NFT Marketplace Blur (🤝) / Token Launch — Blur, an NFT marketplace for traders, released its $BLUR token via airdrop to more than 100k active users of the platform. Traders will have ~56 more days to claim the airdrop, though nearly 93% of traders have already made their claim. At the time of writing, Blur has more than 146k users, a fully diluted valuation of ~$3B, and has processed ~$1.4B in NFT trading volume — more
Starbucks NFTs / Hit the Market — Starbucks Odyssey, an NFT-powered loyalty program, released its first collectible stamp in mid-December called the Holiday Cheer Edition 1. The collection consists of 5,000 pieces and was free-to-claim for Odyssey members who completed specific challenges. The pieces are now trading on the secondary market for nearly $2,000 — more
GQ Magazine / NFT Launch — Men’s fashion magazine GQ will launch its first NFT collection that offers holders subscription rights, a curated GQ box of products, and access to live events. Dropping March 8th, the NFTs will be priced at 0.1957 ETH (the year GQ was founded) — more
Lamborghini / NFT Collection — Lamborghini, the iconic luxury sports car brand, has teamed up with NFT marketplace VeVe to launch an NFT collection. The collectibles will feature the Huracán STO model with different rarity traits and are set to drop on VeVe Feb. 19th — more
Siemens / Issues €60M Bond on Polygon — Siemens AG, a 175-year-old industrial conglomerate, issued a one-year bond under Germany’s Electronic Securities Act. The bond offering makes Siemens one of the first major multinationals to issue a fully compliant digital bond, which was sold directly to three investors, without the need for an intermediary bank — more
Polygon / Zero-knowledge Layer 2 Solution — Polygon will release a new Layer 2 scaling solution, zkEVM, to mainnet on March 27th. zkEVM is a ZK-Rollup that performs off-chain computations on a secondary layer for faster and cheaper transactions. The aim is to expand the Ethereum network's scaling capabilities and offer developers on the Ehereum network a seamless way to scale their apps — more
Amazon’s Alexa Fund / Leads Web3 Funding Round — Amazon’s venture capital arm Alexa Fund led a $20M Series A-4 funding round for 3D character studio Superplastic — a creative studio that creates “synthetic celebrities”. Superplastic previously released NFT collections on Ethereum and partnered with big brands like Gucci and Epic Games’ Fortnite — more
Napster / Acquires Mint Songs — Napster, the brand best known for popularizing peer-to-peer music sharing in 1999-2001, announced its purchase of Mint Songs through its venture wing Napster Ventures. Mint Songs is a music-focused NFT marketplace that allows artists to release music NFTs and connect with fans — more
Magic Eden / Layoffs — Magic Eden, the leading Solana-based NFT marketplace, announced its undergoing “companywide restructuring” and laid off twenty-two members of its staff. “To be clear-eyed, addressing our strategic goals requires making changes to our team. In order to reach our goals, our team must encompass certain types of new skills and expertise without losing momentum.” — more
Binance / Penalties Expected — Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange, expects to pay penalties to settle investigations by U.S. regulatory agencies. The Justice Department has been investigating Binance over potential violations of U.S. anti-money-laundering law and the CFTC is looking into its derivative offerings — more
Paxos x Binance Stablecoin / Under Investigation — The New York Department of Financial Services is investigating stablecoin issuer Paxos — a platform that issued Binance’s BUSD tokens. Circle, the issuer of the USDC stablecoin, tipped off the agency and cited that Binance didn’t have sufficient reserves for its BUSD tokens — more
Superplastic / $20M Raised — Superplastic, a 3D character studio and creative agency, raises round led by Amazon’s Alexa Fund, with participation from Google Ventures, Galaxy Digital, Sony Japan, Animoca Brands, and Craft Ventures — more
Caldera / $9M Raised — Caldera, a no-code web3 infrastructure platform, raises across two rounds led by Sequoia Capital partner Shaun Maguire and Dragonfly Capital investment partner Ani Pai, with participation from Neo, 1kx, and Ethereal Ventures — more
Monad Labs / $19M Raised — Monad Labs, a startup aimed at building the “fastest, cheapest, and most censorship resistant EVM L1”, raises seed round led by Dragonfly Capital, with participation from Lemniscap, Placeholder, Shima Capital, Finality Capital, and Credibly Neutral, as well as over 70 angels, including Cobie, Hasu, and 0xMaki — more
Alongside / $11M Raised — Alongside, a crypto index-focused platform aiming to serve as an “on-chain Vanguard”, raises round led by a16z, with participation from Coinbase Ventures, Franklin Templeton Investments, Village Global, and Not Boring Capital — more
