Top Video Game Artists Adopt NFTs to Help Ukraine, Collection to Release on Official MetaHistory Museum

Since the outbroke of the Russian-Ukrainian war, many celebrities, social activities, and visual artists joined the league of supporting Ukraine by cryptocurrency and NFT artworks. And the trend just doesn’t stop. Now, a group of top-notch artists bring the support and devotion to a brand-new level with long-lasting impact – the avatar NFT series. The absolutely stunning visuals, the breathtakingly painful images, the suffocatingly realistic resemblance of the ongoing cruelty, and the undying power of resilience truly set these artworks apart and earn them a solid place in the contemporary NFT art world.

Avatars for Ukraine + MetaHistory

A group of top video game industry professionals, credited for game hits Rainbow Six, Warframe, S.T.A.L.K.E.R., and a billion-downloaded Asphalt franchise, together with the most talented Ukrainian digital artists created a charity NFT collection to help Ukraine. The collection will be released MAY 19 2022 on MetaHistory, an official Ukrainian charity NFT platform that has already raised 260 ETH / $722k for Ukraine. Their initiative is supported by the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine, a Ukrainian government institution known for its pro-crypto position, that has already raised more than 60 million for Ukraine in crypto donations.

The charity NFT collection is named Avatars for Ukraine. The title refers to the original meaning of the word ‘avatar’, translated from Sanskrit as “incarnation”. The stunning artworks capture the incarnations of everything free Ukraine stands for: its soul, spirit, wisdom and love. The collection is uniquely different from other avatars, not only in name. The artworks emerged during 2 months of war and were created by 50 of the most talented and acclaimed Ukrainian digital artists from both game and movie industries. Europe’s best science fiction illustrator Volodymyr Bondar, prestigious EuroCon award winner, contributed with an exclusive artwork. Volodymyr can be seen as an incarnation of spirit himself: he risked his life evacuating dozens of people from heavily shelled Kharkiv. Curators of the collection, lead artist and the art director behind a billion-downloaded Asphalt game franchise, both have the same name, Kateryna. One Kateryna spent days hiding from airstrikes in the subway with her cats, the other found shelter in Romania.

Many NFT collections are exclusively interested in the money aspect of it, and the speculative mentality of both buyers and sellers fuels the controversy around the market. For the ideologists behind the Avatars collection, the purpose is noble. Alexey Savchenko (UK), former business development manager for Epic and former PR manager for GSC, says: “We thought if we were going to do NFT to help Ukraine, we should do it in the same way we build our game universes, with high production values and the best talents around us. Epic Games, the company that will most likely be the first one to build the ‘real metaverse’, raised $150 million for Ukraine”. Dmitry Tarabanov (Canada), game designer credited for game hits Rainbow Six and Warframe“: “Both game and movie industries allow you to experience universes worth millions in production, at a price of a few bucks, somewhat the opposite to the NFT culture. The stunning art created by these artists is free for all humanity to experience. Yet if there is a historic artwork, like a sketch of the first AT-AT walker from Star Wars, its original is priceless. The artworks in this collection are as historic. No matter the price, all money goes to Ukraine”.

MetaHistory NFT platform helped the team by shaping the NFT technology to their high standards. MetaHistory has a success record as a charity NFT platform officially approved by the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine, pro-crypto government institution that has already raised millions in crypto for Ukraine, and earlier teamed up with Elon Musk to deliver Starlink to Ukraine. The level of cooperation between crypto industry, electronic entertainment and official institutions has made this NFT collection unprecedented, as well as the circumstances behind it. “We wish there will be no more artworks created in the largest war since WWII. We wish there will be no legendary artists painting while their cities are being shelled. We wish there will be no more than 70 items in this collection, because every day this war has been adding one more artwork. Still, these NFTs are here and now to fulfil their destiny, the noblest cause for this technology that one can think of: to help good prevail, to invest in the future we believe in, and to adopt the right direction of history”, their joint statement says.

 

 

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Upland Metaverse Continues to Expand With New Features Following Strong Performance

A new development on Upland will allow you to build your own business in the metaverse, earning tokens and becoming a real entrepreneur. NFT cars are also on the way to join the platform, bringing brand new ways to enjoy the Play-to-Earn experience such as street racing.

There’s never been a better time to join the metaverse: use this link to claim a doubled 6,000 UPX signup bonus.

Upland Economy Achieves Strong Performance

Upland is an NFT metaverse mapped to the real world, where players can buy, sell, and trade digital properties using the in-game token UPX. It operates on the Play-to-Earn gaming model, and is available on iOS, Android and the Web. The metaverse reached a number of impressive figures recently, showcasing the strength of its economy.

Since 2021 the number of property owners in Upland reached 252,594 and players have earned over $2.8 million USD. The number of minted NFT assets besides properties (such as explorers, NFLPA legits, Spirit legits, and structure ornament NFTs) reached 905,831 in total, including 20,077 unique NFTs. And the number of properties minted in-game is at 2,883,723.

35,819,364,000 UPX has been purchased during this time as well. And the average daily transaction volume was 107,316,000 UPX.

The Upland property market is also very active, with 5,962 mints per day on the primary market and 6,701 trades per day in secondary market sales. In total there were 2,635,225 transactions in the primary market and 1,983,560 in secondary market sales. You could see that owners have been doing very nicely here, as the average Upland property sold for 3.58 times its original mint price in the secondary market.

Shops and Racing Cars Coming to the Upland Metaverse

The Upland economy is given the opportunity to continue its strong performance into the future, as the developers are adding exciting new features to the metaverse.

One such development is Metaventures – player owned and operated shops within Upland. These will allow aspiring entrepreneurs to create a new economy and make a living for themselves in the metaverse. Each Metaventure owner will have a chance to build their own unique brand to create, manufacture, and sell NFTs, as well as act as a broker on behalf of other players, lend in-game assets, and more. Ten players have already created their own brands and are ready to sell their unique Block Explorers as part of the Beta launch of Metaventures.

