It’s no secret that the NFT space is rife with commitment, communication and many other issues ranging from questionable ethics practices all the way to the downright illegal. Many projects are on either ends of the legal and ethical extremes. Nevertheless despite all these potential issues we put money into projects because we want to see gains. We want to make money. We want to believe that we can be a part of the next big thing.

The problem with trying to find the next big thing is that you don’t really know for sure. A good project with bad management or a bad project with good marketing can really stuff your sock full of pain when the realization that its definitely not gonna make it hits you. Sometimes projects get second chances, sometimes they utterly fail and sometimes they have a roller coaster ride that ends up being a moonshot but you had no way of knowing that during the ride. The only thing that keeps you connected is not only the investment and conviction in your plan and the team handling the project but also the scalability, potential and market for the product itself. A strong market can carry a shit projects value to epic proportions and anyone who has been in the NFT market for any length of time can attest to the fact that meme NFT’s can grow to astronmical percentages. It just depends on what you’re looking for. If you’re looking for the quick flip there’s a market for that. If you’re looking for longer term holds there’s a market for that.

In the current market slump, price wise, NFTs aren’t doing too hot. NFT and blockchain based companies are not doing so hot either and cost cutting has been a priority in the entire tech space for 6 months already and has been especially the case in the blockchain space. The aim is to cut unnecessary costs and divert resources to what really matters or to pivot focus on where emerging trends within the NFT space are. It’s a continually evolving business, like any other, only at probably 10 times the speed of other mature and established businesses. The startup world needs to be nimble if it wants to stay ahead and if you couple that with new blockchain tech that underlies NFT’s you can see its like a normal startup on crack. Things are constantly moving and improving and going back to the drawing board. Add regulatory requirements of any given nation state at any given time, you have this complex web of different moving parts that have to work together simultaneously to bring an untested product or experience or service to market and also try, again, to keep costs under control.

Now I did mention the bear market and that has affected sentiment. Sentiment is so negative now that people who had no business nor the mental fortitude to have bet money they could afford to lose are now complaining about every little thing. Only now do they realize that that they were being conned by smooth talking rug pullers or that investing in the space was always a gamble because even legit projects can pull questionable practices that would be unheard of in terms of frequency in other industries. People who were once cheerleaders are now vociferous critics of projects they once had a fanatical obsession over. They would ignore people with a balanced view and legitimate criticisms, they didn’t weigh the pros and cons of putting in their hard earned money into something and instead expected the project to succeed because the messianic founder told them so. Imagine I bought Apple stock at the top of the market and then it crashed and I complained about it. I had years to invest a lower prices but instead of blaming myself for poor timing I end up being a hater about Apple stock and Apple management. Though, as I mentioned, many NFT projects are just bullshit cash grabs there are some great projects that get overlooked because of the bear market. Uneducated and impatient investors who can’t distinguish good projects from bad ones think its all the same. In their world, in order to make sense of it, they just believe if one project rug pulled on them then all projects will rug pull on them. There is no differentiation, no nuance, no context in their world. They choose to view the world in black and wide colors only, no gray is allowed. No exceptions or if’s allowed.

Now during this bear market I am noticing that people who invested in Recur’s licensed NFT collections have grown sour. Naturally this is to be expected as Recur has terrible communication skills but as I mentioned previously this is really standard amongst inexperienced startups. It’s not an excuse but a statement of fact. Every single project, like many in the NFT space, has been delayed and doubly so for those that follow regulatory requirements involving KYC. Those projects that want to be legit have to try to follow rules that other projects can simply skirt because the law has not caught up to them or they are a scam rug pull project with no intention of sticking around for long anyways. Despite Recur’s problems the company has yet to default and disappear and go completely under.

Yes the NFTU project was unexpected and a dumb idea but it was tried and it failed and that’s that. Even if you believed every word that Recur was trying to say, did you at least ask yourself why traditional sports market collectibles have never really taken to college basketball? I mean this was a terrible idea that didn’t require hindsight. It didn’t mean I would have known it would fail but at least one should have said to themselves “Hmm do I know enough about college basketball or sports card trading in general to plunk my hard earned money onto this questionable premise of trading college kid basketball cards?” If Ford came out with a brand new car that had 100 mpg for the same price as a car that had 25 mpg efficiency then it would maybe be a no brainer to buy. If Ford came out and said they are coming out with a card that has less trunk space, less leg room, less fuel effeciency for similar vehicle car classes compared to rivals and you’d probably think twice about purchasing such a car even if it had the Ford name to it. NFTU was a pet project that failed. End of story. It was like an indie NFT art project you see so well promoted on Twitter by starving artists trying to pawn off mostly mediocre artwork as amazing pieces just because they are on a blockchain or part of a collection. NFTU rode the hype wave when it was rolling high and then it couldn’t hold its own when the hype disappeared. Simple as that. If Recur had only this project to its name then yes it would have closed down Recur. It would not have been a rug pull as it was not the intention of Recur to fail, that wouldn’t make any sense despite the unreasonable conspiratorial logic of the left over trolls on Discord or Twitter.

