Nifty News: Steve Irwin's zoo conservation NFTs, SportemonGo is gone, and more

The Crocodile Minter

Australia Zoo, the famous animal sanctuary owned by Terri Irwin, the widow of Steve Irwin or the crocodile hunter, has launched a nonfungible token (NFT) project called “Wildlife Warriors.”

Wildlife Warriors is also the name of a nonprofit organization founded by the Irwins in 2002 which focuses on the protection of injured, threatened or endangered wildlife. All profits from the NFT sales will be donated to the Australia Zoo and Wild Warriors conservation efforts.

The NFT collection is a part of the 20th-anniversary celebration of the Australia Zoo, and users can now sign up for the allow list to obtain early access to the upcoming drops. However, details on the specific number of NFTs, tiers of rarity, utility and pricing are sparse at this stage.

“The rare NFT project will comprise of a series of drops, each focusing on a different Australia Zoo Wildlife Warriors animal. The NFTs will be randomly generated, non-deterministic, utility-driven and 100 percent unique to the buyer,” the announcement reads.

The NFTs are being minted on Algorand, which touts itself as the world’s first carbon-negative blockchain, and were developed in partnership with Meadow Labs, an Australia-based NFT startup.

Australia Zoo is excited to launch the Wildlife Warriors NFT project with Meadow Labs and Algorand, the world’s first carbon-negative blockchain. We’re committed to building a sustainable future for our fauna and flora. For an exclusive VIP access, visit https://t.co/Vag0Zw9I9f. pic.twitter.com/KmxfOfIJb2

SportemonGo is a no go

Despite signing a three-year sponsorship deal with pro-Scottish football team Hibernian F.C., also known as Hibs, in September last year, NFT and fan token platform SportemonGo (SGOX) shut down shop this week.

It appeared the company had built strong inroads into pro-football, as it was also a sponsor of Rangers F.C., and held endorsement deals with Andy Robertson of Liverpool F.C, Luke Shaw of Manchester United and Callum Hudson-Odoi of Chelsea F.C.

According to Edinburgh News, the firm had signed on with Hibs for a multi-year six-figure sum deal but failed to deliver on launching a fan token for the team and also suffered from funding troubles, with its main avenue being the sale of its SGOX token.

Sports Pro Media also reported on Wednesday that SportemonGo stated that it was working on “amicable” termination agreements with all its partners, while the project also posted a tweet on Tuesday suggesting that investors would be able to recover their losses via a token swap.

1) So Sportemon Go.. if it has indeed gone bust... Crypto is highly speculative (as in lose your shirt risky) but legitimate in that context. Rangers have every right to accept sponsorship from that market, & it is not their job to do something the regulators can't even do...

Leeds United launch NFTs to support Ukraine

Speaking of pro-football, English Premier League team Leeds United has launched 11 one-of-one NFTs to support the Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal.

The collection is dubbed “Shirts for Ukraine” and the NFTs depict 11 tokenized Leeds Jerseys that have been digitally signed by the players. The winning bidders will also receive two hospitality tickets to a game on May 15, a pitchside tour with former Leeds greats and attendance to one open training session.

At the time of writing, the highest bid of $1,470.96 is for the tokenized jersey belonging to number 23 Kalvin Phillips, a fan favorite among Leeds fans.

Hyundai to drop 9,500 NFTs

South-Korean automobile giant Hyundai is set to drop a collection of 9,500 NFTs as part of an upcoming metaverse project.

The “Shooting Star” NFTs are set for a pre-sale of 3,000 tokens on May 9, and a general sale of 6,500 tokens the following day. All will be sold for 0.15 Ether (ETH) a pop, or $440 at the time of writing.

The NFTs will act as an access pass to the Hyundai Metamobility universe, and once the platform has launched, the hodler’s NFTs will be automatically converted into “Metamobility” NFTs. It hasn’t specifically been outlined what further utility the NFTs will have, but they will each have a new and unique design after the conversion.

We are gladly announcing that an official website of Hyundai Metamobility universe is now open!https://t.co/FjAryI1FMiReady for the adventure? pic.twitter.com/gOURKLSD4X

Related: Why NFT adoption is so high in South Korea

Other Nifty News:

Holders of the popular memecoin Shiba Inu (SHIB) will now be able to use the cryptocurrency to purchase tokenized land in the upcoming Shiba metaverse platform.

Cybersecurity expert Malwarebytes Labs has identified and disclosed the rising popularity of ape-themed airdrop phishing scams among crypto and NFT scammers.