Metopia Research Report — Degenerate Ape Academy
Introduction
Degenerate Ape Academy is a collection of 10,000 NFTs on the Solana, all of which were minted on August 14, 2021. The vision of Degenerate Ape Academy is “Take 10,000 of the smoothest brained apes, put them all in one location and let the mayhem ensue. The academy was founded on the principles of friendship making, crayon eating and absolute, unregulated, deplorable, degenerate behavior.”
Degenerate Ape Academy is the first zero-trust NFT release on Solana. Through smart contracts, users will have ownership of the artwork and Degen Ape itself after purchase. It will also provide NFT holders with the highest level of access to The Degeniverse and Degen DAOO.
The Degeniverse NFT
Currently, Degenerate Ape Academy is divided into three main types of NFTs: Degen Ape, Degen Eggs, and Trash Panda. Users can purchase them through official NFT marketplace or Magic Eden. In particular, Degenerate Ape Academy has partnered with Rarible to provide Degeniverse with an official NFT marketplace powered by Rarible Protocol, which provides Degeniverse users with a one-stop NFT trading experience and makes NFT trading more convenient and independent.
Degen Ape
Degen Ape is composed of 10,000 NFTs with different attributes. There are 7 attributes in total: Background, Clothing, Eyewear, Fur/Skin, Head, Mouth, and Teeth.
The rarity of Degen Ape can be checked on HowRare. The ranking on HowRare is widely accepted by Degen Ape owners as well as the entire community’s consensus. Users can rank 10,000 Degen Ape by ID, rarity or price, and compare rarity by selecting characteristics of different parts.
According to data on Magic Eden, the cumulative trading volume of Degen Ape is 476K SOL (~$21M) since its launch, ranking fourth on Magic Eden’s ranking list. In the last 30 days, Degen Ape’s trading volume was 14.6K SOL, down 13.25% compared to last month. As of August 16, the Floor Price was 49.99 SOL, an increase of 733% compared to the initial minting price of 6 SOL. Currently, Degen Ape has 4,532 holders, 587 of which are listed on Magic Eden, with a pending order rate of 5.87%.
Degen Eggs
The total number of Degen Eggs is 2,500. There are 6 attributes: Background, Egg Color, Eyes, Mouth, Nose, and Skin Type. According to Magic Eden data, the current Floor Price of Degen Eggs is 70 SOL. The number of holders is 991. The total volume is 76K SOL.
In the original Degen Apes collection, the team reserves additional Apes for marketing, contests, community activities, etc. The team releases all reserved Apes to the public through Degenerate Eggs.
Prior to the incubation of Degen Eggs, Degenerate Ape Academy partnered with exchange.art to host weekly auctions. Each auction will include a special Degen Eggs that will hatch Degen Apes with a rarity of 1/1.
Degenerate Trash Pandas
Trash Pandas is one of the key components of The Degeniverse. It utilizes the 3D art skills from Degen Ape artist Monoliff and some core developers in the Solana industry. Trash Pandas are divided into Background, Body, Exalted_Stat, Fur, Glasses, Head, Mouth and ❤️.
According to Magic Eden data, the current Floor Price of Trash Pandas is 4.1 SOL. The number of holders is 6,147. The total volume is 134K SOL.
Trash Pandas has a symbiotic relationship with Degen Apes. Each Degen Ape NFT holder who does not list their Degen Ape on the trading platform will receive 1 Candy Machine token (1:1 ratio). Ape holders can exchange their Candy Machine tokens to get Trash Pandas series NFT. Holders of Degen Apes and Trash Pandas will receive unique rewards for each of the two NFTs, while the rewards will be increased over time.
Degen DAOO — Operating Mechanism
Degen DAOO is the community operating organization for The Degeniverse, including Degenerate Ape Academy, Degenerate Trash Pandas, and other NFT projects.
Degen DAOO was founded to enable the Degen community to pool resources and execute project development plans and thus grow The Degeniverse brand and support the Solana ecosystem. To participate in DAO governance decisions and community operations, users are required to hold a Degen Ape or Trash Panda NFT collection and join Degen DAOO via Discord #Enroll.
Degen DAOO is independent of the Degenerate Ape Academy development team. It is autonomous by the community in making development decisions, supporting proposals from community members, using its own funds, and funding proposals for Degenerate Ape Academy.
Degen DAOO is able to achieve different types of things, including charity, community support, project support, Solana ecological support, etc. Degen DAOO has also achieved things like building a vibrant community of thousands of people, giving away hundreds of community NFTs to Degen Ape holders, providing high-quality merchandise to Degen DAOO members, and exclusive access to popular NFTs on Solana.
Degen DAOO conducts community interaction by offering a range of community roles, and separate Discord channels for different roles. The types of roles include content creators, governance proposal initiators, marketers, Discord mods, web developers, etc.
Currently, Degen DAOO’s multi-sig wallet is co-managed by 3 multi-signers. The tokens and NFTs in the multi-sig wallet are in Degen DAOO’s multi-signature treasury. Currently, a total of 99 NFTs and 129.5 SOLs are in this multi-sig wallet.
Degenerate Trash Pandas — Governance and operation mechanism
The Trash Pandas DAO is governed by proposals and voting on DAOs through the Realms platform. Realms provides a platform for builders on Solana to create DAOs, manage DAO membership, vote on proposals and allocate funds.
Proposals for Trash Pandas DAOs can be initiated by any community member holding at least 5 Pandas. The proposal and voting process all take place on Realms. The voting cycle is 1 week and each proposal needs to reach a quorum of participants (currently this parameter is set at 1000) to be approved. 1 Pandas NFT represents 1 vote of governance power.
Conclusion
Since the official release of Degenerate Ape Academy, it has been running smoothly for 1 year and consequently launched NFT projects like Trash Pandas and Degen Eggs, community operational organizations like Degen DAOO. All these above make up the structure of The Degeniverse.
In terms of proposal governance and proposal voting, Degen DAOO and Trash Pandas base on Realms on Solana, the DAO creation and voting platform. They have also set thresholds for both proposal initiators and proposal quorum participation. However, it is worth noting that from the current proposal voting statistics, the motivation of community members for proposals still needs to be improved.
