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Creating your NFT Project has never been easier

Marketplaces, NFT, NFTs / By

With NFTs (and smart contracts) growing in popularity, there has been an increase in the number of brands and individuals creating their own projects.

If you’re a developer it may be easier said than done – until now. The rise of new technology has led to the opportunity to create a tool that makes it easy for the non-coders to get in on the fun.

If you happen to be someone who has only just learnt about the gold rush, this platform provides everything you need—from pick to shovel. 

Creating your NFT Project with Thirdweb

Creating an NFT project has now become easier than you think. Armed with all the essentials, you can let your imagination go wild. But, before you get started, here’s a quick rundown of everything you need to know about utilizing Thirdweb.

Creating your NFT Project with Thirdweb

Meet Thirdweb

Thirdweb, which has just undergone a version change, to version 2.0, is backed by Web2 heavyweights Steven Bartlett, Gary Vaynerchuk and Mark Cuban.

This goes to show that it’s really not something to be overlooked. The platform itself is super easy to navigate and the BIG PLUS is that they now take ZERO commission from project owners.

Previously they took 5% of your royalty (so if you had a 5% royalty setup, they took 5% of the 5%).

They have a whole host of contract types available, namely:

  • NFTs (ERC721 standard)

These are collections or one-of-a-kind tokens with fully customizable properties

  • Marketplaces (whitelabel)

Your own marketplace to let the community buy and sell tokens and NFTs

  • Tokens (ERC20 standard)

Custom social tokens, governance tokens and currencies you can control

  • Packs

Loot boxes full of NTFs with rarity-based unboxing mechanics

  • Drops (ERC721 with lazy minting; ERC 1155 standard with lazy minting)

Timed drops for users to easily claim NFTs and tokens (V2 allows projects to dictate phases of deployment and the specifics around each phase)

  • Splits

Royalty splits to manage your project revenue and fund distribution

Within each of these categories, you’ll find a few sub-categories that help you decide which route to take.
There are a few other benefits of Thirdweb that may not be evident to newbies:

  • Guides (these help you understand each contract in detail as well as help you with implementation)
  • A very helpful Discord channel
  • Testnet feature (which allows you trial each contract before spending real money on contract minting)
  • Access to a few chains (Ethereum, Polygon, Avalanche and Flow – with Solana and Flow coming soon)

The true power comes in with their SDK functionality which is, in most parts, editable through their JS snippets. For those that aren’t proficient in coding, the embed feature does the job too. Some of the standout project types include membership NFTs, Public Marketplaces, DAOs, PFP Collections and Blockchain Games.

Teams can also collaborate on projects with ease with the head of projects able to assign permissions to each team member like full permissions, minting permissions, interaction permissions, and transfer permissions.

Source: Thirdweb

As mentioned previously, Thirdweb also assists project creators with their own meticulously created and community-tested guides which covers everything from getting started to contract types and implementation of SDKs and embeds.

We will be reviewing other platforms and solutions that make project creation and management easier for non-coders and coders alike, so remember to check-in and see what we’re up to in the NFT & Web3 space.

Important Web3 Concepts: Part 2

NFT, Community, NFTs, Trends and Forecasts / By

We’ve entered a new wave of the web – Web3. The opportunities and possibilities are endless and venture capitalists, developers, and content creators have seen this and they’re getting in early.

However, the majority of online users are still battling to understand basic web3 concepts in the web3 metaverse.

Entering the NFT/Web 3 space? Here are important Web 3 Concepts you need to know!

In our previous piece, Important Web3 Concepts: Part 1, we covered a handful of important concepts – to recap: Blockchain, gas fees, layers, and tokens.

Now we’ll be discussing the second batch of important web3 concepts you need to know if you’re entering the Web3/NFT space.

important web3 concepts part 2

In this article, we’ll touch on the following concepts:

  • Address
  • Alpha
  • Ape
  • DAO
  • Fractionalized

Address (Wallet Address)

Also known as your public key, this is an alphanumeric code that serves as the address for your blockchain wallet – similar to your bank account number.

Other users can send assets (NFTs, cryptocurrency etc.) to your wallet but only you can access them using your private key.

Your wallet address is usually linked to the likes of MetaMask, WalletConnect, or Coinbase. Web3 websites generally request you “connect wallet” in order to either enter or make use of their platform.

