The Roadmap

How To Buy NFTs

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How To Make Your Own NFT

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Episode Summary:

The Bored Ape Yacht Club is a collection of 10000 unique Bored Ape NFTs— unique digital collectibles living on the Ethereum blockchain.

Rolling Stone Minted First-Ever NFTs With Bored Ape Yacht Club.

Hosts:

Chris Katje

Maz

https://bitclout.com/u/maz

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Disclaimer: All of the information, material, and/or content contained in this program is for informational purposes only. Investing in stocks, options, and futures is risky and not suitable for all investors. Please consult your own independent financial adviser before making any investment decisions.

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How To Buy NFTs

What is a Non-Fungible Token NFT

How To Make Your Own NFT

Best NFT Investments

Episode Summary

Joining us today for another NFT interview: Fang Gang!!

Guests:

Fang Gang: https://twitter.com/FangGangNFT

Paca: https://twitter.com/CryptoAlpacaNFT

Junshi: https://twitter.com/JunshiNFT

Fang Gang is a collection of 8888 randomly assembled Fangsters - twisted lunatics that come out at night to throw parties, hang around in dark alleys and have fun on the streets of New Fang City.

https://opensea.io/collection/fanggangnft

Hosts:

Chris Katje

Maz

https://bitclout.com/u/maz

Follow The Roadmap on Twitter!

Disclaimer: All of the information, material, and/or content contained in this program is for informational purposes only. Investing in stocks, options, and futures is risky and not suitable for all investors. Please consult your own independent financial adviser before making any investment decisions.

Unedited Transcript:

Hey everyone. Welcome to the roadmap. Benzingers new NFT show. We've had some great teams on our show for interviews before the teams behind pixel vault, art blocks, the Vogue collective robotics, the dos pound crypto dads, lazy lion sub duck, and more. We also did an NFT giveaway and we are planning on more NFT giveaways in the future.

So make sure you like this stream and subscribe to Benzinga as YouTube channel. We have a great show today. Fang gang joins us for an interview here on the roadmap guys. This is the road.

Oh, right. Everyone. As I said, this is the roadmap Ben's thing. As new NFT show. If you're new here, we air Tuesday, Wednesdays and Thursdays, 2:00 PM Eastern time. Make sure you like the stream and subscribe so you can get more NFT content right here. Let me go ahead. Bring on my cohost mass mass. What's going on, buddy?

Yo, what's up Chris, back to back, man. I love it. How are we feeling today? I know it's nice to have the, the expanded show schedule now and to have these great interviews. We've got a big one today. I also, I mean, when we started this show, we had a different background and I am still loving this new layout.

So if you're new here, you can see right there on the screen. If you comment in the chat. Your comments appear on screen. So with that being said, if you have any questions along the way for mass, for myself, or for Fang gang, when they are on the stream, go ahead and comment and let us know. And we will be reading that throughout the episode and try to get to questions later on a mass bang gang, right?

That is the focus of the show today. This is a project with 8,888 NFTs. The Fang stirs. Um, there is 4,100 holders, so we're looking at a pretty strong, uh, user base, right. And we have a floor price of 0.07 right now. 17,000 in their discord and over 17,000 followers on Twitter. What do you think of Fang gang?

What do you know about this project? Yeah. Well, shout out to our producer, Alyssa, who has she kind of introduced us or at least my self-defined gang, uh, it's her profile pictures. So that's when I saw it, I was like, oh, they're pretty cute. You know? So they fit that aesthetic of a great profile picture. The community looks awesome.

Uh, very supportive, you know, all throughout Twitter and discourse. So it should be a good episode. Definitely. We always like focusing on teams with strong communities, right? I mean, community is so important in the NFT space. If you want to make it longterm, shout out to our chat. I'm seeing lots of familiar faces that have been on lots of our shows with us.

So shout out to you all in the chat and if you're new here, let us know in the chat as well. Let us know. Hey, it's my first episode. And maybe we will give you a shout out during the episode. Mass before we bring on, uh, the Fang gang team. I think we have a trailer to play, to get hyped for this interview.

Should we roll that trailer? Absolutely. Anybody watching though, we need you guys to hype it up with us. Put that like button down below and let's hype this up. Let's make this intro great. These always get me hyped up for the interview.

Oh, come on. Look at that. Look at that. Shout out to our producer, Alyssa for making that wonderful trailer video. I mean, math, this makes me just want to play the game. I don't even know. Uh, I mean, I know we've got the interview, but I mean, if you have not played the fan gang game yet, uh, to anyone in the chat, make sure you check that out and we're going to hear more about that game during the interview.

