Runes is not online yet, but the ecosystem has already become a red ocean
Current Status of Bitcoin Runes Infrastructure: OKX is ready to go, UniSat is late but arriving, familiar faces are "reemployed," and Bot is "not acclimatized."Written by: Jaleel, BlockBeats
It is hard to imagine an ecosystem that has not yet launched its mainnet, yet already possesses nearly a billion dollars in market value and over 20 infrastructure platforms.
As the official version of the Runes protocol has not yet been released, there are currently no official Runes runes in the market; many projects still exist in the form of Bitcoin NFTs. With the eventual launch of the Runes protocol, it is expected that these projects will be converted into official runes through airdrops or 1:1 swaps, thus officially joining the Runes ecosystem.
Among them, the project with the highest market value is Runes tone, which has a market cap of up to $640 million, with the floor price once soaring to 0.074 BTC, surpassing BAYC and becoming the second-largest project in the NFT market. In addition, early participants in the Bitcoin Runes token pre-mining have already seen substantial returns. The buyer price of RSIC on the OTC platform whales.market is mainly concentrated around 0.01u, corresponding to a total market value of $210 million. Before the halving, early users could easily earn returns of up to $10,000.
Related articles: 《“The Elephant Dances,” Why Can Runestone's Market Value Exceed BAYC?》《Unveiling Bitcoin Runes Token Pre-mining, How Much Can Early Participants Earn?》
It is no exaggeration to say that currently, no Bitcoin ecosystem protocol has the same level of enthusiasm as Runes. BlockBeats has found that besides pre-sale Runes mining projects like Runes tone and RSIC, the biggest driving force behind the Runes ecosystem craze is undoubtedly its robust infrastructure support.
Over 20 Infrastructure Platforms Emerging
In the Bitcoin ecosystem, especially during the early "gold rush" phase, having a full Bitcoin node often means significantly enhancing profit potential. However, for most ordinary users who only "drink soup," the cost of setting up a full node is too high and the operation is complex, so many prefer to use the services of third-party proxy platforms, which are sufficient for their needs.
During the peak popularity of the Ordinals protocol, the minting platforms in the market were mainly concentrated among a few, such as UniSat and OKX Web3 Wallet, with no more than five or six at most. According to BlockBeats' statistics and supplementary information from the community, nearly 20 infrastructure platforms providing minting, trading, and other services have already emerged in the Runes protocol, which has not yet launched its mainnet. Among these numerous minting platforms, there are both new faces and old players in the industry.
Image source: Doggfather
OKX Ready to Go, UniSat Arrives Late but Steadily
Since March of last year, the rapid development of the Bitcoin ecosystem has led to the emergence of billions of dollars in assets and the establishment of over 20 infrastructure platforms. In this context, OKX and UniSat have become key players, and their dynamics and impact in the market are worth discussing.
From quickly responding to market changes to implementing strategic deployments, OKX decided to join the Bitcoin ecosystem in just a week or two. After months of preparation and accumulation, OKX has found a breakthrough for growth in this new track. As the Bitcoin ecosystem continues to heat up, OKX, with its smooth wallet products, has become the "biggest winner" in this wave.
Related article: 《Why Has OKX Become the Biggest Winner of BRC-20?》
Currently, when people in the community mention CEX trading platforms and the Bitcoin ecosystem, the first name that comes to mind is OKX. From Ordinals to BRC20, then to ARC20 and now the Runes protocol, OKX's Web3 wallet has always been one of the earliest platforms to provide support.
According to Jason Wang, the head of OKX Web3 Wallet, the development and testing process for Runes has gone very smoothly, with significant improvements in security and service stability, which has excited the entire team. Their research and preparation for Runes have exceeded six months, and they can finally allow users to experience the charm of Runes.
Bitcoin ecosystem influencer Bitlily also revealed to BlockBeats that during their interactions with OKX Web3, they could sense the tension and excitement in their Runes development process.
On the other hand, while UniSat has been one of the earliest infrastructures in the Bitcoin ecosystem, it has been somewhat slow to respond to the Runes protocol. After the release of BRC-20, recalling when the Bitcoin ecosystem was just "emerging" last year, many traditional players looked down on this "rough imitation of ERC-20." UniSat was the first platform to integrate and access BRC-20 on a large scale, occupying most of the market before OKX entered.
Although the Runes protocol could have been UniSat's home ground, they seemed to arrive late, only announcing on April 5 that they would support Runes and plan to launch Runes inscription services and trading markets in mid-April.
It can be seen that since the beginning of this year, UniSat's focus has been on Ordinals or more specifically BRC20, from the upgrade of Ordinals Jubilee to the development of curse inscriptions, and most recently supporting 5-byte BRC20, seemingly intentionally helping to mitigate the impact of the Runes protocol on BRC20.
However, UniSat arrives late but steady. Currently, they have stated on social media that they have supported the Runes testnet. Additionally, the UniSat OpenAPI for Runes has been launched, with features including: retrieving information on specific Runes; listing holders of specific Runes; listing Runes on specific addresses; accessing the complete event stream related to Runes.
Familiar Faces Finding "Reemployment"
NFT Go was initially positioned as an NFT aggregation platform, providing market data analysis and trading functions. It is equipped with a range of powerful tools and features, including market analysis, real-time listings, rarity assessments, whale tracking, monitoring lists, auction calendars, and trading aggregators, helping users discover, trade, and manage NFT assets.
