If we sound like insiders, it’s because we are insiders. The team at Metaversal builds and invests in iconic NFTs and the technology behind them. We are NFT collectors, investors, creators, composers, and designers. We draw, we paint, we sing. We dance, we animate, we appreciate. We believe in putting creators first, and that web3 is one of the best tools for doing exactly that.

The Metaversalist is our way of helping you navigate a space that changes daily, delivered hot and fresh to your inbox each week, and seasoned with our signature blend of spice, sass, and (when it’s deserved) snark.

In this week’s edition:

• Drops to put on your radar

• The big news stories you need to know about

• Hot goss from NFT Land

• And so much more!

Right, let’s get straight into it!

Do you enjoy The Metaversalist? Why not share the goodness?

Drop alert 🚨

Today (September 22, 2022) in music NFTs, there’s the “omgkirby x rapper Channel Tres” drop on OpenSea. The “lo-fi web3 artist” and American rapper are dropping 5,550 songs for minters to freely use in their own audio-visual creations. Each NFT comes with an illustration of Channel Tres “chillin’” — a nod to the YouTube phenomenon, “lofi hip hop study music.”

Next Wednesday (September 28), the hugely-hyped brainchild of iconic digital artist Tyler Hobbs and software engineer Dandelion Mane drops. Called “QQL.art,” its creators call it a “collaborative experiment in generative art.” The project allows users to generate their own unique artwork based on interactive inputs. However, only folks who buy one of the 999 mint passes will be able to secure their own immutable masterpiece… or let someone else pay them for the option to create one themselves.

DYOR 🔬

Cool Cats has been so quiet in recent months you’d be forgiven for confusing it with Doodles (🤭). Holders have been longing for some signs from the Cool Cats crew that they’ve got a plan to bring the Kittehs back into the upper echelons of PFP projects… a place where many fans fervently (furvently?) believe the project belongs. This week, they got their wish… sort of.

So, who is Stephen Teglas, the man behind the Twitter account @ChiefCoolCat, which at the time of writing had a mere 1,971 followers? Teglas has held SVP roles at The Walt Disney Company and Warner Bros. Entertainment, and until recently worked at RECUR (the company behind the Hello Kitty, Nickelodeon, and Care Bears NFT drops), variously heading up its brand partnerships division, serving as president, and assisting as a strategic advisor.

In other words, he’s the perfect (purfect?) person to turn Cool Cats into a leading web3 brand that’s able to secure the right partnerships, licensing deals, and other accouterments for success… on paper at least. Because many would argue RECUR hasn’t exactly delivered the sort of seamless experience it promised. In fact, RECUR gets quite a lot of hate.

Moreover, impressive as it is, Teglas’s resume smacks of web2ness. Now look, we’re willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Half the battle with successful brand deals is knowing who to call… and it definitely helps when the person on the other end of the phone already knows you. But a stacked Rolladex isn’t enough on its own to build a successful web3 brand.

For the sake of all Cool Cats holders, we hope he delivers… and going on what we heard from him in the Cool Cats town hall this week, at least he’s making all the right noises. He spoke about finding ways to add value for the community and putting it first wherever possible. That’s music to our ears.

We’d like to suggest he take the same advice we gave Doodles when it announced its latest hires: Start by being more communicative with the fans. Hire a social media manager. Put out a newsletter. Get one of those planes that writes messages in the sky. Whatever it takes. Because while a protracted silence can look like you’ve got something brewing, it can also look like you don’t know what to do next… and the market isn’t forgiving if it thinks the latter is what’s going on rather than the former.

🏆 Feel-good tweet of the fall 🥹

Looks rare 🖼

The price is right 🤑

Can you really call yourself a degen if you’ve never watched an episode of Overpriced JPEGs, the all-thing-NFTs-and-metaverse hosted by Carly Reilly? This week Reilly sat down with the team behind Omega RUNNER and Metaversal co-founder and CEO Yossi Hasson to talk about multi-chain NFTs, comics, the future of media3, and the Omega RUNNER 1ED NFT claim that’s free to early supporters and underway right now.

If you bought a first edition RUNNER comic and haven’t claimed your free 1ED NFT yet, we recommend hurrying. Speed, after all, is the currency of power! If you claim in the first 72 hours, you’ll get your gas reimbursed. And if you missed out on the comic, you can still get all of the boosts the 1ED NFT will offer holders by picking one up on the secondary market.

Probably nothing 🤔

OpenSea makes sniping rares easier 🎯

Marketplace OpenSea integrated OpenRarity into its listings this week, making it possible for users to see the relative rarity of NFTs at a glance. Project creators will get to choose whether or not their collection takes advantage of the new feature, but it’s already shown up on a number of high-profile projects and lesser-known ones alike.

OpenSea isn’t the first platform to display rarity ranking — LooksRare began offering rarity info back in March — but as the undisputable market leader, the addition is a welcome one. OpenSea says it aims to make OpenRarity’s open source solution “the single source of truth for rarity ranking” and hopes it’ll be adopted by most marketplaces.

Another week, another raise 💰

Chiru Labs, the company behind PFP project Azuki, is rumored to be on the cusp of closing a $30 million round of funding. Just last week, Doodles announced it had raised $54 million, a move that didn’t do much to buoy the project, in part because it’s not been made clear how an injection of VC capital translates into added value for Doodle’s holders. Nonetheless, it’s evidently fundraising season, because it wasn’t that long ago that PROOF Collective raised $50 million of its own.

