👺 going goblin mode
How 9,999 goblins are saving the NFT market.
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The Big Story
Three months ago, goblin mode entered the mainstream lingo when a fake headline about Kanye West's then-girlfriend Julia Fox went viral. Since then, the phrase has taken over the internet like nothing before, with people making memes and sharing their stories of, well, going goblin mode. And even today, the trend is as alive on Twitter as it was back then.
But not in the way you would expect.
While the phrase emphasizes the complete lack of aesthetics, today, we're going to explore it in terms of a new NFT project based on a similar idea, titled Goblintown.wtf.
Launched on May 22, the Ethereum-based project consists of 9,999 goblin NFTs called Goblintown—a term crypto enthusiasts use to refer to bearish conditions in the digital assets space. As per its website, the NFTs have “No roadmap. No Discord. No utility.” All it has is a Twitter account created by the team, with over 42,400 followers posting stuff like this:
The collection debuted without any marketing fanfare or the commercial hype that follows any upcoming NFT project launch. But that didn't stop the collection from becoming popular among NFT buyers.
According to DappRadar, Goblintown NFT is the second-most traded collection in the last seven days, raking in more than $20 million and outperforming popular NFT projects such as Bored Ape Yacht Club, Otherdeeds, and Azuki. As of writing, it has a market cap of around $50 million.
The most expensive NFT from the collection is Goblintown 8,995, sold for 69.42 ETH or nearly $138,200. Currently, the collection has a floor price of 2.73 ETH (~$5,400) on OpenSea.
One key thing to note here is that the project isn't built by goblins (at least that’s what the creators wrote on the website). The team has also reserved 1,000 NFTs because they wanted to. No other explanation is offered. The project’s meteoric success has sparked rumours that Yuga Labs, creator of Bored Ape Yacht Club, and American DJ Steve Aiko could be backing the project.
All that being said, many wondered how the collection has managed to do so well in such a short period of time. Two main reasons for it:
Free-to-mint: It's a project where you only have to pay the gas fees. "Don't be f**king greedy. That's how we got ourselves here," they added.
Creative Commons Zero (CC0): No intellectual property rights are reserved by the creators, meaning they're free to be repurposed as per the owner's discretion.
For NFT buyers, these two attributes are crucial today, when the NFT economy is witnessing its first crypto bear markets. Over the last 30 days, popular blue-chip NFT projects such as Moonbirds, CryptoPunks, Bored Ape Yacht Club, and Mutant Ape Yacht Club have seen their floor price drop by around 55%. Even secondary sales of NFTs dropped 56.7% in the past week.
But NFT collections like Goblintown and Rektguy—another free-to-mint project with no discord, roadmap, and utility—are trying to reverse this bearish sentiment. Although some see their efforts as being "irreverent." They're viewed as anti-NFT projects that seem to troll blue-chip NFTs and create exclusivity for those wanting to associate themselves with a popular project in hopes of making massive profits.
While some people have benefited from such strategies in the past, they remain unsustainable in the long run. But if this trend continues, it will invite "a slew of copycat projects that feign indifference and attempt to make a virtue out of apathy," DappRadar added.
What’s next?
There has been much debate surrounding the utility of art in the NFT community. Artists are compelled to not only sell their art but also find new, innovative ways to make their value proposition more convincing by offering exclusive access to real-world events, free airdrops, etc. This is what’s different about Goblintown.
While it doesn't offer any real-world incentives to NFT holders, people seem to appreciate the team’s honesty and straightforward approach. They’re okay with art existing simply as art. The growing popularity of Goblintown has once again highlighted the power of originality, creativity, and virality. And many within the community expect more such fun projects in the future.
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