Foxes,
Take a look below to see what we’ve been working on, including more information on “Project Chronicle,” an initiative we teased last time around.
Civis vulpes sum!
🦊💭,
WINS
- We shipped our bounty program. We are using a portion of the Foxes treasury to support community-built projects as part of a bounty program. We have proposed five initial bounties and are welcoming other suggestions, too. More here
- Our first two bounties were officially claimed (with a third on the way!). Two awesome teams have started getting to work on DoppelFox and Endless Thinker! We’re excited to see others claim the remaining bounties and propose additional projects as we move ahead.
- We shipped v1 of Fox Inbox. Lyceum and Kagami, with input from several other Foxes, shipped the first edition of our community-curated newsletter: The Fox Inbox! If you want to learn about game design, P2E, STEPN and Joan Didion this is for you. More here.
- We held our first Twitter Space. Hannibal hosted a Twitter Spaces to talk all things foxes, storytelling, and more. I really enjoyed listening to the conversation! Recording here.
- We strengthened our dev team. We added a developer to the Foxes team! They’re working on an upcoming drop for Genesis holders. We’re also vetting another technical solution on the agency side, which we think could be valuable. While this has taken longer than we initially planned, I’m reminded that hiring great talent takes time.
- We refined the Fox mythology. We’re going to be sharing more information about the world that Foxes inhabit and the journey we are on soon… I am extremely excited about this. Has anyone spotted the first clue? 👀
SPOTLIGHT: CHRONICLE
In last month’s update, we shared that we had started working on “Project Chronicle.” This month, I thought I’d share a little more information about what we’re building and the implications it has for Foxes.
As you know, we were motivated to create Foxes because we believe:
- NFTs are an intriguing mechanism for storytelling
- Many profile picture NFTs were acting as de-facto “characters” for unwritten stories
- Many of these didn’t have the necessary ingredients to be dimensional characters, lacking virtues, baggage, and secrets
The fundamental thesis was that by adding invisible, rich character data to NFTs, they would become more interesting narrative objects and create better stories.
Chronicle is an attempt to demonstrate the power of NFT storytelling, the uniqueness of Foxes, and a way to give holders a chance to build their lore.
We plan to do that by using GPT-3 to “write” stories based on the specific traits of your Fox. Here’s how we expect it to work:
- Go to chroniclenft.com
- Connect your wallet
- Select the Fox you’d like to feature in your story
- Select the metadata traits you’d like to emphasize
- Generate a story using GPT-3
- Share that story on Twitter or (eventually) mint as an NFT – a page in your character’s story
In the near future (~1 year), this could develop into an extremely vivid platform that supports different genres, characters, and lengths. For example, by connecting your wallet, you could tell Chronicle to create a love story featuring your Fox, Coven, and Ape that runs for at least 600 words. This could incorporate “relationship NFTs” (links that explain how NFTs are connected) and additional trait packs to give more color to your non-Fox NFTs.
In the far future (??), this could develop into an entirely new model of on-demand media. In a world in which our most compelling characters are “NFT clusters” (a character, trait packs, dilemmas, relationships — all on chain) you could use Chronicle to create rich fan-fiction on an endless basis. Instead of Lord of The Rings being limited to a three-book series, it could be explored ceaselessly from different angles, in varied fractal realities.
For Foxes, I believe Chronicle could be an extremely effective commercial model. If we can demonstrate that profile picture NFTs need an additional “NFT clusters,” we demonstrate the uniqueness of our project and have the chance to establish ourselves as a purveyor of these items and the stories they help create. A small fee could be taken to support our work on this front, with the Fox Treasury as a beneficiary.
It cannot be overstated that THIS IS VERY MUCH AN EXPERIMENT. We are dealing with complicated novel technologies stacked on top of each other. Moreover, there are certainly other smart people interested in on-chain storytelling and they may be better suited or capitalized to make this a reality.
Our attitude toward Chronicle is that it is an exciting way to play with Foxes, an opportunity to learn, a fun way to tinker on the frontier of the future – with commercial upside.
MISSES
- We could use more framing. Some of the thinking around Foxes requires further definition and framing. Though I have written about the principles of the project at length, what I think is lacking are the “rules of the game.” Where are Foxes? What is our mission as characters? Initially, I expected this to arrive piecemeal – and for some of it to come from the community – but I now think we need to adapt that approach. While I hope the community increasingly leads the way on the creative side of things, better structure is needed. Expect some significant news about the Foxverse soon.
- Some things are taking longer than expected. Namely around engineering (we were lacking firepower – since resolved) and some design for an upcoming drop (still working through.) This can be frustrating on all sides, but again, finding talent takes time. As market mania has faded, we increasingly have the time and space to build deliberately.