An additional exciting development is that NFT cars are coming to Upland! A new transportation system will introduce real-time travel, racing, and car-related business opportunities. Upland even developed its very own car brand, M Motors, that will be introduced in a flagship showroom in Santa Clara, California.

Cars will be used as a means of transportation both between cities and inside them, with some cities only accessible via cars. Players will be able to connect with Ridesharing, which will also support a service economy with the ability to transport cargo within Upland. Racing will be a fully immersive experience, allowing players to compete with each other in both Upland-Sponsored and Player-Generated races (See video below). Players will also be able to operate a variety of new car-related Metaventures such as Showrooms (Dealerships), Body Shops, Racing Academies, and more. Even real world car brands are invited to join the Web3 revolution now via this latest development of Upland.

To learn more about the metaverse, sign up with this link and enjoy a doubled 6,000 UPX starting bonus. and join the community on Twitter or Discord. Upland also maintains a presence on Reddit, Facebook, and Telegram.

 

 

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Strategy and Space Gamers Get Their Own Play-to-Earn Metaverse Full of Cool NFTs — DEEPSPACE (DPS) Alpha Review

Space, the final frontier. The long and exciting journey through vast, dark, deep space with a fleet of your own. The release of the alpha version of the play-to-earn metaverse game DEEPSPACE (DPS) opens up a brand new chapter of the metaverse world for all those who love space exploration, fleet building and formation, and peer-to-peer battles.

Introduction: DEEPSPACE (DPS) is a Play-to-Earn space multiverse exploration strategy game on the Binance Smart Chain (BSC). Earn passive income from holding $DPS, trading NFTs, and taking risks as you explore DEEPSPACE with your fleet of ships. Prepare to explore, harvest, and fight your way through the DEEPSPACE (DPS) universe. Join the community on Twitter, Telegram, Discord, Reddit, YouTube, and Instagram.

Building Your Own Fleet to Launch Into Space

As the metaverse gaming world becomes more thriving and diverse, space exploration and battles fans finally welcome the Alpha release of the space-themed, play-to-earn game with a strong emphasis on fleets. Even the name of this metaverse space game sounds profoundly familiar — The Star Trek Deep Space Nine series, which was aired between 1993 and 1999, has become the classic collective memory of many hardcore science fiction and space fans. Even though as gamers we will not witness the witty and funny day-to-day conversations among the DS9 space station crew, there is the real fun of building a fleet of your own ships to explore the vast, dark universe in a strikingly realistic experience.

Once I successfully registered to the alpha and got accepted into the game, the first thing I looked at was how to acquire my first ships. To prepare for your first space exploration, a fleet is needed. At the alpha stage, since players cannot engage in real peer-to-peer combat yet, one ship is good enough to kick-start the exploration.

DEEPSPACE developed NFT ships that contain three main traits: ship type, ship core, and ship stats.

The four ship types include: fighting ships equipped with state-of-the-art weapons technologies that deal incredible damage; tank ships which are designed for managing enemy engagements, longevity, and withstanding lots of damage; mining ships specially engineered for efficient resource collection; and last but not least, support ships that are focused on utility and boosting the capabilities of your other ships.

In addition to the ship types, each ship also has 8 stats, or to be more precise, their strengths and weaknesses. The 8 stats are: attack, shield, special attack, special defense, luck, mining, health, and speed. If you lay out the number of each stat on an octagram, you can easily see on which aspect is the ship more powerful than the others. The stats are determined by verifiable randomness and are weighted by the ship’s class.

The concept of ship cores is quite interesting. Each NFT ship has a unique core, or property, of one of the four types: fission, magnetic, mechanical, and plasma. The ship cores determine if your ship has a type advantage over other ships, making your ships more effective at their roles. For example, magnetic ships have an advantage over mechanical ships, and mechanical ships are likely to overpower plasma ships. The combination of ship cores and ship stats creates a lot more possibilities for winning the battles in deep space. What’s more, cores can also be used to create semi-fungible token (SFT) upgrades for other ships.

For me, I had a lot of fun minting a ship with 100 DPS, the DEEPSPACE native token. I like going over the NFT ship traits and calculating the best combination of a fleet which covers all the main functionalities I’ll need for my future space exploration (such as fighting and mining). Minting a ship also comes with the inexhaustible pleasure of winning a lottery ticket and opening loot boxes. I just wish the NFT ship-trading search engine could also provide a filter for colors — yes, I have a thing for pink battleships and I scrolled down endless pages to find one which I could afford.

Once four ships are acquired (either by purchasing or by minting), they will appear in the inventory. It’s important to “lock” them. By locking the battleships, they will be sent to the DEEPSPACE game and can be launched from the hanger. Why four ships? Because I don’t want to miss that cool scene of all four launch pads in my hanger being filled!

A Realistic Representation of Deep Space Travel

Many science fiction and space-themed artworks tend to over-romanticize the space travel experience. Such experiences are often depicted as an iconic scene on a fancy and posh looking spaceship bridge with beautiful people wearing sharp uniforms and holding coffee mugs. The lighting is warm and everybody is relaxed. No, this is not the real deep space experience. This is just Hollywood’s version of deep space.

In the metaverse deep space, the space is dark and vast. There are meteor showers and meteorite belts that hit your ship and you have to dodge them. There are intimidating rival ships on your tail. And mostly, the space travel is long and lonely. When you can’t find a convenient wormhole to warp through, you need to navigate the endless void with a clear goal of your destination. This is the realistic part of a deep space experience.