What about the other projects? Star Trek is ambitious and resource intensive. The fans have money to spend though but ifRecur is focusing on Recur builder then it needs to outsource the gaming and NFT mechanics to another company like Tafi. Is Tafi going to work on Star Trek which seems to have game mechanic complexity an order of magnitude larger then any other project Recur runs now? Who knows. What I do know is that project has not really made any tangible progress. I mean the popularity for the IP brand is there and the ability to attract new collectors and players of the supposed game is there but I think Recur probably thought “Hmm if we build a game we’re going to have to keep building a game and managing it and worry about game mechanics and conflicts. In addition we still have to build everything ourselves and also work with our partner IP’s to talk with them what is and is not allowed to move forward. All the while trying to not spend huge sums and not really get any of it back” In other words why spend a million or two on building a complex game where you don’t really have any way of recuperating the investment UNLESS Paramount studios wanted to take over the game building and all Recur had to do was manage the experiences. It might be that Paramount put a pause to putting in hundreds of thousands or a few million dollars into building and coding for a game when the NFT market is in the dumps. Not to mention money spent on marketing the game too. Even if you had a vibrant collector community in the thousands you need to continually evolve the game mechanics. If you ever played Pokemon or Magic the Gathering you know that balancing game mechanics is a never ending process that can draw serious ire from players if not haphazardly. There are so many damn variables with what Star Trek is promising. Again my guess is Paramount is cutting costs across the board and the last thing they want is to build a game for every IP they own in a bear market for NFTs and for its shareholders. If Recur were to sell the project rights to another company that actually builds blockchain games or works with NFTS and understands game mechanic logic well then they should do that or at least subcontract the work to a 3rd party. Out of all the projects with, in my view, that have high potential the Star Trek NFT project has made the least amount of progress. Is it going to die? That remains to be seen. Everything points to at the very least either further extended delays well past 2023 and into 2024, rechanging the roadmap and cutting down on promises originally made and simplify the experience to avoid spending too much money on creating a whole damn game or to just sell the project or shut it down or put it on hold with the blessing of Paramount. Unfortunately one of these is the case but Recur knows they can’t say anything or the trolls will go up in arms.

The only two other viable projects left are Hello Kitty and Nickelodeon. TMNT is just a promise. Until it actually launches and then we know what is in store for the project it is nothing more then a dream and another headache that Recur will not be able to handle with the commitment it requires. It will just be another sour community experience despite a great IP brand. Its best to focus on cutting shit projects now before taking on TMNT. This might mean letting Star Trek go and concentrating resources on what remains. Possibly let go of Carebears and Emoji’s if possible. The cutting of the fat has to happen and its going to keep happening.

So back to HK and Nick. Nick had their mashups and whatnot and after that nothing really came further. There’s nothing further down the roadmap. It was like a short term hype train. People telling me they bought mashups because they would get one free packs for life from every future Recur project. That is some backward ass logic. Forget a 200 dollar mashup. Let’s say you spent only 75 dollars on a mashup and you got free TMNT pack when TMNT drops. You spent 75 dollars to get a pack that would most likely sell for less on the secondary market. Even if it didn’t if you open it and get a goofy pull you would have spend 75 dollars to get access to a TMNT card that was worth 10 bucks maybe. Maybe you get lucky and make loads of money but you don’t buy an NFT to get a mystery pack from a future promised project. You buy a mashup because you are following that projects, Nicks, own roadmap and any rewards for holding that mashup that carry forward into other projects is only incidental. You don’t buy a car to enter a drawing to win a car air freshener my guy. Risk reward don’t stack up.

