2023 In Review: A Year Of Making The Impossible Possible
Follow the Backpack and Mad Lads journey as they build through a harsh crypto winter and come out on the other side as one of the most prominent platforms in the industry.
2023 began with a whimper and ended with a bang.
The Solana community was entrenched in a harsh crypto winter while the future of crypto was decidedly uncertain.
Backpack was just beginning to develop its identity, Mad Lads did not exist and the prospect of launching an Exchange was outside the realm of consideration.
Backpack Wallet and xNFT development began in March 2022, artwork for the yet-to-be-named Mad Lads collection started in September 2022 and the team solidified their presence with a keynote speech at Breakpoint in November 2022.
Within days of Breakpoint the entire crypto industry was rocked by the collapse of FTX and the ensuing chaos that sent markets into a tailspin.
Over the next year the Backpack team continued to ship wallet improvements, add functionality and eventually launched their cultural arm in the form of the Mad Lads NFT collection.
Mad News launched in 2023 to deliver curated snapshots of Mad Lads and Backpack project updates, community highlights and interviews with Solana builders.
Today we take a look back at Mad News history to highlight how far we have come.
June 📅
Armani Ferrante announces Soul Abstraction and xNFT inventory
Meltem Demirrors and Anatoly Yakovenko are Honorary Mad Lads
July 📅
August 📅
September 📅
October 📅
November 📅
Mad News expanded language channels: Vietnamese, Chinese and Turkish
Backpack Exchange opens doors to users for first time (100,000+ signups)
December 📅
Onboarding of Ethereum maxis continues via Mad Lads collection
Community organized Lads Raid group is major force on Twitter
Collection locking expands again to include more bluechip projects
Backpack Wallet integrates real time token prices with Birdeye
Tristan Yver and Armani Ferrante open up to the Japanese crypto community
Armani Ferrante talks about building a CEX on the Solfate Podcast
Mad Lads holders receive early access to SolanaFM Quantum tool
Subscribe to the Mad News to stay up to date on everything that happens in the Mad Lads and Backpack world!