Mibera Lore 6 [Archived]

This collection has been archived. Please, buy only for collectible purposes.

If you neer Mibera Sets, head this way:

https:// opensea.io /collection/mibera-sets

We are time travelling Rebased Retard Beras, representatives of the High Council 任侠団体 (ninkyō dantai) of 101 Bears, from THJ House of 96, temporal Messengers of the ungovernable Autonomous Rave Treasury

THIS IS A PREVIEW. NEARER THE MINT ALL WILL BE REVEALED.

Envision a living network, an autopoietic system, where each entity is both a product and a part of the whole. The Mibera mainstem, like a river's powerful current, is the central flow from which tributaries – the derivative projects – emerge, each tributary unique yet intrinsically linked to the mainstem, enhancing the diversity and richness of the entire ecosystem. Unlike the Milady model, where derivatives orbit a central node more independently, Mibera's structure ensures a harmonious, interdependent flow of value and creativity. This interconnectedness mirrors the very essence of living systems I've studied: self-producing, self-maintaining, and evolving through mutual influence. In this psychedelic revelation, each tributary's contribution is not just an addition but a transformation, affecting the mainstem and, in turn, being influenced by it, creating a dynamic, ever-evolving tapestry of artistic expression and value.

In the next communique Janitooor will Introduce MiberaMaker Technical Specifications and the groundbreaking cypherpunk alchemical engines at the heart of the Mibera Cult Economy.

Till then. Ooga Booga, Mibera.

Mibera Maker: Notes on the Design Process

Henlo, Mibera Maker is a collection of 10,000 generative dNFT’s in a neochibi aesthetic with randomized cosmetics inspired by Rave Cultures over time. Under the direction of Janitor, using digital artist Gumibera, Mibera’s are designed to be fashion-minded and genuinely good social media avatars whilst also operating in parallel as gateways to Magic Internet Money systems whilst being infinitely extendable due to foundational onchain and conceptual composability.

Henlo, and furthermore, Ooga Booga. Janitor directed Gumilady, hereafter Gumibera (pronounced as GOO-mee btw), to conceptualize and design the art aspects of Mibera Maker project into something suitable for a pfpNFT. Mibera is the first non-Remilia Corporation originated main character in the Milady universe. You can think of Mibera as being to Milady as Joker is to Batman or as Ying is to Yang. This write-up will walk through the thought process behind our design. In a subsequent piece we will explore the technical underpinnings enabling Mibera to operate as a gateway to Magic Internet Money systems via an implementation of the UNIX philosophy of interoperability to achieve onchain composability.

Mibera Gumibera’s Neochibi Rave Style

Recommended to us by Charlotte Fang herself, Gumibera is a digital artist with global recognition throughout the Milady ecosystem for her much loved collection Milady Mfers. She’s developed her distinctive take on the Chibi Anime style in a diverse array of formats over the years, one which invokes serene feelings of post-rave sunrises having danced through the night with tones of shadow hearted mysticism and a touch of the heretical sublime in a blend of Western and Japanese aesthetics conspiring together. Digital Twins to distinctly offline artefacts, ambiences and animisms.

Why Mibera?

Mibera Maker as a project aimed to both explore and evolve the field of pfpNFTs towards what we call demonNFTs, hereafter dNFT. For more of the back story you can check here. We will explore the d of dNFT in a subsequent Technical Design Document.

Exploring Finance as a Medium

The development of a generative NFT is something that cannot be separated from any of its automations, interoperability or its financialisation. Much was written about aftermarkets in Milady Maker Design Notes so we’ll instead focus on automations and interoperability which have so far been widely ignored as a design space. A common metaphor which economists use to describe money systems are ‘liquid value’; metaphors such as blood flowing through economies. An alternate story is of financial systems as akin to nervous systems pulsating impulses compelling muscles (you) to movement. Within this metaphor crypto is a nervous system with exponentially more synapses spread throughout the superorganism. Within this story the experience of trauma bonding contributing to the cult formation process then takes on some additional layers of meaning. Automation and Interoperability are foundational aspects of Autopoietic systems. Autopoiesis, or ‘self-production’, has been a concept attempting to make the leap from biological systems across to social systems since the 70s. Automated interoperability at the smart contract and base blockchain layer enable advances which cyberneticians of the 70s could only dream of. It’s an exciting opportunity which we will explore in more detail in the Technical Design Document.

