Author: Golden Finance, Climber
Recently, Web3 short video platform Cheelee announced that it has completed a $10 million financing. Together with the $8 million equity financing in November last year, the two rounds have raised a total of $18 million, with only a seven-month interval. But it is particularly noteworthy that to date, Cheelee has raised a total of $32.75 million in financing.
As a startup in the Web3 industry, the fact that it was able to raise so much money shows that the project has been deeply recognized by investment institutions. In November last year, when the entire crypto market was in an extreme bear market, the $200 million "Crypto Winter Solidarity Fund" jointly launched by the project founder Roman Alekseev and the Web2 mobile application NUTSon further reflected the project's attitude and expectations for the construction of the crypto industry ecosystem.
Today, Golden Finance will explain in detail the basic connotation, operation mechanism and economic model of Cheelee, and take you to understand the uniqueness of this short video project.
Introduction
Cheelee is a short video platform with a Watch to Earn mechanism, which rewards all users who watch content with tokens. The design mechanism is based on GameFi. The platform claims that the team's goal is to allow all users to make money on social networks and to gain benefits from the attention economy together. (Golden Finance Note: Attention economy refers to a special economic model in which companies maximize the attention of users or consumers and cultivate potential consumer groups in order to obtain the greatest future commercial benefits.)
After registering and logging into Cheelee and watching the usage feed, the platform provides each new user with a free "NFT glasses". The glasses can monitor the video viewing time and convert it into corresponding points based on the length of time, which can then be exchanged for token rewards.
In addition, users can also use Cheelee's native tokens to upgrade glasses functions, such as memory, frames, lenses, etc.
Cheelee was founded in 2019 by Roman Alekseev, a serial entrepreneur and venture capitalist with more than 20 years of experience in international markets, and his co-founders Ruslan Sharov and Yuriy Kardonov. Ruslan Sharov is a doctor of law and Web3 expert with more than 20 years of experience in international enterprise building. Yuriy Kardonov is the CEO and founder of CommON, a neurotechnology and virtual reality startup.
Operation Mechanism
As a short video platform that adopts the GameFi mechanism, through move-2-earn gameplay, in-app NFTs and tokens, Cheelee users can convert their attention into money while using the product and make money with the platform. The implementation steps are also very simple, just three steps:
1. Register on the Cheelee app and get free NFT glasses.
2. Watch the feed and get a box with LEE tokens (in-app tokens). Users will earn LEE from boxes that drop within 30 minutes of watching the feed.
3. Once tokens are dropped, users can withdraw or exchange them for real-world currencies, such as US dollars, at any time.
In addition, users can also increase their income by upgrading their initial NFT glasses. The methods are as follows:
1. Use LEE tokens to purchase new NFT glasses directly from the app.
2. Get corresponding points according to different levels.
3. Allocate points to NFT glasses modules, and users can also use Gems (special NFTs) to upgrade modules. It is worth noting that allocating points will increase user income.
4. Purchase additional NFT glasses to increase attention and reward time for viewing feeds. 1 attention is equivalent to 5 minutes of reward feed viewing, which means more attention means more income.
Economic Model
As mentioned above, Cheelee is a Web3 short video platform that mainly uses the GameFi mechanism through the principle of attention economy to help users earn income while watching videos.
The Cheelee economy is mainly based on two types of tokens:
1. CHEEL: Governance token, with a total issuance of 1,000,000,000. Through this governance token, the community can vote on important issues in the development of the platform according to the DAO principles to achieve effective governance.
Early project owners and participants, such as investment funds and teams, will have their CHEEL locked for 24 months. This essentially prevents any free-floating tokens from being available during the growth and formation of active projects. It also means that CHEEL is protected from panic selling and pressure from funds and investors.
Currently, the price of CHEEL in the crypto market is $12.89. As of writing, the trading volume in the past 24 hours is $5,942,675.
3. LEE — utility token, with a maximum supply of 7,000,000,000. The difficulty of obtaining it depends algorithmically on the number of tokens minted: the more minted, the more difficult it is to obtain new LEE tokens.
All in-app transactions are conducted using this limited-issue internal token LEE, and tokens are automatically accumulated to the in-app wallet when users watch videos during the bonus time.
In addition, Cheelee has other token economic mechanisms to ensure the smooth and long-term operation of the project.
1. Buyback
The main purpose is to stimulate demand and reduce circulating supply. Cheelee's tokens mainly use the token exchange rate to support the fund's fund repurchase, and the fund mainly obtains 100% of the profits from the sale of NFT glasses, as well as transaction fees and 70% of social network advertising revenue.
2. Ensure supply
Ensure that supply meets demand. It is formed based on liquidity allocation, and through further circulation, tokens can be reused.
3. Destruction
Burn some of the repurchased CHEEL and LEE tokens to reduce the circulating supply and adjust the price.
route map
Although Cheelee was founded in 2019, in order to build a professional Web3 short video platform, it still needs to rely on the power of Web2 mobile application NUTSon. NUTSon is a short video platform launched as early as 2021, with 1.5 million users, 33% participation rate and 15,000 original videos per day.
From its establishment to its development till date, Cheelee has been recognized by investment institutions and users, and has been moving forward step by step according to the established roadmap.
2021: Mainly promote cooperation with NUTSun.
Q1: Complete video access and user file configuration.
Q2: Advance the cooperation process and further deepen the connection.
Q3: Implement a new short video mechanism.
Q4: Optimize the page and deepen the technical capabilities of the analytical layer.
2022: Continuous optimization.
Q1: Continue to expand the video editor functionality and improve the quality of videos in the product.
Q2: Improve the video library and activity page.
Q3: Build internationalization of the app and design in-app advertisements.
Q4: Smart contract deployment, NFT glasses and GameFi mechanism.
2023: Market-oriented.
Q1: Application release and token listing, Web Market release.
Q2: Provide NFT path for fiat purchases (P2P and direct).
Q3: Enrich the functions of donation, live broadcast, box, and advertising cabinet.
Q4: Develop NFT avatars and metaverse.
Conclusion
In the digital age, people are increasingly turning to online videos for information and entertainment, spending their attention and time on this new form of media. However, in the current Web2 network, it is difficult for users to gain additional benefits from it. The emergence of Cheele breaks this conventional form and creates a new way of gaining benefits for more people.
Fundamentally speaking, Cheele’s operating mechanism belongs to the “x to earn” model, which is similar to the previously popular STEPN type. However, the difference is that the former is obviously more in line with the lifestyle and behavior of most people in terms of earning income. Therefore, if the Web3 short video platform Cheele can continue to evolve, it may not be impossible to become the next STEPN that goes beyond the circle in the future.
