Hi all,
I’m a newbie to Rally. Only joined a few days ago. But, I’ve decided to write a post for other newbies to learn, as I think this will only improve engagement, discussion and the strength of Rally.
Is Rally the King of Social Tokens?
Introduction
This report will provide an in-depth overview of Rally, and their token, $RLY. What Rally is and the problem they are trying to solve, a protocol description, token economics, updates and developments, voting participation, unique addresses, sector and competition analysis, and, finally, its roadmap.
About the project
Currently, creators find it hard to monetize their fan base, create a mutually beneficial relationship with fans and avoid extra fees through platforms and management teams. Rally’s goal is to solve this issue and provide a platform for brands, musicians, athletes, leaders and others to launch their crypto coin.
Rally
Rally was founded in 2018, with the first 10 Creator Coins launching in August 2020. Developments include decentralised governance in October 2020 and community activity rewards in November 2020. By April 2021, over 100 creators had launched their coins, a x10 increase in 8 months, whilst simultaneously updating their community activity reward system by addressing feedback from creators, fans, and supporters. Creators and coin owners who are eligible for community rewards receive rewards as $RLY in their accounts.
Rally has grown to over 200 creators, and over 74% have built over $100,000 USD community-based token economies and five have built token economies worth more than $1M USD.
Through community activity rewards, Rally has distributed over $58M USD in $RLY to date to creators and their communities, and an average of $2.2M USD each week in $RLY, in Q3 alone.
On 08/25/2021, a Network Decentralization proposal was passed through a single-choice voting system, in block 13082642, mined by “
0x0708f87a089a91c65d48721aa941084648562287”, according to Etherscan, with 100% of the 10.55k votes in favour, according to $RLY snapshot. This block transitioned Rally from a single organization into a new structure with five separate projects: 1) Rally.io, 2) Unite,io (Rally Asia Project already in soft launch and will fully later this year), 3) $RLY Network Association, 4) $RLY Ecosystem DAO, and 5) SuperLayer Labs. All projects agree to be built upon and develop or support the $RLY protocol.
$RLY Token
Over 8years, a maximum, fixed supply of 15 billion $RLY tokens, all minted at genesis, will be issued. The token economics are around 14% for the Rally team, 15% for seed investors, 20% for the community including Treasury, Developers, Partners and Liquidity Providers. The last 50% are network usage rewards distributed to the rest of the community.
Very few addresses hold a large majority of the tokens to be distributed. The top 10 addresses hold 93% of outstanding issuance.
However, one address holds almost 50% of supply, which is likely to be the address, part of the Genesis team, distributing tokens to the community. Indeed, the wrapper contract to lockup mainnet $RLY for use on the sidechain, most of which is locked up in Creator Coins. The other two addresses are likely to be investors.
Competitive Analysis
$RLY rolls within the sector of social tokens. Competitors include Chiliz, Fyooz and OurZora. Whilst all are building infrastructure within the social money industry, not all have issued tokens.
OurZora, a platform for community tokens, acts as a marketplace and mints branded tokens unique to specific creators and brands. However, this diverged demand will decrease demand for Rally’s tokenized infrastructure and positive feedback loop for creators and fans. OurZora generated a sales volume of roughly $400,000 in September 2020 and recently partnered with a musician whose token, $RAC, is currently worth $1.46.
Further, Fyooz also provides a large marketplace for creator coins, but, not only does Fyooz have their token, $FYZ. It is also a large threat to Rally due to their tokenized stars such as Devonta Smith, NFL star, and Lil Yachty, a Rapper.
Conversely, Chiliz ($CHZ) is also a competitor in the social token space, with fan tokens, and champions a market cap of $1.85b USD. Although one of the most successful social tokens so far, Chiliz monetizes a different niche – sports and entertainment. With their three main and current Chiliz projects including FanTokenRank, FanTokenStats and FanTokenMarketCap. But, also, consumers have wider access to Chiliz, than to Rally, through 14 exchanges including Binance, Crypto.com, Coinbase and Upbit.
Rally Road map
Continued open-source development from individuals will be key to Rally surviving and thriving, especially during a bear market. In the last month, Rally has had proposals to update network rewards, DAO structures, VIP Ambassador programs, token gating for creators and increasing the liquidity budget. There is also a possibility for Rally to partner with other organisations in the media industry to increase traction to help grow the Rally token and creator economy. As well as partnering with Shopify ($SHOP), a multinational e-commerce company, to create a tokenized B2B2C experience for online brands and their customers. However, all these proposals need to be voted on. Rally has also announced a forthcoming official Creator Coin ($R) to recognize their community and to enhance creator growth. But, importantly, without any monetary benefit to Rally. Last, Rally has already started establishing the $RLY Network Association, as already mentioned, a part of the proposal passed on 8/25/2021. The new main responsibility of this organisation is to oversee network protocols and rewards, build and maintain the core blockchain technology, and oversee the $RLY community treasury.
Conclusion
Rally’s fast growth, especially over the last year, since August 2020, has been met with headwinds from the competition as other projects recognise the multi-billion/trillion-dollar opportunity for monetization and enhanced relationship, benefits and feedback for brands, fans and creators. Rally needs to keep growing, developing, and partnering with others, which stems from rewarding the community, team, investors, and creators.