CRYPTOGALACTIC

2023-05-18 16:17:08 Transforming Dust Into Prizes: LooksRare’s NFT Raffle Hits the Market

LooksRare is starting an NFT raffle where users can buy entries for 0.01 ether (ETH) or less. All they need to participate is a crypto wallet and enough ether to cover the entry cost and gas fees, according to the NFT marketplace.

Zodd, the pseudonymous co-founder of LooksRare, announced ‘LooksRare Raffles’ in a Tuesday blog post. They said that the top prize every day for this week would be a Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT (BAYC).

Though only one BAYC NFT is up for grabs each day, the platform said the prize pool also includes other “blue chip” NFTs. Other prizes include Azukis and allocations of the platform’s native coin, LOOKS.

LooksRare said it will run this raffle program for seven days, with one raffle round each day, collecting a “small fee” on each round. If the reception is good, it could become a permanent fixture on the NFT marketplace’s site, LooksRare told Blockworks.

During the first round on Wednesday, there will be one BAYC NFT, five Azuki NFTs, and 100 bundles containing 1,000 LOOKS tokens, each available for participants to acquire.

The raffle program is built on a foundation of smart contracts, which LooksRare said are “100% transparent” and “provably fair.”

“We use Chainlink VRF (Verifiable Random Function), which is a provably fair and verifiable random number generator…For each request, Chainlink VRF generates one or more random values and cryptographic proof of how those values were determined. The proof is published and verified on-chain before any consuming applications can use it,” LooksRare said in a statement exclusively provided to Blockworks.

The statement continued, “This process ensures that results cannot be tampered with or manipulated by any single entity including oracle operators, miners, users, or smart contract developers.” Open / Comment

2023-05-17 13:05:01 Crypto community reacts to Ledger wallet's secret recovery phrase service

Many members of the crypto community believe Ledger's latest seed phrase recovery feature is a bad idea.

Several crypto community members, including Ledger wallet owners, have taken to social media to express their discontent following the release of Ledger's latest feature. The newly introduced retrieval solution for itshardware crypto wallets, known as Ledger Recover, aims to offer a safeguard in case users misplace their seed phrase.

Ledger Recover is a subscription service that allows users to utilize an additional layer of protection for their private keys. This service employs a technique where the user's seed phrase is divided into three encrypted fragments, each sent to different external entities. Once these fragments are combined and decrypted, they can be used to reconstruct the original seed phrase.

The wallet provider shared that Ledger Recover is an optional subscription for users who want to back up their secret recovery phrase. "You don’t have to use it, and can continue managing your recovery phrase yourself if that’s why you bought a Ledger,” the company explained.

Nevertheless, the concept has enraged many in the crypto community, including security specialists.

Mudit Gupta, the chief information security officer at Polygon Labs, shared, “It's a horrendous idea, DON'T enable this feature.” Gupta expanded further in his Twitter thread that “The problem here is that the encrypted keys parts are sent to 3 corporations and they can reconstruct your keys.” Open / Comment

2023-05-16 17:16:47 Web3 Education Leaders Team Up to Roll Out Beginner NFT Platform HeyMint

Web3 education platform Curious Addys and non-fungible token (NFT) educator Zeneca are teaming up to roll out HeyMint, a beginner NFT platform meant to help creators build out their first collection.

With a goal of easing the minting process for creators and onboarding new entrants to Web3, HeyMint aims to be an accessible, equitable and low-cost creative tool. Creators can upload their artistic asset, choose their desired blockchain, create an allow list presale and enforce royalties. HeyMint currently supports Ethereum and three Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)-compatible chains – Polygon, Arbitrum and Optimism.

Creators pay no fees to list their collections and collectors are charged $1 per mint.

Mai Akiyoshi, CEO of Curious Addys, told CoinDesk that creators need tools that welcome them into the Web3 space rather than alienate them through complicated processes.

“The biggest problem we saw is that creating smart contracts is really difficult and even NFT standards like ERC-721 or 1055 are really standardized,” said Akiyoshi. “We have a lot of experience in educating people in our community and we want to be able to bring in more people who are not familiar with NFTs.”