Anyways despite the empty roadmap for Nick, the Nick brand is enormous and has loads of potential. There is a huge market for the collection and I have no doubt if management correctly it will bring in legions of nostalgic collectors but what incentive there will be to have them open up their pocket books remains to be seen. Like with any project there is a lot of experimentation that is ongoing with how to effectively integrate NFT branding into traditional marketing. People want more then collecting Jpegs. They want to experience why blockchain is better, why blockchain is unique, why blockchain will make them feel they are part of something that is going to grow and scale. Nickelodeon is a brand that is nostalgic for millions but it was a digital experience. Yes people did buy Nick branded toys and dolls and tshirts and shoes etc. However the main pull was watching the show. NFTs are a digital experience that has the potential to enter the physical world as well via phygital drops as well as gaming and collectability incentives. The question is how to correctly frame these so that people are attracted to wanting to collecting these NFTs? Recur can continue to do further drops and expand into further seasons and yes this one of those collections that will draw in collectors regardless but it wont be at the same level as before. Collectors, whether they admit it to you or not, don’t buy for the freaking art alone. Thats just bullshit. They want to hold on to something unique and appreciates in value. Or they want something they can buy cheap and feel content in holding it for years hoping that it does go up in value so that they feel smart about buying before others did. People want to be represented by why they own and value factors a lot into it. I have no doubt that years into the future the Nick collection will be worth much much more then now however during this bear market there needs to something planned beyond mashups or future seasons of Jpeg only pictures. Im not sure how gung ho Paramount is about expanding into NFT partnerships beyond JPEG pictures but they have the financial muscle to put in serious money into expanding into games and interactive experiences with their NFTs. However remember they also own the Star Trek IP. If they put their NFT ambitions on hold during this bear market then you can expect the Nick collection to also be put on hold until Recur and Paramount decide how to divvy up resources for managing Paramounts IP’s and how to best approach them. How to leverage partnerships with other companies to make the NFTs feel more then just a Jpeg experience. Although I will say again given enough time the Nick collection can survive and thrive on being a collectible Jpeg once NFT bull market returns again however the NFT market won’t give it tremendous values like before if its Jpeg only feature. The future NFT bull market wants their NFTs to do shit. To give them something in return for being loyal owners, to allow them access to special stuff, events, gatherings, discounts, drops etc. Nick’s future is safe in my opinion even if Recur decides to do a uno reverse and sell off the rights to another company. I think its a great brand with lots of physical and digital merchandise cross branding potential. Which brings me to the best IP, imo, that Recur acquired the rights to.

Hello Kitty.

There is no other brand under Recurs licensee purview as perfect for NFT use case as the Hello Kitty and Friends brand. Nothing comes close. Not even Nickelodeon which is a solid second in my view. Hello Kitty has truly global reach. If I told my former Georgian or Chinese or Mexican or American students who any of the Nickelodeon characters are it is unlikely they would even know them by looking at them much less mentioning them by name alone. Even amongst Americans if I talk to a 12 year they probably don’t watch Nick reruns all too often and wouldn’t really know who any of the Nick universe characters are.

Hello Kitty on the other hand is a universal brand. Known by hundreds of millions outside of Japan. Hundreds of millions know the Hello Kitty name by itself and I would venture to guess at least a billion would recognize the image of Hello Kitty if they are not too familiar with the name initially.

It is a global brand. A superpower heavy weight in the brand world. A self styled ‘lifestyle’ brand. It is the greatest IP Recur could have on boarded. I’m not even joking. The sheer audacity and balls needed to have gotten Sanrio to work with a small fry start is worth at least a round of applause. I can hear the Negative Nancy’s and naysayers already cracking their knuckles in my direction for even remotely praising this win for Recur lol.

Anyways the point is that NFT’s can enter every single area that Sanrio Hello Kitty works its products. Sanrio IS ALL ABOUT MERCHANDISE! They literally focus on selling all kinds of physical stuff. They sell cuteness. They will definitely do phygital drops and will never really stop NFT drops once they realize a good marketing angle and realize that they can bring whole exclusive communities together by the thousands or millions with NFTs. They have an online series with hundreds of thousands of fans worldwide. They can easily implement NFTs to bring together the anime series diaspora together and NFTs can facilitate that and make the show interactive as well. Watch the show get an NFT, collect or buy 1 seasons worth of NFTS and get access to a special plushie drop available only to series members. Mashup up 3 NFTs from Season1 and get a chance to either win a common or rare NFT which can then give you access to discounts. It’s endless how you can make people come together.

HK also has gaming and their new HK Island Adventures which is like Animal crossing (Which is IMMENSELY popular) has the potential to onboard people into the NFT space. The game has nothing to do with NFTs but future iterations in the next few years will most likely allow the ability to stake or create your HK NFTs for ingame rewards or real world use case.

Collecting is much much of a stronger force within Sanrio then within most other brands. HK lovers collect HK whether they realize it or not. People buy Sanrio merch for the cuteness and uniqueness factor and less so for functional utility or high quality even though it may be high quality product. People seek out Hello Kitty products. Either for their kids or for themselves. NFT’s are just another product albeit with incredible potential that extends beyond a simple pencil or plushie or pillow. NFTs are a match made in heaven for a lifestyle brand like Sanrio.

