
People have spent over $1M buying virtual cats on the Ethereum blockchain - lebanon_tn
https://techcrunch.com/2017/12/03/people-have-spent-over-1m-buying-virtual-cats-on-the-ethereum-blockchain/
======
pmoriarty
Whenever I hear about people spending outrageous amounts of money for
something that should be really cheap, the first explanation that springs to
mind is money laundering.

~~~
dete
I understand this position, but when the money involved is crypto -- which is
inherently highly "launderable" \-- I'm not so sure. Why run your money
through a cat when you could run it through a mixer?

~~~
throwaway_r9RF
If you use the proceeds of your online drug business to buy virtual cats from
yourself, you can tell anybody who asks how you made your money that you made
it selling virtual cats on the internet. And back it up with documentary
evidence. That's better than simple avoidance of direct ties between your
money and illegal activity.

------
cdetrio
I met a couple guys from their team a couple months ago at the ETHWaterloo
hackathon (post from then [1]). They presented a contract analytics tool to
graph the number and type of function calls, like an etherscan.io but for
custom queries/reports. The queries they showed had function names like
SireKitten(), it was all quite funny and I assumed the analytics tool was the
main product and that the kitty contracts were a joke example. Never would've
guessed that it would take off, but I didn't see all the cute avatars then
either.

1\.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15479945](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15479945)

------
iamthirsty
> First off, it’s important to understand that since it’s played on the
> Ethereum blockchain there’s no central entity managing the game. This means
> users literally own their kittens. Unlike playing Neopets where everything
> was stored on a central database and your pet was deleted when the company
> shut down, CryptoKitties is decentralized and will live forever on the
> Ethereum blockchain.

If people just stop playing, and the community dies, isn't that the same thing
(in effect)?

~~~
mattpk
The devs have made the rendering algorithm secret. So even if you have the cat
token, you can't know what it looks like unless you go through their front-
end.

~~~
iamthirsty
So... not much different from a centralized service, eh?

------
archagon
I was recently struck by the thought that the blockchain might be ideally
suited for the creation of some kind of "digital stamp". As with real stamps,
different artists could publish and sell stamp designs of varying quantities.
For uniqueness, perhaps aberrations could be algorithmically introduced based
on each stamp's unique blockchain hash. The stamps could then be used to
creatively sign communications and transactions, with inbound stamps showing
up in the recipient's digital stamp collection. (Or maybe they could somehow
be tied in to miner fees, to make them function more like the real thing.)

With the blockchain, it seems we finally have a way of assigning scarcity to
digital assets. The only problem would be the social value of such goods, but
things like CryptoKitties make it clear that this would hardly be a problem.
People seem to love collecting rare things, even if the rareness is strictly
algorithmic.

I think it would feel great to receive a communication signed by a
particularly rare or interesting e-stamp!

~~~
paulsutter
What’s to stop someone from creating a marketplace for identical stamps at
1/10 the cost?

~~~
RexetBlell
What's to stop someone from making a painting that's practically identical to
Mona Lisa and selling it for 1/10th the cost?

~~~
paulsutter
The Mona Lisa isn’t yet a digital good. But in time it will be possible to
make perfect copies, and that raises all sorts of interesting questions.

~~~
baddox
If by “perfect copy” you mean a physical copy that cannot be distinguished in
a blind testfrom the original in any way, then of course we don’t yet have
that capability. Perhaps with advanced scanning and 3D printing that would be
possible, but I suspect the true original would still maintain higher value as
long as a trustworthy chain of custody was maintained. As soon as a thief
removes the original long enough to potentially swap it with a perfect copy,
the market value of any alleged original would likely vanish.

------
KVFinn
Are the auctions for cats actually executing on the blockchain via smart
contracts, instead of the website?

If so, this might be the first time I've seen something actually kind-of-
useful implemented via smart contracts.

(Well, to the extent that virtual cats are useful...)

~~~
DalasNoin
the auctions are handled by a smartcontract[1], breeding and storage too[2].
Smartcontract are used for a lot of other things, tokens are basically
mappings in a smartcontract between accounts and balances. Multisig wallet are
also based on Smartcontracts. Ethereum has spend a lot of effort on
integrating the blockchain into web applications. You can use metamask to log
into websites with your ethereum address and websites like etherdelta, that
exchange tokens, can lock your tokens in a smartcontract.

[1][https://etherscan.io/address/0xb1690c08e213a35ed9bab7b318de1...](https://etherscan.io/address/0xb1690c08e213a35ed9bab7b318de14420fb57d8c#code)

[2][https://etherscan.io/address/0x06012c8cf97bead5deae237070f95...](https://etherscan.io/address/0x06012c8cf97bead5deae237070f9587f8e7a266d#readContract)

------
jimjimjim
Cats are fine and everything, but how about something more traditional, like
flowers or something. i don't know, tulips maybe?

~~~
spraak
Not cute enough. Cats have long reigned supreme in internet meme culture, it's
the perfect choice.

~~~
cycrutchfield
whoosh

------
searealist
This is so obviously the creators of that game making fake transactions to
establish fake value in their product. It's not hard to send 100k to yourself
for something that has no value to make people believe that it does.

~~~
dete
There's no way to prove it, but all the members of our team have pledged not
to trade in cats in any way. We are definitely not manipulating the price.

I can assure you that we're as surprised as anyone at the speed that this
thing has grown!

~~~
searealist
Well if you can't trust a Director of Blockchain, who can you trust?

