Avalanche / Amazon Web Services — Ava Labs and AWS joined forces to accelerate blockchain adoption for enterprises, institutions, and governments. Avalanche node operators can now access one-click node deployment using AWS and run GovCloud for FedRAMP compliance use cases — a pre-requisite for enterprises and governments — more
Polygon / Network Hard Fork — Polygon, in an effort to reduce the impact of transaction fee spikes and chain reorganizations, proposed a network hard fork on January 17th. The upgrade is part of Polygon’s broader roadmap to improve its technical capabilities by introducing parallelization and zkEVM tech — more
Mastercard / Artist Accelerator — The newly announced Mastercard Artists Accelerator aims to harness Polygon’s tech stack and connect artists with mentors and music fans. With an aim of educating and discovering emerging web3 music talent, the development program will kick off in 2023 with a livestreamed artist showcase — more
Genesis x Gemini / SEC Charge — In a complaint filed on Thursday, the SEC alleged that Genesis “pooled” digital assets from investors using Gemini Earn. The SEC stated this resulted in an improper lending arrangement and mishandling of US retail investor deposits — more
Instagram / NFT Traction — Top NFT artists have successfully sold out of initial drops on Instagram. The lineup includes Drifter Shoots, Refik Anadol, Amber Vittoria, Dave Krugman and Micah Johnson. Instagram supports Polygon, Solana, Flow, and Ethereum NFTs — more
Apple / Mixed-Reality Headset — Ahead of its annual Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple is set to reveal its new hybrid headset in the coming months. The device features combined AR and VR capabilities and it’s reported that developers are already building apps for the device on a new operating system called xrOS — more
FTX / Partial Asset Recovery — FTX reportedly recovered more than $5B in different assets, not including the $425M in crypto held by the Securities Commission of the Bahamas. This is significantly more than the $1B reported on Dec. 20, 2022, though many of these new holdings are large relative to the total supply of the token and therefore highly illiquid — more
Twitter / Awards and Coins — New Twitter feature will allow users to reward individual tweets with “Awards” by issuing “Coins” to the tweet creator. The payments will be facilitated using Stripe and creators will able to withdraw rewards at a $50 minimum threshold. At this time, there’s no mention of crypto payments — more
Silvergate / Crypto Bank Run — Silvergate, a CA-based lender that offers digital asset banking services, announced it recently survived an $8.1B drawdown on deposits. Included in the withdrawals were accounts associated with FTX, which represented “less than 10%” of Silvergate’s deposits — more
Coinbase / Additional Layoffs — Following an earlier round of layoffs in the summer, Coinbase announced it’s cutting its workforce by 950 employees. The company cited “the ongoing market conditions impacting the cryptoeconomy" as the reason for the layoffs — more
Web3 / CES 2023 — The Consumer Electronics Show, the largest tech trade show in the world, recently concluded and web3 was spotlighted as a theme to watch in the years ahead. Several legacy brands reiterated their commitment to web3 strategies and panels included talks about web3’s intersection with VR, luxury NFTs, the metaverse, and beyond — more
Voyager / Binance Sale — Binance will pay $20M to take over $1B in Voyager customer accounts. Voyager Digital Ltd. recently won court approvals to sell its platform to Binance US as part of its plan to liquidate in bankruptcy proceedings — more
Easy Company / $14.2M Raised — Easy Company, a social crypto wallet designed to onboard mainstream audiences into web3, raises round from Lobby Capital, Relay Ventures, 6th Man Ventures, Tapestry VC, and others— more
Alkimiya / $7.2M Raised — Alkimiya, a decentralized capital markets protocol, raises round co-led by Castle Island Ventures and 1kx, with contributions from Circle Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, and Dragonfly Capital Partners — more
Quantum Temple / $2M — Quantum Temple, a platform dedicated to preserving cultural heritage, raises round led by Borderless Capital, with participation from Algorand Foundation, Outliers Fund, Shima Capital, and others — more
Rainmaker Games / $4.7M Raised — Rainmaker Games, a blockchain gaming hub, raises round co-led by Placeholder and Hivemind Capital, with participation from Shima Capital, Peer Ventures, Coinfund, Side Door Ventures, and others — more
C14 / $2.5M Raised — C14, a NY-based web3 payments firm, raises seed round led by General Catalyst, with participation from Fin Capital, Cipholio, and Istari Ventures — more
Jumbo / $3.5M Raised — Jumbo, a decentralized exchange built on the NEAR protocol, raises round led by Pantera and Huobi Incubator, with participation from DWEB3, D21 Ventures, Metaweb Ventures, Fundamental Labs, Proximity, and Genblock Capital — more
