On July 7, 2022, Reddit introduced the launch of a brand new mission: Collectible Avatars. These limited-edition PFPs, created by impartial artists in partnership with the corporate (along with well-liked Reddit neighborhood creators), would confer distinctive platform advantages to their house owners. Backed by the Polygon blockchain and out there for buy at a set worth in fiat, it was Reddit’s first large-scale foray into the NFT house.

The announcement took many without warning. The social platform’s NFT subreddit had lengthy been a terrifying and cacophonous place the place you had been equally prone to encounter both seething NFT hatred or annoying and malevolent NFT scams. Even Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian basically suggested folks to keep away from the poisonous part of the web site at one level. What was the corporate doing diving head first right into a technological development whose fame was battered even outdoors the partitions of its personal platform?

But, in a weird Web3 twist, simply three months after the corporate launched its NFT mission, 4 separate Reddit Collectible Avatar collections maintain spots on OpenSea’s Prime 10 checklist for 24-hour buying and selling quantity, with one assortment knocking CryptoPunks out of the primary spot. On prime of that, it not too long ago got here to mild that Reddit customers have created 3 million Vault crypto wallets on the platform since July, surpassing even OpenSea within the variety of lively wallets on its platform.

All of which sounds a bit insane. So, how did Reddit, a Web2 social media platform, turn into the dark-horse hero of Web3 NFTs?

What are Reddit NFTs?

Reddit’s CryptoSnoos NFTs are digital, limited-edition collectibles based mostly on the social platform’s mascot, Snoo. They’re designed by impartial artists and Reddit creators from well-liked inventive communities like r/Comics that customers can purchase with fiat foreign money. The avatars give customers platform advantages (like distinctive profile animations) and permit Redditors to make use of their avatars as they see match off the platform.

These NFTs emerged from the context and the success of Reddit’s then-recently-updated Avatar Builder, which the platform launched in 2020. Customers may use the Avatar Builder to customise their Snoo with hairstyles, jackets, jerseys, and different gear, permitting them to personalize their profile image.

The present Collectible Avatar NFTs are additionally a conceptual extension of Reddit’s first NFT assortment, which it launched quietly again in June 2021 as a set of 4 creative interpretations of its Snoo avatar. Promoting for as excessive as 175 ETH ($234,000 on the time), their success undoubtedly inspired the corporate to proceed exploring the potential of the know-how.

The place to purchase Reddit NFTs

Should you’re seeking to discover a Collectible Avatar in Reddit’s Collectible Avatar Market, you’re out of luck — they’ve all offered out. You could find them on OpenSea, nevertheless, the place secondary gross sales are starting to skyrocket. Listed here are 4 of the preferred.

In style Reddit NFT Collections

Foustlings x Reddit Collectible Avatars is one in all Reddit’s best-selling collections, having achieved greater than 430 ETH in buying and selling quantity. Created by Reddit person Tyler Foust, the gathering options Snoos in his signature squiggly line type surrounded by vibrant colours.

Spooky Season: poieeeyee x Reddit Collectible Avatars and Spooky Season: Rojom x Reddit Collectible Avatars are two Halloween-themed collections of practically 2,000 Snoos created by Redditor poieeeyee and Rojom, respectively. Poieeeyee’s assortment at the moment holds the number-one spot on OpenSea’s Prime 10 checklist by 24-hour buying and selling quantity, and has seen 514 ETH in buying and selling quantity (as of writing). The fourth assortment in that Prime 10 checklist is The Senses x Reddit Collectible Avatars, one other Rojom creation.

How did Reddit pull this off?

Reddit is aware of its neighborhood effectively. It’s additionally conscious of the controversial standing NFTs maintain within the minds of the non-Web3 initiated. Earlier than the introduction of Collectible Avatars, the corporate launched a report known as The ABCs of NFTs wherein they discovered that 70 p.c of Reddit customers had been open to purchasing an NFT from their favourite model, however 35 p.c thought that manufacturers may additionally “wreck the way forward for NFTs.” In different phrases, they knew they needed to execute their method to NFTs rigorously, minimizing dangerous optics linked with know-how whereas making it straightforward to buy them.

They usually walked a really wonderful line. The corporate employed impartial artists and acknowledged expertise inside its personal platform to make artistically distinctive digital avatars that grant house owners particular utility on Reddit, gave NFT house owners one thing akin to a CC0 license when it comes to mental property utilization, incentivized platform customers to get a cool, new PFP within the course of, and made them out there for buy utilizing fiat as an alternative of crypto. They usually did this all whereas consciously avoiding utilizing the time period “NFT.” The phrase doesn’t make a single look in Reddit’s July announcement.

This technique actually wasn’t misplaced on its person base, as evidenced by this current put up from a neighborhood member. However at this level, no quantity of the acerbic, intelligent, typically poisonous rhetoric that Reddit customers have earned an notorious fame for can do something to carry again Collectible Avatars’ monumental rise.

“Seeing [NFTs] take off acquired us pondering — what would occur if we gave artists on Reddit license to make any type of avatar they wished?” the corporate contemplated in its July announcement.

Should you had stated the reply to that query was “get a number of Reddit Collectible Avatar collections into OpenSea’s Prime 10 checklist, with one knocking the mighty CryptoPunks out of the number-one spot,” you the decentralized neighborhood could have checked out you with furrowed brows.

What Reddit has achieved right here is tough to overstate, and its technique of approaching NFTs with out even utilizing the time period is one which many extra Web2 firms on the fence about NFTs will in all probability implement, given this success story. For now, the Snoo has turned our heads.