Skip to content Skip to sidebar Skip to footer

Welcome to “This Week in the Metaverse,” where Fortune rounds up the most interesting news in the world of NFTs, culture, and the metaverse. Email marco.quiroz-gutierrez@fortune.com with tips.
The past few weeks have been huge for Web3’s integration into social media.
Reddit spawned the creation of more than 3 million crypto wallets after it announced its second generation of “anything but an NFT” collectible avatars on Oct. 20. The newly Elon Musk-owned Twitter then said it was testing a feature to let users buy NFTs directly through tweets, and Meta’s Instagram said it would soon let some users buy and sell NFTs directly through the app, with no gas fees until 2024.
Despite NFT trading volumes crashing during Crypto Winter, major social media companies see value in promoting NFTs.
And it’s no wonder why. As of Nov. 2, Reddit had sold just over $10 million worth of its collectible avatars.
But will the integration of NFTs into social media platforms actually push sales higher and increase crypto usage, or will millions of new users simply stay siloed on Web2 platforms?
Let’s face it, the number of people in the U.S. who own an NFT remains small. Although 46% percent of the U.S. population was familiar with the term, only 2% said they had ever bought one, according to an August study by Pew Research Center.
Therefore, exposing Instagram’s more than 1 billion monthly active users to the technology can be nothing but a plus, according to Chris Cantino, co-founder of Color Capital, who tweeted on Wednesday: “95% of Instagram users have never owned crypto or experienced NFTs in the wild. Now, they’re about to witness many of their favorite creators make and sell digital collectibles for the first time. This is the journey to mass adoption—and things are starting to get interesting.”
Initial data from OpenSea about user spillover from Reddit seems to support this thesis. A spokesperson for the most popular NFT marketplace told Fortune that it had seen a 75% increase in new users on Polygon, the underlying blockchain of the Reddit NFTs, since its spooky season drop in late October. The spokesperson added that 20% of the NFT owners who came from Reddit went on to purchase another NFT on OpenSea.
https://twitter.com/Meta/status/1587929277864910849
But doubts remain over whether mass adoption is truly right around the corner. One Reddit user and a moderator of a subreddit centered around the collectible avatars told Fortune that he hadn’t heard much about people experimenting with other NFTs or other platforms. He also said the diehard fans on Reddit are already making good money from trading and are more invested in the company’s plans for collectible avatars than in NFTs in general.
And there are new scams, which are already starting to pop up for the new Reddit NFTs, according to some users.
Still, it’s possible that once Web3 features roll out on more and more social media platforms, the potential for mass adoption will skyrocket, which will in turn lead to a snowball effect of new features across multiple platforms.
As Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian said in a Thursday tweet, “Builders gotta build.”
Speaking of social integration with Web3, Telegram recently announced a new marketplace built on its Telegram Open Network (TON) blockchain that will be used to auction off rare handles for the platform. Telegram will start by auctioning off four- and five-letter handles, according to CoinTelegraph.
On Thursday, Prada launched the sixth in its series of Timecapsule NFT Collection drops, which will give holders access to unique experiences at Prada Mode Dubai and Prada Extends Miami. The November edition is reminiscent of 1970s patchwork designs.
Online game platform Roblox released a metaverse fashion report that combined behavioral data from Roblox and survey data from 1,000 Gen Z active users age 14 to 24 living in the U.S. The biggest takeaways? Gen Z prizes digital fashion and is willing to spend on it. Three out of four survey respondents said they will spend money on digital fashion, and one out of four said they had spent between $20 and $100 on a single virtual item. But when it comes to fashion, not just anything will fly. Two-thirds said they were looking for brand names on digital items, and the vast majority also said digital clothing designs should be inclusive.
On Halloween, Funko and Warner Bros. Discovery Global Consumer Products released a new horror-themed Digital Pop! collection featuring characters from Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema films, including The Conjuring, It, and The Exorcist. The Funko Digital Pop! line consists of NFTs that resemble Funko’s uniquely stylized figures and start at $9.99 for a pack of five.
This story was originally featured on Fortune.com
More from Fortune: 
The American middle class is at the end of an era
Elon Musk is facing trial again over his $56 billion Tesla paycheck that’s ‘the largest in human history’
