MakerDAO changes its name to Sky. The old OG plays with the new brand but leaves the community scratching their heads

Written by: TechFlow

Let me introduce you to a new project called Sky.

When this word appears, in addition to the unfamiliarity, do you think that this ordinary and common name should correspond to a dog project that will be able to take to the sky tomorrow?

It is hard to imagine that this is a brand renaming by MakerDAO, the pioneer of DeFi and crypto stablecoin DAI.

On August 27, MakerDAO announced its plan to rebrand to Sky and upgrade its own tokens and stablecoins to the new names SKY and Sky Dollar (USDS).

From MakerDAO to Sky, it is not only a change in name, but also a change in brand awareness.

For applications with sufficient weight, it is very difficult to take a word away from the user's mind. For example, you may still be accustomed to calling a social media software Twitter instead of X, and calling it tweets and CT instead of "posts on X".

MakerDAO's position in the crypto ecosystem may be no less than that of Twitter in social media.

So, knowing that it is not easy, what changes will the new Sky have, and why is the name changed?

What changes have occurred in the business and assets?

What users are most concerned about must first be whether the assets will be affected after MakerDAO is renamed Sky.

According to Sky's latest official push, the original MKR and DAI tokens will be upgraded to new SKY and USDS (Sky Dollar) tokens. This upgrade process follows the following rules:

1. MKR to SKY exchange:

Each MKR can be exchanged for 24,000 SKY tokens. This ratio is fixed, which means that MKR holders will receive a corresponding number of new governance tokens SKY after the conversion.

2. DAI to USDS exchange:

The exchange ratio between DAI and USDS will be maintained at 1:1. This means that every 1 DAI held by the user can be directly exchanged for 1 USDS, ensuring the continuity of the stablecoin value.

It is worth noting that this token upgrade is voluntary. Users can choose whether to convert their MKR and DAI to the new token. This gives community members more options.

For users holding MKR, they will maintain the corresponding governance rights after converting to SKY. Sky promises that the new governance model will be more efficient and transparent.

At the same time, Sky has provided a user-friendly migration tool to help users easily complete the conversion process from old tokens to new tokens.

However, judging from the official website, it seems that only more than 370 users have carried out this migration, and the education and promotion of the community obviously still has certain resistance.

In order to make people more willing to migrate to the new SKY token, the team announced an additional reward mechanism. For users who complete the token migration during the beta period, they will receive 1.25 times the SKY and USDS token rewards.

Why the name change?

For most people, the name change of MakerDAO seems a bit abrupt, and some negative voices have appeared in the community.

For example, although the name was changed to Sky, the old Twitter account @MakerDAO does not seem to have been cancelled and properly handled. Instead, an unknown small account called MakerDAO was registered by others and played with memes.

In the comment section of Sky's official name change announcement, in addition to simple congratulatory comments, opposition voices are also common.

The well-known KOL @stacy_muur asked three soul-searching questions:

" MakerDAO is a good brand, what's the problem? Why are you so keen on rebranding? Why are you hurting mature brand awareness?"

So, why did Sky change its name? Perhaps we can find clues in a blog post by MakerDAO co-founder Rune Christensen as early as May Reconciling the Two Opposing Paths for Decentralized Stablecoins.

In this article, Christensen elaborated on the key challenges and future development directions facing MakerDAO, laying the groundwork for the name change:

1. Dealing with regulatory pressure

Christensen mentioned in the article that decentralized stablecoins are facing unprecedented regulatory pressure. Especially in the United States, regulators have become increasingly harsh on cryptocurrencies, especially stablecoins. In this environment, MakerDAO needs to reposition itself to adapt to the changing regulatory landscape. The name change to Sky may be to draw a line with its past identity and create greater flexibility for future development.

2. Technical upgrade and reconstruction

The article actually points out that MakerDAO needs a major technical upgrade. This includes improving smart contracts, optimizing governance mechanisms, and enhancing the scalability of the system.

So the logic is that the name change to Sky is not just a brand change, but also represents a comprehensive innovation of the underlying technical architecture. For crypto projects, generally such a radical change requires a brand new brand image to reflect it, such as Fantom's Sonic.

3. Large-scale adoption requires new brand recognition

In order to make stablecoins more well-known and adopted, compliance with regulations is a prerequisite, but simplifying brand recognition is equally important. The name "MakerDAO" may seem obscure to people outside the cryptocurrency circle. "Sky" is simple and easy to remember, which helps to attract a wider user base, especially those who are not familiar with cryptocurrency.

Brand upgrades in groups, a new fashion for crypto?

In fact, MakerDAO is not the only one to upgrade its brand.

In the past year or two, the renaming of crypto projects has gradually become a new fashion phenomenon.

When old coins are boring and speculators want something new, it always sounds more exciting if you can change the brand name, create a new token symbol, and start over with a new price curve.

For example, Fantom became Sonic, several AI projects such as FET merged into ASI, Galaxy changed its name to Galxe and then became Gravit... Brand renaming is common in the crypto market.

Data source: @cornergirl999 , compiled by TechFlow

According to a recent case analysis of crypto token upgrades and mergers, brand renaming, token migration or merger does not guarantee immediate and/or long-term positive price trends.

Therefore, projects must ensure that there are sufficient reasons and solid evidence to support "why migration or merger". Only in this way can we obtain the logic and business legitimacy, and leave a correct reason for the hype of the token.

MakerDAO changed to Sky, which obviously followed the crypto fashion phenomenon of brand renaming.

But whether its token and business development will be qualitatively improved, and whether the substance will remain the same after all the appearances have been changed, still needs time to give an answer.