Released in May 2021, Meebits are the next in a series of digital collectibles developed by Larva Labs. Meebits are shaped like 3D characters in a style similar to Roblox or Minecraft. As with many other NFT projects, the scarcity built into Meebits has resulted in huge sales volumes, wild speculation and staggering sales numbers. The smart contract governing ownership of the Meebit NFT is based on the Ethereum (ETH) ERC-721 standard, which ensures compatibility with any Ethereum-based service or exchange. Based on the principle of the uniqueness of each NFT, Meebits are created by algorithmically generating an unusable set of attributes at different levels of rarity. For example, the Meebits skeleton and visitor are much more valuable than humans, so they demand a higher price.
As with most digital collectibles, Meebits' main attraction is their rarity. According to Larva Labs, Meebits are more affordable than their previous projects. The maximum supply of autoglyphs is extremely rare at just 512. Meebits doubles this number, receiving a total of XNUMX unique NFTs, each created on the Ethereum blockchain with a special ID.
The Meebits hype has received a significant boost thanks to the incredible popularity of the CryptoPunks collection, which recently announced that it will be listed at Christie's. Although the reserve price of each Meebit was set at 2.5 ETH ($8,400 as of May 4, 2021), collectors in pursuit of the incredible profits of CryptoPunk's early investors snatched the entire supply within hours of the sale. Meebit's price didn't drop below 2.4 ETH during the sale, netting Larva Labs an impressive $80 million.
Larva Labs and Crypto Art: Who's Behind the Meebits Collection?
The Meebits collection was launched by Larva Labs, a Brooklyn-based product studio and consulting firm founded by Matt Hall and John Watkinson. In addition to its experimental digital art projects, the company develops large-scale web infrastructure, genomic analysis software, and a variety of other games and applications for clients such as Google and Microsoft. Through a partnership with Google Creative Lab, the company developed the Androidify app, which has since become the global face of the Android brand.
Meebits price history
In addition to a free integrated marketplace designed to support trades of up to 100 NFTs per transaction, Meebits is primarily bought and sold on OpenSea, a large peer-to-peer NFT marketplace. Since the launch of the collection, Meebits has been sold for an average of 4.76 (15.600 USD 44.097) ETH for a total of 144.7 0.98 ETH (2.380 million USD). Meebits average price peaked several times during its launch month before crashing along with the rest of the crypto market to an all-time low of 5 ETH ($16,400) in early June. Since then, average prices have stabilized to an average of 100 ETH in August.
It should be noted that the price of any Meebit varies greatly depending on the rarity of its type and properties. Since human Meebits make up the vast majority (94%) of the collection, they sell for an average of 2.92 ETH ($9.580). In comparison, the very rare visitor Meebits, of which there are only eighteen (0.89% of the total supply), sells for an average of 330 ETH ($1.08 million). On May 13, 2021, one of the five rarest disassembled Meebits sold for an average of 700 ETH ($2.3 million). This number was surpassed just two months later when a Meebit pig was sold for 1,000 ETH ($3.27 million).
In early August, prestigious auction house Christie's announced that various crypto-punks, bored monkeys and mibits have been selected for the "No Time Like Present" auction of rare crypto collections scheduled for September 17, 2021. Meebit #6337, described as "a skeleton in a mad dog costume," is a particularly rare item that will be up for sale. Meebit last sold for 44.1 ETH ($143.800) at the beginning of June 2021, but a much higher price is expected to be offered at the auction.
Conclusion
Despite Larva Labs' ambitions for metaverse applications like digital world assets like Decentraland (MANA), going forward, it's unlikely that anyone is buying Meebits for any purpose other than speculation at the moment. Like Larva Labs' previous projects, Meebits has proven to be incredibly successful, demonstrating that despite the overall downturn in the market, there is sufficient demand for digital collectibles. The novelty of the NFT has sparked an increased interest in traditional art collections, attracting many well-known auction houses. The prestigious position held by Larva Labs NFT has also benefited Meebits, both in terms of price and mainstream attention.
