Interview with GMGN United Chuang Haze "Chicken Brother": Stay sharp and focus on long-termism with the team

Interview: Tian Daxia, Ru7; Written by: Tian Daxia

In the world of blockchain, the wind is rising and falling like a tide, speculators are flocking to it, and hot money flows like a tide , creating the myth of getting rich overnight, and also burying countless dreams.

Some people are obsessed with short-term arbitrage and pursue the next wave of trends; some people choose to be patient and find long-term value in the hustle and bustle. Haze, co-founder of GMGN, wants to be the latter.

Haze, who is known as "Brother Chicken" in the world, is born in the 1985s. Compared with a group of post-00s entrepreneurs in the Web3 industry, he is more calm and sophisticated. Haze grew up in this hot land of Hunan. The water of the Xiangjiang River gave him the unique resilience and vitality of Hunan children, and also gave him a keen sense of opportunity.

Today, let’s write the story of Haze “Brother Chicken” and GMGN.

 Brother Ji himself doesn\'t want to post photos, and comes with a Twitter avatar (X: @haze0x)

No matter how big the world is, there is a "9-to-5" journey

Before starting a business to become GMGN, Ji Ge lived a standard nine-to-five life like most people. He said he didn't have any lofty ideals at that time, nor was he a technical genius, but just wanted to make money.

"At that time, I felt that work was just about getting a salary after finishing my work, and life was like this."

Around the end of 2017, by chance, he saw reports about Bitcoin in the news. Although he didn't know the specific uses of Bitcoin at that time, he intuitively thought it was an opportunity worth trying.

In 2018, he also joined a quantitative trading company that does grid transactions due to his interest and began to systematically learn the knowledge of blockchain and quantitative trading. This experience gave him a deeper understanding of the blockchain industry and laid the foundation for his later entrepreneurship.

The time came to June 2023. The Meme Coin market did not explode at that time. It was just that when Brother Chicken traded on Ethereum, he observed the development trend of Meme Coin.

So there is GMGN.Ai, a platform focusing on Meme token tracking and analysis.

Brother Ji explained that the name GMGN is taken from the abbreviation of "Good Morning and Good Night", which means that the team hopes to provide users with all-weather services.

PvP culture created by Meme

At that time, Meme Coin had not yet become the mainstream of this cycle, and many people even thought that this was just a "flash-of-the-pan" hype, but Brother Ji's views were completely different.

In his opinion, Bitcoin was originally a peer-to-peer cash payment system, USDT became the mainstream tool for cross-border payments, and Ethereum opened a new era of asset issuance. Meme Coin can be seen as an upgrade of blockchain asset issuance efficiency.

"It is low-cost, high-efficiency, and can quickly issue assets in combination with hot spots and emotions. This is not only a sector of blockchain, but also the ultimate embodiment of asset issuance methods."

Brother Ji said that the VC coins and application coins speculation in the last cycle have been falsified by the market, and new investment thinking and user groups are emerging. Young users are not very interested in the hype logic of traditional "fundamental analysis", but instead pay more attention to community resonance and entertainment value.

It is this entertainment value that has created the PvP culture of this cycle.

"Correspondence PvP culture" refers to a competition and game phenomenon in the cryptocurrency circle with "Player versus Player" (PvP) as the core. This culture is mainly reflected in the fact that participants compete with each other through transactions, hype, project competition, etc.

Because this culture has also derived nouns like "P-P" that are widely used in Chinese communities, which usually refer to small investors or high-frequency players who are active in on-chain transactions (especially meme coins or small-cap tokens).

Brother Ji thinks that the new trading tools may make Meme Coin's chip structure more transparent and fair, and the trading experience is better.

By analyzing the changes in market sentiment, infrastructure, and user groups, Ji Ge had predicted the possible explosion of the Meme Coin market at that time, and GMGN was born to meet these pain points.

In 2024, with the full explosion of the Meme Coin market, GMGN quickly won widespread favor in the market with its efficient and stable trading functions and user-friendly design.

Many users successfully participated in the early Meme Coin project through GMGN and received generous returns, which has become the focus of the industry.

Pretend to be E and forced to come out to build a community

Don’t you see that Brother Ji is usually active on Twitter like an E person, but he is a pure I person. The team needs to operate and speak out. He joked that he must "pretend" that is cool and "E-super" comes out to market.

His MBTI is INTJ-A, rational, independent, strategic thinking, and full of execution, but the E-person element is also forced out.

Brother Ji admitted: " When the team was having a dinner, we basically didn't speak. Most of our company was technical before, and it was very quiet without drinking, and it felt awkward to speak."

As we all know, the atmosphere in Meme Coin is extremely important, and Brother Ji has gradually found some methods that suit him.

In April and May, after GMGN went online, Ji Ge said that he had conducted some promotions on Twitter, and the user feedback kanban function was very practical. Through this function, they can deeply explore smart money addresses, analyze the operations of large holding investors, and conduct address analysis and data analysis.

During this stage, GMGN gradually accumulated a group of seed users. With these users, the updates and iterations of products are closer to actual needs.

Brother Ji said that what really made GMGN popular on a large scale was the "rat warehouse" function. This feature is inspired by user feedback and our direct observations.

