GameStop has ‘yoinked’ over 250 tech-experienced hires from the likes of Chewy, Amazon, and Microsoft since Ryan Cohen’s digital-first takeover. 

In May, GMEdd.com published GameStop Poaches Talent From The Best – Amazon, Chewy, Facebook, Google, and More, revealing that public profiles on LinkedIn indicated over 30 new hires at the gaming retailer who brought experience from a cross section of high growth e-commerce stars.

Now, GameStop has more than octupled that number, recruiting over 250 quintessential go-getters to aid in the transformation.

Per an agreement with GameStop Corp. in January, Ryan Cohen’s RC Ventures was granted 3 seats on the company’s board as the Chewy co-founder had been urging the brick-and-mortar to adapt to changing times.

Ever since, the public corporation has operated largely in silence while building the foundation for a digital-first technology company that can compete with the likes of Amazon.

Ryan Cohen’s secret to accomplishing this? Finding talent. And lots of it.

GMEdd.com has been tracking GameStop’s tech hires since the appointment of Matt Francis to CTO in February.

Can’t stop, won’t stop, GameStop.

When Ryan Cohen was asked how he finds his management teams during a 2018 Miami Herald interview, he gave his endorsement for the professional networking platform LinkedIn.

We use a special proprietary tool called LinkedIn and we look for people with very relevant experience at companies we respect and we shoot them a message. … We handpicked these people. They are the best of the best, the Navy Seals of management teams.

By scouring LinkedIn, we can discover some motivations as to what would compel someone to make such an unconventional career move from a blue-chip to GameStop.

Brian OKeefe’s post on LinkedIn in October of 2021.

Take Brian OKeefe, an Amazon veteran who had operated as a Global Finance Lead for the e-commerce giant for over four and a half years. 

On LinkedIn in September, OKeefe stated that he has left Amazon to “pursue a new challenge,” and that he is “energized by the team, the mission, and the story here,” at GameStop.

OKeefe isn’t the only GameStop recruit that has shared this same bullish sentiment on social media. In fact, GameStop’s mission and startup-atmosphere seems to be part of the pitch.

Jeremy Martin joined GameStop in July 2021.

Jeremy Martin worked at Amazon for over 8 years prior to starting his next adventure in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, at GameStop HQ. 

Martin wasn’t a small fish, either. Having served as Amazon UK’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO), he designed, staffed, and led high performance finance, sales, and UK operations for the multi-billion dollar e-commerce company.

GameStop Headquarters’ floor plans are available online, dated July 29th, 2021.¹

GameStop’s Grapevine Headquarters’ floor plans reveal Jeremy Martin’s importance to the scrappy startup, with an office positioned right by the CEO and Executive Suite.

The gaming retailer’s newly-appointed Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Matt Furlong, previously worked as Amazon’s Country Leader for Australia, indicating GameStop’s interest in these high-ranking players.

Vinay Patel has not yet announced his new employment, but we can safely guess.²

Amazon employees have begun to notice how GameStop has been poaching all of the company’s talent, with Vinay Patel, a 5 year Amazon vet, stating that he “had an opportunity that was very hard to walk away from.”

Please don’t tell me we lost another teammate to GameStop!

What’s the plan?

Although it seems that GameStop’s recruits are being asked to keep their tasks on the down-low, some can’t help but share their enthusiasm, and it’s in-part to help recruit for their own teams.

Stacey Ferreira is ‘building the experience of the future’ at GameStop.

Meet Stacey Ferreira, who has taken the role of Director of New Formats at GameStop. In fact, you may recognize her name, since she’s founded and sold two technology companies, been recognized on Forbes 30 Under 30, co-authored the best-selling book 2 Billion Under 20, and spoken at a number of prestigious events including TEDx, Singularity University, Inc. Women’s Summit, among others.

Now, she’s focused on building GameStop’s “store of the future,” and working to bridge digital/physical into a seamless customer experience.

Revitalizing retail should not come as a surprise, considering in July individuals with first-hand knowledge on Ryan Cohen’s strategy stated that the Chairman was ‘infuriated with dusty shelves’ and had plans to revive retail stores.

