Dear Bankless Nation,

In my first years in the cryptoeconomy I remember feeling that because my professional work was so technical, it would always be totally separate from my personal creative work.

Then NFTs kicked off Web3’s current cultural bull run, the beginning of which I personally trace back to circa Jan. 2020.

Since then, we’ve seen a surge of creative projects demonstrate how to use smart contract innovations toward a range of cultural ends, and it’s made this space tremendously funner!

So I say let’s keep embracing the fun factor. That’s how NFTs really take over the world.

-WMP

🛒 NFT News & Platforms

• Etherscan launched an NFT display UI:

• Gem, an NFT marketplace aggregator, added a Sweep Mode functionality.
• OpenSea launched OpenSea Ventures, the company’s new investment arm.
• Urbit, behind Urbit IDs, is launching its own layer-two (L2) rollup.
• x2y2, a new NFT marketplace, began a vampire attack on OpenSea.

🏆 Digital Collectibles

• Blitmaps updated its marketplace aggregator to support Blitmaps and Blitnauts.
• CryptoPunk 5822 sold for a record 8k ETH this past weekend:

• Dope Wars just accounted for the highest NFT sale on the Optimism L2 to date as one of its Cobra characters just sold on Quixotic for 2.35 ETH.
• sartoshi, the founder of mfers, published an explainer covering the project’s rise.

• ZENFT, the bonsai-themed VR NFT collection, introduced its Forest Spirits expansion.

🎨 Cryptoart

• Drift is auctioning a never before seen Where My Vans Go piece through Sotheby’s:

• Sotheby’s is also auctioning off one of the fabled editional claim cards to artist Robbie Barrat’s AI Generated Nude Portrait #7, the work at the center of the “Lost Robbies” story.
• SHL0Ms, a conceptual artist and crypto-dadaist, introduced the $CAR project:

🎮 NFT Games

• The Axie DAO is growing:

• Cool Cats is working on bringing its new game elements back online.

💽 Music

• oshi is releasing ample time through Sound today.
• Snoop Dogg is turning historic hip-hop record label Death Row Records into “an NFT label.”

🌐 Virtual Worlds

• Cryptovoxels started listing parcels for its new Comet suburb.
• Metakey unveiled its HQ in Decentraland.
• The Sandbox is hosting a Retrograming Game Jam at the end of February.

💎 DeFi x NFTs

• Sushi is considering launching Sushimi, a 10k PFP NFT project.
• Muse DAO:I missed this earlier this month, but I wanted to note that the project’s Open NFT API beta is now live.

Action steps

• 📺 Watch Are music NFTs the future? by Overpriced JPEGs
• 🧹 Read How to sweep NFT floors by Bankless
• 🗜️ Read Cool NFT tools | Q1 2021 by Metaversal
• 🌐 Read The metaverse land tax by Metaversal