NFT Protocol: July 2021 Development Update
A new hire, successful audit, fresh UI/UX design incoming, $NFT tokenomics, and DEX launch imminent!
For reference: June 2021 Development Update
Back End Development
The NFT Protocol team spent the month of June putting the finishing touches on its back end infrastructure in preparation for what we anticipate being a late July launch of the NFT.org NFT DEX.
The v2 contract with which we will launch the DEX successfully passed an audit by Peckshield in late June. The issues Peckshield found in the code were relatively minor. All issues that needed to be fixed were fixed and then verified as such by Peckshield. Peckshield has provided us with their final audit report which we will publish when the DEX launches.
While many NFT marketplaces and protocols rely on centralized databases to manage the vast amount of data associated with NFTs, we are determined to build a protocol and DEX that is entirely decentralized. We spent much of the month of June building subgraphs using The Graph that will manage the data we need to regularly and reliably access in order to provide our users the clean and intuitive user experience we intend to provide.
Because The Graph is a relatively new toolset and we won’t know if it will handle the volume of data we need it to handle for the DEX until the DEX is live and in use, we have also developed a proprietary smart contract for managing our data which we are calling NFT NODE at this time. The decentralization of the NFT NODE system would depend on the quantity and distribution of people running nodes across the globe and we believe the utility afforded to the entire NFT space by this system would inspire people around the globe to set up and run nodes for NFT NODE. We have high hopes, however, that The Graph will sufficiently meet our needs and are reassured knowing that we have NFT NODE in our back pocket.
Front End Development
In June we hired a new frontend engineering manager who officially began working for us on July 1st. Remon Nashid comes to us from Polymath and with an abundance of blockchain and Web3 engineering experience. We are very happy to have Remon on board with us crafting the UI/UX that we know NFT.org DEX users will come to love and appreciate.
Having already met with lead developer Joseph Fiscella in the final days of June to establish a plan for building the front end of the DEX, Remon hit the ground running right away on July 1st. He’s already familiarized himself with the DEX’s back end infrastructure and begun building the foundation of the front end around it.
At the tail end of June we also hired a new UI/UX & brand designer. We are incredibly excited to be working with this designer because not only does he have ample experience and knowledge of crypto, DeFi and current trends in these spaces, but he also manages the UI/UX & branding for one of the world’s top crypto organizations. Remon and the rest of the dev team put together some wireframes in the first days of July for the designer to reference and he’s already come back to us with a first draft design on Figma which we will be refining over the next week or so, but are already quite excited about.
If all goes as planned we should be able to get a fully functional NFT.org DEX with the new design tested and launched by the end of July!
$NFT Tokenomics
After much consideration and many consultations with our legal counsel we are ready and excited to announce the foundation of the forthcoming tokenomics for our $NFT token.
Staking
The basis of $NFT tokenomics will be a staking contract (yet to be written).
$NFT will be staked with a time-lock mechanism (parameters forthcoming) at https://staking.page/nft/. Staking rewards will be distributed in the form of non-transferable $veNFT tokens (“voting escrow $NFT” per the Curve standard) which will be used to participate in NFT Protocol governance. Those who stake their $NFT with a longer time-lock period yield $veNFT at a greater rate. When a time-lock period completes for a given address, the owner of that address may elect to enter into another time-lock period or to withdraw $NFT from the staking contract. If $NFT is withdrawn from the staking contract, all $veNFT owned by that address will be burned.
Governance
$veNFT will be used to participate in the NFT Protocol governance model at gov.nft.org & https://snapshot.org/#/nft/all. NFT Protocol governance owns the fees collected by the NFT.org DEX (the “NFT Protocol Treasury”) as well as the $NFT token governance pool. The function of NFT Protocol governance is to govern the protocol, leverage the governance pool to benefit NFT Protocol and $NFT token holders, and manage the NFT Protocol Treasury which may at some point include $veNFT holders drawing from the NFT Protocol Treasury in some way.
Future Features
NFT Protocol may in the future build and implement into the protocol additional revenue generating features and such revenue is to be funneled into the NFT Protocol Treasury.
DEX Fee Structure
The DEX fee structure, which is subject to change at any time by way of a governance proposal, is initially based upon how many $NFT tokens the swap taker holds in the connected wallet. Users are awarded a 10% fee discount for holding 10,000 $NFT tokens in the connected wallet and this discount scales linearly up to a 100% discount (no fees) at 100,000 $NFT tokens held in the connected wallet. The DEX will be able to read the $NFT token staking contract such that staked $NFT token balances will be reflected in DEX fee calculations.
Blockparty
It was determined in June that NFT Protocol will power Blockparty’s upcoming secondary market. All transactions on Blockparty’s secondary market will thus generate revenue for the NFT Protocol Treasury. Because Blockparty is already selling and will continue to sell whitelabel NFT platforms to its clientele, our hope is that NFT Protocol will also be able to power the secondary markets for Blockparty’s whitelabel clientele as well.
Blockparty is additionally exploring the possibility of adding “membership” features to its platform. Blockparty will be able to reference the $NFT staking contract and thus be able to provide “membership” features to $NFT token holders and stakers. This model is still under exploration and if we decide to move forward with it further details will be forthcoming.
NFT.org DEX Launch & Beyond
As mentioned earlier in this newsletter we are very hopeful that we will be able to launch the NFT.org DEX by the end of July!
Preparations for launch include not only building the front end, but also continuing to refine $NFT tokenomics, establishing a marketing plan that will yield a strong user base, a governance proposal regarding a “liquidity mining” program to coincide with the DEX launch, and networking with popular NFT projects who we hope will direct volume towards the DEX or partner with us in other capacities.
One such NFT project which we know will be directing its secondary sales volume to the NFT.org DEX is generative NFT project Space Shibas. This project is a collaboration between several entities in the NFT space, including our very own lead developer Joseph Fiscella.
Consideration towards where we go next after we get v2 of the NFT.org DEX launched to the public is already underway.
Blockparty needs its secondary market built.
We have our next feature set for v3 already planned out which includes adding a social media element to the DEX, auctions, and conditional swap orders (i.e., “I’ll pay 10 ETH for any Crypto Punk with a hat”).
Immutable X has recently begun onboarding additional projects into its ecosystem and it may soon be our turn to implement their tech and thus capture volume from Gods Unchained asset sales and beyond.
We’d love to begin the process of building onto Flow and other blockchains with high levels of NFT activity.
We’ve got a lot on our plate and an incredibly talented dev team assembled to make it happen! We’ll keep you posted regarding our upcoming roadmap and we’ll see you at the launch party very soon!
