Raised $20 Million for Daughter's Medical Bills in Three Hours, "Web3 Crowdfunding" MIRA's Christmas Miracle

By: blockbeats|2024/12/26 17:00:02

“If you could press a button to immediately end your own life and cure a child's brain tumor as a result, every parent would not hesitate to be the first to press the button. But the cruelest part is, such a button simply does not exist,” Mira's dad, Chen Siqi, wrote on Twitter. His calm yet loving words reveal his helplessness and bewilderment.

The Story Behind the Death Button

On September 23 this year, Chen Siqi's daughter Mira was diagnosed with a rare brain tumor called craniopharyngioma. Although this tumor is benign, it is located in a very dangerous part of the brain, and any slight mistake could lead Mira to suffer from the disease and lose her ability to take care of herself.

Chen Siqi has been actively collaborating with Dr. Todd Hankinson from the University of Colorado, the only one in the world studying this tumor, to secure bi-weekly intravenous injection trials for his daughter to suppress the tumor's growth. However, there is currently no fully effective treatment for this tumor, and researching such a rare disease requires substantial financial support. So, this Christmas, Chen Siqi embarked on his web3 "crowdfunding" journey.

Raised 0 Million for Daughter's Medical Bills in Three Hours,

Chen Siqi began posting on Twitter, calling on netizens to donate to Hankinson's lab. A movement to save the girl Mira unfolded on Twitter, with heavyweights such as former Uber CEO Ronak and hellopatient co-founder Alex stepping up for Mira.

It seems the heavens heard every helpless cry from Chen Siqi in the corner of the room, saw every tear he secretly wiped behind the door. Within just 3 hours after Chen Siqi's post, he quickly raised $75,000 through gofund.me. As of now, Chen Siqi has raised $224,000, 25% away from his $300,000 goal.

Web3 Crowdfunding Resurgence

However, what seems to be a story of a friend circle crowdfunding renaissance on Twitter has only just begun. In addition to fundraising through Web2, Chen Siqi did not forget to include his Solana and BTC addresses.

Mira's story was able to break into the crypto scene, thanks to the efforts of two men.

One of them is Shaw, who is still preaching in China. After learning about Mira's situation, Shaw donated $100,000 worth of $degenai tokens to Chen Siqi's wallet to help their family through tough times. The other is Dev from pump.fun who created the token Waddles. After witnessing Mira's story, Waddles donated 50% of the $MIRA tokens to this father who was running around to treat his daughter's illness. Where there is attention, there is funding flow. With the support of Shaw, Ronak, and other Web3 and Web2 personalities, MIRA experienced a nearly 60x price increase in less than 3 hours.

So, who is Chen Siqi, and why did Shaw pay attention to her? Chen Siqi is the founder and CEO of Runway, a startup backed by a16z. Chen Siqi also served as the CEO of SandVR (a16z) and the Chief Product Officer of Postmates (later acquired by Uber). It is because of his professional background that he received such widespread support from the "big shots."

At the same time, Bio Protocol also took note of this scientific donation event and believes that decentralized scientific funding will become a major use case for crypto in the next cycle. Rare disease research is rarely funded in real life, and the pump.fun and MIRA incident have further pushed the Desci narrative to a climax.

Through the interaction between Bio Protocol and Shaw, MIRA has become the iconic Meme of the Desci concept.

Dad Chen Walking on a Tightrope: How Should the Donation Be Handled?

Despite having a large amount of funding, how to handle this donation is also a question. Obviously, Chen Siqi is also at a loss. If this funding is managed well, not only can it raise funds for his daughter, but it can also further broaden the development direction of Desci. If mishandled, it will not only cause public outrage but may also be similar to the judge's question, "If it wasn't you who touched it, why did you help?"—people will not foot the bill for similar cases again.

Therefore, Chen Siqi handled the situation very cautiously. As early as 4 hours ago, Chen Siqi announced his intention to sell 10% of the supply at some point today to donate to the Hansen Lab, with the remaining portion being reserved, accounting for 5% of the total supply. Unless announced at least 24 hours in advance, he will not sell any more tokens. Furthermore, in terms of fund management, Chen Siqi has started soliciting the opinions of netizens on Twitter regarding selling a portion of his own position, while also announcing that any newly injected funds will be entirely donated to the Hansen Lab for cancer research.

