Jun 21, 2022
Particles Analysis — A solution to the illiquidity in the 1/1 market
Yup, it’s me and I’m back again with another one of our weekly deep dives! The NFT craze has been going on for a while now and from it, growing niches such as the 1/1 NFT market on Solana have emerged.
The cool thing about 1/1 art is it gives life-long artists a truly independent platform to showcase their artwork to audiences that are inaccessible in the physical world. The low supply of these NFTs imply scarcity among a growing number of new-age art collectors looking for premium art. This space is growing but most people don’t know where to look and by the time they find out, they’re out-priced entirely. If people want to have some exposure to this market and can’t buy one themselves then it makes sense to collect and share these pieces as a community…
Enter: Particles!
Particles curates iconic 1/1 art and fractionalizes them for their members. You’re probably thinking, “ BUT I love art, why would I want a token?!” right now. Here’s the fun part, if you fall in love with a piece and want to own it entirely, their unique one of one token or $OOO actually lets you redeem art directly from their vault.
This week we’ve partnered up with Particles to bring you the inside scoop about what they are doing, how it works, and all that good stuff. As usual, this is not financial advice but only educational content. Always do your own research on any crypto project.
Table of Contents
1. Summary
2. Overview of Particles
3. Fractionalization
4. Utility
5. Roadmap
6. Q&A
7. Concluding Thoughts
Part 1. Summary
The TL;DR for this one.
- Particles is an exclusive collection of 1,555 Solana NFTs
- The 1/1 NFT market is an ecosystem of artists, collectors and investors contributing to the decentralized creator economy.
- Particles partnered with Holaplex to index 1/1 sales data, building the first open-sourced NFT artist leaderboard on Solana. Now they’re aggregating all marketplaces into a single data tool for the space.
- Particles holders gain membership to the Particles DAO, with access to community voting and $OOO rewards from fractionalized 1/1 art.
- The DAO has already acquired 1/1 NFTs from renowned artists like John Lê, Adam Ape, Rupture, and Eko11.
- Particles partnered with Bridgesplit to securely fractionalize 1/1s and operate a curated art index.
- The biggest highlight of Particles is their ability to onboard new NFT collectors by providing a low barrier of entry into the emerging 1/1 market. They also serve as a platform for up and coming artists.
- With a roster of features planned down the road, Particles will evolve into a blue chip collection as their community and art appreciates in value.
Part 2. Overview of Particles
The 1/1 NFT market is an ecosystem of artists, collectors and investors contributing to the digital fine art movement.
NFTs offer artists a means to monetize their creativity in new and innovative ways. The 1/1 market is well established on Ethereum, where creators have demonstrated an immense diversity of artwork ranging from painting, poetry, music, 3D design, fashion, or any combination of these.
Particles is on a mission to discover talented NFT artists within the space. They are the first NFT collection that purchases and fractionalizes 1/1 NFTs to be airdropped to its members in the form of $OOO or One of One token. They have already acquired artworks from top artists like John Le and Voxel Monkes.
The team sees 1/1 artwork as the beginning of a new creator economy being built on Solana. Blockchain technology offers creatives of all mediums the ability to take their careers into their own hands and develop innovative business models that are more equitable and efficient than legacy systems. Since the space is still in its infancy, this presents a perfect opportunity to jump in.
Part 3. Fractionalization
If you don’t know what fractionalization is, make sure to check out our crypto 101 articles and videos first!
Particles NFT is taking one step further with fractionalized NFTs. The biggest problem with this new technology is the idea that you will never be able to put an NFT back together after its been fractionalized, defeating the idea of true ownership.
Requiring 100% of an NFT’s fractions is not only inefficient, it is also easily exploited by even 1% of the token’s holders refusing to transfer ownership. This is why they’ve created One of One or $OOO token (pronounced like the Ooo in Ooo La La.) It is a token with a first of its kind utility, giving fractionalized owners the ability to actually redeem artwork directly from a diversified index of NFTs.
