Warner Music backs NFT project that aims to mint virtual superstars in the metaverse

Singapore-based Ownft World said its new NFTs will effectively live like real celebrities, earning income through music videos, animations and fashion shows
The project aims to tie an NFT’s value to the popularity of its idol rather than its resale value

NFTs

Coco Fengin Beijing

Published: 3:30pm, 21 Jan 2022

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A new metaverse project that includes Warner Music Group as a partner is using non-fungible tokens (NFTs) to create virtual celebrities that can appear in various digital media and tie a token’s value to an idol’s popularity.

Called The Guardians of Fashion (GOF), the project will mint 6,888 NFTs for two-dimensional avatars based on human characteristics, Singapore-based start-up Ownft World announced in a statement on January 13. The tokens will use the Ethereum blockchain.

Warner Music has signed on as GOF’s first music partner. The company will issue a virtual casting call to identify 100 GOF avatar talents for upcoming partnerships, such as animatics videos. GOF has also collaborated with Yeah1 Group, a leading multichannel network in Asia that represents influencers, for an upcoming anime series based on the avatars.

China unlikely to ban NFTs as digital collectibles flourish

“NFT values are usually based on rarity,” project director Eu Wing Leong said in an interview with the South China Morning Post. “However, with GOF, avatar owners are going to be able to enhance the value of their GOF avatars via the popularity route, as well.”

The public sale will start in early February, according to Leong, with each NFT starting at 0.18 ether (US$514).

GOF avatars are meant to exist as actual celebrities with their own careers, performing in things like music videos and virtual runway shows to maintain a regular income.

The companies involved will “share the streaming revenues for production and marketing costs of each project,” Leong said.

This makes the NFTs different from those that only generate value when traded. The tokens that can trace ownership on a blockchain gained widespread popularity last year as a means for artists and collectors to sell and trade digital works like physical goods.

Avatars from the Guardians of Fashion project. Photo: Handout

Last March, the digital photo collage Everydays: The First 5000 Days by US artist Beeple sold for a record US$69.3 million at a Christie’s auction. In December, the world’s first text message – a 1992 holiday greeting saying just “Merry Christmas” – was minted as an NFT that sold for €107,000 (US$121,322) at a Paris auction house.

The NFT market does not show any signs of slowing down in 2022. Several real-world celebrities have been wading into the crypto waters with their own projects. Steph Curry, a National Basketball Association player with the Golden State Warriors, Argentine professional footballer Lionel Messi, and Taiwanese pop star Jay Chou have all launched their NFT collections.

The NFT boom has resulted in a surge of related activity in Hong Kong, and the trend has even caught on in mainland China, where a ban on cryptocurrencies has made it difficult to access NFTs from overseas.

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Chinese tech giants Tencent Holdings, Ant Group and JD.com have all launched their own platforms for selling blockchain-based “digital collectibles”, shunning the politically sensitive term NFT and restricting users from reselling their tokens. Ant Group is the fintech affiliate of Alibaba Group Holding, owner of the Post.

The state-backed Blockchain Service Network (BSN) will also roll out application programming interfaces (APIs) this month that will allow businesses and individuals to build their own user portals or apps to manage NFTs. As with the digital collectibles platforms, this infrastructure will not use cryptocurrency for trading tokens.

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