Moonbirds Take Off
A New NFT collection dropped on April 16th that absolutely blew up called Moonbirds. This avatar NFT endeavor has become one of the highest-grossing NFT collections of all time.
Moonbirds is a collection of 10,000 utility enabled PFPs (profile pictures) that are composed of an assortment of rarity traits. Each Moonbird also allows access to a private club membership with additional benefits the longer you hold on.
Why was there so much hype about this particular project? The founder, Kevin Rose, an internet entrepreneur, is well-known, well-connected, and he had Gary Vee and Alexis Ohanian promote the drop. This combination of avatar style NFTs along with prominent influencers backing the collection, is an example of a successful roadmap launch.
Kevin also developed a community called PROOF Collective which drove more sales. PROOF is a membership-based group for NFT enthusiasts, including Beeple, and its membership NFT has gone up 50x in the past 5 months. So, many in the Collective were certain Moonbirds would follow suit; and now that the results are in, they were not wrong. As of April 21, Moonbirds has produced over $330M in total sales (check out Dune Analytics dashboard).
The interesting benefit of purchasing a Moonbird is that each holder can “stake” their Moonbird for better rewards. You can “nest” your bird without it ever leaving your wallet. The longer they are “nesting” the more benefits they accrue and the higher the price the Moonbirds will likely surge, as less supply will be available for purchase.
The bottom line is that although many collections have recently struggled to develop momentum, the right combination of traits, exposure, community, and influence will get the job done. Only time will tell if Moonbirds has lasting power.
Snoop Dogg and his Death Row+ Streaming Service Launch
Photo Credit: Reuters
Snoop Dogg is working on controlling the streaming revenue and NFT revenue for his own music and of the artists who have partnered with his record label, Death Row Records. Although to start, Death Row+ will have much fewer listeners, he believes that there will be bigger payouts in the long run.
In an interview on REVOLT’S Drink Champs, Snoop didn’t hold back when he explained his philosophy behind starting his own streaming service. “Those platforms get millions and millions and millions of streams and nobody gets paid other than the record labels. [As an artist] you get 100 million streams, and you don’t make a million dollars. So, what the f—is that?”
Photo Credit: Jeff Kravitz
Snoop Dogg has already put his philosophy to the test as he dropped his latest album, BODR (Back on Death Row) as a limited edition of NFTs and was able to cash in on $21million in sales despite only amassing 16 million streams and 34,000 downloads.
Snoop is a definite visionary when it comes to combining music, NFTs, and marketing. He is going all in on Death Row+ as a metaverse-first company and launching a Death Row app soon.
The First Hologram NFT
Photo Credit: MakersPlace
MakersPlace has teamed up with The Holoverse in presenting the first NFT hologram to the world. This is no ordinary hologram, the art piece is Leonardo da Vinci’s, La Bella Principessa, and it will be floating inside a crystal glass case as a half-a-billion-pixel 3D hologram.
According to MakersPlace, “In 1998, the portrait was brought to a pair of art scholars who realized, after careful determination, that the piece was a Leonardo da Vinci. La Bella Principessa is kept in cold storage and has only been exhibited three times. The portrait will soon enjoy human eyes again, but this time as a half-a-billion-pixel 3D hologram floating inside a crystal glass case, care of The Holoverse.
Leonardo da Vinci's, La Bella Principessa, depicts a fashionable young woman in a beautiful renaissance dress and hair netting. The sitter is believed to be Bianca Sforza, a young aristocrat from Milan.
The piece was likely commissioned by Leonardo’s employer, Ludovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan, to celebrate the marriage of his beloved but illegitimate daughter, Bianca, in 1496 to an Italian nobleman.”
The auction began on April 21 with an opening bid price of $105,000.
This new type of offering indicates how art advisors and marketplaces are pushing the envelope when it comes to how NFTs can be used to bring forth fascinating new dimensions of artwork to collectors.
Stay Curious!
~NFT Art Source
I follow Shaan Puri and read his daily Newsletter The Milk Road. He answered a subscriber question regarding what’s the metaverse and his thoughtful explanation follows:
What’s your take on the metaverse. I keep hearing everyone say metaverse, but I have no idea what the hell they are talking about.
-Laurie from Texas
Don’t worry, they don’t know what the hell they are talking about either.
Think about it this way. 30 years ago we spent NONE of our time online. Your friends, your photos, your assets, etc.. All of it was the real world.
15 years ago (2007), some of it had moved online. Facebook helped us keep in touch with friends digitally. Our photos became digital.
Today - a LOT has moved digital. We have friends we met on twitter. We facetime and zoom instead of meeting in person. We own digital assets like bitcoin and NFTs. Many people’s job is fully digital and remote.
The arrow is pointing one way. Less physical world stuff. More digital stuff.
Now imagine 30 years forward. We won’t need phones. A screen will be in a contact lens on our eye. We won’t need cash. Our money will be digital. We won’t fly for business meetings. We will just pop up a hologram and talk.
What people call the “metaverse” is actually a transition from “most of our life happening physically” to “most of our life happening digitally”.
Ideally, nobody should “own the metaverse”. Facebook changed their name to Meta, but I don’t know about you - I don’t want some product manager at Facebook to own the metaverse.
Amazing! Beautiful!!!👏👏👏