zaps vs $ZERU
Two separate economies, kept at arm's length by design.
Zaps runs two economies that never touch, and the separation is one of the most deliberate decisions in the product.
zaps: the internal currency
zaps, lowercase, are the currency of the reputation economy. Earned through trading activity, spent on entry fees and action fees, locked as skin in the game, burned as proof of belief.
zaps are not a tradeable token. They cannot be withdrawn, listed, or sold. They exist only inside the app.
$ZERU: the network token
$ZERU is the separate network token, kept deliberately minimal. It carries exactly two utilities, governance and a fee burn, described on the $ZERU page. It carries none of the gamified mechanics that make zaps fun: no staking multipliers, no reward boosts, no yield.
No bridge, no conversion
There is no stated path, mechanism, or rate that converts zaps into $ZERU, and none is planned. The two are built, governed, and valued independently.
Why the separation exists
Because it makes both sides better at their jobs.
Stacking heavy financial utility onto a tradeable token, staking, multipliers, yield, invites that token to be treated as a security. zaps avoid this entirely by never being tradeable, which frees the product to make them as playful and as consequential as the reputation economy needs: instant burns on a tap, permanent vouches, dispute stakes, entry fees. None of that would be possible on a financial asset.
Meanwhile $ZERU stays boring on purpose, and boring is what a network token should be: a governance right and a claim on the network's growth through the fee burn, nothing else.
What this means for you
If you are here to earn something you can sell, zaps are not that, and no page of these docs will suggest otherwise. What zaps buy is standing: entry to the room, weight behind your word, proof of your belief, and a share of what your community wins. Inside a reputation network, that is the whole game.