Ironblocks / $7M Raised — Ironblocks, a startup building a blockchain-native cybersecurity platform, raises round co-led by Collider Ventures and Disruptive AI, with participation from ParaFi, Samsung Next, Quantstamp, and Balaji Srinivasan — more
Aura Network / $4M Raised — Aura, a Layer-1 blockchain aimed at building the “Internet of NFTs” within the Cosmos ecosystem, raises round co-led by Hashed and Coin98 — more
Orb Labs / $4.5M Raised — Orb Labs, a blockchain interoperability protocol, raises seed round led by Bain Capital Crypto, with participation from Shima Capital, 6th Man Ventures, Aves Lair, Newman Capital, Modular Capital, and SevenX Ventures — more
HIGH FREQUENCY Volume 1: The Compilation Album / Noise DAO (🤝) — “Volume 1 is a compilation album featuring new songs from artists who we believe represent the values of web3, have the potential to be breakout stars, and whose work is essential to every music NFT collector’s set long-term. With each release, we invite new collectors to discover and learn more about the artists who are pushing the space forward.” — more
LA County Museum of Art Acquires On-Chain Art / LACMA — “LACMA announced today the first and largest collection of artworks minted on blockchain to enter an American art museum. Thanks to a generous gift from collector Cozomo de’ Medici, 22 digital artworks by a group of 13 international artists—from Brazil, Canada, China, England, Germany, Portugal, and the United States—are now part of or promised to the museum’s permanent collection.” — more
A Pragmatic View of ChatGPT in a Web3 World / Jesus Rodriguez — “The hype about the possibilities of ChatGPT have certainly found its way to the Web3 space. In recent weeks, crypto media outlets have openly discussed the role that ChatGPT can play in ending Google’s dominance, completely automating smart contract development and making Web3 the dominant architecture paradigm. A different perspective becomes apparent once you look into the specific capabilities and limitations of ChatGPT and match it to the current state of Web3 technologies.” — more
Web3 Credentials: Crossing the Consumer Chasm / Regan Bozman — “Products leveraging Web3 credentials can be the consumer category that breaks out and crosses the chasm. Writing all social and professional credentials onto a single, open database is a massive innovation unlock. Replacing email logins with wallets can provide applications with more context on their users, thereby creating richer user experiences. As always, the biggest challenge is finding a killer use case that resonates with a large audience.” — more
Crypto’s Next Frontier: AI & DeFi / New Order — “Classification, pattern recognition, and predictive capabilities make AI models an ideal fit for financial applications that depend on large, real-time data sets. This requirement makes AI a natural fit with decentralized applications and blockchains. Sufficiently trained AI models could create unmatched insights when provided with the ordered, immutable, and fully transparent data created by blockchain ecosystems.” — more
Tokens, Symbols, and Schelling Points / Hive Mind — “As we scroll through the digital landscape, we are increasingly encountering communities organized around tokens. One explanation is that tokens serve as a kind of "Schelling point"—a term coined by economist Thomas Schelling to describe a focal point that individuals will naturally gravitate towards, even without direct communication. These digital assets serve as a kind of "gatekeeper" — filtering out the uninterested and bringing together those who share a passion.” — more
A Guide to Bitcoin NFTs / Corporate Trash — “Ordinals digital artifacts and NFTs on Bitcoin have been polarizing within both the NFT and crypto communities. As more collectors seek to gain exposure and inscribers flock to Bitcoin to make their mark, many are wondering: what are Ordinals, the latest Bitcoin NFTs, and where did they come from?” — more
BasedAF (🤝) / Metaverse Marathon — “Ever considered running an ultramarathon in the Metaverse? Of course not. The physical challenge alone is beyond immense. Not to mention the insane technical hurdles to overcome. You’d quite literally have to be mad. And what better word to describe BasedAF CEO and founder, SuperMassive. Not only did he complete a grueling Metaverse marathon at BasedHQ, but he also raised $100k for Great Ormond Street Hospital in the process.” — more
Outland Art / Art Blocks (🤝) Engine Partnership — Outland Art, a platform dedicated to fostering critical conversations around emerging digital technologies and their connections to contemporary art, announced a partnership with Art Blocks Engine that will enable Outland to bring long-form generative art collections to its platform — more
