Digital Collectibles: Topps launches Garbage Pail Kids NFTs on WAX

[nutildah]

A couple weeks ago my friend contacted me wanting to know everything there was to know about Bitcoin and how to get it. It turns out that the Topps trading card company had chosen the WAX blockchain to release digital versions of their Garbage Pail Kids series cards on, and as a big collector of the physical cards he was interested in knowing a bit about how the blockchain works, how to send and receive coins and NFTs, etc.

If you didn't know, NFT stands for Non-Fungible Token... This is to designate a class of assets that cannot be broken down into smaller pieces or easily interchanged. Basically, if you own a NFT, it is yours, and nobody else owns the exact same one.

Topps is an American company that has been making sports cards since the 1950s. They started famously with baseball cards, then moved on to football, basketball, hockey, etc. In the 1980s they started their Garbage Pail Kids series which were actually stickers, but almost nobody actually peels off the sticker and they keep it as a trading card.

Here's the "face of the franchise", from series one (released in 1985):



So anyway, Topps thought it would be a good idea to release their trading cards as NFTs, starting with the Garbage Pail Kids series. They toyed with the idea of using Ethereum or EOS and then settled on WAX, which is an EOS clone that is especially geared for trading items for video games. Thought its been around for a couple years now, WAX hasn't really brought any video game publishers on board, and the Topps launch of the GPK series is by far their biggest event to date.

My friend talked my ear off about how he thought this was gonna be the next big thing in collectibles, and indeed I watched the price of WAX take off about 20% over the course of a week as all other coins were kind of declining. There are 3 main advantages of NFTs over physical collectibles:

- they are indestructible so long as the host blockchain continues to function
- they can't be forged or replicated
- they are incredibly easy to buy, sell, or trade around the world, as well as to showcase to your friends

There's also a few disadvantages:

- they aren't "real", as in the physical sense
- if you're not technologically savvy you can lose them forever
- you need to understand the basics of the blockchain to move them

From what I heard is the GPK community (yes, there is such a thing) is pretty evenly split over how they received the whole thing: some people won't touch it as they don't trust solely digital things, and some people are embracing the idea as collectors, thinking it is worth getting in to. They all have one thing in common: they don't know how to buy WAX.

The first sales of card "packs" (5 cards to a small pack and 30 cards to a big pack) sold out in about 28 hours, and you could buy the packs using a debit card or PayPal, so that was no problem. For those who missed the boat, they have to learn how to buy WAX, and though its a real hassle for some of them, this use of NFTs is definitely encouraging a whole new breed of people to learn about crypto.

Rumor has it that, after the next series of GPK cards is released in June, Topps will move on to releasing Star Wars cards (which they own the rights to), and then sports cards. I'm personally thinking this could propel WAX much higher in the future, so long as a steady influx of interest is maintained.

As a reference point, the price of WAX is currently $0.0464. You can check out how much cards are currently selling for here. Some cards are already going for several hundred dollars, its a bit nuts.

There's a lot more to talk about but hopefully this thread will spark discussion on whether or not digital collectibles in the form of NFTs has a future. Currently, the market says "yes," but in the long run, things remain relatively uncertain.

[Lachrymose]

They toyed with the idea of using Ethereum or EOS and then settled on WAX, which is an EOS clone that is especially geared for trading items for video games. Thought its been around for a couple years now, WAX hasn't really brought any video game publishers on board, and the Topps launch of the GPK series is by far their biggest event to date.

I've created a thread about Decentraland and its ERC721 non-fungible tokens a few months ago. The first problem I noticed was that the Ethereum network was very inadequate and costly for a game. I had to pay around ~10 cent transfer fee for each transaction I made in the game even if I adjust 1gwei as a transfer fee. For this reason, Topps Company must have been preferred the WAX blockchain instead of the Ethereum network. As you said above; who missed the boat have to learn how to buy WAX to get those cards, and this is encouraging new people who don't know cryptos to learn something about this world. Games, cards or similar things built on the blockchain will have a positive impact on the rise of the cryptocurrency market in the long term.

[coinfinger]

These things always boggle my mind. I heard about collectibles first with the cryptokitties, having a rare kitty could worth a lot but eventually it dropped and dropped and dropped so I gave up, I wans't invested too highly neither, I just never found it all that awesome so its fine, but at the same time the price dropping meant that maybe collectibles on digital world is not really all that possible.

Nowadays stuff like these pops up, there are tons of people who think its quite possible to make digital collectibles a thing, but I am not entirely sure if I should be getting back in just yet, maybe this is just another hype, like the cryptokitties cloging ethereum network type of hype, but eventually it will be not like that cryptokitties, more like today's cryptokitties, so I want to stay away and watch for a while first.

[Coyster]

I had not heard about Non-fungible tokens before your thread, so thank you, I've just read more about NFT and saved some sites to understand much more later.