$OOO Token
Particles has partnered with Bridgesplit to give their DAO the ability to curate and compile a basket of NFTs and distribute fractions ($OOO tokens) in a diversified manner.
$OOO (or ‘One Of One’) is an SPL token the fuel that powers the entire Particles ecosystem. $OOO was created with a starting supply of zero. It is minted only when an NFT is deposited in the vault and fractionalized and burned only when an NFT is redeemed. The amount of $OOO tokens minted is relative to the purchase price of the 1/1 NFTs they’ve collected. Thus, $OOO tokens are backed by tangible value and allows for the open market to decide its future value.
Holders can earn $OOO via staking and community rewards. Each Particles NFT has the ability to receive up to 10 $OOO per day during the first staking epoch.
$OOO can be used in Particles’ OOO gallery where holders will be able to collect art from a curated selection at arbitraged and discounted prices. As an added benefit, they will hold $OOO only auctions and raffles for art made by the creators they incubate. Holders decide when and how much token they would like to liquidate into SOL or use it towards bidding on artwork, accessing market data, attending metaverse events, and other fun incentives designed in collaboration with artists.
Make sure to give their litepaper a read or a detailed overview and their tokenomics to understand the mechanism behind their dynamic supply token.
Part 4. Utility
Particles DAO
By holding a Particles NFT, you become a member of the Particles DAO. Your membership into this DAO gives you access to community voting and insights on up and coming artists in the ecosystem.
The DAO collectively decides which 1/1 to purchase and when to sell. The funding of the DAO comes from secondary marketplace fees. The marketplace fee of 10% is broken down into 2 components — 5% goes to the DAO and 5% to the Core Team.
The DAO uses these funds to acquire NFTs for auctions, fund metaverse and IRL events, and develop tools for the space. The DAO council will ultimately be responsible for all decisions and is composed of the DAO’s founders and elected community leaders.
Analytics
Particles has observed the growing need for an all inclusive analytics platform to paint the complete picture of the 1/1 space for collectors & artists alike!
Leaderboard
Particles partnered with Holaplex to index 1/1 sales data on Solana, building the first and only NFT artist leaderboard on Solana. Holders will get exclusive 1/1 alpha and analytics dashboards and breakdowns for their collecting strategy.
Top Collector Wallet Tracker
The proposed tracker follows the movements of capital in the space to uncover overall market insights and trends from the most active wallets in the ecosystem.
The Particles Gallery
The Particles Gallery is a place to discover talented artists creating on Solana. They will hold $OOO exclusive auctions for art, IRL & metaverse concert tickets, and technology.
Artist Launchpad
While there are already many launchpads focused on incubating NFT projects within Solana, Particles wants to focus on providing a platform for on-chain artists to showcase their pieces and receive expert advising. Particles members will receive alpha on rising talents and these creators will receive the community and marketing support of a larger NFT collection.
Lots of people are finding out about the creativity unleashed with creating art on the blockchain. Particles’ mission is to onboard the creator economy onto Solana . Ultimately, empowering artists from all mediums to utilize blockchain technology in a safe, sustainable and ethical way.
Metaverse Museum
To celebrate these artists, Particles created a virtual gallery at the Miami Hacker House.. Users can navigate around the museum donned with multiple art pieces that they have acquired. At the end of the experience, gallery visitors received an NFT made in collaboration with United We Art and the artist BDay. The museum is well-curated, user-friendly, and very fun to navigate around. I recommend checking it out on desktop, it’s a cool interactive experience but it is too high quality for a phone to handle.
Part 5. Roadmap
Particles is working on updating their data analytic tools to map the entire 1/1 ecosystem. They’re preparing for DAO elections and the much anticipated Artist Accelerator. Inspired by Y-Combinator, the leading incubator for unicorn companies, Particles wants to apply a shared and fast paced environment for artists to hone their craft. Lastly, the Particles DAO is prepared to cross-chain to the Ethereum & Tezos ecosystems.