So without further ado, let me bring on the co-founders of Fang gang. We've got pocket and June sheet joining us on the roadmap what's going on. Hey. Of course, of course. And that trailer video by our own producer, Alyssa highlighting the Fang gang game, a super exciting project to talk about. Uh, let me go ahead and kick off the questions here before we get into Fang gang.

One of the things we always like to ask teams is what was your history like before you created the project? You know, were you involved in other MFTs? Did you hold NFTs or was this a completely new space to you? So I'll, I'll start with pocket here to kick things off. Awesome. So, uh, I've joined the NFT space back in March, beginning of March or, uh, end of February.

And, uh, I've been, uh, I started experimenting, so I've been a designer and, uh, uh, want to be artists for all my life. And so I found a space through to try some stuff here. So I've launched, uh, uh, experimental collection. It was my first one. It, it didn't go anywhere big, uh, but it was a way to learn. And then a while later I launched my, uh, uh, the collection that actually, uh, when I got my nickname from, which is crypto or backend, uh, where I did, uh, our Packers for ID, like, uh, over 50, uh, in pixel format.

So that's how I started. And then of course I started as a creator, but quickly, uh, started to be a collector as most of the artists in this space. Uh, and I met June, she along the way, uh, we, we joined the same chat room, uh, I think back in March too. And we started talking and, uh, that's what that is to creating fan gang, uh, in August.

So it was a short but intense ride so far. Perfect room. Was it? Uh, it was, uh, uh, Twitter, uh, chat with a lot of artists, like, uh, people that were starting at the same time as this, uh, like crypto burbs was there, uh, June. She was there. I know, uh, uh, hash vestors was there like some names that are being talked about nowadays, uh, started with us right there.

Awesome. Jinshi same question for you. Uh, what's your, uh, intro to NFTs look like here. Um, so also back in March, like Bucca set, um, my brother had told me about NFTs, uh, because of their crypto punk hype was real back then. And, um, well, as, as a, as a studying a multimedia designer artists, um, I thought I would hop in and just create some stuff.

So I kicked it off with a personal collection, uh, based around doge because there was the high back down of course. Um, and I made some pixel dogies out of those. Um, after that, I started to look at more of the collecting side of things. Uh, so I branched out my collection quite a bit, um, met amazing new artists, um, and just, uh, made many more connections in the NFD space.

I think that's, that's key to, uh, to anyone who's trying to hop in. So, uh, there was a lot of fun. And then I think maybe in July, we started working on fan gang and, uh, the rest is history. Awesome. Yeah. Give us some more, uh, behind the scenes, you know, you too, Matt, and then, you know, how did the idea for fan gang come to be?

And, and then maybe June she talk about the, the artwork, right? What was the inspiration, how did this artwork come to be? Um, I don't know. Basically we wanted to create a, a unique character and not link it directly to a certain type of animal. It's still a mystery to our community. What type of animal?

Thanks there is. And that's, that's part of the fun, obviously. Uh, so we wanted to create a unique character that is not necessarily animal. Like I said, uh, I think most inspiration for me personally came from, uh, more old timey cartoons, maybe Felix, the cat, stuff like that. Um, 'cause I love that stuff. And I wanted to incorporate that into this design and that pocket.

And I went back and forth, designing the base of the character, a lot of iterations, a lot of sketches, a lot of discussing. And, uh, we ended up with this beautiful creature. Awesome. And PACA, you know, uh, same to you. Uh, you know, you met June, she, you came up with the idea, give us the behind the scenes. You know, why fan gang, why this style of artwork and project, uh, for this.

Well, I think may and June, she are pretty much aligned when it comes to the, the inspirations of fanging. Uh, actually one of the things that got me here and when we were experimenting, we, we looked at that a lot, uh, was vinyl toys because, uh, when we started it, uh, we had the idea of going beyond an NFT collection, like creating an IP.

And building up on that. So that's what, uh, that's, that's one of the things we wanted with the characters is that they could be, uh, they could be used in different media, different formats and, and above all, we wanted people to be able to remix them to which happens so far. So we launched a, uh, uh, an art contest, I think about a month ago.

Uh, and, and, and that's, that's the confirmation we needed that we were doing what we propose ourselves to do, because people were able to, uh, to grab the, the, the, the most iconic traces of the characters and, and, uh, redo them in their own style. So I think, uh, when, when creating the characters, these, this concern we had, uh, actually, uh, worked, ended up.

Love that. So pocket June sheet, let's talk a little bit about the recent airdrop that you guys sent to everyone who had delisted or listed for one Eve. Can you guys tell us a little bit more about that? Um, let's start with you, do you and cheat. All right. So we always had in mind that ever since we started the diamond facts club, which was a, I think halfway through September, uh, pocket came up with the ID to, to do this, to reward holders and active community members, especially.