In the metaverse of DEEPSPACE (DPS), there are seven planets and each of them has its own unique lore and natural resources. The seven planets — Mitra, Gelida, Athena, Tyranus, Vorvoid, Melas, and Chaldene — shine in the dark emptiness with a unique bright color. After launching from the hanger, locating the wormhole, and avoiding all the meteor attacks, the first and nearest planet I could visit was Chaldene. After a planet is visited, it is added to the journal for the convenience of future travels.

Chaldene, for example, is a beautiful light blue planet colonized, domesticated, and owned by the galactic government for players to mine for very basic resources. Mining resources on this planet is safe and involves very little risk. Melas, on the other hand, is an enormous plasma planet that has constant, ongoing nuclear fusion which emits light in visible, UV, and infrared form. Only specially equipped ships can venture here.

Once a player discovers a new planet and approaches it, there are options to mine and gather natural resources or to start a battle — a fight to the death. Not all planets welcome battles and not all planets are safe to mine.

On Twitter, the DEEPSPACE (DPS) official account is holding a competition for the best DEEPSPACE Alpha Game footage. For those who didn’t get a chance to play the alpha game, it’s a great opportunity to see the amazing graphics that the alpha has already achieved.

We are looking for the best #DEEPSPACE $DPS Alpha Game footage! 🎥🎮

There are 3 X $100 USD prizes available. Join the Alpha today & submit your best footage in 4K or 1080P to https://t.co/y3d3zaoRVD 👈 by 31/01!

Sign up to test the $DPS Alpha today: https://t.co/oXKmVk5LCd 🚀 pic.twitter.com/yHdqZM0yrG

— DEEPSPACE (DPS) (@DeepSpaceBSC) January 19, 2022

Explore, Mine, Harvest, and Earn!

As a play-to-earn metaverse space game, DEEPSPACE’s main player revenue comes from mining resources, upgrading and trading ships, fighting and winning battles, and claiming real estate for passive income.

John Wear, part of the DEEPSPACE (DPS) Core team, said in a recent interview about DEEPSPACE and its GameFi, “Having a game that is actually fun is a crucial aspect in keeping balance for the in-game economy because you cannot rely on new player inflow exceeding active player’s in-game demand forever. This is why we are making it a priority to keep our game rewarding, engaging, and entertaining over time for already active players. We’re looking to put the “game” in Gamefi. Many games out there are masked casinos or fancy staking processes. We are focusing on building a fun to play, immersive and addicting game to be enjoyed by both gamers and crypto enthusiasts alike.”

According to the DEEPSPACE (DPS) team, in Q2 this year, the mining and fighting mechanism will be enabled in this metaverse game. I already can’t wait to see it happen.

 

Will you be an ambitious fighter and conqueror, or a diligent explorer and miner in this metaverse space game?

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How NFTs and the Metaverse Can Help Save the Planet

The head of a leading South Korean cryptocurrency exchange has recently promised that its non-fungible tokens featuring the world-famous K-pop band BTS will be minted by “low carbon, eco-friendly” technology after receiving backlash from environmentally conscious young fans about the energy use of NFTs. Wait a minute, environmentally conscious people. NFTs and the metaverse are not environmentally unfriendly technologies. To the contrary, they can save the planet and bring humankind a much greener future.

The Crypto Mining Required for Minting Supports the Development of Green Energy

South Korea is not only among the leaders of the global cryptocurrency and blockchain race — the fans of South Korea’s most successful, world-famous K-pop band BTS are also very educated on the subject. When Hybe, the entertainment company that manages BTS, announced that they would issue BTS-themed NFTs that will play music, the reaction of the fans was not “what is an NFT,” but rather “NFTs are not eco-friendly.” Sirgoo Lee, CEO of Upbit’s operator Dunamu which is in a joint venture with Hybe, had to promise in response that Hybe would use “low carbon, eco-friendly” technology to mint the NFTs.

The controversy surrounding the environmental impact of crypto mining and minting NFTs is mainly centered on energy consumption. But in fact, many crypto mining farms tend to be located in low-temperature, high-latitude countries where electricity is much cheaper and is generated from renewable sources such as geothermal or hydroelectric power. Even energy from volcanoes is being developed for crypto mining. The recently formed Bitcoin Mining Council calculated 56% of the industry uses sustainable energy resources.

Although some industry experts do argue about the calculation, it’s undeniable that seeing cryptocurrency and NFTs as environmentally unfriendly technologies demonstrates an isolated and narrow view of what cryptocurrency and NFTs can actually do for mankind and the environment.

Instead of Purchasing Physical Commodities and Luxury Goods, Buy More NFTs

Gift boxes, plastic and nylon wrappings, holiday décor, limited editions, special collections, you get the idea. The human desire for purchasing and owning essentially unnecessary things has been around for centuries. In order to fuel this consumerism, merchants and brands do their best to make additional items that hold special value throughout time. Killing or suffocating this century-old consumption desire would be hard, but there are also alternatives.

Instead of purchasing, owning, and later discarding and littering physical objects everywhere — which are totally not biodegradable and would end up floating on or sinking deep into the oceans — why not migrate this desire to the metaverse and keep it digital?

Minting NFTs is not an add-on to the already existing human footprint on the fragile environment. Hopefully, once more and more people migrate their consumption from our current world to the blockchain-based metaverse, the physical consumption of commodities and the massive amount of junk generated through this process will also be largely replaced by the virtual and more eco-friendly NFT.

In the past six months, an increasing number of artists, celebrities, and even politicians have released their NFT collections on the blockchain. It is amazing that people of social influence are leading the way, issuing digital limited editions and special collections, instead of printing cards, molding plastics, manufacturing chemicals, and polluting the environment when the items are no longer viewed as valuable.

Instead of Accumulating Mileage, Let’s Meet in the Metaverse

During the Covid-19 pandemic, many people around the world noticed how nature somewhat returned to its life and vibrancy with humans not transgressing against it. Wild flowers were blossoming, blue skies were back, valleys filled with cheerful water, and the fields turned green again.

