GM

Time for another week of having fun with your online friends.

In today’s edition:

• Huge NFT drama (featuring Mr. Beast)

• The Mint and Watch Lists

• Four fresh drops

Links for the Mint/Watch list drops are HERE.

Did you know?

We have a premium pass that gives you access to a directory of every drop we cover, complete with detailed information on how to get on every whitelist (including those underrated ones that aren’t already full).

And for those curatooors out there, you can get free NFTs just by finding drops that end up on the Mint or Watch list.

Lastly, hang with me and the MoS team in a private discord with weekly voice chats. The vibes are great.

Would you like to be featured in Mint or Skip like the above ☝️ ?

Huge NFT drama (featuring Mr. Beast)

The world of NFTs is like an arena, where builders are always trying stuff, some of which will work and some of which won’t.

But sometimes, on very rare occasions, the planets align to create something that should theoretically break the laws of physics.

A single announcement that produces both a massive W and a massive L at the same time.

And that’s exactly what we got this weekend.

The Creator League

On paper, this is one of the biggest announcements this space has seen all year.

It even got a full promo on an official Mr. Beast video yesterday, which already has an incredible 57 million views.

Here’s the TLDW:

A group of content creators, including some big influencers like Bella Poarch and ishowspeed, joined together to start a league where they’ll be competing in a variety of different games for prizes.

Fans are invited to buy a $20 pass that gives them access to a digital VIP experience during Season 1.

This includes:

• A chance to play on a creator team

• The ability to vote on events

• AMAs with the creators

• A private discord

• Giveaways

So far, everything sounds fine – and I can actually see how this could be a new kind of interactive experience that more creators replicate in the future.

But this project also has a dark secret

An unforgivable truth that, to some, goes a step too far.

It turns out that, on the backend, the Creator League is using something called…a blockchain (NEAR protocol, to be specific).

And those $20 passes that people are buying, are in fact NFTs.

audible gasps

Obviously, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with this. In fact, there are many reasons why consumers might prefer it to be this way.

But apparently, the creators themselves were not aware that NFTs were involved. It actually sounds like they were explicitly told that they weren’t.

And now they’re not happy – probably because they know many of their fans have an irrational hatred for all things crypto and something like this is just not worth the pushback.

Things escalated yesterday when CDawg, one of the creators in the league, dropped out after learning that blockchains were involved. And now it seems like others are considering doing the same.

This all shows just how toxic the branding around NFTs remains today

Many consumers conflate the general technology (non-fungible tokens) with specific implementations that they dislike (e.g. outright scams or cringe PFPs) and then just reject the entire thing.

In this case, the creators aren’t even upset with how the passes were being sold, or whether the business model is scammy, or even who's behind it.

We know this because they originally signed up while being fully aware of all these details.

The only new information is that we now know it uses a decentralized public ledger, which apparently is a nonstarter.

Now, of course, some of the blame goes to the team running the creator league

At the very least, you should be avoiding creators who have a track record of speaking out publicly against NFTs in the past.

It took me 10 seconds of typing CDawg and NFTs into YouTube search to find multiple rants expressing exactly how much he hates them.

Maybe he wasn’t the best fit?

Now the whole vibe feels sour. Lying to creators makes it even harder to convince normie gamers that this isn’t a scam, even if there were no ill intentions or speculative features from the beginning (it seems the tokens might not even be transferable).

Bottom line

Mr. Beast video promos are like the Holy Grail of marketing for a limited NFT drop.

And yet, this project is in limbo less than 24 hours after receiving one. One creator is out, others are debating the same, and things aren’t looking great in the court of public opinion.

Never a dull day.

NOTE: These drops are lightly curated. Our only requirement is that they have recognizable founders. As usual, DYOR. To learn more go here.

Flowers of Alfiren by Andrew Mitchell

Generative artist Andrew Mitchell, one half of Mitchell & Yun Studios, will soon release Flowers of Alfiren, a collection over a year in the making.

It features 86 flower-inspired onchain pieces (example outputs here) and will launch via the artist’s new Flower-verse Foundation World, where he plans to curate more nature-inspired art.

Feels like a natural progression for the artist – he’s been selling out SuperRare 1/1s in a similar style since the start of this year.

Between Heaven and Earth

Foundation expands their in-house curation with the launch of Forever Projects, an initiative showcasing artists at the forefront of the AI and generative movement.

The first “moment” (check out what those are here) is Between Heaven and Earth, a collection featuring 6 limited editions from various artists, totaling 135 pieces.

The roster features: elsif / wren / Blank Embrace / WILLARD / NOCELLCOVERAGE

One for emerging art and Foundation maxis.

Security by Ripcache

Ripcache, one of the most influential active crypto artists, recently unveiled Security, his long-awaited collaboration with Avant Arte and Cozomo de’ Medici.

Security is a 2-in-1, physical plus digital edition of 32 that requires the buyer to scratch off a section of the physical in order to unlock the accompanying NFT.

This is something we first saw from Ripcache in May with the release of Public // Private, which I wrote about here, and I’d argue collectors haven’t had enough.

✨ Added to Watchlist ✨

Hyperconnection 

Crypto art takes over a whole building façade with Verse’s Hyperconnection, a 4-week exhibition starting today which will transform Manchester’s School of Digital Arts (SODA) building into a dynamic canvas for 4 artists:

Kerim Safa / Gretta Louw / Leander Herzog / Kristen Roos

Later, Verse will sell the artists’ exhibited works near the end of the exhibition (September 29th). Mint details are still limited.

The Mint List

1. Taproot Wizards. OG Bitcoin meme inscribed as ordinals

2. 10KTF PFP. Drop from a team that includes Yuga and Beeple

3. Shadow Hats. Ordinals drop from the creators of Forgotten Runes

4. Project Animus. RTFKT's biggest launch since Clone-X

5. Deafbeef x Bright Moments. OG onchain creator with a track record

6. Sugartown Oras. Zynga, Farmville creators, releasing free NFTs

7. Distance by Mapan. Cactoid Labs x LACMA x influential artist

8. Glacier Dreams by Anadol. AI collection from the MoMA exhibitor

9. Symbiogenesis. Square Enix's upcoming gaming NFT

10. Memeland [TBC]. High-value treasure MVPs minting on BTC