The ambition of NFT PASS: to become the "Centurion Card" of the crypto world

Written by: 0xLaughing, Rhythm BlockBeats

In the movie "007: Casino Royale," James Bond, without any reservation, simply presented a black card, and the staff at a luxury hotel in the Bahamas immediately escorted him to a top suite. Without the need for words or lavish attire, the moment the staff saw the black card, they realized that the customer standing before them was "extraordinary."

The black card launched by American Express

In reality, the black card usually refers to the Centurion Card, the highest-tier black credit card issued by American Express since 1999. It is targeted at the elite, with no credit limit, and its cardholders are often government officials, billionaires, and social elites from various countries, invited to apply by American Express, with no applications accepted. There are many legends about the black card, such as turning planes around or stopping trains, but most have not been verified, which is also a testament to the issuing organization's confidentiality regarding customer privacy. What is certain is that cardholders can enjoy the world's top exclusive privileges, rights, and services, which is the main reason it is sought after by the powerful.

Shifting from reality to the world of NFTs, purchasing a PASS card issued by a community to enjoy the rights it brings is no longer a novelty. However, the benefits provided by various communities to cardholders vary greatly, and NFT players are eager for top-tier rights and quality information to maximize their investment efficiency, yet they are held back by the scarcity of blue-chip projects in the NFT PASS space.

In fact, with the recent launches of Moonbirds, 0xOG PASS, and Premint Collector Pass this month, a closer look at the NFT PASS space reveals that it has long been bubbling beneath the surface.

Moonbirds: Expansion of the "Whale Club"

Moonbirds avatar

Since its launch on April 16, in just a week, the Moonbirds project, featuring pixelated cartoon owls, has seen trading volume exceed 110k ETH on OpenSea, with its floor price skyrocketing from the initial sale price of 2.5 ETH to a high of 37 ETH. The tremendous success of Moonbirds NFT in such a short time can be attributed to the strong background and operational capabilities of the PROOF team behind it.

PROOF Background

PROOF Collective has a team with rich experience, and its founders Kevin Rose, Ryan Carson, and Justin Mezzell are well-known figures in the Web2 and Web3 fields, with their information publicly available on LinkedIn.

Kevin Rose is a partner at the venture capital firm True Ventures and has hosted many podcasts related to technology and crypto; his PROOF podcast led to the establishment of the Proof Collective club. Ryan Carson is the founder of three companies and a non-profit community. Justin Mezzell was a freelance illustrator/designer before joining PROOF, with clients including Google, Facebook, Twitter, PayPal, NASA, and The New York Times.

The Proof Collective club is a group of 1,000 NFT collectors, including well-known artists like Beeple (Mike Winkelmann) and investors like Gary Vaynerchuk.

The number of blue-chip NFTs held by PROOF Collective club members is astonishing

According to data released by the PROOF Collective official website, club members collectively own over 150,000 NFTs, 148 CryptoPunks, 817 BAYC, 499 Meebits, 5,288 Art Blocks, and 326 SuperRare 1:1 NFT artworks. These numbers are enough to prove that the PROOF community is indeed a "Whale Club."

Moonbirds triggered a surge in PROOF Collective NFT (Source: NFTGo.io)

PROOF Collective NFT is a community token founded by Kevin Rose, and holders can enjoy various rights within the community. Its floor price has been consolidating around 30 ETH since early February. On March 19, Moonbirds' official Twitter account posted its first tweet, which triggered a price surge for PROOF Collective NFT. In the following month, the price skyrocketed, and the current floor price has reached an astonishing 130 ETH.

However, the price surge has not deterred investors from continuing to purchase PROOF Collective NFTs, as they believe it can bring high-quality rights, including the whitelist for Moonbirds.

High-Quality Rights

First of all, in this Moonbirds sale, 2,000 Moonbirds were allocated as a "benefit" for holders of Proof Collective NFTs, allowing each Proof Collective NFT holder to directly mint 2, while another 7,875 were allocated to lottery winners, and the remaining 125 were reserved for the Moonbirds team.

It is believed that some investors came for this "benefit," quickly profiting after participating in these NFT transactions. A simple calculation shows that if you bought a PROOF Collective NFT at the floor price of around 37 ETH on March 19, after deducting the 5 ETH cost for minting 2 Moonbirds, your net profit would be around 157 ETH.

Another group of investors is more focused on the long-term rights of Moonbirds:

1. Moonbirds holders can enter PROOF's private Discord to participate in closed meetings, but it is currently unclear what the real benefits of these closed meetings are and whether there are differences in access rights between the two NFTs.
2. Moonbirds holders can earn rewards through "Nesting." This differs from traditional "staking"; as long as holders do not transfer or sell their Moonbirds and keep them in their wallets, the system will allocate rewards based on the holding duration.
3. Moonbirds holders will have priority access to the upcoming metaverse project codenamed "Project Highrise" from PROOF.