“On-chain asset data is so transparent that we think this transparency should be better utilized.”

I read "The Art of War" and the product manager read "Tao Te Ching"

Some people think that GMGN should raise funds crazily and become bigger and stronger when it is the hottest. GMGN obviously chose the completely opposite path.

Brother Ji admitted that the team's goal is not to quickly accumulate capital and cash out and leave the scene, but to improve products around core users and control the scale of manpower and product boundaries. He emphasized that if the goal is to step on the hit and quickly arbitrage, then it should indeed raise the valuation, financing, and issuance of platform coins at a high point.

" The core values ​​of our team are consistent, and everyone believes that making things is more important than making money. We encourage team members to continue to learn and grow, such as product managers who read Lao Tzu's "Tao Te Ching" and share their experiences at weekly meetings. We pay more attention to members' self-growth and cognitive iteration rather than short-term economic benefits."

He himself was addicted to "The Art of War" and figured out how to win by surprise. But he also quipped on social platforms: "Our product managers often take advantage of me! He likes to read 'I'm a 'Grand', and I read 'Grandson'."

GMGN attaches importance to community opinions and user questions and feedback.

"If any user has misunderstandings about us and is relatively close, I will fly over and communicate face to face."

He mentioned that an overseas user recently raised questions about GMGN. It happened that the user was playing in Hong Kong. He immediately flew to Hong Kong and chatted with the other party for several hours. Such communication can be seen as a two-way trip, users understand GMGN better, and also allow product evolution to resonate with user needs.

"I think it's very important to go deep into the front line. User feedback can not only enhance my awareness, but also help us improve our products."

Brother Ji admitted that they also pay attention to security plans. In his opinion, the blockchain industry is changing too quickly and attack methods are emerging one after another. Instead of presuming imaginary enemies, it is better to maintain the ability to respond flexibly.

“We don’t spend too much effort on assuming who the opponent is, but instead focus on how to respond quickly and solve problems.”

This "treat moves" strategy is not only reflected in security, but also runs through the entire product development process of GMGN.

He stressed that the team's core goal is always to improve infrastructure and product functions. The infrastructure should be more stable, silkier and faster, and the product functions should be continuously improved according to user needs.

The work and life of young players entrepreneurs

As an entrepreneur, Ji Ge said that there is no clear boundary between his life and work.

"Work and life are gradually integrated," he said. Although he will try to take time to spend with his children on weekends, he does not think that work and life need to be completely separated.

He said that when he was in his twenties, his definition of himself was still very vague and he just wanted to show his strength at work and pursue user operations and user growth. The goal at that time was very simple - to make money.

But now, the biggest change is that the definition of oneself is clearer. No longer just focus on money, but focus more on getting things done. It is difficult to get rich quickly and do things at the same time, and he prefers to choose the latter.

"I have no partial fortune, and all my achievements have to be accumulated a little by little. So, I will constantly redefine myself and confirm what I am doing."

I joked about him when he would retire, and he mentioned that their product manager was older than him, but it seemed that everyone was ready to continue working.

"As long as I still have ideas and passion, I will continue to work. Age is not a limitation, thinking and cognition are the key."

Although Brother Ji is born in the 1985s, he is also a rap enthusiast. From Eminem to Kendrick Lamar and Trap to Memphis Rap, we can see why he can be integrated into the circle of P young players born in the 2000s. Because of his young mentality, this tolerance and love for multiculturalism has also subtly influenced his understanding of products and innovation.

For GMGN's future, his goal is very clear - to continue to deepen on-chain transactions and achieve the ultimate goal. He firmly believes that the team will not blindly expand its business, but will focus on the tracks that they are best at and polish every detail to perfection.

He said: "Rap makes me feel sharp at all times, and do things with the team, and we also want to stay sharp."

In music, he pursues breaking boundaries and releasing passion; while in the development of GMGN, he shows strong rationality and leaps. This seemingly contradictory trait is perfectly integrated in him, creating an image that is both interesting and reliable.

"Meme Operating Guide from 0 to 10 million US dollars"

Previously, GMGN joined hands with several well-known KOL bloggers - including @0xcryptowizard, @CryptoDevinL, @BTCdayu, @0xSunNFT, @hexiecs, @corleonefnf, @Unipioneer and @yuyue_chris - to jointly complete a "Meme Operating Guide from 0 to 10 million US dollars".

This guide not only embodies the professional experience of the GMGN team, but also brings together the practical experience of many industry celebrities. It can be called the "encyclopedia" in the field of Meme Coin.

Nowadays, GMGN is gradually emerging in the blockchain industry, and Ji Ge has also grown steadily from an ordinary entrepreneur to a highly-watched figure in the industry. In his opinion, the world of blockchain has just begun, and there are countless possibilities waiting to be explored in the future.

For Haze, blockchain is not just a career, but also a belief. He believes that through technological advancement and the joint efforts of the community, blockchain will eventually change the way the world works.

And he and GMGN are willing to play a long-term value creator rather than a short-term speculator in this change.

As he often said, "It is just in the wind at the moment, and we still need to be cautious and do things well."