Disclaimer: I wanted to highlight community efforts related to token burns. However, this is not an endorsement from the SHIBA Team. For *every* project you want to support, be sure to Do Your Own Research! Such is the way of decentralized finance. |
If you join any crypto project these days, chances are that you will come with calls to “burn”. Everyone wants to burn as a way to “pump” the price. But the thing is, burn without real demand means nothing. Burning is not a silver bullet to get rich quickly.
The SHIBA team does not burn tokens. Why? Because it does not own massive ammounts of tokens to burn. The launch of SHIB was a fair one, and there are no wallets reserved for the developers. This has certain pros and cons, and one of the cons is that the team can not burn massive numbers tokens even if they wanted to.
The team has never been a fan of burning just to pump the prize. Still, there are ways to burn tokens in the ecosystem today, and we know that new ones are coming later (Read until the last part for a discussion on this).
And then we have other, bigger participants like NowPayments that burns tokens every time their service is used to buy with SHIB. (you can read about it in this article). And just recently, a service called LaborX, used to pay freelancers for work, in crypto, is hinting at the possibility of Shib burns integrated into their platform.
This trend has started a market, a place where new projects can start and where communities can organize and act as a whole. “If you build it, they will come”, they say And this is just how it happened with the unlikely appearance of market built around token burning.
In this article, we went to interview some members of the community working around SHIB burning, because, without any doubt, the ShibArmy has lead the charge regarding burns.
ShibBurn
With the idea of tracking the burns, this project, started in June 2021, launched its latest version nearly a month ago.

We approached the creator of ShibBurn with questions about the project, and had this to share with us:
I learned about SHIB in mid May 2021. After finding out that half of the liquidity had been given to Vitalik, my real interest sparked.

I found myself discussing about his burn and how, while huge, was still insuficient. So to gather more attention around burns, I created a bot to show the burns as they happened. It generated traction! and motivated many in the ShibArmy to keep the burning momentum alive.
Currently we track 3 addresses used to burn SHIB. These are merged into a database that makes us easier to show the burn information for our users to follow.
When asked about the ShibArmy, and the future of community burns, this was the answer
I personally think that it is great that many members of the community are getting involved to explore ways to burn the $SHIB supply. The more projects that exist, the faster the supply will shrink. Along with the upcoming official SHIB projects, it looks inevitable that we will burn more than just billions.
The ShibArmy is a strong and focused group with a mission. I have found lots of support from them towards ShibBurn and other burn projects. Is not common to find this level of unwavering support, and this is very impressive to me.

Community burning faces a trust challenge. I believe accountability is very important for a project to succeed. Building trust is not easy and often, using the SHIB name alone is not enough.
There are reasons to be suspicious of projects claiming to burn. Only the surface is really visible, and the trust has to be won first. “Can we expect that everyone’s intentions are good?“, he asks. And adds “we need to be aware of wolves in sheep’s clothing”
Some activities can have a serious outcome, such as directly suggesting or encouraging holders to spend their money for burns with GofundMe campaigns, or any fundraiser for that matter. Such an approach should not be considered a burn mechanism and it only gives us a bad name. It’s not even a necessity if you build good projects.
As far as transparency, honesty goes a long way. Be realistic and don’t mislead anyone. Try your best to answer questions or explain project. Own up to your mistakes and avoid weak excuses.
There is a space for services like this, that can show the effects of community burning. This is the way the community self organizes.