Welcome to another Snorfkingdom weekly update!

Greetings, Snorfkingdom! The Summer of Snorf is heating up, and with it brings more exciting news! Last week, many of you already saw the Snorfkingdom grow its presence on Discord with our official community launch, growing exponentially in mere days!! One of the privileges community members have been enjoying over the past week was being able to influence what you receive an update on this week, with the ultimate choice being details about Snorf's Tavern Season 1! While we have been covering highlights from the blockchain space before the Snorfkingdom updates in previous weekly updates, this week we will focus on what there is to know about Snorf's Tavern Season 1 and how it will play into the Snorfkingdom community. If you want to just dive straight in to the weekly blockchain space highlights, then scroll down below! For those of you who want all the juicy updates, let's dive in straight from the top! 

Snorf's Tavern Season 1

So many of you have been wondering, exactly what will Snorf's Tavern entail, what will the NFTs look like, etc? There have also been people asking, what is Season 1 and how can I be whitelisted for these NFTs? So let me tell you about it! Alongside reviews and other content creation, Sir Snorfkin and the rest of the Snorfkingdom will now be releasing seasonal NFTs linked to The Tavern. The Tavern is not only our community hub, but a source of lore and storytelling from the Snorfkingdom. The tavern spaces exist in our community channels such as the discord and the upcoming website. The available NFT goodies for Season 1 of the tavern will come in two rarities: Common, and Rare. Rare NFTs will feature exciting animations of the Season 1 grub and are more difficult to collect due to their scarcity, wheras common NFTs will be similar versions of the goodies with no animation, and will be more easily obtainable for those new to the NFT and blockchain space (some of the season 1 NFTs will even be free!). In the future, Sir Snorfkin aims to include tavern items which are crossover collaborations with other collections, but the first and original series of Snorf's Tavern NFTs will be purely SNORF! Curious about how to be whitelisted for Snorf's Tavern season 1? The details are not out yet, but will be announced very soon via the Snorfkingdom community channels (aka discord, publish0x, twitter, and the new website). Make sure to follow Sir Snorfkin on twitter, join the discord, and stay up to date with publish0x to make sure that you don't miss the details on how you can get whitelisted!*

*Transparency note: Due to the increasing number of bots snatching up NFTs via Atomichub, whitelisting is a way to ensure that people minting NFTs are real members of the community. The whitelist is not designed to exclude people, so there will soon be clearer instructions on how to do this in a way so that anyone in the community can be whitelisted (except you MR BOT)! 

Snorfkingdom NFTs: FUNding a community, and functionality

What can you do with Snorf's Tavern NFTs, you may ask? In the future, Snorf's Tavern NFTs will be linked to collectible items for those seasoned collectors who own one of each, but also for varying collections to ensure that not only whales can partake in Snorfkingdom fun, but that everyone can enjoy! Moreover, the future will likely see these NFTs being linked to real-world Snorfkingdom merchandise! In addition to collectible badges and other NFTs, Sir Snorfkin and the rest have come up with a few other key elements to ensure usability and fun with the NFTs. Firstly, Sir Snorfkin has finally installed forgeofsnorf, a wax account dedicated to burning Snorfkingdom NFTs. This forge will be used to limit the volume of Snorfkingdom NFTs by incentivizing burning (for example by transferring an NFT to be burned, you receive special rewards). Alongside the burning aspect, the Snorfkingdom will grow along with its community and with the fun activities and NFTs which are planned. While the amounts have not been decided on, we are setting up a community vault which will be funded by the sales of Snorfkingdom NFTs, secondary market sales, and also donations from the Snorfkingdom community. To perpetuate a giving and supportive environment, this community vault will be used solely for the growth of the Kingdom, whether that be by purchasing land NFTs in game such as uplift, rplanet, Alien Worlds, and more, or by hosting giveaways & airdrops for Snorfkingdom citizens, the community vault will be used to ensure that more people are able to get involved with blockchain gaming and NFTs with a low entry barrier, to ensure that all people can enjoy the blockchain space regardless of their background. As a final point regarding functionality, the aim of the Snorfkingdom is to grow and integrate the functionality of its NFTs into other functional projects, whether this be by being stakable via rplanet, collectible via collect.social, listable on Tokenhead, and much more, there are many plans for functionality links, so please feel free to join the community now and grow and learn with us! 

Website Update

As many of you have been reading over the past few updates, the Snorfkingdom website is soon to launch, but you may be wondering how soon? Due to time constraints, we have moved the date back slightly, and are aiming to launch the website in approximately two weeks. The final date will be announced in the near future, but this means that there will likely only be one more weekly Summer of Snorf update to show you new intriguing insights into the website, the content we are creating, and to give you a more concrete idea about details around the the countdown to the website launch! I hope you all are as excited as I am!

Weekly Blockchain Updates: Publish0x, Big Investments, and more!

So, in other news, it has been a big week for NFTs, both good and bad! Whilst it is always exciting to hear good news about NFTs, blockchain games, and more, I've decided to focus on both positive and negative things this week, so as to provide you all with some more food for thought on the blockchain space which hopefully allows to to not just be excited about new things, but also critical about how they may develop. With that in mind, let's dive in!

More Large Blockchain Gaming investments

This week saw another few major investments in play to earn, NFTs, and blockchain gaming. Most notably, the already well known Yield-Guild Games (YGG) group received 4 million dollars in a seed funding round, showing that instutitions and investors truly see the value in the play-to-earn model. Yield Guild is definitely paving the way, and this investment round just goes to highlight that this play-to-earn model isn't just something to entice players in, it is a viable business model for gaming entities and even in some cases for players who sponsor others. Beyond this, Fox Corporation, the large media enterprise, has announced the establishment of a $100 million fund for blockchain exploration, specifcally focused on NFTs and other related entertainment ventures. Alongside the YGG announcement, it is clear that while NFTs may be riding on a wave of hype since early 2021, large organizations are not only taking notes but dipping their toes in the water, further hinting at the future potential for NFTs.

