Can the NFT marketplace MOOAR developed by the STEPN team surpass Magic Eden?

Original Title: “A Brief History of NFT Marketplaces: Can the STEPN team's MOOAR overtake Magic Eden?”

Author: Col Jung

Translation: Leo, BlockBeats

The NFT marketplace industry is a highly competitive field.

From having only a few participants at the beginning to now developing into a thriving industry, new entrants join the competition at every turn, vying for a share of the lucrative pie.

MOOAR, an emerging NFT marketplace, is backed by Find Satoshi Lab (FSL) — the developer of Stepn. After launching a well-received Web 3 lifestyle app, FSL has driven the development of the move-to-earn industry and subsequently launched DOOAR, which quickly became the largest decentralized exchange (DEX) under Solana.

Currently, the FSL team is launching its own NFT marketplace. But how can new entrants like MOOAR establish themselves in a market filled with established competitors?

Intense Competition

For newcomers who cannot keep up with the frenzied pace of innovation, competition among NFT marketplaces can be an intense and brutal process, with no so-called "safe" spaces in the NFT market.

The largest NFT marketplace — Ethereum's OpenSea — holds the largest share of trading volume. However, in recent months, the latecomer "dark horse" X2Y2 has gradually taken trading volume away from OpenSea and has surpassed it in the most recent quarter.

We have witnessed similar dynamics in the Solana ecosystem.

Magic Eden currently accounts for 70%-80% of Solana NFT trading volume, while the second most popular marketplace (Yawww) only accounted for 15% in the past month, but such temporary advantages are not sustainable. Before Magic Eden emerged, Solanart held the NFT share on Solana, and after the large-scale launch of Degenerate Ape Academy in the third quarter of 2021, 10,000 apes were sold in just 8 minutes, quickly entering the mainstream.

It was from that time that SOL's price skyrocketed to $260 in November. There were related reports on YouTube.

Note: It is still interesting to note that Solana, a chain eager to disrupt Wall Street with its astonishing throughput, ultimately became known as the ultimate chain for NFTs during the bull market.

Unfortunately for Solana, this situation did not last long.

How did Magic Eden defeat Solanart in just one month and become the leader in the Solana NFT market in a matter of months?

Will X2Y2 repeat history on Ethereum and continue to challenge OpenSea's dominance?

Can the STEPN team's MOOAR compete with Magic Eden?

To address these questions, we need to understand why and how these past milestone events occurred.

Humble Beginnings

Many are familiar with how the NFT craze began on the Ethereum blockchain, driven by CryptoKitties, CryptoPunks, and Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC).

Solana NFTs began around March 2021. Some of the OGs in this market are Kreechures and solarian. This was followed by the first generative art-based Solana Monkey Business (SMB), and of course, the launch of Degenerate Ape Academy (DAA) in August 2021, which brought Solana's NFTs into the spotlight and created a new "blue-chip" NFT.

In the early days, Solanart was the dominant marketplace on Solana (this was just a year ago). It launched in June 2021 and quickly became a badge of honor for the platform's homepage.

The Rise of Magic Eden

Soon, Solanart became yesterday's news. The reason for such a rapid shift was Magic Eden. A year later, Solanart was pushed to only 3% of the daily trading volume of Magic Eden. As I said — it’s brutal.

How did Magic Eden achieve this?

This ambitious team quickly got to work. Initially just a very basic marketplace, it soon evolved into a comprehensive NFT platform that allowed creators and traders to thrive easily, and ease meant adoption.

Magic Eden also adopted:

• An active Twitter supported by founder participation in AMAs
• Large-scale marketing at Solana events
• Continuous new features and platform updates
• Internal account managers for NFT projects.

These favorable factors — combined with strong community support — facilitated the rise of Magic Eden, which subsequently dominated the market, making it a successful strategy.

In fact, this rapid rise was not without controversy.

We saw ongoing technical issues, such as platform crashes after each mint and the infamous Balloonsville rug, which ultimately pushed Magic Eden to strengthen their launchpad rules. Then there was the recent heated creator royalty war and the platform's recent launch of the MetaShield NFT tool collapse.

Space for Two Giants

Just as X2Y2 soared on Ethereum, now nearly reaching 70% of OpenSea's monthly trading volume, can Solana accommodate two giants? Or is Solana too small for both?

Multiple marketplaces will always exist, as humans grow in familiar environments, so there will always be users who remain loyal to certain marketplaces for comfort and convenience, much like why you always go to your favorite grocery store even if there’s another cheaper one nearby.

I believe that if the two dominant NFT marketplaces have different value propositions, then it seems reasonable for them to coexist, meaning they can both offer something different from each other.

