Art Card Trading Site NeonMob Shutters for Good

Today, a sad footnote in the growing "graveyard" of Internet venues catering to bringing exposure (and a little revenue) to artists and art lovers: Art "trading" site NeonMob has finally closed down for good.

Screen shot from the NeonMob front page, this morning

A New Idea: Digital Scarcity

The passing of NeonMob will likely go unnoticed by most, but the venue was unique in certain ways.

Started in 2011, it was in some ways a precursor to NFTs, allowing artists to create and circulate their digital art, and introducing the idea of "unique identification" — and thus digital scarcity — to everything from one-off works to limited and open editions.

The artwork followed a standardized format, as to size and how it could be published, after formal curation and acceptance by the venue's management panel.

Most of the site's membership enjoyed participation as collectors, able to form their own collections and attempt to complete the thousands of artist "series" published over the years.

Many artists were able to use it as a centralized point of exposure: Back when we had the brick-and-mortar Red Dragonfly Gallery, we actually ended up representing several of NeonMob's digital artists in a tangible art prints fashion.

As such it was a really good gateway for exposure and "discovery," both for artists and for potential art galleries and traders.

Decline and Demise: The Age of NFTs

Ironically, it was likely the arrival of NFTs that marked the beginning of the end for NeonMob.

Management's staunch refusal to consider turning part of the trading platform into an NFT marketplace left NeonMob lagging behind general art trends. Where artists previously had been able to earn modest commissions from their published work — funded by paid "premium" subscriptions — the lure of instant riches in the NFT world lured away many, both on the artist side, as well as on the collector/trader side.

This gradually spelled enough trouble for NeonMob that it's closure was announced in January 2023.

Re-Birth and Crowdfunding

The initial closure announcement was soon followed by a different announcement that a buyer had decided to step in and "save" the site, at least for the foreseeable future.

Alas, the new lease on life did not last long as the new owners soon discovered that the site was actually constant money and resource drain.

A crowdfunding attempt was made to raise funds to continue NeonMob, but fell far short of the estimated $1,000,000 needed to secure its long term future.

I suspect things might have gone differently, had the crowdfunding happened before the first shutdown announcement and repeated "maintenance issues" with NeonMob... there once was a large base of support, but it had dwindled to stalwart supporters likely now only numbering in the hundreds.

The final closure announcement — including the reveal that all the published art from 12 years would be "archived" in a read-only format — was made on February 15th, 2024.

NeonMob was significant in pioneering the idea of "digital scarcity" with art published online... but likely owes its demise to not keeping up with emerging marketing trends. Had they embraced NFTs instead of rejecting them, they would likely have enjoyed considerable success.

R.I.P. NeonMob!

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