gm,

today I want to talk about what Mac and I have talked about in DMs recently. Namely about targeting users and about the aesthetics of the crypto space.

Throughout the years I've often been upset about particular crypto movements as they've gone in opposite directions of the ethos that I had in mind. I remember always feeling quite upset at the time about these movements' proliferation.

I've come to realize today that me feeling upset about ugliness proliferating through the crypto space is actually a cultural issue, or the absence of purpose.

I used to work on a project in 2015 called ascribe and it was about registering digital art on the Bitcoin blockchain. This was way before NFTs were actually invented.

In a way it was an aesthetically beautiful project and it spoke to many now influential figures in the digital art space. Years later though, when it had failed, but NFTs had been re-invented on Ethereum, I always looked upset towards NFT projects like Bored Apes. To this day, I still feel like the proliferation of PFPs is a weird dilution of our original idea of onchain art. That is because our vision had involved so many more features, like the fact that we were using the timestamping capability of blockchains, or that you could consign and loan art out to others.

At the same time, Bored Apes were this ugly, almost cancer-like "art" which was worth millions of dollars for no seemingly good reason. It is stunningly obvious today as well that these images were probably created on fivrr and that they're essentially a pre-historic AI slop, a commodified and electrificated version of artistic skill enabled through the mechanical turk gig economy.

However, it is only today that I realize why I was upset about Bored Apes becoming popular, and it is precisely the same reason why I Am upset about the Base chain having a loud voice in the crypto space, or why I think that the Farcaster community sometimes feels incredibly ugly.

It is when we purely promote the crypto space for the sake of making our numbers go up that this cancer forms in our ecosystem. I call this the Coinbase approach to growth. They're a buy and sell button for crypto. Nothing more, nothing less. By virtue of their ugly branding and design you can derive their inherent meaninglessness. They stand for nothing except for working to make number go up and that's why they're ugly. In fact, when Dan Romero, his brand being very closely related to Coinbase speaks for himself and about what he thinks should happen in California, then he is cast in a beautiful light again.

But think about it: Why did Bored Apes have value?

Clearly any 5 year old saw that Bored Apes are excruciatingly ugly art. It was never about the JPEG, or the beauty in the image. Instead, it was always about mainstreaming only the superficial concept of an ownable PFP on Ethereum that can be bought and sold on an online market, ideally for more than it was bought.

The reason why Bored Apes are ugly is because they stand for absolutely nothing but "being able to buy and sell them on OpenSea for a little bit more money." They're ugly because their creator knew that they could afford this ugliness. They knew that, for a short period, there was this opportunity to publish incredibly ugly art that would do well anyways as the market participants mostly valued number go up mechanics.

Now, someone charitable to the project will say that: "Hey there was the whole status as a service dimension and so you got unique benefits from holding a Bored Apes, e.g., you got access to exclusive parties."

But that's first of all just not true. I always thought of Bored Ape holders as total fucking morons. And I'm sure that there were many people who looked through the scam instantly too. The Status as a Service thesis also just seemed to have never worked out as it still isn't high status to one one of these things. It's, in fact, extraordinary low status.

But also, how is "getting exclusive access to parties" a pursuit of a purpose? When was the last time you have seen the faction of airline loyalty points members create something beautiful that stunned the world? Never, and that's for good reason as this group of people doesn't band together for anything. They share an interest because of the airline's business model. They don't fundamentally want to implement their political will.

In opposition, Milady, for example, is about establishing, first and foremost, a new ideology, and its means is the PFP that allows to speak in their new language.

Similarly, the PrivacyNow faction in the crypto space is first and foremost an aesthetic movement which is interested in implementing political policy, namely maximal privacy online. Note that the Monero community is famous for not caring about the price of its coin.

Many blog articles submitted here are quite ugly. They're badly written and they have ugly preview images.

I can't help but to think that we've somehow managed to trap ourselves in the same impasse by catering too much to the crypto space, kinda taking advantage of the same idea as Bored Apes.

In fact, I think we should stop to cater to the crypto space if it is purely to self-referentially embrace it.

As a community in the crypto space, however, I think we all seek unique purpose and I think this is where we can harvest our personal beauty from, and this is what should go on this site. Not the metaphorically devoid of meaning Bored Ape garbage.

The ugly AI preview images of blog article are the worst. They really all look the same kitsch. Personally think we already at an endpoint of what general consumer AI prompt apps can come up with.

Talking about kitsch and ugliness. Trump, a man with shockingly bad taste, has become somewhat fixated on what federal buildings should look like. More ugliness to come I’m afraid. (Actually this neoclassical fetish is an esthetic you often find in blogposts AI previews too.) Nice read: https://hyperallergic.com/986197/since-when-is-neoclassical-architecture-populist/

This is perhaps the greatest irony of the aesthetics of the new populists: The neoclassical forms they crave appeal to them precisely because they have lost their cultural value. Donald Trump cannot command the resurrection of a fictitious Western civilization nor the classiness of neoclassicism. All he can do, in typical form, is make it even more kitschy.

