Farcaster

I think it's really important to lean into the onchain interactions that are happening between users. 

Your working theory (as I understand it) to onboard new users is interesting content. I believe that onchain interactions are a rich source of highly interesting social content that is basically not being surfaced at all in the app today. 

Here's a specific example: I'm in a groupchat with @zinger that we're using to trade. The man is an animal. It's engaging to watch him enter and exit positions. That wallet is probably connected to his Farcaster account. 

Why can't I see that activity on his profile? It feels like a slam dunk and a huge differentiator to other social networks. 

Show me when someone sends ETH to someone else. 
Show me when someone mints someone. 
Show me when someone is up 10,000x on a meme coin. 
Show me when someone uses some new DeFi protocol or makes a loan. 

There are apps attempting this, but w/o Warpcast's reach or eng chops. Eat their lunch. 

It's all there in the open!

Some chatter on this, especially around the “eat their lunch” phrasing

My perspective as a user: 

Warpcast has a difficult role to play: as the largest product on the Farcaster protocol, their actions will drive the majority of new user growth

Along the way, there will be other apps that emerge to fill gaps in the Warpcast value prop. Scheduled casts, onchain actions, real time chat, etc

As those features are validated by users, the Warpcast team is then faced with a choice: integrate these features into the main app (thereby stimulating growth), or intentionally avoid building it to reduce competition with ecosystem partners 

The rub: if Farcaster doesn’t significantly grow, then all ecosystem apps will likely die anyway due to lack of sufficient users. 

My personal framework around this topic is less vibes driven and more realpolitik; as an app builder, you have to be prepared for your great feature idea to be copied as soon as it’s proven to be successful with users.

Building /bright-moments - minting onchain art IRL | /purple #15 | FID 129 #magikarp

Rome, Metropolitan City of Rome Capital, Italy

If Warpcast grows, Farcaster grows. That’s the gist of it. Anything else isn’t important.

I mainly write code and read books. Sometimes I take pictures. I wish I’d write.

https://zora.co/ruhum

I think the importance is whether the feature attracts new users or existing users.

I think we can confidently say >90% of Farcaster users are also Warpcast users. If a feature in a third party farcaster app attracts existing, i.e. Warpcast, users, they shouldn’t copy it. Because there’s no point.

But, if a feature attracts completely new users that’s a different story.

Well, not quite

There is an important balance in ceding non-essential features to other products

Otherwise you risk burning the developer ecosystem and stunting funding if startups are reluctant to build for fear of being rolled over

It’s a balancing act