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This week’s featured collector is ChainSurfer

ChainSurfer is “surfing the Blockchain daily” and their collection proves it. We love the mix of NFTs that ChainSurfer has curated: from Lazy Lions to OnChainBandits. Browse ChainSurfer’s gallery at lazy.com/chainsurfer

🎉 Next week marks a huge milestone for Lazy: the 100th issue of our newsletter! 🎉

To celebrate, we want to spotlight our users and their NFT stories.

For a chance to be featured in the 100th issue of Lazy’s newsletter, please fill out this brief survey:

Thank you for being a part of the Lazy community!

Fill out the survey

We ❤️ Feedback

We would love to hear from you as we continue to build out new features for Lazy! Love the site? Have an idea on how we can improve it? Drop us a line at info@lazy.com

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This week’s featured collector is nchalaris

Nchalaris’ collection caught our attention because it has been receiving above average traffic lately. We took a look and liked what we saw. Browse nchalaris’ gallery at lazy.com/nchalaris

It was an another exciting week for crypto:

A loss of confidence in banks has led to a spike in crypto prices. Arbitrum, a layer 2, announced their airdrop. Ethereum staking withdraws will begin around April 12. A duplicate was discovered in Yuga Lab’s TwelveFold collection (oops!). And another sneaky NFT hack has been spotted in the wild.

In last week’s poll, we asked you about your NFT strategy: buying, selling or holding. What we learned is that roughly 60% of readers are holding their NFTs, while the remaining 40% are split evenly between buyers and sellers. Since the majority of people are holding, we want to revisit strategies for keeping your NFTs safe.

Step 1: Securely Store Your NFTs

If you have some NFTs that you don’t plan on selling or trading anytime soon, it might be a good idea to put them into secure storage. That way you don’t have to worry about accidentally losing them: peace of mind is priceless.
Click here to learn about the three ways to create your own impenetrable storage system.

Step 2: Delegate Your NFTs

Learning to “Delegate” is an important skills for NFT collectors in 2023. Delegation is one of the best ways to protect against getting scammed. Click here to learn how to delegate your NFTs securely.

Step 3: Guard Against The Three Most Common Hacks

Once you’ve curated your collection of NFTs, put them in storage and delegated, it is crucial to be familiar with of the most common hacks. Click here to learn the three ways most hackers try to steal your NFTs.

Step 4: Beware Signature Requests

In January, the creator of Moonbirds lost over $1,000,000 worth of NFTs. This is a dramatic reminder that even highly knowledgeable NFT creators and collectors can fall for sophisticated hacks. And the most sophisticated hack going around are signature requests. Click here for a deep dive into how signature requests can steal your NFTs and how to stay safe.

This week’s poll: What’s your strategy for keeping your NFTs safe?

Shout-out to Lazy user @AlishaAnglinArt for mentioning Lazy in her recent talk at Muhlenberg College.

“In the NFT space we as artists have the creative freedom to do what we want. Much of this freedom arrives from how NFTs open up new ways for artists to reach a broader public of collectors. This occurs globally, unlike in traditional art spaces, where creators and collectors alike are typically limited by the presence (or lack) of brick-and-mortar galleries and other local factors.” — @AlishaAnglinArt

Alisha got her start in NFTs in March 2021 after hearing Mark Cuban talk about lazy.com. Immediately after minting her first Ethereum NFT, Alisha created her account and her first piece “Sublime Fields” sold to a collector on Lazy.

We’re happy to hear about Alisha’s success with Lazy & always appreciate sharing awareness. Thanks!

We ❤️ Feedback

We would love to hear from you as we continue to build out new features for Lazy! Love the site? Have an idea on how we can improve it? Drop us a line at info@lazy.com

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This week’s featured collector is TagachiStudio

TagachiStudio’s is a “creator, collector and contributor.” Their collection of Ethereum NFTs includes a Friendship Bracelet along with different kinds of community membership certificates. Browse TagachiStudio’s gallery at lazy.com/tagachistudio

Two recent NFT projects have attracted a lot of attention among collectors. Here’s a look into what can be learned by their success.

