The renowned NFT marketplace, OpenSea, has published its new strategy regarding royalties for Non-Fungible Token creators, introducing a new on-chain tool.
OpenSea: the new on-chain tool dedicated to royalties for NFT creators
Over the weekend, the most popular NFT marketplace, OpenSea, released its new royalties strategy for Non-Fungible Token creators.
2/ It’s clear that many creators want the ability to enforce fees on-chain & we believe that choice should be theirs–not a marketplace’s–to make.
So we’re building tools we hope will balance the scales by putting more power in creators’ hands to control their business model.
— OpenSea (@opensea) November 6, 2022
“There’s been a lot of discussion over the past few months about business models for NFT creators & whether creator fees (“royalties”) are viable. Given our role in the ecosystem, we want to take a thoughtful, principled approach to this topic & to lead w/ solutions.
It’s clear that many creators want the ability to enforce fees on-chain & we believe that choice should be theirs–not a marketplace’s–to make. So we’re building tools we hope will balance the scales by putting more power in creators’ hands to control their business model.”
Essentially, the new on-chain tool that OpenSea is introducing is a simple code snippet that creators can add to future NFT contracts, as well as to existing updatable contracts.
In this way, as the NFT creator decides whether or not to add this code snippet, OpenSea will apply creator fees for new collections that use an on-chain application tool, while not applying them for new collections that do not implement on-chain application.
The new code will limit NFT sales to marketplaces that charge creator fees, blocking trading of such NFTs on those marketplaces listed at zero or optional royalties.
OpenSea and its view on NFT creator royalties
OpenSea co-founder and CEO Devin Finzer highlighted the marketplace’s position on NFT royalties.
Basically, since its inception, OpenSea has supported royalties for NFT creators so as to attract more and more of them. In recent months, however, with other marketplaces making them optional, the voluntary payment of such fees for creators has been reduced to less than 20%. Furthermore, Finzer points out that in other marketplaces, royalties for creators are not paid at all.
This situation has prompted the most popular of the NFT marketplaces to want to take a stand on this issue with its new on-chain tool, which leaves it directly in the hands of the creator whether or not to add royalties.
In this regard, Finzer states:
“Given our role in the ecosystem, we know it’s critical for us to take a thoughtful, principled approach to solving this problem, and to lead with solutions. It’s clear that many creators want the ability to enforce fees on-chain; and fundamentally, we believe that the choice should be theirs to make – it shouldn’t be a decision made for them by marketplaces. So we’re looking to balance the scales by putting more power in creators’ hands, equipping them with tools to control their business model.”
The new business system is available for new NFT collections
As of 12:00 PM (ET) on Tuesday, 8 November, OpenSea will charge creator fees only for new collections using the on-chain application tool.
As for existing collections, no change will be made at the moment, given the difficulty, at least until 8 December 2022.
Indeed, OpenSea says that anything that may happen after that date will be evaluated in this month of application of the new business system for NFT creators.
In general, Finzer stresses that he is aware that the new system will involve creators first and foremost, but also collections and communities. This change aimed at supporting royalties is seen as an important web3 innovation that helps creators monetize their work more effectively.
Indeed, Finzer stresses that the marketplace will not be able to impose its business model on creators through on-chain functionality.
The tool to prevent scams
Recently, OpenSea jointly with Web3 Builders contributed to an initial funding of $7 million and the launch of TrustCheck, the tool that prevents scams.
It is a free Web3 end-user security tool available to protect them from scams. TrustCheck is a Chrome browser extension that instantly analyzes the risk of a wide range of crypto transactions, such as the interaction of NFTs or smart contracts as well as token swaps.
Simulating transactions before they happen, TrustCheck runs its checks on the company’s machine learning engine and after analyzing the data, offers users personalized security recommendations in real time before finalizing the crypto transaction.
The funding round involving OpenSea, along with Road Capital and other venture and angel investors, will fuel the development and expansion of Web3 Builders’ B2B enterprise product.