NFTs, Doomed to Fail?

Feel free to criticize this as being FUD, but as mentioned previously it is clear that in the blockchain universe, a good dose of skepticism and a critical mindset can go a long way in protecting yourself from disappointments and worse, scams. On this note, it is important to highlight that all of the buzz around NFT isn't inherently positive. Many people still struggle to see the use cases or potential of NFTs, and rightfully so, as there is a long way to go in the development of their functionalities and usability before ultimately being able to effectively give them a more understandable value (in the perspective of the broader public). On this note, earlier this week Coinbase's cofounder compared the current NFT environment to the dot com boom of the 90s, highlighting that he believes that 90% of NFTs will hold very little (or no) value within approximately 3-5 years. This is quite a harsh condemnation of NFTs (although it is just a statement in an interview, so keep that in mind, as everyone is entitled to their opinion!), but playing devils advocate, he makes a good comparison. In the 90s, everyone and anyone who had an idea for an internet company was creating a startup and receiving investments for it, as people struggled to understand the rapidly evolving technological landscape. Sound familiar? That's because we are treading in very similar waters in the current blockchain climate! Thus its important to remember that although there might be some great projects, great games, and great ideas, the long term sustainability of all of these new concepts will only be seen after time has passed, so stay patient, stay vigilant, and always be critical despite the amazing strides which are coming from this sector! 

Publish0x Changes it up

This news is arguably the closest to home this week, as many of us have come to know and love the Publish0x platform and the ability to be tipped for creating content, as well as reward other content creators whom we enjoy reading. For those of you who haven't seen, Publish0x is implementing another overhaul to the platform which consists of the following core points: 

• Removal of ETH as a tipping token
• Reduction in tipping rates site-wide (50%) 
• (potentially) more advertisements 
• Stricter content controls to ensure quality content

Let's be honest, those content creators out there who have been on the platform and are involved in publish0x for the long haul know that while this might seem frustrating in the short-term for newer content creators, this is clearly a step in the right direction for the sustainability of the publish platform as a whole. What good is it if you can receive more tipping rewards for a few more months if the site won't be up after that? Advertisements are also a tough pill to swallow, but again, if the team has chosen for this to ensure the sustainability of the platform, then all readers and creators should be happy with the fact that Publish is being transparent about this whilst thinking about the future viability of the platform. The last update, which might hurt the most, is the loss of ETH as a tipping token. While being tipped at all is an amazing feature of Publish, it will be sad to see a major cryptocurrency go. As an author myself, this is the only change which I think could potentially be detrimental for the platform, as having a major currency such as ETH not only attracts a broader audience due to its name recognition, but also provides greater credibility to the site as a whole. Nonetheless, just as with the other updates, it is great to see the team being honest about this as well as the search for another credible coin for tipping. Anyone else vote for bringing BAT back? The one update that I think all authors should be happy about is the stricter content control. This is not only good for authors, but overall for readers. Some of the articles on Publish have receded to being click-baity, lacking substance, and sometimes just serving to spam referall links. The reduction of these types of articles allows the seasoned and new authors on the platform, as well as the readers, to focus on creating good quality articles to contribute to healthy discussion, transparent learning, and entertaining content. While I would love to write an article detailing what I think could be improved moving forward, I will try to summarize it in a few key points. Igor, if you are reading this, please reach out as I'd love to discuss some of the suggestions further as I truly believe in the publish platform and its future potential: 

• Suggestion 1: Look into EOS, WAX, or BAT as a sponsoring token for new tips. These three in particular are especially well positioned for media and entertainment concepts, and therefore I think they would be great candidates for future tipping tokens. 
• Suggestion 2: Create a community for high quality publish0x authors to have more focused discussions with the team regarding suggestions for the platform. Some criteria for this smaller group could be number of total reads/tips, followers, experts on specific topics, and more. I think having a small working group (similar to how organizations like youtube or twitch) for these authors could also help the team brainstorm how to ensure that the quality content remains and grows.
• Suggestion 3: Increase personalization options for Authors on the platform. There are a lot of topics and a wide range of content creators on the publish platform, but it would be great to have greater potential to personalize both the inidivual author landing page as well as the articles themselves, as there are still points which would be great to have added to the article editor (text fonts, colors, additional widgets, etc). 

These are just some of the ideas that come to mind with the new changes, but no matter what, the thing that authors and readers should value most about the platform is the team's transparency about the recent changes, and their focus on creating a long-term platform which benefits readers and creators alike!

Twitter Giveaway

After the weekend Twitter Giveaway, the winners are as follows:

1. kx2qw.wam 1 NFT treasure pack
2. wo1r2.wam    To be announced with treasure update next week
3. w5pra.wam   To be announced with treasure update next week
4. cfmr.wam      To be announced with treasure update next week
5. cruescontrol  To be announced with treasure update next week
6. fzyr.wam       To be announced with treasure update next week

The prizes rank 5-6 will be announced next week with the release of the Details around the NFT Inaugural Treasure Pack, so stay tuned for this as the prizes will be issued not long after! 

Thanks for reading! 

As always, thanks for checking out this week's update. What do you like about Snorf's Tavern Season 1? What do you think about this weeks blockchain updates? Let me know in the comments below, and don't forget to follow me on publish0x and twitter to stay up to date on the latest from the Snorfkingdom!