VERSO
Verso allows anyone to mint and share their memories onchain.
Problem
Smartphones, cameras and the internet at large have made us all creators, but as the internet today is made of quick, cheap and short-lasting content we lack a place to store and share our creations in a way that gives them context and value.
Solution
Verso allows anyone to create onchain collections of content they cherish. Whether it’s pictures, blog posts, or eventually any form of online content, and share them on their terms. You can think of it as an open, onchain Pinterest, or an intimate, social Dropbox.
Every collection is an ERC1155 smart contract with added access-control logic. You can add “members/friends” to mint and collect together, or eventually have custom logic for token-gated minting/collecting.
Every “verso” is uploaded to Arweave through Bundlr Network and minted onchain. Currently on Optimism Testnet.
Here is a tweet with some demo videos.
Product
Currently:
- Mint your profile onchain
- Collect other people’s versos and add them to your collections (like Pinterest)
- Create collections of content (ERC1155)
- Mint new “versos”
- Add members to your collections
- Rich text editor (mint blog posts)
In the works:
- Having private content (with Lit Protocol)
- Token-gated access-control logic for community building
Progress
An alpha version is currently available on Optimism Goerli Testnet. An example of early collections and versos can be found here.
Learnings so far:
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Verso is easy to explain to non-web3 audiences. This is the first use-case I find that they can really relate to. It speaks to a problem they all share (what do you do with the content you care about?) and a solution that makes sense: your memories should live forever.
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There is currently a gap in the market for creators, as most don’t have a place to properly display their work. This is especially true now that most social media platforms are moving towards non-artistic, cheap videos.
Differentiation
The main differentiation from other minting apps is two-fold:
- Verso allows you to organize your mints/collects in separate collections (much like folders, but onchain).
- It’s social: you can mint, share and collect together by adding users to your collections, just like you would do with any other web2 app.
Ask
10,000 DAI/USDC + any people willing to help/beta test the app.
Funds
Verso so far has not received any funding and has been completely built out of pocket. The main goal with these funds is to launch an alpha version on Optimism mainnet as soon as possible. The main two areas of expenses will be:
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Early design work - Both branding and UX/UI. A big part of the value proposition is providing a beautifully crafted interface so that users do share their content with others.
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Preparing smart-contracts for alpha mainnet. These won’t be the final set of smart contracts but a series of checks and fine tunings need to happen before deploying on mainnet.
For both areas we will need the help of contributors which ideally should be remunerated.
About me
Before Verso I was a growth manager at Dune where I joined as employee number 8 and helped scale the company during a time of aggressive user base expansion. Before Dune, I co-founded a data-analytics business for the travel industry and worked at various tech-startups. In web3 since 2018.