Billboard and Universal Music Group Partner to Launch Flow-Based NFT Collectibles

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UFC Partners With Dapper Labs to Launch NFT Collection ‘UFC Strike’

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LÜM to launch ‘Access Pass’ NFTs for 25 globally known musicians

January 13, 2022 Coin Telegraph

“We really wanted to model ourselves off NBA Top Shot. A community that was building collective value by bringing players underneath an individual umbrella,” said LÜM CEO and Founder Max Fergus.

U.S.-based music platform LÜM is set to announce 25 partnerships with globally known musicians as part of a re-launch involving NBA Top Shot’s Dapper Labs later this quarter.

LÜM was founded in 2018 and built up a user base of more than 200,000 users with a platform that provided services such as social media, music streaming and micro-tipping for its partnered musicians and fans.

The firm has raised around $4.4 million worth of funding since 2018 according to data from Crunchbase, and partnered with popular R&B singer-songwriter Ne-Yo back in 2020.

However, LÜM is now moving on fro that business model and is relaunching on Dapper Labs’ Flow blockchain in March with the focus shifting to musician-related NFTs.

LÜM will initially roll out an NFT marketplace and fan engagement platform alongside NFTs dubbed “Access Passes.”

“When designing our First Fan Access Passes, every detail was taken into account.

We wanted to create something that felt exclusive, collectible, but looked & felt functional. Something fans will cherish but could expect to use IRL and in the future music metaverse.”#MusicNFT pic.twitter.com/pnOmfaS7OX
— LÜM (@lum_xyz) January 12, 2022

Users of the platform will be able to buy NFTs tied to their favorite musicians and trade them amongst a community of fans, while long term hodlers will be granted rewards such as priority access to artists’ future NFT drops, exclusive content and live entertainment experiences.

Musicians will be able to build their communities and launch their own Access Passes which can be used to crowdfund projects such as new album releases. It does not require artists to sign away any rights or intellectual property to middlemen according to LÜM.

Aim to onboard 100 artists in 2022

Speaking with Cointelegraph, LÜM CEO and founder Max Fergus was tight-lipped on who the 25 artists will be for the launch but indicated the wider goal is to onboard 100 top musicians in 2022 to “catalyze the mass adoption of blockchain-enabled technology by artists, and fans”, while the long term aim is to partner with more than 10,000 musicians.

Fergus stated that LÜM chose to partner with Dapper Labs and launch on Flow due to the successful and user-friendly model of other NFTs projects on the blockchain such as NBA Top Shot:

“For us, we really wanted to model ourselves off NBA Top Shot. A community that was building collective value by bringing players underneath an individual umbrella.”

NBA Top Shot is the top NFT project on Flow, and has generated more than $848.3 million worth of secondary sales since launch in late 2020 according to data from CryptoSlam.

Fergus stated that LÜM’s shift to the blockchain was part of a push to get behind “revolutionary” Web3 tech and he believes the sector's impact on the music industry will be as revolutionary as going from vinyl records to online streaming.

“I would put it on a very similar level to that. It's an entirely new way of not just experiencing artists and music but a new way of opening up the total addressable market.”

Fergus stated that a major issue he sees in the music industry right now is “ individual creators trying to monetize their individual fan base,” as he emphasized the importance of introducing a blockchain-based platform that links different communities together.

“By unifying artists underneath an umbrella, we cannot only cross-pollinate fanbases but easily introduce the blockchain community into artists that maybe they've never even known before,” he said.

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November 11, 2021 Bitcoin.com

Flow integrates Filecoin storage services to make NFTs more decentralized

October 15, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Blockchain storage

Filecoin has become the official storage partner of the Flow Blockchain, with the firm working to provide decentralized storage for NFTs minted on Dapper Lab's network.

Filecoin has officially become the storage collaborator for the Flow Blockchain.

Filecoin said in an Oct. 13 announcement that the move was a part of a push to ensure holders' and issuers' NFTs are "securely available everywhere."

The announcement follows from a previous move in August in Which Dapper Labs was working to integrate Filecoin’s storage services with the Flow Blockchain.

The collaboration enables Flow users to mint NFTs, leverage InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) content addressing, and store the tokens in decentralized storage hosted by Filecoin.

According to Filecoin, IPFS content addressing is a solution to location addressing which retrieves online information from specific locations on the web, such as from behind URLs. Filecoin asserts that this method has “obvious downsides” as the data relies on centralized entities who own the locations, and therefore can “control the content.”

“In content-based addressing, content is no longer retrieved from single locations on the web. Rather, content is retrieved from any participating nodes on the IPFS network that have the content you’re requesting,” Filecoin outlined.

As part of the collaboration, Filecoin has also opened “Next Step Grants” worth $5,000 for each eligible NFT project on Flow that integrates with IPFS or Filecoin’s network.

“As the Flow ecosystem grows, Filecoin’s decentralized storage solution will allow future applications that are built on Flow to have an easy way to protect NFT media assets and metadata,” the announcement read.

It's happening! @Filecoin is the official storage collaborator #onFlow

⛓️ Immutable NFT metadata, including media assets, via @IPFS content addressing
Filecoin’s provable and decentralized storage

Full announcement https://t.co/iwEd1JpEVk
— Flow Blockchain (@flow_blockchain) October 14, 2021

Dapper launched the Flow Blockchain in late 2020, and the network is home to top NFT projects, including NBA Top Shot and CryptoKitties. September was a big month for Dapper, with the firm signing multiple partnerships with top firms, along with raising $250 million in funding.

