Community Token
Explanation

First and foremost, if you’re a bit confused about what this is, that’s okay. Ratspeak will continue building what we have set out to build, and you can learn about some of our values and fundamentals when it comes to building in our open letter we published on day one here.

Now, to be straightforward, a token was created for Ratspeak on the Base blockchain, you can read a bit about the experience here, and they set the token up so that the fees when it gets traded are given to Ratspeak - specifically, they set it so my social account could redeem accrued fees.

This is a current trend that helps support open source developers and software, in a world where the work often goes unsupported and must be slowed to a pace that can be supported only as a hobby.

I was on the fence about supporting this for a while, and came to the conclusion that I will support it with the explanation basically as follows:

I know this move is going to upset a lot of people. But before you reach for those negative emotions, I would like to ask you why you are upset about this move. I can think of two reasons:

1. You hate cryptocurrency and anything to do with it.
2. You are afraid it will “taint” Ratspeak or the project.

If it is only the first one, then I can’t convince you otherwise. The cryptocurrency industry as a whole has done a deep disservice to its social image, reeking of money grabs, greed, and false promises. But in-between all of that, there is unique technology at its roots. Just like Reticulum is a unique technology, and it matters how you utilize it.

If you find yourself displeased because of the second reason, then I would ask for your trust in the moment, or your re-evaluation in the future.

If you choose to lose all hope and trust in Ratspeak because of this, fair enough. I will continue to build, and I hope that in enough time, you will come across Ratspeak again, and give it an honest re-evaluation now that time has passed, to consider whether or not this “crypto” stuff has plagued the nature of it.

I can only say that you will be pleasantly surprised, and we can meet again that day.

For those who are not departing from this move, I will continue to state what is obvious:

This is a fun experiment that has significantly helped pushed Ratspeak forward already by helping fund things like community node distributions, donations to open source providers like Mark, getting devices to test new firmware on, and more.

I don’t know where this token will go, just like I don’t know where Ratspeak will go.

This token does not represent ownership, or any rights in Ratspeak LLC, the product, or any associations. By engaging with this token and the community, Ratspeak is by no means offering investment advice, or suggesting any indication of financial decisions. You do not need to hold a token to participate or use Ratspeak, and you never will.

It’s our belief that Ratspeak and a community token initiative can have a symbiotic relationship, and in the best cases, one that will help Ratspeak, Reticulum, and the entire mesh network grow at a faster pace than with no funding.

For any concerns or questions, please, reach out to mail@ratspeak.org.