Moonbirds are flying off to Hollywood

GM. We hope you had a restful weekend and are ready for an exciting week ahead. Already, the markets are waking up and showing some buzz. We're here with you all along the way. Let's get right into it.

Today we cover:

• Generative Art outperforms in 2022

• Moonbirds are going to Hollywood

• Today's Most Interesting Tweets

Generative Art Outperforms in 2022

Looking at Nansen's NFT indexes, it is clear that Art has been outperforming in this bear market. It's the only index that is higher today than it was 1 year ago. This art index includes Chromie Squiggles, Terraforms, and several Art Blocks collections. 

One reason for Art's outperformance is that it doesn't have any promised utility or a roadmap. This allows it to thrive in environments where belief rates are low and there is a high level of investor skepticism about startups hitting their business and product milestones

Moonbirds Are Flying Off To Hollywood

💲 What to know: PROOF Collective & Moonbirds has signed a deal with United Talent Agency (UTA), one of the world's leading global talent and entertainment companies. PROOF/Moonbirds is founded by Kevin Rose, a prolific tech entrepreneur and investor.

Moonbirds is a collection of 10,000 pixellated NFTs, launched in early 2022. The cheapest Moonbird NFT today is 9+ ETH (~$12,000). With this partnership, Moonbirds hopes to establish new partnerships that will bring it into the spotlight in the real world, beyond the Web3 space. Buckle up, cos the birds are going to Hollywood.

☘️ In the weeds: UTA is one of the top agencies in Hollywood, representing pioneering artists, entertainers, and brands. Its clients include Johnny Depp, Angelina Jolie, Chance the Rapper, and 1000s more spanning across music, sports, film, television, theatre, and gaming. UTA also has an interest in NFTs, launching its NFT practice in 2021. Prior to Moonbirds, it signed Deadfellaz and Larva Labs.

When you sign with a talent agency, they help to connect, broker, and execute partnership opportunities that help you to grow. It could be within their network, as well as beyond. And they have a keen incentive to do so: their business model involves taking a cut out of every deal that is signed. 

🤑 Why it matters: For PFPs like Moonbirds to truly thrive and go beyond a niche hobbyist club of digital bird lovers, they need to extend their reach beyond the Web3 community and go mainstream. This is one of the tactics Moonbirds is employing to do so. 

UTA has a wide network of mainstream celebrities and brands and will work to get at least some of them to collaborate with Moonbirds — through merchandising, licensing and sponsorships. This deal with UTA itself is not the meat. What's important is what deals come out of this partnership, and how meaningful are they. UTA has brokered a few deals for Deadfellaz but nothing particularly eye-catching except for some ski boards.

It typically takes several weeks-months to get a deal done, so expect to see more of this partnership in 2023.

Today's Most Interesting Tweets

🐥 Mysterious new NFT project teaser

🐥 Why hyped mints are doomed to fail

🐥 Web3 gaming: less games, more infra

🐥 23 startup ideas using NFT pricing tools

🐥 Capsule House announces a change

🐥 Legends of Venari (Web3 game)'s new drop on 13 Jan

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