Paper 55: $8 to $2,600 In 30 days
This article may or may not be notable
GM - this is the BCheque Papers, edition #55.
Welcome to the 31 new subscribers this week - we are at 1,381 subscribers now!
I write about NFTs/crypto, and trying to make it independently in web3.
This is what we’ve got this week:
This Week In NFT World - The English Premier League Joins
Risk On - Checks: $8 to $2,600 In 30 days
Creator Corner - Write With Me
On The Horizon - Coworking, Staking, NFT Data
For sponsorship enquires, please DM me on Twitter.
Have a great day,
B
This Week in NFT World - The English Premier League Joins
The English Premier League partners with Sorare
Football fans around the world can now collect, buy, sell, and trade officially licensed digital cards featuring every player from across the Premier League’s 20 clubs.
This is huge news: The English Premier League is the most watched league in the whole world.
Yuga Labs loses co-founder Gordon Goner
Yuga Labs cofounder, Gordon Goner, has been diagnosed with congestive heart failure so will step away for some time to focus on his health.
Yuga Labs was started in 2021 with the Bored Ape collection, and since then has become the premier NFT collection holding a $1b+ marketcap.
Famous Fortnite players crush Dookey Dash
Mongraal, who has 2.1M followers on Twitter, posted a super high score on Dookey Dash, Yuga Labs’ Web 3 game which has taken Twitter by storm.
In essence the successful formula for this game is: extreme social status on Twitter + very high valued prizes = internet people will aggressively play to win.
Grant Yun achieves an all-time-high 70 ETH ($110,000) primary sale
This piece was sold by the Art of This Millenium Gallery who now represent some of the biggest artists in the space.
Ness Graphics earns $2M from open edition drop
The Ness Graphics open edition was minted 20,357 times.
This raised 1,400 ETH ($2.27M)
Ness then introduced a burn mechanic where holders could burn 5 NFTs to get hold of a rarer NFT. The results of that burn are below:
More open editions succeed
The Dangiuz open edition was minted 9,152 times. This raised 631 ETH ($1.02M)
The Victor Mosquerar open edition was minted 3,250 times. This raised 224 ETH ($363K)
The Mad Dog Jones open edition was minted 4,532 editions times. This raised 448 ETH ($704,000).
Pace announce exhibition with Tyler Hobbs
Pace, one of the most established galleries in the world, has announced a New York exhibition with Tyler Hobbs.
It will include 12 paintings, based on QQLs (an NFT collection which I wrote about months ago here) that Tyler is minting himself.
Chimpers announce “Adventuring”
Chimpers, the NFT company who have partnered with Paramount and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle IP, announced a boardgame-style game for holders to play.
Adventuring is the gateway to the The Board Ape Chronicles Series 2: “The Quest for the Ancient Chronicles”, and the first ever story about the Chimpers.
The artist, Tjo, made his contribution to Punk 6529’s Meme Card collection. He donated $64k to support nonprofit organizations addressing mental health challenges.
It is trading at 0.75 ETH ($1,250) after a 0.06529 ETH ($110) mint.
Risk On - Checks: $8 to $2,600 In 30 days
Checks have gone from an $8 mint to $2,600 (325x) in one month.
This is what you need to know - and how you could have spotted this opportunity.
The Who
Jack Butcher does not define himself in his Twitter bio.
My attempt to describe: an internet entrepreneur who laconically communicates business and life advice via a minimalist digital aesthetic.
My favourite Jack Butcher visual from his website
He has 240k Twitter followers; and his business, Visualize Value, has 361k followers.
It is not an understatement to say that the creative output from Visualize Value is enjoyed by - and genuinely useful to - hundreds of thousands of people the world over.
The What
Checks began with this tweet: a single piece of artwork captioned "This artwork may or may not be notable".
It was priced at $8 per edition, a nod to how Twitter has commoditised its verification process.
The edition was sold for 24 hours only, and was bought 16,031 times: this is the total supply of Checks. For now….
There is a burn function planned where the supply will be reduced as different types of Checks are born.
The ultimate Check is the Black Check - which would require 4096 Checks to be burned. At current market value that is approximately $6.7M (the below tweet was written when Checks were cheaper.)
Schmrypto, the largest Check holder and a friend of mine, thinks there will be a Black Check by the summer (discussed in a Twitter Spaces last night).
There are serious discussions being had and DAOs being formed in order to try to make it happen.
(A quick sidenote on Schmrypto’s conviction in the project via some analysis by Lowes, the founder of NFTGo. Stone cold conviction!)
And in the words of the top holder himself who has declined CryptoPunk trade offers:
The Why
Beyond the Black Check, there are other reasons why people like this project.
I share some select insights from Michael and Luke (with whom I agree) who are closer to the project than me.
a) The project combines “mechanics, game theory, a proven creator, and strong art.”
b) Appeal of the art
c) Appeal of the tech
d) Appeal to degenerates (!)
e) Appeal to the mainstream
f) Appeal to status
The ironic thing about this commentary on status in the online world is that owning Checks will (or least appears to) equate to status in the online world.
As with most physical possessions - and physical expressions of self - in the real world, digital ownership communicates to the world who we are and, perhaps more importantly, who we want to be.
Anything which taps into this human nature - and combines the factors mentioned above - will do well.
Derivatives
One of the key indicators of a successful project to me is the number of organically created derivatives.
This is an awesome video compilation of just some of the derivatives, and another couple of examples from Budweiser and Lil Nouns.
I hope that was a helpful introduction to Checks with some useful analysis.
If you want more information on the project and when the burn will commence, Jack Butcher himself is always posting updates to the project in a great example of building in public in this Checks megathread.
I extend my thanks to Schmrypto, Luke Weaver and Michael Rippe for helping me in DMs to get up to speed.
Creator Corner - Write With Me
It’s difficult to carve out time to concentrate on one thing in this space.
We are bombarded from left and right with distractions: from the seduction of life changing trades every five minutes to being online around the clock working with people around the world.
I want to create a space in time where people can centre themselves, focus on one thing, and produce something quality without distraction.
As such, I will be streaming the writing process of this newsletter next week on Thursday at 8AM - 11AM ET.
(Unfortunately I had some tech issues this week which meant I couldn’t go live as planned, but I will get that sorted for next week - apologies to those who were waiting and I hope you got the message!)
The plan is to see “behind the scenes, chill, and co-concentrate” on something for 3 hours.
Sometimes I believe it’s just nicer to do things together in a space where we are often flying solo.
If you’d like to join me you can find me here next Thursday writing the latest edition of this newsletter.
On The Horizon - Coworking, Staking, NFT Data
Wednesday Coworking - I look forward to hang out and work with my talented, ambitious and hard working Web3 friends every Wednesday in The Barbican, London. If you’d like to join me one day, DM me.
I am reading a great deal on ETH staking (locking up Ether to earn more ETH as interest). I am currently assessing Rocketpool and Lido as “easier” options for less technical people. If ETH is successful - which I think it has a good chance of being - then return on ETH will be markedly higher now than in future when relatively more people will lockup their ETH for a return.
This is such a brilliant dashboard by hildobby which has loads of great NFT market data. Definitely check it out - will be spending more time in here.
Have a great day,
B
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Disclaimer: The content covered in this newsletter is not to be considered as investment advice. It is for informational and educational purposes only.
I hold some of the NFTs mentioned in these newsletters.
A good job well-done fam