#028: Year in Review and NFT News
Welcome to our final 2021 edition of the NFT Drops Newsletter. We have a longer edition than usual this week, as we recap what an incredible year it has been. Read about our story below: how we got started, managed growth, and what we see in the future for NFTs. Then, we dive into the relevant news from the past two weeks.
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Our Story
We started our twitter account on December 17th, 2020 after a few days of discussion about the future of NFTs. We wanted to be a part of an exciting, burgeoning space that was becoming filled with incredible talent. We thought people would value a bridge between what we identified as an information gap, synthesizing the mass of NFT news out there into understandable tweets. Our twitter account was accompanied by this newsletter, which would more broadly recap NFT news each week.
Growth was super slow at first. We set goals that now seem insignificant. 100 followers, 100 substack subscribers, land a follow from a top account, etc. About six weeks in, we started smashing our goals. We surpassed 1,000 followers before the end of February, and started to establish some relevancy in the space.
By March, our project was something to be reckoned with. We had more than 2,000 followers, got consistent engagement on twitter, and had little competition in the space. We were eager for the future.
Over the end-of-summer NFT craze, things started heating up. We were rapidly gaining followers, and felt the need to expand. From then until now, we redefined our newsletter, twitter process, and outlook for the future. We hired people to help write tweets and develop a website (coming soon!). We started our treasury with the goal of buying NFTs that seem special - stuff that stands out - and supporting those projects to the fullest.
We want NFT Drops to continue to grow as NFTs diffuse into our culture. Over the coming year, we hope to collaborate with influential members of the space on projects that we feel make a difference. We want to contribute to the innovation of NFTs, pushing the boundaries that currently confine us and inspiring others to do the same. Most of all, we want to continue to act as an information bridge, making the overwhelming amount of drop information more accessible and digestible.
Below are stories from the members of our team over the past year, from founders to current membership to new blood. Their experiences further highlight our story, and serve as unique insights into the history of NFT Drops.
Austin
I started NFT Drops with Mike because of a problem that both of us were seeing - NFTs were blowing up in popularity and there was no universal resource to track the drops. Our solution was to create a Twitter account and write a weekly newsletter for previews/recaps. We started growing much faster than Mike and I ever anticipated, so we brought on a few interns who have done an amazing job at growing NFT Drops.
After a few months, I left NFT Drops to focus full time on DeFi. While I still keep up with the NFT space and try to go after select drops/mints, there’s very few people that are as knowledgable about NFTs as Jett, James, and Sam. They’ve done an amazing job and I’m excited to see what they have in store for NFTDrops in 2022!
Jett
As I was finishing applying to college, Mike hit me up to see if I wanted to help doing research and writing tweets for NFT Drops. I thought two things: first, it would be a nice extracurricular boost for my applications, and second, Mike is a smart and cool guy that I want to work with. Over time, NFT Drops grew to be much more than a boost to my college applications. I started to spend more time on NFT twitter, buying my own NFTs (and selling them way too early) and thinking about what to post for NFT Drops. After Austin left, I took on more responsibility. Me and Mike would coordinate moves for the company, and as he got more busy with Gallery, I got more busy with NFT Drops. Now, Mike is dedicated full time to Gallery and I am in charge of NFT Drops. I brought James and Jack on to the team, and I am super excited for our collective future.
James
I joined NFTDrops right before the boom in Solana NFTs. I brought my Solana focus to NFTDrops, and I've enjoyed posting about projects like Playground Waves & Epochs and Solana Monkey Business. The account has nearly tripled in followers since I've joined! In 2022, I'm excited to see projects that focus on community. BAYC has proven how successful a community focused model can be. On the DAO side, OpenDao ($SOS) has found great success by tapping into the community frustration around OpenSea.
Sam
I joined NFTDrops when it was at around 4,000 followers. It’s been super rewarding being able to grow it over the past several months and I’m excited for what the future holds. My interest in getting involved with NFTs was twofold. First and foremost, the entire NFT community is focused on innovation and growth, and is one of the least toxic internet spaces I’ve been involved with. Second, the possibility for NFTs and the digital world are endless, and I really believe that we are just scratching the surface. I’m excited to see where the space will pivot to over the next decade. As far as NFTDrops is concerned, I’m excited to grow our involvement in the space and transition to a more diverse coverage of NFTs.
Jack
Since joining the NFT Drops team just last month, I’ve been super impressed by the vision the team has for the future of the NFT space and the crypto space at large. Their enthusiasm for Web 3 and decentralization has totally infected me and I’m really excited to be a part of this project. Personally, I feel that NFTs are just the beginning of decentralized markets; crypto + community is evidently a recipe for huge change, and I don’t think that’s going to stop anytime soon.
Project Spotlight: Metaversity
Metaversity is the first project at the intersection of education and crypto dedicated to helping people leverage Web3 technologies to generate passive income.
One way this is achieved is by paying out 60% of profits to NFT holders via their innovative “work-study” program. NFT holders receive a proportional amount based on the number of Metaversity NFTs they hold.
A second way is through high-quality courses. Each course features subject matter experts and teaches students strategies that they can leverage to better generate sustainable income and balance risk and reward in the respective topic of each course. Initial courses include:
1. Staking and lending crypto
2. Portfolio Construction for high risk investments
3. Flipping NFTs
A third way is through the community. The community is already highly engaged and will be an important part of the education experience for Metaversity. Subject matter experts will be integrated into the discord to help students with questions and provide their own insight and analysis.
The team is fully doxxed and includes multiple tech startup founders with professional expertise in education, Web 3, SaaS, and community management. Several of them have run 7 to 8 figure businesses. They recently hosted their first Twitter Space where they revealed more about the vision for the project, available here.
NFT News Recap
The floor price of Bored Apes surpassed that of CryptoPunks a few days ago for the first time in history. Soon after, both collections saw large rises volume and floor price. Apes currently sit at 60 ETH, while Punks are at 66 ETH.
OpenSea users are now eligible to claim the $SOS token, which paced NFT headlines over the past week. A formula for claiming is based off of the amount of ETH spent and the number of transactions made on OS. $SOS pumped following its release, and ended up rewarding many users with hundreds or thousands of dollars.
Wolf Game is set to release early in 2022, with a variety of features that have NFT collectors excited. Players compete for $WOOL in an entirely on-chain economy, buy and sell sheep and wolf NFTs, and have the opportunity to purchase land parcels.
Stephen Curry dropped a collection to commemorate his 2021-2022 season, in which he broke the NBA all time 3 point record. 2,974 NFTs dropped via FTX at $499 each to comprise the “2974 Collection”, aptly named for the record-breaking number of 3s.
Adidas launched an NFT project in collaboration with gmoney.eth, Punks Comic, and Bored Ape Yacht Club. 30K NFTs with physical accompaniments dropped at .2 ETH each, and the current floor price is 1.28 ETH.
NFT Drops Twitter Space
Tomorrow at 2:00pm EST we are hosting our first-ever twitter space. We are joined by NFT Drops founders Mike Wen (CEO of Gallery) and Austin Ryan. Hop on to hear us talk about the roots of NFT Drops, the ups and downs of NFTs in 2021, and each of our stories in NFTs.
Thanks for reading! Happy Holidays and Happy New Year to you all! See you in two weeks💧