SeaShrine Creators Series — Aptos Monkeys

The Aptos Monkeys are the latest group of animal NFT friends to have visited SeaShrine.

Greetings Aptonians,

Welcome back to another edition of the SeaShrine Creators Series, where we sit down with upcoming Aptos NFT projects to discuss their inspirations, motivations, future plans, and more. It is our priority to propagate the growth of the Aptos NFT space, and we believe that providing projects with a platform for exposure helps to bring that priority to fruition. Recently, we had the pleasure of sitting down with the Aptos Monkeys team for a Twitter Spaces AMA. Today, we bring you a written account of our conversation and what we learned from our wonderful discussion. Without further ado, let’s jump into the latest iteration of the SeaShrine Creators Series!

What is the Aptos Monkeys project all about?

From our conversation with the Monkeys, we were able to understand right away that they would like to become the largest, most community centric project available to the Aptos community. The brand conceptualization began at the end of July according to our guest speaker, and since then they have created a substantial network within the ecosystem, stating that they have good relations with a lot of other builders in the space. The Aptos Monkeys want to build the primary hub / discord community for all Aptonians, where individuals can go to connect with other builders and network. More than this, our guest speaker talks about how he wants the monkeys to be innovative pioneers on the Aptos ecosystem by building tools that will take our NFT ecosystem to the next level.

Who’s behind the Aptos Monkeys?

Here at SeaShrine, we hold the notion of transparency in high regard. It is beneficial for us to know the teams behind the projects that we speak to, but it is also necessary information that prospecting collectors should have before making any type of investment.

Thankfully, the Aptos Monkeys were fully comfortable with discussing the team breakdown. Jungle Smith, our guest speaker, introduces himself as the founder of the project with previous experience in the Web2 marketing advisory industry. Jungle Smith hopes to employ his expertise within the Web3 environment, in an effort to provide the Aptos Monkeys project with all the exposure and attention it requires. However, Jungle Smith is not alone on this journey, as he goes on to introduce Jungle Dev, an entrepreneur and startup founder responsible for all the technicals behind the project. It appears that Jungle Smith and Jungle Dev are the two core contributors behind the project, but they do have community moderators from parts of Africa and Europe.

Why Aptos?

There’s no denying that the Aptos ecosystem is a hot spot right now, with new projects seemingly popping up on a daily basis. Therefore, we would like to know why the projects we speak to have chosen Aptos over other L1 ecosystems. Is it hype-chasing or something more? Let’s find out below.

In response to this question, Jungle Smith first begins his answer by referencing the importance of innovation and change. He discusses how blockchain technology has evolved since the inception of Bitcoin, and how new L1s have gained prominence due to their respective technological innovations. Jungle Smith goes on to state how change is constant in history, and with that change comes “innovation that challenges the core elements that you used to believe in before”.

In essence, Jungle Smith and his team chose the Aptos blockchain due to its innovativeness. He believes that they are building something unique and status-quo challenging. Diving into the technical reasonings, Jungle Smith points out the increased scalability of Aptos and its insane projected TPS rate.

What led the authors to create the Aptos Monkeys project?

Motivations are always important, as the motivations behind an action can allow us to understand the rationality or irrationality behind something on a deeper level. We believe that asking our guest projects to describe their motivations for their project allows the community to build their own informed opinions. Nevertheless, let’s find out why Jungle Smith and his crew began work on the Aptos Monkeys.

Jungle Smith has a relatively straightforward answer for this question, stating that it is a well known phenomena that the first monkey themed NFT collections on new L1s often perform the best. He says that this is an example of “cognitive bias”, in which ecosystem participants subconsciously associate monkey-themed projects with success. This phenomena is evidenced by the Solana Monkey Business collection on Solana, and the Bored Ape Yacht Club on Ethereum, both of which were some of the first projects on their respective ecosystems. Essentially, the reasoning to build the Aptos Monkeys collection was initially a branding tactic, though the collection has evolved since then. In regards to the art-design, Jungle Smith and his crew wanted to differentiate themselves, and thus opted for a monkey avatar inspired by the Curious George cartoon.

What does the Aptos Monkeys project hope to accomplish?

Releasing an NFT collection is one thing, but cementing yourself as a pillar of an NFT ecosystem is a completely different ball game. Doing this takes countless hours of hard work and effort. We asked Jungle Smith of the Aptos Monkeys what he wishes his project to achieve in the coming months, and this is what he had to say.

Jungle Smith reinforces his intentions to make the Aptos Monkey a community-centric project first and foremost. During our Twitter Space, Jungle Smith talks about how

“as a project we are just as good or useless as what our community wants us to be. Project is worth nothing without community.”

The Aptos Monkeys want to evolve in line with what the community sees fit. Building a brand is not feasible without first developing an engaged and active community, which is something that Jungle Smith intuitively understands.

What is the selling point of the Aptos Monkeys?

The first ever NFTs were straightforward; you purchase a non fungible token from a collection and it grants you complete ownership of that asset. However, as time has progressed, the NFT market has evolved to the point that new collections must have unique selling points in order to capture market share. Let’s hear what Jungle Smith had to say on the topic.

Right off the bat, Jungle Smith talks about how being “nimble” as an entity is extremely important to a project’s longevity. He states that in some instances, roadmaps can be severely limiting and crush creative drive. Thus, Jungle Smith talks about how the only plans for the foreseeable future are to bootstrap community growth and expand their already large network.

Still, we probed further to see if there were any confirmed utilities coming to the collection, to which Jungle Smith dropped some small hints. He stated that there will be a future collab with the DeFi suite, Tsunami Finance. This builds upon their announcement a couple weeks ago, where they confirmed that Tsunami would be the official DEX partner of the Aptos Monkeys.

Conclusion

We would like to extend our gratitude to the Aptos Monkeys team and Jungle Smith in particular for taking the time out of the day to sit down with us for a conversation. We felt as if we learned a lot about what they are building and why, in addition to what we can expect to see from them as time progresses. The community aspect of the Aptos Monkeys will be something to keep an eye on for sure, and we cannot wait to see just how involved and active the community becomes from here. As always, we would also like to show our gratitude to our recurring readers. To those of you who take time out of your days to read our weekly blog posts, we appreciate you, truly. How did you feel about this edition of the SeaShrine Creators Series? Make sure to let us know in our social channels.

Until next time, Aptonians!

Sincerely,

The SeaShrine Team

From: https://medium.com/@seashrine/seashrine-creators-series-aptos-monkeys-95d3364fcbe3