---
type: musing
status: seed
created: 2026-03-09
purpose: Map the MetaDAO X ecosystem — accounts, projects, culture, tone — before we start posting
---

# MetaDAO X Landscape

## Why This Exists

Cory directive: know the room before speaking in it. This maps who matters on X in the futarchy/MetaDAO space, what the culture is, and what register works. Input for the collective's X voice.

## The Core Team

**@metaproph3t** — Pseudonymous co-founder (also called Proph3t/Profit). Former Ethereum DeFi dev. The ideological engine. Posts like a movement leader: "MetaDAO is as much a social movement as it is a cryptocurrency project — thousands have already been infected by the idea that futarchy will re-architect human civilization." High conviction, low frequency, big claims. Uses "futard" unironically as community identity. The voice is earnest maximalism — not ironic, not hedged.

**@kolaboratorio (Kollan House)** — Co-founder, public-facing. Discovered MetaDAO at Breakpoint Amsterdam, pulled down the frontend late November 2023. More operational than Proph3t — writes the implementation blog posts ("From Believers to Builders: Introducing Unruggable ICOs"). Appears on Solana podcasts (Validated, Lightspeed). Professional register, explains mechanisms to outsiders.

**@nallok** — Co-founder. Lower public profile. Referenced in governance proposals — the Proph3t/Nallok compensation structure (2% of supply per $1B FDV increase, up to 10% at $5B) is itself a statement about how the team eats.

## The Investors / Analysts

**@TheiaResearch (Felipe Montealegre)** — The most important external voice. Theia's entire fund thesis is "Internet Financial System" — our term "internet finance" maps directly. Key posts: "Tokens are Broken" (lemon markets argument), "$9.9M from 6MV/Variant/Paradigm to MetaDAO at spot" (milestone announcement), "Token markets are becoming lemon markets. We can solve this with credible signals." Register: thesis-driven, fundamentals-focused, no memes. Coined "ownership tokens" vs "futility tokens." Posts long-form threads with clear arguments. This is the closest existing voice to what we want to sound like.

**@paradigm** — Led $2.2M round (Aug 2024), holds ~14.6% of META supply. Largest single holder. Paradigm's research arm is working on Quantum Markets (next-gen unified liquidity). They don't post about MetaDAO frequently but the investment is the signal.

**Alea Research (@aaboronkov)** — Published the definitive public analysis: "MetaDAO: Fair Launches for a Misaligned Market." Professional crypto research register. Key data point they surfaced: 8 ICOs, $25.6M raised, $390M committed (95% refunded from oversubscription). $300M AMM volume, $1.5M in fees. This is the benchmark for how to write about MetaDAO with data.

**Alpha Sigma Capital Research (Matthew Mousa)** — "Redrawing the Futarchy Blueprint." More investor-focused, less technical. Key insight: "The most bullish signal is not a flawless track record, but a team that confronts its challenges head-on with credible solutions." Hosts Alpha Liquid Podcast — had Proph3t on.

**Deep Waters Capital** — Published MetaDAO valuation analysis. Quantitative, comparable-driven.

## The Ecosystem Projects (launched via MetaDAO ICO)

8 ICOs since April 2025. Combined $25.6M raised. Key projects:

| Project | What | Performance | Status |
|---------|------|-------------|--------|
| **Avici** | Crypto-native neobank | 21x ATH, ~7x current | Strong |
| **Omnipair (OMFG)** | Oracle-less perpetuals DEX | 16x ATH, ~5x current, $1.1M raised | Strong — first DeFi protocol with futarchy from day one |
| **Umbra** | Privacy protocol (on Arcium) | 7x first week, ~3x current, $3M raised | Strong |
| **Ranger** | [perp trading] | Max 30% drawdown from launch | Stable — recently had liquidation proposal (governance stress test) |
| **Solomon** | [governance/treasury] | Max 30% drawdown from launch | Stable — treasury subcommittee governance in progress |
| **Paystream** | [payments] | Max 30% drawdown from launch | Stable |
| **ZKLSOL** | [ZK/privacy] | Max 30% drawdown from launch | Stable |
| **Loyal** | [unknown] | Max 30% drawdown from launch | Stable |

Notable: zero launches have gone below ICO price. The "unruggable" framing is holding.

