ICYMI - Last Week In Crypto: NFTs hit $4.7B in Q1, DeGods are on the move
Exodus of DeGods🚀
Last week, reports from DaapRadar projected NFT sales in Q1 reached $4.7Bn across all major platforms and DeGods NFT have started migrating to the Ethereum Blockchain. Unstoppable Domains roll-out AI-generated avatars for users, and Ticketmaster released a tool for artists to reward their fans using NFT-gated features.
NFT Market Peak at $4.7B in Sales in Q1: DappRadar
The NFT sector seems to be gaining strength as the overall cryptocurrency market's sentiment improves.
The non-fungible token space has rapidly changed as a result of the appearance of new players and shifting dynamics. NFTs had a strong first quarter of 2023 despite a hectic start.
2023 Q1 NFT Market Recap
The NFT market has had a strong start to the year, claims a report by DappRadar. In actuality, Q1 2023 proved to be the most successful quarter since Q2 2022. Due to choppy market conditions, NFT trading volume saw a slight decline of 15.65% in March, but overall performance remained positive. Let's examine the main points of the NFT market performance in Q1 in more detail.
A total value of $4.7 billion was transacted during the first quarter, a 137% increase in trading volume. Due to the Blur token farming period, the figure for February was inflated; however, in March, when 2.7 million NFTs were sold, the monthly NFT sales count only decreased by 4.63%.
Zooming out, NFT sales totaled 19.4 million in the first quarter of 2023, an increase of 8.56% from the previous quarter of 2022.
Ethereum continues to dominate the NFT market in terms of volume in the context of blockchains, holding nearly 90% of the market in March. Comparing Q4 2022 to Q1 2023, its quarterly trading volume increased by more than 245%, or $4.1 billion.
With a $242 million trading volume, Solana is in last place. The layer 1 blockchain has grown by 4.55% compared to the previous quarter.
Even though trading volume in March was down 24.20 percent from the previous month, Polygon had a remarkable start to the year. According to quarterly data, the layer 2 scaling solution's trading volume in Q1 2023 was $85 million, up 125.04% from the previous quarter, making it one of the best three-month periods ever seen since Q4 2021.
Highlight: BLUR & OpenSea Battle For Supremacy
The NFT market leader OpenSea has maintained its position for a very long time. The rise of Blur, however, sparked a public controversy with the initially undisputed market leader.
According to the report, Blur dominated the NFT market in the first quarter of the year, recording a trading volume of $2.7 billion, an astounding increase of 783.89% from Q4 2022 and a market dominance of over 57%.
Despite a decline in trading volume of 6.56% to $1.2 billion for Blur, the platform still holds a market share of more than 70%.
Unstoppable Domains Roll-Out AI-Generated Avatars
Unstoppable Domains, a Web3 domain provider, is introducing artificial intelligence (AI)-generated profile pictures (PFP), enabling users to improve their online personas.
Unstoppable's AI avatar software uses a collection of images, similar to the well-known AI photography application Lensa, to produce distinctive and realistic PFPs that are computer generated.
Users who pay $14.99 can access 200 images produced by the software within an hour after uploading up to 20 images of themselves. These pictures can then be used as an Unstoppable PFP by being created as a non-fungible token (NFT) on a sidechain Polygon.
Additionally, users' PFPs can be purchased on the secondary market OpenSea.
As users connect their domains across decentralized applications, games, metaverses, and more, Lisa DeLuca, senior director of engineering at Unstoppable, told CoinDesk that bringing AI innovation to Unstoppable will help users further tap into their digital identities.
“The cool thing about AI is it adds a technical flair to who you are in a digital representation that allows you to be creative and show that side of you, and also show that you're experimenting in the space of AI,” said DeLuca. “It just allows you to nerd out a little bit when you're showing off your digital identity.”
Unstoppable has been releasing products intending to assist users in creating their Web3 identities. Custom avatars for the domain profiles were made available to users in January thanks to a partnership between Unstoppable and the metaverse platform Ready Player Me. Unstoppable launched a messaging platform using Polygon last week that enables users to communicate with one another using encrypted messages that are sent on-chain.
