Y00ts NFTs have been all over the blockchain. The popular PFP NFT collection that launched on Solana and quickly became a top collection, then moved to Polygon earlier this year, just announced it will be migrating to the Ethereum blockchain.
As part of the move, y00ts will be returning a $3 million grant it received from Polygon Labs. According to the press release, the reason for its migration is to unite the y00ts and DeGods communities — two NFT collections created by the Los Angeles startup Dust Labs. Y00ts said that more specifics about the migration will be released soon, along with news about DeGods’ Season III collection.
In December 2022, Dust Labs announced its two NFT collections would be leaving Solana — Degods to Ethereum and Y00ts to Polygon. The news was a big loss for the Layer 1 blockchain Solana, since according to NFT marketplace Magic Eden, the two collections made up nearly 70% of all Solana NFTs sale volume prior to their departure. Then in March, Polygon successfully bridged the majority of Y00ts to its blockchain. Four months later, and the Y00ts are packing their bags again.
Although Y00ts had planned to use the $3 grant money it received from Polygon Labs to expand its team and continue growing its project, ultimately, bringing the two NFT communities together onto one chain proved to be more important for Dust Labs.
Rohun Vora (AKA Frank DeGods), the creator of Y00ts and DeGods, said that working will Polygon labs has been incredible, and that the two parties are separating on good terms. He added, “We still love Polygon. It’s just time to unite the DeGods and y00ts communities.”
Sandeep Nailwal, the co-founder of Polygon, noted that the returned grant funds will be used to “support our native creators and projects we believe have the vision and conviction to help evolve NFTs.”
The response to the news on X (formerly Twitter) has been mixed. However, most community members are supportive of the move.
Dust Labs Continues to Build its Brand
In October 2021, FrankDeGods and KevinDeGods launched the DeGods PFP NFT collection on the Solana blockchain. It sold out in 10 seconds with a mint price of 3 SOL ($450). Since then, Dust Labs has been on a tear. At Rarity Sniper, we’ve covered several stories about Dust Labs and its top-tier NFT collections this year. Here are the headlines.
First, on March 27th, Y00ts began its migration to the Polygon blockchain with the intention of making its product more accessible and offering holders and collectors more liquidity and interoperability across blockchains. One lucky Y00ts holder who bridged their NFT in the first 24 hours received a BTC DeGods NFT.
Next, in February, Dust Labs announced that it had used the Ordinals’ protocol to inscribe 535 once-burned DeGods onto the Bitcoin blockchain. The floor price of a BTC Ordinals NFT is currently .91 BTC, or around $27,000.
Lastly, about a year ago, Dust Labs raised $7 million in a strategic round that included Solana Ventures, Jump, Metaplex, Chapter One, Foundation Capital, and others. The funding round came shortly after the mint of the Y00ts collection.
The NFT community will have to wait to see if the Y00ts’ migration to Ethereum will be beneficial for holders and collectors. But given the reputation of Dust Labs and the role of Ethereum as the OG blockchain for NFTs, we think there’s a good chance it will be. We’ll be on the lookout for any updates to the story.