Archie Comics announces NFT collection, blockchain writer’s room with Palm NFT Studios

Archie Comics, arguably one of the biggest names in the global comics industry, has announced its foray into the web3 space with a non-fungible token (NFT) collection, as well as what is being billed as the world’s biggest blockchain writer’s room. In association with Palm NFT Studios, Archie Comics is launching its own NFT collection called the Archieverse: Eclipse. There would be 6,666 generative characters as part of this collection, and those who buy these NFTs would get access to the writer’s room – and a chance to be one of the creators of a future Archie Comics chapter.

According to an official release by the American comic publishing house, fans of the series would have access to 3 billion outcomes of storylines based on characters in the Archie portfolio that would be marketed as NFTs. According to reports, each NFT would be sold at $66.66 (approx. Rs 5,000), and those who buy NFTs from the Archieverse Eclipse series would get access to the blockchain writing room.

The part where blockchain comes in is to have writers build on each others’ storylines, and also to accountably track original storylines. While Archie Comics has not exactly announced if this would involve payments made to the writers too, the official release states that fans who contribute to the comic through this new writing room will get “story credits and more.”

Jon Goldwater, chief executive of Archie, said in his statement, “When we launched Archie Horror in 2015, we paved the way for our evolution from a premier publisher to a world class entertainment brand when we brought the world to Riverdale through six seasons so far. As we watched the emergence of this exciting new technology (blockchain and NFTs), and a new fandom growing around it, we knew we had to find the right partner and platform to introduce Archie 3.0.”

The concept behind blockchain writing platforms isn’t an Archie original. Numerous such platforms, such as Mirror.xyz, already exist – offering transparent tracking of original author work and payments made in crypto tokens when their work is used anywhere. Going forward, it remains to be seen if Archie would also turn its comic universe into an open world for fan fiction writers, who may look at this avenue as a way to earn while keeping clear tab of content duplication and plagiarism.