For example, OpenSea remains the most liquid NFT marketplace due to its inherent recognition as an established marketplace. On the other hand, we see a significant number of users flocking to marketplaces like X2Y2 because they "gamify" the entire trading experience — from the ability to stake native tokens, to distributing trading rewards, to providing novel exemptions from royalties for NFT projects without "building."

This apparent difference in expectations and functionalities opens up multiple consumer niche markets occupied by OpenSea, X2Y2, and even LooksRare. Different marketplaces offer users unique identities and functionalities. Therefore, for a new marketplace challenging the status quo on Solana, it needs to fill the gaps left by Magic Eden.

Talking about MOOAR: A Challenger Emerges from the Shadows

Many are familiar with STEPN, a move-to-earn app developed and expanded by the genius team at Find Satoshi Lab (FSL). In less than a year, FSL has attracted over 1 million users into Web 3 across Solana, BNB Chain, and Ethereum.

Click here for a detailed introduction to STEPN and FSL.

Now, the team is launching their own NFT marketplace, MOOAR, but what is MOOAR's unique selling point?

Creator-Centric Fair Royalties

The industry is moving in a direction where fairly compensating creators may become optional. MOOAR refuses to participate in this competition and aspires to be a "beacon" that supports creators' contributions, allowing creators to set their royalty fees at a reasonable level.

This aligns with MOOAR's focus on becoming the preferred platform for launching PFP NFT series, whether independent or as part of their roadmap. PFP collectibles are essentially art, which guarantees royalties for artists. That’s fair.

FSL aims to promote a virtuous cycle where NFT creators become better under MOOAR, making them more willing to create better content to encourage retained members. This establishes a positive feedback loop, positioning MOOAR as a platform known for high-quality projects, with a loyal user base and dedicated creators who can rely on passive income to sustain their work.

A form of synergistic loyalty among users, creators, and the platform. However, if members no longer need to pay royalties to compete for quality content with other members, will they really be willing to pay royalties? Great question! This inspires the next unique selling point.

Zero-Service Fee Subscription Model

How does MOOAR balance creators and users? The former wants fair compensation for their work, while the latter may not want to pay any royalties!

I mean, we all love creators, but times are a bit tough, right? MOOAR introduces a zero-fee subscription model for the NFT marketplace. Members will save money by trading NFTs on MOOAR with a 0% service fee instead of paying a fixed monthly subscription fee to use the platform. This means whether you are making bulk trades of cheaper NFTs or swapping a single Bored Ape (60+ ETH), you will save a significant amount.

Just like exchanges that offer very low crypto trading fees or brokerage firms with low spreads, the zero-fee subscription model provides MOOAR members the freedom to swap NFTs at will.

This also opens the door for FSL to provide additional rewards and interesting gamification plans in the future (such as an upgrade reward system). There have even been discussions about integrating MOOAR members into all FSL products in the future, although I expect this will take longer.

Exciting stuff.

Finally, MOOAR's unique selling points even extend to their launchpad.

Community-Driven "Thematic" Launchpad

The concept of a launchpad is similar to private equity and venture capital in traditional finance, except that ordinary people like you and me can participate, achieving financial democratization for the little guy!

The idea is to give launchpad participants the opportunity to buy into new projects before they launch — usually at a super low price.

Similarly, many NFT marketplaces offer a launchpad service where creators can launch their new NFTs, interestingly, MOOAR has a unique perspective on the launchpad concept.

They no longer wait for projects to approach them but instead limit project releases to a specific theme each "season." This could last for several months.

Web 3 teams can conceive projects that fit the theme and submit them to the MOOAR team for release. MOOAR members holding GMT can vote for their favorite projects. Each quarter, the community-led winners then have the opportunity to launch on MOOAR's thematic launchpad, with winners providing a full suite of marketing and technical support before and after the project launch.

MOOAR's litepaper

Conclusion

The NFT marketplace is evolving, and it is only a matter of time before strong competitors emerge to compete with Magic Eden for lucrative market shares, especially on Solana — the preferred chain for NFTs.

Will it be MOOAR? That remains to be seen.

What I want to say is that the FSL team behind STEPN has the talent, technology, and track record to build and scale innovative startups in a short time.

With substantial financial backing from STEPN and DOOAR, along with FSL's ever-growing team of driven developers, engineers, marketers, and content creators, I believe MOOAR has the potential to go head-to-head with Magic Eden.

The team is determined to stand out from competitors immediately by leveraging its unique selling points (creator-centric royalty policy, zero-fee subscription model, and community-driven "thematic" launchpad).

The NFT marketplace industry is about to enter a heated phase!