Kanye West once famously told his fans that his focus was on building “real projects in the real world.” A post made on his Instagram some months ago indicated he had no interest in doing a “f***ing NFT”, pouring water on hopes that the hip-hop and rap icon would make a move in the world of web3.
However, one of the scene’s most innovative faces might be changing tune. A new trademark application for his Yeezus brand, filed May 27, was done so in a peculiar category: “blockchain-based non-fungible collectibles, assets, currencies and tokens” and “online retail store services featuring downloadable movies, videos, television, music, entertainment, digital art.”
In short, maybe Kanye and Yeezus will be making their move on web3 with an NFT collection or crypto asset of some sort. Or, at least in the near-term, maybe it’s just an effort to protect the Yeezus brand’s multi-billion dollar intellectual property value.
Other rappers in the game such as Ice Cube, Snoop Dogg, and Nas have already jumped into the world of NFTs and web3. Each of them have created collectibles in the emergent industry, in metaverses and on marketplaces like The Sandbox and Royal.