Market Making and Manipulation

Twitter account NFT Ethics revealed that there may be "wash trading" and "nepotism" in PROOF Collective NFT

As the launch date of Moonbirds approached, the strong background of the team and the high sale price became hot topics of discussion in various NFT communities. The day before its launch, the well-known Twitter account NFT Ethics, which had previously exposed insider information about multiple NFT projects like HypeBears and CerealClub, posted several tweets questioning whether the team behind Moonbirds had engaged in "wash trading" with PROOF Collective NFTs: many wallets only held PROOF Collective NFTs, and there were instances of NFTs being sold back and forth between these wallets, creating a "false prosperity" that drove up the prices of this series of NFTs.

NFT Ethics stated: "Wash trading is so common in NFT projects that it is no longer even worth noting."

Indeed, this revelation did not seem to affect the subsequent launch of Moonbirds, as each publicly available Moonbird was minted at a price of 2.5 ETH, and the price subsequently soared.

Kevin Rose stated that there are bots that automatically protect the floor price

Behind the price surge, is it the investors' recognition of Moonbirds' value, or is the PROOF team still manipulating the market through "wash trading" to inflate prices? A tweet from PROOF co-founder Kevin Rose seems to respond to this matter:

1. Once a holder lists their Moonbirds on the trading market, regardless of whether it sells, the "Nesting" status will be canceled. This means that if holders have the inclination to sell, they cannot receive the rewards from "Nesting." The team has set up bots that will automatically purchase any Moonbirds listed below the current floor price.
2. The team hopes to use these mechanisms to incentivize and manipulate, cultivating holders into "diamond hands." Players who bought Moonbirds at a low price can indeed flip them for quick profits, but the PROOF team hopes they can become long-term holders.

The "Shovel" Combination of PASS + PFP

In the DeFi space, to participate in liquidity mining, one must first provide a single token like USDT or an LP for ETH-USDT to mine; here, USDT or LP serves as the "shovel," which users use to mine for token rewards.

Extending this to the NFT space, for example, BAYC holders can receive airdrops of ApeCoin and land, making BAYC the "shovel." By holding a specific series of NFTs, one can gain related airdrops or priority rights for subsequent NFT series, thus the originally held NFTs become the "shovel."

The PROOF team has positioned PROOF Collective NFTs as the "shovel," with Moonbirds' priority purchase rights as rewards, thereby expanding the mid-tier players of the "Whale Club," while Moonbirds, as a PFP, enhances the sense of community belonging for original holders, significantly strengthening the interactivity between projects.

0xOG: The Top NFT Incubator

Opening the 0xStudio official website, its self-introduction states, "An artist-first brand incubator that serves and grows within Web3." If you are familiar with 3landers, you should not be unfamiliar with 0xStudio.

Directly Obtain Priority Rights for Incubated Projects

0xOG PASS designed by artist SeerLight

0xStudio was initially known as the incubator for 3landers, and on April 8, the team officially announced the launch of 0xOG PASS, an art-centric membership pass that allows holders to directly obtain priority rights for projects incubated by 0xStudio. Holders of 0xOG PASS can directly mint 1 NFT in the "first phase" of all projects subsequently incubated by 0xStudio.

Professional Incubation Services

Services provided by 0xStudio

0xStudio offers services including smart contract customization, end-to-end NFT solutions, and token economics design, while placing great emphasis on security and transparency. The two smart contract standards they launched, "0xStandard" and "Wagyu," have passed audits by Inspex, and all subsequent incubated projects will be built on these audited smart contracts.

On January 14, 3landers announced it would be incubated by 0xStudio

Currently, both in terms of market price and influence, 3landers has entered the second-tier blue-chip category. Beyond its artistic value, the team's capabilities have built a strong reputation for it. Looking back at the entire launch process of 3landers, it is evident that the services provided by 0xStudio have consistently safeguarded its success, from Twitter promotion to the formation of the Discord community, and finally to the launch of the official website. The professional incubation capabilities of 0xStudio are a necessary part of 3landers' success, and the success of 3landers has also established a good reputation for 0xStudio; they complement each other.

Also a "shovel," unlike PROOF providing "one-stop services" for its sub-series, 0xStudio has a cooperative relationship with the projects it incubates rather than a subordinate one, which gives the community token 0xOG PASS more compatibility.

Innovative Launch Method

Distribution method for 1,000 0xOG PASS

0xOG PASS adopts a Two-Step Drop launch method, with a launch price of 1.8 ETH. In the initial phase, only 280 will circulate (100 for public sale, 80 airdropped to early supporters of 0xStudio, and 100 reserved for future collaborators with 0xStudio), while the remaining 720 will be sold in subsequent phases, with one 0xOG PASS available for minting every 6 hours until all 1,000 PASS are completely minted.