That’s not all

While the public has not yet been informed what GameStop’s tech-centric roadmap entails, through chatter amongst hires on LinkedIn we can now speculate that the future includes forward-thinking improvements across the board alongside new offerings.

GameStop employees have hinted towards building new mobile apps, an NFT marketplace, a new customer service team, the evolution of the PowerUp Rewards program, new private label products, new supply chain systems, new fulfilment centers, a new website UX, expansion into PC gaming and eSports, revamping GameInformer, a new affiliate and partnership program, and improving the associate training program LevelUp.

GameStop’s senior management is hiring for just about everything.

LinkedIn remains a critical behind-the-scenes resource for GameStop investors, and posts by employees indicate widespread talent acquisition in all departments. 

With GameStop’s new management on a hiring frenzy, tech and e-commerce executives looking to be a part of something are leaving FAANG in droves to fulfill Cohen’s vision

Toast and vestro researched. Toast edited and contributed. 

Sources: Miami Herald, Charles Pich on LinkedIn, Brian OKeefe on LinkedIn, GameStop Space Information, Eva Lau on LinkedIn, Greg Palmer on LinkedIn, Daniel West on LinkedIn, Erik Shewalter, Stacey Ferreira on LinkedIn, Stephen Daws on LinkedIn, Brandon Southern on LinkedIn, Ken Suzuki on LinkedIn, Vinay Patel on LinkedIn

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¹After GMEdd.com published this piece, GameStop’s floor plans were taken down, leading our sources to now point to an archived version.

² Vinay Patel has updated his LinkedIn to reflect employment at GameStop.

After stealthily expanding from Texas to South Florida and Seattle, GameStop is now going for the home run.

While all eyes are on GameStop’s expansion into the metaverse, it’s still important to keep tabs on the physical world, where GMEdd has been tracking GameStop’s corporate footprint for months.

In order to understand GameStop’s forward-looking expansion, it’s important to refresh with some background.

Rapid Expansion

Per an agreement with GameStop Corp. in January, Ryan Cohen’s RC Ventures was granted 3 seats on the company’s board as the Chewy co-founder had been urging the brick-and-mortar retailer to adapt to changing times.

Ever since, the company has operated largely in silence while building the foundation for a digital-first technology company that can compete with the likes of Amazon.

In May, GMEdd speculated that GameStop would be soon opening a new Florida location in a piece titled GameStop Hints at New Florida Office, which was later confirmed by GameStop in September.

Two months later, GMEdd published that the gaming retailer was also expanding out to the windy city of Seattle, which was later confirmed by a GameStop employee on Twitter in October. 

GameStop has yet to officially announce the offices in Seattle, but Rukari did.

The first clue to these expansions? Public job listings for remote positions with these cities as the location. 

While these positions can sometimes be considered remote work, GameStop still utilizes a central office to foster a community atmosphere amongst the team.

we’re hiring

In order to catalog GameStop’s latest filings and job postings, GMEdd.com has created the #gme-tracker bot, available for public viewing on the GMEdd Discord Server.

Recently, GameStop Careers has been flush with job postings for Boston, Massachusetts. There are currently multiple active openings in HR, marketing, finance, and tech categories. 

A Global Corporate Controller position is available at GameStop’s four hubs: Boston, Seattle, Grapevine, and South Florida.

Currently, GameStop Corp. has 31 positions listed in Boston, ignoring 71 additional retail openings.

GMEdd’s GameStop Tech Hire Database also includes a handful of public employees already located in Boston, many of which came from Chewy’s Boston office.

GMEdd’s full Tech Hire Database is located on our Report and Models page.

GameStop’s available job listings include 14 Marketing positions, 8 Human Resources positions , 6 Information Technology/Ecommerce Technology positions, and 3 Accounting And Finance positions.

One job listing in the Human Resources category, searching for a Data Generalist in Boston, Massachusetts, states that the selected applicant would become an integral part of the Boston office.

This one screenshot could be the whole story, but that wouldn’t be fun, would it?

This person will be an integral part of the HR Business Partner team for Field and the Boston office.

