The highly anticipated NFT collection “Akutars” experienced a true development nightmare when poor coding led to a batch of exploits freezing over thirty-four million dollars. While taking serious security warning concerns as project “fud,” the mint continued, causing a massive wave of transactions to fail as over 11,000 in ETH is locked in the contract forever.
Aku NFT
The Aku team took to Twitter, informing their community of their missteps, claiming full responsibility regarding the situation, and providing a timeline for refunds. Furthermore, the project’s founder has expressed his deepest sympathies to those affected by their mistakes and ensures that the community will bounce back from this major upset.
The Akutar NFT collection comes from the work of former MLB player Micah Johnson. After a successful run, Micah decided to follow his passion in the art industry. His skill and storytelling ability have led to a monumental collection featuring the life of a heroic spaceman known as “Aku.”
Holders of the Aku chapters received 61% of the NFTs supply distributed based on how many ‘”Chapters” of Aku’s life they held. For example, holding four ‘unique’ chapters grants the owner one Akutar with an “O.G Trait.
After taking care of their community, 38% of the remaining supply went into a modified Dutch auction. While the remaining 1% will be going toward partners and future collaborations.
Each Akutar out of the 15,000 in circulation grants the holder entry to the ever-evolving Akuverse. Additionally, holders gain exclusive access to future project collaborations and experiences.
The Aftermath
Developing a project is no easy task, and as with anything that has to do with Ethereum, it can be rather expensive. While the act of coding might conjure up images of a hooded figure in a dark corner clacking away at a keyboard, the actual reality remains far from the general public outlook.
In fact, the complexities of coding can require more hands-on than most endeavors today. Thus, networking and consistent collaborations provided necessary stepping stones for a project to thrive long term.
The mistakes that were made are no more costly to anyone than myself. I’ve reinvested most everything into building Aku. Most everything will go back to refunds and we will keep building what we set out to do. Brick by brick. – Micah Johnson
Given that developers have access to debug programs, third-party auditing firms and sites such as GitHub, exploits in code can often be prevented before taking money from supporters. Especially when receiving warnings from a security researcher and shoving them to the side as unwarranted “fud” to watch the ‘accusations’ turn into facts. Though the community has suffered a devastating blow, the AkuDreams community is staying strong while rallying behind the creator
I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry to the Aku family. I care so deeply about the Aku family, I let you all down & I’m so sorry. I will continue to build brick by brick, continue to work tirelessly, because without the Aku community, Aku’s nothing. We’ve come too far, I cannot stop now – Micah Johnson
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