Although it’s sad that BTS fans were not able to fly all the way to Europe or the West Coast of the U.S. to attend the concerts, and people were forced to do all the meetings on Zoom, the saved mileage and the reduced CO2 emissions were a great blessing to the environment. So why not keep it this way?

The Snoop Dogg concert inside The Sandbox, one of the leading metaverse experiences, was a very successful experiment. It shows us the possibility of creating exciting meetups and large events inside the metaverse without the need to fly people around, drive people across the city, and pack people into a physical location with a limited number of overpriced tickets.

Maybe the United Nations Climate Change Conference should consider having a metaverse-based conference to empower attendees to cut their environmental footprint?

If you were a K-pop fan, would you choose to support your band by purchasing an eco-friendly non-fungible token?

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Snoop Dogg Drops 10,000 Playable Sandbox Avatar NFTs – Mint a Unique Doggie and Explore the Metaverse in Style

With the memory of The Sandbox Alpha release still fresh and the funky music from the Snoop Dogg concert still lingering in their minds, fans must be thrilled to know that Season II is already on the way! Prior to the new season, The Sandbox is going to launch a grand collection of unique Snoop Dogg NFT avatars that are fully playable in the game!

Minting will be on 2/22/22 at 10PM UTC at Sandbox.game/en/snoopdogg/ and will cost 150 SAND (plus gas fees). Learn how to buy SAND here.

Get a Doggie for Season II

The Sandbox, one of the most popular blockchain-based metaverse game experiences, is about to launch 10,000 Snoop Dogg avatar NFTs on February 22, 2022, prior to the opening of the Alpha Season II. It’s a great news for both Snoop Dogg fans and The Sandbox lovers.

The 10,000 Snoop Dogg avatars are programmatically generated, voxelated NFTs which contains over 150 traits. Each uniquely cool Doggie avatar can be playable in the second season of the game to attend events and concerts, complete quests, hang out with friends and explore the metaverse like a celebrity. Imagine going to a Snoop Dogg concert in a funky Doggie avatar or appearing in a music video filmed entirely inside The Sandbox!

Tha Doggies. On Tha Sandbox. My 1st ever 10,000 avatars droppin 2/22/22. Be ready. 👊🏿🔥🔥👊🏿👊🏿💪🏿🎤 checc it @TheSnoopAvatars #twotwotwentytwo pic.twitter.com/zbad8YDrKZ

— Snoop Dogg (@SnoopDogg) February 16, 2022

The 10,000 Snoop Dogg avatar NFTs are divided into seven rarity tiers – Human, Blue, Alien, Zombie, Dogg, Robot and Golden. While two-thirds of the Doggies will be common, there will be three types of uniquely designed Doggies with special traits and features to make them stand out of the Doggie crowd.

The “dope avatars” is a set of dope, fresh and funky Doggies designed by the teams at The Sandbox and Snoop Dogg himself. Each one is unique and one of its kind.

The “classic avatars” is a set of Doggies created based on the history of Snoop Dogg. From these exclusive Doggies, you can easily identify some of Snoop’s greatest tracks throughout the years. One of them is the velvety elegant look of Snoop’s 2007 anthem, with sensual seduction, in the intoxicating soulful retro 80’s vibe.

The “signature edition” is a set of Doggies that are completely out of the box. Teamed up with some of the greatest creators in the metaverse, the signature Doggies look like Snoop has been returning from an interstellar, multi-dimensional journey. What does that mean? You need to visit the official site to get an idea.

Follow The Doggies on Twitter to check out more swagging Doggies in the collection.

How You Can Get a Doggie Avatar

The release of the Snoop Dogg avatar collection is scheduled on February 22, 2022. That is 22-02-2022, a very memorable date for the drop. For those who already purchased and hold the exclusive Snoop NFTs such as the Snoopverse Early Access Pass, Snoop Party Pass, JADU Jetpack, JADU Hoverboard, SupDucks, and FLUF Burrow, they will get a chance to mint the Doggies 24 hours before the public release.

Every Doggie will be minted and sold for 150 SAND per NFT. For those who have completed the Alpha Release in December and received any of the generous 5,000 SAND as a reward from the game, it’s going to be a no-brainer to spend the SAND in the most cool way possible. More status update on the Doggies collection can be found on Twitter and Discord.

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Samsung Provides a Glimpse Into the South Korean Metaverse and NFT Craze

At the very beginning of 2022, South Korean tech giant Samsung announced its foray into the metaverse and a new “NFT Aggregation Platform” designed for its smart TVs. In addition to the NFT TVs, Samsung also launched a virtual experience inside of Decentraland, one of the most popular metaverse gaming platforms. It’s high time we had a peek at the South Korean NFT world to see the latest developments.

Samsung NFT TV and Presence in Decentraland

The idea of the metaverse is no longer the distant, dreamy vision shared only among a limited number of crypto veterans it once was. From the moment Facebook re-invented itself as “Meta,” a few more tech giants around the world followed in the company’s footsteps and made some bold movements to venture into the metaverse space.

On January 18, 2022, Microsoft announced the acquisition of Activision Blizzard for a valuation of $68.7 billion USD in an all-cash transaction. Half a month before that, the South Korean tech giant and conglomerate group Samsung Electronics announced three brand new TV models for 2022 that host an “intuitive, integrated platform for discovering, purchasing and trading digital artwork”.

On January 6, 2022, Samsung’s official launch in the metaverse, the Samsung 837X Opening Event opened its doors for Decentraland residents as part of the CES 2022 interactive event. During the three days of the launch event, Decentraland residents who visited and participated in the quests were able to collect four NFT badges inside the experience. They visited various landscapes, watched Samsung promotional videos, enjoyed the DJ concerts, and at the end of the process participated in a competition to win three different levels of exclusive Samsung wearable NFTs.