Once Sanrio gets the hang of NFTs and how to use them correctly and properly the floodgates will open. What I mean is that millions of people from around the world will start to get dropped Sanrio themed NFTs for buying or playing their products. They will work with more and more licensees of their brands to implement NFT drops so that Sanrio not only makes money from licensing the product but also gets to create interactive softpower that it can deftly extract value from many times over.

People don’t realize that Sanrio focuses on social community. It is an expert in bringing fans of its products together and actively listening to its customers. It is a master of influence and perception. Whatever gripes you have about Recur as a licensee you need to grow up and look beyond Recur and at the bigger picture. The NFT universe is much bigger then you likely realize and once the NFT market and Sanrio click just right you’re going to see an explosive interest in the HK main pfp and snapshot collection. The OG collection and all drops will be highly desired collectors items regardless of what plans Recur has for the collection. Although it would really help if Recur not only does the NFT dynamic wrapping properly but makes it a cool experience that really offers something unique to collectors in the present moment. Not only that but if they could list on Kraken and a future Amazon NFT listing that would really be great. However the real catalyst will be what Sanrio does that affects the OG collection indirectly. Sure it would be nice if Sanrio mentioned the OG collection and tied it to some marketing event for OG holders but that isn’t very nice or a popular option. Why?

Its not a good idea to promote the OG collection for our sake because millions of people won’t be able to afford or own one once prices skyrocket as they surely would if they promoted the collection and then those lucky few would have access to features and things most could not. Instead Sanrio will most likely create future mass market NFT drops like those associated with their merchandise. Phygital drops. These would be the 1st Sanrio phygital drops. Maybe in partnership with Recur maybe not. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that through a Reddit like mass drop all people will be able to get an NFT just by purchasing a Sanrio product they were likely to buy anyways. Whatever incentives or utility Recur adds to those phygital collectors will surely bring in many curious people into the NFT world. There will be MANY firsts for Sanrio NFT drops. First Phygital. First phygital plushy. First phygital pillow. First phygital pencils. First phygial game drop etc. First digital anime series drop. First NFT collab with Nike. First NFT collab with Google. First NFT collab with Epic Games etc. The list is endless and lets not even mention subsequent drops that fall into series 2, season 2, Drop 2’s etc. It’s literally a universe of drops each with their own values and features. No they won’t dilute. Only the ignorant think that NFTS dilute each other. You don’t mistake a Nike HK collab with a Walmart HK collab. You just don’t. They would be two distinct collections that each have their different requirements and attributes and use cases if any.

I haven’t even mentioned any interactive use cases Sanrio might implement for their variety of collections. For example collect 3 Nike HK collab NFTS as well as 3 Starbucks HK collab NFTS and if Nike and Starbucks have an ongoing partnership you might have access to a special discount at both Starbucks or Nike stores OR perhaps discount on a unique Starbucks Nike shoe collab accessible in small quanities to hardcore collectors and fans of unique Nike shoe drops. The possibilities are literally endless with NFTS but especially with a lifestyle brand like Sanrio.

I know the risks of NFTs. I know I have spent thousands on Hello Kitty NFTs. I know that the potential for Recur to fold are real and that even if they sell off the project to another company and it delays the project for untold months and even if Sanrio decides to put the project on hold for months until the market clears up…I’m fine with all that. Sooner or later Sanrio will come back around to NFTS and in full force. NFT’s are not a fad and not because of copium or because I spent money and therefore hope it happens. No invest in good brands and NFT tech because the trend is clear and that trend is that NFTS are going to become mainstream globally in the next few years.

I am prepared to lose my entire investment and have been since day one because I believe the risk reward ratio is just so lopsided on the reward side that it is worth taking a chance. If you hate on me for liking the brand, ignoring Recur’s issues and just continuing to plow through then you just don’t have a problem with Recur or with Hello Kitty. You have a problem with people who have contrary and logical arguements to your all or nothing world view and at the very least I am willing to listen to what naysayers say initially before their arguements devolve into speculation and hearsay as well as gossip.

If Sanrio gets as knee deep into NFTs as I expect them to then you will see the haters disappear, use their alt accounts more frequently or just block out anyone who has the ability to tell them they were wrong. I block people because they are annoying but they’re the type that block people who prove them wrong as nothing hurts the fragile ego of a troll more then the whole world realizing they publicly were on the wrong side of a viewpoint.

If I’m wrong I’ll write about it here. Without a doubt. Life has wins and losses and we have to embrace them both as lessons and with open arms. If they’re wrong they vanish like roaches lol.