Apple’s VR/MR Brings the metaverse back into focus

Apple CEO Tim Cook kicked off the annual WWDC23 developer conference with the announcement of the new Apple Vision Pro mixed reality headset. Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

A portal to the metaverse has opened, and its point of origin was Apple’s official reveal of their new Vision Pro VR headset at WWDC 2023 yesterday. My thoughts? Apple’s new mixed reality headset is the most significant thing to happen to non-fungible tokens (NFTs) since CryptoPunks.

Digital property is still an unrelatable concept to some. For those same people, the idea that digital items can have financial value seems artificial at best, and nefarious at worst. But when they get to experience these assets through augmented or mixed reality, a great awaking will occur, and they’ll finally understand how tangible digital assets really are.

CryptoPunks isn’t noteworthy because it’s the first NFT. CryptoPunks are important because their existence inspired most of what we see in the NFT space today, including the ERC-721 token standard, 10,000 collection sizes, and iconic traits. Just like CryptoPunks, Apple’s VR headset isn’t the first to market, but it is likely to inspire the future of NFTs and usher the masses into the metaverse.

Noteworthy Happenings

• The SEC has filed a lawsuit against Binance and Coinbase for alleged securities related to the sale of unregistered securities. These alleged securities include tokens that power many NFT projects like The Sandbox, Decentraland, Axie Infinity, and even blockchain’s main transacting tokens like Polygon’s $MATIC, Solana’s $SOL, Cardano’s $ADA, and Binance’s $BNB.

• Azuki is rocking and Twitter is abuzz, talking about Azuki’s rise to a 1-year highpoint in floor price. We’ve seen some massive sales for rare Azukis including this Rank 420 that sold for over 161 ETH.

• Frank DeGods announced a new Dust Labs product called De[id] that features wallet delegation for wallet security, and Twitter connectivity that allows holders to be auto-followed/unfollowed by official DeGods and Y00ts accounts. 

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We’re opening up our waitlist for 3rd party sites to use de[id] today! pic.twitter.com/t0MaCXQB6a

— Dust Labs (@dust_labs) June 5, 2023

• Opepen founder Jack Butcher celebrated Apple’s new product announcement with an announcement of his own, revealing his own entry into the Openen ecosystem. Opepen holders can now opt-in to redeem their NFTs for the chance to win a new Opepen designed by Butcher himself. 

• A Polygon collection called Weee Did It Palz blitzed its way to the top of the Polygon Collection Rankings. This feat was accomplished without using official Twitter and Discord accounts, and with no sales taking place on OpenSea or Magic Eden. Instead, these sales are ripping on the Element marketplace. 

• NFC, or Non Fungible Conference, is the latest ‘cant-miss’ NFT conference that NFT collectors are flocking to. Taking place in Lisbon Portugal beginning today, NFC is heavily focused on art and is co-sponsored by Cult Crypto Art, and The Sandbox

Peep the charts

• Azuki’s 1-year ATH floor price has helped push the top 10 all-time NFT project to #2 on the seven-day rankings. 

• DMarket and Gods Unchained still won’t let go of the middle of the chart.
• DeGods has had a big week and landed at the 8 spot, possibly from speculation leading up to the De[id] reveal.
• Ben.eth’s FF6000 drop which features an orange square made waves at launch last week as the latest hyped drop in his ecosystem of meme coins. This one however can be bridged to Bitcoin with the new BRC-721E bridge mechanic.

• Ethereum as a whole continues to reflect the change in traders’ sentiment to bullish and is up over 92% from the previous 7-day period.
• Bitcoin stabilized after coming back down from the high of the $OXBT frenzy.
• Polygon is having a big week and has been lifted to the #3 spot on the Blockchain Rankings thanks to newcomers called Weee Did It Palz, The Zumba Warriors, and The Flower Powerz collections.