Takashi Murakami said he might step back from NFTs but stay involved differently, Krapoplis is set to debut on Fox this month, and an NFT artist won a multimillion-dollar contract dispute.
Blue Chip NFTs 101 – What’s The Secret Behind CloneX? Built For The Metaverse
The secret behind CloneX is Takashi Murakami and the RTFKT team, that’s the short answer. The NFT collection is the result of the once-secret collaboration between the legendary Japanese artist and the experts in creating virtual sneakers. Steven Vasilev, Chris Le, and Benoit Pagotto founded RTFKT, which reads “Artifact,” in 2020. The CloneX public sale took place in the last days of November 2021. These people work fast.
The goal of the Ethereum-based CloneX collection is quite simple, to serve as avatars in the metaverse. These NFTs aren’t merely profile pictures. Through the upcoming Clone vault, the CloneX holders will have access to the avatar’s 3D files. The idea is that these figures will work in any metaverse. Plus, RTFKT has expressed metaverse ambitions of its own.
In any case, RTFKT Studios co-founder Benoit Pagotto told Forbes:
“We envision a new kind of relationship forming between owners and 3D creators who will create bespoke content for the avatars, replicating what we’ve seen with Fortnite 3D models ripped by blender creators, creating content for Twitch streamers and YouTubers. It’s a full ecosystem, being built live, and the avatars are just the tip of the iceberg.”
Very nice, but let’s focus on the avatars for now.
About CloneX And Takashi Murakami
The project’s official site describes them as, “CloneX is our most ambitious project yet, the beginning of a whole ecosystem for our community, quality-focused, high-end avatars, ready for the metaverse.” Japanese contemporary artist Takashi Murakami designed all of the CloneX traits, from their eyes and their mouths to their clothes and their helmets. Murakami lives in the line between pop and high art. He has worked with Pharrell and Kanye West, with brands like Louis Vuitton and Vogue, and also with Supreme, Vans, and Billionaire Boys Club.
There are 20K CloneXs total, and those are divided among eight different DNA types:
- 50% are Human.
- 30% are Robots.
- 8.75% are Angels.
- 8.75% are Demons.
- 1.25% are Reptiles.
- 0.6% are Undead.
- 0.5% are Murakamis.
- 0.15% are Aliens.
ETH price chart on Kraken | Source: ETH/USD on TradingView.com
About The Controversial Initial Sale
The CloneX public sale was supposed to take place on November 29th. The demand was there, they sold 13K out of 20K before RTFKT had to pull the plug for the day. Their website was under attack. According to themselves, “Due to our website still being attacked and unusable, we’re pausing the minting till when we’ll have all fixed and upgraded.”
The last 7K CloneX were minted on the 30th. Some people maintain something suspicious went on. At the moment, the rarity of each CloneX was still a mystery, so all the NFTs were theoretically worth the same. The public sale was supposed to be a Dutch auction starting at 3 ETH. In the second round, each of the 7K sold for 2 ETH flat.
Considering that at the time of writing the floor price for a CloneX is 12.9 ETH, participating in any of the two rounds would’ve been extremely profitable.
Curious Facts About The CloneX Collection
- At first, the code name for the project was: Akira.
- All CloneX holders received a Space Pod as an airdrop. Check this Twitter account for “an ongoing thread of all the items being made for RTFKT Space Pods & Loot Pods by the CloneX community.”
- Secondary market royalty for this NFT collection is a steep 5%.
- Holders own the IP of their avatar and can commercialize it for up to $1M.
- The avatar’s 3D files will be available in the following formats: Unreal Engine, Daz3D, .blend, .obj, .fbx, .MA, and glb.
- RTFKT will host “Forging Events,” where CloneX holders can forge real-life physical items based on your NFT.
- For the virtual world, holders will be able to clothe their avatars through Clonex Wearables. Both RTFKT and independent creators will offer different garments.
- At the moment you can only buy the avatars on the secondary market. They’re available on OpenSea.
- In the real world, four white gold CloneX chains exist. They were created by Crown Collection in association with Murakami and RTFKT.