## Futarchy Adopters (not launched via ICO)

- **Drift** — Using MetaDAO tech for grant allocation. Co-founder Cindy Leow: "showing really positive signs."
- **Sanctum** — First Solana project to fully adopt MetaDAO governance. First decision market: 200+ trades in 3 hours. Co-founder FP Lee: futarchy needs "one great success" to become default.
- **Jito** — Futarchy proposal saw $40K volume / 122 trades vs previous governance: 303 views, 2 comments. The engagement differential is the pitch.

## The Culture

**Shared language:**
- "Futard" — self-identifier for the community. Embraced, not ironic.
- "Ownership coins" vs "futility tokens" (Theia's framing) — the distinction between tokens with real governance/economic/legal rights vs governance theater tokens
- "+EV" — proposals evaluated as positive expected value, not voted on
- "Unruggable ICOs" — the brand promise: futarchy-governed liquidation means investors can force treasury return
- "Number go up" — coin price as objective function, stated without embarrassment

**Register:**
- Technical but not academic. Mechanism explanations, not math proofs.
- High conviction, low hedging. Proph3t doesn't say "futarchy might work" — he says it will re-architect civilization.
- Data-forward when it exists ($25.6M raised, $390M committed, 8/8 above ICO price)
- Earnest, not ironic. This community believes in what it's building. Cynicism doesn't land here.
- Small but intense. Not a mass-market audience. The people paying attention are builders, traders, and thesis-driven investors.

**What gets engagement:**
- Milestone announcements with data (Paradigm investment, ICO performance)
- Mechanism explanations that reveal non-obvious properties (manipulation resistance, trustless joint ownership)
- Strong claims about the future stated with conviction
- Governance drama (Ranger liquidation proposal, Solomon treasury debates)

**What falls flat:**
- Generic "web3 governance" framing — this community is past that
- Hedged language — "futarchy might be interesting" gets ignored
- Comparisons to traditional governance without showing the mechanism difference
- Anything that sounds like it's selling rather than building

## How We Should Enter

The room is small, conviction-heavy, and data-literate. They've seen the "AI governance" pitch before and are skeptical of AI projects that don't show mechanism depth. We need to earn credibility by:

1. **Showing we've read the codebase, not just the blog posts.** Reference specific governance proposals, on-chain data, mechanism details. The community can tell the difference.
2. **Leading with claims they can verify.** Not "we believe in futarchy" but "futarchy manipulation attempts on MetaDAO proposal X generated Y in arbitrage profit for defenders." Specific, traceable, falsifiable.
3. **Engaging with governance events as they happen.** Ranger liquidation, Solomon treasury debates, new ICO launches — real-time mechanism analysis is the highest-value content.
4. **Not announcing ourselves.** No "introducing LivingIP" thread. Show up with analysis, let people discover what we are.

---

Sources:
- [Alea Research: MetaDAO Fair Launches](https://alearesearch.substack.com/p/metadao)
- [Alpha Sigma: Redrawing the Futarchy Blueprint](https://alphasigmacapitalresearch.substack.com/p/redrawing-the-futarchy-blueprint)
- [Blockworks: Futarchy needs one great success](https://blockworks.co/news/metadao-solana-governance-platform)
- [CoinDesk: Paradigm invests in MetaDAO](https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2024/08/01/crypto-vc-paradigm-invests-in-metadao-as-prediction-markets-boom)
- [MetaDAO blog: Unruggable ICOs](https://blog.metadao.fi/from-believers-to-builders-introducing-unruggable-icos-for-founders-9e3eb18abb92)
- [BeInCrypto: Ownership Coins 2026](https://beincrypto.com/ownership-coins-crypto-2026-messari/)

Topics:
- [[internet finance and decision markets]]
- [[MetaDAO is the futarchy launchpad on Solana]]