Alpha

This refers to valuable or “insider” information regarding the value of digital assets like cryptocurrency and NFTs. An Alpha leak usually refers to a leak from inside a project that could lead to outsized returns that are over and above the return offered by the market or benchmarks – similar to insider trading.

Ape

This refers to the act of going all in or investing heavily in a coin or NFT project. This is sometimes a reaction to hype or FOMO, or done without too much know-how of a project or asset. The origins are a bit blurry but carry no negative connotations. If you go “ape”, you generally go all in.

DAO

A DAO (Decentralised Autonomous Organisation) is an organisation based on open-source code and completely governed/run by its users and members with NO central authority.

They generally focus on a specific type of project or mission and all functions are fulfilled by guidelines or rules written on the blockchain. Smart contracts lay out the fundamental rules and the code itself can be publicly audited.

Fractionalized

Fractionalisation refers to the process of locking an NFT into a smart contract and then dividing it into smaller parts which are then also issued as their own fungible token. This lowers the price of ownership and allows artwork or other forms of digital assets to be owned by a community.

Fractionalized ownership can be applied to DAOs wanting to purchase blue-chip NFTs, a group wanting to buy a house together, or even a musician wanting to release an album to their fans and have the fans own part of the future success of the album.

Dapp

A dApp or Decentralised Application is an app built on open-source code that lives on the blockchain. These exist independent of centralised people, organisations, or groups and offer an incentive to users for maintaining them through the issuing of reward tokens.

Web3 Concepts Part 1

Important Web3 Concepts: Part 1

NFT, Community, NFTs, Trends and Forecasts / By

We’ve entered a new wave of the web – Web3. The opportunities and possibilities are endless and venture capitalists, developers, and content creators have seen this and they’re getting in early. However, the majority of online users are still battling to understand basic web3 concepts.

That’s where we come in – and there’s A LOT to try to digest so we’ve broken it down into two parts with 4 key concepts in each. We’d hate for you to lose interest or simply be overwhelmed. If you’re still battling to grasp what NFTs are, have a read here.

We’d hate for you to lose interest or simply be overwhelmed. If you’re still battling to grasp what NFTs are, have a read here.

Simplifying Web3 Concepts

In this article, we’ll touch on the following concepts:

• Blockchain
• Gas Fees
• Layers
• Tokens

Although we’ve already covered some of these terms in other articles, we’ll dive in deeper and explain these in more depth.

Blockchain

This is where it all begins – it’s possibly one of the most important concepts to grasp. It is essentially the backbone of the entire NFT industry. In a nutshell, one transaction is a “block” with a whole group of these forming the blockchain.

This is a whole new way of logging activity and transactions, security, and more.

Important Web3 Concepts: Part 1 - Blockchain

Blockchains have a few core features which we’ll also dive into:

  • Decentralised

This means that blockchains aren’t reliant on centralized, Web2 networks to stay online (like an Amazon server). They run entirely on independent nodes and hundreds of thousands of computers from around the world make this possible.

If you’re a miner and you’re one of the cogs that makes blockchain transactions run, you’ll benefit from earning a part of the transaction fee.

  • Public and auditable

Being publicly available and auditable you’re able to view every single transaction on the blockchain – providing full transparency.

An example of this is etherscan.io – Ethereum-based transactions can be viewed here along with the transaction value, the addresses involved, the type of contract, and the transaction ID.

  • Incorruptable

Security and corruption are plaguing the Web2 space and have been for decades. By incorruptible it means that once a transaction/activity has been performed it is stored as a hash on the blockchain.

If someone wants to change any aspect of the transaction, the fraudulent transaction would require more “power” than the rest of the network – which is impossible.

Gas Fees

Gas Fee is the transaction fee that users pay when a transaction is performed. These differ from blockchain to blockchain. The fees go to the “miners” that provide the computational power to make the transactions possible.

Ethereum currently has a major issue with gas fees (with Eth 2.0 apparently changing that – but no one knows when it will be launched). This proves to be a huge scalability issue for the chain and causes smaller projects to opt for Layer 2 options like Solana, with Solana’s Gas Fees being pretty close to $0.00.

Gas fees are represented as GWEI – Gigawei – and represent 0.000000001 ETH. These costs are determined by cost and speed.

