Mad Mint: How The Mad Lads Broke The Internet
Mad Mint: How The Mad Lads Broke The Internet
The Mad Lads NFT launch was plagued with extortion demands, DDOS attacks, RPC node failures and attempted smart contract exploits. Five months later we look back at everything that transpired.
The Mad Lads 4/20 launch was plagued with extortion demands, DDOS attacks, RPC node failures and attempted smart contract exploits - all of which caused delays.
In spite of these challenges the Mad Lads team emerged victorious but it could have turned out much differently.
Take a step back in time as we examine the days leading up to mint, highlight the delays caused by devious dogs bad actors and remember how a team came together to pull off one of the biggest mints in Solana history.
Madlist claims went live on February 28th
Fans of the Mad Lads battled to get Madlisted (read: whitelisted) for months leading up to the claim announcement.
The claim process was supremely smooth and hype around the project reached a new pinnacle.
All was going according to plan… so far.
Mint details were announced on April 11th
Some funny business was foreshadowed when the Mad Lads announced that they were minting a rug on 4/20 for 6.9 SOL. To date it remains one of the most popular posts that the team has ever released.
At the time, nobody could have guessed the scope of the skullduggery that would take place on mint day.
Madlist and Public mint info was released on April 18th
Mint times were released along with a sneak peak at what would end up becoming a powerhouse trait of the collection.
Madlist mint: 7PM EST on 4/19
Public mint: 7PM EST on 4/20
Madlist mint goes live on April 19th
The day finally arrives for the Madlist mint and it was deployed without incident.
The next day was not so smooth.
Jakey streamed his mint and demonstrated just how quick and easy the process was.
In many ways the Mad Lads mint experience was designed to show off the power of Backpack and xNFTs.
Thousands of rugs were minted by Madlist holders leaving around 6,000 Rugs for the Public mint.
Seriously, they minted a rug.
The public mint was scheduled for the next day, April 20th
Vibes were at an all time high and the Mad Lads have more eyes on them than ever.
Cue the DDOS attack.
It’s important to note that the Backpack team had been receiving threats of attack and attempted extortion leading up to the mint.
Ferrante said he began receiving Telegram messages from an unknown party who attempted to extort Coral, claiming that they could “take down” Coral’s Backpack app and botch the drop.
This is when the team kicked off a series of delays (three to be exact).
After careful consideration the mint was officially postponed until the next day.
So much for the #420blazeit vibes.
Armani Ferrante was quick to own the situation and acknowledge everything that had occurred over the previous twenty four hours - an eventful day to say the least.
The Mad Lads community had yet to fully form however public sentiment showed (almost) nothing but support for the team.
Attempt #2 is planned for April 21st
“What doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger” was the theme on April 21st and the Mad Lads team came out with guns blazing in the next announcement.
It was Day 3 of the mint saga and the stakes were high.
The Mad Lads team anticipated a renewed attack so they laid a trap.
Two updates were sent to the minting app. One that was legit and one that could only be found if you were a devious dog bad actor poking around in the code.
Needless to say the plan worked and $250K was netted from the bad actor botters.
In true Mad Lad fashion they returned the SOL trapped in the honeypot within 24hrs.
The rest of the mint played out swimmingly and 6000+ NFTs were minted in the public phase.
All told there were 7879 unique holders before the artwork was ever revealed.
The artwork reveal occurred about two hours after the mint closed
The team flexed xNFT capabilities with the artwork reveal using a gamified approach.
Collectively, holders were instructed to attack the Mad King until his XP ran out.
It was a literal video game.
Watch Jakey battle the Mad King and claim his Mad Lads
Once the Mad King was defeated holders were able to see their artwork for the first time.
History writes itself after the artwork reveal
The Mad Lads collection broke trading volume records on Solana and disrupted the Ethereum market for weeks.
Within 24hrs the Mad Lads flipped all collections on Solana as well as Ethereum.
24H NFT SALES VOLUME IS LARGER THAN THOSE OF THE NEXT 9 COLLECTIONS COMBINED
The trend continued over the next week.
This volume was fueled by monumental Skull and Lassie sales.
Skulls and Lassies remain the most highly sought after traits in the collection.
The Mad Lads pulled off one of the biggest mints in Solana history
The Mad Lads team pulled themselves through the proverbial fire to ensure that their launch succeeded no matter what challenges they were presented.
This set a precedent and established the foundation for the “fock it” mentality.
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Mad Mint: How The Mad Lads Broke The Internet
yay fockit!