RabbitHole (🤝) / v2 Launch — RabbitHole, a platform that makes it easy to earn crypto by participating in cryptonetworks, announced a major protocol upgrade. In addition to the Quest Protocol, RabbitHole introduced Quest Allowlists (you’ll only see Quests you’re eligible for) and Quest Receipts (rewards as transferable ERC721 claims, can be claimed or sold) — more
Deca (🤝) / New Exploration Tool — Deca has launched a way to explore art. A single powerful tool to explore all the beautiful, weird, sublime creations of crypto art. And a beautiful, intuitive way for artists to get discovered — more
Bonfire (🤝) / Native NFT Drops — Bonfire introduced native NFT drop tooling for creators directly on its platform. In a few clicks, creators can design drop parameters and launch NFT collections to expand the reach of their community — more
zkSync Era / Mainnet — “We’re now full open source with the freedom to view, modify and fork the code, as promised. zkSync 2.0 is now zkSync Era, and zkSync 1.0 is now zkSync Lite. Next stop: Full Launch Alpha.” — more
Sappy Seals x Nibbl (🤝) / NFT Fractionalization Experiment — Sappy Seals, a community-led NFT project focused on metaverse expansion, partnered with NFT fractionalization protocol Nibbl. The experiment involves fractionalizing a Sappy Seal, making it the face of a taco brand, and allowing users of the product to claim a fraction of the NFT by scanning a QR code — more
Ordinals Wallet / First BTC NFT Wallet — Ordinals Wallet goes live and allows users to view and store Ordinals NFTs on the Bitcoin network. Wallet functionality will soon include transfers, inscriptions, and buys + sells — more
Hadeswap / Acquires Solana Monkey Business — Hadeswap, a Solana NFT marketplace, announced that it acquired the IP rights to the Solana Monkey Business NFT project. “Hadeswap said that it intends to “respect the legacy” of Solana Monkey Business while “bridging the gaps on its shortcomings” and making the project more accessible to a broader audience.” — more
DOS Labs / Launches Avalanche Subnet — DOS Labs, a gaming studio with over 400k daily active players and a network of game developers, launched a new Avalanche Subnet. “DOS Subnet will provide game developers with SDKs (Unity, Unreal, and others) to quickly and affordably integrate Web3 features into games, lowering the barrier to Web3 game creation.” — more
MPKOZ / Art Blocks (🤝) x Bright Moments (🤝): Metropolis — “Metropolis is a long-form generative art collection by MPKOZ exploring the node-based systems that enable modern society. Every Metropolis minted in the Art Blocks x Bright Moments primary sale will reflect one of the five Bright Moments locations (New York, Berlin, London, Mexico City and Los Angeles) in the form of an associated on-chain trait.” 500 mints, Feb. 22 on Art Blocks, IRL throughout March — more
Gallery (🤝) Mementos / Infinita Prospectus — “Infinita Prospectus, latin for Infinite Perspectives, is a collectible that celebrates the release of our multi-gallery feature, an evolution in the way users can express themselves on Gallery. On February 23rd, a snapshot will be taken of all users with at least two galleries. You have from now until then to set up new galleries using our multi-gallery feature. Minting will open February 23rd until March 2nd at 11:59pm ET. The mint is free and limited to one per holder.” — more
Nathaniel Stern / Quantum Art (🤝): The World After Us — “The World After Us: Imaging techno-aesthetic futures, my first major solo NFT series, is a photographic & video collection of 36 temporary sculptures that “image” and imagine what else our electronic waste might become. They take the forms of: dead devices reclaimed by plant life; fossilized and reconfigured phones & laptops; and reimagined & re-formed digital tools.” Dropping Feb. 24, 12 PM PST — more
Derek Edws / Chromie Squiggle 🌈 x LA County Museum of Art
Cozomo de’ Medici / LA County Museum of Art Donation
Centre Pompidou / Legendary Institution Acquires NFTs
Blur (🤝) / Trading Volume vs. OpenSea
punk9059 / Blur (🤝) Bids ATH Post Airdrop
OSF / OpenSea volume vs Blur (🤝)
Transient Labs (🤝) / Open Editions + New ‘Velocity Mint’ Function 👀
punk9059 / NFT Performance Relative to ETH Weekly Moves
XCOPY / New SuperRare (🤝) Drop: LA WHENEVER
philm.eth / Bright Moments (🤝) x Comprehensive DAO Tools
foobar / Delegate Cash (🤝) Protecting Half a Billion in NFTs
Music Ben / Meet Noise DAO (🤝)
the402 (🤝) / Decentralization Matters
Klara Vollstaedt / New EXO-1 Mona (🤝) Avatar
Vertex Protocol (🤝) / The Everything DEX Launching on Arbitrum
Hume (🤝) x Reo Cragun / Top Drop on Sound (🤝)
9dcc (🤝) / April 12th in NYC 👀
Rusty Bill / Shopify’s Blockchain Integration
🤝 = Collab+Currency Portfolio Company
Curated by @Collab_Currency x @_cutbank
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