Block 840,000 is the chosen location for all the beginnings of #RunesProtocol. On April 20, 2024, right on the 4th Bitcoin Halving event, the Runes protocol was officially mainnet. With the fervor that had been heating up for many days, Runes caused the Bitcoin network to explode in volume and transaction fees.

But this enthusiasm did not last long when only 3 short days later the number of transactions continuously decreased sharply and after 1 week everything almost returned to normal levels.

Is Runes Protocol just a temporary fad by a group of individuals crazy about reforming the Bitcoin network, or a healthy adjustment for continued growth in the long term?

In this article we will learn about the#Runesecosystem, its operations and outstanding projects to answer this question.

RUNES PROTOCOL AT A GLANCE

Runes Protocol is a fungible token issuance protocol on the Bitcoin network created by Casey Rodarmor @rodarmor - founder of the famous#Ordinalsprotocol.

The biggest difference between#RunesProtocoland other fungible token issuance protocols on the Bitcoin network is that it uses the UTXO model. Balance information will be saved directly into the OP_RETURN field of the UTXO instead of witness data like BRC-20 or some other protocols.

This has made Runes Protocol's execution performance more efficient, freeing the network from the problem of "UTXO spam". At the same time, data stored in UTXO helps Runes be more on-chain.

Another notable point about Runes Protocol is that the names of tokens are limited in the number of characters and do not contain spaces, spaces will be replaced with dots, for example SATOSHI•NAKAMOTO.

Regarding the number of characters, Runes names have a maximum of 26 characters, but initially users will only be able to create Runes of 13-26 characters, shorter characters will be gradually unlocked every 4 months for 4 years.

In addition,#Runeshas a numbering system based on the time of creation, increasing from 0. According to some opinions, runes created at the beginning will be more rare because they have historical value. . Runes#0is UNCOMMON•GOODS created by founder Casey.

You can learn details about Runes Protocol in the article: Runes Protocol - Fungible token protocol on Bitcoin by the founder of Ordinals on his personal page or research blog (linktree in bio).

OPERATIONAL STATUS

On the first day of launch, it brought miners 1,289 BTC in transaction fees, equivalent to about 90 million USD. The following days, transaction costs remained at 100 - 300 BTC/day before dropping sharply in the following week. At the time of writing, transaction costs from Runes Protocol are only around 2-3 BTC per day.

However, when looking at the proportion of transaction types, although the number and cost of Runes transactions have decreased sharply, if compared to other types of transactions, it still continuously holds a large market share.

From the chart above we can also see that since the launch of Runes Protocol, it has completely absorbed the market share of BRC-20 and Ordinals. The Bitcoin network has almost only two types: regular Bitcoin transactions and Runes transactions.

After a boom in the first week, there are now about 100-200 new Runes being created every day. The accumulated number of Runes after one month of operation is 74 thousand with 4.6 million wallet addresses.

In a context where miners' block reward income was halved after the last 4th halving, along with the increasing difficulty of mining, it required miners to upgrade their hardware to compete. If the price increase of Bitcoin is not enough to cover costs, miners are forced to turn off miners if they do not want to suffer losses.

New innovations on the#Bitcoinnetwork such as the Runes Protocol will be a significant source of additional income to help miners maintain their production.

That's from the miner's perspective, but what about Bitcoin users? That's the applicability and community culture.

As we all know, since its inception, Bitcoin has been used almost exclusively for one main purpose: storing value, a very small part is used for payment activities or unworthy off-chain lending. tell. Bitcoin holders expect more uses for BTC, but it must be safe and preferably on-chain, because they do not want to hand over valuable assets to anyone to look after.

The birth of#RunesProtocol is not only the foundation for the DeFi ecosystem on Bitcoin but also cultural diversity through other memecoins and tokens above.