Metaverse Fashion Week 2023 Goes Multi-Platform in Push for Interoperability
A year ago, when the annual convocation of virtual and real-world fashion leaders first debuted in Decentraland, things looked very different. Now, as Metaverse Fashion Week prepares for its second walk down the virtual runway, things look very different.
The demand for $2.43 million digital mansions has decreased, and major metaverse developers like Meta have since spent billions of dollars on so far unsuccessful attempts to create virtual utopias. Most startlingly, the word "metaverse," which was popular in the tech and gaming industries only a few months ago, has now earned a bad reputation.
But fear not, those who still envision a constellation of virtual worlds brimming with life and all manner of wearable digital accessories. The metaverse is progressing.
In addition to an impressive lineup of high-end brands, including Dolce & Gabbana, Balmain, Coach, and Tommy Hilfiger, this year's Metaverse Fashion Week will feature established names in online fashion, like DressX and The Fabricant. It will also be the first significant multi-platform metaverse event, occurring across several interconnected metaverse worlds.
This year's Metaverse Fashion Week (MFW) will be held exclusively in Decentraland, as it was last year, as well as in Spatial, another metaverse platform, and through Over, a decentralized augmented reality (AR) layer that overlays virtual assets on the real world.
Although the technology to truly enable interoperability—the seamless transfer of digital wearables across various metaverses—is not yet available, the fact that MFW's organizers and the high-profile companies involved are even attempting to conduct a live event across multiple platforms simultaneously marks a significant advancement for supporters of an open, decentralized, and interoperable metaverse.
“Technically, people can’t jump across [worlds] exactly the way they are. That's not possible yet,”. “But what's exciting is the intention of interoperability, showing the way of what's possible.” - Kim Currier, social media lead at Decentraland
Digital fashionistas may one day be able to transition seamlessly between metaverses in the same way that Bugs Bunny did in "Looney Tunes: Back in Action" when he ran from a Dali painting into Munch's "The Scream." Decentraland and its partners hope that this year's Metaverse Fashion Week will demonstrate the potential of inter-metaverse collaboration, even though that objective may still be far off technically.
“The cross-platform agenda was designed to unite designers and expand the aesthetic possibilities for all of the [event’s] creators,” Currier said.
While Decentraland, with its cartoonish aesthetic, continues to be one of the most well-known decentralized metaverse platforms, Spatial offers a more lifelike animation style that may even be better suited to showcasing traditional clothing.
Throughout the programming for MFW, portals placed throughout Decentraland and Spatial will transport attendees back and forth between platforms. And brand-new businesses like Lighthouse, which compares itself to the first metaverse search engine, aim to make it simple and effective to navigate a vast multi-platform experience.
Despite being hailed as the future of online togetherness, many metaverse platforms often feel, in practice, enduringly and crushingly lonely. Lighthouse, which was launched in December, aims to address this issue.
“Every time you jumped in a world it felt empty, not because the world was too big, but just because you didn't know where the hotspot was. Now you can log in, see exactly where all your friends are, and make sure you always jump into a place that’s crowded or busy.” - Jonathan Brun, Lighthouse’s co-founder, and CEO.
Many Metaverse Fashion Week attendees last year complained about finding the right events and avoiding huge, empty pockets of vacant digital space, according to Lighthouse.
This year, MFW attendees will be able to use Lighthouse to instantly port to any location in Decentraland or Spatial and see where all of their contacts are located in real-time. Through a networking feature, they will also be able to arrange the contact information obtained from other MFW attendees.
The company is also creating a trending areas feature that will let users see where the party is across all metaverse locations. It currently indexes 26 metaverse platforms, including Decentraland, Spatial, and The Sandbox.
Avalanche Foundation launches NFT initiative for Digital Artists
According to a blog post, The Avalanche Foundation has started a program to support non-fungible token (NFT) artists. The program will provide funding for artists and give NFTs to selected DAOs.
According to Avalanche, its Avaissance initiative will consist of two parts.
Over fifty digital artists will receive funding, mentoring, and virtual workshop sessions through the initiative's first component, the Artist in Residence (AIR) program. NFT collections from each artist will be made available on the Avalanche blockchain.