Um, so that's when we started to give away 0.18 or at one faster every single day, uh, to everyone who, well, like you said, the, their Franks or list above one eighth. Um, and we wanted to do something extra. I know like giving back a bit of is already cool, but we wanted to do an add drop as well. And we recently hired a new developer to work with us.

Shout out to reveal if you're watching. To do ad reps and stuff like that. So that's more, uh, easy to us to do that right now. And one day pocket DME with this amazing artwork, he made it all himself, no discussing or back and forth or iterations. And he made this and I was just amazed by it by it. And I thought let's, let's add up this to our diamonds banks club members.

Yeah. That's awesome. So, um, parka, why do you guys do the daily diamond fangs raffle? Um, and you know, why is this important for the committee? Uh, well, first of all, I think it's, it's a good way to keep the community engaged. And, uh, when we launched we wanted the community to be, uh, one of, uh, one of its most, uh, strong points.

So, uh, we've been working, uh, on that daily, beyond the, the diamond banks club. Uh, we, we try to reward our holders constantly. Uh, like we did an airdrop on Halloween and we're trying to, uh, do, uh, games daily. We do a lot of stuff, uh, to, to keep the community engaged. So the diamond thanks club is not only a way to, to, to reward our holders, but it's also a way to express our creativity so we can do stuff like this, like the diamond, thanks to God, uh, just because we want to, and we can reward our holders with that.

So, uh, it's, it's, uh, a way to do, to build on community. Love that. So speaking of community, can you guys tell us a little bit about the Fang runner week three contests, you know, the high scores in the game, what are your guys' high scores? And do you guys put a game? Yeah,

I've been trying to break 15 K for a while, but I can't quite get there. It's hard. It's hard, but I mean, there's, I think, uh, the high score so far is like 24 K on the first week. And that's nuts because when, when I'm on 12 30, 13, K I'm already stressing and sweating a lot. So this is, this is, this is not, uh, but we've been having a lot of fun with Fang runner, I think.

Uh, well, it's, it's another way to reward the community as, uh, as the diamond. Thanks. Uh, we, we tried when we launched the game, it's just the promotional game. It's not nothing too big yet, but, uh, we, we, we launched the game, uh, along with a pixel thanks collection. Uh, but when we, when we, when we propose to do that, we wanted to reward players and we, again, we wanted the community to be engaged with the project.

So, uh, one way to do it is to rewards, uh, holders, uh, and players above all, uh, uh, every week, uh, for their, uh, crazy runs like those 24 K that I think it was invalid by gut. So we've been rewarding so far, um, with, uh, special pixel fangs, special peaks of thanks there's for the collection. We created them specially for this, uh, but, uh, we have something planned for the F for the fifth week that we can't reveal yet, but it's, it won't be an NFT.

What used to be something. Uh, but you'll have to stay around the city to see it. And that's in what, two weeks you said two weeks yet. Nice. Yeah. So can you guys tell us, so will the pixel fangs be expanded then? Or is it going to be something completely different from the NFTs, like you said,

I think it was talking about the price. Yeah. So in two weeks we have a physical price for any thing, runner competitors. Um, but we, we are, uh, in talks to expand the game later on. Yeah. We want to do much more with it. Uh, just a matter of time, basically. Nice man. And, uh, especial note for this one, we've been working with pixel hands on, on pixel fangs and the Fang runner game.

Uh, and we actually want to keep on working with him, uh, everything pixel related because he's the pixel king. So, uh, I'm sure we will expense, uh, Uh, we've been working on that. We can share much yet, but we've been working on it. Awesome. And we asked people in the chat to drop their high scores in the chat.

I saw, you know, I think, uh, 8,000, uh, 4,000. Um, but yeah, it looks like you've got a lot of people that play that game. I know I'm going to be playing it over and over now that I know what some of the high scores are to beat here. Um, but it it's just so addicting. Uh, you know, another common question we ask, right?

When we have teams on is when merge. So is merchandise a part of the plan going forward and when will we get an update on the.

Um, so merge was something we had in mind from basically the very first date, um, because the longterm vision for fan gang, eventually it's just expanding it into a brand, um, something much more, um, than just your avatar. Um, so merge was something really big and something we're really excited for. Uh, we often call it a premium merge merge store because we want to do a little more than most projects do a lot of projects, have a really cool merge, but we want to take it a step further and add some very exciting merge items, as well as non wearable items and stuff like that.

I'm currently in the process of sketching, a lot of designs and patterns for the clothing items. Uh, so it's starting to take shape. Um, um, and I hope we can release that end of the year, beginning of next. Yeah. And actually it's still still about merge. We, when we launched banksters, uh, if I don't know if you've noticed it already, but, uh, some of the factors of, uh, some specific brands that we created for the collection, like the wild fangs, uh, and the three little piggies and, uh, uh, by 12th grade is some of them Lupa.

