After spending a lot of time interacting with members of the Algorand NFT community reference upcoming projects, and getting almost zero traction through the FTX.us marketplace, I have decided to move my Day of the Dead series NFT’s to the Algorand blockchain. It might be a bad idea to move them so close to my self imposed deadline, but screw it, I’m doing it anyway. More details after the picture.
It’s the end of October 2021 and everything I write here is based on my knowledge and the current crypto/NFT market at the time.
In my previous articles, I talked about listing my Day of the Dead series of NFT’s on FTX.us (Solana blockchain) and why I chose to use them. While all of those reasons are still valid, I‘m just not getting the engagement I thought I would get. Despite all of the updates they are currently working on, they don’t seem to rotate through galleries with active sales. Right now, they are focusing on other projects that have an established base on Solana, which is totally understandable. But, that doesn’t do anything for me or my sales.
I want to get my work in front of more buyers. Some of the new Algorand galleries now have auctions, will get my work on their front page, and the Algorand community has been very engaging and helpful. Maybe to most people my work sucks, or they’re moving on to buy NFT’s based more on utility than just collecting art. Regardless, I think moving to Algorand will help me gauge my audience and get my work into more wallets and personal galleries which is my main goal.
Updates to Algorand marketplaces — There are several galleries on Algorand that are being actively developed and all have pluses and minuses. In previous articles I talked about the AB2 gallery which seems like the standard site to mint NFT’s on. They give a 10% royalty to the creator address of all work sold through their site. Unfortunately, they don’t show individual galleries on the front page to gain exposure for new artists. I also discovered their “Report” feature doesn’t really function the way you think it would. If you are a legitimate artist, and someone files a “Report” on the site saying it’s a scam, there is no way to clear that “Report.” The AB2 explanation is, those should be considered warning signs for the buyer to perhaps do some more research on the creator address. But it is not possible to clear them out. The problem I see is, some “Reports” are just someone asking the artist a question. It’s obviously not the intended use of the reporting function, but since the site is accessed globally, someone obviously thought that feature was a way to talk to the artist. Hopefully that will be improved in the future.
If you read my previous article, you know I had a very successful sale on the Rand Gallery. More improvements have been made to the site and the gallery owner continues to be very helpful through Twitter and Discord. They have implemented artist royalties and will hopefully be adding regular auctions in the future. But as far as I know, there are no plans for that at this time.
One of the most recent marketplaces to come up is the Algoxnft.com marketplace. This site is popular because they offer regular auctions which most people are familiar with. One of the big things I like about this site is auctions that are nearing completion are moved up to the top of the front page. I think that’s great and makes sure everyone’s work gets front page exposure, even if it’s for a brief time. There are some small differences from a regular auction site like Ebay though, like your bid does not automatically increment as new bids are placed. For example, if the current bid is 5 ALGO, and you enter a bid of 12 ALGO because that is the maximum you want to pay, then the current bid jumps to 12 ALGO and that is what you’ll pay. Also, every listing shows a “Current Bid” even if there are no bids on the piece. You can click on the listing and it will show you the starting bids and bid history if there is one.
Since I want to sell this series on November 1st and 2nd, I am going to list them on Algoxnft.com. I will set the auction end times with 5 minute gaps so everyone has a fair chance at picking one up.
One last thing I want to bring up is the Algorand NFT community. As I was posting my work, a couple community members sent me private messages to help guide me through the process of using various sites, as well as some of the drawbacks and benefits. I have over 100 followers on Twitter now, which to me is crazy considering I started with 5 a few weeks ago.
I’m hopeful the trend will continue as my work makes its way into more wallets and virtual galleries. My NFT “project” goal is to visually stimulate viewers and make them feel some sort of emotion when looking at my work. I’m sure some people will scoff at the lack of “utility” in my NFT’s, but that’s ok. We’re still very early in the space and as I learn more, I’m sure I’ll be able to expand on that later if I want to. If you have questions about the Algorand NFT space, I would encourage you to reach out and ask wherever you’re most comfortable. My handle on Twitter, Instagram, Telegram is @ocularmagic or just tag your question with #algorand or #algofam.
As always, thanks for reading, I hope you learned something along the way!
James
