The Path Forward

Team NFTMaps • 23 August 2022

After a period of radio silence from us, we are delighted to finally be able to talk about the future of NFTMaps.

Before that, however, we would like to publicly thank everyone who has supported our project, and the incredible community that we have grown. We understand the frustration that many have felt with our team over the last month, and we hope that today's news will alleviate said frustration.

NFTMaps originally set out to create a massively scalable, centralised Minecraft metaverse, where you portal into your own metaverse through a central 'map'. Shortly after our mint (bringing NFTs into existence), a blog post was released on the official Minecraft blog outlining the future of NFTs within the Minecraft platform. This post had the effect of derailing our project, and we are unfortunately unable to provide some of our original promised features. However, we believe that the alternative, outlined below, provides a solution which is more inclusive, fair and flexible to allow everyone the opportunity to build and deliver on our platform.

Firstly, let's talk about what's changing. We will no longer be providing individual maps in-game through a central portal server. Mojang, and Minecraft have been clear that they do not want to see maps and Mojang Intellectual Property (IP) being distributed in the form of NFTs. Whilst this is disappointing, we fully respect and will abide by any and all regulations and policies outlined by Mojang, Microsoft and Minecraft.

We would also like to thank the IP team at Mojang for their communication and professionalism whilst working with us.

For each NFT on our OpenSea Collection, we will be providing a 3D Model of your map, with a grid reference. You will - at a later date - have the ability to generate all your maps as one model. These maps are generated through our software, and will use a combination of our and open source texture files unrelated to Minecraft. In essence, these maps have no correlation with Minecraft in any sense. It won't use Minecraft textures, Minecraft generation algorithms, Minecraft sounds or any other Intellectual Property. There is no Minecraft in the map, and rather, you have a unique voxel model of your map. Nonetheless, the properties of your map will match those already on OpenSea for each map.

Minecraft is a game about building, and creating while providing everyone with the opportunity to create, explore, design and innovate. We strongly support and believe in these values and ideals. We are committed to promoting innovation and exploration, and our strategy - outlined below - aims to promote and encourage a diverse ecosystem of creative and innovative creations.

Allowing someone access to a server exclusively based on their ownership of an NFT - something which by definition is limited in quantity - arguably goes against the ethos of inclusive and fair access to a game.

As such, going forward, the ability to create a server through the NFTMaps Launchpad will not be restricted to owning an NFT.

But, hold on, you might say? Isn't that the entire point of the NFTMaps Launchpad?

Yes, and no. The NFTMaps Launchpad is an experiment - a way to create a new kind of Minecraft server, designed and shaped around Web3. There are numerous news sources and blogs which criticises Web3, accusing the concept as being a cash grab and a scam.

There's good reason for these accusations. There have been many attempts to create NFTs, cryptocurrencies and tokens for the gain of selling them on a false promise to raise capital and increase the value of the currency, only to quickly cash out and disappear.

Given that Minecraft is a game predominantly played by young people, who may be more susceptible and vulnerable to shady and dishonest projects and platforms, it is vital to ensure any Web3 project is transparent, honest and accountable.

$MAP and the NFTMaps Launchpad

We are excited to formally announce the $MAP token, a new cryptocurrency designed to be used to create and own Minecraft servers.

Our launchpad will be evolving. Instead of your NFT being the exclusive means to create a server, we will instead be allowing any person to rent a server using their $MAP balance.

$MAP will exist like any other cryptocurrency, and can be obtained by converting Ethereum to $MAP. The token will also have benefits to those who own a NFTMaps NFT - we will be sharing more information on this later.

NFTMaps will be a first-of-its-kind server hosting platform, enabling easy and secure access to create Minecraft servers. Our Launchpad will be as accessible as any commercial traditional server hosting platform (that is, a server hosting platform which takes monies in exchange for providing allocated resources used to host a Minecraft server).

It will also promote a rich and diverse ecosystem of innovative creations, and will be a platform open to anyone to create and publicly share their creations.

You will be able to monetise your servers using $MAP, and will be able to sell products within your server, providing they abide by the Minecraft Commercial Usage Guidelines.

We will be providing an initial set of features to our Launchpad in the coming weeks, with the ability to create a simple server. This platform will be actively developed and maintained, with community and development tools being available to help you create your server.

Conclusion

The last few weeks have been turbulent, and we apologise for the lack of updates and developments from our team. We hope you're excited as we are for what's to come in the next few weeks and months.

Your continued support is invaluable to us, and we look forward to sharing more with you soon!

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