Important Web3 Concepts: Part 1 - Gas Fees

Layers

The blockchain ecosystem is split between Layer 1 and Layer 2. Layer 1 refers to the blockchain itself (like Ethereum, Bitcoin, Solana, and Flow). Layer 2 on the other hand refers to a network or technology that operates on top of an existing Layer 1 in order to improve scalability and efficiency.

  • How it works

A part of the burden is transferred to an adjacent system or technology
This adjacent technology handles part of the network processing
After all is done the end results are sent to the main blockchain

Important Web3 Concepts: Part 1 - Layers
Source: Bitlevex

L2 takes a lot of pressure off the main blockchain and this means the network doesn’t become congested and it becomes more scalable. Polygon and Immutable are the leading L2 solutions for Ethereum. L2 solutions allow the small guy or project to take part in Web3 without having to pay exorbitant gas fees.

Tokens

Tokens represent tradable units on the blockchain. You may have realised already that cryptocurrencies are essentially made up of tokens. The tokens like Bitcoin and Ether are fungible – meaning 1 ETH holds the same value as another ETH – unlike NFTs.

Platforms like Thirdweb make it easier for projects to launch their own token, and decide on the quantity and distribution.

With NFTs, they are Non-Fungible, so each would hold a different value (even if they’re part of the same collection).

In the next part, we’ll discuss smart contracts, Hashes, exchanges, DAOs, and marketplaces.

Web3 - The new silicon valley

Web3 – The New Silicon Valley

Metaverse, Trends and Forecasts / By

Lately, there has been a mini exodus of skilled professionals leaving Web2 giants like Google and Amazon to get involved in Web3 and Crypto startups – and that could be to the flurry of funding and interest in the space of late, or simply wanting to get in early.

Up until recently if you bagged a job in Silicon Valley working for the likes of Twitter, Meta, Uber, Google, and Co. you’d see it as striking gold.

And although for some budding tech workers that are still the case, a large number are jumping ship to cash in on the hottest place to be: Web3. This includes NFT projects, Exchanges, Crypto startups, DeFi, and other Web3-based businesses.

Executives and developers are looking to get in early and leave secure, high-paying jobs to possibly get in on the ground level for the next wave of web.

What is Web3? Here Are Some Ways To Explain It To A Friend | ConsenSys

Some notable moves to Web3 include:

  • CMO of Novi (Meta’s digital wallet project) took the same position at blockchain payments company Circle
  • Former GM of Amazon’s Edge Services is now the CTO of Gemini
  • Lyft’s former CFO and Uber’s former Director of Corporate Development have since joined leading marketplace Opensea.
  • Airbnb’s former SVP of Policy and Comms left for a crypto venture capital fund
  • YouTube’s former head of gaming left for Polygon Studios.

This is however just the beginning. With executives and business leads already taking the leap, the rest will follow. And this could either push Web2 giants into a downward spiral and go on a hiring spree, or it will force their hand to adapt and grow in Web3 as quickly as possible.

Just as there was a shift or drive for talent when Web2 started gaining momentum, the same is happening with Web3 and Crypto, and more than likely will continue to happen as new industries emerge.

This gives a sense of excitement and a challenge for developers, strategists, and executives to put their stamp on this new industry.

There are already a few recruitment agencies that are focusing on placing top talent at leading Web3 and blockchain startups. These include:

  • Web3.career
  • Remote3.co
  • Remoteok.com
  • Crypto.jobs
  • LinkedIn
  • Discord servers
  • Thirdweb

The list does go on and it is advisable that you DYOR before handing in that resignation at your cushiony job and head into a Web3 startup. Take your time to understand the roadmap, team, product/service, and where you fit into the mix.

A lot of projects are currently on the hunt for fixed-term contract candidates whereas others are looking to start building their team for the foreseeable future.

Some notable positions at these businesses include full-stack developers, blockchain and smart contract developers, UI/UX designers, marketing strategists, community managers, and content creators. No matter what your role is right now in Web2, chances are there’s a spot for you in Web3.

The future of NFTs Beyond Art & Gaming

The future of NFTs: Beyond Art & Gaming

NFTs, Community, Metaverse / By

Apart from those that are heavily involved in Web3, there has been widespread speculation around the future of NFTs, especially how NFTs and Web3 can actually benefit or make inroads into core industries around the world.

Well, it already has and it’s not showing any signs of slowing down. From finance to communities, from real estate to events – Web3 and NFTs are here to stay and will more than likely improve our day-to-day.

