Good day everyone,
I hope you are all well and having excellent day, welcome to CryptoGod-1’s blog on all things crypto. As I am sure those of you interested in the NFT space have heard, there was big news in terms of OpenSea royalties recently, and it has had a big knock on effect with the NFT collection Bored Apes Yacht Club (BAYC) and their creators, Yuga Labs.
OpenSea Announcement
In November 2022 the NFT Marketplace OpenSea made the announcement that they would be introducing a feature known as Operator Filter. This feature would allow creators to ensure any and all secondary sales of the NFTs could only occur on marketplaces that enforce creator royalties. However, OpenSea have recently announced they will be 'sunsetting' the tool by the end of August 2023. The feature was brought in to help creators ensure they would still receive their fee and to mitigate against new platforms such as Blur. The announcement was made due to a lack of adoption within the ecosystem along with loopholes which allowed platforms to bypass the tool. There was also pushback from creators towards this tool and those were the main reasons for OpenSea's decision.
Yuga Labs Announcement
The entity behind the popular NFT collection Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), Yuga Labs, have made their own announcement on the news. They have decided to half their support for OpenSea due to the change in the Operator Filter. Yuga Labs announced their intent to wind down support for OpenSea and will begin the process of sunsetting support for OpenSea’s SeaPort for all upgradable contracts and any new collections. They aim to have this complete by February 2024. The company went on to reiterate its commitment to protecting creator royalties, ensuring that creators are adequately compensated for their work.
Community Feelings
With such big news dropping from both OpenSea and Yuga Labs, there was plenty of buzz among the community. The announcement from Yuga Labs was met with a somewhat positive note from the BAYC community along with content creators and founders of other notable NFT projects like EllioTrades and Alex Becker.
The CEO and co-founder of the Forgotten Runes Wizards Cult NFT project, Dotta, also noted support for the decision by Yuga Labs, highlighting the power of creators to shift towards marketplaces that prioritize royalty payments.
The CEO of Pudgy Penguins NFT project, Luca Netz, was also quick to show that his project may follow the same path as Yuga Labs in the wake of this news. Creator royalties has always been a divisive topic within the NFT community, although back during the boom of 2021 enforcing creator royalties was the norm. Since marketplaces such as Blur have entered the space, the thought has shifted and more and more users are interested in zero trading fees and an optional creator royalty payment models. This has certainly disrupted the market and led to a decrease in trading fees and royalty percentages, and it has made a clear divide within the NFT community.
Whether the long term of NFTs will be on the side of those who prefer the cheaper trading model offered by platforms like Blur, or those who prefer the payment of royalties to creators remains to be seen.
Have a great day.
Peace. CryptoGod-1.
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