The floor price of 0xOG PASS has risen to 10.5 ETH

"We believe that excellent teams must prove themselves over time." The 0xStudio team hopes to use this innovative NFT launch method to allow investors to decide for themselves whether they are willing to join them over time, rather than forcing people to take risks for 0xStudio's future success right now. "We are not in a hurry to sell; we are more focused on organic growth." This approach allows the community to develop slowly and healthily, growing together with the team.

Projects incubated by 0xStudio

The relationship between projects and incubators is always complementary. The success of 3landers has proven that 0xStudio has strong incubation capabilities, and investors choose to purchase 0xOG PASS because they believe this team can still incubate many excellent projects like 3landers, allowing this "shovel" to continuously generate returns. 0xStudio is currently incubating another excellent NFT project, "LonelyPop," and synchronously launching its 0xOG PASS at this time is a very smart move, as it can further stimulate investors' desire to purchase PASS and continuously expand its influence.

Premint: Lottery Machine and Advertising Space

The first tweet about Premint

On October 16 last year, Premint's founder Brenden Mulligan posted the first tweet about Premint on his personal Twitter, stating, "It has basic functionality but is much better than Google Docs." The product was originally positioned as a Web3.0 lottery tool, addressing the pain points of NFT players and project parties in conducting lotteries/verification at that time.

From the perspective of NFT players, Premint is a platform that guides users through the lottery process, allowing users to complete steps such as following the project party on Twitter, joining the official Discord, and filling in addresses on a single page. From the perspective of NFT project parties, they no longer need to develop their own lottery systems, saving time and technical costs; Premint can help project parties collect addresses, verify funds, automate lottery results, and attract followers.

Premint has accumulated a large number of users

In just half a year, Premint has accumulated a large user base: over 2,300 projects have used PREMINT to manage their whitelist lotteries, with a total of over 1.8 million entries registered across various projects, and over 500,000 wallets have connected to PREMINT to participate in lotteries.

At this time, Premint, not satisfied with its existing functionality, chose to launch a PASS token with higher-end services and features, divided into two categories: one for NFT players and one for project parties.

Excellent Lottery Tool

A minimalist lottery interface

The Premint Collector Pass, aimed at NFT players, has a total of 10,000, and its price has risen from the initial sale price of 0.25 ETH to around 2.5 ETH. Holders can enjoy the following rights:

1. Track popular projects
2. Automatically recommend lottery activities based on held NFTs
3. Priority participation in testing new features on the Premint website
4. Customize a personalized calendar displaying registration and minting times for all projects on the platform
5. Subscribe to a collector's weekly newsletter to understand recent trends in NFT projects
6. Use trading royalties to subsidize holders, allowing them to purchase NFTs at discounted prices
7. Obtain exclusive purchase rights for special releases

Self-Traffic "Advertising Space"

The transaction volume and price of Premint Creator Pass have risen simultaneously

The Premint Creator Pass, aimed at project parties, is more like a consumable. The Premint platform has a free lottery feature, but it is quite limited and only suitable for small lottery events. If project parties want to launch a new, larger project lottery on the Premint platform, they need to purchase a Premint Creator Pass from the Premint official and consume it. Its sale price has also risen with the NFT market's popularity, from the initial 0.25 ETH to 1 ETH, meaning that project parties now need to pay 1 ETH as "advertising fees" to launch a lottery event on Premint, thereby enjoying more advanced lottery features provided by the Premint platform, such as verifying the Discord identity of lottery users and setting wallet balance thresholds for lottery participants.

Potential Issues

As a tool-based project's PASS token, its current functionality may have relatively low user retention. Firstly, for NFT players, what they need most is the platform's convenient lottery features, which are not proprietary. The cost of switching to a new lottery platform tool is very low for Premint users. Secondly, for each project party, most will have a long interval before launching another project; with the emergence of subsequent competitors, the saturation of related NFT projects, and potential traffic loss, the revenue brought by "advertising space" for the platform will continue to decline. Therefore, how to deepen the low-threshold "moat" is a question worth considering.

Conclusion

The recent launches of several NFT PASS tokens have been very successful, leveraging their advantages in resources, information, capital, technology, and traffic to explore their respective niche markets. They seem to have no competitive relationship, yet they continuously vie for heat and funds within the market. In this wave of unpredictable NFT markets, there is both downward compatibility of the "Whale Club" PASS and the wild growth of low-threshold tool PASS from the bottom up, but they ultimately share the same ambition: to become the "Centurion Card" of the crypto world.