Blue Chip NFTs 101 – How Did Moonbirds Conquer The World In A Bearish Market?

2 years ago

The utmost occurrence of Moonbirds is the NFT communicative of the twelvemonth truthful far. The postulation opened up truthful powerfully that it archived instant bluish spot presumption and a spot astatine the top of the charts. The marketplace for NFTs is bearish astatine the moment, however did the pixeled owls execute specified a feat? It surely wasn’t conscionable the art, adjacent though the Moonbirds person a distinctive look and astir apt marque fantabulous illustration pictures AKA PFPs. 

Let’s uncover the story. This 1 has it all; a nascent but almighty organization, brainsick numbers, net legends, an ambitious roadmap, airy controversy, and, of course, metaverse plans.

Moonbirds: Formal Characteristics

There are a full of 10K Moonbirds, they were issued nether the ERC-721 modular connected the Ethereum blockchain. The mint terms for each 1 was a whopping 2.5 ETH. That means that, astatine existent prices, the Proof Collective made implicit $70M connected that archetypal day. The madness doesn’t extremity there,  according to CryptoSlam, the Moonbirds person generated $481M successful income truthful far. That’s 160K ETH from astir 12K buyers. And for each secondary sale, Proof received a 5% cut.

According to the Moonbirds authoritative site, the enactment distributed those archetypal 10K birds arsenic follows:

  • 7,875: Public merchantability to allowlist winners

  • 2,000: PROOF Collective Members (1,000 passes) each person 2 escaped mints

  • 125: PROOF wallet for aboriginal collaborations, marketing, and advisors

All funny parties, including Proof Collective members, were capable to participate a raffle to beryllium whitelisted for that nationalist sale. Of course, determination was controversy, which we volition cover. The Moonbird NFT postulation promised the usual, rank to a backstage radical and a Discord server, and aboriginal yet-to-be-revealed utilities. A staking mechanism, cleverly named “nesting” and a aboriginal metaverse codenamed “Project Highrise.”

According to the Moonbird’s site, their “unique instrumentality connected the Metaverse” volition beryllium “a melodramatic departure from the existing ‘never-ending’ worlds that consciousness similar a integer shade town. Ours is uniquely different, and you’ll person archetypal entree arsenic a nested Moonbirds holder.” 

It’s besides worthy noting that, “owners of Moonbirds person afloat commercialized creation rights for the Moonbird they own.”

BTCUSD terms  illustration  for 04/30/2022 - TradingView

ETH terms illustration for 04/30/2022 connected Oanda | Source: ETH/USD connected TradingView.com

What Is “Nesting” And What Can It Do For You?

Staking is simply a DeFi staple. It locks assets and takes them disconnected the market, which benefits each different holders and the task successful general. In Moonbirds, the process is called “nesting,” and “the longer you nest your Moonbird, the much rewards you’ll accumulate.” What rewards exactly? That’s not yet clear. And the nesting process is not yet available. 

However, the Moonbirds tract already lists definite characteristics. Nesting volition beryllium “non-custodial (no request to transportation it to different contract) and the holder numbers displayed connected OpenSea etc volition not beryllium impacted.” Those stats are precise important for NFT projects. Holders can’t merchantability their NFTs portion nesting, but they tin transportation them. “The intent is to let holders to determination their Moonbirds betwixt their ain accounts, e.g. if they compromise their wallet via a rogue signature.”

There’s besides this vague promise, “as soon arsenic your Moonbird is nested, they’ll statesman to accrue further benefits. As full nested clip accumulates, you’ll spot your Moonbird execute caller tier levels, upgrading their nest.”

Controversy. Of Course.

For the level of occurrence that the Moonbirds accomplished, the contention astir them is beauteous mild. The archetypal 2 aren’t the Proof Collective’s fault, and the 3rd 1 is beauteous modular practice. Let’s spell done them:

  • Their raffle got deed with a Sybil Attack. That means, a idiosyncratic oregon enactment created much than 400 wallets to get arsenic galore tickets, oregon chances to triumph a whitelist. They earned much than 50 spots. This Twitter idiosyncratic unveiled the full thing:

Looks similar idiosyncratic created 400+ accounts to Sybil Attack the @moonbirds_xyz raffle:https://t.co/HeWT5d8DCP

They’ve already sold the bulk it looks like. Just astatine a speedy glimpse they won 20+

One example:https://t.co/UTqYWRkgsG pic.twitter.com/szgJGT5JXO

— zachxbt (@zachxbt) April 16, 2022

  • According to The Next Web, they recovered “at slightest 10 hacked Twitter accounts crossed countries ranging from athletes to politicians posting scammy links that pb you to a fake Moonbirds website. ”Their purpose was to get the unsuspecting assemblage to nonstop them ETH successful hopes of getting a non-existent Moonbird. When pressed, 1 of the Proof Collective founders said, “Oh the spam is terrible! We’re doing everything we tin to incorporate it. Lots of atrocious actors doing their play.”

Oh the spam is terrible! We’re doing everything we tin to incorporate it. Lots of atrocious actors doing their play. This wasn’t task disapproval (which is of people valid) truthful overmuch arsenic gatekeeping which projects merit designation oregon success.

— Justin Mezzell (🥃,🦉) (@JustinMezzell) April 19, 2022

  • The NFT Ethics relationship did its champion to onslaught the Moonbirds project, but each they could bash was impeach the Proof Collective of lavation trading to pump up the terms for their different NFT task and of gifting those memberships to influencers, “GaryVee (Gennady), his member AJ, Beeple and immoderate aged friends received the Proof corporate for free.”

1/ Some radical contacted america to inquire our sentiment connected @moonbirds_xyz that is minting time for 2.5 ETH, which would instrumentality retired much than 75 cardinal USD retired of the ecosystem. As usual, galore are acrophobic to talk retired due to the fact that they don't privation to offend "powerful" Web3/NFT influencers/VCs. pic.twitter.com/YXvAqs8mwn

— NFT Ethics (@NFTethics) April 15, 2022

Hardly thing to constitute location about. On the adjacent “Blue Chip NFTs 101” we’ll instrumentality a look astatine the enactment down the Moonbirds, the Proof Collective, and their different NFT project. A rank to the influential group. It mightiness beryllium the NFT with the astir invaluable inferior to date.

Feature Image Moonbirds illustration from the authoritative website | Charts by TradingView
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