There's a lot more to talk about but hopefully this thread will spark discussion on whether or not digital collectibles in the form of NFTs has a future. Currently, the market says "yes," but in the long run, things remain relatively uncertain.

If the collectibles are to function on a cryptocurrency blockchain network, but to purchase them you have to do it through PayPal or debit card then there may be no benefit for the cryptocurrency network in the long run. But imo if collectors need to buy a particular cryptocurrency to own the collectibles, surely it's a mahoosive boost for the market and more people get to know about cryptocurrencies(and that means adoption).

Do you think it possible any company to launch a digital collectible on the bitcoin blockchain, to be purchased only with bitcoins?

[nutildah]

I've created a thread about Decentraland and its ERC721 non-fungible tokens a few months ago. The first problem I noticed was that the Ethereum network was very inadequate and costly for a game. I had to pay around ~10 cent transfer fee for each transaction I made in the game even if I adjust 1gwei as a transfer fee. For this reason, Topps Company must have been preferred the WAX blockchain instead of the Ethereum network. As you said above; who missed the boat have to learn how to buy WAX to get those cards, and this is encouraging new people who don't know cryptos to learn something about this world. Games, cards or similar things built on the blockchain will have a positive impact on the rise of the cryptocurrency market in the long term.

Your MANA post was very comprehensive, good job. I had been following that project for quite a while too but didn't really understand the limitations of using ETH until you explained it based on your experiences. The thing that turned me off about Decentraland is that the land costs are so damned high... Its still a bit unbelievable really that tiny parcels are going for hundreds or thousands of dollars. Still a bit of overconfidence in the value of their project IMO.

As a clone of EOS, WAX doesn't have traditional transaction fees; more that you buy computational resources with WAX or stake your own WAX to be able to make transactions. The first 5 or 6 transactions are free when you set up a Wax Cloud Wallet account, but beyond that you have to buy at least a little bit of WAX if you plan on making a lot of transactions. So indeed this is ideal for those who are entering the game with zero understanding of the blockchain, crypto, or how to get it.

Do you think it possible any company to launch a digital collectible on the bitcoin blockchain, to be purchased only with bitcoins?

Well, I know some non-company entities have with Rare Pepes. They exist on the bitcoin blockchain under the Counterparty (XCP) protocol. For several years they had a pretty active community which has dwindled recently. But you have to pay BTC's relatively hefty transaction fee in order to buy them or move them, which is definitely a turnoff, as compared to CryptoKitties or Decentraland or GPKs on WAX.

[nutildah]

Just to add a bit here:
WAX is not a clone of EOS. EOS, WAX, and quite a few other chains are built on the EOSIO protocol. Unfortunately, only EOS took the name and fame and now people keep mixing it up.  
WAX is geared towards e-commerce, mostly focusing on no-coiner adoption. As they did with this GPK release using their cloud wallet that allows users to interact with smart contracts without handling keys or anything.

OK I think I get it a little better now. But just to clarify, WAX's blockchain is completely separate from that of EOS's, correct? I didn't know anything about EOS before learning about WAX. I still don't understand why people need EOS for anything. At least WAX has a functional use case. EOS has a lot of casino dapps, and that's fine, but not really that interesting IMHO.

Logging on to the Toppsgpk website for the first time, it was the most nocoiner-ready platform for blockchain stuff that I'd ever seen. It's great that they and the Wax Cloud Wallet site can introduce non-crypto people to crypto using baby steps. That's what it's going to take to onboard the old-school physical collectibles types.

Been waiting for an excuse to post this meme. 

[NFTeaPlease]

On Wednesday July 8th Topps and Wax are releasing a new special edition run of Garbage Pail Kids, Tiger King Edition.

Here is the information so far:

Latest Article with some designs:
http://gpknews.com/2020/07/details-on-upcoming-topps-x-wax-gpk-goes-exotic-digital-set/

(Here is the Paper Tiger King GPK release, to look at the common card images):
https://www.beckett.com/news/tiger-king-gets-the-gpk-treatment-in-2020-topps-garbage-pail-kids-gone-exotic/


They will be sold on Wednesday July 8th, to be bought by credit card in packs of 5 for $4.99 or 25 for $19.99.
Bought from: (Time of launch yet to be announced):
https://toppsgpk.io/shop


To Buy and Trade Series 1 cards and Tiger King cards you will need a Wax Cloud Wallet:
https://wax.io/  and   https://all-access.wax.io/dashboard

(Series 2 GPK will be released sometime in August.)


Here are the numbers:

Tiger King Series:
Collectors edition: 48
Tiger Claw Rare: 343
Tiger Stripe Rare: 4,750
Prism: 61,500
Common: 173,360

Total: 240,000 cards

Compare this to:

GPK Series 1:
Collectors: 36
Golden: 100
Sketch: 3,609
Prism: 24,364
Common: 60,000 ?

Total: 90,000 ?

