Is Friend.tech Leaving the Base Blockchain?

Shocking remarks by Racer, the co-founder of the SocialFi protocol Friend.tech, about potentially relocating the project from Base have caused a mild panic within the community. With Friend.tech already facing challenging times, the market responded anxiously to the news.

In late March, the FRIEND token fell by over 45%. The drop intensified when Racer first announced that the project would exit Base, an Ethereum L2 developed by Coinbase in collaboration with Optimism.

In a message on the X platform, quoted by The Block, the co-founder of Friend.tech offered $200,000 to developers who could facilitate a secure migration from Base, avoiding major issues for users. In his subsequent post, Racer expressed frustration with the tense relationship with the Base team. Additionally, he claimed the project faced considerable pressure from Farcaster, who had funded its initial launch:

“Farcaster investors went apeshit smearing us when we launched because they misunderstood what we were doing. Pushed it really hard on their team and users and the relationship has been downhill since then with us getting ostracized from anything that is for the ‘Base community',” Racer bemoaned. 

Later, the Friend.tech co-founder removed his accusatory posts against Base and Farcaster, and as of May 27, they are no longer available. This deletion could have been prompted by a conciliatory remark from Base creator Jesse Pollak.

Jesse started by professing his admiration for Racer and his project, which he said had frequently pioneered at the edge of what’s possible. He also acknowledged that the Friend.tech team might have felt isolated within the Base community, noting that the overall situation “sucks.”

“I'd love to see the relationship between the broader ethereum/base ecosystem and friendtech heal — I think there's a lot of good that we could do together.

– I'll be sad if the team decides to leave @base, but I also respect and will support whatever path – that's the beauty of the decentralized, onchain economy!” he summarized.

This saga appears to be far from over.