gm. I hope you didn’t miss me yesterday. the holiday weekend has left me with far fewer brain cells than when you last heard from me on Friday. so do bear with me today as I typo my way through the latest NFT news from the long weekend! I sure did miss a lot by the pool…
ALPHA ⚓️
looking to capitalize off the success of Goblin Town, a few new projects (and one old one) used a similar model this weekend to great success. the first came Friday; “Elf Town” (the creativity in the space knows no bounds) launched with a free mint model - quickly selling out and going up to a respectable .1 ETH floor.
then, we saw OSF’s project ‘rektguy’ (which was also free to mint) pop up to almost a 1 ETH floor on the news that Snoop Dogg had not only bought one and complimented the art but also (briefly) used it as his profile picture.
memurs was next on Monday and can you guess what happened? crazy gas fees, but it still sold out!
that’s because the word “free” is the best marketing there is (I, for one, am always down for a free sticker, so please DM me).
and in this economy? who can argue with the price point of “free plus gas” when you have no extra ETH to throw around?
mint price has been a long-debated issue in the NFT world. we’ve gone back and forth mostly. Moonbirds was a 2.5 ETH, which we were initially upset with and then seemed like an extreme deal a few hours later. Cool Cats was initially .06 ETH but was eventually dropped to .02 ETH and set the standard for “cheap” mints…a trend that has been bucked in recent months as we’ve gone up to .1 and .25 ETH in many cases.
free mints are a natural community pushback to these greedy project leaders as of late.
instead of paying upfront, we now can enter projects that have to “prove it” to us.
in theory, that motivates teams to build more for longer…as their only revenue stream is commission/royalties.
however, it’s demotivating in the sense that there is no ETH for the teams to start with. often, the initial mint and sell-out is enough to convince the teams behind these projects to quit their normie jobs and commit themselves fully to Web3.
we will see how this plays out in the long-term but I like us sticking with free mints for a while. how many a project has been abandoned with a mint price >0? at least, rugs won’t hurt as much anymore when you only pay gas.
BETA ⚓️
in the wee hours of Monday morning, possibly after some hungover/still drunk Memorial Day shenanigans, a Bored Ape Yacht Club holder “fat-fingered” a listing.
instead of selling his Ape for 100 ETH, he listed it for…10 ETH. that’s a difference of about ~$180K if you’re doing the math at home.
it was immediately swooped up by bots (which tends to happen here before it’s resold on other marketplaces), and it serves us as yet another terrible tale of decentralization…
as we learned with Seth Green’s stolen Ape, the recourse for mistakes like this is often limited. with this particular case, since it’s not even fraud, the options for nftmetaman are even fewer.
OpenSea has some red text that warns you that you’re listing below the floor, but clearly that’s not enough. I imagine as cases like this skyrocket with mass adoption, there will be more warnings put in place. ultimately though, they’ll be for nothing if we’re zombie clicking and going through the motions on autopilot.
my recommendation to everyone out there? double-check and triple-check your listings. also don’t drink and NFT.
DELTA ⚓️
speaking of Seth Green, he’s updated us on the status of the fight to get his Bored Ape back. never underestimate what even (slightly) connected and rich people can get done that an average person can’t.
to keep you in the loop, a pretty sophisticated hack (that I know I would fall for) is being investigated on OpenSea. more details are below, but you essentially have an “offer” on an NFT that was dropped into your collection for >1 ETH. however, it’s all a ploy to get you to sign and gain access to your wallet. that 1 ETH offer could prove way more costly. be careful.
nouns DAO, one of the more confusing ecosystems out there, experienced some non-Goblin Town, non-Yuga-related pumping over the holiday weekend. as much as I want to ignore it, I no longer can, so I will have to learn before I get left behind. it is an OG though, so this is long overdue and I’ll report back tomorrow.