The winners of the $1.5 billion Powerball jackpot will probably take it in cash. That’s a huge mistake, experts say
The US may be headed for a ‘tripledemic’—one doctor issues an urgent warning
Related Quotes
People are parodying these scientific renderings using the faces of celebrities to describe historical figures.
Roblox (RBLX) closed the most recent trading day at $43.30, moving +1% from the previous trading session.
Two weeks ago, Square Enix released a new story trailer for its upcoming RPG, Final Fantasy XVI. There’s just one noticeable problem—there doesn’t seem to be a single non-white character in it. So IGN asked producer Naoki Yoshida about whether or not the game would feature any Black people or other people of color. Unfortunately, his response made me go “Yikes” in real life.
A letter has been sent to Twitter's top 20 largest advertisers, urging them to cease advertising on the platform if Elon Musk rolls back its current content-moderation practices.
Norristown man accused of Oct. 22 slaying of Angel Torres on the 1800 block of South 9th Street.
Twitter owner Elon Musk lamented a drop in revenue after high-profile advertisers paused spending on the platform citing uncertainty about its direction. The billionaire pointed the blame at activist groups. General Mills, Mondelez, Pfizer and Audi joined a growing list of brands pausing Twitter advertising, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal. The moves seem to be cutting into Twitter’s top-line.
Elon Musk seems to be waking up from a bad dream. Tesla's billionaire CEO is discovering a new reality linked to his acquisition of Twitter : it's not going to be easy to reinvent the platform, considered the de facto town square of our time. To generate income from the microblogging website, he will have to rely on a key group: the advertisers.
At an investor conference in New York, the billionaire spoke about advertising and hate speech and implored people to pay for a verified account.
Yahoo Finance's Rachelle Akuffo discusses dogecoin falling on reports that Elon Musk has halted Twitter's crypto integration.
(Reuters) -Warner Bros Discovery posted a quarterly loss on Thursday that missed Wall Street targets due to restructuring of the combined media company, but investor concerns were tempered by news that HBO's fantasy series "House of the Dragon" became the most-watched series premiere in the network's history. Warner also missed expectations on revenue, helping send its shares down 4.8% after hours. Warner Bros. Pictures, film subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery, is planning to cut a number of jobs in distribution and marketing which will reduce the headcount by 5% to 10%, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.
The film’s appearance on Amazon.com Inc.’s Prime Video is a case study in the consequences of the e-commerce company’s strategy of acquiring as many shows and movies as possible.
After Nick Cannon confirmed he is expecting baby No. 11—his second with Alyssa Scott—Ryan Reynolds responded to the news on Twitter. See his post.
The microblogging website, which is owned by Elon Musk, is embarking on a drastic austerity cure to reduce costs.
Elon Musk tweeted that Twitter has had a massive drop in revenue due to activist groups pressuring advertisers, as the social-media company started sweeping layoffs just over a week after the billionaire took it over.
Billionaire posted sketch about clinic where patients pay for confrontations with professional arguer
Elon Musk is now the begrudging owner of Twitter. It’s a company he pursued relentlessly before deciding he was no longer interested after signing a $44 billion deal to acquire it. After staring down a difficult trial for backing out of the deal, he went ahead with the purchase at the original price, showing up at the company’s San Francisco headquarters on Oct. 26 to seal the deal.
People have literally told the doppelgänger that he "looks more like Logan Paul than Logan Paul."
Despite the high cost, the ARK Invest founder has secured a small stake in Twitter as part of a new fund to bring venture capital to the little guy.
‘This is what my app has looked like ever since my tweet upset you yesterday,’ tweeted the irritated congresswoman earlier this week
Paramount Global is the rebranded recombination of CBS and Viacom that has created a media conglomerate with global scale. CBS contributed Showtime in addition to its television assets–the CBS television network, 28 local TV stations, and 50% of CW, a joint venture between CBS and WarnerMedia. Viacom brought several leading cable network properties, including Nickelodeon, MTV, BET, Comedy Central, VH1, CMT, and Paramount. Paramount Pictures produces original motion pictures and owns a library of 2,500 films, including the Mission: Impossible and Transformers series. Paramount operates a number of streaming services, most notably Paramount+ and Pluto TV.

source

Leave a comment