Born from a novel of cold empires and free cities
The name comes from a book. Vitalik Buterin wrote Snowmoon in 32 chapters and gave it to the world as open source, free for anyone to retell.
The book imagines a world that runs on cryptography. Two societies stand against each other: Veridia, and the Arctic Empire. Their conflict is fought with ideas as much as power, through privacy, proofs and new ways of deciding things together.
In that world, people pay in zipcoin. So does Snowmoon: every swap passes through ZC, the same coin the characters carry.
Veridia
The society at the heart of the story. Snowmoon chooses its side: open code, shared rewards, nobody holding the keys.
The Arctic Empire
Its rival. Power that gathers in one place and decides for everyone else. A token with an owner and a tax switch would belong here.
Zipcoin
The money of the novel and the other half of our pool. You enter through ZC, and the snow you collect falls in ZC.