The emergence of Bitcoin NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) Quantum Cats has allowed for dynamic changes in Bitcoin inscriptions, which seems to herald a new era of Bitcoin NFTs.
Previous Summary:
Bitcoin NFT trading is hot! Weekly Ordinals sales volume ranks second only to Ethereum.
Background Supplement:
Report: How did Bitcoin inscriptions and BRC-20 explode? The origin of that crazy week.
Table of Contents:
The changes of “Quantum Cats” – Recursion + Pre-signed transactions
The changes of Pizza Ninjas – Recursion + Sat Endpoint
Conclusion: The grassroots era of Bitcoin NFTs has changed.
Narrative scarcity
Technical innovation
Quantum Cats, a series of NFTs soon to be released by the Taproot Wizards team, has attracted much attention in the Bitcoin NFT ecosystem.
Quantum Cats
Setting aside the powerful influence of the “Wizards” in the Bitcoin NFT ecosystem and the impact of players having a greater chance of obtaining the “Wizards” whitelist, “Quantum Cats” is an interesting project.
What will “Quantum Cats” become in a year?
We know that the Bitcoin mainnet does not have smart contracts, and once an inscription is carved, its content is fixed. How does “Quantum Cats” make the inscription image continuously change? BlockBeats explores this interesting question with you. After exploring this question, we will also find that Bitcoin NFTs have entered a new era.
The changes of “Quantum Cats” – Recursion + Pre-signed transactions
The CTO of Taproot Wizards, @rot13maxi, mentioned in a tweet that the following technologies were used to achieve the dynamic changes of “Quantum Cats”:
– Recursive inscription
– Pre-signed transactions
– Symmetric encryption
– Client load management
Recursive inscription is well-known. In short, recursive inscription allows inscriptions to refer to and retrieve content from each other. Recursive inscriptions contain JavaScript code, and when viewing an inscription that includes JavaScript code in a browser, the browser executes the code in a sandbox and ultimately presents the content obtained from executing the code.
By referencing other inscriptions in the chain, it is understandable to achieve image changes. However, if the referenced content has already been chained, the referenced content is transparent, and there are no surprises anymore.
What to do? This is where pre-signed transactions come in. If the referenced content is an inscription that has not yet been chained, the displayed result will naturally be “404 Not Found”. Pre-signed transactions are used for transactions that perform the “unveiling” action, but they are not broadcasted. When the pre-signed transactions are broadcasted one day, the referenced content will appear, and the image of “Quantum Cats” will change.
Symmetric encryption is used to ensure that there is no data leakage before users see the updated image, preventing surprises from being greatly discounted. Here, it should be noted that “Quantum Cats” actually added two layers of protection.
The first layer of protection is an additional reflection. For example, backgrounds, bodies, noses, and other features are assigned as “layers”. Each “Quantum Cat” points to a JSON file, and its ID is reflected to a new short ID, which is then reflected to the inscription ID of the feature. This JSON file is called a “layer connector”. Before the “layer connector” is chained, holders can only see that they have referenced the “layer connector”, but they do not know what features will be assigned after execution.
The first layer of protection is to prevent troubles caused by direct referencing of inscriptions. Even if delayed chaining can be performed for directly referenced inscriptions to maintain confidentiality, the rarity of “Quantum Cats” features can still be calculated based on the number of references.
The second layer of protection is symmetric encryption, which is to prevent sudden increases in mining fees after the “unveiling” transaction is chained on this JSON file. If the transaction cannot be completed immediately, the code of the JSON file will be leaked before the “unveiling”. What to do? Each “layer” is symmetrically encrypted.
As for client load management, it is not directly related to achieving the dynamic changes of “Quantum Cats”, but it provides a good experience for users when browsing a bunch of “Quantum Cats”, preventing network timeouts and browser thread pool exhaustion.
Apart from the approach of “Quantum Cats”, there is also the recursion + Sat Endpoint method of Pizza Ninjas.
The changes of Pizza Ninjas – Recursion + Sat Endpoint
Sat Endpoint actually greatly enhances the functionality of recursive inscriptions. By using the Sat Endpoint functionality, re-carving can be performed on a single satoshi, and different versions of inscriptions on the satoshi can be retrieved and displayed.
