[Twitter Space Recap] Metasports Co-Founder Outlines Kusho World Revival Strategy

Editing by Michael Mislos

• Metasports Co-Founder Joe Josue, who acquired Filipino NFT project Kusho World after its original founders left, has shared plans to revitalize the project in a recent BitPinas Twitter Space event.
• Josue’s strategy for Kusho World includes securing trademarks, respecting existing plans, ensuring legal compliance, and the creation of a decentralized autonomous organization.
• Reassuring the community, Josue emphasizes that any changes to the Kusho ecosystem will seek support from its members, aiming to create a collaborative environment for the project’s growth.

One of the big news that broke out in the web3 space last month is about the personal acquisition of Metasports Co-Founder Joe Josue of Kusho World,  a once-promising anime-inspired Filipino-made NFT collection that faced a downward spiral after its original founders left.

In a recent BitPinas Twitter Space, Josue shared his future plans as Kusho’s chief builder.

Listen to the Twitter Spaces here:

• Part 1: Background story of Kusho. What happened that led to the acquisition
• Part 2: Lingering Questions. What happens to former plans. Accountability of old team
• Part 3: Final Questions for Kusho

Who is Joe Josue? 

Joe Josue is the co-founder and the current CEO of Metasports, an esports and web3 agency. Metasports’ gaming IPs include Lunacian Sports League, management of content creator Kookoo Crypto, Overdrive Studios, and Oasis Gaming. (Find more articles on BitPinas about Metasports here.)

Before entering the web3 space, Josue served as a partner and chief marketing officer of Acadarena, the leading campus esports company in the Philippines. He served as Chairman of SEAesport, one of the longest-running gaming and esports content platforms in Southeast Asia.

Josue’s Introduction to Kusho

As crypto winter began impacting the NFT industry, Josue met the founding team of Kusho through mutual friends and workmates. While preparing to participate for Conquest 2022, a gaming event by Acadarena last year, his team invited Kusho to participate, offering exposure to a broader community.

After the event, issues surrounding Kusho emerged, and Josue reached out to the founders to offer advisory.

“I had reached out personally because I started seeing some of the issues happening. I think it’s around October or November if I’m not mistaken. []I reached out to the team and I said. ‘Hey, I would like to offer an advisory.’ You know, I have a lot of experience managing businesses and we’re ‌thankful to be able to manage our own business during the downturn,” Josue shared during the Twitter Space. 

At that time, Josue received no replies from the founding team, whose resignations were also making waves in social media. He then contacted the founder of Kusho to express his intention to acquire the NFT project. 

Josue said he nearly abandoned acquiring the project in January of this year, as the founding team was difficult to reach:

“I called Roi and I said I want to acquire and see what’s left. Let’s see if we get along and see what will happen. I think I was on a 3-hour call with Roi. I tried to understand what is available. If I can get in touch and see if they can turn it over to us, to me and I want to see if there’s a price. I don’t want to go into some of the details of the grievances, but thankfully everything was turned over as much as we can.”

Josue was referring to Roikyuu.eth, an outsourced developer for Kusho and not a member of its original team. As per Josue, Roi was one of the last bastions of Kusho who kept the community alive and going despite the abandonment of its founding team.

Josue’s Plans on Kusho

As per Josue, one of the good news during his acquisition was that none of the assets of the collection were frozen. He also assured that any changes in the Kusho ecosystem would first seek the support of the Kusho community. 

So far, Josue’s plans for Kusho include:

Becoming a legal entity, securing trademarks and ensuring legal implications are addressed

By establishing Kusho as a legal entity and securing the necessary trademarks, the Kusho chief insisted that he is aiming to protect the brand and its intellectual property, ensuring a strong foundation for future growth.

This is where Josue mentioned the project MINKA and its token. Originally, Project MINKA was meant to provide every Kusho holder with 3.0 $MINKA every day, which may be used on their genesis Kusho staking. But he explained that before Kusho will release its utility token, he really wanted to secure the brand by making sure that the project is fully compliant with relevant laws and regulations:

“Governments or any kind of regulation has a history of making examples of the most public things. So I hope you guys will understand my thinking about it. If we’re going to release a token, I want to get it right, make sure the legal implications are correct, and that all is in place before we ‌actually release a token.”