As it stands, the common uses for NFTs include PFPs (profile pics), art, music, or collectibles. Web3 has become synonymous with phrases like the Metaverse. Yes, those are some of the areas in which Web3 and NFTs are currently known to operate, but there’s so much more to come.

Already companies, dev houses, startups, and VCs are chasing the next big thing – how to put their stamp on the next web. We’ll cover a few core industries that will be changed thanks to Web3/NFTs but feel free to check out our 5 NFT Trends For 2022 for some deeper insight.

The following will be changed thanks to this new tech including:

  • Music
  • Real estate
  • Governance
  • Raising capital for new ventures

Music


The music industry is already being shaken up by the sudden rise of NFTs and Web3 culture. Gone are the days when musicians lose a large chunk of their earnings to middlemen.

Gone are the days when musicians are disconnected from their fans and followers. A Music NFT is a certificate of ownership of unique audio or a musical piece that can be bought or sold that provides undeniable proof of ownership thanks to blockchain technology.

There are a number of types of music NFTs:

  • Full songs and albums
  • Digital art
  • Tickets
  • Video content

Artists will now be able to claim full ownership of their work and get closer to their fans than ever before and thanks to blockchain technology they’ll be able to sell their pieces to a wider audience.

Real Estate


You may think that there’s still a good couple of months or years before you’ll be able to buy a house through an NFT. Wrong! Earlier this year a house was sold as an NFT for around $650,000.00 (around 210 Ether) through Propy.

The process involved around 50 people that had to go through verification and show proof of funds – and come auction day there were 2 bidders that had been vetted and had the opening bid amount in a digital wallet.

The property first had to be moved to an LLC from an individual owner and once the winning bidder was determined the LLC was transferred to the new owner and funds transferred to the digital wallet.

Due to Ether taking a slight knock, the “value” of the funds that the seller received dropped by around $40,000 within 24 hours.

With the rise in use cases for NFTs and crypto, Propy aims to appeal to the tech-savvy and younger generation of home buyers that are tired of the archaic processes involved in buying property.

The longest step in the wholesale was a 5 minute KYC verification. Propy also aims to be able to offer mortgages (not straight buy-outs) through a stablecoin like USDC that’s always pegged against a strong currency like the Dollar.

Governance

We’ve all heard the term DAO recently – but what is it exactly and how will it change the governance of communities, businesses, and brands?

Decentralised Autonomous Organisations are set to change the way we function as a society and in some areas eliminate elicit behavior.

There will be no CEOs calling the shots based on a whim or no CFO cooking the books. DAOs are based on the premise that every person involved holds a vote and has a voice.

This trustless system runs on blockchain protocol fully and autonomously in accordance with rules encoded via smart contracts.

Eventually the normal 9-5, one-job-only will be replaced by people engaging with and for a few DAOs – performing pre-determined tasks from anywhere in the world.

What Is A DAO And How Do They Work? | ConsenSys

DAOs have become so popular that some NFT projects are including tokens that act as voting rights for the project’s direction.

This means that the project can’t make any big move without the approval of the community that is invested in it.

Shares in a DAO can be transferred or exchanged/sold as NFTs and some projects offer a limited number of voting tokens per wallet – as to not give too much control to a single individual.

Raising capital for new ventures

Gone are the days when you need to approach VC, Angels, investment firms, your friends and family, or even take some savings out to fund your new business venture or invest in a new product.

NFTs are becoming a great way to raise capital and build a community. And fast.

Projects from all over the world are building utility-driven NFT collections that essentially offer fractionalised ownership to the minter. This ends up being a win-win. The project gets the funding it needs to get built or carry on running, and the minter benefits as the project become successful.

The way that NFTs and Web3 are becoming more and more applicable to our everyday life is astounding and as mentioned previously, it is only going to grow in popularity as mass adoption starts to kick in.

That brings us to our closing point – education. Education is needed to facilitate this mass adoption of the next wave of the web.

Platforms like Inevitable are already offering free courses to educate the masses on how web3 works, what NFTs are, and how they can be used.

Rug pulls - what they are and how to spot them

Rug pulls – what they are and how to spot them

Metaverse, NFTs / By

Rug pulls are becoming an increasingly popular way to bring the Crypto, DeFi and NFT space into disrepute and to make a quick buck.

Rug pulls are when a project is hyped up, builds a community, and goes to mint only to plummet to zero (or very close) due to the founders jumping ship or simply not following through on their promises.

