GM. This is the Milk Road. We’re like Flintstone vitamins for your recommended daily intake of crypto nutrients. Yabadabadoo.

Here’s what we got for ya today:

• The NFT Marketplace War heats up

• Top 3 things to watch this week

• Hottest NFT collections

• Yuga Labs gets caught stealin’

THE NFT MARKETPLACE WAR HEATS UP 

It's been a busy week for the top two NFT marketplaces - OpenSea and Blur. And the debate for #1 is heating up quicker than a LeBron vs MJ argument. (Editor's Note: If your answer is MJ, hit the unsubscribe button below. We don’t accept blasphemy here.)

Here’s everything you need to know about the NFT Marketplace War:

1/ Blur released a token

Blur is one of the newest NFT marketplaces on the block[chain]. And although it's only been around for a few months, Blur has quickly become one of the top platforms to trade NFTs. 

Why? Blur has no marketplace fees, and optional creator royalty fees. (Less fees = more money for traders)

And now Blur has its own token too. That's right, it finally launched its highly-anticipated token, $BLUR, and airdropped $400M worth of tokens to early users of its marketplace.

Blur users all rushed to claim their tokens like it was a stimulus check. Everyone knows a stimmy does the body wallet good.

The craziest part? The top 3 most active users*** on Blur each received $1.5M+ worth of $BLUR tokens. But there’s a big asterisk there… 

You see, the top 3 wallets have allegedly been wash trading - where you buy the same asset from yourself over & over to artificially pump the price up. In this case, wash trading would help increase their Blur trading activity, and thus earn them a larger share of the $BLUR airdrop.

Either way, a lot of people got free money and Blur got a ton of activity from new users hoping to get tokens in the next round of the airdrop. In fact, Blur had more daily Ethereum trading volume than OpenSea for the first time ever last week.

So of course, OpenSea had to respond with its own power move…

2/ OpenSea cuts mandatory royalty fees

There’s been a huge debate in NFT land over the last few months: To pay [royalty fees] or not to pay. Royalty fees = a small % of each NFT sale that goes back to the creator. It's one of the biggest reasons why creators launch an NFT in the first place.

Recently, most marketplaces have moved over to a “no royalty fee” model. But there was one marketplace that held strong… OpenSea. 

That all changed last week when OpenSea announced that it was getting rid of mandatory royalty fees. For a “limited time,” there will be 0% marketplace fees and optional royalty fees (minimum of 0.5%). OpenSea will also no longer block other marketplaces that refuse to pay royalty fees to creators.

Many are speculating that Blur's recent boom forced OpenSea’s hand into cutting royalty fees to stay competitive.

The Milk Road Take: Sheesh, the NFT Marketplace War is heating up faster than some Uncle Ben's 90-second rice.

And although it might not be clear who the winner will be, it's quickly becoming clear who the loser will be... creators.

NFTs appeal to creators for one big thing: royalty fees. Now, almost all marketplaces have made them optional and the one marketplace that had creators' backs has turned.

You know what they say… If you can’t beat 'em, join 'em. 

We aren't mad at ya, Opensea. Just disappointed.

I WAS UP ALL NIGHT PLAYING PRIZE KINGDOMS 

Can I be honest? 

I barely got this section in on time. 

I went to sleep at 4am & woke up to write this at 8am (we sent this an hour later).

Why? 

I was up all night playing Prize Kingdoms. (A game created by INK Games.) 

Listen, the game is addictive and I like winning.

Prize Kingdoms is like if Clash of Clans met Sorry. Here’s what sets it apart from other games:

• It’s a legit Triple A game. The graphics are clean and bright. (I love the little guys with the red hats).

• The game play is addicting: You roll dice and move from kingdom to kingdom building cities, attacking others, and earning prizes.  

• The game has 5 stars on the App Store. The team made games at EA, Zynga, and SciPlay.

The best part?

They’re about to add referral technology that pays you for bringing in your friends.

But you need an INK ID to get paid and there’s only one way to get one.

You need to be referred. 

Click the button below and type in “milkroad” to grab yours.

Super easy…and they’ll let you know when the payment platform goes live!

3 THINGS TO WATCH THIS WEEK

There’s a lot of crazy stuff happening every week.

One week, UFOs and trains are getting blown up. 

The next week, that Pete Davidson guy is somehow dating another super model. (he's becoming one of the Seven Wonders of the World.)

So when it comes to crypto, we wanna make it as easy as possible for you to keep up with the most important stuff. Here are the top things you should keep an eye on this week:

• Crypto Earnings SZN. Three crypto companies are on deck to release the numbers for their last quarter - Coinbase (2/21), Block (2/21), and Coinshares (2/22). We’ll finally get a better idea of how badly each company got FTXed and how much damage was caused.

• ETHDenver kicks off on 2/24. ETHDenver is one of Ethereum's biggest conferences - it’s known for getting crypto nerds out of the house & showcasing new products. We expect some big news from Ethereum projects this week. And all eyes will be on if Ethereum's Golden Boy, Vitalik Buterin, makes an appearance too.

• A new web3 games launches. Paul Bettner, the co-creator of Words With Friends, is launching a new game called Wildcard - a multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game with NFTs. Not only can players earn NFTs, but so can viewers. Everything will be streamed via the game’s Discord server, and viewers can also win NFTs for supporting their favorite gamers. 

Buckle up ladies & gents, it’s gonna be another busy week. 

HOTTEST NFTS OF THE WEEK

Pop Quiz: What 3 letters get crypto nerds all hot & bothered?

Nope, not JLO. Although she’s a close second.

It’s… NFT. And the JPEGs have recently been making a comeback. 

Over the last 7 days, NFT trading volume jumped 21% and hit $236M. So we sent the Milk Man on a mission to figure out one thing…

Which collections saw the most volume? Here they are:

Top takeaways:

• SewerPass continued its momentum. SewerPass is the NFT pass that let people play Yuga Lab’s new game, Dookey Dash. The game has now ended, so the recent volume is likely from people wanting to buy the NFTs with the highest scores associated with them. (Milk Road Rule #58: If you suck at something, pay someone who’s good at it instead)

• Checks cracks the Top 5. Checks NFTs were created by a Milk Road friend, Jack Butcher, and have been the talk of Twitter since it launched last month. This past week, it came in at #5 for all collections and is sitting on the Mt. Rushmore of NFTs. Way to go, Jack.

If you wanna keep up with all the latest NFT action check out Unleash NFTs, bitCrunch’s NFT analytic platform. 

MILK AND COOKIES

Yuga Labs gets caught stealing. The creators of Bored Apes were recently called out for allegedly illegaly trademarking the logo for their NFT collection, the Bored Ape Kennel Club. That’s right, a collection worth $115M+ allegedly stole art from a drawing-guide-for-dummies product.

Sony 🤝 Web3. The tech giant announced its launching a web3 incubator program in partnership with Astar Network. Another day, another big company jumping into web3.

YouTube’s new CEO loves web3. YouTube has a new CEO (Neal Mohan) and he loves NFTs, the metaverse, pina coladas and getting caught in the rain. JK on those last two, but looks like NFTs and the metaverse could be coming to YouTube soon.

The SEC sues another celebrity. NBA legend, Paul Pierce, was sued for promoting a crypto token and not disclosing it was a paid advertisement. Pierce has agreed to pay over $1.4M to settle the charges. Ouch, from Mr. I-Called-Game to Mr. I-Called-Banks.

MILKY MEMES

🤣🤣

That's a wrap for today. Stay thirsty & see ya tomorrow! If you want more, be sure to follow our Twitter (@MilkRoadDaily)

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DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.