In recent days, the entire Bitcoin community has been experiencing halving. However, this coincided with the launch of the Runes protocol, a protocol enabling the creation of memecoins on the BTC blockchain. Magic Eden took advantage of the Runes hype by opening a platform for trading memcoins and NFTs.
Runes protocol, i.e. another controversy around memecoins on BTC
Memecoins on the Bitcoin blockchain are, for many members of the cryptocurrency community, almost as irritating as the donkey from Shrek asking “how far away?” Well, it turns out that the Ordionals protocol is just the tip of the memecoin iceberg, because the Runes protocol has just appeared. The introduction of Runes resulted in a large increase in Bitcoin network activity. There were bottlenecks and increased transaction fees. Miners were quite happy about this, as the introduction of the Runes protocol and the increase in network traffic allowed miners to earn a record $107 million in daily revenue.
Magic Eden quickly took advantage of the situation, creating the “simplest and most intuitive” Runes platform. This is a place to trade NFTs based on the BTC blockchain. It is worth adding that the platform was launched on April 23, i.e. a day earlier than planned by its creators. Zedd Yin, co-founder of Magic Eden, explained that the platform will focus on BTC-based NFTs:
As early backers and early builders of the Ordinals marketplace, it was important to us that we built the best Runes experience possible in this important evolutionary step for Bitcoin.
How will BRC-20 and the Runes protocol affect the Bitcoin network?
Bitcoin purists definitely do not support the Runes or Ordinals protocol, because in their opinion it is a complete denial of the idea of the Bitcoin network. Supporters of memecoins and NFTs on BTC, in turn, believe that this is a natural direction in the evolution of the blockchain created by Satoshi Nakamoto. It is worth noting that the launch of the Runes platform by Magic Runes is very symbolic, as April 23, 2024 marks exactly 13 years since the last e-mail sent by Satoshi Nakamoto.
The topic of BRC-20 and NFT tokens based on the Runes protocol are electrifying the Bitcoin community and will certainly be a bone of contention for a long time. Higher transaction fees and network downtime are just the beginning of the impact of BRC-20 tokens on the BTC blockchain. The huge interest in such memecoins and BRC-20 heralds further problems. Will Runes and Ordinals actually cause a lot of problems for BTC network users? We will find out about this in the coming quarters.
