NEO Tokyo. 2023. Let’s Talk.
Citizens, compadres, degens. Welcome to 2023. Welcome to another year of NEO Tokyo.
This is Becker writing this. Also please note, Firestorm co-wrote this with me. He also fixed my baboon grammar/writing in many places. Give him your thanks in Discord later.
Let’s get straight to it. In this post I am going to be covering our plan for 2023 short term AND long term. I will be covering what you should expect. I will be breaking down our mission, objective, and entire strategy behind the community as well. I will also be hammering down a ton of details on our upcoming NEO Tokyo building & BYTES infrastructure.
This post will be broken down into a few parts:
-The state of crypto gaming, NFTs and where we are in NEO Tokyo
-The immediate, short term objectives of NEO Tokyo in 2023
-The long term + bear market objectives for NEO Tokyo in 2023
ALSO : Please forgive me for the delay on this update. I wanted to have it out Monday however I wanted to make sure the full NEO Tokyo dev, art, and management team was fully aligned before blowing a trumpet of commitments.
We have a lot to cover. So let’s get to it.
The State Of Crypto Gaming, NFTs and NEO Tokyo
The first thing I want to discuss before we talk about where we are going is where we are.
First off…While it MAY seem like I am talking about financials/investment return right now I want to be very clear our goal at NEO Tokyo is never financial return. This is not a MLM or a passive income for life play. This is not some buy, hold, and get rich master plan. I absolutely hate operating NT around financial gain because it destroys the actual thing we set out to build AND is the core value of NT.
The core value of NT is a community of metaverse industry participants SUPPORTED by an infrastructure that gives them an advantage in the metaverse industry . The goal is to attract developers, VCs, founders, investors, and influencers who are focused on this space. The second goal is to use our infrastructure to encourage foundational building that gives the people above a HUGE advantage in this industry.
By combining the value of an EXTREMELY refined community WITH invaluable utility via access, services and tools…We will have something that is an absolute fucking nuclear bomb WHEN this industry returns.
A huge rise in Metaverse (gaming, nft ownership, AR, VR, etc) is going to happen. It’s going to be gigantic. Our goal is to be perfectly positioned with a foundation of community and utility when this occurs.
This ABSOLUTELY will not happen if we operate like other projects where we focus on “MONEY MONEY ROI ROI MONEY MONEY DROPS DROPS WE GOTTA GAME COMING, YOU GONNA GET RICH.”
The reason for this is operating as such attracts people who give zero shits about the mission or priorities I stated above. They come for money, do not contribute, and forcefully push the project in a direction for their financial gain. Then they TURBO dump once the project gets there.
This leaves a project in ruins and hurts the long-term value for actual holders. In short, it hurts the people that are here for the mission and rewards people that don’t give a SHIT about the ideals I laid out above.
Thus, every single one of my actions since the beginning of 2022 has been about getting the RIGHT people in NT over time VS hyping the NFT for immediate financial rewards and toxifying the community.
Why Am I Stating This In Such A Long Winded Fashion
Because there is a world of difference between what is “right” when it comes to building a brand, community and business….and what is “right” in NFT’s right now.
At the moment, all that matters in NFTs is what is hot and pumping floors. These are the usual drops, useless coin releases OR big “future” promises based around what the market likes right now. Not everyone that does this is being silly. Nor am I calling people out. However the main fuel behind most projects right now is some sort of “impending wealth” from holding the NFT.
Almost all of these methods are directly opposite of what you want to do if you want to build brand that will last long-term. The ENTIRE sentiment of whether a project is on the right track in NFTs right now is whether someone will buy the NFT for more than the holder paid for it. AKA it’s simply a game of greater fool theory.
This works now. It’s popular now. It absolutely will not work long-term. A project built on greater fool/hype theory will eventually stop going up, its drops won’t be profitable and all that will be left is fools trying to save their bags.
A NFT should work like
A) A Pokemon card where the value is the collectible
B) A club membership. Like a country club or social club where you benefit from being a member.
The fact that NFTs can be traded so easily is a massive double edged sword. While it’s benefits are clear, It has ALSO created a market that often leans towards rewarding tactics that enhance speculation VS building correctly.
I NEVER want people to heavily justify to others that the reason to join NT is
-Passive income
-Some drop/thing they can dump on the market for more money
-Some money/etc they will make in the future
Unfortunately if you look at most projects…This is literally all they talk about. We’ve all seen “OH THIS DROP IS COMING, BETTER GET IN NOW!!!!” or “When they release this IT’S GONNA MOON”.
This is long term toxic. It’s not sustainable. Especially when this market matures.
