Bitcoin will be fine with Monkey JPEGs, says creator of NFT protocol

Some hardcore Bitcoiners are up in arms over the prospect of ubiquitous internet memes like pixelated cats and smoking monkeys clogging up the blockchain.

Casey Rodarmor, the creator of the recently introduced NFT protocol called Ordinals that is at the center of the angst, says not to worry. He sees inscriptions, or the newfangled non-fungible tokens, giving the oldest blockchain a new use that could increase its utility. Opponents argue that they will crowd out regular transactions with high fees due to the large amounts of data required to inscribe the digital images, GIFs and representations, undermining Bitcoin’s original mission as a peer-to-peer payment network.

Until recently, NFT collections such as Bored Apes and CryptoPunks were primarily based on Ethereum and served as a catalyst that helped make that platform the world’s most commercially important blockchain. The seven-day average number of transactions on the network has reached its highest since February 2021, according to CryptoCompare. Tens of thousands of NFT-like inscriptions have been created since the protocol’s launch in late January, believed to still pale in comparison to the 1.38 million NFTs minted on Ethereum in January, according to blockchain data firm Nansen.

The jump in activity on the Bitcoin network comes amid a dramatic 50% rally by the biggest cryptocurrency since the start of the year that has renewed focus on the token after an epic price collapse in 2022.

Bitcoin and generative art have long been among Rodarmor’s favorite activities. The Emeryville, Calif.-based programmer, who runs a monthly meetup for Bitcoin developers in the San Francisco region, has dabbled in generative imagery for live music as well as the exclusive art market on Ethereum.

“I wouldn’t describe myself as an artist, but I’ve made a lot of generative digital art, sort of like programmer art,” the 39-year-old Rodarmor said in an interview.

After several years of meandering through community college, the high school dropout transferred to the University of California, Berkeley and graduated in 2009. He worked at Google as a software engineer for over two years and had a few stints at crypto firms before starting work with the Ordinals project in January 2022.

Rodarmor came across Bitcoin and its explanatory “white paper” in 2013 while working at Google. “I like things that take power away from government,” he said. “I was very excited that it had a chance to work, a chance to create better money that benefits everyone.”

Like many Bitcoin purists, Rodarmor champions the cryptocurrency as a path to financial freedom. This sentiment has led so-called maximalists to embrace the principle that no alternative can compete with Bitcoin as a secure, permissionless network.

Although the network is highly secure, it may not be as scalable as other blockchains such as Ethereum, which is also home to the largest decentralized exchanges.

“So I basically decided that I can create Ethereum NFTs, but I wouldn’t feel comfortable telling anyone to buy them because of security issues and centralization,” Rodarmor said. “I was fine, I guess I’ll have to figure out a way to do NFTs on Bitcoin if I want to make some JPEGs for people to buy.”

Ordinals are an abbreviation for ordinal numbers, which express the position of an object. In short, the protocol allows users to send and receive rate – the smallest unit of measurement of Bitcoin registered on the blockchain – which carries optional extra data in ordinary progression, Rodarmor explained in a podcast interview.

The Ordinals protocol would not have been possible without Bitcoin’s previous technical upgrades such as SegWit and Taproot. They have effectively made it possible to store large amounts of non-financial data on the blockchain.

The collection on Bitcoin so far includes a series of Bored Ape JPEGs, as well as inscriptions of Donald Trump and fallen crypto boss Sam Bankman-Fried.

Ironically, some of the first NFTs on Bitcoin are images that have been popular on Ethereum, including Ether rocks, Bored Apes and Nyan Cat, an animated flying cat with a pop-tart body, which sold for nearly $600,000 in 2021 .

As Bitcoin NFTs gain momentum, Rodarmor is considering whether to build a platform where people can exchange NFTs for Bitcoin directly on the blockchain – a decentralized marketplace for the inscriptions. For now, the developer and his team, including a few interns he met on Twitter, are trying to make sure there are no software bugs and that people can use the code. All of the Ordinal NFT trades appear to take place over the Discord and Telegram messaging services, Rodarmor said.

“We’re going to implement trustless offerings, which allow people to exchange Bitcoin for inscriptions, and I think that’s what people really want,” he said.

Ordinals have become a full-time job for Rodarmor, although he hasn’t made a profit from the protocol yet. In the meantime, he is accepting donations. Rodarmor is also thinking about how to make it easier for those who contribute to the protocol to accept donations and get paid.

“Although we don’t have official support from the collections yet, people are already making the inscriptions,” he said.