Throughout its lifetime, memes have come to be understood as more than just cat images and glitch videos that solicit the occasional laugh. In contrast to the often frivolous nature of Internet culture, memes have become very important in popular and mainstream culture. achieving staying power as a kind of universal language.
This rings true in the NFT space as well, where memes continue to be created, shared, and sold for incredible sums. Considering the far-fetched, self-deprecating, and sometimes even nonsensical nature of Web3, blockchain culture would be nothing without humor, distilled and spread through memes.
But among the Rare Pepes and mfers that populate the Web3 comedy annals, a burgeoning project has begun to stand out. Although still relatively young in the grand scheme of NFT history, The Memes by 6529 brings collaborative humor to the blockchain while fueling a conversation about decentralization, community, and self-sovereignty.
Who is 6529, the meme provider?
Boasting potentially the most direct NFT collection name we’ve seen recently, The Memes by 6529 is essentially an amalgamation of NFT memes curated by a prominent thought leader and Web3 Builder 6529. But while the collection may seem like an aimless hodgepodge of memes to some, it comes as an integral part of the 6529 and open metaverse (OM) fire.
To understand the full scope of the project, we must first understand its creator. In layman’s terms, pseudonymous collector 6529 (also known as Punk6529) is a wise Web3 voice and thought leader in the NFT space. First achieving notability in 2021 as a high-end NFT collector, he garnered respect throughout NFT’s initial bull run through his philosophical threads on Twitter and as a Champion of Artists, easily becoming one of nft now’s 2022 NFT100 Honorees.
Between Fall 2021 and Winter 2022, 6529 openly transformed from an NFT collector into a full-fledged mission-driven builder. Arguing for the establishment of an open metaverse against centralized and corporate players like Meta, his OM project revolves around the idea that “100 million people in an open metaverse can change the world.” Currently, OM and the 6529 brand act as a hub for crypto art exhibits, single-edition collections, education, and more. This is where The Memes come into play.
Having established themselves as a leading force in the fight for an open metaverse, 6529 is using The Memes to rally support for OM and spread values of decentralization, community, and self-sovereignty far and wide. To this end, 6529 has designed The Memes to be open and accessible, with generally large and inexpensive print sizes to keep a low barrier to entry for all who seek to join their cause.
What is The Memes, practically speaking?
The Memes, released on June 9, 2022, is a multi-tiered, multi-season NFT project that combines humor, collaboration, and Web3-centric messaging. However, the idea (as well as the name) stems from Marxist ideologies, specifically, the notion that for capitalism to collapse, workers must “seize the means of production.” That is, the working class would need to gain control of the land, labor, and capital that can be used to produce products while prohibiting private property and redistributing wealth more broadly.
In the NFT space, this phrase has been lampooned and reconfigured to fit with Web3 ideologies, emphasizing that meme culture is a driving force behind blockchain communities. So, by seizing memes of production, artists and creators are building a new creative economy through blockchain technology, giving power back to the working class of the creative industries. Yes, it’s a high-level concept, but it’s been boiled down to memes, art, and vibes via 6529’s The Memes.
The Memes Collection features a full season, comprising eight memes, each featuring between two and 11 limited-edition NFTs per meme. Memes can be thought of as messages, which means that artists who contribute an NFT to The Memes aim to create a visual representation of said meme (message). See Meme Four of Season One with the message “GM” below as an example.
To date, artists of all faiths have been invited to contribute an NFT to The Memes. Although the project started with some simple edits created by 6529 and 6529er — the multidisciplinary designer who created the 6529 logo — has since grown to encompass the works of artists big and small, from photographers to illustrators, 3D artists, and even NFT legends like XCOPY.
It is important to note that every meme featured on The Memes coincides, in one way or another, with NFT or cryptoculture. From innocuous sentiments like “WAGMI” and “Use a hardware wallet” to more action-driven communist-adjacent statements like “Freedom to transact” and “Don’t let institutions steal your JPEGs,” 6529 has carefully crafted the language. of the project can relate to Web3 while talking about the aforementioned values of decentralization, community, and self-sovereignty.
The future of Memes
Now, halfway through season two, it’s clear that The Memes will continue to draw on the spirit of decentralized creativity and diversity to drive the project forward. With new contributions from artists like Cath Simard and Grant Riven Yun, The Memes continue to generate buzz drop by drop, creating something of a Trojan horse NFT project. From the outside, The Memes looks like any other popular project, which means that price increases breed hype and bolster trade. However, upon closer inspection, The Memes have a significant connection to core blockchain concepts.
Perhaps this is one of the main reasons why The Memes continues to grow in popularity. Now just over half a year old, many of the initial NFT meme releases can’t be bought for less than an ETH or two, and getting a full set, meaning one of every meme released, has become quite the feat. legendary. In fact, only recently, a CryptoPunk was traded for a full set of The Memes, offering a historical benchmark for the rising value of The Memes.
But even as the floor prices on almost every edition of The Memes catalog rise, the project’s creator warns against joining the ranks of meme holders simply for profit. Again speaking of the true meaning behind the creation of him, 6529 tweeted a warning to his followers, urging them not to “buy meme cards to ‘make money'” but to “buy them because they have a sense of ownership and want to help with the mission.”