And that’s everything you need to know about CloneX at the moment. There are many more things to learn about RTFKT, though. Do your homework on that. And, while you’re at it, read “Blue Chip NFTs 101’s” other guides: Moonbirds and Proof Collective in Ethereum, and DeGods in Solana. More to come.
Featured Image: Murakami from the official site | Charts by TradingView
The Top 5 Most Valuable NFT Collections And A Tool To Track Them Down
Some of these NFT collections are so ever-present that they are already part of the collective unconscious. Others, the general public has not even heard about. What makes an NFT collection valuable? Market capitalization is the potential value of the whole collection, based on its size and the value of the individual pieces. In the case of NFTs, it’s hard to pinpoint, because it’s a volatile market with lots of action all-day-every-day.
Agreeing on which are the most valuable #NFTs collections is certainly hard.
We created a matrix called "Most Valuable NFTs Collections" and it shows the 20 most valuable collections, sorted by their market capitalization.
Access this data for free here: https://t.co/wXJyMCmRBD pic.twitter.com/PyzbPMDKCk
— IntoTheBlock (@intotheblock) April 21, 2022
When IntoTheBlock announced their list, they presented it by saying, “Agreeing on which are the most valuable NFTs collections is certainly hard.” Besides market capitalization, the “Most Valuable NFT Collections” list tracks number of owners, volume trade, average price, and number of sales. All of those stats are pretty common when discussing NFTs, but it’s certainly helpful to have them all on an interactive database.
The page also displays useful graphs that put everything into perspective, like “All-time Most Traded Collections,” “Collections With Most Unique Owners” and “Booming NFT Collections.” With that being said, let’s dive into each of the collections in the Top 5 and give some insight about them.
#1 NFT Collection: Bored Ape Yacht Club
At the moment, the BAYC surpassed the all-powerful Cryptopunks as the most valuable NFT collection. This is not surprising, since the Bored Apes became part of popular culture and are on their way to becoming mainstream. On their official site, they describe themselves as “A limited NFT collection where the token itself doubles as your membership to a swamp club for apes. The club is open! Ape in with us.”
As with most successful products, the Yuga Labs creation doesn’t come without its share of controversy.
#2 Cryptopunks
They might not have been the firsts, but the Cryptopunks are certainly responsible for spearheading and popularizing the NFT movement. At first, you could mint them for free. Nowadays, the average price is 76.64 ETH. On their official site, they describe themselves as “The Cryptopunks are one of the earliest examples of a “Non-Fungible Token” on Ethereum, and were inspiration for the ERC-721 standard that powers most digital art and collectibles.”
The creators recently sold the whole collection to Yuga Labs. And, of course, controversy follows this project as well. And, they’re also on their way to mainstream adoption.
ETH price chart on Capital.com | Source: ETH/USD on TradingView.com
#3 NFT Collection: Mutant Ape Yacht Club
At first, these ones were free as well. They came into the scene as a way to reward BAYC members. Owners received an airdrop of “Mutant Serum,” using it they could mint a mutant version of their ape as a completely new NFT. Nowadays, the average price is 32.99 ETH. They don’t have an official site, but this is the NFT collection’s Open Sea page. As you can see by its place on this list, the interest in this collection keeps growing.
#4 CloneX
The collaboration between legendary Japanese artist Takashi Murakami and “digital artifacts” creator RTFKT is a success like no other. This might have to do with Nike’s recent acquisition of the company. The NFT collection ’s official site doesn’t describe itself, but NFT News does, “CloneX NFT collection is not only equipped for the Metaverse and features high-end avatars, but also marks the beginning of a community-focused environment ”
#5 NFT Collection: Moonbirds
The newcomer of the bunch is the Moonbirds NFT Collection. Their official site describes them as, “a collection of 10,000 utility-enabled PFPs that feature a richly diverse and unique pool of rarity-powered traits.” Since they’re so new, they’re easily beating all of the other collections in number of daily sales. Of course, the NewsBTC team has been covering the story as it happens.
Other NFT collections in the Top 10: Azuki, Sandbox’s LANDs, Doodles, Veefriends, and Meebits.
Featured Image: the most valuable list, taken from this tweet | Charts by TradingView