This leaves investors high and dry and brings the entire industry into question.

Being human means simply coming to terms with the fact that scams will always be around, but if you know what to look out for you can mitigate the chances of you yourself being rug-pulled.

We’ve discussed this topic extensively with industry experts, real users, and platform creators to try and protect you.

Although we’ll only discuss a handful of flags to look out for, we strongly recommend you continue to DYOR (Do Your Own Research) for every NFT project you may be interested in.

Typical types of rug pulls in crypto & DeFi

  • Stealing liquidity

Simply put, in order for a cryptocurrency to be traded, a liquidity pool needs to be created that holds a certain amount of currency for investors to buy and sell.

In a rug pull, a developer will create a scam token and create the liquidity pool together with a legitimate currency like Ether.

As people start buying in and trading, they deposit ETH for the bogus token and when the time comes, the developer can pull the ETH from the liquidity pool leaving only the worthless scam tokens.

The investors are now left with essentially untradeable worthless tokens and the developer has sailed off into the sunset.

  • Disabling the sale of tokens

This occurs in both crypto and the NFT space. Essentially the end result is the same as the above but the process is slightly different.

Here, the developer/founder will disallow investors the opportunity to sell or trade their tokens after investing.

When the price is high enough, the developer will sell their share, causing the price to drop and leaving investors high and dry.

  • Project founders cashing out

Some projects are created for the sole purpose of early exits by developers or founders. They would mint a useless token or “shitcoin” and assign a large amount to themselves before driving the hype or while the price is very low.

Once a rally has occurred and the price is high enough, the developer will sell their large amount of “shares” either at once or in stages (as to not be so obvious).

Red flags of a rug pull

Okay so we’ve discussed the broad types of rug pulls, but let’s see what the warning signs could be. As this is mostly NFT focused content we’ll steer the direction towards NFT project red flags and stay away from the DeFi side.

There are a handful of clear red flags that should give you an indication to watch out or practice more-than-normal caution before getting involved in a project:

  • Project appeared overnight

Have a look at the project’s timeline (historically). If they have a proven track record of engagement, how long the project has been in the works and how they have been engaging with their community.

One area of this would be their website – if it is flooded with inaccuracies, errors, a vague roadmap, and NO TEAM, this should be an immediate warning.

  • Undoxxed Founders

We’ve previously discussed the importance of a doxxed (documented) team in NFT projects. In a nutshell, this gives the community and prospective investor peace of mind that the developers and founders can’t just slip away unnoticed.

Yes, there have been some doxxed teams that ended up being rug pulls like Squiggles and similar projects, but this is at least a reassurance that they are willing to put their name and face on a project.

  • No visibility on launch sites

Before any project launches, they tend to list their project on NFT announcement platforms like UpcomingNFT, NFTEvening, etc. to inform the NFT community of their upcoming mint.

These listings generally include the mint date, information about the project, the chain they’re launching on, and the mint price among other details.

If a project is hard to find other than their Discord, Twitter and Website, you should practice caution.

  • Vague roadmap or white paper

Roadmaps and whitepapers detail the proposed direction of a project. This gives prospective minters/investors an indication as to what to expect, the potential utility received, and the timelines.

These vary in technicality and length. Road maps are more often than not both on the website and Discord servers whereas whitepapers live on the website or could be requested from the developers or founders.

  • Questionable social presence

With influencers running wild on Twitter and Discord, it’s tough to distinguish the real followers vs the fake or “bought” followers.

Adding to that, a disproportionate amount of followers between Twitter and Discord could be a potential flag too. These large amounts of followers could be bots to give an illusion of community, wherein actual fact it’s nothing more than smoke and mirrors.

The above is the basic red flags to look out for – we could get very technical re liquidity, looking into the smart contract code, etc. but we’ll cover those in a future article.

Find The Latest NFT Drops Here

Find The Latest NFT Drops Here

NFT, Trends and Forecasts / By

Hundreds of NFT projects are launching daily from all corners of the world and on a variety of different blockchains and marketplaces. It may become tricky to stay on top of them and to know when they’re launching, the chain is used, price, utility, etc.

No one has the time to go and scour through OpenSea, LooksRare, Solanart and co. to find the hottest new projects. Apart from features on popular platforms, we’ve put a list of 10 platforms and methods you can follow if you’re interested in staying in the know re the latest NFT drops, even the secret or exclusive ones.

