Fall 2022

NFTs AND THE METAVERSE

An open introductory course to NFTs and the Metaverse, delivered on-chain and in the metaverse.

The University of Nicosia (UNIC) has been a leader in cryptocurrency education and research since 2014, when it taught the world’s first for-credit cryptocurrency course.

This course was taught by UNIC faculty and @punk6529 – a deeply influential thinker on NFTs and the metaverse and one of the largest NFT collectors in the world – along with an incredible array of guest panelists and lecturers.
The course was free to attend, and you could register by minting the course NFT (free + gas); students who would like a certificate of completion from UNIC pay a small fee.
UNIC also offered a 1-week starter pre-course on the mechanics of being able to transact on-chain.

Meet Your Course Instructors

Punk 6529

Punk6529 is among the world’s foremost collectors, investors and thought leaders in the NFT space, well-known for his extensive tweetstorms on NFTs and decentralization.  6529 is a leading advocate of the “open metaverse” – namely that the architecture of the metaverse should be decentralized and interoperable and, specifically, that NFTs could serve in this role.

6529 is active in several key areas: a) the 6529 Museum is a very extensive NFT museum, with a particular focus on generative art; b) 6529 Capital is a leading asset manager in the NFT space, and c) OM, which is building an open, decentralized metaverse.

Professor George Giaglis

Professor George M. Giaglis is the Executive Director of the Institute for the Future at the University of Nicosia. He teaches three MOOCs at UNIC: Introduction to Digital Currencies; Introduction to DeFi; NFTs and the Metaverse; and was instrumental in designing the curriculum of the world’s first academic programs in this space.
He has also been working with institutional and corporate clients, including the European Commission and the European Central Bank, on blockchain and technology monitoring projects, as well as advisor to a number of technology companies. He has published 12 books and more than 150 scientific papers, and is the Chief Editor of the Blockchain Technologies section at Frontiers in Blockchain.

Welcome to Your Classroom

The course took place in specially designed virtual auditoriums inside OM – Punk 6529’s Open Metaverse.
Our goal was to see if we could deliver a course 100% on-chain and in the metaverse.
Adjacent to your classroom was the 6529 Museum District, home to one of the leading NFT collections in the world, spread across 20+ galleries, as well as a growing ecosystem of artist and collector galleries in the surrounding areas.

World-Renowned Guest Lecturers

Keith Grossman

President,
TIME Magazine

Fred Wilson

Co-Founder and Partner,
Union Square Ventures

Chris Dixon

General Partner,
Andreessen Horowitz

Yat Siu

Chairman
Animoca Brands

Erick / Snowfro

Founder- Art Blocks,
Creator - Squiggle

Dmitri Cherniak

Generative Artist,
Creator - Ringers

Claire Silver

AI Artist.
Co-founder of A2 Accelerate Art

Tyler Hobbs

Generative Artist,
Creator of Fidenza

Balaji Srinivasan

General Partner - a16z
Former CTO - Coinbase

Reuben Wu

Award winning visual artist and music producer

Gargamel

Co-Founder,
Yuga Labs

beeple

NFT Artist

Matt DesLauriers

Generative Artist,
Creator of Subscapes

Charli Cohen

Founder of RSTLSS

Bharat Krymo

Decentralization Maxi, NFT Collector, 6529 Capital

4156

Co-Founder
Nouns

GMoney

NFT Collector
Futurist. Disruptor. Ape.

Helena Sarin

Generative and GAN Artist

BatSoupYum

Asset Manager, NFT Collector, 6529 Capital

Kevin Rose

Founder - PROOF Collective
Partner - True Ventures

Drift

Artist
Army Special Operations Veteran

Sam Spratt

Artist

Sasha Stiles

Metapoet, Artist, AI Researcher

Loren Bednar

Generative Artist

ix_shells

Generative NFT Artist

AC

Generative Art Collector, Founder, 6529 Capital

Thomas Bailey

General Partner
Road Capital Management

BonaFideHan

CEO
Deca

Rayan Boutaleb

Founder and CEO.
OnCyber

Aaron Wright

Co-Founder Tribute Labs
Professor Cardozo Law

Richerd

Co-Founder of Manifold

VonMises

NFT Collector

Michael Bouhanna

VP, Contemporary Art Specialist & Co-Head of Digital Art, Sotheby's

Sebastian Fahey

Managing Director, EMEA and Executive Lead Metaverse, Sotheby's

Misan Harriman

Chair of Southbank Centre,
Photographer, Activist

Blessing Atas

Phone photographer
Visual Art & Storyteller

Priyanka Patel

Photographer
Chief Panic Officer & Co-Founder of The Burrow

Innamodja

Artist at SuperRare,
Founder of Code Green and NFT Factory Paris, Head of Philanthropy @worldofwomennft