I WANT people to justify joining because of things like
-Tools/services/access that will SUPER benefit their careers/participation in the space
-Networking they cannot get elsewhere in metaverse building
-A chance to get a spotlight on what they are building with the right community
-To meet hires/partners
-To attend unique events/meet ups with super like minded high power people
-Access to information/talks that will give them a huge edge
-Friendship & guidance with similar minds
-Help developing/marketing/plotting their products
Stuff like this IS sustainable. Some “drop” will end once the drop occurs. People will leave.
However a country club of like minded people and utility gets infinitely STRONGER over time as the network compounds. The KEY is consistently getting the right people. A lot of current NFT speculation culture attract 100% the wrong people for what we are doing. They have zero interest in being a part of the club and 100% interest in selling their club access to someone for more.
OF COURSE having a high floor is fun. BUT we want to high floor to come SOLEY from members not wanting to sell their club access. We DO NOT want it to come from members hold because they think they can sell their club access for more later on if they game NT right.
Its a VERY VERY subtle fine line, that needs to be pointed out for you to understand the theory behind NT.
In short : What is considered “good building” in most of the NFT community…is actually not when it comes to business/brand building. A lot of the market continue to lean towards tactics that appease profit driven flippers/investors who are BY FAR the most vocal. The problem is these rarely prioritize long-term success OR the satisfaction of serious project holders.
Thus, I will be using processes that I consider “good building” from my decade in business, marketing, and brand building.
I personally plan to be working on NT for a decade plus. Think about that. I literally plan to be 45 years old (34 now) and still working on this project and community.
I absolutely….refuse to surround myself and serious holders of this project with those people. I can’t think of a greater hell long-term. 10 years of “Wen Drop” makes my inside twist up.
Thus, I will often refuse to bend the knee to what is “hot” in the market.
I am sorry to have to emphasize this so much. It is simply EXTREMELY important to me that every holder and person joining NEO Tokyo understands why I make the choices I do and will often ignore what is “hot” in NFTs…I consistently see a few holders get frustrated with me, and it’s due to their lack of understanding of my logic in building. This is my logic.
If you are here for the mission I state in this post…You are going to love NT. If you are here to to speculatively invest, you are often going to hate me. The best I can do is be extremely clear and build a culture that speculative investors stay away from so that EVERYONE is happy. There are PLENTY of other projects that will meet a speculative investors needs and lean towards aggressive hype strategies. A speculative investor will be much happier there! We all win. No hard feelings!
So How Is This Going?
I encourage you to go look at our unique holders, average length of hold and NFTs listed.
It is perhaps the best of any serious NFT project on the market.
I then encourage you to go look in our Discord. It is BY FAR one of the best communities in the space. Even the big blue chips are “crickets” compared to it.
7+ Divisions were organically created by community leaders who stepped up to contribute to our mission: AMA, Creatives, Development, Gaming, News, Outreach, and Research.
Some of these leaders include: DamonNeedsToCreate, Chronicle, Slime, Zehi, FelixNorden, BadFuture, Bings, RCK, Thare, Danor, and more.
The talent we have in the Citizen pool has been instrumental in forming one of the strongest communities in the space.
Next, look at all the building that has happened. Our rolodex of projects that have been birthed in NT is again…one of the best of any NFT project on the market…
To name a few just in this past year, directly from Citizen founders: Mint Defense, Non Fungible Arcade, Steady Stack, SwapStreet, Spectre, and more.
See the Neo Tokyo Ecosystem graphic to get a better sense of the magnitude of NT’s network. 100+ projects/companies with Citizen founders or employees. It speaks for itself.
Lastly, look at the internal projects that have been delivered by our community: Citizen Capital, WL Marketplace, Community Site, Merch Store, News Team Page, Code Breaker, NT Plays Tournaments, 1 Year Anniversary Event, and more.
Why?
Because at NEO Tokyo we set out to build a community of the RIGHT people. Our mission, values, and culture is connecting with the RIGHT people who care about participating in the metaverse industry.
On the flip side it has REPULSED….DISGUSTED… and utterly pushed out anyone who is here to make a quick flip and get rich off this community.
I am sure you can see just how much healthier the Discord and community have become. Conversations have shifted towards building, the industry, developing, and working on cool shit. This opposed to the absolutely vile “WHY IS BYTES CHEAP, WHENS THE NEXT DROP, WHENS THE NEXT WHITE LIST, THIS PROJECT IS PUMPING WE NEED TO COPY THEM” type of people that used to infest our discord.