Particles plans to extend the experience beyond the digital world to offer IRL experiences around their community-owned artwork. The mission is to bring in more partnerships that attract a mainstream audience to on-chain creativity.
Part 6. Q&A
Shoutout to DegenGigaMan and the Particles Discord mods for answering some of our questions!
Q: Where do I buy Particles?
A: Magic Eden: https://magiceden.io/marketplace/particles_nft
Q: I got my Particle now, what do I do?
A: Join the community at dsc.gg/particles. Verify your Particle to access DAO channels with http://matrica.io. Drown in love from the community and immerse yourself in art. Post your new Particles NFT in a tweet and tag @particlesnft to watch the magic happen.
Q: Will $OOO be listed on a DEX?
A: Yes. $OOO will be listed on a DEX in tandem with the launch of auctions, raffles and top secret project that will all build on top of the token’s utility.
Q: What will the price of $OOO be?
A: The price of the $OOO is not established by the project but rather by the free market. After an order book is established, the fair price of $OOO will be determined.
Q: Where does all the $OOO token go when an artwork is redeemed?
A: It gets burned… forever.
Q: What are the future plans of Particles?
A: Particles would like to build products and service that will shake up every creative industry, starting with the fine art market. Next on the roadmap is fleshing out their analytic tools and launching their artist incubator program.
Q: Where can i find the art that has already been collected?
A: https://heyzine.com/flip-book/acf2e05687.html#page/1
Q: Since the price of the NFT and $OOO is always changing, how does Particles maintain the value of $OOO and when the 1/1 is sold?
A: There is no immediate impact on the price of $OOO when artwork is redeemed. This is due to the dynamic burning/minting mechanics of the token. Fractionalized artwork will always be priced in One of One token. 1 $OOO = 1 $OOO.
Part 7. Concluding Thoughts
Particles was first brought to our attention when we met co-founder and lead dev, DG at the LA Hacker House. The Particles team is super friendly and quickly agreed on collaborating with us for this piece.
The concept of fractional ownership is not entirely new. Complete ownership of high-value assets is next to impossible for retail investors without taking out a massive portion of their savings. Fractionalized NFTs help solve this problem. Personally, I think the biggest highlight of Particles is the onboarding of more NFT collectors since it encourages more people to start their NFT investment journey. It’s also quite rare for a project to be solely focused on the art aspect of NFTs — a concept that seems to be lost in the current market.
The choice of building on Solana is very smart, as the 1/1 art scene on Ethereum is already somewhat mature. However, Solana is still building and being early on a trend will give Particles an edge over other projects.
The team is comprised of previous YC and Science INC founders with a background in building start ups in the LA tech scene. It’s evident that they really care about the project and is focused on creating a platform for 1/1 artists to showcase their work. The Particles community seems to be comprised of equally enthusiastic members who actively interacts with each other and provides suggestions on how the project can grow even further.
With a roster of features planned down the road, Particles will be able to evolve and strengthen as their community and assets grow. What they have in store now all point to a good direction. I’m excited to see how Particles will continue to build out its vision and help energize the art NFT scene on Solana.
Make sure to follow Particles’ social media so you don’t miss any of their updates.
https://twitter.com/particlesnft
https://discord.com/invite/particles
That’s all for this week, hope y’all enjoyed this project collab piece. Disclaimer: this deep dive is done in collaboration with Particles, however I’m not affiliated with Particles in any way. This article is written with the sole purpose of providing a more in-depth understanding of this project to more users.
As always, this is not financial advice but merely my own honest opinion. I’m not a financial expert so always DYOR on any crypto projects.
Don’t forget to follow our Medium so you don’t miss a story. Feel free to join our Discord and come chat with us. I also write an Oasian’s Digest newsletter that rounds up daily crypto news straight from crypto twitter, so make sure to subscribe on our Twitter profile for that.
https://twitter.com/theoasians
https://discord.gg/cwudwkNYeX
https://t.me/theoasisdao
Also be sure to check out our videos on Youtube if you’re more of a visual learner.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUncsUYpaXaAoSLeBNSaHBQ
