Estimated read time: 3 minutes & 28 seconds
GM. This is the Milk Road.
Today, I’m going to tell you the origin story of the Milk Road.
Yes, this newsletter is now over 150k+ readers strong.
We give you the best crypto content on the planet, Monday-thru-Friday.
But 6 months ago, the Milk Road was just an idea. Just a Twinkle in Ben’s eye.
Me and Ben were sitting at FarmCon (yes, a farming conference in Kansas City) thinking about how much more interesting crypto is than corn…and we had the idea.
Wouldn’t it be fun if we built the “Barstool” for crypto? An entertaining brand that would make it fun to follow along with this giant crypto wave?
We called it, “The Milk Road”.
Ben liked the name because it was a play-off of “The Silk Road” (the illegal marketplace where Bitcoin first became popular).
I liked it because it sounded funny.
Here’s how it went down that night:
We bought a crappy .xyz domain and got started.
But we needed a logo.
Should we hire someone? Well.. then we’d have to wait for them to make it.
But I’m allergic to waiting, so Ben quickly threw together a logo in Canva.
I got excited and spent $2,000 buying the domain Milkroad.com
Then we began the hard part. The daily grind of writing an amazing newsletter, every single morning.
No sick days. No sleeping in. Send the bad boy every morning.
At first, it felt lame. Everyone else in crypto is investing millions of dollars, or building cutting-edge protocols… And here we are, two little blogger boys typing a free newsletter from our bedroom.
Believe it or not, putting “I write a daily crypto newsletter to 284 people” doesn’t crush on Tinder.
But a few editions in, people started sharing with friends. Posts started going viral. And we quickly grew in the past 6 months to over 100,000+ daily readers. That’s like 1.5 football stadiums of people reading this thing every morning.
And so we decided to treat ourselves to a little makeover.
We hired a badass designer named Jeremy, and we came up with a new brand logo and mascot for the brand.
Alright, it’s finally time…hold onto your butts…here’s the new logo:
And the cherry on top…our new mascot. May I introduce you to… The MilkMan.
He’s like us.
- Fun to be around
- A little awkward
- Here for a good time
And starting tomorrow, you'll see the Milkman in every email. Along with a brand new look & feel for the newsletter.
Over the history of mankind, we’ve seen endless amounts of “rebrands.” From people to businesses.
We’ve seen name changes:
- Facebook → Meta
- Matchbox → Tinder
- Blue Ribbon Sports → Nike
- Ron Artest → Meta World Peace
Now, it’s the Milk Road’s turn to rewrite history.
We even made a little video about the new brand…give it a peek here:
If you want to see the full process of how we came up with this look (and the other brand names/logos/mood boards we went through), we’re uploading a “behind the scenes” video to our YouTube channel soon.
Subscribe to get notified when it’s out.
OK, ENOUGH ABOUT US. WHAT'S GOING ON IN CRYPTO?
ProShares, an exchange-traded fund (ETF) provider, dropped a bomb yesterday.
They’re releasing a new ETF that lets investors bet against the price of Bitcoin (short BTC).
It’ll be available on the New York Stock Exchange starting today.
This is interesting because it could give long-term holders an opportunity to profit from price declines, without actually selling their BTC.
And that’s already being done on the Toronto Stock Exchange.
Bitcoin is down 53% YTD. This Bitcoin Shorting ETF is up 71% YTD.
ProShares was also the first to launch a Bitcoin futures ETF back in November. They saw ~$1b in trading volume on the first day.
Now, we’ll wait and see what happens when it’s as easy as pressing a button for Wall Street to short BTC.
DAY 1 OF NFT NYC
The biggest NFT event of the year started yesterday, NFT NYC. It’s the Super Bowl of NFTs.
NFTs invaded Times Square.
Check out a few highlights:
There was a HUGE Bored Ape balloon.
Pulled up to ApeFest @BoredApeYC
— scurf.eth (@NickScurfield)8:19 PM • Jun 20, 2022
There was a Pepe Frog Art Exhibit.
PEPE is ART
— Scarce.City (@scarcedotcity)8:13 PM • Jun 20, 2022
There was a concert. Jimmy Fallon and Beeple were seen raging in the first row.
.@jimmyfallon & @beeple just chillin at apefest😂 @BoredApeYC
— FFVV1211.eth (@FFVV1211)2:04 AM • Jun 21, 2022
But the best moment? The Crypto Haters Club showing out in full force. They were chanting:”NFTs. Not for me!”.
Look at the signs! God Hates NFTs!
My editor removed 6 consecutive joke captions about this photo because (and I quote) “don’t get canceled the same day as the new brand launches. At least wait a day.”
Turns out it was a marketing stunt by Bobby Hundreds, the founder of an NFT project called Adam Bombsquad. Bravo, Bobby, Bravo.
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VITALIKS ULTIMATE TRAVEL GUIDE
Even our Lanky King thinks we’re better off talking about something else other than prices…
So instead of releasing a blog on the best blockchains, he dropped …his 40-liter backpack travel guide.
Here are a few things were learned about our Lanky King:
- He’s a Uniqlo maxi. T-shirts? Uniqlo. Underwear? Uniqlo. Shorts that double as a swimsuit? You guessed it, Uniqlo.
- He travels light. All his items fit into a 40-liter Hynes Eagle backpack.
- He’s cheap. How cheap? He uses a toilet paper roll as his microphone stand.
And this is exactly why we love Vitalik and feature him at the bottom of every single edition.
See ya tomorrow!
Shaan aka “Elon’s chocolate milk”& Ben "2% Milk" Levy
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DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.
