Latest Solana NFT Collection Gives Ethereum NFTs a Run for Their Money

Y00ts NFTs have garnered attention for their free mint and approach to NFT intellectual property rights

article-image

blockworks exclusive art by axel rangel

share

key takeaways

  • Dust Labs — DeGods and y00ts creators — raised a $7 million seed round
  • Y00ts generated over $7 million worth of secondary sales since Monday despite minting delays

The company behind the Solana-based DeGods project, the most valuable Solana NFT collection, is at it again.

Dust Labs is in the midst of a whirlwind week — complete with a few hiccups — between a $7 million seed raise and the release of its newest NFTs, y00ts.

The “y00ts mint t00b” collection has topped OpenSea volume charts for the past 48 hours, amassing 227,000 solana (SOL), or over $7.1 million in secondary sales at the time of publication, per CryptoSlam data. Its floor price peaked at 167 SOL on Wednesday. 

The hype behind y00ts, short for y00topia, is in part due to its scholarship whitelist program and its custom version of copyright, promising to reform the traditional monetization system for NFT collections.

Only collectors accepted to the y00tlist are eligible to mint a t00b NFT. Essentially two different collections, t00bs are vials that can be burned to mint y00ts NFTs. 

DUST, the DeGods ecosystem utility token on Solana, is necessary to mint y00ts. 

The full NFT reveal hasn’t occurred yet, and a derivative collection called y00ts Yacht Club, has already been developed and sold out.

Initially scheduled to drop on Sept. 4, the y00ts mint was delayed due to a “blocker bug” five minutes before start time, according to the team. 

Since going live on Sept. 5, the project’s volume is greater than that of the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) collection within the last seven days. 

However, even the waitlist mint, scheduled for Sept. 6, ran into unknown issues and has been rescheduled

Despite the delays and complications, Twitter user alexjm.eth lauded the project for having “singlehandedly sparked bullish sentiment in the midst of a painful bear.” 

Another collector, NFT influencer Franklin, decided to sell his y00ts mint spot and make a 90 SOL profit. He is the 6th largest Bored Ape collector with 60 BAYC NFTs in his portfolio.

Loading Tweet..

Y00ts and DeGods’ founder Frank responded to Franklin via Twitter, stating that it’s “gonna be hilarious when degods flip apes this year though.”

Loading Tweet..

Backers of the startup’s venture included Foundation Capital, Solana Ventures, FTX Ventures, Solana NFT protocol maker Metaplex and top Solana NFT marketplace Magic Eden. 

The company tweeted that it intends to build a “B2B SaaS start up to help NFT projects provide the most value back to their holders.”

A new approach to intellectual property

Dust Labs is experimenting with a new copyright and ownership system for y00ts NFTs they call ⓨ, as a replacement for the more common copyright symbol ⓒ. 

The power behind ⓨ, according to the y00ts team, is that any active community member can start their own “club” or sub-community — based on shared interests, memes or merchandise — and register the derivative project with ⓨ.

Each sub-collection is a governing body that can benefit from royalties on every y00t that sells with any of their customized traits. This system may also make it easier to approve or reject requests to use an NFT’s intellectual property (IP). 

This comes at a time when many blue chip NFT collections are altering their own terms of service when it comes to copyright and IP rights.


Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

Tags

Decoding crypto and the markets. Daily, with Byron Gilliam.

Upcoming Events

Old Billingsgate

Mon - Wed, October 13 - 15, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

Industry City | Brooklyn, NY

TUES - THURS, JUNE 24 - 26, 2025

Permissionless IV serves as the definitive gathering for crypto’s technical founders, developers, and builders to come together and create the future.If you’re ready to shape the future of crypto, Permissionless IV is where it happens.

Brooklyn, NY

SUN - MON, JUN. 22 - 23, 2025

Blockworks and Cracked Labs are teaming up for the third installment of the Permissionless Hackathon, happening June 22–23, 2025 in Brooklyn, NY. This is a 36-hour IRL builder sprint where developers, designers, and creatives ship real projects solving real problems across […]

recent research

Research Report Templates (10).png

Research

Kamino has evolved into a full-stack asset scaling suite with V2: unlocking new markets, improving capital efficiency, and catering to various risk profiles. We believe it is best positioned to become the credit backbone of Solana as the ecosystem matures. Simply put, KMNO remains our highest-conviction bet in the Solana ecosystem. This report lays out our thesis.

article-image

EigenCloud wants to make crypto-economic guarantees a plug-and-play primitive

article-image

In a new letter, Gemini alleges that the CFTC’s DOE had ulterior motives for 2022 suit

article-image

Sponsored

Neitec’s Debita platform is closing the credit gap by unlocking high-yield private debt in markets that need it most

article-image

From bank porters to stablecoins, the history of money is a story of acceleration

article-image

The Byreal DEX will use both centralized and decentralized liquidity sources to route trades

article-image

Last week’s solana ETF amendments points to “some sort of push from the SEC to get things organized,” a person familiar tells Blockworks.