Walt Disney Co DIS launched its NFT marketplace, Disney Pinnacle, for tokenizing its iconic animation characters from the past century, as well as characters from its Pixar and Star Wars franchises.
A collaboration with Dapper Labs, the NFTs will be uniquely styled as collectible and tradable digital pins built on a layer-one blockchain Flow, which was also created by Dapper Labs.
What Happened: Disney Pinnacle is a mobile-based application with an "early access, closed release" for invited users only. Baby Yoda, Woody from “Toy Story” and Snow White are likely to be the tradable assets, CoinDesk reported.
The NFT platform will officially launch later 2023 on the Apple App Store for iOS, the Google Play store for Android, and then on the web. Currently, the official website is reflecting only a waitlist tab.
Read More: Alex Salnikov: Why NFTs Are Not Dead - The Future Of NFTs Powered By Brands And Developers
“Fans anywhere will be able to collect dynamic pins on their phone and trade instantly and securely with each other no matter where they are in the world,” Dapper Labs' CEO Roham Gharegozlou commented.
Disney Pinnacle will only be open to users 18 years old and up, while the URL supplied by Dapper appears to either be geoblocking New York State or the U.S. entirely.
Why It Matters: Vancouver-based Dapper Labs is known for its NFT brands such as CryptoKitties and NBA Top Shot which became one of the breakouts of the NFT craze.
Gharegozlou said in a video call to CoinDesk, “Digital collectibles that are based on maybe the most popular products ever … are a path to both adoption of Web3 technology as well as a way to show people what's possible.”
Dapper Lab’s first conscious effort to go beyond sports collectibles was highly significant and the company's promotional material showed the term NFT was avoided and more importance focused on Disney Pinnacle's mass market appeal.
The call also highlighted how Dapper Labs and Disney have tried to keep the average Disney fan in mind when building an interactive and immersive experience that non-native crypto fans could use.
In early 2023, Disney discontinued operations of its metaverse division as part of a broader restructuring plan leading to a cut in its operating expenses by $5.5 billion. The company also laid off 7,000 staff over a period of two months.
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