The man who hit the US social sentiment with a cryptocurrency exchange has issued a token.

Who is the most popular person in the United States right now? The answer might not be the well-known Trump or Musk, but a man named Nick Shirley.

Who is Nick Shirley? He is an independent investigative journalist stirring up social sentiment in the U.S. today. On December 27, Nick Shirley posted multiple videos of his investigative visits on social media platforms like X, Instagram, and YouTube, accusing Minnesota of rampant fraud and corruption.

In the videos, Nick Shirley visited a daycare in the state. Although it was during operating hours, the facility was closed, and the 99 registered students listed in public records were nowhere to be seen. Shirley asked a local resident who had lived in the area for 8 years, and the resident said, “I’ve been living here since 2017, but I’ve never seen any children.”

In the video, Nick Shirley said, “This is one of hundreds of ‘daycares’ that received millions of dollars from the government. This one, which is even misspelled as ‘learing’ (should be ‘learning’), received $1.9 million in tax-exempt funding… And this is just one case among thousands of businesses in Minnesota suspected of fraud… Minnesota Governor Tim Walz knows about these frauds but has never reported them.”

Shirley’s videos have sparked massive attention and discussion across the U.S., with hundreds of millions of views in just two days. A 42-minute full investigation video on X alone has garnered over a billion views.

Prominent figures from politics and business have also engaged with Shirley. U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris retweeted and responded multiple times, saying Shirley’s investigation is more valuable than all the work for the 2024 Pulitzer Prize; Elon Musk also followed Shirley’s account and highly praised Shirley for demonstrating media value, calling ‘learning’ the “word of the year.”

Here’s some background on U.S. politics: Minnesota is traditionally considered a Democratic stronghold, but recent years have seen a significant shift, turning it into a swing state. More importantly, current Governor Tim Walz was Harris’s running mate in the 2024 election and had a chance to become Vice President like Vance… So it’s not surprising that Harris personally stepped in to criticize.

Given the hot topic and its meme-friendly social and political attributes, the on-chain world naturally wouldn’t be late.

First, the community spontaneously hyped the most abstract misspelling in the investigation—‘learing’—on the Solana chain, where the meme token’s market cap is currently around $3.34 million.

Next, the community discovered that Shirley seemingly registered a creator platform on Zora and issued a personal creator token $thenickshirley on Base. Interactions between Coinbase founder Brian Armstrong and Shirley confirmed that the token was indeed issued by Shirley himself.

As of this post, $thenickshirley ’s market cap is approximately $5.65 million (peaking at $9.02 million), and Shirley has earned $41,646 in creator royalties.

Brian Armstrong stated that this demonstrates content monetization on Base outperforms other platforms. Shirley also thanked Armstrong after earning money, praising Base and Zora as “legends.”

Additionally, prediction market Polymarket quickly followed up with speculation about the “next steps” regarding this topic, with current odds shown below:

An hour ago, Shirley posted his Venmo and crypto addresses on X, openly accepting “tips.”

From the rising meme trend $thenickshirley, to Shirley’s token issuance, to the launch of “multi-channel crowdfunding” and ongoing market-driven fermentation, we are witnessing a performance of the synergy between online media and open finance.

This is not just a meme speculation; it’s more like a real-world experiment in “creator economy + on-chain content monetization”—a person with huge influence and public impact in the real world, without sponsors, platform cuts, or advertisers, directly completing the cycle of attention monetization through on-chain tools.

What it proves is not “how much this token can rise,” but a deeper question: whether content can truly be monetized on decentralized platforms with lower friction and greater transparency. Perhaps, within this, lies the future evolution path of the media industry.