Quasar / $5.4M Raises — Quasar Finance, a decentralized asset management protocol in the Cosmos ecosystem, raises round led by Shima Capital, with contributions from Polychain Capital, Blockchain Capital, HASH Capital, and others — more
Reviving Trust in Crypto / Ria Bhutoria — “Last year, we had to learn hard lessons because some bad actors strayed from the ideals on which this industry was founded. The series of unfortunate events reminded us that we need to wield crypto’s core properties across centralized and decentralized products we build, rather than abstract them away. If we return to the core values that united us in the first place, I believe the original vision of crypto can be realized.” — more
Meet IYK (🤝), The Team Behind Your Favorite Drops and Activations / aventurine.eth — “By bridging the use of NFC (near-field communication) chips and blockchain technology, IYK is one of the first companies to offer a product that solves two problems at once, marrying physical and digital products together and allowing businesses to reward customer engagement across the entire spectrum of consumer experience with endless possibilities.” — more
Web3 could help fashion become more sustainable / Dominic-Madori Davis — “If there is one industry that could use web3, that industry is fashion. Hear us out. Fashion is one of the most polluting sectors in the world, and, according to the UN Environmental Programme, is responsible for up to 10% of the world’s carbon dioxide output, more than the international flights and maritime shipping industries combined … A possible step toward finding the multiple solutions needed to fix this damaging sector is, well, embracing more web3.” — more
The Web3 Growth Stack / Shayon Sengupta & John Robert Reed — “We’ve become increasingly interested in a category of innovation that we’re internally calling the Web3 Growth Stack—i.e., the tools that product managers and marketers use to acquire, engage and retain customers using Web3 technologies … The remainder of this post will explore what crypto-native growth infrastructure could look like.” — more
Optimism in Web3 / Jeff Morris Jr. — “A large number of the most influential web2 companies and brands recently released or will soon launch web3 initiatives and already have distribution. The products are easy to use and the web3 features are abstracted to feel like web2 product experiences … In 2023, we have the opportunity to onboard the next billion users to web3 and that alone should make us optimistic.” — more
Zero to Governance / w1nt3r.eth — “Liquid delegation is a modern frontier of technical aspects of governance, only a few DAOs are exploring this space … This post was inspired by awesome work from folks at Maker, Compound, OZ, Nouns, and countless others who dare to push the boundaries.” — more
10 crypto predictions for 2023 / David Phelps — “Writing my crypto predictions for 2022 a year ago, I vowed to make them as “absolutely wild as possible.” … So for this year’s predictions, I tried to be contrarian-pragmatic. What I mean by that is that many of the following 10 theses for 2023 are deeply unpopular within crypto—I’m not even sure I’ve fully convinced myself of one or two of them. But they also almost all entail projects willing to test these theses over the next year.” — more
My Predictions for 2023 / Greg Isenberg — “We’ve officially landed in 2023. And I want to start 2023 by making predictions about how the internet, the rise of AI, ecommerce, social apps and platforms will look this year. The goal? To bring you perspective you may not find anywhere else right now. Always with a lens on building community.” — more
The Top Web3 Luxury Fashion Predictions For 2023 / Bethanie Ryder — “If 2022 was the year Web3 found its footing, then 2023 is shaping up to be when the landscape officially gains ground … Today, new trend cycles are already emerging — showing us what we can expect to see across a potentially explosive year for luxury and the metaverse. Jing Daily rounds up the key themes and predictions to keep on your radar for 2023.” — more
Bright Moments (🤝) / Tokyo Collection — Bright Moments announced the lineup for its Tokyo event happening in the spring of 2023. Each artist will generate 100 works on-chain IRL, more details coming soon about the Tokyo Collection Mint Pass sale — more
POAP (🤝) / New Website — POAP launched a new website with the aim to “…become a more connected organism, where all the pieces understand how they fit together. Creators, collectors, builders, and new community members can learn who we are, why we exist, and how we see the world we’re making.” — more
StoryDAO (🤝) Brand Update / StoryCo — StoryDAO has rebranded to StoryCo in anticipation of its new platform and first production. StoryCo is a collaborative space where creators can come together to co-create and co-own franchise intellectual property (IP) — more
