FAKEBTCTKVR: Rare Magazine, Now Exclusively Available on Scarce.City

FAKEBTCTKVR is a collaboration between two of today’s hottest trends in Bitcoin: the BTCTKVR magazine and Rare Scrilla’s frog-centric collection of Fake Rares. At core, it’s the 2nd edition of this year’s BTCTKVR magazine with a designer cover. And it’s a limited-edition collector’s item that you can exclusively acquire on Scarce City. But there’s definitely more to the picture than meets the eye.

You see, the Fake Rare project exists on Bitcoin’s Counterparty protocol as an initiative which rejuvenates the Rare Pepe collection. Some entries are remixes of classics, but most of them are entirely original creations by new artists who never got to become Pepe scientists. Every entry from the Fake Rare collection is backed 1:1 by a FAKEASF card – basically, in order to submit new art to the directory you need to destroy one of the 2000 FAKEASF tokens.

This method guarantees that the Fake Rare collection will never have more than 2000 entries. Also, it’s a way to make artists think twice before submitting a new creation, as there’s a monetary cost involved – as of April 2022, one FAKEASF card costs as much as 0.035 BTC.

Now let’s get back to the collaboration between Rare Scrilla and the BTCTKVR magazine. Every print is backed 1:1 by a FAKEBTCTKVR Counterparty token. So when you buy the magazine from the Scarce.City listing, you get much more than the magazine in the picture – you receive an NFT which is part of a soon-to-become historic collection.

Think of Fake Rares as a contemporary adaptation of Rare Pepes which gives artists the chance to create new contexts and situations in which the beloved grinning frog character can be positioned. The original Rare Pepe directory certainly didn’t have a depiction of Pepe reading a BTCTKVR magazine – but one of the 2000 Fake Rares definitely has it.

The magazine cover is a special art piece by Rare Scrilla, one of the most prolific graphic artists and musicians in the Bitcoin space. So if you’re a fan of Scrilla, then you should already be well-acquainted with the Fake Rare movement – so you understand the unique value proposition of the FAKEBTCTKVR collaboration. But if you don’t know who Scrilla is, then you should start by listening to S10 E11 of the Bitcoin Takeover podcast to learn more about his work – you will soon discover that his DJPEPE cards (of which only 169 exist) get regularly sold for 0.2 BTC a piece. This doesn’t necessarily mean that FAKEBTCTKVR will become a lot more valuable in time, but it’s an indication that Scrilla’s work is highly valued on collector markets.

Furthermore, there’s more to the magazine than the cover: you get articles about mining, running your full node on a Raspberry Pi 4, understanding the nuances of decentralization, protecting your privacy while using the internet, building your own hardware wallet, as well as thought pieces on cypherpunk culture and video games that bitcoiners should love.

Oh and this is only the first volume (and the one which comes with Scrilla’s cover): volume two presents a complete history of the BTCTKVR podcast, with included criteria which help you select the episode that you should be listening to next. You also benefit from QR codes that make it simple for you to get access to the recordings without dealing with searching and browsing.

To learn more about the contents and ambitions of the 2022 edition of the BTCTKVR magazine, listen to this interview with the IBEX folks.

Now let’s talk about the price of this special edition of the BTCTKVR magazine: I told the guys from Scarce City to start from 0.0044 BTC (approximately $210) and increase the price by 1% each time someone buys one of the copies. Given the maximum supply of 100 copies (as only 100 FAKEBTCTKVR Counterparty assets exist), this means that the last copy should sell for twice as much money as the first one. This is a way to encourage early adopters and create a little bit of FOMO – if you don’t get the magazine today at this price, then it’s likely that somebody else will. In the end, waiting will only make you pay more.

There’s also a time limit which comes with a destruction clause. You can only get a copy of the FAKEBTCTKVR magazine + Fake Rare Bitcoin NFT pair until Sunday, April 10th 2022. If any copies remain unsold when the sale closes, then they will be destroyed. This might sound a little too extreme, but it’s a way to protect and increase the scarcity of the magazines and tokens that found their happy owners.

BTCTKVR magazines have never been largely-available consumer goods – they are rare collectibles which I’ve printed and distributed to people I like. In the case of FAKEBTCTKVR, the scarcity and artistry are both taken to the next level. And while the price might seem a little bit on the high side, you need to be aware of the historical significance of a limited print which is also digitally backed by a token that’s part of a similarly-limited collection.

Also, we’re talking about a Bitcoin NFT which also comes with a physical print. In terms of collectibles, there are many more overvalued pieces which have no human input and only retain a market valuation due to heavy marketing. Here’s an example below.

To summarize, FAKEBTCTKVR’s rareness isn’t fake. It’s a limited edition of the BTCTKVR magazine whose cover is designed by Rare Scrilla, and which can only exist in 100 copies – but if fewer get sold, then the unwanted ones will get destroyed. Also, there’s a Counterparty NFT that’s secured by the Bitcoin network and is part of the Fake Rare collection (once again, this collection can only have 2000 entries).

If you see any value in the sum of my work and Scrilla’s art, then grab your copy before it’s too late. In a few years, you will either see the price of these soaring on secondary markets or else laugh at me for having delusions of grandeur. Regardless, you’ll own actual proof of work from two bitcoiners who love their craft.

On, and did I mention that this is a Scarce.City exclusive that Miami conference attendees will be able to check out? Obviously, you don’t need to participate in any social gathering in order to grab your copy – an internet connection and enough BTC in your wallet will get the job done. But if you want to meet Scrilla and the Scarce.City folks in Miami, then they can also tell you a little bit of the story behind the project. They say that every collectible needs a good story, right?