It’s unclear who’s leading the round for Chiru Labs’ raise, but whoever it is, it’s a significant sign of confidence, especially considering Azuki founder Zagabond was embroiled in scandal earlier this year after it emerged he’d started and subsequently abandoned three NFT projects before Azuki, sending the price tumbling from 30 ETH to 10 ETH. Today it’s sitting around 11.15 ETH (~$14,800), which suggests degens still believe in its long-term prospects. Investors, it would seem, agree.

Bag boosters 💸

The week that was (Sep 15-22, 2022) 🗓

The recent run of Solana projects making their way into the top 10 came to an end this week. It’s ETH all the way down, with newcomer RENGA capitalizing on the excitement around storytelling NFTs (where holders can help shape the lore and accompanying narratives) and racing into pole position. Azuki had a good week, too, thanks in part to its successful fund-raising efforts.

NGMI ☄️

The art of the bad-faith hot take 🔥

A week ago, ArtNet published an op-ed masquerading as a news piece that was clearly intended to get NFT fans raging. And rage they did. Entitled “The Boom and the Bust: How NFTs Went the Way of Beanie Babies,” a lot of questions you might have about the piece are answered by its incendiary and clickbaity title.

Following the inevitable backlash, the outlet published a justificatory note along the lines of “lol, soz, editorial freedom, both sides, etc.” See, ArtNet’s previously expressed enthusiasm for digital art and NFTs, so publishing a take like this looks pretty disingenuous. But even worse, it makes ArtNet look like an elitist defender of the status quo, more attuned to the old guard of rent-seeking gatekeepers than to artists themselves, many of whom have NFTs to thank for letting them make art full-time without needing the establishment’s approval. What a shame.

To the moon🌛

• Electronics retail giant Best Buy is now stocking crypto hardware wallet maker Ledger’s wares. In fact, it’s been doing so since the start of September, but it seems crypto/NFT Twitter only took notice this week. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Being able to pick up a Ledger in person and having them on display in stores is a great way to get more people using hardware wallets… which they really ought to be if they have any crypto or NFTs at all. This is not a sponsored post, but Ledger, if you want to talk, our DMs are open.

• Over the next month, Moonpay QR codes will be hidden in a Halloween-themed scavenger hunt across Universal Studios Hollywood and Universal Orlando Resort in what might be the largest ever POAP (proof of attendance protocol) drop ever. Seven million NFTs are up for discovery by millions of park attendees. With the process as easy as scanning a QR code and no app download required, this could be a massive web3 onboarding event. After all, everyone knows you never forget your first NFT (though, granted, that’s usually because it’s trash 🫡).

• Messari, the crypto market intelligence oracle founded in 2018, announced it’d closed a Series B round of $35 million. The round featured new investors like Samsung Next and FTX Ventures, along with previous backers like Coinbase and Kraken. To celebrate the news, you can now collect or win one of five NFTs from Messari’s inaugural Mainnet collection.

• Former boxer and long-time pigeon fan, Mike Tyson, has partnered with web3 game studio Ex Populus (which is backed by Animoca brands) to launch a collection of NFT playing cards called — we kid you not — “Iron Pigeons.” Considering most boxer-backed NFT projects turn out to be rug pulls (*cough* Floyd Mayweather *cough*), we’re going to wait to see how this one plays out before throwing our hat in the ring — or our, err, pigeon in the sky.

• Creeps holders are overjoyed to hear the ex-CMO of Levi’s, ex-VP of Nike, and ex-VP of Lululemon are all joining Overlord_xyz to build the Creeps streetwear brand, which it hopes will compete with the likes of Supreme.

• Bored Ape Yacht Club parent Yuga Labs is rumored to be working on a new collection called Mecha Apes that could help it raise $50 million (not that it needs it).

• Solana-based PFP project Okay Bears has signed an exclusive global licensing deal with IMG, which has previously worked with the likes of Fortnite, Lego, and Angry Birds.

🪡 Thread of the week 🧵

Goats only 🐐

Whether you’re a staker or a flipper, a hodler or a trader, a Cool Cat or a Lazy Lion, you should be watching or listening to Goats and the Metaverse.

In each episode, collectibles OG and entrepreneur Stan “The Goat” Meytin and Metaversal co-founder and CEO Yossi Hasson talk about digital and IRL collectibles, NFTs, and the week’s news worth knowing.

This week, they unpack storytelling NFTs and look at one project in particular: RENGA. Check out the latest episode here:

Aside from providing invaluable insights into digital art and collectibles, Stan and Yossi have also put together a collection of NFTs dubbed “The Goat Vault.” When the show hits 5,000 subscribers on YouTube, one of those lucky subscribers will win the contents of the vault, which at last count is valued at over 10.21 ETH (~$13,800).

Prefer listening? Check out Goats and the Metaverse on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Anchor, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Follow for more 🐦

Congrats on making it all the way down here, fren!

If you’re reading this, it’s not too late to follow @HelloMetaversal on Twitter. We share insights and analyses from our investment team on the state of the NFT market and what we’re collecting ourselves.

Let us know which stories left you cold, steaming mad, or lukewarm. And we’ll see if the devs can do something.

IYKYK 😢

Until next time, see you in the Metaverse.