Friend.tech, a social platform that allows holders to buy shares of people who hold an account on X (formerly known as Twitter), has seen a surge in users since its Aug. 10 launch. According to a database created by Yearn Finance developer @Bantg, the platform has grown to more than 100,000 addresses. This growth correlates with the huge revenues made by the platform since its launch, with over $25 million in fees generated, according to DefiLlama. A Dune Analytics dashboard corroborates the finding, pegging the number of unique users to at least 80,000, with 15,000 users added since Sunday.
The platform has attracted a slew of personalities outside of crypto circles on X, such as Richard “FaZe Banks” Bengtson II, co-founder of the influential esports community FaZe Clan, and NBA player Grayson Allen. The shares grant the holders privileges, such as the ability to send private messages to the sellers.
The GitHub repository has created concerns about users viewing blockchain transactions linked to these wallets, but some developers suggest that the wallet addresses going public doesn’t matter and isn’t an immediate cause of worry. “For most tech-savvy users it was obvious that Twitter and deposit addresses can be linked,” said @AlexSmirnov. “I think friend.tech should have made it more explicit and notified users that their deposit address will become public and will be traced by their Twitter profile.”
Friend.tech has made over $1.04 million in fees, set at 5% of the value of each transaction over the past 24 hours. That’s banked the platform some $709,000 worth of Ether in revenue (what the platform takes after paying out gas fees and other costs), data from DefiLlama shows.