Though the special launch event is over, the Samsung 837X virtual experience in Decentraland still remains open to everybody as a nice promotion and a reminder of future events. Inside the Samsung 837X building, the three individual experiences — Connectivity Theater, Customization Stage, and Sustainability Forest — showcased how a commercial brand could utilize the Web 3.0 metaverse space to create an interactive and fun experience for engaging with audiences and consumers, as opposed to the old-fashioned outdoor billboards or online advertising which Web 2.0 users got so tired of.

From time to time, I read many concerns of people who are enthusiastic about the metaverse. Some of them fear that the future of major metaverse gaming experiences might be full of giant corporations from our reality which have purchased a massive amount of land and stuffed it all with tasteless and ugly advertisements. Samsung, among a few other global brands who became the first to dive in, at least seems to be trying to set a good example and standard for how their metaverse experience should be engaging and sincere toward the metaverse generation.

South Korean NFT Market and Becoming a Leading Force in the Metaverse

On January 13, the CEO of South Korean crypto exchange Bithumb, Heo Baek-young, said in an interview that the exchange was in process of developing an NFT exchange that would help the company “stay competitive” with other domestic Korean exchanges. Korean media also reported that the NFT exchange developed by Bithumb is likely to be backed by LG, the local and global competitor of Samsung in electronic devices and smart device manufacturing. Will the future Bithumb NFT exchange become a convenient and major NFT exchange for South Korean NFT artists? Likely.

Coming before this launch of an NFT exchange developed by an influential crypto exchange, there are already some independent South Korean NFT websites trying to promote a number of Korean NFT artists and their artworks.

KoreanNFT.com, for example, is a fairly new website which contains NFT works of over 160 Korean NFT artists. According to the website, the founder of Korean NFT, Donglee Han, is also a Korean NFT community leader who helps other Korean NFT artists become members of the international NFT community.

Graduating UCLA with a major in art history, Donglee is a visual artist living in LA, and her NFT works can be found in SPACE776, an art gallery which has locations in both New York and Seoul that exhibits early-to-mid-career artists who work in a variety of mediums. These range from traditional oil painting to live multimedia art and NFT art. On this website, there is an Opensea link on each artist’s individual page.

A cool project that I found is called DRUGer, created by the artist that goes by the name DRUGer (드러거). In his DRUGer collection so far, there are 20 items. Each artwork contains an animal with flashing visual effects (epilepsy warning) that simulate an “eye drug”.

If you think that the burgeoning and bustling NFT scene in South Korea is all about tech companies, NFT artists and their artworks, you’re missing a lot more that is going on in the country.

In November 2021, the super famous South Korean music agency HYBE, which manages world-famous Korean pop band BTS (Dynamite, Butter, Permission to Dance, I’m sure you’ve heard some of their hit songs), signed a joint venture with South Korean fintech company Dunamu to launch non-fungible tokens (NFTs) featuring the popular band, as well as other artists. In the unexpected area of politics, South Korean lawmaker Lee Kwang-jae announced in December 2021 that he was going to start accepting crypto donations and issuing NFT receipts with his image and election promises to his supporters.

Korean retail is also in on the national race to embrace blockchain-based NFT technology and applications. According to the Korea Herald, online retail company CJ Olive Networks recently announced a partnership with local blockchain company Galaxia Metaverse to sell NFT artwork and fashion items. Lotte Home Shopping, another retail leader in South Korea, announced the launch of an NFT marketplace in April this year, and is planning to sell NFTs created using its own virtual models and virtual fashion items. The list goes on and on.

Why is this happening? Park Sung-joon, head of the Blockchain Research Center at Dongguk University, said the coronavirus pandemic has accelerated online shopping and is pushing retail giants to try to gain the upper hand in new areas like NFTs by using their retail channels.

The South Korean Ministry of Science even announced a five-year plan designed to put the nation at the forefront of the global metaverse race. As reported by the Korea Herald, the country is aiming to become the 5th-largest metaverse market by 2026. In order to achieve that, the government is planning to aid at least 40,000 professionals and 220 firms specializing in the metaverse.

What motivated the South Korean government to make such a serious commitment to win the metaverse race? When the Fourth Industrial Revolution of advanced manufacturing and Industry 4.0 has already become the present, getting an upper hand in the next round of the revolution, be it the Fifth Industrial Revolution of human-machine collaboration or humans migrating into the metaverse, could give the country a huge advantage in technological innovation and economics.

In the everlasting shadows of complex geopolitics and uncertainty, limited by natural resources and regional power plays, South Korea has been focusing on the path of developing technology and top brands with global recognition for the past forty years. If we believe that the metaverse is going to be the next global chapter for most of the developed world, then there is no reason not to aim for success and dominance.

How Is the NFT Market Regulated in South Korea?

Last but not least, the regulations. Artworks and art dealing, like any other business, are regulated by the government and regulators. The local regulations on avant-garde artworks such as non-fungible tokens undoubtedly impacts the development of the local market.

South Korean media reported in November last year that the country’s financial regulator, the Financial Services Commission (FSC), confirmed that NFTs do not fall under the definition of “virtual asset” and thus will not be regulated by FSC. However, this doesn’t mean that the local NFT art trading market will not be regulated at all. There is an option for NFTs to be regulated as securities, and by the Financial Supervisory Service, a different regulator. NFTs that function as “security tokens,” providing the holder with royalties, would be considered a regulated entity.

In an age where tech giants, the retail industry, and even the entertainment industry in South Korea are all testing the NFT-investment water, the local regulators indeed need to weigh the options and find the best approach.

Have you found any Korean NFT artworks that particularly appeal to you?

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The Gift of NFTs: Why You Should Consider Buying an NFT for Your Loved Ones This Holiday Season

2021 is coming to an end and the new year is just around the corner. If you’ve ever considered getting a very unconventional, extremely trendy, and totally unforgettable Christmas gift for your loved ones, NFT artworks can be a great option. If you decide to buy one now, it will for sure be delivered before the holiday arrives.

