Deep Dive into the TON Inscription Ecosystem

General
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  1. The Inscriptions Revolution from BTC to Multi-Chain

1.1 Analysis of BTC Inscriptions Explosion

  1. Financial Basis:Improved macro capital liquidity, approval of spot ETFs, and the anticipation of the 2024 BTC halving have driven the market to explore BTC ecosystem inscriptions. This influx of funds triggered a bull market, with both narrative-driven and value-driven projects vying for prominence.

  2. Consensus Basis:BTC holds the strongest consensus in the crypto field, largely due to its historical significance rather than its technology. Developing products on this strong consensus foundation is simpler than creating new narratives or consensus.

  3. Growth Expectations:Financial markets are driven by expectations. BTC’s low valuation and underdeveloped ecosystem suggest significant growth potential. By mirroring Ethereum’s ecosystem development path, BTC has attracted substantial speculation, funding, and attention. This has laid a foundation for the development of BTC’s track.

  4. Diverse Options:Although Bitcoin’s inscriptions are primarily led by Ordinals, other competitors like Atomical, Rune, SRC20, BRC420, and Taproot Asset also have their own advantages, applications, and followers.

  5. Head Start Advantage:Capital and liquidity are mainly concentrated in Ordinals, while other protocols often have only a few projects with market value and liquidity. This is still quite different from the flourishing state seen during previous bull markets.

1.2 Reasons for Multi-Chain Inscriptions’ Continued Popularity

  1. Overflow Effect:High transaction costs on the BTC chain have become a barrier to entry for many players. The prosperity of BTC inscriptions has led to network congestion and increased minting costs, driving users to seek inscriptions on other chains, thereby boosting their activity.

  2. Low Development and Deployment Costs:The development cost and technical requirements for inscription protocols are relatively low compared to infrastructure and most DeFi projects. This reduces the entry barrier for project developers. If OP stack achieves one-click chain deployment, inscription protocols often achieve one-click deployment. Thus, the key for inscription projects is their utility and development plan, emphasizing operation and market aspects.

  3. Lottery-like Attributes:Inscriptions are akin to lottery tickets. With numerous inscriptions emerging daily, liquidity for inscriptions is scarce, and users often mint inscriptions with small amounts of funds, treating it as a lottery. This mindset fosters continuous participation. Many players in the inscription community adopt a “30U for safety, 50U as minimum” mentality, indicating a reluctance to miss any potential opportunity.

  4. Fair Launch New Narrative:Every asset has meme attributes. If a meme is the sum of a project’s mechanism, narrative, market value, background, and history, the current secondary market trend favors Fair Launch. From POW to ICO to Fair Launch, the pursuit of equal opportunity in coin distribution has been constant. Compared to Public Sales, inscriptions excel in this by requiring only minimal network gas fees for minting.

  1. Overview of the TON Inscriptions Ecosystem

As a major crypto blockchain, TON has also joined the inscriptions trend. From December to January, several inscription projects emerged on TON, including inscription protocols and infrastructure, with some achieving impressive results. They are developing TON’s inscription ecosystem and expanding in mini-program frontends, asset trading, DeFi, protocol integration, and mini-games.

2.1 Tonano

Tonano is the first inscription protocol deployed on the TON blockchain: TON20. The launch of the first TON20 inscription nano in early December 2023 had a significant impact on the TON ecosystem, causing network congestion and a temporary delay. Despite not having prior marketing, the $nano minting event brought over 20 million interactions and 37,000 unique minting addresses to the TON ecosystem. Following the success of $nano, other TON20 inscriptions such as Bolt20 and Dedust also achieved significant minting numbers.

Tonano’s presence established both user recognition and the inscription brand within the TON community. The initial success of TON20 inscriptions, coupled with Tonano’s continued product updates, including a TON20 inscription indexer, trading market, and cross-protocol asset bridge, has laid a solid foundation for the ecosystem.

2.2 Gram20

Gram20 is the second inscription protocol on TON, offering enhanced usability and functionality compared to TON20. Gram20 is the first protocol to utilize Telegram mini-programs for inscription deployment, minting, and transfer, and has introduced a trading market. Despite initial marketing efforts, Gram20 faced challenges with user participation due to protocol fees. However, it promised to use the fees for token buybacks and ecosystem development.

Gram20’s innovative features include minting interval limits, penalties for early minting, and a customizable fee structure, setting it apart from other protocols. It also launched an OTC market through Umbrella and attracted attention through various institutional and KOL partnerships.

2.3 TONOT

TONOT combines the concept of inscriptions with Telegram’s social attributes, ensuring fair inscription opportunities. By linking Telegram accounts, TONOT allows each activated account to mint up to 500 TONOT inscriptions, with additional minting opportunities through invitations. The initial launch in January 2024 saw overwhelming participation, surpassing previous records with over 61,000 unique minting addresses.

TONOT’s fair minting approach and integration with Telegram provide a transparent and equitable experience. Future applications include staking and mining, decentralized identities (DID), and in-game token consumption. TONOT aims to expand its use cases within the TON ecosystem, leveraging its social and gaming integration.

2.4 FairTON

FairTON is a project launch platform prioritizing fairness, community-native aspects, and full lifecycle support. It avoids off-chain indexing issues by implementing inscription operations on the smart contract level. FairTON emphasizes fair token distribution, community involvement, and comprehensive token management solutions, including customizable vesting tools and anti-rug mechanisms.

FairTON introduces JettonX, a framework compatible with the Jetton token standard on TON, allowing for customizable project launch mechanisms. This solution ensures seamless integration with the TON ecosystem’s liquidity and infrastructure.

2.5 TownSquare

TownSquare focuses on promoting mass adoption of the TON blockchain by integrating Telegram’s broad user base with Web3’s privacy and transparency features. The project plans to launch the first decentralized open-source inscription indexer and develop tools for fair and secure asset management.

By addressing the fragmentation and security issues associated with off-chain indexing, TownSquare aims to provide a decentralized indexing solution that enhances protocol flexibility and security. It also plans to introduce automated services to ensure fair minting processes.

  1. Summary

Current inscription projects across chains face several challenges:

  • Sustainability Issues:Free minting often leads to a lack of sustainability, with only well-funded projects able to buy back tokens and support their market presence. Many start-ups struggle to maintain operations after initial enthusiasm.

  • Lack of Innovation: Many imitation inscription protocols replicate BRC20 formats without considering differences between networks, leading to a lack of technical and gameplay innovation.

  • Market Fragmentation:Off-chain indexing results in fragmented and closed ecosystems, limiting asset liquidity and interoperability. Many protocols lack smart contract programmability.

TON’s ecosystem is addressing these challenges with innovative solutions:

  1. Leveraging Telegram’s Social Infrastructure: TON’s use of Telegram’s mini-programs and account integration enhances user engagement and reduces acquisition costs, supporting mass adoption.

  2. Smart Contract Integration:TON’s smart contracts enable programmable inscriptions, supporting diverse payment methods and launch mechanisms, offering flexible and sustainable solutions.

  3. Emerging Ecosystem:The TON inscriptions ecosystem is growing, with various protocols like Tonano, Gram20, TONOT, and FairTON exploring new use cases and expanding functionality, laying the groundwork for a robust and versatile ecosystem.