Reddit launches a new NFT avatar marketplace – TechCrunch
Reddit launches a new NFT-based avatar marketplace today that lets you buy blockchain-based profile pictures at a fixed price. The company said you do not need to have a crypto wallet to buy them, so your credit or debit card should be enough and you can use Reddit’s own wallet product to store them.
The social network said it releases 90 different designs, and the total amount of NFTs sold in this early access phase is “tens of thousands”.
The company noted that if you purchase one of the limited edition NFTs, you will have licensing rights to use it on and off Reddit as an avatar. These rights are not as extensive as owning an NFT from the Yuga Labs’ Bored Monkey Yacht Club collection, which allows you to create items or TV series based on the boring monkey you own. Also, you can mix and match the avatar’s appearance with the merch available in the avatar builder, and the avatar will have a “glowing effect” next to your comments together.
Photo credit: Reddit
This is not Reddit’s first rodeo with NFTs. Earlier this year, the company began testing a feature that would allow you to set any Ethereum-based NFT as a profile picture – weeks after Twitter released a similar feature. Last year, Reddit released limited edition NFTs based on its mascot Snoo called CryptoSnoos.
Reddit has partnered with Polygon, an Ethereum-compatible blockchain, to create these avatars on the chain. You can use Reddit’s own blockchain wallet called Vault – which is available on the company’s original app – to store and manage these NFTs. Vault is currently used to earn blockchain-based community points and apply them to special features such as tags and animated emojis.
Today, NFT avatars will be available to members of r / CollectibleAvatar’s invitation subreddit for a first look. The community will have details on how to set up a wallet, exclusive AMAs of artists and posts behind the scenes about the one-time profile photos. Since there is no auction, all NFTs have a fixed price and can be purchased through fiat currencies such as US dollars. List prices for these NFT avatars are $ 9.99, $ 24.99, $ 49.99, $ 74.99 or $ 99.99. If you are not part of that community, the company noted that these collectible avatars will be available for purchase on the avatar builder site for everyone in the coming weeks.
Photo credit: Reddit
The company has worked with artists – some from communities such as r / Comics, r / ProCreate and r / AdobeIllustrator – for the first collection. Reddit-branded artists also receive royalties – with a 50/50 profile shared with Reddit – from secondary sales of these NFTs on marketplaces such as Opensea and Rarible.
Reddit says that while NFT profile images are an early-stage blockchain project, it wants to explore more features with the technology.
“In the future, we see blockchain as a way to bring more empowerment and independence to communities. Reddit. Reddit has always been a model for what decentralization could look like online; “Our communities are self-built and driven, and as part of our mission to better strengthen our communities, we are exploring tools to help them become even more self-sustaining and self-governing,” the company said in a statement.
Reddit has joined a long list of companies experimenting with NFTs. After launching NFT support on Instagram, Facebook has recently transferred some of these features to the blue app. After launching its own digital art collection in May, eBay acquired the NFT marketplace KnownOrigin in June. In May, Spotify began testing a feature that allowed some artists to promote digital collectibles on their profiles, and the link-in-bio startup Linktree rolled out new features for creators such as unlockable links for specific NFT collection holders. Expect more of these tests in the near future.