These include the likes of:

  • NFT Calendar (nftcalendar.io)
  • NFT Evening
  • Crypto Potato
  • Next NFT Drop
  • NFT Solana (nftsolana.io)
  • Upcoming NFT
  • Early Minter
  • NFT Drops Calendar
  • NFT Insider
  • NFT Sniper

NFT Calendar


NFTCalendar is the first release and event calendar for the growing Non-Fungible Token industry. They cover the most interesting events and NFT drops across marketplaces and platforms.

Website

NFT Evening


NFT Evening is dedicated to supporting mainstream NFT adoption by making content fun & accessible. Learn about NFT collectibles, NFT art, and the best blockchain games that even let you earn free crypto!

Whether you want to invest in NFTs, create NFTs or simply collect them, NFT Evening is the first stop for all the NFT news you need!

Website

Crypto Potato


CryptoPotato was established at the beginning of 2016 by crypto early adopters. CryptoPotato has recently become one of the world’s leading information sources for crypto investors.

They insist on original high-quality content, and our site has set a goal to always look from the crypto investor’s point of view. We believe in Bitcoin, we believe in crypto, we believe in blockchain technology.

The platform covers crypto news, margin trading, guides and DeFi news along with access to scholarships and IEO lists.

Website

Next NFT Drop


Explore the latest NFT launches and hottest NFT drops from an expansive NFT projects list. Next NFT Drop is the pioneering NFT platform that provides traders and collectors with relevant resources regarding upcoming launches, new Non-Fungible Token releases, and additional information regarding each project.

Simply filter through the NFT projects to find your preferred drop.

Website

NFT Solana


NFT SOLANA Calendar keeps you updated with the most promising NFTs projects released on Solana. The platform also allows you to add the projects to your Google Calendar so you don’t miss a moment.

Track the live stats across socials, mint price (SOL), quantity available etc. of the upcoming Solana-based projects.

Website

Upcoming NFT


The upcomingnft’s aim is to help creators and contribute to their growth in the crypto art sector. As a result, any developer can freely add his or her drop or event to the upcomingnft.

This website is dedicated to giving you information about generative art and collectibles. Get access to NFT launches; NFT Giveaways; NFT Events & NFT Auctions.

Website

Early Minter


Join thousands of other NFT Project creators and list your NFT Project for FREE on EarlyMinter. They also offer a featured placement where your project will be placed prominently on all categories and our homepage.

Website

NFT Drops Calendar


With over 150,000 organic monthly users, they keep an eye on everything happening in the industry and cover current news and events for our community to stay updated.

Website

NFT Insider


NFT Insider aims to give you everything you need to navigate the NFT landscape in a fun, safe, and informed way – from the latest drops and in-depth interviews to community highlights, exclusive first-looks at the latest blockchain games and a whole lot more.

Through their articles, videos, podcasts and livestreams, if you want to know what’s happening across the NFT space, NFT Insider is the place to be.

Website

NFT Sniper

On NFT Sniper you’ll find all info on upcoming NFT releases and projects that are released yet. Check the rarity of individual NFTs, check on which marketplaces they are listed, and find their latest prices.

Find The Latest NFT Drops Here


Website

——–

There’s definitely no shortage of platforms to subscribe to and browse if you’re looking for upcoming drops, hot projects, and information on your favorite projects.

But as always, DYOR when it comes to minting.

Understanding POAP

Understanding Proof Of Attendance Protocol in NFTs

Metaverse, NFT / By

With the Metaverse picking up momentum, a few protocols have been popping up all over the show – and one of the biggest is the Proof Of Attendance Protocol. But what does it mean exactly?

POAP (pronounced Poh-ap) is a great new way to keep a reliable record of life experiences. Every time you attend an event or perform an activity in person or in the metaverse, you will receive a unique badge that is supported by a cryptographic record. These badges are represented as an NFT that is minted on Ethereum sidechain xDai and live within the user’s wallet.

All POAPs are created with the ERC-721 standard used for NFTs but in order for an NFT to be classified as a POAP it needs to meet 3 basic criteria:

1. It must be minted through the POAP smart contract
2. It needs to contain the metadata related to a specific time or date (up to one year in length)
3. It must have an associated image

Medium states that “Each event has a custom design, meaning POAPs quickly turn into a rare collection of coveted NFTs which can only be earned by traveling the world to one of Ethereum’s most sought after gatherings.”

