Crypto Terms: STEPN & beyond

Greetings! STEPN has come a long way from our humble beginnings in December of 2021. We are well on our way to accomplishing our mission of bringing Web3 to the masses. That said, it is acutely evident that many of our users are new to the crypto space and may not be familiar with the jargon used. We have compiled a list of terminologies specifically relating to the STEPN ecosystem and beyond to help you navigate the crypto world a bit better!

Glossary of Crypto Terms

Airdrop: Everyone loves a free airdrop: When digital assets (NFTs, coins, or tokens) are distributed directly into users’ crypto wallets. This is usually done by projects for various reasons such as rewarding users, token allocations, or as part of a larger marketing strategy to draw attention from the crypto ecosystem.

Burn: To burn an NFT or token is to remove it from circulation, thus “destroying” it. This is done by sending them to a “dead” wallet, which is an inaccessible wallet address, subsequently removing it from circulation.

This is usually done for multiple reasons. In the STEPN ecosystem, this has been done to reduce the circulating supply of our governance token — GMT, which should theoretically make it more scarce and consequently more valuable.

Degen: Short for “degenerate”, the term “degen” was originally used in gambling to refer to gamblers who made high-risk plays without the necessary skill or experience.

In crypto, the term has been picked up and used (often self-deprecatingly), to refer to traders who perform high-risk trades or actions — and not necessarily because they see the actual value, but capitalize on concepts like FOMO (explained below) or gambling to snag a profit.

DEX/CEX: Centralised Exchanges (CEX) refers to platforms like Binance, which people can use as a central point to trade crypto assets with others, usually via order book. A CEX is typically overseen by a centralised company that doubles up as the custodian of assets.

Decentralised Exchanges (DEX), on the other hand, perform similar functions but without a central authority. Instead, transactions are governed by smart contracts. This allows for faster and lower-cost transactions as opposed to a CEX. DEXs utilise a non-custodial structure, giving users more control over their assets.

Popular DEXs include Orca and Raydium. Just recently, STEPN has also launched our very own DEX, which you can find more about here.

Floor price: The floor of a project refers to the lowest priced NFT for sale on the marketplace.

In this example, the floor price is 3.05 SOL

FOMO — Fear Of Missing Out: A common phenomenon in everyday life, but potentially disastrous for traders. Not wanting to miss out on potentially large gains, traders may hastily or impulsively make decisions with limited knowledge about the underlying investment.

FUD — Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt: First appearing in the 1920s, the term FUD refers to strategies to sow fear, uncertainty, and doubt. This was applied in the political, marketing, and sales fields amongst others.

It is also a term that is rampant in the crypto space. FUD spreads like wildfire in the NFT world because a large number of rug pulls (scams) make it easy for people to distrust and err on the side of caution.

FUD may also be an orchestrated tactic to manipulate prices. So, instead of a good-hearted stranger warning you about a project, it may be part of a coordinated attack on a project by a group, that intends on sweeping the floor after affected holders list their NFTs for cheap.

Governance: A pillar in Web3, governance tokens empower users and investors alike with the power to make decisions. Typically, governance tokens allow holders to vote on major decisions within the ecosystem.

For instance, in STEPN, holders of GMT will be able to vote on how profits are redistributed to the community in the future. You can read more about it here.

Liquidity Pool: A liquidity pool is a pairing of 2 cryptocurrencies that are locked in a smart contract to enable fast transactions. This allows for swapping either token into the other.

Liquidity Pools typically utilise Automated Market Makers (AMMs), which are smart contracts that allow for seamless swapping of cryptocurrencies within a liquidity pool without an order book, as opposed to what you may find on a CEX/DEX.

Metaverse: The metaverse is “an integrated network of 3D virtual worlds.” People imagine that in the future, a developed metaverse would be similar to the hyper-realistic VR world in Ready Player One.

Currently, the metaverse is used as “a catchall term for technologies that point in that direction”. This can be blockchain games, virtual worlds like Decentraland and Sandbox, or even 3D art galleries.

Roadmap: A roadmap illustrates what a project intends on setting out to accomplish, by matching deliveries with deadlines. In general, roadmaps are not set in stone and are meant to give investors a rough sense of when the project intends to deliver on its promises.

Example of STEPN’s Roadmap

Royalties: Trading fees paid to the project owners and artists when a NFT is sold on a marketplace.

Seed phrase: A combination of words that grant access to a crypto wallet. This is something that should be kept extremely secure and not shared with anyone else. Think of it as a master key to your crypto wallet. It is usually made up of 12–24 different words, and is needed to be keyed in each time you access your wallet on a different device.

Tokenomics: A portmanteau of token and economics. Essentially, it serves as a blueprint to a specific token, breaking down aspects like supply, use cases, and distribution.

You can refer to STEPN’s tokenomics here. We have also previously written an article breaking down our tokenomics here.

Web3: The latest iteration of the internet, Web3 intends on giving users full control of their own data, as opposed to Web 2.0 where user data is primarily controlled and owned by large tech companies. If fully realised, this version of the internet aims to integrate Artificial Intelligence (aka Machine Learning), allowing data to be shared and integrated across platforms, and aims to give users full control of their data by leveraging decentralised networks via blockchain.

Whale: In crypto terms, a whale is a crypto investor that holds a large amount of cryptocurrency or many NFTs of a specific crypto project.

Some whales may have such massive holdings that they can single-handedly manipulate markets.

Whitepaper: A project’s whitepaper serves to outline what a project is about. This includes detailing what the project is about, tokenomics, and other relevant information.

STEPN’s whitepaper can be found here, where we explicitly break down our project and game mechanics for users both new and old.

Conclusion

We hope that reading this listicle will give you a deeper insight into these terms you see floating around on Twitter and Discord. Let us know if we missed anything! If you like what we have done, drop a comment and if the response is resounding, we will consider expanding the glossary beyond the STEPN Ecosystem. STEPN On!