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Luis Clark
Luis is a personal finance expert who has been passionate and writing about crypto for more than five years.
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    What is Bored Ape Yacht Club? BAYC Explained

    What is Bored Ape Yacht Club

    Given the growth of cryptocurrencies in 2021, digital collectibles have now become a cultural phenomenon. These blockchain-based assets demonstrate digital ownership and are now used in various industries and fields. The Bored Ape Yacht Club is one of the top non-fungible tokens (NFT) collections.

    This article will explain what is Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT collection, how it works, and if it’s a good long-term investment.

    What is Bored Ape Yacht Club?

    Bored Ape Yacht Club, or BAYC, is an NFT collection created by Yuga Labs on the Ethereum blockchain. The entire collection consists of 10,000 indifferent-looking ape-like cartoon figures dressed in various outfits and facial expressions. The development team created over 170 unique assets for the Bored Ape NFTs.

    Following a successful minting process three days prior, Bored Ape was launched on April 23, 2021. The project was created by a team of two designers and two software engineers who wanted to create something different from the current art world

    Two of the early founders went by the aliases ‘Gargamel’ and ‘Gordon Goner’.  BuzzFeed News, a celebrity publication, has since identified them as Greg Solano and Wylie Aronow. However, the other two have kept their aliases of ‘No Sass’ and ‘Emperor Tomato Ketchup’.  ‘No Sass’ and ‘Emperor Tomato Ketchup’ has been described as computer science students who wrote their first Solidity codes in June 2021, and Solano stated that despite successfully coding the NFTs, they were not ‘crypto savvy’. While Solano is a writer and editor, Gordon Goner planned on taking his Master of Fine Art

    (MFA) program before he fell ill. He thereafter took up cryptocurrency day trading.

    Their choice of apes was influenced by the idea of collectors who have a lot of money but don’t know what to do with it. The NFT’s facial expressions are boring, despite being dressed in high-quality digital apparel.

    Although the project is only a year and a few months old, the NFT collection has been one of the top-performing collections in the emerging crypto sub-sector. The dope apes have piqued the interest of digital art collectors as well as celebrities, who are now using bored ape profile pictures on social media platforms such as Twitter.

    How Does Bored Apes Club Work?

    The digital collectible functions in the same way as all other NFT collectibles. It is intended to demonstrate digital ownership of an asset. Ape owners are thus immutably recorded on the blockchain. While BAYC NFTs may appear to be regular JPEG images, they are strings of unique data recorded on the blockchain, along with the owners of those strings. 

    Aside from that, Bored Apes have more utility. The JPEGs also serve as a membership card for the Yacht Club. Ape owners use it as a key to the ‘BATHROOM’, a digital graffiti board on which NFT holders can write.

    Why Do Bored Apes Cost So Much?

    Bored Apes listed in OpenSea

    LarvaLabs’ CryptoPunk algorithmically-generated avatar collections helped launch NFT stardom. The pixelated-looking odd artwork piqued the interest of many celebrities, with some selling for millions of dollars at the height of the 2021 crypto boom.

    Bored Apes introduced a completely new narrative to the developing sector and quickly gained cultural significance. The first NFT collection was pre-sold for 0.8 Ether (or $90) and has since been purchased for millions of dollars on secondary NFT marketplaces such as OpenSea and SuperRare.

    Does this imply that they are all that expensive? Absolutely not. The cost of a Bored Ape is largely determined by its unique characteristics. For example, Bored Ape NFT number 213 is currently the least expensive of the market’s 10,000 unique pieces, priced at 71.4 Ether ($109,672 in current Ether valuations).

    Meanwhile, not all Bored Ape NFTs are in individuals’ hands. The NFT collection’s rarest Bored Ape number 7495 has not been sold since it was minted in April of last year. The NFT also comes with a dagger in its mouth, which only 49 Apes have. A Cyborg eye, a Cross earring, and DMT fur are among the other features. This means that it could fetch much more than Ape number 2087’s $2.3 million if it were to go on the market.