With the Boston office confirmed in a simple HR job listing, we can begin to speculate why the aspiring tech company is so interested in New England’s oldest city.

Mirroring Chewy… Again

In July, Reuters published a story citing three anonymous sources from GameStop:

 Three people with first-hand knowledge of his strategy said he plans to breathe life into the stores by investing in what customers want and improving how employees can serve them.

See Ryan Cohen to Revitalize Retail, an Inside Look for more on this piece.

The article goes on to say that Cohen, who co-founded Chewy in 2011, is planning to turn GameStop into the “Chewy of Gaming,” which should not be surprising to anyone who’s followed his actions thus far — some of the first big moves by GameStop under Cohen’s leadership were opening two new fulfillment centers in the same locations Chewy started

Cohen is undaunted. He is seeking to repeat his success with online pet supplies retailer Chewy, which he sold to PetSmart for $3.35 billion in 2017. He wants to turn GameStop into a gaming and entertainment retailer or the “Chewy of gaming”, with lower prices, better selection and faster delivery times on online orders than its rivals.

With this year’s expansion, GameStop will retain their original corporate location in Grapevine, Texas, along with now adding the growing business-hubs of South Florida, Seattle, and Boston. 

GameStop’s own Game Informer, the company’s in-house publisher of the latest in video game news, reviews, previews, podcasts, and features, is headquartered in Minneapolis. 

Chewy, on the other hand, refers to itself as “dual-headquartered”, with headquarters in South Florida and Boston. It also has two other corporate locations: Seattle — which opened recently — and Minneapolis.

See an interactive version of the Chewy and GameStop Offices map here: Google My Maps.

Chewy’s primary headquarters are in South Florida and Boston, paired with new offices in Minneapolis and Seattle. Both companies have fulfillment and service centers across the United States.

It’s possible that GameStop has observed what’s worked for Chewy and is following in their footsteps. Expanding to the same locations as Chewy also makes poaching top talent from the pet food retailer easier.

So Why Bawwston?

It is worth noting that Boston is home to the first investor in Chewy, Larry Cheng, who has since joined GameStop’s board following an announcement in April

On Twitter, Larry Cheng has advocated for Boston’s tech and veture capital community.

Cheng is passionate about the Boston tech and venture capital community.

Four years after Cheng’s investment in Chewy in 2013, when Ryan Cohen was asked by the Boston Globe why Chewy was expanding into Boston, the Chief Executive shared his interest in Boston’s talent.

Boston is an amazing technology hub and startup hub, with dozens of universities. There’s just a ton of talent. We looked at all of the major US cities when we were planning this office, and Boston was the most competitive — either equal to or better than anywhere else.

Ryan Cohen was interviewed by the Boston Globe in 2017.

Ryan Cohen also said that a small team was already working in a temporary space, and the company would move into a lease of a 20,000-square-foot office. It’s likely that GameStop has similar plans.

With GameStop already opening up two “Amazon-sized” fulfillment centers, rumored offices in Seattle and Boston, alongside hiring up to 500 employees at the newly-leased customer service center in South Florida, the company has expanded beyond the expected and GameStop’s next trajectory might just be the moon.

Toast and Jenna researched and contributed. Toast edited and contributed. 

Sources: GameStop Careers, GameStop on LinkedIn, Chewy, Boston Globe

GameStop has announced a new $500 Million asset-based revolving credit facility with improved terms and liquidity.

GameStop Corp. today announced that it has entered into a new $500 million global asset-based revolving credit facility (“ABL Facility”) with a syndicate of banks. The new five-year ABL Facility, which was oversubscribed, replaces the Company’s existing $420 million facility due in November 2022. 

In addition to delivering enhanced liquidity, the new ABL Facility provides for reduced borrowing costs, lighter covenants and more flexibility. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. acted as Lead Arranger and will serve as Administrative Agent.

Form 8-k

GameStop Corp.’s latest SEC Form 8-K reveals more information about the asset-based revolving credit facility.

