Interview with ICGiraffes NFT: Aiming to Reach New Heights
We interviewed Robert, the Product Manager of the Giraffe NFT project. He's sticking his neck out to create value for holders by airdropping baby giraffes and giving a commission for life from Minister giraffes.
- Please tell us about you: your name, position in the project, your achievements, etc., so that we can introduce you.
My name is Robert Neculae, I am the project manager for ICGiraffes. A few things I can tell you about me are that I'm an entrepreneur with 9 years of experience. I started from the bottom in Finland working several jobs to try and build a budget with which I could launch myself into the entrepreneurship world.
Up to this point I have built the core of my business centered around trusted and proven people that share my insight on the bigger picture and understand that in order to have success you must try harder and harder but also smarter and more innovative.
I'm a very positive person, I watch every single action I take as a success. I could argue that I have managed to climb 10 stories during the 9-year path I have made for my evolution. I am a proven businessman on multiple layers of affairs, the ICGiraffes project being the latest one on my CV. I have built a team based on the prospects I have made and until now we are delivering everything we have proposed ourselves to do.
2. How would you describe your artistic style?
We went with a friendly, funny cartoonish art style suitable for young and adult audiences. Inspired by pieces from childhood cartoons and books, this art style is joyful and aims to make people happy, fuzzy, and warm :)
3. What drew you to NFT creation rather than traditional canvas-based art?
Unlike traditional art, digital art is more dynamic. One can create anything one wants in any style one wants, even imitating classic art like an oil painting on canvas or charcoal on paper.
4. Are there any artists who have inspired you? What do you like about their work?
Everything is a source of inspiration....nature, people, events. But if I have to name a few artists I admire, it will be Daniel Lieske, Sergey Klyuchnikov, and JeeHyung Lee.
5. What made you create NFTs?
We must orient ourselves towards digital art and assets in the modern age as they are more secure and harder to copy. As we move into the web3.0 era, we mean to be present and pioneer the evolution of the digital world. We are proud to be part of what we feel to be a positive change.
6. Can you tell us about your project?
This is the most exciting part as we have multiple strategies to bring value to our project. Let’s present them:
- Baby Giraffes - if you own 2 ICGiraffes items from any of our releases or collections, we will give the owner a Baby Giraffe NFT for free in their wallet. This is a precious item since they are unique to our projects.
- There are 25 Giraffe ministers in our universe that rule the ICGiraffes world, thus making them essential pieces of our collection. Owning a Minister Giraffe will give you 35% of the resale of every NFT in our project as commission for life.
We explore what people want and are looking for from such an ambitious project, and we want to deliver the best possible quality and income for our members.
7. How many NFTs will be minted? Can you talk us through the process of how you create the art?
10,000 NFTs will be minted.
Everything starts with an idea. After that comes research, inspiration, and study. And then comes the artistic part. First, I begin with...a LOT of sketches and then some more sketches. When I find the perfect illustration to represent the idea is time to do the actual art piece. Eyes and shapes, colors, lights and shadows, and VOILA...Masterpiece :)
8. Will people be able to breed, stake, rent your NFT, or will it ever be in a game?
We are developing a platform where people can breed by having two ICGiraffes NFTs that will receive a baby Giraffe to their wallet after X time of stacking. The time of stacking will be determined at a later point and communicated to our Discord community.
9. What excites you most about your launch, and which date is your launch?
As we get closer and closer to finishing our work, we have decided to launch our collection at the LATEST on 15.03.2022. We are excited because we have multiple utilities that we want to experiment with to learn and better our future projects.
10. What advice would you give to anyone trying to enter into the world of NFTs?
Verify the professionalism displayed and backed by the project's developers through their various community activities and NFT utilities. As the NFT world is still young, we will need to learn where to find value and keep producing it for our members to keep them engaged and interested in our project. Keep paying attention and find the correct entryways into what you want to buy.
11. Do you have further plans to work with ICP Squad in the future after this initial sale?
If our first projects are successful and have the desired results, we will expand our collaboration with ICP Squad. We are invested in our chosen path because we trust the results delivered on other projects. As we get closer and closer to our release date, we are very confident that we will have the success we all have been working for.
12. Can you envisage a future where the most valuable NFT space is on the Internet Computer?
Since the business is in its earliest stages, we can scream YES! The IC world already has players on its platform that can climb the ladder to the top. A few examples are Pokedstudio or Dfinity Space Apes. These are great examples to inspire us to evolve as much as possible and deliver the best product.