This both proves your attendance and opens you up to a world of possibilities. The new protocol allows event organizers to engage with their audiences on a deeper level by providing more customized and tailored experiences.

The one benefit of POAP is the ability to integrate a range of services like exclusive events, private chat rooms, competitions and so on. On the user or attendee side, POAP can be used as a bragging right or to store a memento to remember an event in the years to come (basically a web3 version of storing your ticket stub of seeing your favorite band or attending the World Series).

An individual can use a POAP in a number of ways:

  • As proof of attendance or bragging rights to show you attended an event
  • As a ticket or entry mechanism to attend an exclusive event or be part of an elite group
  • As a raffle entry (see poap.fun)
  • As access to “draw” on a shared canvas with various communities (live and collaborative)
  • Community polls

The POAP Collection would be a digital representation, that only requires the individual to have a wallet address. The distribution metric can then be used to distinguish what members did and are doing to achieve the POAP.


How does it work?

Simply visit the POAP platform to create your own event and to distinguish what you’ll be able to offer attendees or members. The users will then be able to look out for QR Codes in the POAP events to start collecting badges and participate in activities.

Users are continuously going to be looking for ways to brag that they were at the start of the “next big thing” and the only way to prove that would be by means of a POAP badge. Imagine if you could prove you were in the room when the iPhone was launched for the first time? With a POAP you will hold “proof” digitally and be able to showcase it publicly and be privy to the benefits that stem from attending such events.

How do I claim a POAP?

When you attend a POAP-sponsored event, the event organizer will distribute claim codes in the form of QR codes or URLs. Simply scan the QR code or enter the URL in your browser to claim the POAP using your ETH address.

Can I sell POAPs I have collected?

Although it isn’t recommended (due to it being linked to your life’s story) you can in fact sell your POAP by using epor on xDai and Opensea on Mainnet.

How much does it cost to set up a POAP?

Absolutely nothing. All costs are covered by POAP, so it is 100% free for both issuers and attendees (end users).

——-

There’s no doubt that POAPs are the future for events both in the real world and in the metaverse. Gone are the days of printing tickets, welcome to the new way of managing and attending events – welcome to POAP.

Web2 vs Web3 – Whats the real difference?

Trends and Forecasts / By

The internet we’re all using today, including the social media platforms, is Web2. This version of the web is ruled by data-hungry corporations that see your personal information as a fair exchange for their services.

Web3 on the other hand refers to decentralized apps (dApps) that run on the blockchain. This allows people to participate and contribute without selling off their personal data. Web3 has been hotly contested in all corners of the globe and in most industries, and the big question on everyone’s lips – why do we need a “new web” and “can we trust it?”. There are a number of key benefits of this new form of web:

  • Anyone who is on the network inherently has permission to use the service (no extensive permissions required)
  • No one can block you from using a service (Facebook has become known for censoring news, blocking political figures and so on – with Web3 that will no longer be the case)
  • Payments and built in via the native token (ETH)
  • Pretty much anything is programmable (Turing-Complete)

On the flip side, this is new territory and it does come with it’s set of challenges and limitations:

Web1 vs Web2 Vs Web3


Let’s look at this practically at a few practical examples:

Web2 Web3
Twitter can censor any content Web3 tweets would be uncensorable due to decentralized control
Payment services/providers may disallow payments for certain types of work Web3 payment dApps require no personal data and can’t prevent any payments
Servers for gig-economy apps could go down and affect worker income Web3 servers can’t go down – by using Ethereum, they are on a network consisting of 1000’s of computers as their backend.

The whole ecosystem is changing and the apps/platforms we have come to know over the last two decades may eventually start to slip away, not immediately but eventually, to make way for their Web3 counterparts (known as protocols). When it comes to this, there are a few key industries that have hand incumbents that have set the standard and owned their space – these industries being data storage and web hosting; data processing and information markets; domain name systems (DNS) and applications (music, concerts etc.).

Data storage and web hosting is currently ruled by the likes of Amazon Web Services (AWS), Dropbox & S3 – but they’re being infiltrated by new kids on the block Sia, Filecoin and Arweave. Data processing and information market heavyweights Snowflake and Google could be nugged out eventually by the likes of Ocean, Erasure and Streamr.

