The Friend.Tech team relinquished smart contract management

Friend.Tech developers have given up on managing smart contracts.

The Friend.Tech team has published a message announcing the transfer of control to address zero on the Ethereum network at X.

The admin and ownership parameters have been set to 0x000…000 to prevent any changes to their fees or functionality in the future.

This change does not affect the separate web client, which operates at https://t.co/YOHabcBL3H and will continue to operate as is. There is no charge for either…

— friend.tech (@friendtech) September 8, 2024

The developers of the socialfi project blocked any changes to the system, which raises questions about the future development of the project. Complete refusal of control makes it unlikely to implement new functions.

This change does not affect the separate web client operated in Friend.Tech, which will continue to operate as is. Currently, no fees from smart contracts or Friend.Tech go to the Friend.Tech development team via multisig.

Changes caused the Friend.Tech token to crash

Launched on the Base network in August 2023, the platform quickly caught the attention of the crypto community and earned developers more than $20 million. However, after the release of the second version and a failed token drop, user activity decreased and the project faced stagnation. The transfer of control over smart contracts excludes the possibility of relaunching Friend.Tech. The changes led to the collapse of the project’s native token.

The Friend.Tech token (FRIEND) responded to this news with a sharp decline, falling by more than 39%. At the same time, the asset’s price surpassed $1 in May 2024.

Source: TradingView The rise and fall of Friend.Tech

Friend.Tech quickly gained popularity in the community. In September 2023, the protocol’s daily revenue surpassed Ethereum. The project also attracted funding from venture capital firm Paradigm, although the amount of investment was not disclosed.

However, interest in the project has decreased. This is evidenced by a noticeable decrease in the number of transactions in the social network.

Source: Dune

Three weeks after the launch, the community began to talk about the “death” of the project; the number of active users, incoming funds, and the volume of commissions collected dropped by about 90%.

Additionally, Friend.Tech trading volumes dropped by more than 95% at the start of the year. The team pointed to an airdrop amid the decline in activity, but this failed to bring back the project’s former popularity.

Later, the developers of the decentralized social app announced the development of the Friendchain network in collaboration with blockchain infrastructure company Conduit, but later deleted the post containing the announcement.

What is Friend.Tech used for?

Friend.Tech is a decentralized social app based on Coinbase’s l2 solution Base and integrated with X.

At the end of March 2023, two developers known by the nicknames 0xracerAlt and Shrimp founded Stealcam, a web3 social network for multimedia distribution. In 2022, Racer attracted attention with the creation of the Tweet DAO, which integrated with Twitter and provided access to accounts through the ownership of special NFTs.

After a sharp decline in revenue in May 2023, the developers decided to change the name of the project to Friend.Tech. Initially, the platform was planned to be launched on Arbitrum, but a few months later it was released on another network — Base.

The protocol allows trading of “keys” – tokenized user shares. Their owners get access to closed channels and exclusive content. After registration, platform users can start selling their shares to other participants or buying “keys” for accounts they are interested in. The project positions itself as a “marketplace for friends” and essentially tokenizes influence on social networks using blockchain technology.

Shortly after launch, the platform came under fire from some community members, with one user with the pseudonym Yazan saying the app had six to eight weeks before its stock price and overall activity dropped sharply.

The project’s shortcomings, Yazan said, include “ridiculous” pricing, non-working group chat, and potential scams.

Let me tell you something.

Something is wrong @friendtechnology.

🚩 Content creators making money from a group chat that doesn’t work, even though you can’t even respond to people directly?

🚩 The way pricing works is ridiculous and can be easily abused.

🚩 Pumps and discharges. picture.twitter.com/TJqcktEM6P

— Written by (@WrittenXBT) August 20, 2023

Another user, nicknamed Legendary, predicted that the platform would crash, as happened with BitClout. Perhaps the user was right.

Do recent changes mean the end of Friend.Tech?

The changes did not affect the Friend.Tech web client, so the app can continue to operate indefinitely. However, Ethos founder Serpin Taxt believes the recent changes spell the end for the platform. He said he would buy the project’s technology and integrate it into his own protocol, but “it’s over now.”

The end of an era 😭 not at all what I had envisioned.

It was probably legally challenging, but I would (and had privately announced) buy the company’s business. @friendtechnology took over technology and when given the chance turned it into an ethos

It’s over now.
F https://t.co/Uel6pMKEkC

— Serpin Taxt (0x5f Capital) (@0x5f_eth) September 8, 2024