Last week was a big one for the NFT ecosystem, with a flurry of activity and developments taking place. From new big launches to new tools, there was a lot to keep track of.
In this article, we provid you with a comprehensive overview of the latest news and trends.
Whether you're a seasoned NFT enthusiast or new to the scene, this article has something for everyone.
Contents
π Macro - Porsche Failure. Or our failure;
ποΈ Last week's news - Doodles, american.eth, legislation;
π° Investments/Financing - Neopets, Metahood;
π£ Projects news/Updates - Elrond Apes, Rug Radio, Drifters;
βοΈ Legal - Our Metaverse Lawyer talks today about Law and Order. And he vows to...;
βοΈ Tools - Inspiration and tricks in AI art;
π Veefriends
βοΈ NFTility
π Dictionary - Private key, Interoperability;
πΈ Sale of the week
π Macro
We had other plans for today's macro section, being a bunch of reports worth mentioning. At the same time it's important to be honest. And to learn from our mistakes, even if they don't seem to be ours. On January 23rd, Porsche released their collection of NFTs. 7500 NFTs at a price of 0.911 ETH/piece. A failure. Less than 20% of the total number was minted and now FP on OpenSea is less than the mint price!
Some say the price was high. 0.911 ETH. Approximately $1500. Not true. We're talking about Porsche! 9gag's Captainz, for example, was minted 3 weeks ago for +1ETH/piece. 9999 NFTs. And they let people know that those who were on the whitelist for the public sale to forget about it, they won't have a chance. There was such high demand that it was clear it would be sold out in private sale. So it was!
So let's say what's on our minds. And what we can learn:
- Let's just be glad that we got the intuition right and the feeling told us that the Porsche NFTs are not quite what we wanted; or at least the arrogant, cold, corporate way they communicated!
- Having got past point 1 it's good to realize that, sadly, it's not (just) Porsche's failure. Which sure, may only be a failure in the short term. Anyone can have a comeback. Especially Porsche. Although momentum is hard to re-ignite. Even by Porsche! But this story is a black ball that at least in the coming period, will fall on us Web3 & NFTs degens. Every brand that fails to have a soft landing, even if it starts from a solid launch pad, bites a little more off the credibility of the whole industry. Unfortunately, other brands will say...yeah right...that's right, there's nothing there with those NFTs. And the haters will repeat: I told you so! And at the end of the day, we too will have to shake it off, cheer up, and continue #NFTeducation, convinced that it will be better in the future.
Porsche's failure is also due to us. Porsche's greed is also due to our greed. They had some cool stuff in the back, but didn't know how to communicate it. And whoever advised them probably told them: everyone with a reputation can have their NFTs sold out. And they thought, well, we're Porsche. We'll do it without struggling too much.
There is arrogance in some brands "entering" Web3, especially through NFTs. We're talking about the people who represent the brands and an enemy that we all know very well because each of us hosts it. Right inside us. It's ego and yes, we all have it. Some less, some more. This ego makes brands think they must succeed because of their past successes, their name in the industry, etc. The reality is that most of them fail. Because the need for this #NFTeducation we keep talking about is real. It starts with understanding the culture.
Alex CΔlin pointed out very well: "this is the difference that brands who want to come here need to understand quickly: if you want to have a chance of success, forget about how many followers you have on Instagram and how many cars you have sold so far. Get down to grass (or tyre) level there in Discord with every person who asks you a question."
Otherwise, the people most passionate about technology and this culture in NFTs will have to fight and keep educating & developing. Degens, as we like to call ourselves. It will be easy for haters to keep making fun. Because they treat this subject superficially.
Do we need such failures, such as Porsche? Oh YES! So do we and other brands that are preparing collections of NFTs can learn from the Porsche failure! And slowly, slowly the whole ecosystem will benefit! We can't evolve without getting hurt!
And Mtk said it well "Companies like Porsche will come along...and they will need good advisory services. I think it's not so bad when such projects fail because they can serve as a case study. And while we're at it, why not learn and, who knows, maybe some of us will become consultants in the future."
If you're reading this you're in the right place! We will continue #NFTeducation and it's not just us Metaventis founders anymore. Already a bunch of cool, passionate, ethical, and eager to roll up their sleeves people have started to gather around us! And just like our microbubble, there are hundreds and even thousands of other microbubbles worldwide. Someday, we'll compound! LFG!