Domain Name Systems (DNS) like Verisign, GoDaddy and ICANN have met their Web3 counterparts Handshake, ENS and Unstoppable Domains. And finally, applications like Spotify, Medium, and UpWork/Fiverr could eventually be replaced by the likes of Audius, Royal.io, Mirror and Braintrust.

Another set of key aspects when comparing Web2 to Web 3 include profiteers, governance, network establishment and composability. When it comes to profiteers Web2 is mostly the investors (capital and founders) whereas Web3 profits go to the users/fans of the projects. Governance in Web2 places executives as fiduciaries and Web3 places users at the forefront by way of community leaders and influencers.

Web3 puts a huge emphasis on incentives to users and members/advocates to grow the network whereas currently Web2 networks are established through immense investments into marketing spend. Finally composability – Web3 relies solely on free and clear content built and distributed on top of DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organisations) and has limited deplatform risk compared to Web2 partners using API with a high risk of being de-platformed.

Web3 dApps

Over the last 2+ decades, we have progressed from Web 1 (Information economy) through to Web2 (Platform economy) and have now arrived at Web3 (Ownership economy). Large corporations built on shaky values, banks, and many other institutions are going to be flipped on their head eventually if they don’t decide to adapt themselves.

The likes of Yahoo, MSN, and Craigslist were once untouchable in Web1 but were wiped out completely in Web2 by the emergence and dominance of Facebook, Instagram, UBER, Snapchat, and the like. Now we could see the same happen in due course when it comes to Web3. Facebook (and some other well-known platforms) have already taken action to prevent this from happening. More notably was their (Facebook) name change to Meta – which positioned themselves perfectly for the Metaverse and it made their intentions known for what’s to come.

5 Brands In The Metaverse

Metaverse / By

Towards the end of 2021, we started seeing brands of all sizes and from a range of industries slowly starting to grasp the concept of the Metaverse. With a vast majority of brands still doubting the idea altogether, some see the opportunity and the up-side of getting in early.

Before we discuss the brands themselves, let’s take a quick detour and see the possibilities for brands in the Metaverse. The virtual world is relatively unexplored and most AR/VR companies have been playing in it for years – but on a very small scale. From virtual product launches, VR walk-throughs to VR games and tours – yet we’ve only just scratched the surface.

Nike//RTFKT Studios

Possibly one of the biggest headlines of 2021 was the partnership between physical shoe giant Nike & virtual brand RTFKT. The acquisition was announced in December of last year and coincided with another 7 trademark applications by Nike to indicate their intent to Nike-branded virtual footwear, apparel, and accessories for use in virtual environments.

Gucci Garden

Fashion heavyweight GUCCI recently teamed up with Metaverse heavyweight Roblox to launch GUCCI Garden – an immersive, interactive exhibit in the Metaverse that upon entering the garden, the avatars start out as neutral mannequins but leave as one-of-a-kind creations having retained fragments of the spaces they entered.

Wendy’s

Off the back of Fortnite’s announcement of a food fight between Team Pizza and Team Burger, Wendy’s launched an organic meta game aimed at promoting it’s burgers.

However, with Wendy’s being firmly against the concept of frozen beef (and Team Burger only using frozen beef) they created an avatar on Twitch, dropped it into the game and began destroying burger freezers.

Wendy’s continued to destroy freezers for 9 hours straight and encouraged other gamers to do the same – which they did.

Disney


Disney announced plans for their parks to enter the 3D realm by filing a patent in December for a “virtual world simulator” which essentially provides a “highly immersive individualized 3D virtual experiences without requiring those users to wear an augmented reality AR viewing device.”

Disney already has a foot in the Meta-door with integrations between the physical, digital and virtual world. One example is the Disney MagicBand+ which allows users to engage with content like never before.

Hyundai x Roblox


In Q4 of 2021 vehicle manufacturer Hyundai launched their Hyundai Mobility Aventure on popular Metaverse platform Roblox. This space featured their products and future mobility solutions. This intuitive offering allows users from all over the world to meet up (as their avatars) and experience what Hyundai has to offer as well as being able to customize their avatars.

This was the first virtual experience on Roblox by a leading vehicle brand and targeted the young, tech-savvy crowd that enjoyed exploring the virtual world.

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There were way more projects than what we mentioned above which goes to show how the space is growing and how brands are adopting this new technology to get a feel for what’s to come. We could see simpler, more everyday adaptations in 2022 by consumer brands as the focus turns to mass-adoption.