Arthur Hayes: In order to create authentic digital art, I developed the Ordinals project Airheads
"I want to create authentic digital art, which I define as a new way of expressing human creativity."Original Title: Airhead
Author: Arthur Hayes, Founder of BitMEX
Compiled by: Deng Tong, Jinse Finance
What is the meaning? Why do you work so hard?
The meaning lies in providing for yourself and your family, ensuring they have clothes to wear and a roof over their heads. However, once your income is sufficient to meet basic needs, what is the meaning of life? In an era of thinking machines and abundant hydrocarbon energy, why do we continue to work so hard when we possess so much material wealth?
The meaning of human existence is to consume art. Art takes many forms, but fundamentally, it is an experience created by humans to entertain others. It is completely useless, yet at the same time, it is priceless.
Let’s take a look at some traditional forms of art and discuss their utility.
Sports ------ a form of human activity where energy is wasted playing games while others watch.
Dining in restaurants ------ a human activity that enhances the flavor of food, allowing for the pleasurable consumption of calories to continue living.
Listening to music ------ music has no meaning beyond enjoyment.
Dancing ------ humans expend precious energy to move their bodies for fun.
Viewing visual art ------ involves visual objects created by humans for the appreciation of others.
Overall, these activities are the essence of human culture. Culture adds value to life, and thus, human culture creates economic activities worth trillions of dollars. Clearly, platforms that allow for the consumption and preservation of culture hold immense value.
Consuming culture through public blockchains in a way that retains scarcity yet is infinitely scalable will attract the next billion users to cryptocurrency. This is the dream that fueled the NFT bull market of 2021.
Source: The Block
Despite the impressive first NFT bull market, what are people actually trading? People promise to buy, sell, and store these new forms of digital art in a decentralized manner. However, upon closer inspection, many collectibles are merely combinations of scarce, fungible digital tokens that point to centralized databases storing the art content. The pixelated PFP you purchase likely points to a database owned and operated by a centralized entity. If, for some reason, that database is not maintained, your "asset" will immediately become worthless.
In 2023, Bitcoin Ordinals suddenly emerged as a means to create digital products that exist purely on the Bitcoin blockchain. As long as we venerate Satoshi, the data inscribed on the blockchain (known as Ordinals) will exist. Ordinals do not require applications outside the Bitcoin blockchain to exist and persist.
Ordinals bring culture to the most widely used and valuable public blockchain, Bitcoin. This is why, as sales of crypto digital art rise, Ordinals will lead the way with the rise of the crypto wealth effect. The trading volume of Ordinals will surge, and the creativity of the community will be fully showcased. The best part about Ordinals is that, regardless of how foolish or offensive some may find the inscribed art, no one can take it down.
At Maelstrom, I commissioned the head of the investment team, Akshat Vaidya, to fund an Ordinals project. After careful research, we invested in the Oyl wallet. To showcase what can be achieved using Ordinals technology and the features of the Oyl wallet, I collaborated to develop an Ordinals project called Airheads.
I wanted to create genuine digital art, which I define as a new way of expressing human creativity. I instructed the Oyl team to create an art series that could only be completed using Ordinals technology. The talented creatives at Oyl came up with the concept of Airheads.
Fugazi Finance
The entire world instinctively recognizes that the current stage of human civilization is a facade. The meaningless destruction of World War II birthed many technologies that power modern civilization. Peaceful, safe, and nearly carbon-free nuclear energy can generate gigawatts of electricity. Billions can travel the world on commercial flights. Of course, the most significant outcome of war is the creation of a new form of silicon-based life, which we call thinking machines or computers.
Post-war, the growth of population and relative wealth among humans has been staggering. But simple things have been accomplished, and now, politicians, in a bid to justify their existence, have begun printing money and engaging in various activities that net a drag on the human condition. Green energy may be the most severe misinvestment of this era globally. Because we have cheap and abundant capital, which is merely a derivative of cheap and abundant hydrocarbons, politicians believe they can dictate natural laws rather than the other way around. Adopting lower-density energy forms like wind and solar and expecting them to replace higher-density energy forms like coal, natural gas, and oil will never happen naturally. By "naturally," I mean without government subsidies or loans below market rates.
The green energy scam is just one example. Many of you lament the inflation that has occurred since the U.S. abandoned the gold standard under Nixon in 1971. Forget about government-manipulated year-over-year inflation statistics. The nominal price of a loaf of bread is higher today than it was yesterday. In an era of advanced technology and cheap energy, it doesn’t have to be this way.
