The Otonomist - June 2021 Issue
June is when Summer starts and this month’s Otonomist brims with ideas and new initiatives. We begin with a more technical exposé of our new token pre-sale smart contract. Our lead post then asks if and how Venture Capital and decentralized projects can co-exist. We follow with our research on token distribution models since 2009 and hint at how we will design ours. We end with an exciting announcement.
Enjoy the post-Covid sun!
Han, Founder & CEO, Otonomos
PRODUCT UPDATE
Be In On The Deal: A Smart Contract that Automates Token Pre-Sales
In our February Otonomist, we talked about “launchpools” and their potential to turn capital formation on its head by letting the community stake in a refundable pool which turns into committed capital at the end of a pre-sale period.
We have now turned this idea into a smart contract which, in its first deployment, will be used to build a book of prospective token buyers for our own OtoCo token pre-sale.
We designed it such that, in a next release, it can be used by OtoCo users and other issuers who want to automate their token pre-sale the same way.
This more technical post describes the contract’s objectives and properties. Anybody can comment or contribute via our GitHub!
UNBOUNDED THINKING
Bye to Sand Hill Road: An Ode and Epitaph to Venture Capital
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F41d425e7-bd9e-48af-84a0-31cf4a644a43_1160x418.png)
Venture Capital is as much part of TradFin as banks and other centralized finance.
Perhaps as a result, resentment - if not outright hostility - has been growing within the blockchain community against crypto Venture Capital funds, and their role in recent financings of decentralized projects.
In this post by Han, we proposes a new model that preserves the best of VC with decentralized venture building.
RESEARCH
The Metamorphoses of Token Distributions Since 2009: Lessons for an Optimal Mechanism
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fdbd35c27-c1fa-42e6-a324-cb3341760980_992x288.jpeg)
In this post, we examine various token distribution models, roughly in chronological order.
We then try to abstract the properties of an ideal token sale mechanism.
We conclude that even if a perfect design may be out of reach, its directional contours are already visible and the direction is clearly towards decentralization, openness, and spontaneity.
ANNOUNCEMENT
Our OtoCo Token Pre-Order Window Opens on Thursday 24 June at 9 a.m. Pacific Time
On Thursday 24 June 2021 at 9 am PST / noontime EST / 4 pm UTC / 5 pm BST / 6 pm CET, our purpose-built smart contract starts taking pre-orders for our OtoCo token.
Anybody who connects their Ethereum wallet can stake DAI, USDC or USDT to reserve their place in the pre-order queue and lock in their token price.
Check our countdown page or join our official Telegram channel now to make sure you’re one of the first to get all the details on where and how to stake.
Next month: Look out for The Otonomist July/August premium issue on crypto hedge funds: where to launch, how to structure fees, if and how to benchmark performance, what investors expect, and much more. As always in your inbox on the third Thursday of the month.
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