How much are pixels worth? — The blue partyhat is one of the most valuable items in Runescape.

You have probably heard of Runescape, the worlds largest free MMORPG browser game that was created by Jagex in 2001. Other than being a grand fantasy game where you can kill monsters, complete quests and level up your skills — You can also invest in an in-game store-of-value — The blue partyhat.

The Runescape developers introduced scarce tradeable items that evolved into something that could be characterized as a store-of-value (SoV), just like Bitcoin, gold, antique artifacts, and especially — Bomb token.

“I need to pull this.” Christmas crackers. Open it with a friend and receive a partyhat.

In 2001 the Runescape developers created the “2001 Christmas event” where “Christmas Crackers” would be airdropped to the ground and players could pick them up. When you pulled it with another player, then one of the players would receive a partyhat of a random color. The hats were just used for cosmetic purposes and provided no utility other than eventually becoming a display of value.

The price history (year 2003–2006) of the partyhats of Runescape. This is an old graph from https://tip.it — a Runescape hints website.

The first years, partyhats were abundant to the few thousand players, and therefore the price was low. As user count grew, so did the price and scarcity of the partyhats.

Numbers from the chart above: (“gp” is the monetary unit in Runescape)

2001 — N/A

2003 — ~5,000,000gp

2004 — ~20,000,000gp

2005 — ~60,000,000gp

2006 — ~150,000,000gp

2019 — ~18,000,000,000gp

Today the price for a blue partyhat is around 18,000,000,000gp, meaning it increased 360,000% in 16 years.

You may even buy one for 5,000$ here. About 3 months ago, a blue partyhat was worth more than 1 Bitcoin.

Does this mean that we all should buy blue partyhats because they are a good store-of-value?

No.

Partyhats are not a good store-of-value. You would have to trust Jagex, that their in-game partyhats would keep their value forever.

Shouldn’t we trust Jagex? — Well, let me introduce another supposedly discontinued Runescape holiday item.

The rubber turkey — or why centrally controlled assets are not a good store-of-value.

(see “Hyper Inflation” or “Venezuelan bolívar”)

The rubber turkey can be wielded in your hand, and you can whack other players just to annoy them with a sound effect. What an amazing utility. Price?

All-time-high: 43,000,000gp

Today: 500,000gp

The rubber turkey reward was released first in 2014, and the Runescape developers decided to release it again in 2017. Total supply of rubber turkeys were hyper inflated. Naturally, the price plummeted. It lost nearly 99% of its value.

The owners of rubber turkeys couldn’t trust in rubber turkeys any longer.

This is one of the reasons why decentralized blockchain technology is useful for Bitcoin & cryptocurrencies like Bomb token. It has no central point of failure, and is resistant to control.

Most importantly — Bitcoin is resistant to hyper inflation. But let me show you the opposite — Have you ever heard of hyper deflation?

May I present to you:

Bomb Token — The first self destructing currency. A social experiment and economic case-study.

1% of the BOMB in a transaction is destroyed with each transaction made. It is described as a decentralized hedge against inflationary instruments.

I will call Bomb Token a digital collectable — A store-of-value. However it has not proven itself through the test of time like Gold and Bitcoin, I believe Bomb Token has strong fundamentals it its tokenomics and community to become a safe haven asset. Let time decide.

If I call BOMB a decentralized and hyperdeflationary blue partyhat — Do you get my drift?

From abundant to scarce - It makes a big difference.

Bomb token is almost like a blue partyhat, but decentralized and hyperdeflationary.

For legal reasons: This is not investment advice. This is my personal opinion.

Become a guinea pig in the Bomb token experiment.

What makes a good store-of-value in your opinion? I would like to hear what you think.

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If you enjoyed this piece, you may send BOMB, ETH or any ERC-20 token to this address: 0x0948db56e3daecD5276Ad6E17D7fA50595949A38

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Thank you.