GM

So the big news last week was the Blur airdrop, which made many people happy, as well as Opensea’s decision to remove fees and royalties, which made many people angry.

Combined, the two brought us an old fashioned NFT twitter royal rumble. Founders gave opinions, platforms chimed in, threadooors…wrote threads.

Even the guy at my local bagel shop shook his head and told me life hasn’t been easy as a Coinbase NFT maxi.

We’ll be interrupting this broadcast of Eternal Marketplace Wars to bring you the latest in the world of upcoming NFTs.

enjoy ✨

This week's update:

• Let's talk about that Puma NFT drop

• The year of Pepe the Frog

• All the latest rankings

More info on the Mint/Watch lists here. 

LET'S TALK ABOUT THAT PUMA DROP

Context:

PUMA revealed mint details for their upcoming PFP drop Super PUMA this week. Here's how it looks:

• Supply: 10,000

• Price: 0.15 eth

• Date: February 22

This marks their second major drop after releasing PUMA Nitro last year.

Our Take:

Look if you told me, without any context, that PUMA was releasing a PFP collection, I'd be...cautiously hyped. Mildly pumped. You could maybe even hear me give out a "LFG" at a soft, library-approved sound level.

On one hand, this is a multi-billion dollar, globally known, shoe brand that is diving deep into NFTs — you love to see it.

On the other hand, we've seen a string of awful, borderline cash-grab projects from nearly every major brand that has entered the space until now.

So we're already starting on shaky grounds. But just when you start to give them the benefit of the doubt...

BAM. They hit you with art sneak peeks that look like this:

Oh boy. The cereal box art, the nonsensical filler traits (a camera? a bib?), the resemblance to Chester Cheetah. I can't believe this is happening again.

You can try to justify it by saying they're going for a playful style and it's not meant to be taken seriously, but we don't buy it.

This is simply poor execution from yet another brand that should be able to afford the best talent available.

Yet Super PUMA is still on our watchlist. Why? Well because at the end of the day this is still a PUMA NFT, and you can assume that PUMA, like Nike and Adidas, wants a foothold in web3. So you can expect them to continue releasing NFTs and digital experiences for the foreseeable future, and eventually some will hit.

And we know that PUMA rewards collectors. They're airdropping 40% of their Super PUMA NFTs to owners of their Nitro collection for free, and there's a good chance Super PUMA holders get similar treatment for whatever else they release down the road.

Bottom line: this will likely sell out just like most other big brand NFTs do regardless of execution. And for those that are fans of PUMA and want to be a part of their ecosystem, this could still make sense as an access token.

Plus there are some interesting connections to the 10KTF ecosystem, so maybe there's more twists coming.

As for the art, we can just pretend it doesn't exist, together.

THE YEAR OF PEPE THE FROG

Context:

Vincent Van Dough, one of the most well-known crypto art collectors and the world’s number 1 Pepe fanboi, announced he’s partnering with a group of artists for an ambitious series of drops called Notable Pepes.

The first set comes out Sunday February 26th.

How we got here:

2/4/2023: VVD released Pepe Checks as a meme derivative of VV Checks.

2/5/2023: Pepe Checks gets minted 238k times for $1.6 million. Sheesh.

2/12/2023: VVD announces Notable Pepes, Pepe Checks will give access.

2/26/2023: First weekly Notable Pepes drop begins.

How Notable Pepes work:

1. VVD partners with prominent artists (some from OG Rare Pepes).

2. Every Sunday they'll release 5 new cards (NFTs) with a Pepe theme.

3. Pepe Checks are used as raffle spots for the mints.

Our Take:

It may surprise you, dear reader, that Notable Pepes is borrowing its model from another NFT collection that gained popularity this year.

I know, it’s shocking. NFTs have a reputation for never taking inspiration or copying any other projects — just a stream of fully original ideas, all the time.

But it’s true. This is the same playbook we saw with Punk6529’s Memes, which also runs on weekly releases from notable artists and uses prior NFTs to whitelist collectors. VVD was even the most recent Memes artist.

The strategy has worked very well for 6529. Memes already have 16k eth in volume and collectors have spent as much as 25 eth for a single Meme card.

Does that mean anyone can easily copy paste this model and find similar success? No.

There’s only a handful of names that come to mind with the reputation, artist network, and web3 marketing know-how to pull it off — and VVD is one of them.

He also has a secret weapon: Pepe the frog. Even though we’ve seen a billion new IP characters emerge during the NFT explosion in the last 24 months or so, Pepe is still the most beloved meme in the space - a kind of Mickey Mouse for crypto artists and collectors.

I think the idea of reigniting the Pepe tradition that stretches all the way back to the first crypto art collectibles in 2016 is compelling. And it helps that VVD already has street cred from spending more on Pepe art than anyone else in history.

If you're gonna bet on someone to run a Pepe ecosystem, might as well go with the mega-connected whale who also happens to be a superfan.

So what should you expect? Well if this all works like Punk 6529’s Memes, then the value for any given pepe card will come from:

1. The design and artist name

2. The card’s WL utility for a future drop

This upcoming round on Sunday has the extra benefit of being the first series in this new ecosystem, which always holds a special premium for collectors.

Added to: Mint List Rank #9 ✨

THE MINT LIST

Coming Soon: deep dives on www.mintorskip.com.

• Sewer Passes. Yuga Labs' next mystery drop.

• Project Animus. RTFKT's biggest launch since Clone-x.

• Moonbirds Mythics. The fourth collection in the Proof ecosystem.

• FewoWorld. New PFP by Fewocious, a rising star in the crypto art world.

• Garbage Friends. New PFP by Markus Magnusson coming after Invisible Friends.

• Ether. Anime PFP collection by viii, an artist with a cult following.

• Metropolis by Mpkoz. The first Art Blocks X Bright Moments IRL drop.

• Momoguro. New IP from an award winning entertainment studio.

• Notable Pepes 3-8. The first weekly drop in VVD's latest Pepe project.

• Iron Paw Gang. The latest drop from Random Character Collective.