Curious Addys and Zeneca have already amassed $5 million from their own NFT collections and have worked with notable brands such as Universal Music Group and the World of Women NFT collection. Zeneca previously founded Zen Academy, an online course to help bring new NFT collectors into Web3. Open / Comment

2023-05-15 17:18:18 Grayscale Investments Files for 3 New Exchange Traded Funds

On May 9, digital currency fund manager Grayscale Investments announced the establishment of the Grayscale Funds Trust and submitted registration filings for three exchange-traded funds with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

As the leading digital currency fund manager, in terms of assets under management (AUM), Grayscale Investments unveiled the Grayscale Funds Trust launch.

Grayscale highlighted that they had previously established Grayscale Advisors, an SEC-registered investment advisor, which will serve as the new trust’s advisor.

Moreover, Grayscale announced that David LaValle, the company’s global head of ETFs, would assist with their expansion. “It has been incredibly exciting to build our ETF franchise – hiring a dedicated team, expanding our partnerships, and enhancing our position within the ETF ecosystem,” LaValle said. Open / Comment

2023-05-14 17:54:15 US dollar index made a concerning close above both flag and red resistance. Not confirmed yet, as there's no trading on weekend.

Monday will be extremely important for DXY and BTC! If dollar fixes above red and bear flag fails, stocks and crypto are in trouble. Vice versa, if DXY dives down and forms a fakeout, BTC is set to pump hard Open / Comment

2023-05-13 17:24:51 OpenSea Pro has announced a new feature:

— "Update on OpenSea Pro: Best Collection Offers on the home page.

— Now you always have a list of offers at your fingertips for any collection.

— Instantly check the best deals and minimum prices on collections right on the home page." Open / Comment

2023-05-12 18:31:48 BTC UPDATE

More than 12 hours have passed since the dump happened, what do we have by now?

First of all, I decided to reduced by a half the amount of Bitcoins I bought yesterday, tiny profit printed.

Why?

We don't like how Ethereum looks here. Next post will be about it. Moreover, the price didn't engulf the $27,800 - $27,900 level we is not a good sign.

However, we still have the $27,100 support below the current price level. As long as it stays strong — we are safe. Open / Comment

2023-05-11 20:05:45 From FOMO to JOMO: Web3 Mental Health Collective Peace Inside Live Launches NFT Collection

Digital mental health collective Peace Inside Live is releasing a wellness-inspired non-fungible token (NFT) collection to raise funds for mental health in the Web3 space.

The company is teaming up with 11 partners, including alternative wellness advocate Deepak Chopra’s metaverse organization Seva.Love, TIME magazine’s Web3 arm TIMEPieces, crypto domain provider Unstoppable Domains, digital artist Adam Bomb Squad and NFT platform House of First, to release the JOMO Effect NFT collection in honor of May’s Mental Health awareness month.

With over 40 creators contributing digital art works to the collection, the tokens are available to mint as an open-edition on Polygon through marketplace Magic Eden for 24 MATIC, or about $21, for the next 24 hours. The “Joy List,” or allow list, opened for three hours preceding the public mint at 20 MATIC, or about $18.

Minting a JOMO Effect NFT donates primary sale profits to five mental health charities, including the American Foundation or Suicide Prevention. Collectors can also participate in Chopra’s Soul of Leadership course, access to Peace Inside Live’s meditations and mindfulness materials, claim a 30% discount for an Unstoppable Domain, and more.

JOMO, or the “joy of missing out,” is a term that emerged to counteract FOMO, or the “fear of missing out.” It’s been a prominent conversation in the Web3 space as collectors have been eager to “ape” into collections, attend events and be omnipresent in the NFT space in hopes that they don’t miss the opportunity to turn a profit. Open / Comment

2023-05-10 17:05:31 Kazakhstan collected $7M in crypto mining taxes in 2022

The government of Kazakhstan received 3.07 billion tenges (approximately $7 million) in tax payments from crypto mining entities in 2022 following the implementation of an amended law regulating the fiscal burden of mining cryptocurrencies, according to local media reports.

Preliminary data from the government for 2023 shows that mining fees collected by April 27 totaled 240 million tenges, over $541,000 at the time of writing. The figures are much lower than the 652 million tenge (~$1.5 million) in fees paid in the first quarter of 2022.

Kazakhstan ranks among the world’s top Bitcoin mining hubs. As of January 2022, the Central Asian country contributed 13.22% of the total Bitcoin hash rate, just behind the United States (37.84%) and China (21.11%), according to data from Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance. Open / Comment

2023-05-09 18:54:40 Open / Comment