Coinbase 🤝 Bored Ape: Degen Trilogy 🎥
Elon & Twitter: A love hate relationship; Zuck Bucks 💸
Dear NFTimer,
So I guess countries are making NFTs now. We know that Ukraine embraced crypto and NFTs and even launched their own NFTs to support their efforts against the war going on in their country. Last week, UK government announced plans to make Britain a global hub for crypto technology. They are working with Royal Mint on an NFT drop! Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak said that it’s his ambition to “make the UK a global hub for cryptoasset technology … by regulating effectively we can give [the companies] the confidence they need to think and invest long-term.”
Hell yea!
Dive in👇🏼
🎨 NFTs
Coinbase announced this morning that they are creating a movie trilogy featuring Bored Apes and ApeCoin. Submit your Bored Ape.
The last ever Aventador Lamborghini is going to make is being sold with a 1/1 NFT. Auction will start on April 19th.
Adidas dropping Ozworld — whatever that is. Not hyped about Adidas anymore tbh.
Some Twitter users are claiming to be affiliated with the Azuki project are scamming people and stealing NFTs from their wallets. Be careful!
Claire Silver will be designing an NFT for Chicago Bulls for their Coinbase NFT platform.
Logan Paul launched a new company, Liquid Marketplace, that allows people to invest in shares of rare collectibles.
NFT photographer and Quantum founder Justin Aversano (who is probably one of the most famous NFT photographers with his Twin Flames collection) announced plans for physical NFT gallery in Santa Monica.
Queen of the Nights is a women-led generative NFT project that celebrates brazen, wild, unpolished women who just opened their microverse website. Embrace the absurd.
Paramount got into NFTs with its first series starting with Star Trek.
MoMA is hiring a web3 associate.
🔮 Metaverse News
Anyone — not only LAND owners — can use In-World Builder in Decentraland.
Ledger bought LAND in Sandbox as part of its initiative to push the metaverse and educate newbies. The statement said, “The partnership will empower The Sandbox’s 2.2 million registered users with essential security, support, and best practices, as well as engage Ledger’s millions of users in over 180 countries to secure their metaverse holdings.”
👾 NFT Games
NFT integration might be coming to Call of Duty (owned by Activision — owned by Microsoft.)
Gaming startup Improbable raised $150M from Andreessen Horowitz, Softbank and others to connect metaverse worlds, valuing the company at $1B.
Community Gaming, the platform that facilitates esports tournament prize payouts in crypto, has raised $16 million in Series A round led by Softbank, Animoca Ventures, Binance Labs, and ConsenSys Mesh.
Ubisoft won’t be adding any new NFTs to Ghost Recon, but will bring Tezos NFTs to other games.
🎶 Music
Ice Cube spoke to Decrypt and said: “I’ve had to go through the system my whole career. The studio systems, radio—you know, gatekeepers that’s been in place … We produce a lot of good stuff, but what keeps me up at night is the things that we don't get made—the good projects that we don't get financed. It’s the ultimate ‘fuck you’ to the mainstream programmers of the world, and it gives the power to the people.”
Azuki announced a collaboration with the Korean hip-hop trio, Epik High, to create original visual art for their upcoming Coachella performance.
Music artist Grady becomes the first artist to hit a 10 ETH secondary sale on Sound.xyz.
⚽️ Sports
World of Football is an NFT project which gives exclusive membership in a real-life football club, founded by FIFA Agent Cisco Terreros.
ESPN signed a multiyear deal with Tom Brady’s NFT startup, Autograph. The first NFTs are based on the Tom Brady docuseries on ESPN, which are released on Polygon.
🎥 Movies
Director Kevin Smith is planning on releasing a feature film titled “Killroy Was Here” that can only be accessed via NFTs minted on Secret Network. Holders can use their NFTs to create short films, and can participate in making the sequel.
Ocean's Eleven director Steven Soderbergh teamed up with crypto-powered film fund Decentralized Pictures (which I’ve written about before) with a $300,000 grant to fuel the blockchain film financing platform.
🔥 What else is hot?
Blur raised an $11 million seed round led by Paradigm.
Food News: Los Angeles restaurateur Andy Nguyen teased his Bored & Hungry burger popup in Long Beach & did the first pop up.
The owner of 104 CryptoPunks took out a $8.3 million loan using the NFTs as a collateral.
Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary said, “Bitcoin mining is going to save the world” at the Bitcoin 2022 conference in Miami.
Payment company Block announced that U.S. users can soon receive Bitcoin via the Lightning Network, and users can also choose to be paid in Bitcoin.
Meta is reportedly planning virtual currencies and lending services to its platforms, with some (hopefully jokingly) referring to as “Zuck Bucks.”
NEAR Protocol raised $350 million led by Tiger Global, FTX Ventures, and Dragonfly Capital.
Elon Musk bought 9.2% stake on Twitter, more than any other single investor. He later got appointed to the board as well. He already asked his followers if an edit button should come, and suggested that everyone with a Twitter Blue account should get a verified check.
📖 Reading List
“The roads not taken” by Vitalik —> PoS could come sooner
“9.2% and the Master of Twitter” by Ranjan Roy
“Cultural Liquidity: The Rise of Cryptomedia” Rex Woodbury
“Cracks in the Fat Protocol Theory, and its effect on crypto portfolio construction” by Chia Jeng Yang
“Cryptomedia, NFTs, and the next internet” by Bobby Hundreds
🤪 Cool fun beans
I don’t even know what is what anymo:
🧵 Threads
This artwork brought tears to my eye🥺:
Tell me what you’re working on in the discussion thread! I’ll make sure to check it out, and you might get a feature in the next NFTimes edition!
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Disclaimer: Investing in NFTs comes with inherent risk including technical risk, human error, platform failure and more. This newsletter is strictly educational and nothing we offer is financial advice. We are not professionals or licensed advisors. Views my own and not any other company I’m affiliated with.