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Buying crypto handshake domains plus 0x NFT derivative projects
In this week’s Alts by Flippa newsletter I discuss:
Buying my first crypto handshake domains including .patey/
Mutant Ape Yacht Club 0x derivative projects
Remember, every heading is a channel in the Discord - come join over 600 of us
Cheers!
Richard Patey
Director, Investor Community at Flippa
#domains
Handshake domains are new TLDs based on a distributed and decentralized blockchain, that are not yet compatible with most traditional DNS systems.
Namebase is the main domain registrar for Handshake names, and is also an exchange for Handshake coins (HNS). You can use HNS to buy names in the marketplace, bid in Handshake auctions, and make sellers offers.
Namecheap recently acquired a 51% stake in Namebase, which The Shake substack covered. Namecheap CEO Richard Kikendall confirmed the news on Twitter who gave this answer to why Handshake is important:
Currently, Namecheap offers the following handshake TLDs: .creator, .elite, .ill, .oh, .oo, .oot, .orb, .p, .pgp, .saas, .sox. And there is no transfer in/out supported at the moment for these.
I bought patey.creator, but there are far more “interesting” TLDs available on Gatgeway.io (co-founded by Mike Carson) you can buy a subdomain on, including emoji TLDs… (some NSFW):
In order to view these Handshake domains you need to configure them (namebase article, namecheap article) but the easiest way is simply to add https://hns.to/ in front of any HNS domain you want to visit such as https://clay.hns.to/ for Clay Collins (the founder of Leadpages back in the day). Or you can simply use the Brave Browser.
Clay owns the .c/ TLD which according to the web3domains substack:
The .c extension is the shortest and most versatile domain extension ever in the blockchain domain space, and can stand for Corporation, Company, Commerce, Capital, Computer, Crypto, Cloud, Customer, Club, Chip etc.
And as the .c domains twitter page states, it’s the new .com:
So naturally, I had to buy patey.c on gateway.io
Handshake subdomains have renewal fees whereas Unstoppable Domains, such as my richardpatey.crypto I bought in last week’s newsletter does not.
However, when you buy the actual Handshake TLD there are no yearly rental fees.
I may not have been able to buy patey.com (as a really nice Patey Tribe member won’t sell it at any price) but I have been able to buy the decentralized blockchain-based alternative .patey or in HNS speak patey/ on Namebase for a bargain 99 $HNS (about $20).
As such I can set up richard.patey/ and any subdomain I choose - and I can gift (or sell) these subdomains to other Patey Clan members in the future:
On Namebase (run by Tieshun the CEO) you can quickly set up a decentralized website using their dLinks service which I did and can be seen at hns.to/patey or below:
And people are making great add-ons for Handshake, such as HNS Chat by Eskimo, which lets you send messages to other Handshake names, and there’s even a Handshake conference running March 16-18th. Plus a lot of cool other use cases.
It’s interesting to watch the top HNS domain sales on the nbshoutout Twitter account and there are tools such as Shakestats to make blockchain domain trading easier.
I asked on Twitter what the most expensive handshake subdomain (secondary) sale has been so far and got this answer:
I’m certainly going to keep an open mind about the potential for web3 domains to flip traditional ones.
#nfts
I’ve not been doing too much with NFTs recently other than adding a My Curio Card to my collection whilst waiting for Coinbase NFT to launch so that my Lazy Lions can hopefully pop and I can sell one for some liquidity:
But MAYC derivative projects have got me excited again.
The first one I saw was the Full Body Mutant Club where MAYC holders can mint their, well, full-body versions such as the one below:
The project is meant to be for the ape IP holders, but naturally, there’s a bunch listed that anyone can buy on Opensea.
I then came across this MAYC 0x expansion project, offering an unofficial 10K expansion of the MAYC club to go from 20K to 30K mutants.
And the art is awesome, as member BusinessAttire_CA in their Discord explains:
For those that aren't into the art side of things, almost ALL trait-based NFTs are created by drawing individual traits as separate layers. Those layers are then separated into individual files. The only thing on a layer/file is the trait with a transparent background. Software is then used to compile the layers. The software adds each layer, in order, one on top of the other. When finished is flattens the image (no layers) and saves as a raster image. When these derivative 0x projects are created, they must extract/deconstruct/separate each trait into those individual files again. This is difficult for many reasons and takes talent (I know I am doing it right now for a project).
I bought this cute one below:
Which is an even nicer version of the OG mutant ape I once owned and flipped:
According to Rarity Sniffer, my 0xMAYC is the #750 most rare out of 10,000, as red hats and diamond teeth should be.
And these are selling like hotcakes, the volume is impressive, over 100ETH volume traded on Opensea already in just over a week and featured in The Nifty’s email as having top unit sales on the last day of February:
I look forward to seeing if this has a shot at getting beyond 1ETH.
I followed up with the Discord user mentioned above to ask about his own project rescuing an abandoned NFT community and he said:
We will be reusing the same layers just like most 0x projects do, but we will have the ability for existing holders to swap for the same traits. After that the set is recompiled (randomized) and we add new traits, new 1 of 1s and move forward with a secondary swap for existing holders and a public sale (there will be overlap of the random swap & public sale).
It really is an incredible space where NFT communities can launch and thrive off the back of existing or abandoned communities.
Ok that’s it for this week.
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Cheers!
Richard Patey
Director, Investor Community at Flippa
Alts by Flippa is owned by Flippa. Nothing in this email is financial advice and we are not professional investment advisers. We send weekly updates on what we're doing personally - consider it informational and for entertainment purposes only.
🤝 Own your name/
I just searched my name on gateway. There are some hilarious options available, like juliet. coinslut, but also potentially useful ones such as juliet. fancoins or startup. I'm partial to juliet. thelegend :D