    Celebrities and showbiz outcasts have been piling up on the collectible, beginning with sports icons and progressing to those in the entertainment industry. Snoop Dogg, Paris Hilton, Mark Cuban, and Eminem are all fans of the groundbreaking Ape collections. However, celebrity disc jockey and music icon Steve Aoki is one Bored Ape owner with most collectibles. Steve is said to own nine BAYC NFT art pieces and two Mutant Ape Yacht Club pieces, a spin-off from the Bored Ape collection.

    What Makes a BAYC Different?

    As previously stated, each Ape Yacht Club NFT is distinct from the others. This is largely due to their disparate characteristics and components. This includes the background colour, eye colour, mouth colour, clothing, hats, moods, and accessories. Although most of them have bored expressions on their face, approximately 12.43% of the Apes smile.

    These distinctions are accentuated further by Yuga Labs’ decision to equip some with biker vests and helmets. Essentially, the more a Bored Ape’s rare traits and components are, the more valuable it is on the secondary NFT market.

    Celebrity Endorsements and Collectors

    Most expensive Bored Ape Sold

    Because of the efforts of celebrities and collectors, NFTs have now become status symbols. CryptoPunks and BAYC NFTs have piqued the interest of many public figures, who now use them to represent their digital identity on their verified social networks.

    Given that Bored Ape has recently transitioned to a high-value NFT artwork, some of the Bored Ape holders work in the music, entertainment, or sports industries. The NFT, created by Yuga Labs, is now owned by celebrities such as Stephen Curry, Paris Hilton, Serena Williams, Tom Brady, Justin Bieber, The Chainsmokers, Kevin Hart, and even popular late-night TV host Jimmy Fallon. 

    Because of its strong ties to famous people, Bored Ape has since surpassed CryptoPunks as the most expensive NFT art in the emerging digital art landscape. Because of the project’s success, it acquired the intellectual rights to the Punk-looking NFTs in early 2022. The Bored Ape team is not finished yet; they have big plans to make the Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT more than just a social media following.

    Roadmap For Bored Ape Yacht Club

    The Bored Ape team has taken significant steps recently to solidify its position in the emerging NFT sub-sector. Its first move was to acquire the CryptoPunks’ intellectual property. Besides the BAYC, spin-off and hugely successful NFT projects have also been launched. The Mutant Ape Yacht Club and the Bored Ape Kennel Club are two of the most successful NFTs. Both are Yuga Labs offerings that are iterations and exaggerations of the Ape Yacht Club. While Mutant Apes are a collection of 20,000 NFTs created by exposing Bored Ape NFTs to a mutant serum, the Bored Ape Kennel Club is a collection of dog-themed NFTs that serve as Ape owners’ companions.

    Yuga Labs has expanded on its NFT legacy by launching Otherside, a Metaverse-focused project. Otherside is a Yuga Labs-developed immersive and interactive multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) that uses NFT technology. It seeks to build on the legacy of Bored Ape by allowing Ape owners to engage in gameplay via playable NFTs. 

    The Otherside metaverse project has added Otherside Land NFTs or Otherdeeds to its already impressive portfolio. The 10,000 NFT collectors of its Bored Ape would be able to carve an ideal society in which players could collaborate, build, and test out game design and experience. 

    Otherside isn’t the only thing to come from Yuga Labs. In the early months of 2022, a separate decentralised autonomous organisation (DAO) launched the ApeCoin cryptocurrency to foster a new frontier for the rapidly expanding Web3 ecosystem. ApeCoin is used as a voting mechanism in the Bored Ape ecosystem and can also be locked up through staking to generate more ERC-20 tokens. 

    ApeCoin has gone on to become a global crypto hit and is now available on the top cryptocurrency exchanges.

    Is Bored Ape a Good Investment?

    Bored Ape Yacht Club Home Page

    Bored Ape has had NFT success, and its transformation from artwork to an entirely new ecosystem is quite remarkable. Many people regard Bored Ape as a status symbol, as they now have access to an exclusive club and members-only benefits. However, is it a wise investment?