Above is the capitalization chart of fungible tokens in ecosystems compared to their native tokens researched by Binance. Bitcoin is the ecosystem with the largest capitalization but the rate of fungible tokens is very low. From a certain perspective, there will be a lot of development space for the fungible token ecosystem on the Bitcoin network.

ECOSYSTEM AND OUTSTANDING PROJECTS

Although it's only been a month since the mainnet,#RunesProtocol has had quite an effective momentum period, making its ecosystem relatively developed over time.

We can divide projects in the Runes ecosystem into 6 large groups. Below is a list of groups with outstanding projects for each group.

( @X Profile)

» Mint / Launchpad

• Luminex @luminexio

• Unisat @unisat_wallet

• Runespad @runespad

• OrdinalsBot @ordinalsbot

• Ordbit @ord_bit

• Metarunes @MetaRunes21

• Magic Runes @Magic_Runes

• SatoSea @satosea_xyz

• Ordinals Wallet @ordinalswallet

» Marketplace / Dex

• OKX Web3 @okxweb3

• Magic Eden @MEonBTC

• Unisat @unisat_wallet

• Ordinals Wallet @ordinalswallet

• ApeSwap

• LFG

• SatsX

• Saturn

• RuniGun

• RunePro

• Whales Market

» Lending

• Liquidium @LiquidiumFi

• Runessance

• Runeflex

» Wallet

• Xverse Wallet @XverseApp

• Unisat Wallet @unisat_wallet

• OKX Wallet @okxweb3

• Magic Eden Wallet @MEonBTC

• Leather Wallet @LeatherBTC

• Ordinals Wallet @ordinalswallet

» Tool/Explorer

• Ord io @ord_io

• GeniiData @GeniiData

• Best In Slot @bestinslotxyz

• SatScreener @SatScreener

• RuneMine @rune_mine

• Ordiscan

• Btctool

• Runesmarketcap

» Runes Project

• UNCOMMON•GOODS: The first Rune#0of Runes Protocol was created by founder Casey @rodarmor by hard embedding in the code. UNCOMMON•GOODS has no total supply limit and will be freely minted for 4 years. The end of mint is the 5th halving event.

• SATOSHI•NAKAMOTO: Stand at rune position #6. SATOSHI•NAKAMOTO is a mysterious rune like the "father" of Bitcoin. There is no information about the development team or social channel, but it is very supported by the community. Currently SATOSHI•NAKAMOTO has a capitalization of about 30 million USD.

• RSIC•GENESIS•RUNE @rune_coin : Runecoin is a pre-rune project that has been running for quite some time. The project allows NFT RSIC holders to perform mining to receive RSIC•GENESIS•RUNE for free. RISC has always been a project that has received community attention since its launch. Capitalization of RSIC•GENESIS•RUNE is about 180 million USD.

• WANKO•MANKO•RUNES @wankomankorunes: Wanko is a memerune created based on the story of Casey Rodarmor. WANKO•MANKO•RUNES will end mint at block 840,094 or 1 billion tokens minted, whichever occurs first, and has currently paused minting with a total supply of 75,250,000.

• ANARCHO•CATBUS : Anacho Catbus is a meme inspired by the name in the introduction of Casey's personal page. The current capitalization of the project is about 3 million USD.

• Z•Z•Z•Z•Z•FEHU•Z•Z•Z•Z•Z @RuneFehu : The second rune#1to be etched after UNCOMMON•GOOD. It was created by Fehu team.

• Some other prominent runes: MAGIC•INTERNET•MONEY, PUPS•WORLD•PEACE, FUNNY•FISH•MASK, DECENTRALIZED, THE•TICKER•IS•ELSA.

EPILOGUE

After Ordinals and BRC20,#Runesis the innovation that contributes a lot to the overall development of the Bitcoin network. Currently, we are in the very early stages of the Runes ecosystem. This quiet period is the right time for product development projects for a future Runes Season.

Above is all the information about the Runes ecosystem and outstanding projects, hopefully it can help you in your research process.