Founded in 2021, NFT Go is not just a one-stop NFT data analysis platform; it also offers users a variety of NFT solutions, including data analysis, trading aggregation, and asset management, while launching data APIs and aggregator APIs. In April last year, NFT Go completed a $4 million strategic financing round, receiving additional investments from Qiming Venture Partners and Hash Global, with new investors including 500 Global, Skyland Ventures, and Fosun Group co-founder Liang Xinjun and a former Binance executive's personal investment.
Recently, NFTGo founder Lowes announced on social media that they not only launched the NFT project RuneGo but are also actively integrating into the Runes ecosystem, developing new features related to it. This includes comprehensive tracking of Rune assets and smart wallets, similar to the tools they previously developed for NFTGo, as well as providing low-friction trading and analysis of rune assets, user-friendly minting tools, etc. It is reported that RuneGo holders will enjoy additional benefits.
Additionally, GeniiData is worth mentioning; it is a platform focused on cross-chain data analysis and API services, characterized by high performance, data reliability, and extensive coverage. It provides professional tools for individual data studios to discover, verify, and build Web3 solutions through blockchain analysis. For enterprises, GeniiData serves as an incubator for decentralized applications, offering access to comprehensive on-chain data APIs.
Since the rise of the Bitcoin ecosystem, there have been very few platforms that have accessed Bitcoin on-chain data, while GeniiData has been quite active in this regard. The prices and market data of BRC-20 tokens can often be obtained through GeniiData, including capturing real-time minting situations of popular inscriptions and NFTs (such as Ordinals heat maps, wallet statistics). It was also one of the first native inscription data platforms to provide dedicated viewing pages for Merlin Chain.
As the team developed, GeniiData naturally launched minting functions and more minting projects. Recently, GeniiData also completed the minting of its own platform NFT "Feeling Good," similar to RuneGo, where users holding "Feeling Good" NFTs will enjoy fee discounts in future minting processes.
Notably, according to Bitlily's tweet, GeniiData recently provided Casey with feedback on a significant bug. Regarding the severity of this bug, Casey's exact words were, "This would have been pretty devastating if it hadn't been fixed before launch."
In conversations with BlockBeats, Bitlily also mentioned: "GeniiData's research on Runes has been quite in-depth; they should be quite thorough in this technical field."
Bots Struggling to Fit In
During the recent market warming process for minting platforms, BlockBeats has also seen some new faces emerging in the market, such as bot tools, marking the first appearance of bots in the Bitcoin ecosystem, commonly used in the context of "as a backup solution when minting platform websites crash."
Many people are still full of expectations for bots, but the community's acceptance is mixed, and not all community members are on board. Due to the different transaction forms of the Bitcoin network compared to EVM, there is a potential for unverified vulnerabilities in code design. Moreover, some community members bluntly stated that "bots on Bitcoin are a false demand" and "the probability of minting platform websites crashing after the Runes mainnet launch is low."
BlockBeats discovered from Bitlily's explanations that in recent NFT rush sales, website crashes mainly occurred because certain events did not require high gas fees; users could successfully purchase by simply clicking to submit orders and paying a small gas fee, a method known as "locking orders." When events are free or have very low costs, many studios deploy scripts to participate automatically, leading to instantaneous high traffic and click volume, which can cause website crashes.
However, in the Runes ecosystem, all orders will be submitted to the memory pool, sorted and confirmed based on the gas fees paid. High gas fee transactions will be prioritized for confirmation, while low gas fee transactions may be delayed to subsequent blocks for confirmation, which is similar to the mechanism for rushing BRC-20.
"After the mainnet launch, gas rates may be high, but even under such pressure, the main impact will be on nodes that process and broadcast transactions, such as memspace and quicknode; the likelihood of front-end websites crashing is very low." Based on Bitlily's past experience, she made some conclusions.
In this context, bots may face some obstacles in the construction of the Bitcoin ecosystem, appearing somewhat "out of place," but BlockBeats will continue to observe and report on their subsequent developments.
The Game of Gas Fees is About to Begin
After BlockBeats conducted an in-depth observation of the current Runes-related infrastructure in the market, it was found that these platforms tend to provide one-stop services.
Users can conveniently perform various operations throughout the Runes ecosystem, from minting to checking progress, calculating transaction amounts, tracking wallets, and participating in trading markets; these functions are designed to complement each other at the code level. This trend of one-stop services not only provides great convenience for users but also enhances the overall efficiency of the ecosystem and user engagement. As these infrastructures continue to improve and optimize, we expect the Runes ecosystem to attract more participants.
Additionally, observing the current market dynamics, it can be seen that infrastructure platforms are warming up the market by releasing NFTs to attract and retain the first wave of user groups. These early users are not only the core target customers for the platform's future development, but these NFTs are also designed as a special credential, symbolizing their early support and trust in the platform. This strategy not only helps build user loyalty but also provides a direct way for the platform to interact with its target customer base.
When choosing among the many minting platforms in the market, Bitlily recommended some minting platforms she is optimistic about to BlockBeats: "For the first layer, I recommend GeniiData, UniSat, iDclub, and OKX; for the second layer, I recommend Unicross."
As for which minting platform will ultimately hold the largest market share, "the real minting experiences of each platform, as well as interaction, service fee costs, etc., will only be known on the day of the halving when we see the official products. For now, we can only make guesses based on past experiences and publicly available information, which is not very certain," Bitlily told BlockBeats.
After all, the user's body is the most honest.
