The Bored Ape Business Model: Decentralized Collaboration via Blockchain and NFTs

Abstract

The Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) NFTs stand out for their meteoric success. One underappreciated aspect of the business model adopted in the Bored Ape licenses is its use of decentralized collaboration or De-Collab. Buyers of Bored Ape NFTs are granted unlimited rights to commercialize the underlying Bored Ape associated with a particular sale of an NFT from the collection, which even includes the right to make derivative works from Bored Apes and keep the profits generated. The Bored Ape license’s adoption of a De-Collab approach presents tantalizing possibilities for the Creator Economy. Although it is too early to tell how successful this approach will be, recent deals of Bored Ape NFT owners with Universal Music and music producer Timbaland to create bands for the metaverse show the great potential De-Collab offers. As the Bored Ape ecosystem develops, further study should be made to evaluate the successes and failures of the De-Collab model as a source of innovation and creativity.

Keywords: NFTs, blockchain, web3, metaverse, decentralized collaboration, De-Collab, Bored Ape Yacht Club, CryptoPunks, Yuga Labs, Larva Labs, Creator Economy

JEL Classification: K10, K30, L82, M11, M20