The Quadratic Funding Collection

On the first day of March, a collection of the foundational texts on Quadratic Funding were bundled together and sold as an NFT. Funds raised from the NFT sale were “split between the Gitcoin Grants Matching Pool and the Plurality Institute, both of which fund and support public goods.” It took several days for the NFT sale to get noticed, but once collectors realized that the collection included an essay by Vitalik Buterin, one of the creators of Ethereum, it quickly sold out and became one of this week’s most traded NFTs.

While many commentators have credited the success of this project to Buterin’s association, there are two other aspects worth noting: 1) The NFT is a collection of texts which makes this a success story for NFT books 2) The NFT funded charity, demonstrating the positive potential for NFTs in fundraising.

TwelveFold

This week the creators of the Bored Ape Yacht Club released a generative NFT collection on the Bitcoin blockchain. Bitcoin NFTs are a relatively new invention and the quick adoption by Yuga Labs surprised collectors and inspired creators. TwelveFold was sold via auction and raised over $16m.

The success of TwelveFold suggests a continued hunger among NFT collectors for innovation. The success of TwelveFold wasn’t just because Yuga Labs created it—although that obviously played an important role. It was also because TwelveFold was released onto Bitcoin. This made it feel fresh and exciting. There was a joy to discovering the intricacies of a new blockchain’s NFT system.

This week’s poll: What is your NFT strategy? Are you buying, selling or holding?

We ❤️ Feedback

We would love to hear from you as we continue to build out new features for Lazy! Love the site? Have an idea on how we can improve it? Drop us a line at info@lazy.com

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This week’s featured collector is Ayeetoeknee

Ayeetoeknee is a collector of Ethereum NFTs with a focus on sneakers. They also collect artwork by Ron English, a prolific counter-culture street artist. Browse Ayeetoeknee’s full collection at lazy.com/ayeetoeknee

A court case with major implications for the future of NFTs is now underway. The case could decide whether NFTs are securities that require regulation.

In May 2021, the creator of Top Shot was sued by an individual who argued that the NFTs of NBA moments were securities. Now, almost two years later, the case has entered the courtroom and one of the first rulings does not bode well.

A briefing from Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, a major multinational law firm, explains the situation:

Before the court was the question of whether Moments were investment contracts and therefore securities, which the court analyzed under the Howey test, which examines whether (i) there is an investment of money (ii) in a common enterprise (iii) with a reasonable expectation of profit derived solely by the promotional or managerial efforts of others.

Although the court has not made a decision on whether Top Shots are securities, the court did reject the motion to dismiss the case. This indicates that the court believes it is plausible that the NFTs are securities and, if the case continues, is willing to make a determination.

As an analysis from Blockworks points out: “It is unclear whether the case will proceed to trial or if a settlement may be reached.”

If the case does proceed to trial then there is the potential that a precedent could be set with wide-ranging implications for the NFT ecosystem. After all, if NFTs are securities then it would drastically limit the ability of artists to release them, marketplaces to sell them and individuals to collect them.

All eyes will be on the Top Shot case as it continues to move toward trial.

Learn more at Skadden and Blockworks.

This week’s poll: Will the courts rule NFTs are securities?

We ❤️ Feedback

We would love to hear from you as we continue to build out new features for Lazy! Love the site? Have an idea on how we can improve it? Drop us a line at info@lazy.com

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This week’s featured collector is Mortifiedmonke

Mortifiedmonke is a 22-year-old artist based in Upstate New York. Their artwork explores “concepts, styles, and mediums.” Browse Mortifiedmonke’s unique creations at lazy.com/mortifiedmonke

The Sudden Demise of NFT Royalties

We have been actively watching the NFT royalty debate for the last six months.