Giannis Sourdis

NFT Curator at M0NA,
Co-founder of Amplify Global and Couch Heroes

Michael J Casey

Chief Content Officer,
CoinDesk

Artnome

CEO and Cofounder of ClubNFT.com and RightClickSave.com

Jeff Bandman

Principal - Bandman Advisors, Industry Associate - University of Nicosia

Eliana Torres

Intellectual Property law | blockchain + Web3 Lawyer

Anika Meier

Digital Art Writer and Curator

Micol Ap

Founder & CEO at VerticalCrypto Art

Deborah Quazzo

Managing Partner,
GSV Ventures

Claire Zau

Vice President,
GSV Ventures

Kathleen Breitman

Co-founder of Tezos

Robert Scoble

Futurist

Maxim Perumal

VR Hardware Developer

Why Take This Course

The Metaverse is likely to be the default interaction model for the Internet in the coming decades. It will present tremendous opportunities and challenges across all aspects of society, including business, governance, personal relationships and social goals.
NFTs are the first mechanism that allows intangible/cultural objects to be represented on-chain in an open, interoperable, permissionless and programmable context.
This course explores the interaction of these two themes, providing the participant with a good fundamental introduction to both their theory and current applications.

Participants who successfully completed the course have both an initial conceptual overview of the field and a practical ability to interact with emerging applications in this area.

The course is suitable for students of all backgrounds and professions. Prerequisites for the course include the ability to use Metamask or another web3 wallet, as well as a small amount of ETH (less than $20).
UNIC offered a 1-week starter pre-course on the mechanics of being able to transact on-chain, on September 26th, 2022.

Course Outline

The course took place over a 12-week period, starting the week of October 3rd and ending the week of December 19th, where each week corresponded to a specific topic or area.
In addition to asynchronous access to course materials and lecture notes, each week there was a live video session with course instructors, during which course-specific questions were answered, and/or guest lectures took place.

COURSE PRICING

The NFTs and the Metaverse course is 100% free for everyone to attend.
Upon course completion, successful participants are able to mint an official “University of Nicosia Certificate of Completion” as an on-chain Ethereum NFT (0.25 ETH plus gas).

NFTs AND THE METAVERSE

  1. Technical primer:
    1. A brief introduction to ETH, ERC-20, ERC-721, ERC-1155
    2. The structure of ERC-721 and ERC-1155 tokens
    3.  Contract types (standalone, shared)
    4. Marketplaces
  2. Main uses of NFTs to-date:
    1. PFPs
    2. Generative Art
    3. 1 of 1 art, including photography
    4. Gaming assets
    5. Metaverse assets
    6. Access passes / Utility focused
    7. Representations of offchain assets
  3. Market size and structure
  4. NFTs – a generic container for intangible assets?

  1. Copyright and Trademarks in traditional art
  2. “Right Click Save As”
  3. Copyright vs Provenance in NFTs
  4. Rights management in NFTs
    1. Commercial rights
    2. Public domain / permissive licensing models

  1. What is a PFP?
  2. PFPs and community building
  3. PFPs as publicly writeable databases
  4. PFPs and other forms of decentralized identity
  5. Future opportunities and challenges in PFPs

  1. NFTs as a platform and medium for digital art
  2. CryptoArt
  3. Cross-over Artists
  4. Photography
  5. Future directions

  1. NFTs, the natural medium for generative art?
  2. The history of generative art (1950s to date)
  3. On-chain generative art
  4. Long-form generative art
  5. Future directions in generative art?

