Interviewing Runes CFT, Founder of VEGGS

What inspired Veggs? Are you a developer? What’s your background?

I wanted to make a high-quality inscription project that wasn't built around speed or hype. I develop frameworks, concepts and the end user experience and leave the programming to the experts. My default mindset is that of an engineer but I tend to lean towards art and creative projects when it comes to my free time. I’m weirdly talented at creating frameworks of how their ideas and systems could/should work. I wanted to try applying this talent to the realm of inscriptions and parallel token(s). I’ve always wanted to attempt this model, which has already been picked up and used by other inscription projects. That tells me I’m on the right path.

How does the art factor into the ecosystem? How does the VEGGS token factor in? What are its current and future utilities? How does the NBACON token factor in? What are its current and future utilities?

I had a feeling that $RUNES was running too hot and my gut said it could end up botted to oblivion. So I stealth launched $VEGGS as the legit token. I ditched $RUNES, foiling bot profiteers. Sure, bots hit $VEGGS (sold out in 24 minutes), but I changed the game: It wasn't about hoarding $VEGGS, just having one mattered for the airdrop. This leveled the playing field and bot hoarding lost its edge. $VEGGS value dropped, making massive holdings useless. Then, I hinted that $VEGGS mattered for buying #VEGGS inscriptions, becoming a top holder myself. This spiked $VEGGS utility. In our ecosystem, $NBACON is stable, while $VEGGS is the key to participating in auctions. Hold $VEGGS and $NBACON, and you can bid on inscriptions. In ties, the most $VEGGS wins. We balance a stable $NBACON with the speculative $VEGGS. Holding $VEGGS not only gives auction power but also supports our ecosystem. I minted all $NBACON for stability and set its trade value. We trade $NBACON for ATOM tokens, promoting fairness and community engagement. VEGGSlayers and players get first dibs on new inscriptions, keeping the game transparent and engaging.

What’s the roadmap for VEGGS?

1. Continue producing #VEGGS inscription art that is original and one-of-a-kind. We will not flood the market but will consistently produce and incentivize new #VEGGS inscriptions to grow the community. 2. Push the circulation and utility of $VEGGS token to increase value proposition and encourage game theory HODLING. 3. Reward inscription holders in the future with pass-through airdrops (PTA) and other community incentives. 4. Create new ideas based on community participation and opportunities for growth. Members can expect new twists and fun surprises; this project is an open-ended mystery box.

What do you see for the future of Asteroid?

I foresee tons of ideas popping up because Asteroid is so fast and cheap to deploy. Focusing on the short-term, I think the inscription media player I pitched could be a game-changer. It creates the capability for artists, musicians, filmmakers, etc. to launch and incentivize endless creative projects. For example, let’s say a musician produces a new 3-minute song, and they release it as 180 separate inscriptions (1 second per inscription). Using the inscription playlist file, the media player can play all 180 inscriptions back-to-back to play the whole song. Fans and speculators can buy any number of those inscription pieces, thereby claiming ownership and benefits (perks, revenue sharing, etc.) preset by the artist. This opens a direct channel of artist-to-fan interaction and turns community members into micro-executive producers on various projects.

You've taken a really active role in shaping best practices for creators and protecting consumers, can you tell us more about that? How did you come up with these ideas that are now best practices? Specifically naming the cosmos wallet?

Protocols are awesome in the early stages because of a lack of rules, but the freedom of unregulated commerce also attracts bad actors. I caught a handful of fake #VEGGS on the testnet of the inscription marketplace and had a conversation with a white-hat user who fingered the obvious hole. Scammers at that point could simply copy-paste the details of an inscription, slap it on the marketplace and sell their fakes to unwitting buyers. I published our discovery through text inscriptions publicly thanking the white-hat for the help. The insight quickly led to a solution. I was familiar with Stargaze’s naming system, an offshoot use of the $HNS Handshake protocol. That gave me the idea to push an easy ID system: pick up a project’s Stargaze name and use it to name the project’s inscribing wallet—the “Created By” wallet you see on each and every inscription. Asteroid is updating their system to help deter bad actors, but naming project wallets in the meantime has been working well. I noticed at the same time that copycat projects from other markets were being uploaded to the protocol and sold to unsuspecting buyers as originals. I also spotted a lot of “wash trading” to establish a false sales record and to create FOMO for the copycats. So I started the practice of inscribing “Telescopes”—marketplace inscriptions with details about copycat projects that appear when a user is searching for the original or copycat project. Details include 1) the wallet ID of the copycat project at the time the Telescope was inscribed, and 2) the online and on-chain name and location of the original project it copied. This and using my X account to alert the community has already slashed the number of copycats and seriously disrupted their profits. Stopping scams becomes a lot less work when everyone participates in a neighborhood watch. I’m sure most of these issues will disappear as soon as Asteroid launches their next update, but the more we can sting bad actors to reward creatives for original work, the stronger and more desirable the protocol will become.

Are you involved in any other projects? Do you have any plans to work on a different project? What does your future hold?

Not at the moment and not in the Asteroid protocol. I wouldn’t mind a role in the development of the inscription media player because it could have massive impact for the protocol’s community and I understand how it should work. I also have ideas for future inscriptions and I think there’s a market for physical 3D printed #VEGGS that starts with the high-def version of the original inscriptions. Since this is my first self-led inscription project I want to explore things that other developers might be afraid to touch because they feel safer replicating what’s already worked in the past. I want to do the opposite and show that promoting quality over speed always results in long-term success vs. short-term gratification. And I want to keep making art.

Any near-future milestones for VEGGS (dates, events, etc)? Anything else the community should know?

We’ll be releasing unclaimed #VEGGS on the Asteroid inscription marketplace and announcing multiple PTA (pass-through airdrops) for specific categories of #VEGGS. Inscriptions will need some type of beneficial layer of airdropped tokens or inscriptions to holders, and #VEGGS will become an inscription airdrop pioneer in the near future. Members should absolutely be on X.com and keep notifications turned on for my posts @RunesCFT. Community members have the best chance of grabbing what they want by catching my 96-second posts. We will not have a Discord or Telegram group because that puts the community behind a wall where non-participants can’t see what we’re doing. I want to keep everything out in the open and publicly available, to create windows instead of locked doors. People can see how it works and decide whether or not they want to join without having to wade through a boatload of comments. X.com decentralizes security by enabling and enforcing anti-fraud reporting, so I don’t have to expend bandwidth on fraud prevention. I can focus on building the community rather than defending it. Other platforms don’t have those features built-in and I don’t want to have to hire extra muscle. Also, keep an eye out for more news about ATOMAP CFT-20s and ATOMAPS inscriptions.