NLL 101
Settle in for the story of the Nine Lives Lounge.
Why LaMelo?
NLL — Never List LaMelo.
How many LaMelos do you have?
How much did you pay for your LaMelo?
These things are often heard when you get a group of Cool Cats set holders together. They tend to define their set by that one Moment — the LaMelo Ball Cool Cat Moment™ NFT that immortalizes the first putback dunk of his career. But the quest to complete this set was so much more for collectors than a single moment.
The Cool Cats Master Challenge
In January 2021, the first Cool Cats packs were dropped. Each pack cost $14 and included one Cool Cat moment with four Series 2 base moments. The set memorialized moments from the first half of the ’20-21 NBA season. This pack drop started what is known as the first and only Master Challenge on the NBA Top Shot platform. January 31st, the Master Challenge was announced, and between February 7th and June 1st 2021, collectors chased 7 separate challenges earning rewards that had to be held throughout.
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This is what characterized this as a Master Challenge — unique from any challenge before or that has come after it. It is the only challenge that has required collectors to hold every previous challenge reward to qualify for the final challenge reward. This meant that if collectors missed a previous challenge, they were required to buy the challenge reward from the marketplace. This requirement caused the Luka Doncic Cool Cat Moment™ to reach a peak of nearly $9500 as people chased their 30/30.
From mid-January until June 1st, 2953 collectors stayed engaged and were able to achieve the requirement of 29/29 to complete the final challenge and earn the 30/30 designation with the air drop of the LaMelo Ball Cool Cat Moment™. This is a tremendous number of collectors considering the length of time and financial investment. This series helped to create a bond between collectors that was the first of its kind, causing collectors to identify with the set and wear its completion as a badge of honor. They decided to create their own utility, formed their own Discord called Cool Catz, and went to work forming a community focused on one thing — #HODLaMelo. This marked the beginning of NBA Top Shot set-themed communities.
Welcome to Nine Lives Lounge
Then on August 6th 2021, NBA Top Shot released a blog post announcing their support of the Cool Catz community and their desire to honor holders of the Cool Cats set. They introduced air drops, exclusive Infinite Objects, autographed jersey giveaways, and access to key decision makers at Dapper Labs. The two groups came together to give the community an official name, and thus the Nine Lives Lounge (NLL) was formally brought to life.
In the first days of December 2021, the members of the Nine Lives Lounge decided to gift a membership to NBA Player Kevin Durant, a newly Certified Baller on the Top Shot platform. They started slowly sending the lowest priced moments, but the effort quickly gained community support leaving only two Moments left. Then an NLL legend, ShazzyJ2000, stepped up and gifted both the LaMelo and the Luka Cool Cat Moments to complete the set for the Easymoneysniper. A small group of set holders were inspired by this community-building activity and got together to discuss what utility they’d like to see and how they’d bring it about.
Returning to the community’s roots of “create your own utility”, the small group pitched the idea of electing a council that would work on a community agenda with the funding and full support of Dapper Labs. A few months later, elections were held, and a new era of the Nine Lives Lounge has begun. The council leadership has brought fresh interest from collectors and renewed hope for set holders.
The past nine months in the exclusive NLL discord channel of NBA Top Shot have given set holders a chance to get to know each other, to learn from each other, and have presented new challenges for them to solve as a team. We’re proud to say set completions still remain over 90% after a tumultuous year.
Now, on the 1yr anniversary of the Master Challenge, IX. Labs is introducing the first-ever NLL Portal and the 30/30 Badge NFT — the next level of fandom and utility for Cool Cats set holders by Cool Cats set holders. Stay Tuned!
#NLL #CreateYourOwnUtility
