Solana now has a beer – with DeGods, Okay Bears and other NFTs on the can

It is a Solana smartphone, and a Solana IRL store– and now a Solana beer.

Solana Summer Shandy just dropped today, but unlike the recently opened store and upcoming smartphone project, this alcoholic lemonade shandy drink doesn’t come from the Solana Foundation or its core network contributors, Solana Labs.

Instead, the beer is the creation of barrelDAO, a user-run brewery and distillery. Solana Summer Shandy is released in limited quantities: only 333 total 16-packs of beereach represented by a Solana NFT which can be purchased today and then redeemed from Monday to receive the beer.

BarrelDAO intended to launch the sale earlier this afternoon on the top Solana NFT marketplace, Magical Edenbut as at publication was apparently still sorting through problems with the fall. Each 16-pack retails for 1.35 SOL, or almost $45 currently, and that price includes shipping to the US, UK and Australia.

And the beer represents Solana in more than just name and redemption tokens: the boxes are also plastered with original artwork by Mark Lauthierwith references to a wide variety of Solana-based NFT projects, along with specific avatars within these collections.

Look closely and you will find images and other references to popular Solana NFT projects such as DeGods, Degenerate Ape Academy, Okay Bears, Solana Monkey BusinessThugbirdz, Cets on Creck, Catalina Whale Mixer and John Lê’s “The First Edition”.

Dave Goldman, co-founder and CEO of Barrel Labs, said Decrypt that barrelDAO itself owns about 20 of the individual NFTs referenced on the boxes, while 23 of them are shown via license agreements entered into with the holders of the individual NFTs.

An NFT is a blockchain token that represents ownership of an item, such as digital artwork, collectibles, and video game items. They can also be used as an entry card to an event or community, or redeemed for goods. The NFT market increased in 2021, generating $25 billion of trading volume.

Many NFT projects allow holders to commercialize their owned artwork and use it to create their own derivative artwork, products and other projects. The Ethereum-based Bored Ape Yacht Club is the most famous example, and keepers have used their Monkeys for things like restaurants, candyalcohol and marijuana packaging, virtual bandsand much more.

“Over the last three days, we have painstakingly reviewed and licensed every single NFT used in this box design,” Goldman said Thursday. “We knew this could start a big conversation about IP in the NFT space and wanted to make sure we set a standard for others [consumer packaged goods] brands to follow.”

There is already a conversation – and some debate – about the use of IP rights around NFTs. Yuga Labs has inspired countless other NFT projects with its permissive Bored Ape license, but there are some questions about whether current rights grants effectively transfer IP rights to holders, including whether they would hold up in a court of law.

Just last week, crypto investment firm Galaxy Digital released a research report suggesting that the Bored Apes license in particular contains contradictions over IP ownership. Yuga Labs and Moonbirds creator Proof are also claimed to be among them Web3 builders which has “misled” NFT owners about the extent of IP rights they have.

It’s relatively early to determine the legality of IP rights surrounding NFTs, but that debate and confusion didn’t stop a bunch of NFT owners from offering their avatars for the Solana Summer Shandy release. And it’s a conversation that could go more smoothly with a frosty drink in hand.

Pseudonymous Solana NFT collector Topo Gigio tweeted about including their NFT from the Boogle project. “When barrelDAO reached out to use my Boogle on the beer art for their upcoming release ‘Solana Summer Shandy’ I was PUMPED to be a part of it.” they wrote.

In addition to launching NFT tokens to redeem for real beer, barrelDAO also sells NFT versions of the digital artwork. Each edition of the artwork will sell for 0.69 SOL (about $23) and provide holders with as yet unspecified benefits around future barrelDAO product releases.