Dialogue with GMGN Lianchuang: After three stages, I still haven’t decided to issue a coin
Interview: Nathan, 7UpDAOFounding Partner
Guest: Haze, Co-founder of GMGN
Nathan: What kind of experience did you have before founding GMGN?
Haze:
I didn’t have an undergraduate degree. Before I entered the Crypto circle, I worked in a very small place. To be frank, I didn’t have any dreams at that time, I just wanted to make money. At the end of 2017, I accidentally saw news about Bitcoin. At that time, I didn’t know what it was used for, but I thought I could buy some. Then in 2018, I joined a quantitative trading company that did grid trading and started to learn on my own. The first tutorial on grid trading in this industry was written by me at that time. There was a note-taking product called "Jianshu", and I published some tutorials on it, but unfortunately I can’t find it now because it has been blocked.
Nathan: There are rumors in the market that GMGN is backed by Pai Network. Does this mean it was incubated by Pai Network?
Haze:
Not really.GMGN is an independent project, maybe because some of GMGN's early employees, including me, had worked at Pai.com, which caused misunderstandings in the industry. I worked at Pai.com for about three years, doing their user growth, operations, and customer service. I felt like I had done everything except writing code.
Nathan: How did the idea and project establishment process of GMGN begin?
Haze:
In June 2023, we started GMGN. The name GMGN is"Good morning, good night"But when we were looking for a direction, we also discussed other things. At that time, the inscriptions of the Bitcoin ecosystem were very popular.Some friends asked us whether we should do anything related to BRC-20?
At that time, there were already some teams working on BRC-20 in the market.walletBut my first feeling is that we should not do it. First of all, inscriptions do not solve anything. They have neither cultural appeal nor spiritual connotation. They are nothing more than engraving something in the Bitcoin block. Secondly, its transaction experience is too poor and too slow. The transaction efficiency and asset issuance efficiency are poor, which leads to a big problem of asset liquidity. If the efficiency is not good, your bubble will not be big. This is the same as the NFT in the previous cycle, and it will eventually die slowly.
However, the core of the cryptocurrency industry is still around asset issuance and trading. After excluding the inscription direction, I discussed with our product manager that it would be better to develop products related to Meme coin in the Ethereum ecosystem. So, in June 2023,The first chain GMGN connected to was Eth, focusing on the entry point of “smart money tracking”.But everyone knows that Ethereum has never really taken off, so weIn March 2024, we started to move to Solana.
Why did you switch to Solana? Do you still remember the "Silly Dragon" coin in January 2024, the DePin-like Mobile in February, and Bome in March? I participated in (buying) all these coins. I have the experience of voting with money. I determined that the capital sinking and the outlet of Meme coin would eventually occur on Solana, so I discussed with the team. In fact, they also did a lot of research at that time, and our internal cognition was consistent.
Nathan: When you switched your strategic thinking from Eth to Solana, did you consider any potential risks when making the decision? Are you worried about any risks that you didn't expect?
Haze:
In fact, we were also entangled internally, mainly because of the time cost. Everyone was worried that if we spent another two months of development time to switch to Solana, but Solana also failed, what would we do? This would be a big blow to morale. But what finally convinced us was that after working on the Ethereum Meme for so long, all the "hunters" on the chain we saw were not as powerful as the momentum in the Solana ecosystem, so we made up our minds to do it.
Nathan: What do you think are the major natural growth and explosions that GMGN has experienced from its inception to the present stage that have made you feel strongly that, well, we made the right bet this time?
Haze:
First, after switching from Ethereum to Solana, we have been growing steadily overall, which is the first step to a successful decision. Secondly, we launched the “rat warehouse” feature in July and August 2024, which made us feel obvious natural growth and explosion. At the same time, Pump.fun also became popular. Then, in November 2024,BinanceThe launch of ACT and Pnut also helped with the education of the on-chain market.
Nathan: I feel that your product iteration logic is "bottom-up"Xiaobai NavigationThe key is to start from how product tools can satisfy users' pain points and find the priority of iteration. If a large company makes similar products, it may become a "top-down" product planning, first emphasizing how to make product transactions smoother and how to modularize the code to make the product look more structured and extensible, rather than grasping users' pain points and iterating in small steps.
Haze:
Yes, this is also related to the genes of our team. We don't think of doing big things on the first day. We think that we should make something that users really need, can use, and can fill their needs. Another reason is that we don't have many resources and don't have the ability to support doing a big thing on the first day.
Nathan: How many people were there on your team at the beginning? How many people are there now?