Here is the Market to Buy and Sell the digital cards with WAX:
https://gpk.market/
and:
https://collectables.io

GPK Market Twitter:
https://twitter.com/GPKMarket

GPK Enthusiasts Telegram:
https://t.me/GPKTrade



Have fun, and Good Luck

[nutildah]

(Series 2 GPK will be released sometime in August.)

I'm curious... do you know why Topps decided to delay series 2? They just wanted to get in on the whole Tiger King phenomenon while it was still relatively recent?

There's so many other series they could be releasing from their back catalog. I'm thinking 1952 MLB would be pretty dope. A lot of people would want to get their hands on a digital version of the Mickey Mantle rookie card.

[NFTeaPlease]

Yes I'm not sure, I think they're testing the waters and seeing how things develop.

This Tiger King launch for instance has a lot more cards, so we'll have to see if the demand will match it or not.

All I heard about Series 2 was that it would launch in August sometime, so not sure if they delayed it or not.

Perhaps they should have started with Tiger King and then moved onto the Series 1, 2 etc. But it is what it is.

I also heard that Capcom's Street Fighter 2 is launching some cards on the WAX blockchain, and there's another exciting project called 'Blockchain Heroes' launching in early August.

Financially it's worth keeping an eye on things and seeing how the different projects onfold. Certainly in relation to their print runs and how many participants get involved in which projects and what they value the NFT's at.

The Series 1 GPK had $110,000 of cards, so $1 each at sale. Since then the secondary market has gone crazy. One guy apparently spent $250,000 on packs and cards. That's the thing about crypto there are a lot of very rich whales out there who are willing to splash their cash.

[nutildah]

This Tiger King launch for instance has a lot more cards, so we'll have to see if the demand will match it or not.

All 20,000 packs (240,000 cards) sold out in roughly an hour! You pretty much had to place your order in the first 30-40 minutes to guarantee the ability to purchase a pack. It was freaking astounding. Even got the attention of William Shatner, who has his own digital memorabilia release coming out on WAX soon:



All I really wanted was a Joe Chaotic card, am waiting for the prices on them to come down a bit. Will have to settle for a fuckin' Carole Baskin card in the meanwhile.

[leea-1334]

Hmm,,, thanks for the new nutildah, I actually never heard of such a thing until now. I am always wondering if I should invest in these NFTs but collectibles are quite a weird hobby for me. I know a lot of people who collect things and in theory the price keeps going up because of rarity and preservation but my friend who collects watches did tell me that in fact, even though the catalogs say things cost ABC, but to find an actual buyer is almost impossible so he ends up keeping these just as a hobby. I wonder if the same will end up for NFTs on blockchain?

[nutildah]

Hmm,,, thanks for the new nutildah, I actually never heard of such a thing until now. I am always wondering if I should invest in these NFTs but collectibles are quite a weird hobby for me. I know a lot of people who collect things and in theory the price keeps going up because of rarity and preservation but my friend who collects watches did tell me that in fact, even though the catalogs say things cost ABC, but to find an actual buyer is almost impossible so he ends up keeping these just as a hobby. I wonder if the same will end up for NFTs on blockchain?

Well, NFTs are much easier to trade than physical collectibles because there are markets set up to make this possible instantly. You don't have to ship anything anywhere and go through the process of creating a listing on something like eBay or Amazon. You just log in to a certain market using your wallet credentials, view your collection, pick the item you want to sell and click "Sell." Then you wait for buyers. I think its 8% of every sale goes to the NFT creator, and there might be a 1% market fee (I forget).

The most popular market for WAX NFTs is called simplemarket.io, but you can find other ones (as well as a list of everything that is currently on sale) at waxplorer.com.

[nutildah]

Earlier this week (last week since its Sunday), the William Shatner memorabilia packs sold out in 9 minutes!

https://trekmovie.com/2020/06/26/william-shatner-releasing-set-of-collectible-digital-trading-cards/


https://finance.yahoo.com/news/william-shatner-makes-history-wax-133500313.html


Kind of unbelievable. Unfortunately none of the new releases have helped the price of WAX as people are selling to buy BTC. I still hold out hope for its long-term future, however. There's a lot more to come.

[SMARTSPEC]

SCAM DONT BUY.
Op is talking nonsense dont trust him.

[nutildah]

Welcome and thanks for bumping my thread! I'd forgotten about it.

Since last time, WAX released another series of Garbage Pail Kids, but these ones are currently selling much cheaper than series 1 as several more copies were minted of each card this time around. I just hold about 20-30 Topps GPK NFTs at the moment, no more WAX to speak of, but I will be paying attention to find out when Topps is slated to start releasing sports cards as NFTs.

[NFTeaPlease]

Hi nutildah,

On Tuesday there is a series 2 launch of Blockchain Heroes. 20 new heroes and 20 new villains.

More information i've added to this thread about Blockchain Heroes series 1;

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5260705.0