The Credit Agreement provides for an asset-based secured revolving credit facility with a borrowing capacity of $500 million and a maturity date of November 3, 2026, and includes a $50 million swing loan revolving sub-facility, a $50 million Canadian revolving sub-facility, and a $250 million letter of credit sublimit. The Credit Agreement also includes the ability to add a $25 million Australian revolving sub-facility, subject to the completion of certain conditions.

The Credit Agreement replaces the Second Amended and Restated Credit Agreement, dated as of March 25, 2014, by and among GameStop, Bank of America, N.A. and the other lending institutions (listed in the full 8-K). The prior facility was due to expire on November 20, 2022.

Borrowings under the Credit Agreement accrue interest at the election of GameStop at an adjusted LIBOR rate plus an applicable margin (ranging from 1.25% to 1.50%) or an adjusted prime rate plus an applicable margin (ranging from 0.25% to 0.50%). The applicable margin is determined quarterly as a function of GameStop’s average historical excess availability under the facility and is set at 0.50% for prime rate loans and 1.50% for LIBOR rate loans until GameStop’s first day of the calendar quarter commencing on April 1, 2022. 

In addition, GameStop is required to pay a commitment fee of 0.25% for any unused portion of the total commitment under the Credit Agreement.

Source: GameStop News Release, Form 8-K

Cryptic tweets are nothing new to GameStop investors, but Chinese is. What is the Loopring CEO saying on Twitter?

Loopring’s LRC Ethereum token has climbed over 120% in only days as speculation rises that GameStop’s NFT marketplace is launching soon.

On Wednesday, October 27th, GMEdd published source code from Loopring’s public GitHub repository that confirmed the highly-anticipated partnership amongst the ambitious digital pioneers.

The Swordsman (劍客)

While traders attempt to position themselves accordingly, Loopring’s CEO has shared a classic chinese poem on Twitter.

Loopring CEO Daniel Wang tweeted this at 9:37 PM EST on November 1st.

The text originates from Jia Dao’s classic Chinese poem, The Swordsman (劍客).

十年磨一剑

霜刃未曾试

今日把示君

谁有不平事

Jia Dao was a Chinese Buddhist monk and poet active during the Tang dynasty.

According to Dr. James J.Y. Liu, a professor of Chinese and comparative literature, Jia’s poem sums up the spirit of knighthood in four lines.

Here is a translation, courtesy of Andrew W.F. Wong.

For ten long years, a sword I whetted,  
Its frosty blade, as yet, untried.
Today, I hold it unsheathed before you;
Of you, to whom was justice denied?

What does it mean?

The poem can be understood as an analogy of a man, the poet, after studying hard (whetting his sword) for ten years, is now ready to take the imperial examinations (show his sword/swordsmanship to represent scholarship and abilities), pledging that he, as an official (the “swordsman”, as in the title), will right all injustices.  

One explanation is that Wang considers himself the swordsman, and, after years of hard work, he is now ready to present his abilities, GameStop NFT, to the world.

A special thanks to all of the GMEdd readers in China. We appreciate your support!

Source: Daniel Wang on Twitter, Andrew W.F. Wong Translations, Jia Dao on Wikipedia

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GameStop Corp.’s latest Form 8-K SEC Filing reveals Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Jenna Owens has departed from the company.

In an SEC filing on October 29th, GameStop Corp. has detailed the departure of the company’s Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Jenna Owens, with the pair having entered into a Separation and Release Agreement. 

The Separation Agreement provides for Ms. Owens’ departure from GameStop, effective October 25, 2021, as the Company’s Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. 

GameStop claims the responsibilities associated with the position are being absorbed by other members of the company’s management team. Owens remains entitled to the following severance benefits in accordance with her existing letter agreement with GameStop: 

(i) six months base pay, 

(ii) an amount equal to the applicable premiums for COBRA continuation coverage for six months and 

(iii) the remaining portion of her sign-on bonus. 

Background

On March 23, 2021, GameStop announced the appointment of Jenna Owens, age 42, as the Company’s Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, effective March 29, 2021. 

Prior to joining GameStop and since 2017, Owens served in a variety of senior roles at Amazon.com, Inc., including Director and General Manager of Distribution and Multi-Channel Fulfillment.