No matter how the elites deceive you, you know this.
Your reaction is speculation. Your reaction is to buy magical internet money. Your reaction is to elevate the "scarce" digital cultural forms you understand and appreciate.
Airheads is a series that leverages the inflation imposed upon us by the elite. It achieves this both aesthetically and technically.
Aesthetically, Airheads is a series of characters modeled after balloons. Imagine Jeff Koons' balloon-like characters, playful yet decadent. These balloons metaphorically embody the inflation of our time. They are fat and beautiful because we have all experienced inflation.
Technically, Airheads is the first Ordinals series to use a leaderboard system, where the size of your wallet determines your rank. Unlike other series with random attributes, Airheads has a clear hierarchy. This approach utilizes recursive inscriptions to break through the boundaries that collectibles can represent, making Airheads the only series truly designed for early investors who take on the most risk.
Details
Airheads are unique Bitcoin Ordinals designed to showcase and flaunt your wealth. Each Airhead is an inflatable balloon-like character, generated using recursive art, visually representing the scale and value of your digital portfolio at the time of minting. There are 10,000 Airheads available, and these characters use sequential ranking and hierarchy to reflect the asset weight in the leaderboard, making it a fun and competitive way to display wealth.
Special characters and tiers: Airheads are evenly distributed across 10 tiers, each representing different levels of portfolio size. Some of the most exciting characters may appear in lower tiers, adding an element of surprise and value.
Packaging variants: Each Airhead is wrapped in one of 25 mysterious packaging variants, randomly assigned. Some packaging themes match characters across tiers, making them unexpectedly rare and more desirable.
Overall, it looks like this sexy Airhead. Note that some body parts are inherently large; some characters are just constructed differently ;).
How to Obtain an Airhead?
To obtain an Airhead, you have several options:
Whitelist Application:
The whitelist will open on August 6. Apply using the Oyl wallet. Follow @airheadfun on Twitter and complete tasks to earn XP (experience points). Even if your wallet is small, you can earn big. Participate and climb the leaderboard as you complete each task. All applicants who win allocations must pay the minting fee.
Compete on the Leaderboard:
Bring your Bitcoin, Ordinals, BRC-20, and Runes to climb the ranks. The goal is to accumulate the largest portfolio in the Oyl ecosystem to earn the most impressive and inflated Airheads, reflecting your highest position on the leaderboard. The more you have in your portfolio, the higher your rank, and the more prestigious your Airhead. You must rank in the top 10,000 to receive an allocation.
Purchase a Whale Pass for 0.069 BTC:
Secure your chance to obtain an Airhead by purchasing a Whale Pass. Send the Whale Pass to a whale wallet (like your vault or distributed ledger). When that whale wallet activates it by sending it to the Oyl wallet, all assets in the taproot address you sent it from will also count towards your leaderboard position, providing a significant advantage (if you are indeed a whale).
Earn XP and Rank Up
XP is earned by holding and increasing your Bitcoin, Ordinals, BRC-20, and Runes assets. There are over 15 qualifying assets in the BRC-20, Runes, and Ordinals series that are eligible to earn XP. This will elevate your rank on the leaderboard, helping you become the fattest, most inflated Airhead. The goal is to accumulate the largest portfolio and showcase your wealth.
Install the Oyl Wallet
Get the Oyl wallet from the Chrome Web Store and explore the in-wallet trading experience at Oyl.io. Prepare for the whitelist opening on August 6 by creating or importing your wallet, then transferring Bitcoin, Ordinals, BRC-20, and Runes. Once the whitelist opens, watch your XP accumulate and climb the leaderboard for a chance to mint an Airhead.
Tithe
Those in the divine industry often say that 10% of your income should be donated to churches, synagogues, mosques, etc. Traditionally, Maelstrom will use the funds raised from the Airhead airdrop to pay a tithe to Lord Satoshio. A portion of the funds earned will go towards our Bitcoin developer funding program.
Future
My goal is to showcase what can be achieved using Bitcoin Ordinals technology and the user-friendly Oyl wallet. I sincerely hope that artists will take notice and draw inspiration from this series to bring their contributions to the human experience to life. If Airheads can inspire others, it will solidify its status as a pioneering series and maintain value for a long time.
We all know that the corrupt elites wandering the world in our name will not stop printing money. We know that the human suffering triggered by inflation will continue to grow. But at least we can find some fun, inflate our Airhead, make it very fat, and tell those who disdain cryptocurrency to please my Airhead.