Dirt (🤝) / New Platform Launch — Dirt debuted its new publishing platform and redesign. Daily publications will continue to be inbox-first, but the freshly designed dirt.[fyi] is the place for those that prefer the browser experience. “We will send out a free dispatch 3x a week (Daily Dirt) and longform articles 2x a week (Weekly Dirt) that require a subscription to read in full.” — more
PROOF (🤝) / United Talent Agency — PROOF announced it signed with United Talent Agency. The two teams will work together on partnerships that aim to extend the Moonbirds community beyond the existing web3 native audience. UTA is a firm with 1,400 people onboard and specializes in film, T.V., music, sports, brand, broadcast, and beyond — more
Gallery (🤝) / Introducing Members Club — Gallery introduced the Members Club for holders of its Premium Membership Cards. Members will receive an exclusive badge on their profile, early access to beta features, entrance to a Members Only channel to reach the team, an email newsletter with early Gallery news, + future special perks — more
The402 (🤝) / Clips Feature — The402, a platform for crypto-enabled livestreaming, launched a new feature called Clips that allows viewers to clip their favorite moments and share them on socials. “Sharing clips on Twitter drives discoverability and we also have a built-in attribution system that can eventually allow streamers to reward fans for proliferating their content.” — more
Foundation / Worlds Launch — Foundation launched a new web3-native curation tool called Worlds — “think decentralized exhibitions, true web3 auction houses, collective creativity, and more. Curators earn ETH when the NFTs listed in their World sell and fees are determined by the curator, enforced on-chain, and paid out automatically.” — more
Async Art (🤝) / ClubNFT Podcast — ClubNFT, founded by Artnome, recently launched their new podcast, The Dankness, using Async’s Music Blueprints. Three episodes are live right now + the team is committed to minting future episodes on Async for free — more
Ready Player Me (🤝) / Unstoppable Domains — Web3 domain provider Unstoppable Domains is teaming up with Ready Player Me so that users can connect their avatar to their Unstoppable identity, which will enable avatar interoperability across 6,000 of Ready Player Me’s applications, games and metaverses, in addition to Unstoppable’s 650 partner apps — more
El Collectooorr / NFT Experiment — “El Collectooorr is a novel experiment in crypto art collection. El Collectooorr aims to autonomously create collections of NFTs by minting them as they drop on Art Blocks. It uses complex logic to decide which mints to participate in and what prices to bid at, so users don’t have to.” — more
Ora Labs / Dune Search — Ora Labs is a new search experience for Dune dashboards. Users “can find dashboards by describing what you're looking for - like "how's DEX activity on eth?" - rather than relying on keyword matches.” — more
Homage / Remint NFTs — “The most popular NFTs are prohibitively expensive. Reminting allows you to create replicas of your favorite NFTs at affordable prices. By reminting, you earn HOMAGE tokens. HOMAGE tokens track how much you’ve used Homage.” — more
Per Kristian Stoveland / Art Blocks (🤝): The Harvest — “This project has been inspired by a life-long fascination for science fiction and space exploration. Aiming to capture a moment of awe, the beams reach to their origin, emulating a cathedral-like atmosphere in the vein of Hugh Ferris, while borrowing inspiration from Micheal Whelan’s landscapes. All in the effort of capturing a sense of how small we are in relation to the cosmos.” 400 pieces, minting Jan. 18th at 10:00am PT — more
uMathA / Art Blocks (🤝): Ad Extremum Terrae — “Ad Extremum Terrae explores visual storytelling in a form of generative art. The project tells a story of the tragic end of all existence in a distant universe, long since forgotten. Any given individual output depicts a passing moment, captured during the final breath of each dying world.” 200 pieces, minting Feb. 10th at 10:00am PT — more
Robert Whitman / Art Blocks (🤝) x Pace: New Worlds — “Ad Extremum Terrae explores visual storytelling in a form of generative art. The project tells a story of the tragic end of all existence in a distant universe, long since forgotten. Any given individual output depicts a passing moment, captured during the final breath of each dying world.” 500 pieces, minting Jan. 25th at 9:00am PT — more
SuperMassive / Marathon in the Metaverse
PROOF (🤝) / Derek’s Signs of Fire 🔥
Blockcrunch / Derek on Decentralized Social
WarDaddyCapital / NFT Lending Deep Dive
BAYC / Wallet Delegation for Upcoming Mint
w1nt3r_eth / PartyDAO Tic-tac-toe Game
Token Terminal / The Team Behind Blur
0xSisyphus / Blur Bids
0xPrismatic / NFT Predictions 2023
CozomoMedici / Will NFTs kill traditional art?
Sudoswap / Lockdrop Details
dotta / Forgotten Runes Adventure
Gabriel Leydon / Limit Break’s Opt-in Programmable Royalties
Nic Carter / AI Opportunity Priced In?
Ben Tossell / AI’s Real Winner
🤝 = Collab+Currency Portfolio Company
Curated by @Collab_Currency x @_cutbank
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