As a backend/devops engineer with experience in games/fintech, I'm still new to NFTs but am collaborating with a couple of friends on an interesting project. I could use some advice on how to negotiate my stake.
One collaborator (the most important) is a very talented artist with a significant social media following, the other (the artist's spouse) is a successful VC. I think the project could really go somewhere, that is, at least before any NFT bubble bursts...
We all want to sort out our respective ownership/compensation soon. However, this is new territory for all of us (not a traditional startup) and it's hard for me to decide what makes sense to ask for.
The artist is without question the most important individual in the project – it will be her work on display, with her name behind it. No amount of code will make the project successful without a unique story and good art. She is irreplaceable.
On the other hand, the engineering side of the project is essential. It's not just solidity/smart contract writing – it's the question of how to construct final NFT output images from individual asset images, define rarities/price hierarchies, etc. There are other of engineers out there who could do it, but they are not so easy to find quickly, and they may demand more than just cash at this point in the NFT game. Supposedly BAYC [boredapeyachtclub.com] paid only $40k to outsource both illustration AND engineering, but that was before NFT hype reached its current levels, and I don't think that example can serve as a baseline anymore for either artist OR eng compensation.
Unlike with traditional tech startups, these NFT projects don't really have to use equity to attract talent for the long term because NFT drops can happen so quickly.
So what is the engineer's asking price here? The artist's? The VC's?
Thanks much!
There is currently a flood of NFT's hitting the market. Like any startup, but even more so, the odds are that your NFT won't be the next billion dollar thing, and will probably be close to to zero. So you are are really optimizing for continued friendships here, most probably in the case of zero success, but also in super rare case of massive success.
Crypto eng is in stupidly high demand, so don't sell yourself short. If the eng work is small, you could do 1/3, 1/3, 1/3 which is effectively 2/3 for the artist. If the Eng work is larger, like an interactive game, or something special on the smart contracts, I'd do 50%/50%.
NFT's are often an interactive process. Your first release may not have sticking power.
Send me an @ on twitter and @danielvf when you launch, I'd love to see it.