~~~
Jonovono
So all 1500 users (500 online now) and all the comments on this subreddit are
just faked by axiom zen?
[https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoKitties/](https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoKitties/)

Okay...

~~~
frakr
Only a small number actually have to be faked to build momentum and FOMO.
Greed is very powerful and seems to bear a lot of influence on those
participating in crypto.

------
rudiger
_> Right now about 15% of all Ethereum network traffic is dedicated to the
game, making it the most popular smart contract on the network._

If I still had ether, this would be a pretty strong sell signal.

~~~
tlrobinson
On the contrary, I think virtual worlds will (eventually) be one of the killer
applications of blockchains.

People will be more likely to invest real time and money into virtual
goods/currency/reputation if they can’t be confiscated by a corporation for
arbitrary reasons. The idea will really take off once virtual goods are
“portable” between games. At that point you don’t really have disparate
“games” but rather a... Metaverse
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaverse](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaverse))

(I don’t imagine all virtual goods will be universally portable. You might be
able to bring your CryptoKitties into Second Life but not World of Warcraft,
for example...)

~~~
imtringued
Could it be used for vendor neutral always on drm?

~~~
tlrobinson
Not sure I follow.

------
lettergram
And that guy was in my startup school class.. lol well, if you're reading this
- congratulations! I'm impressed

------
0x4f3759df
Here's a list of other dapps coming
[https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/7gltfs/the_dappen...](https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/7gltfs/the_dappening_is_almost_upon_us_2018_will_be_a/)

~~~
spraak
> the dAppening

Brilliant :D Thanks for sharing this.

------
masonlee
Are the founders hoping for additional kitten games? It seems that the game
art is protected by copyright and trademark. And the breeding game itself is
possibly covered by a patent. But what about representing this kitten data as
cats elsewhere? I can't tell from the Terms of Use if this is encouraged or
discouraged.

[https://www.cryptokitties.co/terms-of-
use](https://www.cryptokitties.co/terms-of-use)

"A. You acknowledge and agree that we (or, as applicable, our licensors) own
all legal right, title and interest in and to all elements of the App, and all
intellectual property rights therein. The visual interfaces, graphics, design,
systems, methods, information, computer code, software, services, “look and
feel”, organization, compilation of the content, code, data, and all other
elements of the App (collectively, the “Axiom Materials”) are owned by Axiom
Zen, and are protected by copyright, trade dress, patent, and trademark laws,
international conventions, other relevant intellectual property and
proprietary rights, and applicable laws."

------
AlphaWeaver
I participated in the alpha for this, and it was pretty cool. I'm glad to see
that it's been successful, but I'm not sure why anyone would pay to play the
game beyond transaction fees.

------
panarky
Cryptokitties now accounts for nearly 14% of all Ethereum transactions.

[https://imgur.com/a/XdQ5B](https://imgur.com/a/XdQ5B)

Looks like this caused the pending transaction queue to increase from around
700 yesterday to over 9,000 now.

[https://imgur.com/a/il6UD](https://imgur.com/a/il6UD)

------
neuralzen
Similar to Cryptopunks 6 months ago, although they hit only 250,000 USD in
sales.

Total Value of Punks Sold 518.47 ETH ($241,413.99 USD) Average Sale Price 0.46
ETH ($213.83 USD) Estimated Market Cap 2,899.15 ETH ($1,349,933.50 USD)

[https://www.larvalabs.com/cryptopunks](https://www.larvalabs.com/cryptopunks)

------
aqsheehy
Totally not beanie babies

------
junkscience2017
okay, no more complaining about not being able to afford houses

------
mattpk
From their FAQ
([https://www.cryptokitties.co/faq](https://www.cryptokitties.co/faq)):

The developers levy a 3.75% fee on every cat purchase. Doesn't really seem
like a decentralized app in that regard.

~~~
dete
We take a cut of all auctions facilitated by our smart contract, but we put no
restrictions on owners' ability to transfer or sell their Kitties outside our
site. In fact, CryptoKitties is the first smart contract to implement the
draft ERC-721 standard, which attempts to make NFTs (non-fungible tokens) as
interoperable as ERC-20-compliant fungible tokens.
[https://github.com/ethereum/EIPs/issues/721](https://github.com/ethereum/EIPs/issues/721)

------
smaili
Any thoughts on how apps built on Ethereum will impact the price of its Ether
currency?

~~~
ryanSrich
I would say the price should go up, but the price of ETH is anything but
predictable. As we've seen with the rise of BTC, there's no rationality in the
market. It's all based on hype.

If price was based on tech, ETH would be $10k+ and BTC would be a dying relic.

~~~
frakr
Is there anything like Bitpay for Ethereum? I haven't seen any major retailers
that directly accept ETH, which is a pretty significant use case for any
currency.

~~~
ryanSrich
While directly accepting ETH is certainly beneficial, it would make more sense
for retailers to accept an erc20 based alternative to BTC (see BTH [1]).
Ethereum is a platform. Digital currency is but a single application.

1\. [https://medium.com/@bitether/introducing-bitether-bth-the-
ne...](https://medium.com/@bitether/introducing-bitether-bth-the-new-
erc20-bitcoin-2-0-b6c6e0d14acd)

------
mr_toad
How long before we see crypto doggies, crypto magic swords and crypto
spaceships?

------
JetSpiegel
Just because the current Ethereum value is $1M, doesn't mean people actually
spent that much money. They could have a bunch of Ethereum from when it was
dirt-cheap.

~~~
fermuch
If you have that amount in gold, but you got the gold when it was cheaper,
wouldn't you be losing the same amount of money all alone?

~~~
xchaotic
It's psychological. Easy to earn, easy to spend.

------
Frogolocalypse
cats.com?

