Ethereum NFT Marketplace Blur Launches with Free Airdrop for Traders

Another day, another NFT marketplace.

VC-backed marketplace Blur launched on Wednesday, promising new users free crypto in the form of an airdropped gift containing an undisclosed amount of BLUR tokens. If you’ve traded an NFT in the last six months, you may be eligible for the free airdrop – but you won’t be able to open the airdrop and access your gift until January 2023.

“To celebrate our launch, we’re sending care packages containing $BLUR tokens to everyone stuck in the bear market,” the marketplace wrote on Twitter.

The first airdrop will be free to claim for the next two weeks, but will have to sit in traders’ wallets unopened until next year, when BLUR will become usable as a management token for the platform. Traders can also receive an airdrop by posting an NFT for sale on Blur.

Calling itself the NFT marketplace for “pro-traders,” Blur offers an aggregation feature, portfolio analysis, and zero marketplace fees. It is website claims traders can use Blur to “snipe reveals faster than anywhere else.” It also boasts that it allows purchases “10x faster than Gem”, an NFT batch purchase tool Open sea bought back in April.

In a blog postsBlur said the platform has been in a closed beta for nearly a year, but claims the aggregator still managed to see the second-highest volume in just four months.

Debate around creator royalties has swirled around NFT Twitter after some NFT creators and collectors condemned Magic Eden’s move to optional royalty last week, it called a “L” for the NFT economy. But Blur offers “incentivized royalties,” providing those who choose to receive royalties with airdropped rewards beyond the initial launch gift.

“Today, royalties are unenforceable on-chain, and traders already have many zero-royalty options,” Blur wrote in its announcement blog post.

The new marketplace plans to offer three levels of unspecified rewards. Those who choose to forego paying royalties altogether will receive “low rewards”, while traders who pay “partial royalties” and “full royalties” will receive proportionally more rewards from the market.

“We will monitor our initial solution and work closely with traders, collectors and creators to explore other solutions that can be voted on via governance when $BLUR launches in January,” the site explained. “Blur’s marketplace fees are off, so Blur themselves won’t make a single penny until then.”

This is not the first time an NFT marketplace has offered its traders tokens in exchange for buying and selling NFTs through its platform. Looks Weirdwhich launched in January, is handing out LOOKS tokens to its traders – but there have reportedly been billions worth of NFTs did the shopping as a result.

Blur’s NFT Marketplace, which will be “majority owned of society,” previously raised above 11 million dollars in seed funding from Web3 VC firm Paradigm and investor degener like 6529Cozomo Medici, Deeze, MoonOverlord and others.

After its first initial airdrop, Blur plans to release one second bigger, more involved than in November. IN second airdroptraders will have to use Blur and list higher value NFTs to earn bigger rewards.

Blur has yet to respond Decryptits request for comment.