13. Why do you think NFTs have become so valuable in such a short space of time?
There can be multiple copies of his art but only one original piece. That is what makes the original painting valuable and irreplaceable. NFTs are different from cryptocurrency in that you can exchange cryptocurrency to purchase useful products, so they are fungible that way.
14. Tell us about your team
When we decided to begin on this path, we knew that having a solid team would increase our chances of success. Our team has a graphic designer, marketing manager, mini-game developer, two social media admins, and a team manager that has a piece of work from all others, besides having his own. The base of our operation is robust and handled by professionals, so we have the most significant chances to achieve success.
15. What advantages do you believe you have over other competitors?
Besides offering the simple utility of NFTs through buy/sell mechanics, you can also receive a passive income through the ministers that will give you 35% resale commission for life! We offer everything that others do but then a little more. This will differentiate us from the rest.
16. Do you have partners? Tell us about them
Yes, we have partnerships. Our main partners are ICKitties, ICPuppies but there are also others to come since we are trying to bring good ideas together and work to better ourselves.
We haven’t reached the halfway point with our partnerships since we have been fully committed to improving our product and concepts first. But the better part of our project is centered around a partnership that will give us the extra exposure we need while also helping others.
17. Tell us about the challenges you face while building your project?
Since we all are professionals with experience in their fields of work, we are pretty new to the whole NFT world and what it will bring as changes to our society. Hence, it's a fun role to play but might be dangerous since this NFT project is the first of this kind ever made by any of us. We are doing the work, and it’s delivering results, but the challenging part is not assessing the win percentage and thus not being able to invest accordingly. This is not a negative aspect, but I might get some chills not knowing where we can grow.
18. What are your short and long-term achievements and targets?
Short-term targets have to be our release sales and build the needed support to roll the utilities we have implemented. “The Organism,” as we like to call it, is the embodiment that has to find a fixed cash flow source for it to start and keep on working. If this is reached, then the sky's the limit for us.
The long-term targets are that the baby Giraffes will grow in value and be catchy for our community's audiences. If so, we would have given great value to our users for free. This is a significant conceptual utility that we will need to see as a reality to check the last box on our sheets.
19. Please give us some details about your roadmap
As far as our planning, we have reached every point and term on schedule. The roadmap is straightforward as follows:
- In December, we have worked to build our team and identify what we needed to offer our project the best possible solutions to succeed. Team and concept creation, together with the design for our NFTs, was the sole purpose for our first month.
- In January, we created the IC Giraffes universe concept, completed the main professions artwork design, and made our first partnerships with other IC projects. We moved to the next phase of our project by doing our first giveaway, which was a complete success by offering 15 pieces from our collections for which 400 people registered. This activity had the purpose of showing us an estimate of what we can expect from our fellow long-necks.
- In February, we managed to finish our website, collection design completion, and rendering. After a brainstorming session, we have also decided to make a valentines day wearable collection showcase to offer some extra spice before our release. We will finish our month with a podcast with the members from IC Kitties and IC Puppies to help boost our community and thus reach more people associated with projects that are a total success.
- The last phase of our project is also the most interesting and dynamic one. We will develop on our website a breeding section where you will be able to stake 2 ICGiraffes for a set period, and you will be airdropped one baby giraffe. After a few more meetings, we have also decided to create a mini-game and also make all necessary moves to allow our long-necks to bring their IC Giraffes NFTs into the Metaverse, but this is still in the works and will take time to complete as it is only a concept at the moment.
20. Any plan to move into Metaverse?
The NFTs you will purchase from us will be transferable to the Metaverse as this was one of the primary utilities we posted on all our channels.
21. Will your NFT be tokenized in the future?
We are considering it.
22. What benefits do you think the Internet Computer has over other L1 blockchains when it comes to creating NFTs?
One of the biggest benefits is that it is extremely fast. the last time I read about it it was over 30 blocks per second which is a mile ahead of his competitors. Another advantage is that gas fees are almost nonexistent making it a more welcoming platform for people who cannot afford to pay tens or hundreds of dollars in gas fees on platforms like Ethereum.
Another advantage is the fact that this is a new blockchain with huge potential and infinite scalability and over the years when ICP will be mainstream we want to be able to look back and say we played our part in the adoption of this blockchain which is a reward in itself.
Thank you for taking the time to answer our questions 😊
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Sponsored Content : Dfinity Community does not necessarily endorse any content or product on this page. While we aim to provide you with information regarding important projects and developments in the Internet Computer ecosystem, readers should do their own research and carry full responsibility for their decisions, and this article should not be considered as investment advice. Please note that every effort is made by DC to vet projects we promote