Nike Dot Swoosh Metaverse is Nike’s Web3 Platform on the Blockchain for NFTs
Nike takes one step further into the metaverse today with the debut of the .Swoosh, a new platform that will be home to the sportswear brand’s virtual footwear, apparel and accessories. Nike wants to build a robust web3 community in .Swoosh (pronounced “dot Swoosh”) where users will one day be able to access exclusive events, collaborate with Nike designers on virtual products, and even earn royalties from the sale of those products .
“It will be a place where our community can come in and create that future with us,” said Ron Faris, GM of Nike Virtual Studios. “You can collect, trade and flex virtual Nike products. You can go to IRL events with your token-gated virtual creations.”
Faris, who helped make the SNKRS app a powerful driver of Nike’s digital revenue, was tapped in January 2022 to lead the newly established Nike Virtual Studios. The division is a separate entrepreneurial group within Nike tasked with translating the brand into the world of web3, NFTs and the metaverse. Nike Virtual Studios has its own teams dedicated to virtual product design – some of them veterans of creating physical Nike merchandise and some of them experts in pushing the boundaries of what a shoe can look like in digital form.
In creating the .Swoosh, Nike consulted the team from RTFKT, the popular NFT brand that Nike acquired in December 2021. RTFKT (pronounced “artifact”) has transcended the digital realm, creating physical versions of some of the Nike-branded sneakers.
“We’ve learned a lot from our friends at RTFKT about how to do this right,” says Faris, “and we talk to them weekly about what are the best practices and how we can start taking certain learnings and really expand on them.”
Currently, .Swoosh is in an invitational beta phase, meaning users will need an access code to enter. The platform is accessible via browser on mobile or desktop; it’s not a social network, so you can’t chat with other users there, or a dedicated app, a la SNKRS.
Nike selects the first wave of participants who will have access from three groups: the most engaged customers, those who live in cities that do not usually get first access to new technologies, and partners from the diversity, equity and inclusion groups. .
On Friday, users with access will be able to claim their .Swoosh handle by registering their own domain—for example, “brendan.swoosh” for this writer. (Those who don’t yet have access can join a waiting list.) These domains will be users’ digital homes within Nike’s metaverse. Nike owns the .swoosh domain, which means it has access to all links in the domain.
Nike isn’t selling anything through the .Swoosh yet — they’ll release their first collection of virtual products there in January, Faris says. Users will be able to purchase items there with a regular credit or debit card as they would on nike.com, and their purchases will be secured on the blockchain. The brand is silent on what exactly the first collection will entail. .Swoosh will test tools for the collection’s items: some will be tied to physical products, some will give holders access to events.
Much of Nike’s plan for the metaverse is secretive—it holds more promise for the future than concrete benefits for the immediate present. The most exciting features are still to come.
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Faris says that in the future, Nike may offer a pre-order of a physical shoe in the form of a virtual one. Starting this spring, the .Swoosh will host creator challenges where winners can help Nike create a virtual product line and earn money from sales of the line. Members will be able to vote on the colors of virtual products. These processes start at curation, where .Swoosh users will help guide Nike designers, and mature into creation, where they will have tools to design alongside them.
Nike says its virtual releases will be wearables for RTFKT’s Clone avatars. The brand’s virtual products will eventually be available as wearables in video games, expanding their reach. The brand has done this before, launching Air Jordans for Fortnite in 2019. Next year, Nike will announce new partners that allow wider applications for its virtual goods.
But for now, Faris says, Nike wants to be mindful of the pace of the .Swoosh.
“We’re not going to sell things right away,” he explains. “We really want to be careful and thoughtful about how we invite the community in. So we’re starting with a month of education — a six-city tour where we’re going to pick rooms to help educate.”
Nike Virtual Studios will be heading to Atlanta, Charlotte, Louisville, Los Angeles, New York City and Tallahassee in December. The brand will host Zoom classes at retailers — think boutique stores and local sneaker shops that carry Nike products. Updates on the .Swoosh will be posted on Instagram and Nike’s Medium blog. Nike believes a significant amount of education is required around the metaverse before it starts releasing virtual goods on a regular basis.
Once it has a more regular cadence around virtual product drops, and once Nike Virtual Studios establishes a following around them, the team believes it can create opportunities for laypeople similar to those typically reserved for Nike’s most trusted partners. .Swoosh can have digital storefronts not only for top athletes and Nike collaborators, but also for regular users.
If Nike Virtual Studios is successful in this endeavor, it could be the .Swoosh’s most impressive achievement yet. The potential here is to unlock the brand’s tools and intellectual property for use by an audience beyond the confines of the Oregon headquarters.
“What we really want to do is expand the definition of what a creator can be,” says Faris. “Often it is limited to just a fashion designer or a designer, whereas we believe creators should be anyone who wants to express their opinion or express their perspective.”
