Bored Apes and Doodles and Snoop Dogg, Oh My!

From Snoop Dogg imitators walk around Times Square to the staged protests against NFTThe NFT.NYC conference was designed to promote Web3 brands and gather as many people as possible in the Big Apple.

Members from top-tier communities such as the Bored Ape Yacht Club and Doodles showed up in full force for one of the largest NFT (non-fungible token) events.

Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) hosted the ApeFest Jamboree for members on Pier 17 with performances by comedian Amy Schumer and performances by rappers Eminem and Snoop Dogg, who also had its premiere a music video featuring their BAYC avatars.

The founders of BAYC creator Yuga Labs on Friday published a letter on Medium in response to the setback from a recent investigative video on YouTube called the Bored Ape Nazi Club which made conspiracy allegations and accused the team of having cult associations.

Doodles further permeated pop culture with one setup in real life of the Doodles world and a number of announcements, including Doodles 2, an upcoming collection of animated profile picture NFTs. Pharrel Williams was also announced as the company’s new brand manager. The Doodles Dooplicator project, which was sent to owners in May, became the most sold project on OpenSea in the 48 hours after the news.

Title sponsors for NFT.NYC 2022 included the blockchain network Polygon and the crypto payment provider MoonPay, which debuted its own NFT minting service called HyperMint.

Throughout the event, Blockworks interviewed developers, collectors, founders and analysts. Here are some of the highlights from the week.

The promise of an open metaverse

Various companies are working to make the metaverse a reality, more specifically a 3D interoperable open metaverse – this means bridging virtual worlds that act as gamified social networks, and merging our physical and digital identities.

“The future we are fighting for involves breaking down virtual walls and connecting the world,” said Timmu Toke, CEO of Ready Player Me, a platform that creates metaverse-ready avatars with a selfie-compatible selfie across apps and games.

Interoperability in the meta-verse can be compared to an open free trade market “that is not controlled by anyone,” Toke said. And an open system is simply “better business.”

Avatars are the most important element of an open and scalable metavers, according to Toke, and interoperable avatars will generate more sales of digital assets “because people will put more value on avatars that can be used anywhere, not just in one game.”

When it comes to digital identity, Danny Greene, general manager of MeebitsDAO, believes that identity is “not monolithic”, but rather fluid. “Expressing ourselves in the meta-verse is clearly different from the experience [in real life] where ingrained prejudices have a direct impact on how one is perceived, he said.

“The avatar you choose, the wearables you wear, the spaces you occupy are a signal of what’s important to you, what you stand for,” Greene added.

Last week, more than 30 technology giants including Meta, Microsoft and Epic Games formed a standards organization called the Metaverse Standards Forum (MSF) to define the priorities and principles behind metaverse technologies, including virtual reality and augmented reality.

Players will continue to play

When it comes to games to make money, Grant Haseley, founder of games to earn the game Undead Blocks, said that the future of games to make games will depend on “shifting the paradigm from pointing and clicking and being able to earn decentralized yield farming. ”

Esports tournaments and NFTs can give players the opportunity to win big, he said, but the rewards should go to those who really want to be a member of the community.

“If you’re a top player, and you’re engaged, driven and driven to return to those games and those ecosystems, then you should earn some rare assets.”

Dylan Bushnell, vice president of game design for publisher Atmos Labs, spoke about the need for horizontal integration and the value of customization in blockchain games.

Blockchain games have done well when it comes to replicating collector mechanics, but they continue to attract only niche audiences, according to Bushnell, adding that players want to play in a universe that reflects who they want to be.

“Your identity in a game is only as meaningful as the amount of variety, like how much we allow you to customize” from performance to appearance, Bushnell said.

He added that publishers must give people the choice between creating their characters or avatars that they have spent time building and competing with part of their identity, without limiting performance.

NFT lending remains strong

There are several motivations for taking out an NFT loan with security, from gaining influence to be able to buy more NFTs to obtaining the liquidity needed for another purpose.

A major issue now in a bear market, according to Gabe Frank, CEO of the peer-to-peer NFT lending platform Arcade, is that NFT borrowers should secure their NFT exposure.

By comparing taking out a loan on an NFT with buying a put option, Gabe explained that if the collateral falls below the market value, the borrower does not have to repay the loan. So you basically have the right to sell it. It’s a way of securing downside risk. “

He also expects to see more defaults in the coming months, stating that lenders steer clear of artwork NFTs, as opposed to PFPs or collectibles because they are less liquid. However, Frank is optimistic about CryptoPunks: “The floor will be 10 million in 10 years.”

CryptoPunks’ floor is up from the low 50s in terms of ether per week with TerraUSD crash, to 66 ETH at the time of publication, although it represents a drop of around $ 10,000 in US dollars as the price of ether has dropped from $ 1,700 to $ 1100 in the same period.

On the other hand, Stephen Young, CEO of rival peer-to-peer lending platform NFTfi, considers CryptoPunks to be a work of art.

“The 10 million PFP projects, all of which were launched at the same time, are simply falling through the cracks. And people are rushing to the assets that show real value and perseverance. “

Young believes that CryptoPunks, as well as generative art on the chain such as Autoglyphs or Art Blocks collections such as Squiggles, Fidenza and Ringers, can now appeal more than ever to traditional art collectors given the unfavorable market conditions. $ 60,000 for a punk is “suddenly actually affordable” for art collectors, Young said.

“First prizes fall all the way along [ether] until we get to the bottom, and then you will see quality projects start to rise in terms of ether prices again, he added. “Because at some point, they’re cheap.”

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