The Car Man Metaverse NFT (Kaman Cheche Metaverse) launched by Dudu House (iParking) in 2022 is Taiwan’s first NFT project that combines physical parking services. The project issues 2,000 NFTs, which include four types:
- Eternal King (200 pieces): Lifetime free parking
- Daylight Man: 2 years of free daytime parking
- Night Walker: 2 years of free nighttime parking
- Digital Hero: 1 year of free parking at all times
The minting price is 0.5 ETH (approximately 36,000 New Taiwan Dollars at the time), featuring the concept of "the world’s first lifetime free parking NFT," attracting a large number of users to purchase, with sales close to 50 million New Taiwan Dollars. Users must bind their license plate number through the iParking App to activate the rights, and the rights become invalid once the NFT is resold.
Bubble Burst: Controversy and Trust Crisis
Empowerment Shrinkage and Withdrawal of Stations
- Multiple users reported that after purchasing the "Eternal King" NFT (with secondary market prices reaching 400,000 New Taiwan Dollars), commonly used parking stations were gradually closed.
- In August 2022, 9 prime location stations in Taipei’s East District (such as World Trade Center, Dunhua South Road) announced their removal, leading to a shrinkage in the core value of the NFT, with users angrily criticizing it as "cutting chives."
- iParking responded that the service scope is based on "cooperative parking lots" and does not guarantee the permanent operation of specific stations.
Technical Vulnerabilities and Rights Delays
- The whitelist minting stage experienced issues due to a design flaw in the smart contract (using an Array to store the list instead of a Merkle Tree), resulting in subsequent users having to pay exorbitant Gas fees and facing transaction failures.
- The parking feature originally scheduled to be launched in April has been postponed to the end of May, during which the company prioritized the development of new products, causing dissatisfaction among users.
Three Major Prevention Strategies for NFT Bubble
User Side: Rights Verification and Risk Assessment
- Confirm the issuing entity: Choose projects backed by physical companies (e.g., iParking, a subsidiary of the listed company ZTE Electric), to avoid the risk of anonymous teams running away.
- Keep service terms: Record and preserve announcements from Discord, Roadmaps, etc., as evidence for future rights protection.
- Beware of "lifetime rights" traps: Physical services may be affected by changes in partners, so it is necessary to read the disclaimer clauses carefully (e.g., iParking states it can withdraw at any time).
Project Party: Transparency and Compliance
- Clearly disclose risks: Mark the possibility of service changes prominently on the official website (e.g., risk of termination of parking cooperation contracts) to avoid consumer misunderstanding.
- Prohibit ambiguous clauses: Clauses such as "reserving the final interpretation rights" may be deemed invalid by the court for violating consumer protection laws.
- Technical optimization: Use low-cost whitelist solutions like Merkle Tree to enhance user experience.
Regulation and Industry Self-discipline
- Standardized Contract Norms: Lawyers suggest incorporating NFT clauses into the standardized contract management of consumer protection law, with penalties for violators.
- Physical Service Guarantee Mechanism: Project parties can establish a deposit or insurance to compensate for user losses caused by changes in cooperation partners.
Case Insights: The Boundary of Rights and Responsibilities in Virtual and Physical Integration
The core of the controversy surrounding Dudu House NFT lies in the ambiguous rights and responsibilities related to the "binding of virtual rights to physical services." Although it added 1,281 users through NFT and activated idle parking spaces, the lack of clear delineation of responsibility for the risks associated with the parking lot collaboration ultimately led to a crisis of trust.
Future NFT projects need to design business models more rigorously:
- If physical empowerment is provided, a third-party guarantee or refund mechanism should be established;
- Dynamic rights (such as increases or decreases in parking spots) should be announced in real-time through the app or community to reduce information disparity.
Blockchain technology is not a get-out-of-jail-free card. When NFTs promise to enter reality, clear rights and responsibilities are the cornerstone of trust. A balance must be found between consumer rights and project innovation in order to promote NFTs out of the bubble and towards mature applications.
