Reddit’s collectible avatar experiment falls victim to NFT fatigue
In early July, Reddit announced a foray into the NFT world through the introduction of Collectible Avatars: custom avatar profile pictures and effects that appeared next to users’ accounts when they comment. But after just a month, the company appears to be shifting gears, signaling that the new venture is off to a slower start than expected.
A new set of four avatars called “Aww Friends”, “Drip Squad”, “Meme Team” and “The Singularity” will be given away for free to some of the most active users on the platform. Those with the appropriate number of karma points (Reddit’s karma score is the number of users’ upvotes against their downvotes) will be able to choose from the aforementioned options and receive them via AirDrop.
When Collectible Avatars were first announced, prices were set at a flat rate, unlike other NFT projects where valuation fluctuates based on trading activity and the general market. Those prices ranged anywhere from $9.99 to $99.99, so the decision to give away avatars for free seems like a way to get top redditors and community members to showcase their collection across the platform’s intricate web of comment sections.
Bad time to enter – To be fair to Reddit, this NFT venture isn’t exactly a clever ploy to build hype, gather investor funds, and then walk away with the project’s highest valuation. At least the platform is trying something new – digital collectibles with stable value, which act as a badge of recognition within an established network of communities.
The problem is that general interest in NFTs has waned. For proof just examine the OpenSea activity for collectible avatars. Over the past month, there have only been three sales, and most of the trading activity has taken place in the first couple of weeks after the project was created. Interestingly, OpenSea does not provide a graph to chart this activity, as it does for other collections.
Examining r/CollectibleAvatars reveals a similar lack of enthusiasm; until the recent posts announcing free avatars, the subreddit had been relatively quiet, with no activity for two weeks. Any popular subreddit with at least a small part of a community or following wouldn’t go dark for that long.
As more big brands and companies try to bet on web3, following trends that exploded through the crypto boom from 2020 to 2021 will only lead to reduced costs and a steady loss of interest. The problem with most NFTs is that the creator almost never manages to live up to the hype and ambition of the project, even if their intentions are good. Reddit seems to be learning it in real time.
