Manhattan and The New “Collections Reveal” Feature

With air travel now live in Upland and over 40% of San Francisco minted, we’re now ready to unlock the first NYC properties for the masses! In order to do so, we must first mint the collections.

On August 20th, just before the unlocking of the first NYC bubble for purchase, we’ll be minting the 24 Manhattan collections ciphered on the blockchain.

A cipher is an algorithm for performing encryption or decryption. In common parlance, “cipher” is synonymous with “code”, as they are both a set of steps that encrypt a message. In other words: we will be adding collections to NYC in a way that you can know they are there but not yet know what they are… until the right time.

Why we need the collection reveal mechanics

Upland is all about building a fair economy and we try to be as transparent as possible. In order to do so, we’ve created a process called “the Collection Reveal” that ensures the number and type of new collections is predetermined, rather than influenced by market events, or favoritism coming into play. This is important because collections are a powerful tool in Upland’s economy, making them a big part of most players’ strategies. When we make a decision to add a collection, it affects the market price of everything it touches. When a property goes into a collection, it increases in value.

This mechanic serves as a way to introduce collections one at a time, and only when it’s determined that NYC can start transitioning from vanila mode, while still having the collections predetermined in a provably fair way.

What each ciphered collection includes

Each ciphered collection will include the following information:

• Internal id of the collection
• Name of the collection
• Verbal description of the properties that can fit in the collection
• The EOS transaction for the collection minting (containing proof of the date of the minting)
• In case the collection is custom (i.e. properties cannot be identified by their association to a neighborhood or a street, for example) — a list of the full addresses of all matching properties will be added

Each collection will be ciphered using a key that is unique to that collection and the keys will be kept secret by Upland

The minted information will not include:

• Amount of properties required to complete the collection (between 2 and 5)
• Level classification of the collection (standard, limited, exclusive, rare, ultra rare)
• One time reward
• Yield boost

This is because some of the parameters, which compose the underlying calculations of those values, may change with macro economic tweaks and the introduction of new features. An example of this would be the localized adjusted value of unminted properties based on market activity, causing us to reexamine the expected one time reward for a collection.

The reveal process

In the future, collections will be automatically revealed for new locations. For now, as we study the effects of the NYC vanilla expansion, it is important for us to balance the timing of these releases as well as other content and activities, like treasure hunts and challenges. This approach will allow us to make sure the economy remains healthy, balanced, and sustainable.

The Upland team will carefully curate the timing of each collection’s reveal, at which point the collection will become visible in Upland, and at the same time, the key for the ciphered collection will be made public.

For the tech geeks among the readers:

Using the collection’s published key, players who wish to verify that the collection has been predetermined, will be able to call an action on the Upland smart contract with the Internal ID of the collection (which will be publicly visible via the Upland API) and the key passed as parameters. This action will decipher the collections details and make them temporarily available for reading on the chain. The source code of the deciphering action will also be made public.

Minting only city-specific collections

City-specific collections are collections that are completed by having properties in the same city. This makes them an inherently limited commodity. Only city-specific collections will be minted on the blockchain.

Generic collections, such as “king of the street” “newbie”, or “city pro”, will not be minted on the blockchain. Cross-city collections are collections that require properties in different cities (but not specific cities). Future cross-city collections will include dynamics such as owning 3 properties in 3 different cities.

Cross-city and generic collections do not have the same burden of fairness that city-specific collections do, because they generally do not increase the value of properties directly, since their accessibility grows with each new city expansion. This is why the Upland team will be adding cross-city collections as the complex landscape of Upland unfolds, ensuring property trading will be a dynamic and exciting way to advance your game.

We’re excited to announce this process and help all Uplanders better understand how our economy operates.

-The Upland Team