Respecting existing plans if still possible

“I’m not rooting it out as a possibility that sort of community wants, but. Yes, all the current, all the external plans are former plans,” he answered.

In a previous report, Josue said that it will be up to the old core team to fulfill rewards like merchandise boxes. A separate channel in the Kusho Discord will be created to support fulfillment.

Integrating and introducing new stories without changing the art and design

According to the Kusho chief, his team has no plans to make major changes, especially to the arts and design of the collection:

“So the way that we’re designing the new adventure is not to replace, it’s actually to provide them like a new integration of a story.”

Josue also assured that Kusho’s artist did not leave the project. That even though this artist was part of the original founding team, they were not part of the team that makes the decision. On the same Twitter Space, the Kusho chief expressed his disappointment over the founding team of the project for ‌slowly resigning one by one, which for him is unprofessional. 

“He’s an artist and he’s a creator, a designer. But as far as I can tell, everyone, and I think everyone I’ve talked to still holds that quite in high respective regard for his involvement and support. Maybe I haven’t checked in on his mental or ‌emotional state after things that have happened, but as far as I can tell, the community does not put any fault on his side. I think there’s even a couple of people who consider him mentors for artists that’s, as far as I know,” Josue said. 

Malaya Labs

When Josue announced his acquisition of the project, one of his earlier plans is to form a labs team. He confirmed this plan during the Twitter Space, adding that this labs team will be formed four to six months from now:

“Essentially, the labs team is equivalent to maybe Chiru Labs for Azuki, BEANZ, and all of that. So what this lab is doing is going back to basics and going into stealth mode. Right now, the labs team transparently consists of myself, Roi, again the OG Dev, who I consider now quite a good friend and really a business partner on this end. And we have one other person on our team, which is Dwayne, who’s a virtual discord engineer and is now working with us a lot in different spaces. I’m actually talking to a lot of the old team and we’re actually actively interviewing and recruiting people.”

Josue called the labs team Malaya Labs. Malaya is a Filipino word that means “free” or “having freedom.” 

“This is storytelling, counterpart, technology, and collaborative art. I won’t share much more, but essentially what they’re doing is building the team, and that will be the custodian of what we’re going to do. So we’re going to be building a new adventure with benefits for all the holders of Kusho, and kind of like a new journey and experience. Right now, our aim, operationally, is to be actually six months to one year ahead in terms of operational planning and clarity,” he assured. 

Kouncil

Another plan that Josue revealed is the creation of the Kusho DAO, which will be called the “Kouncil”:

“I really want to be able to give back to that community and foster it. The Kouncil is planned to be a voted council among all holders. The majority, at first, will be from Malaya Labs, but a number of those who will be privy to information and be able to decide what happens with the community will be done by the Kouncil. Right now, we’re planning, I mean, initial ideas around five people, three from our team right now, and then two will be voted on by the holders. And depending on how the fundraising goes and the strategy goes, the very minimum, what we’re planning to do is that a percentage of all of the royalties will be committed to the DAO.”

According to the Kusho chief, he was surprised about the number of people that are really passionate about the project even if Kusho has recently experienced its “dark days.” He even shared that there was a member that holds 17% of the collection, which for him, is wild. 

Quick Updates in the Discord 🪬 pic.twitter.com/qN3cAulj7V

— Kūsho World 🪬 (@KushoWRLD) April 8, 2023

“It’s not about hype. It’s not the time to be hyped. Our focus is to help holders know that there’s something happening, and find their way back if they find that the community in the discord is a place or a home because of what we’re doing as active members. But they also know that there’s something else working on the side,” Josue explained. 

During the Twitter Space, the Kusho chief also thanked the Kusho community for their support. As per Josue, about 80% of the community was supportive and hopeful for his acquisition.

“So now we’re finalized. I don’t want to add more stress as well, and I want to focus on the future. I think that we can do better things in the future. We can do this ‌all because this is the best opportunity,” Josue concluded.

This article is published on BitPinas: [Twitter Space Recap] Metasports Co-Founder Outlines Kusho World Revival Strategy 

Disclaimer: BitPinas articles and its external content are not financial advice. The team serves to deliver independent, unbiased news to provide information for Philippine-crypto and beyond.