These people have left. The right people have stayed. The mission and objectives we set out to do are being accomplished. AND if you are one of the few people who are here purely for financial gain (which is fine, we all like money…) we are building towards something that will be INCREDIBLY valuable in the future metaverse run that is going to happen in the next few years.
So, before we get into the meat of the post I wanted to thoroughly explain the core of our decision making. There are MANY short-term things we could do that would increase floor price, however, long-term it would kill the project. Our goal is to build real, long-term un-fuckable value, hence why we opt to not fomo into trends/pumpable actions…..ESPECIALLY in a bad bear market.
That Bullrun…Is Currently Not Happening
I am sure everyone is aware we are in crypto bear market, thus also a NFT bear market of sorts.
To be honest, I currently believe NFTs based around art and community have bottomed. I do NOT believe crypto gaming/metaverse and NFTs based upon games have bottomed.
NEO Tokyo falls somewhere in between these. We are NOT a game. This is a good thing. We are very much associated with games and this will continue to tug at us a bit till the metaverse industry bounces back.
It’s EXTREMELY important to understand the niche NEO Tokyo fills.
We are not an ART/PFP project similar to Apes.
We are ALSO not a game similar to Axi.
We are a NETWORKING/Utility community NFT project. The closest comparison to what we are would be Proof and Moonbirds. However we are focused around metaverse and gaming.
We also need to be honest. While we all believe metaverse will take over the world, that moment clearly is not right now. The demand for crypto gaming, metaverse, and NFT projects around this is at a cataclysmic low.
Its important to remember it will not always be. We will be in a great spot when this all reverses.
It is ALSO important to remember where we are. It’s important to remember that there is really no benefit to rushing or fomoing into things in the bear. The price of NFTs in general is likely not going anywhere regardless of what a project does. THUS it’s far more important to focus on building solid foundations correctly while we have this “time out” period in the markets.
It is also paramount to SURVIVE the bear market. I personal have seen many projects panic and start over committing to things that are now killing the project. Their attempts to pump their price lead to short-term pumps that then lead to bigger dumps. This is because they promise something for the sake of hype that does not deliver real value. People buy with zero interest in the project to ride the hype and then dump.
This is a recipe for killing a NFT project. Its far more important to take our time. The bear could last another 1-2 years. Its important that we run an EXTREMELY focused, methodical marathon based on long-term, high-value building VS trying to constantly sprint to appease the greedy, short-sighted NFT market.
This is exactly what we are doing now. So with that being said, lets focus on our short-term goals first.
NEO Tokyo In The Short Term
If you do not know where to find me, I am usually in Angie’s OR Purgatory in our Discord every day at the moment.
When I am in there I am usually asked “what’s next?” multiple times. Everyone wants the next exciting announcement and then the next one…and then the next one. This is NFTs after all. A project’s value is rarely about its value. Its about the value of the next drop or future incoming “thing”. I get it.
That said…I have a very very simple view on the short term.
This is: Drop BYTES 2.0 (B2).
I do not care about anything else. I have told the team to not start a single new thing until we have a fully functional B2 live. It has taken WAY longer than we anticipated because the scope has kept growing on what we need it to do.
B2 is the single most important thing we need to accomplish right now. This NOT because we think B2 will create some immediate huge demand that pumps the price. It IS because B2 is the foundation of all the infrastructure, apps, and incentivized behavior INSIDE of NEO Tokyo.
If you have a moment, I would STRONGLY advise you read the two following posts on B2. They cover the “incentivized building” program and the tokenomics. We set out to build this all last year, and we are extremely close to realizing our goal.
Bytes and Incentivized Building
Again please read those. What I say next will be a bit confusing without them.
Why B2 Is So Important
B2 is the glue that holds the entire system together. It also creates a flywheel effect when it gets going. It then GIVES the benefit and control of this flywheel to the BEST members.
B2 ties back into and rewards the values I stated at the beginning of this post.
A) It attracts people to build utility inside of NEO Tokyo for their OWN benefit
B) It funds future building inside NEO Tokyo
C) This building ads value to NEO Tokyo
D) This attracts more of the right people into NEO Tokyo
E) The system PUNISHES short term flipper/cash chasing behavior. It reward long term active member behavior.
AND as the this system runs, it gets faster and faster like a flywheel. However, even if the flywheel is speeding up it is VERY hard for short term oriented BAD members to benefit.
The entire system naturally incentivizes the values of building, community, and networking in the metaverse industry WHILE forcing the opposite out.
Let’s Look At A Quick Example Of BYTES 2.0 In Action
The mission above attracted the builders of Citizen Capital in NEO Tokyo.
Cit Cap…The NEO Tokyo launch pad is built by NEO Tokyo citizens, for NT citizens.