Haze:
At the beginning, there were 9 or 10 people; now there are more than 30 people, and most of them are product and technology. Internally, I am the co-founder, and our product manager is the CEO and founder. He is in charge of products, and I am in charge of sales and branding. We don't care about anything else, and we don't have the energy to do it.
Nathan: What are you doing in terms of proactive operations and growth strategy?
Haze:
We have accurately found the Kol and the word for "打狗" (beat the dog).Community, recommend GMGN to them. Because I have accumulated this resource in the past. I am a front-line "dog-hunter" myself. I know which KOLs are really powerful. We know some of them in the NFT era. But we are not contacting them to promote "rebates". Because they all have very strongmake moneyAbility, they don't need to rely on rebatesmake moneyWhat they care more about is whether your tool can help them make more money. So the focus of our cooperation is whether we can help them iterate their needs in a more timely manner.
Nathan:Have you ever thought about what the ultimate form of GMGN is? At what stage is GMGN currently in the process of moving towards its ultimate form?
Haze:
We don’t think much about the “ultimate form” because the changes on the chain are too fast. We only think about what features to iterate next week. When our team is working on this thing (GMGN), all the points revolve around whether this function can be launched and whether this thing can be done. If I think it can be done, but the product team thinks it can’t, we will argue about it and then see whether it should be done.
Nathan: What do you think about the income structure? Will you issue coins?
Haze:
We currently have only one source of income, which is transaction fees. If we need to face more intense competition in the future, we will consider whether we need to engage in a price war. But at present, this is not the focus we need to consider changing.
As for the coin issuance, to be honest, we are still discussing it internally and have not yet formed a final opinion. If we issue coins, one thing we are more worried about is whether users will pay more attention to the price of the coin and ignore the use of our products. If the stickiness of the product becomes insignificant due to the coin issuance, we think it is not worth the loss.
Nathan: What have you learned from the past battles among NFT trading platforms? Although NFT is now a sunset.
Haze:
Whether it is OpenSea, Blur, or other competing platforms, I think the core problem is not the issue of issuing coins, but the self-degradation in the face of user needs. You can choose not to issue coins, but you have to change the product and pay great attention to user needs. In fact, when users are used to a platform, it is difficult to attract them. How degraded do you have to be to force users to leave? Another example is the earliest derivatives in the cryptocurrency circle.exchangeIt was BitMEX. When I was trading cryptocurrencies, it was that interface. I rememberCommunitySomeone suggested that the interface should be changed and an APP should be launched, but they did nothing and watched them go from being the leader in derivatives trading to being at the bottom. When we look at every innovator or leader in a trend, their downfall comes from not paying attention to the needs of users.
Nathan: How do you think you should keep yourself and your team hungry? In addition to GMGN, what other products and opportunities have you been paying attention to recently?
Haze:
I think you have to keep paying attention to new things and don’t be biased. Just try out anything that is relatively new. If you happen to find that it can solve the user’s pain points, then you should try to make one.
In addition to GMGN, I am more concerned about the Payfi field.cryptocurrencyCross-border payment can solve big problems, but I haven't figured out which implementation form is the most correct, and which entry point is the best? At present, it is difficult and needs to be thought about again, but even if you don't do it yourself, it would be cool if you can figure this out and get an answer.
NAthan: When do you think on-chain transactions will exceed CEX's transaction volume? What is your big prediction for the industry in the next few years?
Haze:
I think the next four years will be the best four years for the Crypto market. Trump, as the President of the United States, issued a coin, which is also a disguised recognition of the legitimacy of Crypto. It is no longer a gray industry. In addition, Elon Musk, as a Crypto philanthropist, interacts with Trump very frequently, which is unique in the history of the cryptocurrency circle. Therefore, the four years of Trump's administration are a very golden four years, and also the four years with the best liquidity.
The current transaction volume of on-chain assets is 130 billion US dollars; in November 2024, this figure was only 40 billion US dollars. In just two months, it surged from 40 billion to 130 billion.In the next year, the transaction volume of on-chain assets is likely to exceed one trillion US dollars, which is when it exceeds the transaction volume of CEX.There will be more wealth effects.
Nathan: By the way, what year were you born in and what’s your zodiac sign? Besides work, what else do you usually do?
Haze:
I was born in August 1987, a Leo, and have been in Singapore for four years. When I took the MBTI test two years ago, I was an i person. Now, after work, I like to bask in the sun, sweat, and play tennis with a coach.
The article comes from the Internet:Dialogue with GMGN Lianchuang: After three stages, I still haven’t decided to issue a coin
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