As many emerge from years of pandemic isolation to embrace old holiday traditions, developers are creating new holiday experiences in the world of web3. One such project is Santa.fm, an NFT gift exchange developed by web3 product studio VenturePunk and powered by Chainlink VRF (Verifiable Random Function).
The concept is fun and straightforward: participants have until Christmas Eve to deposit their NFTs, which must be from a verified collection on OpenSea, into the Santa.fm NFT gift pool. Chainlink VRF then returns an unopened gift NFT, which the depositor gets to “open” or reveal on Christmas morning. Because VRF is a tamper-proof and auditable source of on-chain randomness, the process by which NFTs are randomly exchanged is provably fair and cannot be manipulated by third parties including the VenturePunk team.
VenturePunk Founder and CEO Jordan Lyall – whose previous holiday venture, HelloSanta, was acquired by JibJab in 2014 – told Chainlink Today that the idea for Santa.fm was conceived as a no-frills way to bring joy to NFT collectors and communities this holiday season.
“We’re launching several new innovative products and communities starting in January. But several weeks ago, we realized we’d wrap up 2022 without shipping a product. So we started brainstorming end-of-year ideas for a fun side project that we could launch mid-December,” he said.
“We pitched each other dozens of ideas, but the one that ultimately stuck was a simple NFT gift exchange. It was the perfect combination of fun, simplicity, and memes. That intersection is our sweet spot.”
Though Lyall said Santa.fm is a relatively small endeavor compared to what VenturePunk has in store, it may offer a glimmer of Christmas yet to come.
“In the next few years, we’ll continue to see existing traditions being brought online and on-chain,” he said. “And we’ll experiment with new customs afforded to us by this technology as it and our understanding of it evolves.”
He expects the Santa.fm gift exchange will close with several thousand participants on Christmas Eve. (At the time of publishing, the pool has 1,183 gifts.)
“I think the project appeals to those of us who like to try new things with our NFTs. In a down market, now is the time to be experimenting with new forms of interaction, new methods of utility, and new ways to connect with others using this tech.”
While Santa.fm offers a primitive glimpse of the future, it’s built on technology that is designed to be future-proof.
“Chainlink’s VRF system is the gold standard in terms of on-chain randomness,” Lyall said. “With a wave of new NFT-powered games and experiences coming soon, Chainlink will have a major impact on the continued adoption of NFTs.”
To learn more about VenturePunk, visit their website and Twitter.