It was just under three months ago when a fellow Gods Unchained player posted a link to a Discord server created by someone going by the name of Whaleshark.

I knew the name. Whaleshark was the one who spent ~$40,000 purchasing Atlas, a Mythic card from Gods Unchained, and also owned at least one other Mythic. I would also see the name pop up occasionally on Twitter related to some large purchase.

But the moniker was all I knew. I knew nothing about the person behind it. I envisioned some ultra-rich guy sitting in a penthouse suite rubbing his fingers together and saying, 'Excellent!' Perhaps that mental image actually wasn't too far off!

artwork by Rare Designer (https://opensea.io/assets/odysseum-cyberpunk-store)

I went over to the linked Discord and poked around a bit. Then as I was trying out bot commands, when Reverend Goose saw that I had 0 Whale, and sent me ten as a welcoming gift! In current terms, that is quite the present! But at the time, Tip.cc didn't even give it any value.

But nonetheless, I appreciated the community outreach. Just a couple of days after that I watched a community stream with an artist by the name of metageist, as he worked in VR, creating this incredible 3d sculpture out of thin air (literally!) It was an incredible thing to see, and probably the defining moment that pulled me into the WHALE community for good.

After that I was all in! Most of my free time would be spent on the Whale server.

Since joining the Whale community, I have participated in a group hunt for an Avastar, cheered on a virtual marble with my name attached as it careened down a virtual course and eventually flew off the edge into oblivion, seen public disputes arise about wash trading and copyright infringement in the NFT art scene, viewed artists conjuring up amazing creations while an audience watched and listened, purchased my first art NFTs, created my own original NFTs, listened to DJs with others in a chat room, found numerous new art and NFT communities, branched out into NFT collecting on WAX, used Uniswap for the first time, participated in a joke contest (finishing third, thank you very much!), saw the formation of liquidity pools for $WHALE and considered joining one, learned that I had been playing Axies incorrectly (I didn't realize that you could specify where each Axie stood during combat!), created a voxel-based Forest Giant, discovered and created fractal art, bought a plot in Sandbox, discussed slow cooking and marinating options, exchanged photos of pets, celebrated birthdays, purchased a role as a Dolphin, touched where I was not supposed to touch (hmmm. That sounds bad. Nothing physical! It's related to a crazy ongoing social experiment / game involving airdrops and red packets on the Whale Discord), watched the opening of a hundred Legendary packs for Gods Unchained, and more! 

Then there is a completely different list of events I have not participated in (yet), ranging from the infamous poker matches, to emoji creation, to karaoke nights!

To say that the Whale social scene is active would be an understatement. And while Whaleshark and the NFT Vault are the fulcrum point behind it all, the scene has grown by an astounding amount, taking on a life of its own.

I only expect to see it continue to grow further. Join in while you can! It has been an amazing ride for me and I'm positive there will be even more fun and surprises to come!