, this viral new app on Coinbase’s layer 2 is making people rich. Some of the top Friend Tech accounts have earned more than $10k in just 2 weeks. What is this new craze all about? In just 11 days Friend tech has outperformed established players in the crypto ecosystem, including Uniswap and the Bitcoin network.
Then why are critics warning against it? Did it actually leak the user data of 101K users? Here is the entire truth behind Friend tech. Let’s discover more about this project.
What is Friend Tech?
The app is built on the Coinbase-incubated Ethereum layer-2 Base. It has become a Massive Ether Money Machine as NBA Players, FaZe Clan Joined In. It tokenizes Twitter accounts on-chain, letting users buy and sell “shares” of their favorite social media personalities.
NBA players are joining friendtech pic.twitter.com/iKVLFah6AV
— borovik.eth (@3orovik) August 21, 2023
Basically, it’s a mobile-only social media platform linked to Twitter that tokenizes user accounts. Users who buy another account’s so-called shares gain exclusive access to that account’s private chat room, which is a very exciting way to connect and engage.
But social media influencers are saying “Something is not right” and they believe six and eight weeks before both share prices and general activity begin to nosedive.
Let me tell you one thing.
Something isn’t right about @friendtech.
🚩 Creators making money from a group chat that doesn’t even work when you can’t even reply directly to people?
🚩 The way pricing works is ridiculous and can be easily taken advantage of.
🚩 Pumps and dumps. pic.twitter.com/TJqcktEM6P
— Yazan (@YazanXBT) August 20, 2023
Okay, so before we get into the details of issues let’s first see the Current Status: It went live with an invite-only beta on August 11. A day after Base’s mainnet launch.
- It has generated a whopping $2.88 million in protocol fees: Friend.tech’s revenue and fees also outpaced market leaders in Uniswap, MakerDAO, and even layer-1 blockchains like Bitcoin and Tron on August 20.
- The number of daily txs on Base reached a new peak of over 900,000 on August 20: Nearly double of leading L2 networks in Arbitrum and Optimism.
What is Interesting about Friend Tech?
It is the implementation of a bonding curve that automatically calculates the buying and selling price, similar to Uniswap’s automated market-making (AMM) design.
- Traders do not need to find a counterparty to buy or sell the shares on Friend.tech, instead, an automated mathematical formula determines the price based on the number of users holding an account’s shares.
- The share’s price rises with the number of shareholders.
Here are some stories:
- FaZe Banks joined the platform on Sunday and his share surged to become one of the top shares. He tweeted “I’ve always thought the idea of betting on the success of especially YouTubers/ streamers success would be cool. Outside of just time and resources. I’ve discovered so many talented people, a product like this is perfect for that.”
- Popular crypto trader and influencer Cobie’s account on Friend.tech is currently valued at 2.04 Ethereum, or about $3,400, with around 145 holders. 3. Crypto analyst Adam Cochran’s account with 57 holders is valued at 0.576 ETH. 4. NBA player Grayson Allen joined the platform and saw his share prices quickly become among the costliest in a few hours.
Sniped a code off twitter today and joined @friendtech. Like the concept and looking forward to what the team can build with this
— Grayson Allen (@GraysonJAllen) August 21, 2023
Potential
While its popularity has risen, I think the hype could be short-lived. it’s gaining considerable traction with notable personnel joining the social media app outside the crypto circles like Y Combinator founder Garry Tan, NBA player Grayson Allen, and professional gamer Faze Banks. Since its launch, Friend.tech has seen a total volume of 38,884 ether, across 1.59 million transactions, as per Dune. Some top accounts have made 10k since its launch also speaking in terms of the app, it has remarkable UX: Works as an app, no app store needed -sets up bridges for your deposits just once, no more txs signing.
All in all, I think the platform offers a unique way for users to monetize their social influence. By selling shares of themselves, users can generate passive income from their followers. This could be a major incentive for influencers and other high-profile individuals to use the platform.
Top @friendtech accounts have earned more than $10k in just 2 weeks.
But who is earning the most?
I've matched around 200 of the most well-known CT accounts to their FT wallet.
Here is what my new Dune dashboard is revealing 🧵👇🏻 pic.twitter.com/nwk7URGX7P
— Crypto Koryo (@CryptoKoryo) August 21, 2023
Risk & Rewards
Some of the red flags raised are:
- Creators making money from a group chat that doesn’t even work when you can’t even reply directly to people?
- The way pricing works is ridiculous and can be easily taken advantage of.
- Pumps and dumps.
He also believes the app is just hype, six and eight weeks before both share prices and general activity begin to nosedive. Let’s look at another opinion. A crypto analyst “DeFi Made Here” tweeted that currently, the app is “nothing else than a way to speculate on shitcoins aka influencers’ shares and farm a potential airdrop.”
Friend Tech will transform into a platform for creating and managing premium paid groups or will end up as Bitclout.
At the current stage, @friendtech is nothing else than a way to speculate on shitcoins aka influencers' shares and farm a potential airdrop.
It does not work as… pic.twitter.com/ZtUlevqpd8
— DeFi Made Here (@DeFi_Made_Here) August 20, 2023
Moreover, its bonding curve is very steep, making it “difficult to attract more people” to buy a user’s shares, they said. “It just becomes too expensive after the first 100 shareholders”. Also, a report claimed that the personal information of more than 100,000 of its users was “leaked.
However, the Friend.tech team clarified that the information came from scraping its public API and refuted the report.
Ps: If you have an invite code and have decided to go all in, I’d suggest you revoke access to X once you’re in. To do that, you need to go to:
- Security and Account Access
- Find Apps and sessions
- Click on connected apps
Friendtech has access to your X account 🤯
Revoke it + more safety tips for friend tech:
* It uses a bonding curve, price runs up too fast
* People will fake demand easily, then dump on you
* Bots buy cheap too fast, and will dump on you
* Revoke its X access like this: pic.twitter.com/kFBH05xGaR— xero 🎮 (@xerocooleth) August 21, 2023
Stay safe.
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