Welcome! This is the first of many ‘decentralised’ newsletters by the Alpha33 team. We are a group of NFT enthusiasts from all over the world (6 continents to be exact) who share a common love of JPEGs, and wish to give back to the community that brought us here. Enjoy!
Project #1 - Doodles
Contributor: @chris_sirise
Mint Date: 18 Oct 2021
Mint Price: 0.123 ETH
Opensea | Discord | Twitter
Analysis
The team has worked in companies that have produced highly successful products and communities, such as Dapper Labs, Snapchat and Kabam Games. They are fully doxxed and active in the discord community. It is clear they have the right background to run this project professionally, including navigating the regulatory climate around utility tokens and DAOs which have been a trending topic in the NFT space and definitely something to be watched about if you are looking to hold NFTs long term.
I personally find the art style very attractive and easily received by a mainstream audience, yet distinct enough to build a brand around. The community is in its nascent stages, but so far the discord has been extremely lively and positive. The project had high reach at launch and many influencers in the NFT space bought in at the start.
The floor has remained steady between the 0.8-1 ETH range for the first 3 days, while the holder ratio has been trending well, increasing from around 30% to now more than 42% unique holders (4.2k out of 10k). As of the time of this writing, the floor has increased significantly to 1.8 ETH. Holding a price above mint and increasing unique holders are both definitely positive data points that the project is doing well in its initial days.
Potential Risks
Unfortunately the team has not revealed a detailed roadmap yet. There has been clear communication that a lot of work is going on behind the scenes and there will be some clarity given soon. However, given the uncertainty around how regulators and Opensea might view DAOs and utility tokens in the long run, the team is being careful about how they build out the project. This is a net positive as it is a good sign that the team is building for the long term.
At time of mint, up to 5 transactions were allowed. This caused the project to start with many holders having multiple copies. As of time of writing, there are 1.9k doodles on sale in Opensea. This large number is likely because minters who have multiple copies are selling off some for immediate profit. On the flip side, there has been sufficient demand to keep the price floor stable and above the mint price still, plus holder count has been increasing.
If the team puts together a strong roadmap, this project has all the right ingredients to be a good long term hold.
Project #2 - Brush Strokes by 0xCulture
Contributor: @thryec
Mint Date: 15 October 2021
Mint Price: 0.05 ETH
Mint Count: 1111
Links: Opensea | Discord | Twitter
Analysis
Brush Strokes is the genesis project of 0xCulture (referred to as 0x from here), a software programmer-turned-NFT artist. Genesis holders will have a say in the curation of 0x’s future projects, as well as the collections of other artists that they intend to onboard onto the platform, and have preferential access to these new drops.
Brush Strokes were created using a generative script that took in a seed derived from your wallet address, with the images stored in IPFS. The minting process was probably one of the best we’ve witnessed out there (and we’ve minted a lot), and 0x put in a great deal of work to make sure that the mint was not overrun by bots.
The TLDR of the minting process is:
Input your wallet address into Discord using a bot to generate two unique values, a nonce and a signature
Input these two values into the Mint function on the smart contract, together with the mint price
Mint would only succeed if the signature and nonce matched the wallet address that was used
This process not only prevented bots but also reduced the frequency of minting, thus avoiding gas wars in the process.
Brush Strokes is only the first part of 0x’s larger plan (known at point of writing as The Culture Project) to influence and create culture in the NFT world. They intend for it to be a ‘platform that propels the works of all types of artists and creatives such as painters, musicians, clothing brands, sculptors, and everything in between’, for both the physical and digital worlds.
The Discord has really good vibes with people helping one another out with questions, discussing the art, and interacting with 0x, who genuinely cares about his community and takes the time to listen and respond to feedback. We also have an AMA channel where members are free to post questions, and the responses from 0x have been extremely detailed and informative.
Potential Risks
As a one-man team, 0x may face operational challenges in the future when they plan to expand the project to include more artists and collections and possibly have a larger community to manage. For the genesis drop, 0x single-handedly managed everything from the smart contract, marketing, and discord community, and thanks to their hard work everything went without a hitch, but it could have been a challenge if unforeseen issues had arisen. Juggling all of this along with a day job (for now at least) is an extremely challenging endeavour, and could put a strain on 0x’s capacity in the long term. Please do not take any of this as doubt in 0x’s commitment and capabilities, we have great confidence in their ability to deliver, and wish to provide a responsible view on the longevity of the project.
Overall we would say that 0xCulture is building something really special here, and we’re thrilled to be along for the ride. Can’t wait to see what he has in store for the future!
Project #3 - Superlative Secret Society (SSS)
Contributor: @c___hello
Mint Date: 22 September 2021
Mint Price: 0.079 + Gas
Links: Opensea | Discord | Twitter
About
Superlative Secret Society (SSS) is one of those projects that floor price has consistently picked up even in this bear market. A collection of 11,111 NFT’s that offers holders utility, both in the metaverse and the real world.
Team
The Initiator @prasdiman (https://twitter.com/prasdiman) - Creative direction and project management.
The Artist, @Witjk (https://twitter.com/AriefWitjaksana). Artist, visionary and visual storyteller.
The Technician, @the_bot. Backend, smart contracts and servers.
The Speaker, @goddamnft (https://twitter.com/goddamnft). Marketing and community management.
Highlight: Community, art and real life utility. One highlight is the build out of an art gallery based in Bali, Indonesia.
Project development: Real life gallery being built out, merchandise on the way
Analysis
One of the challenges that were faced during the launch of this project was how the smart contract was written in a way that rewarded early minters with the rare NFTs. Many felt that it was unfair and the team has responded that it was a clear oversight on their end. The “Repus” will be airdropped later on in the year to make up for this oversight.
I believe one of SSS’ greatest strength is in its community. Ever since I joined their Discord (when they were at 5,000+ members), I’ve observed that their community is made of people who truly enjoy art. It was also the community that believed in them when their project dropped below to 0.06 floor price (flippers have mostly left and FP has been fluctuating between 0.25 to 0.45). You can also see strong engagement within community members — where members are welcoming new joiners by “designing” SSS onto other PFP projects.
The team is currently focused on building the gallery in Bali, and that will take some time. Apart from that, I sense that merchandise will most likely be released soon. Community members are already making derivatives and selling their ideas since they have full ownership to their SSS NFT.
Potential Risks
Some of their roadmap does promise real life utility that might be difficult to achieve. A physical gallery seems like a lot of work compared to Metaverse gallery — from operational costs to tax implications. 15ETH towards community fund sounds like a lot but to maintain a gallery that is world-class - that would take up money! How would they be able to find additional streams of income to maintain the this utility?
Upcoming: “Repus” drop and gallery opening
Overall: Genuinely like this project. The team is working on the project full time, and I see that it has an appeal different to other PFP projects. The unique number of ownership is increasing (currently over 50%) and I believe it will continue to thrive in this crowded market.
Phew, that was pretty long
If you have made it to the end, thank you for reading! We appreciate YOU, and hope that you’ve found at least some part of it useful. Come chat with us about NFTs on Twitter! Catch y’all in the next one, WGMI <3
Disclaimer: None of the above is financial advice. Please do your own research and invest responsibly.