The Playable future of NFTs

Leveling up! A term that has become ubiquitous in our vernacular. Video games have long been an escape from reality for kids and adults alike. Within the games, players are on a seemingly endless quest to gain an edge. A jacket for an armour boost. A more powerful sword to vanquish the next-level boss. Even a new wide receiver to get a few more touchdowns in your Sunday game against the Bears.

Now, as we look at in-game items, I thought, who better to ask than our in-house Nerds? Co-hosts of NerdFT Radio, CryptoCrier, and RedSoxGuy aka RSG.

Many big game brands have focused their historical attention on console gaming. One of the big problems with this is the high costs associated with the setup. Additionally, they are not portable. We now have a new generation of players who grew up playing video games on mobile devices. Much of the developing world won’t have big-screen TVs and an Xbox at home, but they do have tablets and smartphones.

As the platform you access the game from becomes less (or not at all) important, the conversation shifts to where does the game live? Blockchain technology feels like the simplest and most obvious answer to this.
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NFTs- A New Hope

NFT PFP have gotten a bad rap of late. I have been one of their harshest critics on this page. Though much of my criticism has been nuanced, I have maintained a pretty strident tone. I am happy however to see a dramatic reduction in project launches. Perhaps just because the allure of easy fast money has left the space. I think this is now a fantastic opportunity for NFTs to grow up a little and launch the next phase in development.

When Jerome Powell stepped up the the podium in Jackson Hole two weeks ago, markets tanked. The Dow Jones alone lost $1.2T in market cap. That money didn’t vanish however, it simply converted into to USD (aka dry powder).

So what will attract new users, investors and ultimately liquidity to NFTs?

In this guy’s humble opinion, PASSION.

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DFK Sails to Klaytn

Here today, gone tomorrow! When the Harmony network was exploited for $100M , DeFi Kingdoms (DFK) was the blameless victim of the hack. Making up as much as 90% of the traffic on the Harmony network, the popular game bore the brunt of the fallout.

In a recent release, DFK announced it was leaving the Harmony chain and heading to Klaytn.

So why go to a chain so few people have heard of? Klaytn is more centralized than many blockchains. We have different theories as to why Klay chose centralization. … Continue readingDFK Sails to Klaytn

Mass adoption

Death, taxes and rug pulls. The three certainties of life in Web3. What if we moved to a world with no moon and no rug? Kinda takes the fun out of it eh. I know, we all want the dopamine hit that comes along with the wild roll of the dice. The crippling depression that follows the 95% drop in value is less desirable however.

Call em Normies, call em Boomers, call em what you will. People who go to work 9-5 Monday to Friday. Folks who go for beers Friday night and watch Football on Sunday. Maybe they have retired from the rat race and spend their winters in Florida and summers in Colorado. They don’t know what a wallet is nor do they care what your PFP is.

I prefer to think of them as liquidity. Sweet, sweet liquidity. It is the holy grail for Web3 to go from a fringe scam to a legitimate financial market. I mean we have seen a crypto market cap in excess of $2T, which is nothing to sneeze at. Web3 however is dwarfed by more traditional financial markets. Today the total Crypto market stands around $1T; whereas the Dow Jones is about $40T.


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Perilous Bridges: Crypto’s Achilles’ Heel

Hacked! Millions of Dollars lost! These types of headlines are often the only crypto related ones the mainstream media will publish.

Many people want crypto to fail. “I knew that fake internet money was a scam all along”. People are afraid of what they do not understand. Since crypto can be scary, many people would rather see it crash and burn. Seeing other folks get rich and not understanding how is not a comfortable experience for many people.

Catastrophic failure have occurred and millions of dollars stolen. Much in the same way cars require bridges to cross a river, liquidity requires a bridge to cross from one blockchain to another. Under these bridges are where the trolls lurk.

Continue readingPerilous Bridges: Crypto’s Achilles’ Heel

NFTs pt 2- Monkey see, Monkey do

So, the NFT Bear market turned out to just be a pile of Bull-shit. We got wrecked by a lack of creativity combined and an influx of supply. Cheap copy pasta knockoffs with little to no thought put into them.

In part 1, we explored the raw data. The NFT market hasn’t actually turned South, simply over-saturated by the PFP genre. Perhaps having extinguished its 15 minutes of fame. Following in the footsteps of Tickle-Me-Elmo and the pet rock. Then again, an Ether Rock did sell for 289 Eth, so what do I know?

Perhaps we should begin by asking why has the NFT market been so focused on PFPs? Why do are most collections using a 10,000 piece mint? Since for many “investors” it was monkey pictures that started it all. Maybe a story about monkeys is a good place to begin. … Continue readingNFTs pt 2- Monkey see, Monkey do

Layer 1s

Decisions decisions decisions. Choosing a blockchain is kinda like choosing an outfit for a fancy occasion.Similar to a bad outfit, being on the wrong chain at the wrong time can leave you standing out in a crowd for all the wrong reasons.

So why is layer 1 important? Ethereum was the first smart contract layer 1. Many smart contract platforms have developed to try and compete with Ethereum. A few major players in this space are Avalanche, Solana, Binance chain, Algorand, Cosmos, Cardano, and Harmony. Each of these chains offers a currently improved transaction speed.

Can a project survive if it is not a layer 1?
Are subnets a viable solution?
What is our personal investment strategy? … Continue readingLayer 1s

$Ape coin makes a splash

Liquidity came to Bored Ape holders in a big way! In one of the worst kept secrets, Ape coin was launched earlier this month. So many have already claimed, I don’t need to address the specifics. I’m sure you have heard all about it by now. The big questions now are what is the future of $Ape, how high/low can it go and is it a worthwhile investment if you were not lucky enough to be the beneficiary of a claim?

Personally, I was on vacation when it launched, hoping it didn’t fall apart before I arrived back home and would be able to claim as a Mutant Ape holder. One of the unexpected advantages of this, is it allowed me time to watch what was happening, with no emotion trying to get me to act since I had no access to my wallets while away. One of the first surprises to me was the post launch price pump held up better than I expected it would. My friend and collaborator Crypto Crier likes to use a rule of 150 days. Simply put, he says it takes about 150 days of post launch activity on a coin or token to get a real sense of what fair market value of it will/should be. Given I trust his opinion and don’t feel like doing a deep dive into this research myself right now, I am going to say this is true.

So if it is too soon to get a good feel for fair market value of the the coin, what can we conclude right now?

Continue reading$Ape coin makes a splash

My Journey- Real Estate to Crypto

I was lucky. I got some great advice early in my career from a very successful businessman. He said to me “never invest your time or your money in something that doesn’t continually pay you every month for the effort or capital you have previously invested.” He had been in the franchise restaurant business starting in the early 80s. He was nearing the tail end of his career as I was just starting mine, but his words always stuck with me. From these wise words I adopted the idea that the three sweetest words in the English language are “passive residual income”. That is the dream, right? Sitting on a tropical beach somewhere sipping a mojito knowing that while you are living the life of leisure, you are still getting paid. The picture painted by about every get rich quick scheme known to man, but the dream lives on. … Continue readingMy Journey- Real Estate to Crypto