They were incentivized to build it on BYTES in return for support. On top of this, they have access to the 6,500 of the best game investors in the space. Our 6,500 members also get top access to seeds/etc.
This project then attracts more people into NT. It also pays a small tax on the BYTES to fund OTHER projects people build on NT.
BYTES are produced only by long-term, committed holders in NT. Thus they get the best access/use from the projects in NT.
In short, how this simply looks:
-Attracts builders
-Gets them to add value to the community
-Funds the community
-Rewards the best members, gives little to short-term members (please read the tokenomics).
-Then via the value added, it attracts MORE builders/founders/creators in the industry
-The cycle repeats…
This is why BYTES 2.0 is so powerful. It incentivizes all the behaviors that make our community stronger. This is why it is the foundation.
My Hands Are Pretty Much Tied Until This Foundation Is Here
At the moment it’s extremely hard for me to share this vision and attract people to it. This is because the foundation of the vision is not here yet to use.
The good news, is based on the team’s responses we should have B2 live here extremely soon.
I am not going to give a date because every time I do, it had to be delayed.
I personally find this fucking unacceptable. I will not get into details, but the work flow behind B2 and NT changed over December to make sure we ship now.
My plan at the moment is to finish B2 and THEN announce the drop date. Which I expect to be very soon.
Community Leadership
A group of 15 or so leaders from the community have been leading community objectives, priorities, and the proposal system that’s in place. They were tasked with allocating the funding of the NT Treasury to NT’s top priorities and guiding the community.
The Community Leads team has been serving its purpose well over the last 9 months, but it has become clear, as a team of volunteers in the current model, it has not been sustainable for the amount of work and time required.
As mentioned in the last Town Hall, Firestorm is working on a new structure, onboarding, and offboarding for the Community Leads team that will go into effect soon. It will clarify the team’s objectives and include a new, refined structure that still allows time-poor leads to advise and contribute in their direct areas of expertise, along with a new application process for interested, skilled Citizens.
That. Is. It.
I am not thinking about, planning, or envisioning anything else short term at the moment. In my opinion NEO Tokyo needs to serve its core function before anything else before even considering adding more.
Adding anything else to NT would be like adding features at my tracking company HYROS…without the tracking working. AKA silly sausage mode.
We do have long-term plans and strategy AFTER this though. Let’s discuss that now.
The Long Term + Bear Strategy Of NEO Tokyo
I’d first like to state that the bear is for building. However, that is a dumb ass blanket statement that means nothing with out context.
So let me be a bit more specific. My goal is to NOT have to build in the bull. I want to get NT to a point where all we do when the bull returns is rinse and repeat. Boring. AF.
Most projects are going to either do nothing or panic promise crap in the bear. This will lead to an absolute panicky, reactive strategy in the bull OR for them to be to bogged down with their bear promises in the bull.
For example : Many projects have promised a game during the bear to hype holders. There is a 99% chance these games will suck. When the bull comes, they will be the project with the shitty game that is not finished. They will die.
Many other projects will break their necks pivoting trying to follow every trend. The result will be a project that has no core values, community, or purpose. It’s just some whimsy wishy washy bitch of a project that’s try to leech its way to importance.
No. That’s not how we will operate.
Proper Building Is SIMPLE and BORING.
I realize that statement is not exactly well received in the HYPE driven NFT world. Here is why it will win though.
At HYROS, my current company I am CEO of which is valued well past 9 figures, everything we do is boring and repetitive.
Why? Because in order to truly have value you need to do ONE thing better than anybody else. You need to also KNOW what you do and then STICK to that. You then do it over and over and over.
The process is boring but the result is special.
See. HYROS was not the first tracking company on the market. The reason we became the fastest growing company is because we isolated what the single most important things to customers, and then only did that. Over and over and over.
I recognized we needed two things to lock in customers
A) The best tracking accuracy on the market
B) To make it easy to set up the tracking (customer success in short)
Then ALL we did…for years…is focus on tracking accuracy and making set up easy. That’s it.
Because our team of 50+ people ONLY did that…all day long. We got really fucking good at it.
Because we were really fucking good at it, people began to flock to us. Because their experience was exactly what they wanted they told their colleagues. Their colleagues told their colleagues.
And voila….the flywheel effect started. We went from being a start up to valued at hundreds of millions of dollars.
And again…we did this by isolating what was most important…and only doing that for years. It’s not exciting. It doesn’t create hype. It creates a SOLID foundation that is undefeatable in the long term though. This is because when the hype and fomo is gone…all that is left is to keep customers AND get them to refer others is foundational value.
AKA does the most important thing.
So, lets step back and look at the mission I stated originally.