Prior to joining Amazon.com, Inc., Jenna Owens held senior roles at Google, including General Manager of Operations of Google Express from 2012 to 2015 and Head of Operations Efficiency for Americas Ad Sales from 2015 to 2017. 

Owens has also worked in operations and supply chain at McMaster-Carr Industrial Supply Co., and Honeywell Inc. Ms. Owens holds an Interdisciplinary B.A. from Amherst College and an M.B.A. from New York University’s Leonard N. Stern School of Business. 

Jenna Owens’ profile is still live on news.gamestop.com.

GameStop.com’s Leaders page details Jenna Owens’ prior responsibilities at the gaming retailer.¹

As COO, Jenna will be responsible for overseeing functions that include business intelligence, fulfillment, supply chain and store operations. She brings to GameStop approximately two decades of technology, operations, fulfillment, and supply chain experience.

Terms of Employment

Owens entered into a Letter Agreement with GameStop Corp. on March 23, 2021 describing the basic terms of her employment. The Letter Agreement provides that Owens’ starting annual salary would be $200,000 and that she would also be eligible to earn a total of $2,500,000 in sign on bonuses, paid in 24 monthly installments.

The agreement entitled Jenna Owens to a relocation bonus in the amount of $200,000 to assist with the costs of her relocation to the Dallas/Fort Worth area. 

The Letter Agreement also entitled Owens to a number of restricted shares of GameStop’s stock, determined by dividing $9,000,000 by the average closing prices of GameStop’s common stock for the 30 trading days immediately preceding the grant date, detailed in the Form 8-K.

Ms. Owens’ employment was also conditioned on her execution of a non-competition agreement.

Why the sudden exit?

GameStop’s Form 8-K filing does not detail why the company’s Chief Operating Officer has departed, having left on Monday, October 25th. Such is normal for GameStop.

While at GameStop, Owens had controversially introduced the GameStop Operating Principles, asking retail employees to “dramatically improve the speed at which you operate,” and to “stay focused on execution over ideation.”

GameStop’s Operating Principles, as shared on reddit.com/r/GameStop in August.

Although some of these principles would resonate with a tech start-up, they failed to motivate unhappy retail employees, who congregated on Reddit to voice their frustrations.

While the Operating Principles letter was sent under Jenna’s name, some speculate that it wasn’t so black-and-white.

A debate over Jenna Owens’ departure sparked support for the retail-focused COO.

A Redditor under the username ‘Quigonsin’ has an extensive post history on r/GameStop as an employee at the retailer. According to him, the Operating Principles wasn’t Jenna’s writing, and GameStop had simply pinned it on her.

Quigonsin, who claims to have spoken with Owens on numerous occasions, believes that the COO was let go for fighting in brick-and-mortar employees’ favor.

She’s also the only reason we got training hours for new hire keyholders; the new team was gonna stay with zero until she pushed for it. That document definitely wasn’t her.

GMEdd.com has spoken to other verified retail managers who have privately substantiated these claims, adding that Quigonsin and Jenna Owens interacted and had a ‘direct line’.

As Jenna Owens’ responsibilities are now being absorbed by other members of GameStop’s management team per the filing, it remains unclear whether or not GameStop Corp. will recruit for a replacement Chief Operating Officer.

Sources: Form 8-k Departure, Form 8-k Agreement, GameStop Corp. Thirleck on Reddit, Quigonsin on Reddit


¹ After GMEdd.com published this piece, Jenna Owens’ GameStop Leadership Profile was taken down, leading our sources to now point to an archived version.

Posts by Loopring on LinkedIn reveal that GameStop’s soon-to-be-announced NFT marketplace will feature instant, gas-free transactions.

Last night, GMEdd published source code from Loopring’s public GitHub repository that confirmed the highly-speculated partnership amongst the ambitious pioneers.

Prior to this, GMEdd.com had published digital breadcrumbs leading to that same point, detailing how Loopring has the technology that GameStop would require to bridge traditional e-commerce and blockchain and engineer the revolution of gaming.

