Targeting the Next Bull Market Opportunity: Ordinals Ecosystem

Gita1999

"""Exploring the Ordinals Ecosystem: Targeting the Next Bull Market Opportunity""

Bitcoin was the first cryptocurrency project, designed to create a secure, decentralized, and censorship-resistant network. It has earned widespread trust among the public and has become the most significant blockchain project. However, Bitcoin's base layer is straightforward, which has made it highly secure, decentralized, and resistant to censorship but lacking in additional functionality. To this day, the primary function of the Bitcoin blockchain network remains value transfer. In contrast, other types of blockchains like Ethereum and Solana offer more diverse ecosystems.

Until the release of the Ordinals protocol, creating NFTs on the Bitcoin blockchain was impossible, gradually breaking the status quo of Bitcoin's scalability limitations. It immediately caught the public's attention, and the innovation of BRC20 tokens expanded the possibilities and imagination for Bitcoin. Since the protocol's launch, over 27 million Ordinals have been recorded, and Bitcoin's price has risen as users seek trading platforms to invest in the latest digital assets introduced in the crypto world. On August 31st, Binance Mining Pool also officially launched Ordinals engraving services, allowing users to register ""sats"" and store ownership records, among other features.

So, what is the Ordinals protocol, and what developments have occurred in the past six months? Why are major institutions starting to focus on Bitcoin Ordinals? Are there any value participation opportunities, and how can one get involved? This article aims to comprehensively explore the Bitcoin Ordinals ecosystem.

Origins of Ordinals: Bitcoin NFTs

In the current blockchain network, NFTs are primarily minted and verified through tokenization standards built on blockchain protocols (e.g., ERC-721 on Ethereum) and traded on centralized markets like OpenSea, Rarible, and Nifty Gateway. Transactions that meet these standards require wallets that support them, but they are affected by network congestion speed and costs and are inherently sensitive to third-party risks due to their reliance on centralized markets. However, is there a way to directly mint, buy, and sell NFTs on the base layer of a blockchain and imprint them on its smallest currency unit?

The non-Turing completeness of the Bitcoin network means it does not support smart contracts, making it impossible to issue NFTs through contracts. Rodarmor's solution was to engrave NFTs onto BTC. Since Bitcoin has a limited total supply of 21 million coins and a high price, it has the smallest unit called a ""satoshi"" (sat), where 1 Bitcoin can be divided into 100 million sats. Rodarmor's idea was: could they arrange these ""sats"" in a certain order, assign them a sequence number between 0 and 2,100,000,000,000,000, and then connect them to other information like images, text, videos, or even a piece of code? This would make each ""sat"" unique and irreplaceable, akin to NFTs. This would essentially give Bitcoin the native ability to create NFTs. Rodarmor wanted to create a system to number the ""sats"" and assign each one a unique serial number (Ordinal), resulting in integers from 1 to 100 million, with each number representing a ""satoshi"" of Bitcoin that cannot be further divided. This unique identifier would allow users to track every ""sat"" on the blockchain. Rodarmor hoped to achieve this in a thoroughly Bitcoin-native way, without using sidechains or separate tokens.

In early 2023, Rodarmor unveiled the NFT protocol Ordinals on the Bitcoin mainnet. It allows the identification and tracking of each individual ""sat"" (satoshis) based on their order of minting in both time and space. The protocol enables unparalleled on-chain asset verification, ensuring that the ordinal number remains unchanged when someone transfers from one wallet to another. Ordinals also allow the engraving of various types of content, including images, text, videos, music, and more, onto individual ""sats"" on the Bitcoin network.

Since its launch, Ordinals has sparked a renaissance in discussions about Bitcoin NFTs. Trading volume has exploded, and new markets for Ordinal NFTs have sprung up like mushrooms. According to the latest data from Dune Analytics, the cumulative minting volume for Bitcoin NFT protocol Ordinals has reached 27,819,966, with a total fee generated of 1,949 BTC.