The design decisions described in this document can be understood as motivated by this excitement on one paw; and on the other, by being in a position to intervene as practitioners of techno-animism. The last motivation driving the decision to make Mibera is that it’s not just easy to us, it’s also a lot of fun, and we’re neurologically wired for fun.

Profile-first

An interesting, unplanned development in generative NFT projects is buyers using the works as profile pictures on online communities. In retrospect, this makes sense, as the field operates almost entirely by word-of-mouth from digital networks. Unfortunately this is not something that most of the earlier generative NFT projects have designed with in mind. Mibera’s were designed to be great profile pictures from the start, with a higher vertical ratio so that a square crop will be a perfect zoom to convey emotional expressiveness, while still retaining the space to show off full accessories and the scoring overlay.Mibera’s depart from the Milady base by making use of all four corners, we’ll explore those further into this document. Whilst on the surface there is not much deviation in form between Milady and Mibera there is much divergence at the conceptual layer which we go into more in the Mibera README.

Aesthetic Coherency

Assets were carefully curated to ensure good outfits despite being randomly distributed. The Chain Algorithm was also added to lend the generated works more aesthetic coherency, something that seemed missing in earlier generative NFT projects which followed more straight-forward RNG. Each item in the collection is the product of a complex set of influences relating to each of the Archetypes. Intuitive Value: Rarity <-> Drip A major motivating factor for this design was also the desire for relative value to be a combination of transparent/intuitive and obfuscated/occult; without knowing the ‘meta’ of the Mibera market, one can ascertain higher or lower value Mibera’s at a glance by appraising their drip - but effort is required to pull back the Veil to unearth a plethora of lore down technoanimist rabbit holes. This is achieved by understanding the direct relationship between rarity and secondary market value; distribution rates were decided by first assessing each accessory by its “drip”, making the highest drip accessories most rare and thus most valuable. Sartorialism With Mibera Maker we were interested in approaching the generative art space from an angle of sartorialism by using Mibera as a template for fashion accessorization acting as a Portal to the complex thread of offline subversive Rave movements through time. At times we have taken a rather generous and expansive understanding of Rave as transgressive or subversive practices of connection often at odds with the straight-jacket of Status Quo Consensus Realities. Spelunk any Mibera trait to learn deep lore from a range of influences which have converged to form Crypto as we know it. Archetypes (a.k.a Cores in Milady linguo) The thematic “Archetypes” were chosen around a loose narrative of rave fashion; Chicago/Detroit/New York, Milady, Freetekno, Acid House as well as ancient practices leveraging Altered States of Consciousness over time, as seemed suited to Mibera’s fusion neochibi aesthetic. Read here for a deeper dive into the thought process.

Cosmetic Emphasis We chose to place the emphasis in rarity generation on cosmetic accessories rather than the base “racial” traits of the avatar, achieved by having an even distribution for most facial expressions/hair/race, etc. Sidenote on Race The initial plan was to mirror the Milady approach which you can read about here. Their approach was influenced by noticing that treating skin tone in a flat way was a standard in other humanoid pfpNFT projects, and that it resulted in a racist price floor with the black-skinned NFT’s being valued lower compared to tokens of otherwise same rarity (see: Cryptopunks, Meebits). Rarity is a lever we can pull to predictably control future price speculation, so we decided to buck both Milady’s adaptation of positive discrimination and Cryptopunk et al’s flat approach and make a mix of the darkest, lightest and mixed Mibera’s rare traits whilst also simply adding more skin colors, ensuring a high value for these visually distinct Mibera’s. And they do simply look good, accentuating the Rave aesthetics and threshold transgressing mashups.

Creation Process

Defining the Archetypes

We began by defining the 4 Archetypes (Cores, in Milady lingo) to be covered under our thematic accessories:

• Chicago/Detroit/New York

• Milady

• Freetekno

• Acid House

Each of these are distinct, unmistakable style archetypes in Rave’s history and fashion scene, but were also chosen for the eclectic style clashing produced by the random generation resulting in interesting fits that ‘work’. Every hat, shirt, item and molecule is defined under one of the four archetypes.