You know the drill. Read those posts first, then come back. Actually, you’ve probably read them already, considering GMEdd.com crashed amid all the traffic and LRC went up 58.5% today. You’re welcome, Loopring. Sorry if we startled you.

Nobody Rides for Free

In an October 13th, 2021 thread on Twitter, Damiana Amabile, a former Chewy executive turned GameStop Director of Product shared her frustration with completing her first purchase on leading NFT marketplace OpenSea. 

Amabile states that, “the process was not easy,” and that it was eye-opening considering how traditional e-commerce has embraced a one-click/tap checkout experience.

The first tweet in Amabile’s Twitter thread discusses gas fees.

The GameStop Director of Product’s first complaint about OpenSea was that the concept of “gas fees” is so foreign to anyone not in the space. She imagines this is a high drop off point in the conversion tunnel. 

“Gas fees” are the transaction fees that users pay on a blockchain protocol to have their transaction executed. The system works on a standard supply and demand mechanism. 

If there is more demand for transactions, users will be forced to pay more to have their transactions processed quickly and efficiently. Currently, there’s plenty of demand.

High gas fees can be regarded as one of Ethereum’s biggest inhibitors to growth, with little desire for users to complete trades that often cost more than what they’re worth.

High gas fees have plagued Ethereum for over a year.

In a CoinDesk Opinion story from October 14, 2020, former Amazon executive turned CEO of a blockchain education company Michael J. Garbade writes that High Ethereum gas prices make it impossible for ERC-20 projects to run any microtransaction payments on Ethereum, defeating the idea of using the Ethereum network for one of its principal use cases.

Garbade explores one potential solution: zkRollup technology, stating that the trustless protocol from zkSync was, at the time, the most efficient answer.

zkRollup technology has the potential to solve high gas fees on Ethereum’s network

While there are several companies that have built ETH Layer 2 protocols using zkRollup technology, Loopring has since emerged as one of the most advanced and capable of mass-adoption.

Loopring, we’re not done yet

Loopring states that one major advantage of being application specific is that the protocol can optimize Loopring’s L1 footprint to the extreme as opposed to other Layer 2s. 

This means Loopring L2 is much more scalable, faster + less expensive to use than other general purpose Ethereum L2s.

If you’re confused, Loopring’s Head of Community Byron Wiebe can frequently be found answering questions from LRC holders and curious GameStop investors alike on Loopring’s Discord server (to the best of his ability given the circumstances).

Byron answered some questions from ManBearOrca on October 26th.

When asked about delaying the launch until ETH2.0 is live, Byron goes on to state that Loopring’s technology is already capable of handling 4,000 transactions per second currently, “similar capacity to Mastercard daily transactions globally.”

Byron also states that Loopring’s free Layer2 Wallet will be launching simultaneously or prior to the NFT Marketplace, allowing for easy adoption amongst those who aren’t used to crypto.

“We Uh, We Fixed the Glitch.”

In a LinkedIn post today, Loopring has added some commentary on their Q3 2021 Quarterly Update, which was published by Byron.

Loopring announced that they will be enabling NFT support, “allowing anyone to mint and trade NFTs instantly and gas-free.”

Loopring shared this post on LinkedIn on October 28th 2021.

Loopring goes on to state that this functionality is now the foundation of a new NFT Marketplace launching soon.

With Damiana Amabile’s major gripes with NFT transactions solved by Loopring, the gap between traditional e-commerce and blockchain could be bridged.

It’s now beyond a reasonable doubt that GameStop has found a partner for their venture into the future.

We just wouldn’t be so sure that Loopring is the only one.

Sources: Loopring on LinkedIn, Damiana Amabile on Twitter, CoinDesk, Loopring Discord

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Loopring’s public GitHub repository has leaked code confirming GameStop’s highly speculated partnership with the Ethereum Layer 2 scaling protocol.

On Friday, GMEdd.com published clues that Loopring has the technology that GameStop would require to bridge traditional e-commerce and blockchain and engineer the revolution of gaming.

The following Monday, GMEdd discovered and shared GameStop’s latest NFT job listings, which detailed interest in Web3.0, Blockchain Gaming, and even an NFT marketplace.