As much as I care about aesthetics in my personal life, I often discarded it in tech.

I felt like most projects can succeed despite their visual flaws. From bare bones Craigslist, through old ugly Reddit UI up to Tesla's kitsch interior.

That being said, after our conversation and reading your comment I agree that aesthetics can also be treated as something more. A signal of what you stand for.

Like Apple where you can look at a MacBook and see that it's a product of stellar craftsmanship, and you understand they believe in making beautiful things. Or Milady, Cryptopunks or Fidenza.

It reminds me of a classic Herbert poem, "Power of Taste", about refusing to cooperate with Soviets

(roughly translated from Polish to ChatGPT):

It really did not demand great strength of character

Our refusal, our dissent, our stubbornness

We had a little of the necessary courage

But essentially it was a matter of taste, yes, taste

In which lie the fibers of the soul and the cartilage of conscience

Who knows, had they tempted us more cleverly, more beautifully:

Sent pink women, flat as a wafer,

Or the fantastic creatures from Hieronymus Bosch’s paintings...

Yet at that time hell was as it was:

A wet pit, an alley of murderers, a barracks

Named the palace of justice

A homemade Mephisto in a Lenin jacket

Dispatched Aurora’s grandchildren into the field—

Boys with potato faces,

Very ugly girls with red hands

Indeed their rhetoric was much too coarse—

(Marcus Tullius turned in his grave)

Chains of tautologies, a few concepts wielded like flails,

The dialectic of tormentors, with no distinction in reasoning,

A syntax devoid of the beauty of the subjunctive

Thus aesthetics can help in life;

One must not neglect the study of beauty.

Before we submit our assent, we must carefully inspect

The shape of architecture, the rhythm of drums and whistles,

The official colors, the disgraceful burial ritual.

Our eyes and ears refused obedience;

The princes of our senses chose proud exile.

I often discarded it in tech.

Actually mostly love tech esthetics if it’s a bit utilitarian non-design - when form follows function. I love simplicity. Actually love the looks of the Kiwi site. (But I’m a bit biased lol) But for example also love like the IPFS web-UI. Stuff like that. Old school hacker news looks great too.

In tech spheres it gets’s ugly when it’s over-designed pump tech future lambo looks, when it’s made to look like expensive - which you sadly see a lot in crypto.

Man, I've despised Bored Apes ever since they came out. And one of the reasons is the complete lack of culture (on top of all the above-mentioend). There is no shared identity in BAYC other than being rich and a dork.

Meanwhile, Milady is a more interesting place, where they deliberately build a community around certain values, a shared identity.

I love it when things are a little less clean and frictionless, and you have stuff to "discover" - not like you understand the whole thing in one single glimpse. Of course, that is the opposite of what most projects want to achieve with their digital presence.

But it often also shows in the real-life experiences they create... it's never like you actually love the event or space it's in. Or the space is beautiful but no one knows to appreciate it.

I recall last year in Denver I went to an event in a beautiful art gallery, tried to hit up a conversation with someone about the paintings and they were like: oh I didn't even realize.. This repeated quite a bit.

I find this pretty sad, but of course it's no wonder then that we make ugly stuff haha

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Speaking of Kitsch, there's a stunning piano song cycle called Kitsch Music by Valentin Silvestrov (https://youtu.be/V-mV0zKLbJs?si=LnBpGTcK_Emo3VUn)

I felt like most projects can succeed despite their visual flaws. From bare bones Craigslist, through old ugly Reddit UI up to Tesla's kitsch interior.

I think you're again making a mental error by trying to equate a general idea of beauty with aesthetics. This is the same error that we discussed when talking about that smart bear article. Craigslist is not a website that many would not consider "a nice website" but it's actually really beautiful when looking at it from the perspective of its utility.

Craigslist is not a website that many would not consider "a nice website" but it's actually really beautiful when looking at it from the perspective of its utility.

Yeah it was very good from the utility POV in the 90s. And I wouldn't judge e.g., mobile phones from the 90s by today's standards.

But my critics is that in 2025 we have found better ways to organize the information on the websites, that's one of the reasons why companies like OLX are growing and Craigslist is shrinking.

New here 👋

Not sure if this is the best place to ask this question, but is there a "Getting Started" or "Best of Kiwi" type of page to help me explore how to use Kiwi best?

Just joined, and getting Hacker News vibes. Looks like a good list of topics that people are submitting so far. Looking forward to exploring more and getting some tips about how best to use the platform!

✌️

hi, and welcome!

We have the top page which shows the most upvoted conversations if you mean that: https://news.kiwistand.com/best