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Crypto is Becoming Fashionable
NFL Rivals, Fashion Houses Accepting Crypto, NFT Trading, and a Gargantuan Web3 Fund.
Austin Miller & John Meyer
May 31, 2022
GM and welcome to The Mint, where we exclusively watch cooking shows on Netflix for no good reason.
Digital Pigskin
Go long! Last week, the NFL announced NFL Rivals, a new way to experience the league.
"With the rise of blockchain technology, we are thrilled to partner with Mythical Games on a blockchain-enabled game that delivers new play-to-own NFT capabilities, creating a new adventure for fans who love to play football games"
There aren’t a lot of details being released yet, but apparently, Rivals “will allow NFL fans and gamers alike to compete against others with their assembled player rosters and teams… and also own, collect and trade non-fungible tokens (NFTs) of their favorite players.” It sounds like this game will be very similar to EA’s Madden Ultimate Team, but there will obviously be some slight differences.
The game is slated to release in early 2023, and you can stay updated by signing up here.
Is Web3 a Luxury or a Necessity?
Soon enough, it could feel like a necessity for retail companies to accept cryptocurrency as payment. The luxury retail space has been an early adopter of the web3 space, using NFTs for digital fashion, the blockchain for authentication, and now, adopting crypto as an acceptable payment method. Gucci, Burberry, Balenciaga, and Dolce and Gabbana all have had successful NFT projects in the past year, using digital fashion to put their products on other famous NFT collections and game characters.
In the span of three weeks, Gucci, Balenciaga, and Tag Heuer have announced they will begin to integrate payment systems that accept crypto.
How? →
A QR code that can be used to execute the crypto payment will be emailed to the customer, and the retailer can keep the payment in crypto or automatically convert to US dollars.
Who is next? →
This is a perfect example of a domino effect, and my prediction is that other large luxury retailers like Louis Vuitton will follow suit in the coming weeks. Digital fashion will continue to grow, as self-expression, trends, and culture become as prominent in the metaverse as they are in real life.
Wanna Trade?
OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, recently made headlines by introducing a new marketplace protocol called SeaPort that gives users new tools for placing bids on and purchasing NFTs.
The Current System →
Let’s say you’re interested in the new Faceless collection by GreatJones. To buy one of these NFTs, you browse the collection until you find one that you like in your price range. You can either purchase the NFT for a set price or you can make an offer for it.
Faceless #184
This particular collection is connected to Ethereum, so you’ll need to have an Ethereum wallet like MetaMask connected to your account to make the purchase. Once the seller accepts your offer, you will pay the 2.5% fee to OpenSea for the transaction as well as the gas fees for transferring your Ethereum to the seller.
A Sweet New Feature →
The Mint Staff’s favorite new feature from SeaPort is the trading/bartering protocol. Users can now offer one of their own NFTs as payment for another NFT. If you are an avid NFT collector, this feature is really beneficial. Instead of relying solely on cryptocurrencies for transactions, users can now use their own digital assets to pay for items. The Mint staff likes this new feature because it’s fun and useful!
Funding in the Bear Market
In last week’s Mint, we dove into a crypto report from a16z, the crypto arm of venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz that outlined the growth of crypto in 2022 and its possibilities moving forward. This week, a16z made more headlines by announcing their fourth crypto fund. Totaling $4.5 billion, the fund is an absolute whale.
"We think we are now entering the golden era of web3. Programmable blockchains are sufficiently advanced, and a diverse range of apps have reached tens of millions of users. More importantly, a massive wave of world-class talent has entered Web3 over the last year. They are brilliant and passionate and want to build a better internet."
As a branch of a web3 startup, you could say this news got us a little excited. $4.5 billion for companies like ourselves? Boo-ya.
a16z has provided funding to numerous web3 startups such as:
Funding is vital to growing new industries. Thankfully, VC funds like a16z are literally pouring money into the web3 space, despite the current bear market.
Bloomberg
Today’s newsletter was written by Austin and Caitlin
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