The rise of the open edition (OE) is officially here. After increasing in popularity throughout 2022, the last few months have seen thousands of artists and Web3 builders creating claim pages for open-edition mints. The NFT community has flocked to them in droves, generating millions in revenue and reinvigorating the crypto art space as it tries to shake off the icicles of a frosty 2022. Beyond the financial boost, OEs benefit the NFT ecosystem by driving engagement, allowing an artist’s fan base more opportunities to collect their work while expanding that community’s reach at the same time.
This all sounds like good news — and it is, depending on who you ask. While some celebrate open editions, others worry that they ultimately harm the space, diluting the value of an artist’s output (most notably their 1-of-1s) and bringing little to collectors in terms of utility. There’s also the question of the unknown long-term effects that OEs have on a body of work.
To parse out these concerns and understand why open editions have begun their staggering ascent, we looked at the numbers and spoke to some of the artists and collectors who know the OE trend best. But first, it’s worth understanding the historical context behind this upswing.
How did open editions get so popular?
Open editions are NFT drops with no set supply limit, allowing collectors to mint as many tokens as they want within a certain period (usually within 24, 48, or 72 hours). They can also be open-ended, with no time limit, though these are somewhat rarer. The open edition itself isn’t a particularly new drop methodology in the NFT space (Beeple famously dropped three open editions on Nifty Gateway in 2020, for example), but the sheer volume of OEs showing up on the radar recently is unprecedented. Countless artists have joined the OE rush in recent weeks and months, including Terrell Jones, Lucréce, and Marcel Deneuve. And their mints are mostly being…
