As friends with benefits burst into crypto awareness in 2020, it was the kind of Fomo-inducing project that immediately made people talk. With a blink flash, sexy name and members including musicians Erykah Badu and Azealia Banks, it was a club that many wanted to be a part of.
By coming at a time when everyone was locked down and hanker for connection, it filled a void and showed that crypto could bring people together for real. About 6,000 bought into the token (became members) and chapters sprouted worldwide and centered on hipster-tech node like LA and NYC.
The New York Times, as it tends to do with crypto, gently spotted the idea. A 2022 profile opened with an anecdote about members developing an “flavored, sparkling Yerba Maté” with a coffee company. “It makes your soda $ 6 instead of $ 2,” a member said. The inference was clear: This was crypto children with ideas, disposable income, lots of time on their hands and not much to show for it.
Still, the New York Times hit what was definitely new at FWB. It called the group – which was mostly formed on Discord – a “decentralized soho house” and “A VIP Lounge to Crypto’s creative class.” It was to tokenize a society (with a DAO) in a way that proved that you could create something valuable IRL as much as online. New said the group had raised $ 10 million from investors and that after a financing round it was led by Andreessen Horowitz valued at $ 100 million.
It wasn’t clear what FWB did exactly. Of course, it was good to organize cool events all over the world. It was good at building society, generating Fomo through the media and increasing its token price. But after that? TBD.
“The original model was just a group chat with a symbol.
Frop until 2025, after FTX and crash, FWB looks like a more serious clothing. Today, it is focused on building products that people actually want to use and have hope of expanding web3 in addition to specialized financial products. Smaller Yerba Maté, more in-Weeds innovation in music, film and culture.
“This is a good bending point for the industry. We have the opportunity to encourage a new wave of builders to the room. Making this vision and pie bigger is incredibly important,” Bresnitz said. “We have done really well in the physical world. Now we focus on the revitalization of the online world and bring back this value back.”
This week, FWB announced friends with Builders, a cohort -based construction program collaborated with AWS, Alchemy, Thirdweb, Quicknode, Akave, Filecoin, Base, World and several others. The idea is to invite creative technologists to work collectively quarter after quarter on projects at the beginning of phase using tools provided by the partners. The first cohort (application deadline: April 28) will be focused on developing products around AI agents.
Bresnitz emphasizes that friends with builders are certainly not a hackathon.
“The general model of Hackathon doesn’t work. You get eight hours at a conference, 48 hours to build it and then get prize money. It only speaks to a particular type of builder who can work intensively over 48 hours,” Bresnitz said.
With friends with builders, the reward is the developed product, not the award and gong, awarded by Hackathon organizers. It is also focused on products where the web 3 technology is under the hood, rather than the thing itself.
“Someone could come in and build the 700th defi platform and we won’t stop them. They can totally can. It’s great. But for me personally it’s that the industry needs to bundle all this up to something that feels perfectly normal,” Bresnitz said.
He points to projects such as Blackbird, Restaurant Loyalty app, as an example of the type of product friends with builders want to incubate. Blackbird is useful and has mainstream appeal, and the crypto element (it has a cryptocurrency called fly) is emphasized. The point is of use, not that it is crypto.
“We need a new type of person in this room,” said Bresnitz. “The person from FWB has always been creative technologist. These are people who understand what people want and they are looking for technology to support it. It’s different from what we see often [in crypto]which is ‘we built a hammer that is also a screwdriver, who wants it?’ “
Bresnitz claims that Crypto has created good tool infrastructure for builders. Now it must develop products that emphasize the technology. Builders in his program will have access to founders in the partner groups via Discord and Meetups. They receive developer credits and are able to press extensive Devrel (developer support).
Friends with builders drive in quarters 1, 2 and 4th quarter 3 will be back to FWB’s annual party collection in California, where the builders show their work. Last year, Base, a key FWB partner, held its annual gathering, base camp, in the same place (near Idyllwild) shortly before party began.
As a pilot for the new program, FWB recently organized a cohort with World (formerly Worldcoin). FWB/World received 140 applications and the participating builders created 40 new mini-apps. The builders flew to Buenos Aires to attend Crecimiento, and now some will attend a demo day in New York on May 21. Two of these projects already have a sheet from investors.
Bresnitz is a strong spokesman for his initiative. But he also shows a humility to crypto that is not always clear in conversations with other founders. He believes web3 has not yet shown what it can really do for the world.
“We haven’t broken the code yet. This is about me saying” Can we try something else? “