  1. Art vs Collectibles: Historical Parallels
  2. Manufacturing social construction: Aesthetics, rarity and markets
  3. NFT-Fi: Financialization of NFTs
  4. Tax considerations

  1. The economics of gaming:
    1. In-game economies
    2. Economics of game studios
  2. CryptoKitties and the birth of on-chain gaming
  3. Axie Infinity, Zed and play-to-earn gaming
  4. On-chain gaming vs traditional game economies and economics
  5. Future of on-chain gaming: opportunities and challenges

  1. What is the metaverse? Is there one metaverse? Multiple metaverses?
  2. Early metaverse experiences
  3. MMORPGs
  4. VR-based systems
  5. Early NFT-based metaverses
  6. “Open” NFT-based approaches
  7. Social networks

  1. State of 3D rendering on desktop/mobile:
    1. Proprietary game engines (Unreal Engine and Unity)
    2. Web-based standards (WebGL)
    3. Pixel streaming
  2. Extended reality (augmented and virtual reality)
    1. Current state of technology
    2. Key opportunities and challenges
  3. Expected development challenges

  1. A brief overview of USA securities law:
    1. The Howey Test
    2. Accredited Investors and Qualified Purchasers
    3. Investment Companies Act
    4. Reg A
  2. Venture Capital
  3. DAOs
  4. Token offerings
  5. NFTs
  6. Crowdfunding

  1. Retrospective: Representing off-chain objects on-chain
  2. Regulatory bridges and enforcement of off-chain claims
  3. Case Studies:
    1. Fashion
    2. Real Estate
  4. Timeline, opportunities and challenges

  1. History of web 1 and web 2 technology stacks
  2. Conventional off-chain and permissioned chain technology stacks
    1. Social Media
    2. Gaming engines
    3. CBDC
    4. Hardware
  3. Open on-chain standard stacks
    1. Web 3 applications
    2. NFTs
    3. Open standards

ETHEREUM USER STARTER PRE-COURSE

One of the prerequisites for registering for “Free MOOC: NFTs and the Metaverse”, was the ability to mint an NFT on the Ethereum blockchain.
For those who had not done this before, UNIC offered a 1-week free starter pre-course from Sept 26th to Oct 3rd, 2022 covering the mechanics of being able to transact on-chain in Ethereum.

Pre-Course Dates:
September 26, 2022 – October 3, 2022

Master’s Degrees

Students who want to pursue an academic degree in a Crypto-related area, can apply to one of the University of Nicosia’s three Master’s degrees.

You can apply to a Master’s degree by clicking the programme links.

World Leaders in Crypto Education and Research

Note: The following information pertains to Fall 2022.

The University of Nicosia (UNIC) has an almost decade-long track record as the leading university in the field of cryptocurrency and blockchain. UNIC launched the world’s first degree program in cryptocurrency in 2014.

Today, UNIC has educated over 100,000 students in academic and professional training courses, hosts the world’s largest team of faculty and staff focused on crypto-assets and blockchains.

UNIC serves as the academic lead for the EU Blockchain Observatory and Forum (a European Commission initiative to accelerate the development of blockchain within the EU) and also was selected to serve on the Technology Advisory Board of the European Central Bank (ECB).

UNIC runs the Decentralized conference, Europe’s premier annual blockchain conference since 2017. The growing Decentralized network now comprises 19 chapters with 55,000+ members from over 100 countries.

UNIC recently announced the Open Metaverse Initiative (OMI), a new comprehensive initiative focused on the academic, research and policy issues relating to the metaverse, with a particular emphasis on open public systems and standards.

UNIC at a Glance

Note: The following information pertains to Fall 2022.

The University of Nicosia (UNIC) is one of the leading comprehensive research-oriented universities in the Mediterranean region, committed to teaching, research and innovation, sustainability, societal engagement and contribution to culture.

  • Ranked #157 in the EU and Top 501 – 600 in the World (Top 2%) by Times Higher Education World University Rankings (THE WUR 2023)

  • #47 in the world in International Outlook (THE WUR)

  • #201-250 in the world for Business and Economics (THE WUR)
  • #201-250 in the world for Education (THE WUR)
  • Ranked #136 in QS World University Rankings (EECA Region)
  • #1 Largest University in Southern Europe that Teaches Primarily in English
  • 14,000+ Students from Over 100 Countries