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Instagram, the popular social media app owned by Meta Platforms, is set to launch its NFT integration pilot for the platform on Monday. According to the report from CoinDesk, Instagram is planning non-fungible token (NFT) integrations for Ethereum, Polygon, Solana and Flow. A small group of NFT enthusiasts from the United States will participate in the pilot. It's unclear whether Instagram will support NFTs from all four chains when it launches. Unlike Twitter, Instagram will not charge its users a fee for displaying NFTs according to CoinDesk. Instagram will support widely used crypto wallets like MetaMask. https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/05/08/metas-instagram-to-support-nfts-from-ethereum-polygon-solana-flow/

Sony Electronics has partnered with Theta Labs to launch nonfungible tokens (NFTs) that can be viewed in mixed reality through Sony's Spatial Reality Display, a display that allows individuals to experience things in 3D without the use of typical 3D peripherals. The Spatial Reality Display follows the viewer's eye movement and modifies the display accordingly, providing a 3D viewing experience. Sony and Theta will be releasing an NFT called The Tiki Guy which is a 3D Tiki Mask. There will only be ten of these NFTs produced. While the NFT drop is designed for 3D viewing, 2D versions will be available as well. According to Nick Colsey, a Sony Electronics executive, “Consumers can now enjoy a next-generation 3D experience without the need for 3D eyewear. Theta’s NFTs are just the latest way we can show our rapid adoption of metaverse-friendly technology.” https://cointelegraph.com/news/theta-labs-to-help-sony-launch-3d-nfts-compatible-with-spatial-reality-display

In a recent announcement, Asset management giant VanEck (with over $82 billion in assets under management) stated that it’s releasing a 1,000 NFT collection on Ethereum meant to showcase the real-world utility inherent in the NFT structure. The NFTs are being designed in a partnership with NUMOMO, a Korean-based NFT agency. According to the press release, the project will trace the journey of a fictional character named Hammy, who is modelled after American Founding Father Alexander Hamilton. The first release, dubbed “Episode One: Printing Press” can be viewed on VanEck’s signup page https://www.coinbureau.com/news/investment-giant-vaneck-release-new-nft-collection/

It’s no secret that traditional gamers have hated NFTs in gaming for a while now. Recently, a group called Climate Replay (which is made up of a large number of Minecraft developers) released an online guide and ‘pledge’ to increase awareness about the potential dangers of NFTs and cryptocurrencies. However, a week since its release, the pledge has only seen signatures from 72 individuals and 5 companies thus far. The pledge and guide highlighted the environmental concerns of using blockchain technology and of the various security issues faced by such games citing the recent Ronin Bridge hack. The Pledge reads, “By ignoring key risk factors and glaring issues, adopters of NFTs and other forms of digital ownership that embrace these problematic aspects erode efforts to create an equitable and sustainable existence for all. NFTs in gaming do not bring any meaningful value to the players.” https://decrypt.co/99136/minecraft-developers-petition-against-gaming-nfts-gets-just-72-signatures-in-one-week

On Saturday, Solana faced its seventh outage thus far in 2022. The outage lasted for seven hours overnight between Saturday and Sunday and is being attributed to a swarm of bots that overwhelmed the Candy Machine, a tool for minting non-fungible tokens Metaplex, the NFT platform powering Candy Machine, identified the bots inside the dApp as the primary cause of Solana's downtime and revealed a plan to address the issue and prevent it from happening again. Metaplex elaborated on their plan stating, “To combat this, we have merged and will soon deploy a botting penalty to the program as part of a broader effort to stabilise the network. Candy Machine is used by a majority of new SolanaNFT projects to launch their collections. In this change, a 0.01 SOL penalty will be collected when a wallet attempts to complete an invalid transaction, which is typically done by bots that are blindly trying to mint.” https://www.coinbureau.com/news/solana-faces-seven-hour-outage-after-bots-overwhelm-nft-minting-app/

Flipkart, which is backed by Walmart, has announced the launch of its in-house innovation unit called Flipkart Labs. According to a statement by the company, Flipkart Labs will be focused on testing nonfungible tokens (NFTs), virtual immersive storefronts and play-to-earn features. According to Naren Ravula, VP and Head of product strategy and deployment at Flipkart Labs, “We are in the early days of a paradigm shift from Web2.0 to Web3.0 and this evolution of the web/internet built on the concepts of decentralisation, openness, and greater user utility will have a profound impact across many areas including e-commerce," https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-28/walmart-backed-flipkart-to-test-web-3-0-metaverse-expansion

The creators of the perhaps the world’s most famous NFT collection, The Bored Ape Yacht Club, Yuga Labs, have just completed the purchase of IP for perhaps the second most famous NFT collection, The CryptoPunks! Yuga Labs’ first move as the CryptoPunk’s IP holder, is to grant full commercial rights to individual NFT holders: “With this acquisition Yuga Labs will own the CryptoPunks and Meebit brands and logos, and as they’ve done with their own BAYC collection, Yuga Labs will transfer IP, commercial and exclusive licensing rights to individual NFT holders”. Yuga’s decision to give BAYC IP to holders has prompted a number of exciting moves including the inception of numerous projects, even including ‘metaverse bands’ with Bored Apes as band members. On the flipside, Larva has come into conflict with its NFT holders over refusal to transfer commercial rights. Some holders even abandoned the project over the controversy. Yuga has since stressed that their absolute focus will still be the BAYC ecosystem, and they have no immediate plans to do anything but give IP to the CryptoPunk holders and see what they do with it! https://decrypt.co/94898/bored-ape-yacht-club-yuga-labs-cryptopunks-larva-labs