    Its merits speak for it. Bored Apes are only 10k in number, have a lot of utility, and attract a lot of celebrities.

    Nonetheless, because it is an NFT, it is subject to the same whims as several other projects. Bored Apes can rise or fall in response to market sentiments because NFTs are known to respond to market fluctuations. Furthermore, its value is largely subjective, which means that it is determined solely by how much a seller is willing to pay for it.

    How to Buy a Bored Ape Yacht NFT - Tutorial

    So how do new members get their hands on a Bored Ape NFT? The current way to acquire exclusive NFT collectibles is through secondary marketplaces such as OpenSea and Rarible. The procedures remain the same, and we’ve included a step-by-step guide below.

    Step 1: Create a Wallet

    Creating a new wallet to store NFT is simple, and the Metamask wallet is the most popular option. Go to the Metamask website and download the necessary software. Follow the on-screen prompts to ‘Create New Wallet’.  Remember to keep the 12, 21, or 24-word secret recovery phrase safe. This enables investors to access their Metamask wallet from a device other than the first.

    Step 2: Buy ETH

    To buy a Bored Ape, an investor needs to own cryptocurrency. Ether is the accepted digital currency and can be purchased easily on centralised Bitcoin platforms such as Binance and transferred to the Metamask wallet. Metamask also allows for direct purchases. Tap ‘Buy’ and choose a payment method from the list.

    Step 3: Connect to OpenSea

    As the most popular NFT marketplace, we chose OpenSea. Navigate to the OpenSea platform and click the ‘Connect Wallet‘ icon in the upper right-hand corner. Enter ‘Bored Ape’ into the search bar and select the appropriate result.

    Step 4: Buy BAYC NFT

    To make a purchase, locate a Bored Ape and tap on ‘Buy Now’.  Choose a payment method and make the necessary transfer. After that, the NFT will be deposited into the linked wallet within minutes.

    Buying a Bored Ape on OpenSea

    Final Thoughts

    The Bored Ape Yacht Club has evolved from an NFT artwork into a full-fledged ecosystem. The project has since become a symbol in the rapidly expanding NFT space.

    In this guide, we’ve gone over the ideology behind the collectible and why there have been a growth of BAYC holders as well as the steps required to become an ape owner. While NFTs are subject to subjective valuation, Bored Ape is one of the hottest tickets in the crypto space.

    FAQ

    Most frequent questions and answers

    There have been a number of unsuccessful attempts to imitate Bored Ape. Another digital collectible cannot replicate Bored Ape’s ideology without appearing to be a forgery. So, no.

    Yes, in a nutshell. NFTs are highly speculative in nature, and the majority of projects lose value once the minting process is completed. Interested investors should only own NFTs in which they have confidence, as the value of a project can fall at any time.

    Because NFTs are speculative in nature, their prices fluctuate depending on market conditions. In a bear market, a once-expensive Bored Ape NFT would most likely be worth less.

    There is a fixed creator’s fee of 2.5% on secondary platforms like OpenSea, which means that all future purchases will net a continuous stream of royalty. Aside from direct minting of NFT avatars, this is one of the ways the Bored Ape team generates revenue.

    Not at all. It is based on the concept of bringing together a group of bored crypto billionaires looking for new ways to spend their money. It is not a yacht club, but it thrives on the belief that yacht owners portray a billionaire’s lifestyle. 

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    Skrumble.com provides all its content for informational purposes only, and this should not be taken as financial advice to buy, trade, or sell any investment instruments or products, including but not limited to cryptocurrencies, or use any specific exchange. Please do not use this website as investment advice, financial advice, or legal advice, and each individual’s needs may vary from that of the author. Investing in financial instruments, including cryptocurrencies, carries a high risk and is not suitable for all investors. It is possible to lose the entire initial investment, so do not invest what you cannot afford to lose. We strongly advise conducting your own research before making any investment decisions. This post includes affiliate links with our partners who may compensate us.

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