If the technical innovation of “Quantum Cats” focuses more on its artistic narrative (paying tribute to OP_CAT) and artistic behavior (progressive unveiling), then Pizza Ninjas, using recursion and Sat Endpoint, aims to create breakthroughs in functionality.
Moreover, compared to smart contracts, Sat Endpoint has the advantage of “trust”. Although inscriptions are immutable, Sat Endpoint can use re-carving to allow inscriptions to be upgraded in a way permitted by the holders. The change control of smart contracts lies in the hands of the project party/developer, but on Bitcoin, the situation is completely different. It can be understood as a software releasing multiple versions, and users can choose to stay in their preferred/more stable older versions or upgrade to the latest version, because only NFT holders have the power to re-carve. Moreover, NFTs that use different versions of “smart contracts” (actually a .js file) will still remain in the same series, without splitting into multiple series like Ethereum due to contract changes.
The diagram of Pizza Ninjas illustrates this point well – developers release different versions of .js files, and holders choose (re-carve) which one to use.
What’s more, Sat Endpoint actually turns simple artworks into a token-gated programmable mini-computer, and by re-carving, it can achieve CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) of applications. The code on the inscriptions can be executed directly by viewing the inscriptions through various inscription browsers.
We have seen someone re-carve the classic game “DOOM” on Ordinals early on, and with Sat Endpoint, even more creative and imaginative possibilities can be explored on a single inscription. Taking Pizza Ninjas as an example, the team designed custom JavaScript code to provide holders with a simulator of the Nintendo classic game console SFC, and holders can re-carve SFC game ROMs into it, turning their Pizza Ninja into a game console running on Bitcoin.
With the continuous exploration of various experts in the Bitcoin ecosystem, more geeky explorations like NFT game consoles will emerge. Pizza Ninjas proposes a concept called “Art as Application (AssA)”.
Conclusion: The grassroots era of Bitcoin NFTs has changed
The numerous new features brought by the Ordinals protocol update and the influx of funds have raised the threshold for “entrepreneurship” in Bitcoin NFTs. It can be said that the era of “grassroots entrepreneurship” where you had to download the burned images yourself on the website and focus on fair and free narratives has passed. The most intuitive feeling for everyone may be that the quality of the images has improved, but upon closer inspection, there are actually two main development directions.
Narrative scarcity
The existence of inscription numbers makes the competition in the “narrative” of Bitcoin extremely fierce. For example, the appearance of Nodemonkes has squeezed the “first native 10K PFP” narrative originally belonging to Bitcoin Frogs. Rare sats and ancient sats have become standard configurations for top-notch NFT projects on Bitcoin.
Technical innovation
From the most famous “Quantum Cats” and Pizza Ninjas to the less influential Shadow Hats and Fomojis, one of the main reasons why these projects have sparked extensive discussions in the English-speaking community is that they provide new points of discussion/artistic charm/interactive fun for users through technical innovations.
Although current inscriptions still appear as images, they are actually carved with code, and what people see is the result of executing or rendering the code. This cannot be achieved by technical teams unfamiliar with Bitcoin.
Of course, human resources ultimately come down to money. It cost $66,000 just to burn 3,333 Quantum Cats, and grassroots entrepreneurs, even if they have the technical ability, are unlikely to come up with such a large sum of money to chain inscriptions.
Even so, the development of the Bitcoin NFT ecosystem is still in its early stages. The aesthetic of the development direction of “technical innovation” is somewhat “narrow and deep” – like generative art, it requires us to explore the underlying stories in detail to appreciate its deeper charm. However, it is difficult to narrate a story with direct and elegant words like generative art. Going deeper, it’s all about code, code, code, which is more limited in its appeal to non-computer enthusiasts. Providing users with easily perceptible new gameplay, like Pizza Ninjas, is what I believe is the right solution. “Quantum Cats” relies more on the high expectations of the “Wizards” for support.
In addition to these two tracks, the construction of community and culture is also a track where opportunities still exist on Bitcoin. For example, Bitcoin Puppets has been used by some players to compare with Milady.
The rapid development of Bitcoin NFTs has brought about changes in the Bitcoin NFT era. As an ordinary player, although the increasing sale prices of new Bitcoin NFT projects are becoming unbearable for me, I am still excited about the constant emergence of new things.
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