Last week, the legal actions associated with blockchain and NFT in various regions of the globe diverged dramatically. In China, Tencent closed its NFT marketplace following a series of limitations on NFT activities in this country, while the UK government approved using NFT airdrops to fulfill the lawsuits. There will be other news related to OpenSea's layoffs, the merging of Ethereum, and some activities in the NFT market. Let Trait Sniper give you an overview below!

Blockchain Market

Tencent Closed Its NFT Marketplace

The huge Chinese internet and technology business, Tencent, has closed its NFT marketplace. Although there have been no formal announcements, many assume that this is due to legal issues with government policy. Chinese state media said that in June, Tencent Holdings and Ant Group signed an agreement to stop the secondary trade of digital collectibles and "self-regulate" their market operations. China does not officially prohibit NFTs, but current government regulations targeting NFT technology make NFT trading difficult. The nation also cautioned investors about the risks of NFT trading.

U.K. Court Allows Lawsuits Can NFT Airdrop

According to reports, the UK High Court issued the order on June 24, but it was not made public until last week. A case filed by Fabrizio D'Aloia, the founder of Microgame, who is suing the cryptocurrency exchange Binance Holdings in addition to other platforms, resulted in the UK court's decision on the delivery of legal documents through blockchain. He claimed that “persons unknown” fraudulently cloned his crypto assets on these platforms.

Notably, the court has allowed the airdropping of legal papers in the form of NFTs to two wallets initially used by D’Aloia and then stolen by those accused of fraud. In the United Kingdom, victims of crypto scams may now sue unknown scammers. The court also concluded that the exchanges were responsible for ensuring that stolen crypto wasn’t removed from their systems.

OpenSea Lay Off 20% Of Their Employees

Devin Finzer, co-founder and CEO of OpenSea, announced that the business had laid off 20 percent of its employees. Devin tweeted, “The folks leaving us are smart, hardworking, mission-driven individuals who’ve played an immeasurable role in growing OpenSea and the NFT space to where we are today.” OpenSea has promised to support employees who are leaving the company. In fact, the corporation will continue to provide severance pay and health benefits until 2023. They will also use their broad network to search for new employment opportunities. This is understandably a result of "crypto winter" and global economic uncertainty in the NFT space.

The merge of Ethereum from PoW to PoS could take place in September

According to Tim Beiko, a senior engineer at the Ethereum Foundation, the Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus mechanism will be replaced with a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism during the week of September 19th. The merger should reduce Ethereum's energy usage by approximately 99.5%. Proponents of PoS believe that it offers superior security and scalability.

NFT Market

MetaMansion: The Collaboration of Playboy and The Sandbox

Playboy first teased that it might construct a virtual version of the infamous Playboy Mansion when it released a collection of Rabbitar NFTs in October 2021. Now, Playboy has declared that The Sandbox will be the official home of the Playboy MetaMansion.

In summary, Playboy believes MetaMansion will be a socially engaging and interactive game in The Sandbox. Additionally, there will be event programming, NFT releases, and others. Rabbitar holders will be able to validate their NFT in order to get the "Playboy Rabbitar" position. In the future, they will be eligible for exclusive access, giveaways, and other advantages.

Obviously, all of Playboy's activations at The Sandbox draw inspiration from the publication's seventy-year history, content library, and art collection, as well as the lengthy list of legendary events hosted at the Playboy Mansion.

Skyweaver Introduces Their First Expansion NFT Cards

The Skyweaver card game has over 500 trade cards and has a large fan base. But these cards cannot be purchased and can only be acquired through playing the game. Deckbuilding and a "prism" mechanism are essential components of the Skyweaver NFT game concept. Five prisms are available, from which players may construct their preferred card deck. The five prisms are courage, prudence, compassion, and intelligence.

Each prism will get 10 new cards in the Skyweaver expansion, including four spells and six creatures. In addition, each card is meant to help a certain prism and contributes to the game's lore and concept.

The Skyweaver NFT trading card game expansion is ongoing work. The popular game has confirmed they will also release an extra 20 cards for the Clash of Inventors expansion over the summer.

Final Thoughts

The layoffs continued in the bear market when OpenSea decided to cut 20% of its employees. The contrast in countries adopting new technology such as blockchain and NFT is evident. Especially when the US has included the applications of NFT in support of legal proceedings while China restricts trading activities on the blockchain. Now, NFT projects in the global market are also more cautious and have not had many breakthroughs. A highlight point is the joining of big brands such as PlayBoy, which will build a future for the blockchain.

Trait Sniper Weekly News 7 (11.07 - 17.07.2022)

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