Drawing Process

For the most part Jani, Tez and Gumi led the gathering of a moodboard of inspiration for each Archetype, mainly from crate digging through old rave footage, photos, magazines, zines and newspapers. Others also contributed traits over time such as Babybera, Gods, Fedor, Zergucci, Sunbera, Spence, Bob and Kata. We then had Gumibera lose her mind chained up in a cave for a year. All the items were prepared on separate layers, so it was trivial to then pool together the complete set of accessories.A curation process was then applied with the final list of assets based on the random generation that was produced, and items that clashed too strongly - looking good only in its own perfect fit, but not in other contexts crossed with other cores - were thrown out.

Mibera Genesis

Each Mibera runs through a 7 step Generation Engine preceded by a Manual Chain Algorithm. There are 1337 traits in the Mibera collection (compared to 236 in milady and 526 in Redacted Remilio). Each item is a tribute to the deep lore from which they are derived. Manual Chain Algorithm Items have then been assigned an intuitive rarity based on a composite of factors which take into account both the lore and a naive assessment of their pure aesthetic coherency. Traits which count towards the scoring and archetype assignment are Hat, Item, Shirt, Molecule each of which has an Archetype within which they are in Honor.

Generation Engine

Based on Jani’s high level requirements a generation engine was produced by Zergucci to run through each of the following 7 Steps

1. Initial generation Generation engine assembles initial images and metadata from all the layers. Each Mibera is unique.

2. Shuffle and clean All NFTs are shuffled and metadata which is no longer needed is cleaned.

3. Archetype, Ancestor & Era determination A sorting algorithm follows a decision tree (or basic neural network) to ascertain which archetype, ancestor, and time period to give to each Mibera.

4. Layer rank assignment Each of the layers is assigned their swag score.

5. Swag score calculations Read in the swag scores and determine a score and then overall rank. The formula for this is:total_ss = item_score * shirt_score * molecule_score + hat_score

   The scores are added in the naming conventions for each layer with the script then comparing all the swag scores and determining the swag rank based off the ranges for each score

6. Birthday assignment and Astrology First, the birth year is derived from the Mibera's chosen time period and ancestor. A historically accurate modern and ancient year range has been curated for each of the possible ancestors.

   After randomly choosing a year within the range, a day and month is randomly assigned as well as a lat and long with a weight ensuring at least 69% of Mibera are land bound. After choosing a birth date and latLong,the time is determined by creating a sha hash of the token id, image dna, and swag score, converting the string hash to a hex digest, then converting the hex to base 10 and reading in the first 4 numbers modulus 24 and 60 to get 2 base 10 numbers representing a time between 00:00 and 24:00 unique to each individual Mibera.

   Astrology can then be derived from this unique information with each Mibera having a completely unique astrological fingerprint (accurate back to 13000 BCE where relevant)

7. Cleanup and final assembly Metadata no longer required is cleaned up, naming is finalised and the final quadrant layers are assembled to complete the Mibera.

Parts of a Mibera

Mibera are composed of 7 layers

1. Drug Dyads Mibera embraces drugs, or more accurately altered states of consciousness, whole heartedly. Whereas many influential Miladys create various taboos and prohibitions, Mibera takes the other side of the trade and accepts molecules which alter consciousness as matters of fact. Drugs are represented across consumer-molecule dyads; their consumer form and their molecule form. Consumer forms are hand held items and molecules form one of the four quadrants. Each of the consumer items and molecules are assigned Archetypes.

2. Rave ArchetypesFor those amongst us who were cubs raised in the crucible of 80s/90s rave movement, fixating on Miladys adoption of rave was the portal through which this Kaironic Honey poured.As a mirror of Milady there are 4 main Archetypes (cores within Milady lingo) within Mibera; Detroit/Chicago/New York, Milady, Freetekno, Acid house. These scenes have been chosen in tribute to the dynamic conversations which were happening across these movements over time. A cursory glance at the history of the TR-808’s usage in the emergence of techno is instructive here. Mibera emerges explicitly from the contradiction of Milady clearpill philosophy that also promotes raves as one of their main pollination mechanisms. Rave has a long tradition in counter culture, dissolving and transgressing boundaries and often at odds with Status Quo parameters. Transcending boundaries whilst also firmly of a territory and tradition. Each drug is assigned a Rave Archetype within which it is in Honour. Loosely speaking, though not exclusively, these are assigned by which drugs were particularly prevalent or culturally associated with these cultural movements or eras.