ποΈ Last week's news
-
Doodles has struck a deal with animation studio Golden Wolf, which it will acquire. The internationally award-winning studio is best known for the content it produced for the Rick & Morty series. It has also worked with big brands such as Disney, Nike and Facebook. With memes and PFPs being some of the main elements of Web3 culture and NFTs the future looks promising. In addition, the success of Doodles so far has these designs at its core. Because that's exactly what the word Doodles means. Doodles π. Poopie, founder of Doodles, says to expect unconstrained storytelling and R&D (research & development) on the AI animation generation side. He ends with the following phrase: "We buy, we don't sell!". F**king legend!
-
The domain american.eth was sold for 31 eth. $50 k. Meanwhile, the hunt for less ethical domains never stops.
-
New Jersey authorities are proposing a bill that would make it illegal for residents to buy or sell NFTs without a license. The bill is called the 'Digital Asset and Blockchain Technology Act' and has been initiated in 2022. Residents would have to apply for an NFT license through the nation's multi-state licensing system. Subsequently, whether Nationwide would agree or not, a response should be received within 120 days. It also involves a fee, and an annual renewal fee + fines. Are we going to evolve?! We understand that legislation is needed to increase adoption. And countries take inspiration from each other! We, the passionate community, need to contribute to legislation too! We even have our Metaverse Lawyer!
-
Beeple has announced that the grand opening of BEEPLE STUDIOS will take place on March 11. We're talking about 50,000 square meters of physical space dedicated to art and artists.
π° Investments / Financing
-
Metahood raises $3 million in seed round to build a niche marketplace for the land plots in the famous Metaverse. Whether we're talking land in Decentraland, Sandbox or Yuga Labs' The Otherside, Metahood will have it all. Like Zillow or Redfin in the US. The concept is different from a classic marketplace of NFTs, in that they've set out to provide more context for those trading land in the Metaverse. The interface will show available plots of land in relation to those around them, giving a broader picture of the "neighborhood" in which you're about to buy your land. The round was led by crypto VC 1confirmation, with participation from Flamingo DAO but also angel investors such as Sandbox co-founder SΓ©bastien Borget, SuperRare co-founder John Crain, and Brian O'Hagan of Sorare.
-
Neopets raises $4 million to bring its community to the Metaverse. Neopets is not a startup, but a brand that has "been around" since 1999. Neopets is basically a website with 150 million users who raise virtual pets. Neo-pets. Get it? Pets, but more like nouveau pets. According to Wikipedia, users can own virtual pets ("Neopets") and buy virtual items for them using one of two virtual currencies: Neopoints, which can be earned on the site, and the other, Neocash, which can be bought with real money. So we didn't invent virtual currencies or virtual items, nor were we the first degens. The site was launched at the end of 1999. Two years later came the first investment, and in June 2005, Viacom (the company that owns Nickelodeon, which is a 40-year-old American TV channel) bought Neopets Inc. for $160 million. Now, the $4 million funding comes from some of the biggest names in GameFi, like Polygon Ventures and Avalanche's Blizzard.
π£ Projects News / Updates
-
Rug Radio is hiring a new CEO. It's Loxley, who will co-CEO alongside founder Farokh. Rug Radio, along with Metaventis (sorry, sometimes you can't help yourself :D), is one of the top media companies in Web3. At the same time, it's a user-owned platform, through a DAO structure.
-
MutantApeXClub, which came out just after another copy of BAYC (but with some volume), is doxxed, and is backed by an American rapper, creator of several collections that went nowhere. He called his project a "social experiment" and promised to give his money back. Awesome! Nooot! Just so we all understand (again) the role of education in this.
-
New sneak peek at the metaverse created by Drifters.
-
Challenges for new CEO Elrond Apes.
βοΈ Legal
Today we're going to talk a bit about law and order in the Metaverse. Remember that sexual harassment case in the Metaverse? When a woman who was a beta tester was virtually molested by a stranger in Horizon Worlds.
There have already been quite a few cases of sexual abuse in the Metaverse, and this has opened up a discussion about the legal issues that need to be addressed. If your avatar is sexually abused, does it count as actual abuse? You could have easily taken off your VR headset, couldn't you? Or were you so immersed in the virtual experience that, for a moment, you forgot it wasn't happening in real life? And we're not just talking about sex crimes. As technology develops, the Metaverse will likely mimic the real world and we'll be able to do everything we can already do in real life and more. Including all kinds of crime π€.
Well, justice initiatives have been popping up all over the Metaverse. You remember, of course, the global Metaverse police launched by INTERPOL. And recently MetaCourt was launched, a Web3 & Blockchain project offering the first legal Metaverse with a game theory-based dispute resolution protocol as the primary utility for disputes arising from NFTs, Metaverse and Blockchain, backed by the $COURT token (how else?π) built on Solana.