NFT Art: New Gold for Gen Z Investors and Art Lovers

Whether NFT art is for Gen Z is still debatable, but we see that there are more and more Gen Z NFT art creators all around the world that have been quick to adopt the new technology, and even faster to monetize their artworks via blockchain. This even before many millennial institutional investors understood what NFTs were and why investing in the metaverse is important.

NFT art is first and foremost — art. If you see the representation of the creator’s mind and find beauty in a piece, it has aesthetic value for your personal collection. And unlike traditional art that you mostly see in galleries, museums, auction houses — or on their websites — NFT art is more accessible on web 3.0 (Web3) and more tradable.

If you are an art lover and are considering investing in the future of metaverse, NFTs are definitely a good option for your personal investment and art collection. This also makes them a very unique and timely gift for Christmas 2021: to impress your existing NFT-loving friends and to introduce people that you care about to the world of metaverse via this investment option.

A Lottery Ticket to the Metaverse Future

In the “good old days”, when people selected gifts for their loved ones to celebrate important holidays or anniversaries, what they considered to really hold value were objects such as expensive jewelry, luxurious watches, or simply, diamonds and gold. It’s a big question mark whether these traditional investments of expensive and rare items as gifts still hold much value when the fiat world is already so unstable. So why not consider an alternative gift that might hold stronger value in the future, metaverse-oriented world: NFTs.

Of course, an NFT piece of jewelry or a luxurious watch in a metaverse game might not be worth a lot of money (depending on the game and the popularity of the asset), but it’s a lottery ticket that gives you a small foot in the door of the metaverse future. NFT investment can be very diverse in the metaverse, as are gift options.

If you are very rich, you might consider gifting your loved ones a piece of land in Decentraland or The Sandbox. If you really love MMORPG games, you might want to buy a unique NFT hero from that game for your friend. If your loved ones are not interested in either metaverse games or metaverse experiences in general, an artistic and expressive NFT artwork will do.

Needless to say, those who understood the potential of NFTs and got into things like Cryptopunks early are very happy right now. One might be tempted to look down upon such a highly pixelated profile picture (thinking of Cryptopunks, here) which seems so basic that an average five-year-old could probably make it, and call the whole thing a scam. But many people firmly believe that this is just the infant stage of NFTs, metaverse, and the advent of a brand new world. If there is only a ten percent chance this world will come, I wouldn’t mind spending a few hundred dollars (or even much less) on a newly-released NFT artwork that shows great potential to survive and thrive. Remember that faded old baseball card that your grandfather left in the bottom drawer? There’s a chance these “silly” pieces of art could skyrocket in value like that child’s Mickey Mantle card.

NFTs Are a Neat Way to Invite Family and Friends to the Crypto Metaverse

It’s highly likely that your loved ones have already heard of the terms blockchain, cryptocurrency, NFT, and metaverse. It’s also likely that they don’t really understand what these are or how they work. Because of this, buying an NFT gift for them this Christmas could be a great way to introduce them, from the very beginning, and help them to embrace the decentralized crypto metaverse.

First, in order for them to receive the gift, you will need to guide them in how to download and install an NFT-supporting wallet app on their phone, and explain a little bit about how the wallet works. In principle, it’s not that different from helping them open a cryptocurrency wallet and just sending them some coins. However, giving someone a piece of digital art will be perceived as more appropriate for a holiday gift and less like “homework” from someone that wants to teach you about their favorite financial technology.

After setting up the wallet for them, they will be able to receive your NFT Christmas gift. If it’s an NFT asset that can be used in a game, such as land from The Sandbox, a super cool hat for the avatar in Decentraland, or three Axie characters from Axie Infinity, even better. Now you can also help them create a metaverse game account and let them experience the games using your gifted NFT assets.

However, it is very important to emphasize how valuable these assets are both in the metaverse and in our reality to make sure they don’t “spend” them accidentally or exchange them for assets that will devalue quickly.

Besides Cryptopunks and Bored Ape Yacht Club, There Are Other Good Ones out There

Now you are ready to open up your crypto wallet and pay for the selected Christmas gifts for your loved ones. If you are shocked at how much NFTS are worth today, as compared to a few days or months ago, don’t worry. Not everyone can afford Cryptopunks or BAYC. Unless you are a big whale, we already missed that train. But it’s not too late to start. There are still many other options you can consider.

The major NFT art marketplaces are OpenSea, Rarible, and Rarity. There are new, more affordable marketplaces where people can buy and trade NFT assets popping up almost every day. Browse through these marketplaces and look for something that is pleasant to your eyes, suitable for your loved ones, and price-friendly for your crypto wallet. Maybe next Christmas your NFT gift investment this year will earn your entire family a luxurious trip to a European ski resort for two weeks. All-inclusive.

Would you buy an NFT for your loved ones for Christmas? Let us know in the comment section below.

 

via Neomi

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Snoop Dogg, Deadmau5 and NFTs — The Sandbox Alpha Game Review

I came to the Sandbox Alpha for the musical experiences of Snoop Dogg and Deadmau5. It was awesome dancing with my voxelated avatar: green hair, pink sports bra, denim shorts, yellow stockings, and red shoes. All with the insane creatures around me dancing, and the feeling of indulging in a real concert with flashing lights and pounding beats. I thought I might just stay at the show for the rest of the Alpha, until I saw the reveal schedule countdown and realized I had to get out of there and complete the quests. I needed to be able to claim assets by the end of the Alpha. The prize NTFs were calling me.

Introduction: The Sandbox is a decentralized, community-driven gaming ecosystem where designers and artists can create, share, and monetize NFTs and gaming experiences on the blockchain, and is partnered with many industry giants. Its popular virtual real estate, known as LANDs, are taking over the NFT world.