Cointelegraph reported on Sept. 14 that Google had partnered with Dapper to serve as a network operator for Flow. Google signed on to support the development of Web 3.0 products and services such as NFT projects with “scalable” and “secure infrastructure.”

On Sept. 30, the NFL partnered with Dapper to launch an American football equivalent of NBA Top Shot on Flow, which is slated to drop later this year.

During the announcement of the $250 million funding round, Dapper outlined that the fresh capital will be used to fund further licensed NFT projects across sports, music and entertainment, along with scaling up its NBA Top Shot platform.

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CNN selling historic news ‘moments’ as NFTs

June 17, 2021 Coin Telegraph

CNN

CNN will drop NFTs depicting historic moments such as space travel, technological advancements, and presidential elections.

CNN has followed Fox and Time Magazine into the NFT market, announcing the launch of collectible historic moments from the news.

CNN’s NFT project is dubbed “Vault by CNN: Moments That Changed Us” and includes a series of tokenized iconic moments from its 41-year history, along with a vault to purchase, store and display the NFTs.

The news organization has not revealed which specific historic moments will be tokenized, however, it noted that themes including CNN exclusives, notable firsts, world history, and presidential elections, will be covered.

The initial launch will include six weekly drops starting from late June, with CNN teasing the first drops may depict space travel and election results. The NFTs will be sold in a combination of open and limited editions.

The NFTs will be minted on the Flow blockchain, which CNN chose for its energy-efficient proof-of-stake consensus mechanism. Flow is also home to NBA Top Shot, which has had huge success selling iconic sporting ‘moments’.

To purchase NFTs, users will need to sign up to CNN’s vault, where they will store their moments. Cryptocurrency is not be required to purchase, with the platform accepting credit cards via third-party payment platform Stripe. The vault’s description reads:

“Until now, there has been no way to 'collect' these moments. Users can often find old footage online, or packaged up in documentaries, but they cannot 'own' them or display them in the way they can with a print newspaper or magazine.”

CNN has also partnered with video framing firm Infinite Objects so that users will have the option of rendering their NFT onto a screen and displaying it physically offline. The vault’s description reads.

Interestingly CNN’s online archive already boasts 700,000 hours of news content that can already be purchased and downloaded without conferring 'ownership'.

Despite putting forward ownership as a value proposition of the NFTs, they note that “CNN retains copyright and ownership over the content.”

A growing number of news outlets and media organizations have entered the NFT market in 2021.

CNN’s move into NFTs follows Fox Corp’s announcement of a $100 million creative fund for NFT content creation yesterday to accompany its animated tv shows.

In late March, Time Magazine entered the market with three tokenized magazine covers on SuperRare, with the “TIME Space Exploration — January 19th, 1959” generating the biggest sale of 135 Ether (ETH) worth around $318,000 at today’s prices.

Since then, Time has dropped another seven NFTs depicting magazine covers, with the “TIME First Issue — March 3, 1923” fetching 120 ETH worth roughly $283,000 in June.

Dapper Labs-backed NFT avatar platform raises $65M in funding

May 4, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

Avatar developers Genies are set to launch an NFT marketplace on Flow later this year after closing a Series B funding round with $65 million.

Digital avatar developer, Genies, has raised $65 million to build an NFT marketplace for digital avatars on the Flow blockchain led by several heavyweight investors, including Flow’s developers, Dapper Labs.

SEC filings dated May 3 reveal the California-based company recently closed a $65 million Series B funding round led by investment firm Bond, alongside Coinbase Ventures, Tull Investment Group, Breyer Capital, and Dapper Labs.

The $65 million is slated to fund the development of Genies’ NFT Marketplace, which will allow users to create and trade tokenized avatars, in addition NFT clothing worn by the avatars. Genies expects to launch its marketplace in beta during the third quarter of this year.

In a tweet revealing the funding, Genies stated it hopes to become the single “virtual portable identity across the digital world,” offering users a means to express themselves within the virtual metaverse.

Genies launched in 2017, initially targeting for its avatars to be used on centralized social media and messaging platforms. On April 29, Genies announced it would be teaming up with Dapper Labs to launch a Genies marketplace on the Flow blockchain.

Move over NBA Top Shot @dapperlabs has a new pet project. The Genies Marketplace is on track for a beta release this summer⚡️https://t.co/Oui29g1sqa
— GENIES (@genies) April 28, 2021

In an interview with VentureBeat’s gaming division, Genies’ CEO, Akash Nigam, noted the firm is transitioning to target a broader audience after initially planning to offer celebrities customized avatars to use in the context of digital events and launches.

Nigam stated the platform will host simple and intuitive tools allowing kids as young as six to “create their own digital wearable and goods collection and then release it in the marketplace and sell to the masses as well.”

In March, Genies released a series of NFTs in March commemorating pro-soccer player Mesut Ozil’s move from Arsenal F.C to Galatasaray in the firm’s first foray into nonfungible tokens. The tokens were auctioned on Nifty Gateway, with Genies selling out of 518 tokens for $670 each, or roughly $347,000.

Flow blockchain

Aim to onboard 100 artists in 2022

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