Before this, being early to niche things meant primarily winning points in a subcultural status game, now it was suddenly associated with very real material and financial consequences.

As with everything in crypto, early participants are disproportionately rewarded. There will be diminishing returns -- the 100th company to buy a CryptoPunk or Bored Ape will get a fraction of the press and attention that the first does.

“A lot of the crypto world has pushed itself into the mainstream too quickly, to the point where no native culture has been able to ferment,” Angelo says. “You can’t attach the current culture to this new one and expect it to work. We want to create something completely new.”