The Sandbox Alpha, Show House for Metaverse Creators

What is the Sandbox Alpha? What would I experience there?

The Sandbox is a popular metaverse game with the GameFi mechanism of asset ownership. GameFi stands for “financialization of video games”. To put it simply, it’s how gamers can make real financial gains or losses within the realm of a game itself.

In a regular, non-metaverse video game, you pay for the game (one-time purchase, monthly/yearly subscription, or the “freemium” model of a lot of further in-game purchases) and become a customer. Whereas in a metaverse game, the players can actually become game asset owners by either creating assets and later putting them on sale or by buying and acquiring ready-made assets to own.

In the Sandbox Alpha, when I walk around the various quests, I see land, and I see NFTs hanging in almost every corner with direct links to OpenSea for purchase, and lots of other customized equipment and accessories that players can purchase with real cryptocurrency. The sale and ownership of land in Sandbox is the most essential ownership in the game.

That’s why when exploring the various quests and walking around the extremely diverse landscapes of the game, it feels like going to a metaverse real estate company to see their show houses. It helps me to understand how the land can be developed, decorated, and made attractive. My mind raced with brilliant visions of what else might be done on those empty plots of land in order to make them unique and appealing.

I truly enjoyed the gaming experience. Since the main purpose of the Sandbox Alpha is to let the Alpha Pass holders, landowners, and creators understand the great potential of this metaverse, all the Alpha quests are designed in a way to be explorative, adventurous, and easy to complete. It’s basically a lot of walking, hiking, climbing, and jumping for my chic avatar in various landscapes. The quest is mainly about moving all around the landscape to reach certain points (sign posts), get familiar with the environment, and appreciate the design details in the process.

When I entered an area, there were two NFT characters that I could talk to in order to receive my mission. The Metaverse Guide with a blue exclamation mark above his wise head and two blue crystal balls in each of his hands was the right NFT to give me the Alpha quest.

The quest usually consists of four or five iconic places that I need to reach. The other NFT character is a random character in the story, like a scientist or a warrior, with a yellow exclamation mark on his head. His quest will likely send you to collect some rare resources and get into some sword fights. But again, in this metaverse game, there is no real death for your character. If a wolf bites you to death or you fall into the greenish acid pond, you’ll lose your life bar and respawn at the starting point to start all over again. Never give up!

What’s even more awesome is that falling from high places will not get you killed. That’s why I selected a lot of scenic and high-rise sites to do a “leap of faith”. The only downside is that later I needed to find a way to climb back up and complete the rest of my quests. My character can also stay underwater for two hours without breathing. I let her stand on the flowing lava of volcanic stones as well.

Six hours into the game, I went to the Snoop Dogg concert in the basement of the NFT institute. I took selfies at the Deadmau5 concert at the AlphaHub, I danced at Club XYZ, I climbed up and fell down endlessly at the post-apocalyptic Edge of the Abyss, I slaughtered wolves in the Dungeon of Dum-Yz, I explored the medieval castle in the Fortress of Bloodsouls, and I found peace in the sunset at Rusty Cliff.

I have to admit that before I played Sandbox, I was used to high-resolution games with realistic visual effects like the Final Fantasy series from Square Enix. I never thought I would get used to the voxelated characters — basically a pile of moving boxes. But I did, and I loved it.

The more I immersed myself in the metaverse environment — the graphics, the characters, all the objects, the architecture, the sound effects of howling wind and chirping birds, the background soundtrack that soothes or frightens you — it all came together and greatly enhanced my playing experience. I no longer stared at my voxelated body with a critical eye. Everything blends in naturally and it was just exceptional.

If this is the show house the official Sandbox team is presenting to us, I have a lot of hope for future releases and just can’t wait to see the other brilliant ideas from creators worldwide.

The “Easter Egg”

After completing all the 16 Alpha quests released before December 17, I moved on to the additional experience named “Christmas Eve Miracle.” I didn’t have super high expectations for this experience and I assumed that it would be just another Christmas jingle-bell cliché, but it turned out to be what surprised and amazed me the most, in the end.

The experience started on a narrow path surrounded by tall pine trees. I walked down the path and suddenly, at the end of the turn, a cheerful and bustling town unfurled in front of me, full of Christmas decorations. Fireworks, technicolor lights, Christmas markets, street performances, cozy cafes, and souvenir shops all filled the panorama. Christmas trees and gift boxes, people full of joy, snowflakes falling elegantly from the night sky, and the beautiful, soul-touching piano music with a grain of melancholy in it. Check it out here.

 

via Neomi

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Starting My Journey Into the Metaverse by Throwing Tomatoes at Zuckerberg’s Face

Editor’s Note: The following story was written by Neomi, an author from China with experience covering art, music, culture, tech, and travel. Bitcoin.com News sent her into the field of blockchain-based metaverse experiences to capture the feeling of a pioneer entering this new reality.

Decentraland, Day One: I Need a Hat

Upon entering Decentraland for the first time I wanted to lay low, so I created my avatar: a bald guy with a black suit and a pair of black sunglasses. Within just ten minutes of beginning my exploration, however, I came across ten other players that looked exactly like me. We probably had another thing in common, too — none of us could afford to buy a proper hat. I had heard people were investing millions into NFTs in the metaverse but had just been too afraid to check the prices. Suffice to say, I found out that things are expensive — even hats.

In order to look slightly different from the other bald guys in the metaverse, I needed to grind for some assets. I ended up in a game area where everyone was mining meteors for gems. In the beginning, I didn’t understand why people stood motionless as if their internet was dead, but then I realized they were doing the exact same mining activity as I was. Some even floated in the air as they climbed on top of their meteors, which the other players cannot see. The experience was built to be welcoming and inclusive so that every player had their own meteor to work on, like an episode of Black Mirror. Otherwise, the mining field would probably have become a battle royale arena with players beating each other over the head with pickaxes as they competed for resources.