Decentralized justice??? I don't believe it until I see it! I don't know about you, but I can't wait to be a real metaverse lawyer, pleading virtually and wearing a virtual robe while sitting at home wearing pajamas and a VR headset. I can already imagine what the Virtual Lawyers' vow would sound like: "I swear to uphold and defend the Constitution and laws of the Metaverse, the rights, and freedoms of users, and to practice the profession of virtual lawyering with honor and dignity. So help me Blockchain!".
βοΈ Tools: Inspiration and tricks in AI art
Midjourney is a revolutionary tool that you can use to generate images just based on a prompt, i.e. a message describing what you would like the AI to draw for you.
If you play around a bit with various AI tools (Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, Dall-E, etc) that generate art, you'll notice that it's not so easy to pull out some wow-looking images and that you need to learn various keywords to add to the prompt, plus other tricks. You can start reading all the documentation, which is recommended, but it's still not enough and the power of example always pays off.
Because of this need, sites have popped out that have put together millions of AI-generated images where you can search and then discover the exact words that generated those images.
Here you can find two sites that we like and find useful when we want to look for new art styles.
Prompthero is the largest database of Stable Diffusion, DALL-E, Midjourney, Openjourney prompts where you can find millions of AI-generated images.
Lexica.art is a similar site where you can search for images already generated by other users and even generate images directly from the site based on a prompt. What we like about lexica.art is that once you land on an image you like, you can explore that style and find dozens of other similar images.
Have as much inspiration as you can and we look forward to seeing what cool things you generate next.
π Veefriends
VeeFriends.com has had a facelift, which comes with several improvements, including the ability to set up notifications via email or SMS, and a new login system, so more web2-like with username and password, but with a new way of connecting the wallet to the account, this is done once, through a one-time eth transfer, worth a few cents, to a specified address. Gary has recommended on numerous occasions that those with a VF1/2 make an account using the new platform.
And also related to platforms, Book Games have been somewhat forgotten on TokenTrove, with no focus on them lately. Perhaps it's time to remember them and get acquainted with Immutable X. For many fans, they were the way into the VeeFriends ecosystem, and let's not forget: "Book games are played forever!"
VeeFriends & DailyDose: Ryan Carson is one of the people who will take the stage at Veecon! π
There are 115 days until VeeCon! π
βοΈ NFTility
We often associate the rise of blockchain technology with the hippie movement that began more than half a century ago. While by definition they had different goals, both are anti-cultural movements that raise alarm bells about the status quo.
In today's edition, we want you to imagine the present as a portal between the past and the future because that's exactly what the MNTGE (read Mintage) project is trying to do. As the name suggests, it merges the physical and digital worlds, but in reverse of what you would expect. The team, with experience in the retro fashion and streetwear niche, wants to convert IRL items into digital format, ready to be worn in the metaverse. The process takes place through scanning, and the digital product becomes a faithful copy of the original. It looks something like this. There's no room to write more about the team, but if you go to the thread, using the first hyperlink, you'll discover for yourself if there's more to discover.
Created late last year with a 1.5k broadcast, MNTGE Pass primarily provides access to a community where people passionate about retro fashion can interact both with each other and the culture preserved through it. In addition, holders will have priority access to future digital collections launched through MNTGE, as well as the upcoming MNTGE Market platform, where they can purchase products and accessories carefully selected by experienced collectors.
Cultural movements always happen. Often linear, and sometimes explosive. The project presented above may seem super niche, but we invite you to see things in perspective. Gen Z values will shape the next few decades, especially when it comes to planetary sustainability, and the fashion industry will not be bypassed.
We recommend you open this report on a new page, and after you finish reading the entire post come back to it. I promise it's an interesting read.
π Dictionary
-
Private key. Also known as a secret key, it is a kind of password and is used with an algorithm to encrypt and decrypt data. It's a secret and no one can tell you unless you tell someone. Not an online note, not a cloud note. In short, it's the access key to everything you hold on the blockchain. Tokens or NFTs. There's a saying: not your keys, not your money!
-
Interoperability - Blockchain interoperability refers to the ability of blockchains to communicate with each other. At its core are cross-chain protocols, which allow blockchains to read data from and/or write data to other blockchains. Meaning, for example, being able to sell your BAYC monkey, which is on Ethereum, Solana, or MultiversX. Even if you initially have your phone blocked in Orange ideally you can also use it in Vodafone. We believe the future blockchain will be interoperable!
πΈ Sale of the week
What does +half a million dollars mean these days? Depends, we'll tell you if you open the door to monkey #4025! Especially since it's robotic (the glasses are also cool ). It sold for 395 ETH.
Find us:
Creative Tim
Metaventis