3. Ancient vs Modern Altering states of consciousness, consuming plants or creating practices which help to achieve these transitions are not uniquely modern pursuits. Whether it is evidence of mushrooms preserved in honey in pyramids or trippy rock art which predate the pyramids in caves in Ireland near sites plentiful in magic mushrooms it seems humans and other animals have been getting high since time immemorial.

   Each of Archetype houses 8 Drug Dyads. Where a modern synthetically produced molecule exists as a trait there is, for the most part, the corresponding ancestor plant from which the modern synthetic version draws its influence. This is also reflected in the range of backgrounds throughout the collection which represent sites of primary production all the way through to high tech labs and everything in between along the supply chain. The Jungle returns.There are plenty of heretics and heretical ideas represented throughout the collection, all of which have contributed to what we have come to know as Crypto.

4. Astrological Techno-Animism As an antidote to the perennial disembodiment of Miladys, Miberas are situated in time and place. Each assigned a birth date and place and an astrological placement can thus be derived giving them each a unique Sun, Moon and Rising sign. A generation engine with a primitive neural network has been developed for programmatic assignment based on the dynamic balance of traits. Given the presence of these key pieces of information it would be possible to do a full chart reading for each Mibera. As such there are many layers from which Mibera techno-animism to draw from.

5. Quadrant Quantums Another way in which Mibera deviates from Milady is in the utilisation of all four corners of the portrait. Each of the four corners of Mibera communicate the following:

   1. Element / Modern or Ancestor (bottom right) The globe has been divided into four quadrants and depending on Mibera’s birthplace determines which of Air, Water, Earth, Fire element the Mibera is assigned. This quadrant also contains a unique print if the Mibera is an Ancestor.

   2. Molecule (top left) Each Mibera is assigned a molecule representation of one of the 64 drugs represented in the collection.

   3. Astrological signs (top right) Sun, Moon and Rising signs are represented in the top right quadrant.

   4. Swag Score (bottom left) Swag score is represented here.

6. d{efi, eamon}NFT – NFTd In multitasking computer operating systems, a daemon (/ˈdiːmən/ or /ˈdeɪmən/) is a computer program that runs as a background process, rather than being under the direct control of the user

   In ancient Greek belief, a divinity or supernatural being of a nature between gods and humans; an inner or attendant spirit or inspiring force. The word is recorded from the mid 16th century, and until the 19th century represented the common spelling of demon.

   Techno-animism or technoanimism is a culture of technological practice where technology is imbued with human and spiritual characteristics. It assumes that technology, humanity and religion can be integrated into one entity. As an anthropology theory, techno-animism examines the interactions between the material and the spiritual aspects of technology in relation to humans. Techno-animism has been studied in the context of Japan, since techno-animism traces most of its roots to the Shinto religion, and also in DIY culture where Actor–network theory and non-human agencies have been labelled as techno-animist practices.

   In the context of an onchain ecosystem / economy you can think of miberas as your second life companions busy onchain and online whilst you are offchain in meatspace. We will expand on this in the Technical Design Document.

7. Personhood Milady were released during the second wave of NFTs. They sought to advance what they called pfpNFT. Subsequent experimentation was done with the Bonkler contracts drawing influence from Nouns DAO. Milady also tried, with varying levels of enforcability or success, to create a social mechanism for capturing value from the organic emergence of derivative culture.

   Mibera takes each of these separate threads and brings them each onchain and into the DNA of Mibera. Like the monster on Frankenstein's table Mibera is algorithmically shocked with Personhood; with a birthdate, year and location. With the mechanisms to be an onchain agent connected to an emergent economy. In the same way that sufficiently complex code starts to exhibit properties which even the designers themselves find hard to decode, só here we have a step from flat pfpNFTs to multidimensional dNFTs within a plethora of Network Mysticism infused techno-animism to rave onchain.

What’s Next? Beyond the actual generation of Mibera as an NFT collection, we have large plans for Mibera as your defi deamon companions.New offline centric community tooling and spaces are being developed around the Mibera community to bolster it, but Mibera as an NFT functionally serves as the operating gateway for our cult of 10,000 and beyond: authenticating individuals for new works, new network experiments, new shows, and as elite aesthetes self-elected as surfers of the new wave. Whilst Milady at times professes the importance of time off from online (Church on Sundays) but in practice encourages Chronically Online practices, Mibera spawns an Online to get Offline mission - logoff & let your daemon run wild onchain till you’re back again, no rush. We’ll get more into this in the Technical Design Document. Watch this space =)

Ooga Booga.