How a joke Twitter thread took on a life of its own and changed my life

I’m a digital artist who has been struggling to sell my artwork in the current bear market. With the NFT space feeling quite dead this year, I decided now was the perfect time to experiment and have some fun without worrying about hype or profits.
I started doing these digital performance art projects using the new AI tools like Midjourney, Stable Diffusion and DALL-E. I would take artists’ work with their permission and remix it using AI, posting the results for free just for people to enjoy. The response was great, and it got me thinking about how I could use these experiments to get more eyes on my actual artwork that wasn’t selling.
That’s when I had the idea to turn to AI to create the next great meme coin. I jokingly tweeted that I gave GPT-3 a budget of $69 and told it to make me a successful new meme coin. I said I would follow all its instructions no matter how crazy they sounded and document the process for everyone to follow along.
At first it seemed absolutely absurd, but I thought why not just go for it and see what happens? The worst that could happen is I’m out $69 and waste a day or two. And at best, I might get some engagement on Twitter.
Little did I know what I was about to get myself into!

Coming Up With the Concept

The AI assistant (who I named Claude) first told me to come up with a unique, catchy name and fun backstory. It suggested things like AstroCorgi, MoonLlama, and RocketRaccoon.
I put the top name suggestions up on Twitter polls and let the community weigh in. Overwhelmingly, they voted for “TurboToad”. So our meme coin had a name.
Next I needed a mascot character. I had the AI generate prompt ideas and again let the community vote. They chose “B” — a cute toad wearing steampunk goggles. We were off and running!

Creating the Tokenomics

This is where I realized the AI assistant had some outdated ideas about meme coins. It was suggesting things that worked back in 2021 but not so much now.
So I fed it some more up to date information and had it focus on community owned coins like Pepe, Wojak and Suka. It used this to come up with fair tokenomics where the majority of coins are owned by the community.
I now had a name, mascot and tokenomics. We were cruising!

Coding the Smart Contract

This was the first big challenge. The AI told me to just go learn Solidity and code it myself. As someone with zero blockchain coding experience, I knew that would take forever.
I had the AI walk me through it line by line, asking for clarification whenever I got stuck. There were so many errors! But after hours and hours of back and forth, we had a working smart contract.
I could have never done this alone. The AI was crucial for explaining concepts I didn’t understand and troubleshooting errors. We made a great team!

Launching the Token

After a successful audit and creating the website and social channels, it was time for the big launch!
Or so I thought. My first attempt failed miserably. A bot immediately bought up the tiny liquidity pool I had set up. I was out of money and ready to call it quits.
But the community rallied around me, insisting we find a way to make it work. I went back to the AI assistant and it helped me come up with a plan to crowdfund a relaunch.
50 generous people sent me contributions, some as little as $1. I airdropped them all turbo tokens based on how much they contributed. Now we could restart with a token owned by the community!

Gaining Traction

We relaunched the token and set up the social channels. Very quickly, turbo started getting traction. It was so exciting to see the community take ownership, providing liquidity and telling their friends.
Seeing the market cap hit $1 million within 48 hours blew my mind. I never imagined it would take off like this!
My relationships with other artists and creators in the crypto space were crucial. As they shared the project and vouched for me, it helped turbo pick up steam. It’s taken on a life of its own that I couldn’t control even if I wanted to!

Reflecting on the Journey

As I reflect on this wild ride, I’m filled with gratitude. Not just because the project boosted my artwork sales and could help me achieve financial goals. But because of the stories people have shared.
Backers telling me how the money they earned helped pay loans, bills, or afford new opportunities. Notes from my daughter saying how proud she is of what I’ve accomplished. Those personal connections mean the world to me.
I’m so glad I didn’t give up, even when it seemed impossible. I almost walked away so many times. But the community pulled me through, proving what’s possible when creative minds come together.
While I provided the initial spark, this project now belongs to something much bigger than myself. It’s shown me the power of imagination, persistence and community. I can’t wait to see where it goes next!
The journey to create something from nothing has been wild and rewarding beyond my dreams. If you have a crazy idea — go for it! You never know what can happen when you take that leap of faith. I’m living proof that magic is possible.