Beeple’s CryptoPunks marketing stunt briefly pumps Nakamigos NFTs

Beeple caused Nakamigos NFTs to soar — and later plummet — in price this weekend after an AI-based stunt at the artist’s CryptoPunks meetup depicted Larva Labs’ founders launching an earlier iteration of the collection.

At “CryptoPunks meetup 2.0,” a video showed an AI rendition of Matt Hall and John Watkinson supposedly launching the “V-ZERO CryptoPunks.”

The founders apparently discussed how the original, earlier iteration of CryptoPunks was created two years before the actual CryptoPunks NFT collection.

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Both Hall and Beeple also signed flyers, however, these used pictures from the Nakamigos collection, a separate NFT project based on CryptoPunks. These flyers also rained down from the sky after the AI video was finished.

This led some to believe that the Nakamigos were in fact the “launched” V-0 Cryptopunks, and the collection’s trading volume and price in ether (ETH) duly shot up by 1,782% and 127% respectively.

However, when news spread that it was a joke, the price tumbled by 57% and returned to a roughly pre-pump 0.189 ETH.

Beeple then doubled down on the joke by releasing an apology video that ridiculed anyone who previously fell for the stunt. He listed multiple telltale signs that it was joke, and said he would make things right at the URL “I’mafuckingretard.com.”

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Someone has already bought a similar domain and is using it to redirect people to a different NFT collection. Beeple also shared a satirical post implying a lawsuit had been filed that accused him of buying hundreds of Nakamigos NFTs in advance.