For six months, the AIR program will offer funding, mentoring, and virtual workshops to artists "of any skill level." To support upcoming Avalanche NFT artists and create a "Avalanche Permanent Collection," the MLI will work with the curatorial teams of the DAOs.
As of now, Avalanche has named three mentors: the director of motion graphics Emonee LaRussa, the founder of ALLSHIPS Dave Krugman, and the chief of staff at Valhalla Ryan Wen.
The Mona Lisa Initiative is the program's second component, a cooperative digital art curation program (MLI). This initiative aims to distribute NFTs to various DAOs for digital art. Avalanche will also compile a permanent collection of particular works of art.
Digital artists are invited to apply through Avalanche's official online application form. Applications for the project will be accepted up until April 28, 2023.
Ticketmaster Goes Live With NFT-gated Features
On March 27, the American ticket seller Ticketmaster revealed a brand-new feature called token-gated ticket sales that would let artists give NFT holders special advantages like "special presales, prime seats, custom travel packages, and access to unique concert experiences."
According to a statement released by Ticketmaster on Monday, such "token-gated ticket sales" are compatible with Ethereum-minted tokens kept in digital wallets like MetaMask or Coinbase.
The tool was initially requested by the heavy metal band Avenged Sevenfold (A7X) as a way to reward owners of its Deathbats Club NFT collection, which was released in late 2021. Rewards may also include particular seats or unique travel arrangements in addition to presale access, at the artist's discretion.
The lead singer of A7x, M. Shadows, described his band's partnership with Ticketmaster in a tweet sent earlier this month.
“This new capability allows artists to get special access and rewards to specific fans they want to super serve,” David Marcus, Ticketmaster’s executive vice president of global music, said in a statement. “Artists like Avenged Sevenfold are using Web3 and NFTs to build deeper relationships with their fans, and we’re proud to help foster that connection through live events.”
Holders of Deathbats NFTs "had the easiest experience I've ever seen for buying tickets," M. Shadows claimed in a different tweet last week.
He tweeted, "Let's hope more bands follow."
The launch comes after Ticketmaster unveiled an offering in August to enable sellers on its platform to issue NFTs ahead of, during, or after events.
Dapper Labs reported at the time that Ticketmaster had already created more than 5 million NFTs on the Flow blockchain. The Flow (FLOW) blockchain was developed in 2019 by Dapper Labs, the organization behind CryptoKitties and NBA Top Shot.
Additionally, Flow was used by Ticketmaster to distribute over 70,000 commemorative ticket NFTs for Super Bowl LVI in 2022.
DeGods begins migration to Ethereum
On Saturday morning in Hong Kong, DeGods, the largest Solana-based non-fungible token (NFT) collection by total sales volume, began its migration to the Ethereum blockchain.
The Forkast Solana Composite, a gauge of the Solana NFT market, has risen by 2.9% over the past 24 hours, indicating that activity on the Solana network has been increasing despite the migration.
The sister project of DeGods, Y00ts, started moving to Polygon on Wednesday. Dune Analytics data indicates that about 80% of Y00ts have already finished the move.
According to CryptoSlam, the data division of Forkast Labs, DeGods owners completed over US$2.19 million in sales on Friday alone, which is the highest amount since the NFTs were first issued in October 2021.
The increased activity might be a sign that investors are expecting DeGods' price to increase on Ethereum, as it has with Y00ts, whose floor price has increased by more than 50% since the NFTs started to land on Polygon, according to CoinGecko data.
According to CoinGecko data, the deflationary collection saw a 29.6% increase in price in the 24 hours before 1 p.m. in Hong Kong. The deflationary collection, which started with a 10,000 NFT mint, had a floor price of 939 SOL (US$19,940). 10.4 ETH ($19,000) was the floor price for DeGods on Ethereum.
DeGods and Y00ts were created by the Los Angeles-based NFT company DeLabs. In December 2021, the same month that Solana's native coin, SOL, fell below US$10 for the first time since early 2021, DeLabs announced the projects' transitions to their designated blockchains. To migrate blockchains, the startup received a $3 million grant from Polygon.
Around $200 million, or the estimated market capitalization of the NFT collection, is anticipated to be lost from the blockchain due to the migration of DeGods from Solana.