Although Chen Siqi's and Mira's stories received mixed reviews on Twitter, blockchain has proven the feasibility of on-chain donations and fundraising through its transparency and widespread participation. The flow of each fund can be guaranteed under public scrutiny. Perhaps on-chain donations will be a dawn before the large-scale application of Web3.

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Mixin has launched USTD-margined perpetual contracts, bringing derivative trading into the chat scene.

The privacy-focused crypto wallet Mixin announced today the launch of its U-based perpetual contract (a derivative priced in USDT). Unlike traditional exchanges, Mixin has taken a new approach by "liberating" derivative trading from isolated matching engines and embedding it into the instant messaging environment.

Users can directly open positions within the app with leverage of up to 200x, while sharing positions, discussing strategies, and copy trading within private communities. Trading, social interaction, and asset management are integrated into the same interface.

Simplified Trading Experience: No KYC Required, Opening a Position in Five Steps

Based on its non-custodial architecture, Mixin has eliminated friction from the traditional onboarding process, allowing users to participate in perpetual contract trading without identity verification.

The trading process has been streamlined into five steps:

· Choose the trading asset

· Select long or short

· Input position size and leverage

· Confirm order details

· Confirm and open the position

The interface provides real-time visualization of price, position, and profit and loss (PnL), allowing users to complete trades without switching between multiple modules.

Social-Native Trading: Strategy and Execution Completed in the Same Context

Mixin has directly integrated social features into the derivative trading environment. Users can create private trading communities and interact around real-time positions:

· End-to-end encrypted private groups supporting up to 1024 members

· End-to-end encrypted voice communication

· One-click position sharing

· One-click trade copying

On the execution side, Mixin aggregates liquidity from multiple sources and accesses decentralized protocol and external market liquidity through a unified trading interface.

By combining social interaction with trade execution, Mixin enables users to collaborate, share, and execute trading strategies instantly within the same environment.

Referral Mechanism: Non-institutional users can receive up to 60% fee split

Mixin has also introduced a referral incentive system based on trading behavior:

· Users can join with an invite code

· Up to 60% of trading fees as referral rewards

· Incentive mechanism designed for long-term, sustainable earnings

This model aims to drive user-driven network expansion and organic growth.

Self-Custody Architecture and Built-in Privacy Mechanism

Mixin's derivative transactions are built on top of its existing self-custody wallet infrastructure, with core features including:

· Separation of transaction account and asset storage

· User full control over assets

· Platform does not custody user funds

· Built-in privacy mechanisms to reduce data exposure

The system aims to strike a balance between transaction efficiency, asset security, and privacy protection.

A New Path for On-Chain Derivatives

Against the background of perpetual contracts becoming a mainstream trading tool, Mixin is exploring a different development direction by lowering barriers, enhancing social and privacy attributes.

The platform does not only view transactions as execution actions but positions them as a networked activity: transactions have social attributes, strategies can be shared, and relationships between individuals also become part of the financial system.

Regulatory Background

Mixin's design is based on a user-initiated, user-controlled model. The platform neither custodies assets nor executes transactions on behalf of users.

This model aligns with a statement issued by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on April 13, 2026, titled "Staff Statement on Whether Partial User Interface Used in Preparing Cryptocurrency Securities Transactions May Require Broker-Dealer Registration."

The statement indicates that, under the premise where transactions are entirely initiated and controlled by users, non-custodial service providers that offer neutral interfaces may not need to register as broker-dealers or exchanges.

About Mixin

Mixin is a decentralized, self-custodial privacy wallet designed to provide secure and efficient digital asset management services.

Its core capabilities include:

· Aggregation: integrating multi-chain assets and routing between different transaction paths to simplify user operations

· High liquidity access: connecting to various liquidity sources, including decentralized protocols and external markets

· Decentralization: achieving full user control over assets without relying on custodial intermediaries

· Privacy protection: safeguarding assets and data through MPC, CryptoNote, and end-to-end encrypted communication

Mixin has been in operation for over 8 years, supporting over 40 blockchains and more than 10,000 assets, with a global user base exceeding 10 million and an on-chain self-custodied asset scale of over $1 billion.

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