NFTs in a nutshell: A weekly review

Instagram is building native minting features for NFTs, while OpenSea finds itself in the middle of the heated “creator royalty” debate. Creator monetization was a core pillar of much of last week’s NFT discussion, all while the “excitement to irrelevance” spectrum of new NFT projects is seemingly accelerating (if Art Gobblers is any example).

Meanwhile, it’s more mainstream IP that makes it on the chain. Every weekend we review the biggest NFT stories from the last week of spring nut shell. Let’s take a look at last week’s action as we head into the final two months of 2022.

This week’s non-fungible token news

OpenSea’s position on Creator Royalties in question

OpenSea has found itself in a difficult position trying to sort through royalties. The leading NFT marketplace reiterated over the weekend that it is working on dynamic tools that give creators flexibility around creator fees:

There has been much discussion in recent months about business models for NFT creators and whether royalties are viable.

Given our role in the ecosystem, we want to take a thoughtful, principled approach to this topic and lead with solutions. 🧵

— OpenSea (@opensea) 6 November 2022

It comes as OpenSea competitors have sought to cut into market share by cutting royalties for NFT creators, allowing them to undercut OpenSea prices at the expense of creators. OpenSea has hit back with force, threatening to blacklist competing marketplaces as things grow more defiant. The marketplace is expected to make a formal decision regarding royalties and the like within the next month.

The rise and possible demise of art lovers

From gobblers to… gobbled? OK, maybe not that fast – but things went from trending up to… not exactly trending up, in a short amount of time. Crypto investment firm Paradigm teamed up with ‘Rick And Morty’ co-creator Justin Roiland to release NFT collection Art Gobblers this past week; despite massive volumes in the early days of the project’s release, there has apparently been a swift return to earth. Volume and price within the project have continued to fall as last week continued. The project’s GOO token experienced similar effects; despite being designed as an inflation token, the GOO price went from over $2,000 to about $60 in less than a week’s time.

Non-functional citizenship

A small island in the South Pacific is aiming to build a full-fledged community of crypto investors, as we covered in depth earlier last week. The real estate developers on the island want a crypto paradise with 21,000 capacities that is tax-free; for interested residents, ‘Satoshi Island Land NFT Deeds’ are currently available on OpenSea for under 1 ETH.

Polygon (MATIC) has been established as the blockchain of choice for Meta's Instagram, as the social media platform continues to build NFT infrastructure for creators. | Source: MATIC-USD on TradingView.com

Warner Bros. Last NFT drops

Warner Bros. is on track to be a weekly feature in the nutshell at this rate, with continuous new NFT projects featuring their vast catalog of IP. This past week there was another announcement surrounding Game of Thrones, courtesy of Warner Bros. and their NFT native partner, Nifty’s.

The new release is described as “a digital collectible experience,” and taps NFT studio DAZ 3D. Expect the release to be published sometime this winter.

Instagram’s NFT efforts continue

Instagram took the stage at Creator Week 2022 last week to continue touting the firm’s efforts to allow app users to sell and buy NFTs on the social media platform. Despite Meta’s recent struggle to find its way through VR and metaverse-based initiatives outside of Instagram, there is a continued push to release an initial toolset for Instagram creators around NFTs.

This set comes thanks to the platform’s existing partnership with blockchain Polygon. Testing has already been in place for almost a year now with what started as a very limited beta run with select creators. It comes at a time of increased pressure around the ‘creative economy’, with TikTok aggressively taking market share from Instagram while paying out advertising; other creator-first platforms, such as Twitch or YouTube, also pay their creators, while Instagram historically has not.

Even Elon Musk, who now runs the government at Twitter, has stated that monetization for creators is on the horizon. We’ll see who can win the race as social media platforms seem to build creator affinity.

Featured image from Pexels, Charts from TradingView.com

The writer of this content is not associated or affiliated with any of the parties mentioned in this article. This is not financial advice. This op-ed represents the views of the author, and may not necessarily reflect the views of Bitcoinist. Bitcoinist is an advocate of creative and financial freedom alike.