First, in Newsletter #70, we discussed the rise of SudoSwap, an NFT marketplace that does not pay royalties to creators.

Then in Newsletter #84, we discussed OpenSea’s strong defense of royalties, their declaration that “it’s an existential imperative for the space to preserve creator fees,” and their threat to blacklist marketplaces that did not respect royalties.

But none of that prepared us for this week’s dramatic culmination of the royalty debate: OpenSea has reversed course and no one remains to defend creator royalties.

The story of why OpenSea chose to reverse course is long and fascinating. It involves Blur, an upstart challenger that captured 70% of OpenSea’s marketplace volume, along with economic pressures from an NFT winter and a shift from platforms that earn profits from trading fees to platforms that earn profits from their native token.

For a deep dive into exactly what happened, we recommend reading The Royalty Wars.

With the royalty debate seemingly settled for now, creators are left wondering how they will earn an income from their NFT art. After all, for many artists the majority of their earnings came from royalties and not the initial mint. The lack of royalties could make things difficult for creators. Or perhaps it’ll instigate new approaches. Time will tell.

In any case, we are continuously amazed by the rapid changes happening within crypto and we look forward to seeing what will happen next!

This week’s poll: Do you support mandatory royalties for creators?

We ❤️ Feedback

We would love to hear from you as we continue to build out new features for Lazy! Love the site? Have an idea on how we can improve it? Drop us a line at info@lazy.com

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This week’s featured collector is svenmalefist

Svenmalefist is an immersive web developer of realtime illusions. Their Lazy profile showcases artwork they’ve created along with an NFT ticket for the upcoming Non Fungible Conference 2023 in Lisbon. View Svenmalefist’s creations at lazy.com/svenmalefist

Collector Poll Round-Up

For the past few weeks, we’ve asked Lazy collectors to weigh in on topics ranging from whether NFT finance is a good idea to their support for Bitcoin NFTs. In this week’s issue, we’re going to take a look at the results.

In Newsletter #93, we explored some of the ways that the music industry is adopting NFTs and we asked you to tell us what is most exciting. The results were clear: the majority is keen to see NFTs that grant royalties to songs. This is in line with our sense that there is a growing expectation among collectors that NFTs provide financial value beyond speculation and aesthetics.

Newsletter #92 was all about Bitcoin NFTs, a topic that has since continued to generate a lot of debate as more and more projects either clone themselves onto Bitcoin’s blockchain or move their collections entirely. A little more than half of Lazy’s collectors who responded to the poll thought Bitcoin should encourage NFTs.

After $1m worth of NFTs were stolen in a sophisticated hack, we published Newsletter #91 on how to protect yourself. We were also curious to see how many collectors had suffered from a hack. The results were alarming: half the respondents had been hacked at least once. And 1 out of 10 had been hacked more than two times!

Conceptual NFTs were the topic of Newsletter #90. And, to be honest, we were not surprised to learn that most people do not collect them. But, a glimmer of good news for the conceptual NFT artists: 9% of respondents might be willing to collect these kinds of NFTs in the future. Our guess is that there will be a conceptual NFT that breaks through and raises the popularity for the entire genre.

We explored NFT Finance in Newsletter #89. The results of the reader poll suggest many collectors are still making up their minds about NFT Finance: over a third of respondents weren’t sure if it was a positive development. Time will tell if the financialization of NFTs leads to greater mainstreaming or harmful speculation.

That’s it for this month’s poll round-up. Got an idea for a poll we should run? Send us an email and let us know!

 🎨 Lazy.com is seeking a UX/UI designer with an interest in NFTs. 🖌

Tens of thousands of collectors use Lazy.com to display their NFTs. Help us shape what they see. Apply now by sending a sample of your work.

We ❤️ Feedback

We would love to hear from you as we continue to build out new features for Lazy! Love the site? Have an idea on how we can improve it? Drop us a line at info@lazy.com