OpenSea Reinforces Compulsory Royalties After Facing Flak

OpenSea had previously considered making creator royalty fees optional after several other rival marketplaces had done away with them. 

OpenSea To Stick With Compulsory Royalties

NFT marketplace OpenSea will not be making creator royalties optional. The platform toyed with the idea after several other rival marketplaces (e.g., LooksRare) made the decision to remove compulsory payment of crater royalties while buying NFTs. On Saturday, OpenSea revealed that it was considering making these royalties optional for traders on its platform. The NFT artist or creator sets a royalty fee, which typically falls between 5% and 10% of the secondary sale price. The platform set a self-imposed deadline for when it was going to be considering community feedback and apply that to possible courses of action. These included making creator fees optional for traders, only enforcing them on certain types of NFT collections, or even implementing completely new enforcement methods.

Community Protests Against Optional Royalty

However, the marketplace faced a lot of flak from the community that severely criticized this approach. Many prominent creators and NFT artists spoke out against this move, including the famed NFT collection Bored Ape Yacht Club creator Yuga Labs. Pushback also came from noted streetwear brand The Hundreds, which had an NFT collection drop planned for the OpenSea platform this week. The firm canceled the drop, explaining to the platform that “artists are always in control.” 

Therefore on Thursday, the OpenSea team announced that it has decided not to go ahead with its optional royalties plan and will be continuing to charge compulsory royalties for creators on its platform. 

The company, which is the largest NFT marketplace in the world by trading volume, tweeted out, 

“We will continue to enforce creator fees on all existing collections. We’re awed by the passion we’ve seen from creators and collectors alike this week. We were looking for your feedback, and we heard it, loud and clear.”

Growing Trend Of Royalty Rejection

However, the marketplace also disclosed data that revealed that the share of market-wide creator royalty fees has been dropping drastically, with more and more royalties-rejecting marketplaces popping up all over the web3 space. The OpenSea team also tweeted that creators will have to provide additional benefits along with their NFTs in order to incentivize traders to stick with paying royalties and the platforms that honor royalties. They also suggested that creators need to build paths to on-chain enforcement for their existing collections, as well as stop linking fee-avoiding marketplaces on their project websites.

The team tweeted, 

“Unless something changes soon, this space is trending toward significantly fewer fees paid to creators. No policy that we implement will reverse this trend if this behavior continues.”

Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.