Since then, Loopring has been hard at work to prepare for the team’s anticipated Q4 2021 launch, and has pushed new code to its GitHub repository labeled “NFT feature”.

Git happens

GitHub is a popular platform amongst developers that is typically used for version control. It is helpful when more than just one person is working on a project. 

While Loopring made progress towards their NFT Marketplace launch, updates were pushed to a public GitHub repository.

On Tuesday, code was committed to the Loopring GitHub repository by Loopring developer W. Tang.

Loopring’s ‘NFT feature’ code reveals several references to GameStop

The amended code in the branch “NFT-DEV” under the GitHub commit titled ‘NFT feature makes reference to “gameStopMeta” and an IPFS URL.

IPFS is a distributed system for storing and accessing files, websites, applications, and data. IPFS was noted to be used by GameStop previously during their first NFT project reveal

GameStop uses IPFS to store and share data.

The IPFS URL resolves to a directory with 7 .json files that contain “Hello World” placeholder code in various graphic styles. 

Hello World is a common sample text designed to familiarize users with most programming languages.

GameStop has used several stock “Hello World,” images as placeholder NFTs, within an NFT collection titled ‘Styles of Programming’. 

Hello, GameStop NFT!

The names of each style 1 through 7 are: C Style, Console Style, Green Bold Style, Old Game Style, Classic Style, Declarative Style and Javascript Style.

Power to the creators

Also found within the JSON files are references to “creatorRoyaltyBips,” with a value of “500”. 

Bips, otherwise known as basis points, are a unit of measure used in finance to describe the percentage change in the value of financial instruments. 

One basis point is equivalent to 0.01% (1/100th of a percent) or 0.0001 in decimal form. 

A fractional basis point such as the 500 bips referenced in the code is equivalent to 5%.

GameStop’s IPFS details ‘creatorRoyaltyBips’

These findings suggest GameStop’s NFT marketplace will allow for resale of digital assets, including the ability to pay royalties to the original creator on future transactions.

This aligns with the slogan revealed on NFT.GameStop.com from May.

Power to the players.

Power to the creators.

Power to the collectors.

EIP-1155: Putting the Fun in Fungible

The code posted on GitHib reveals that GameStop NFT is built on EIP-1155 which allows the creation of Fungible, Non-Fungible, and Semi-Fungible in one single token standard.

ERC-1155 is a unique token that supports non-fungible (NFTs) and fungible tokens. It’s faster and more efficient than prior iterations.

This allows flexibility to create unique “non-fungible” items, such as rare collectibles, artwork, in-game items and “fungible” items such as in-game currency, points or cosmetic items that can be owned by many people. 

The second NFTType reference is to EIP-712, a secure method of signing a transaction on Ethereum.

Stealth Projects Started at Chewy

While at Chewy, Ryan Cohen led the stealth “Project Bear,” committed to disrupting the $9B pet pharma industry. Despite Cohen’s departure 3 months earlier, Chewy did not roll out or even announce the initiative until it was completely ready for launch.

Chewy launched Chewy Pharmacy in July of 2018.

It is likely that GameStop will not make any splashy public reveals about GameStop NFT until the offering is finalized, following the same playbook as Chewy.

Fortunately, CHWYdd.com was unavailable at the time to break Project Bear news before release.

The full application of GameStop’s NFT Marketplace and the kinds of assets that will be offered for trading remains unclear.

Loopring has disclosed a launch date “at some point in Q4 2021,” and the partnership appears keen on disrupting the $150B gaming industry.

As GMEdd.com curated this piece, Loopring’s loopring-web-v2 public repository and IPFS links were taken down, leading our sources to point to archived versions.

Toast, vestro, and Jenna researched and contributed. Toast edited and contributed. 

Sources: Loopring on GitHub, nft.gstop-sandbox.com, Winda Tang on GitHub, 1.json, 2.json, 3.json, 4.json, 5.json, 6.json, 7.json, Winda Tang on GitHub, Loopring Github Archive, nft.gstop-sandbox.com, Pet Product News

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