One critical difference between the blockchain-based metaverse and an MMORPG (massively-multiplayer online role-playing game) is the ownership. The metaverse belongs to a decentralized network of players. Sure, the developers created the platform, but they do not have the ultimate rights to everything in it, or the final creative authority over the realm, as in more standardized games. Whatever you own in the metaverse, it belongs to you — such as the hat I still couldn’t afford to craft with those gems that took me a whole night to mine.

I really do not remember the last time I worked so hard in a game, grinding to level up or just to collect low-level equipment. But this time, the (un)excitement was a little different. Knowing that whatever you own in this game actually belongs to you — via blockchain immutability — is a game-changer. This further brings me to realize that the metaverse is not a utopia. Everything here is hard-earned (except for some free, airdropped NFTs). Either you are already “crypto rich” and can buy items off the shelf, or you are talented enough to create your own products and sell them to other people. Mediocre muggles will need to find their own positions in this new world so as not to feel too incapable.

Decentraland, Day Two: The Experience

As a cultured person who enjoys noise-free spaces, the moment I spotted the Spanish Museum on the map, I immediately decided to jump in and have a look. I was imagining an Andalusian-style building with NFT painting exhibitions from the new Dada movement. In the metaverse reality, I spent a long time trying to get to the top of the building to chase a promised, free NFT, by jumping and falling countless times on some moving blue platforms.

Before starting my Super Mario-style jumping adventure, though, I had to choose whether I was anti-Facebook or pro-Facebook. This was brilliant: an original resistance force from within the Decentraland metaverse, designed to pass on the key message and true voice of the real metaverse: we do not want a centralized metaverse controlled by a large corporation like the dystopian future in Ready Player One. I really didn’t expect that this resistance would be rising up so soon within Decentraland. On second thought, though, it’s about time.

What elevated the experience, even more, was that when I finally made it to the top of the building, I got to choose from a box of hearts or a box of tomatoes — to throw at the face of Mark Zuckerberg. The Meta CEO’s visage was printed on all six facets of a rotating cube floating in the air. Indeed, in some of the user-generated experiences, the graphics might look a bit rough, probably due to the old laptop I was using. But that’s not the point. The point is that I had genuine fun playing the game and succeeded in slinging my tomato into the Zucker-mug, and am now waiting for the free NFT to arrive.

Getting back to the graphics, the infrastructure for amazing creation is there already. In some experiences, the visual effects and graphics were actually quite impressive. If you have a bigger screen with a higher resolution, it’s even better. The moving clouds and the azure sky were reflected so delicately on the glass floor, like a beautiful oil painting. Futuristic skyscrapers and cyberpunk flying vehicles make you feel that you are standing in the center of Neo Tokyo. Again, having fancy CGI and Mass Effect-tier graphics isn’t the main goal of a metaverse. The ownership, experience, and freedom is.

It’s worth mentioning that many interesting experiences like the resistance offered by the Spanish Museum are time-limited. El METAEVENTO, the fun tomato-throwing event, was live from November 6 to 26. When I went back to take a few selfies for the memory, the whole setup was gone, leaving only an empty museum with the same anti/pro posters on the glass wall.

By the way, after two nights of mining, I still didn’t get myself a hat. But I did guide six ghosts back to their graves in Halloween Town. And I learned you don’t need an expensive hat to have fun in the metaverse.

Decentraland, Day Three: Sotheby’s and Spicy Pandas

Scrolling down the places of interest in Decentraland was a fun thing. There were so many places that seemed very appealing (and even mysterious). Sotheby’s Natively Digital gallery was on my to-do list even before I had entered Decentraland for the first time. To show due respect for fine art and the brand name, I decided to create a new avatar. Still no hat, but the new avatar at least had hair.

And there I was. Who could have guessed that one day I’d show up at the prestigious Sotheby’s in my high school sailor uniform and dango buns without being judged? Only in the metaverse. At this stage, unless there is a special event, there aren’t many areas to explore inside the Sotheby’s building. The installation art with a toilet paper shortage theme was funny. It even looked like the Sotheby’s building had been looted, what with the big mess next to the reception area.

Another landmark in Decentraland on my list was Chinatown — Dragon City. I assumed that like Chinatowns everywhere in the real world, it would be built by the Chinese and look authentic — not like an Orientalized Chinese fantasy.

But then I saw what looked like a cooked panda inside a yin-yang-shaped hotpot from above. Another panda, in the non-spicy half of the hotpot, seemed to be enjoying himself while the unlucky one was already cooked to medium-well. I wished I had a virtual phone at the moment, to take a selfie with the cooked panda and post it somewhere on Decentraland social media.

Finally, a short note about metaverse immortality. Jumping into the (shallow) water near Dragon City will not get you killed. In fact, I tried a couple of risky things that would for sure get a character killed in an RPG, and it seems like characters in Decentraland do not die. Period. So when I couldn’t be bothered to take the elevator or walk all the way down the dazzling, winding stairs, I just jumped off the ten-floor building and landed elegantly on the ground like a gold-medal-winning Olympic gymnast. This tiny detail was in fact very empowering and liberating.

The metaverse world has no boundaries and no fears. Not being afraid is the first step to free exploration.

The high-rise temples in Dragon City were absolutely gorgeous with lots of details. I didn’t hear any traditional Chinese music in the background and had to check whether my internet was too slow. But you know, for me the essence of Chinatown is the authentic food. Yet, in the metaverse, smell and taste experiences are unlikely to be incorporated any time soon. So, now it’s time to order some chow mein delivery.

What do you think about Neomi’s first adventure in the metaverse? Would you have thrown hearts or tomatoes at Zuckerberg? Let us know in the comments section below.

via Neomi

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