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- Twitter vs Reddit fight about NFTs 🥊
GM folks, this is Web3 Seems Legit, the weekly newsletter that gives you crypto talking points in 5 minutes or less, so you can always sound smart at the dinner table 😏.
In this issue, we're coving these latest web3 stories:
Will Reddit lead NFTs to mass adoption? Months after the launch of the Reddit NFT avatars, it finally pumps and crypto Twitter is loving it.
Apple turns into a bad apple for NFTs. After imposing the 30% tax on NFTs last month, Apple has rolled out even stricter terms to regulate NFTs.
Is the Metaverse in trouble? Despite a loss of over $3.6 billion in Q3, Meta will continue to invest heavily in building the Metaverse. But the real trouble isn't really the money investment.
Will Reddit lead NFTs to mass adoption?
Just a month ago, no one on crypto Twitter could care less about Reddit's new NFT avatar collection. In fact, they laughed at it. Now, it's all anyone on CT can talk about 🤦.
Reddit NFTs are absolutely popping off right now.
Reddit onboarded over 3M wallets, minted over 86k NFTs, and brought in a 175 ETH sale ($230,000).
This caused a huge surge in NFT volume on Polygon. Reddit NFTs are currently at a $100M market cap.
(H/T @0xKofi for the data)
— Blockworks Research (@blockworksres)
7:43 PM • Oct 24, 2022
So why the sudden surge? Reddit's NFT avatars have remained relatively low-key since its initial launch in July. As part of their go-to-market strategy, Reddit intentionally made no mention of NFTs or blockchain.
Turns out, while Twitter is a sanctuary for crypto lovers, Reddit is kind of the opposite.
Reddit has hated on NFTs pretty much since inception. It turns out the key to getting them to collectively accept them was simply to rename them from "NFTs" to "Digital Collectibles".
Eventually everybody will embrace NFTs, even if they don't know they're doing it.
— quit.q00t.eth (@0xQuit)
5:13 PM • Oct 24, 2022
Without even knowing, over 3 million Redditors were quietly ushered into NFTs and crypto Twitter is loving it because it proves that:
There is a demand for collectible NFTs, whether people want to admit it or not
For web3 to succeed, we have to get rid of buzzy crypto terminology
Web3 mass adoption can only happen when people don't realize that it's happening
Reddit Avatars are the Trojan Horse of NFTs that are on boarding millions into Web3, and no one is talking about it 🧵
— AB (@ABBBBBB_NFT)
5:32 AM • Oct 19, 2022
With 1.5 billion registered Reddit users, NFT avatars are only the beginning for Reddit 🙌.
Reddit is secretly building a metaverse empire.
NFT avatars are JUST the start.
Here's their master plan and how you can capitalize 🧵
— Liam Herbst (@liamherbst_)
2:38 AM • Oct 26, 2022
Now...we should probably let Redditors know how NFTs work 🤷.
Apple turns into the bad apple of NFTs
While Reddit embraces NFTs, Apple on the other hand isn't so welcoming.
A month ago, Apple announced that they would be charging 30% on in-app NFT purchases. Of course, many people weren't happy about the fee, but others were hopeful that Apple was allowing the use of NFTs in mobile apps 👍.
Apple has decided to let developers sell NFTs inside of games/apps. Everyone is focusing on apple wanting its 30% cut of each transaction without realizing this could put an ETH wallet in every single mobile game onboarding 1B+ players!
— Gabriel Leydon (FREE,OWN) (@gabrielleydon)
10:00 PM • Sep 23, 2022
It was all fun and games until Apple introduced new terms this week:
Users can't use NFTs to unlock in-app features unless the NFT was purchased through the App Store 🚩
Apps can't use external links to redirect users to purchase NFTs elsewhere 🚩
Only approved exchanges can facilitate crypto transactions (i.e. Coinbase) 🚩
All this just shows that Apple wants to take advantage of users by keeping NFTs in their ecosystem 🙅♀️.
Today, Apple released new rules for crypto apps (especially web3 games) in the App Store.
Apple's stance on NFTs, crypto, and payments will have a massive effect on the industry.
A 🧵 featuring critical points, my takeaways, and winners/losers based on initial reading:
— Daniel (@dgmason)
9:31 PM • Oct 24, 2022
Crypto apps are now finding themselves in a bind and forced to pivot their products that won't work with the hefty 30% fee.
The recent Apple rules have screwed over @soundmintxyz in building a backend infrastructure on the blockchain for our mobile app. We wanted to use the blockchain to verifiably prove we had a limited quantity phygital collection on a public ledger. The 30% fee makes it impossible.
— DefiBrian 🍃 (@DeFi_Brian)
9:12 AM • Oct 25, 2022
It's a double-edged sword. On one hand, Apple is showing that they want to work with NFTs, but only under their strict terms that benefit themselves. Corporate greed is one hell of a drug 💊.
Is the Metaverse in trouble?
If you thought only crypto was volatile, well think again 🫠. After Meta's quarterly earnings call, their stock took a -20% nose dive when revealed that Reality Labs, their metaverse division, lost over $3.6 billion in Q3.
Meta reports earnings
20% wick 🤯
— TradingView (@tradingview)
8:11 PM • Oct 26, 2022
Since revealing their Metaverse platform (Horizon Worlds) earlier this year, Zuck has been at the center of heavy criticism and mockery because well...their Metaverse kind of sucks 🤷♀️.
The metaverse video in which they said they've added feet was faked, they have still not cracked the technology for adding legs. kotaku.com/zuckerberg-fac…
— Laurie Voss (@seldo)
12:16 AM • Oct 14, 2022
$15 billion later with no working legs, Zuck still stands by his investment in the Metaverse. In fact, despite the earnings loss, Zuck made it clear that he is going to continue to invest heavily in building the new virtual world.
$META down almost 15% on results. Initially shares were up 8%, then tanked with Zuckerberg commentary that they are increasing investments in the metaverse.
Bottom line is Zuckerberg is saying to investors get onboard with the metaverse or go away.
Jumping on the call now.
— Gene Munster (@munster_gene)
9:01 PM • Oct 26, 2022
As Zuck abandons investors for his own corporate interest, people are livid. Why is he continuing to pour money into something that's not working?
Well, if you look at the bigger picture, the Metaverse isn't about "revolutionizing" remote work, it's much more than that 🤔. It's about building a digital heaven.
It’s actually worse than this. They’re spending $15B to build a legless Second Life clone by trying to solve a particular engineering problem that is interesting to nobody except the kinds of folks who are interested in weird computer problems
— Emily GPU prices (@EmilyGorcenski)
6:24 AM • Oct 27, 2022
It sounds cool until you realize that Zuck would be the creator of this man-made heaven. Now that's scary 🥴.
In other news 🗞️
Twitter is reportedly building a crypto wallet to support deposits and withdrawals. As Elon moves into Twitter HQ, rumors that the social platform is working on an in-app wallet are circulating.
Azuki sells out golden NFT skateboards for $2.5 million. This week's craziest NFT purchase goes to the Azuki whales. Eight golden skateboards were sold for more than $250k each, breaking the record for the most expensive skateboards sold.