Words that start revolutions. Inspire generations. Make us human.

Now, these words can be etched onchain.

Etch is a powerful platform by Matt Kane and Deca.

Etch

Is this just another NFT that will forever be worthless (and worth less than I paid for it)? Yes and no.

This is a Gabagool Writing Token, conceived and launched by an anonymous crypto enthusiast named Gabagool. He explained that it was created as a means of "supporting on-going experiments with writing, tokenization, token-gating, and publishing + privacy." This was exciting to a very specific set of people; writing in the crypto space was not very sophisticated at the time (still isn"t) so there was interest to capture, and his previous project, Information Token, had achieved high valuations and a fair amount of attention. Before long, the Writing Token was selling for around 0.3 ETH from an initial mint of 0.05. (https://mirror.xyz/gabagool.eth/qk5AtdAuhcxAfPfR4eZg8hlzhFU1VsMEiuUKSV0SDQU)

While Gabagool was working on the spartan design of his Writing Token, he was also embezzling tokens from one of his decentralized employers, the financial project Velodrome, to the tune of about $350,000. (https://web.archive.org/web/20220814062013/https://twitter.com/zachxbt/status/1558554317333925888) The funds were later fully recovered and he has since disappeared into the chain, probably never to be heard from again. As Gabagool, at least. (Maybe just his real name next time.)

I"ve had my own experiences with greed on-chain. The buttons are just there, they"re ready to be clicked and sometimes you just do. Or you don"t and should have, as the case may be. You"re in the sub-basement of the internet, alone. Just you and the buttons, and just behind those maybe a chance to breathe in life.

I don"t feel bad for Mr. Gabagool, and I"m not thrilled about having to look at this token, either. But I do appreciate the reminder.