The core value of NT is to build community of metaverse industry participants SUPPORTED by an infrastructure that gives them an advantage in the metaverse industry. The goal is to attract developers, VCs, founders, investors, and influencers who are focused on this space. The second goal is to use our infrastructure to encourage foundational building that gives the people above a HUGE advantage in this industry.
So how do we do that. What few actions can we reduce our entire focus to that will generate the highest result towards that mission.
It’s simple.
Initial Step : Create a powerful, purpose driven community with a infrastructure flywheel (almost done)
Core repeatable steps:
1. Attract high-value people via the community and infrastructure
2. Create a good experience via culture and support it with incentivization
3. Advertise/promote 1 and 2
That’s really it.
If we use the core foundation to attract developers, VCs, founders, investors, and influencers who are focused on this space.
THEN get these members to participate in our culture, build in our infrastructure.
THUS creating a good experience
AND then promote this experience.
The entire flywheel starts. As we promote the experience (step 3) it fuels back into step 1, which then flows into step 2 and thus step 3.
Every time the system completes a rotation it gets faster.
Pretty soon you have the ONLY…and I mean only….fucking community even worth considering for anyone in crypto gaming/metaverse. It’s not even an option.
Finally What Is Our Final Destination
Over the next few years, we are going to need to be flexible.
However, my end state of NT is where the community is far beyond anyone one person. By this I mean there are apps, tools, services, assets, brands being built on our infrastructure OR within the NEO Tokyo brand. The founders of these assets will then be profiting from whatever they build.
I want NT to be its own economy for the holders to benefit directly from. I also want it to be a source of ALL things crypto/metaverse entrepreneur/builder. In short, the things listed above AND networking, community, alpha…The very best place you can possibly be when participating in this industry.
YES…Of course there is “more”
There are tons of thing we want to do in 2023. I am personally looking at a lot of in-person stuff, online events, future utility, etc. I really do not want that to be the core of WHY people get into NT at the moment. I don’t want people to join because “BRO BECKERS GONNA DROP SHIT, GET IN NOW BEFORE THE PUMP”. I rather just take our time with these things and reveal them in a non-rushed, comfortable way.
At the core, all there should be is those 3 steps above. That should be the main value action of NT and everything else should be a cool bonus.
At HYROS for example, we do tons of cool shit. Creative reporting. A mobile app coming soon. Ad masterminds. However….85% of what we do is just those 2 things. Track good…Make it easy. Without those two things we fail. With them we are unbeatable. Everything else is secondary.
The above 3 steps are not the ONLY things I will do in the bear. You can safely assume they will be my #1 absolute priority in the bear and I will be dedicating 85% of my time to them.
NEO Tokyo is a self-replicating beast. It doesn’t need gimmicks. It needs good people inside of it who make the community valuable with their presence AND by delivering infrastructure/utility INCENTIVIZED by their own self benefit.
If we just do that, the community, networking, utility, and access in crypto gaming/metaverse will be unmatched. Thus making us the #1 community for this sub-niche. Thus achieving our mission. Game over. We win.
That’s It.
If you want to chat I am usually in Purgatory or Angie’s. These are the main hubs for S1s and S2s in Discord. I usually respond to any tag while I am online.
Once BYTES 2 drops, we will be moving on to some other things. I realize my approach to things is painfully dry and boring. Those of you that are looking for hype, excitement, and cool announcements will likely be very happy as well.
I want to emphasize I don’t care about anything else till B2 is here. Then the 3 steps above are 85% of my concern. If we achieve those over and over we will be nuclear bomb by the time the bull arrives. 6,500 people all working/building in one direction in one industry will bring absolutely unstoppable community value.
Please understand that while those are my focus, I also understand the NFT world and we will participate in the fun shit as well. I want to get the serious business stuff that will move us forward done FIRST before committing to anything else publicly.
I don’t have much else to say. We have shit to get done. We have a flywheel to active and begin spinning. Words/some motivational speech here are not important. Just getting the 3 steps done, over and over.
It is personally crazy to me how far we have come and how many good people are here already. We are only 1.5 years into this. I will remind you that NFTs/Metaverse are not even in their AOL/56k modem phase. We are in the phase of the internet where it was being used to send military messages in bunkers and a cool gimmick. This will change over the next decade. We will be perfectly positioned to be a part of that.
I for one cannot wait to see everything this community accomplishes together over this next decade.
Grand Rising
-Alex Becker
P.S.
We have the absolutely sickest hoodies + hats dropping from our community TODAY.
Watch for a Discord announcement around Noon CST. Theres only 150 this drop so you will have to move fast.