And, uh, our idea is to expand those, uh, into the real March. So, uh, we'll probably have some wild fangs merge, t-shirts hoodies and whatnot. So that that's, that's something we planned from the start. And that's why this process is only happening now, after we launch a bunch of things, because we really want to focus on this and, and do it properly, you know, as, as June, she said, premium merge store.

Awesome love that. I know there's going to be a lot of excited fans out there to get their hands on that merge. Um, you know, this show is called the roadmap. Uh, you know, so another big highlight is we always like to talk about, you know, the roadmap and what's next. So I saw a comment already in the chat from third, I won saying, can you talk about Fang city?

So if you guys can share a little bit about Fang city and that roadmap, uh, for our viewers, Yeah, absolutely. Actually, I've been drawing all day for new thanks city. So I just stopped for the, this, this live stream, but it's been our focus lately. Uh, so June she has been working on Merck and I've been drawing for new thanks CD, mostly.

Uh, and, uh, I think the, this started as a community project. So this, this wasn't something that was on our roadmap, uh, uh, since the beginning, but our, our current dev reel, uh, came to us with an idea of developing, uh, that, that new Fang CD we talked about before, uh, eight into a, a hub, a place where, uh, you can, uh, search for everything, uh, Fang, gang related.

So, so far we have a few ideas in mind, something, and, uh, it will probably, uh, stop. Uh, just with the game room and the merge store, uh, and the two, two or three other rooms, but our idea is to expand it a long time. So, uh, when you, when you enter new thank city, you'll be able to name your faster, tell his backstory and then roam around and, and interact with other fencers.

Um, but it will be a long-term project. So when we launch it, we'll probably have like three or four buildings, but, uh, as, as we go, uh, as we go down the roads, we, we could add more things. So it's, it's a dynamic websites, uh, to say, so I don't know if you want to add something. Um, and that's about it. I'm super high for it.

And, uh, I can't wait to expand that as well. I think it's cool that we have stuff that we can expand later on like Fang runner is basically the core of what we wanted to make and people are enjoying it and we're having fun with it. We are rewarding the community with it. Uh, but we are expanding that and same for new fact city.

It's something we want to release and people have fun with and also expand later on. Perfect. Yeah. I mean, that's awesome to hear more about what's ahead and pocket also that you're working on the artwork. Um, you know, and thanks for taking a small break to join us on the stream today. We appreciate that.

Um, well, uh, another thing we always like to ask the teams, and this can be a difficult one, you know, especially for the artist, is we like to hear what are your favorite traits, um, from Fang city? So, uh, June G let's start with you. Oh man grills, grill gang all the way. Fucking grill myself. Really? My favorite.

Yeah. Um, besides that I think, uh, the for code is amazing. Um, And the wild fangs, uh, all the hoodies and stuff like that. They, the caps they have on it's dopest. Fuck. I would wear that in real life. There you go. Ask me suits too. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah, we got to see the fur coat here a while. We're trying to pull that up a parka.

Oh, there it is. Haka over to you. Um, what are some of your favorite traits in the, in the series here? Just check my PFP. You'll see a four codes. So that's definitely one of my favorites. Uh, I'm chain gang of everything that has changed. So basically, uh, the tank top and the four coats are two of those. Uh, and then I'm a separate for bunny.

Heres I love them. I think they're workout. Breeding. So check those two and then there's there's well, all the wild things, uh, merge, uh, speaks to me. I love it. Uh, and there's more, I think it's hard to pick one, you know, I love almost all of them. That's awesome. If there's one with the fur and a grills, that'd be awesome too.

Oh, there's not. Yeah. There's no. Yeah. Oh man. That'd be awesome. So guys, we, you guys had a ho how a wean costs contests, uh, earlier this last month here. Uh, will there be more holiday contests coming up, you know, since we're approaching holiday season here? Yeah, man, we, uh, we have something for Christmas lined up, well, lined up where we're discussing it right now.

Thinking of cool ideas. Slowly starting to work on it. Um, uh, but it's tough because we're also working on merge in New York city and everything coming out. It's, it's a lot, it's a big package, but the Halloween, uh, costume maker is definitely something we will return for Christmas, uh, and run a contest with it as well.

Of course. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. I can't wait to see, like Santa hats or you guys get creative with all that stuff. Yeah, that's really cool. I love that. Um, so speaking, you know, we talked to community earlier, um, discord management, right? So we know discord, depending on which discord you joined, it can be completely hectic or one of the best, you know, organized, structured communities you've been to.

How do you guys manage the community? Do you do anything specific to make sure it's running smoothly? Um, well I guess that's the question for me as I am the community manager, um, I don't know, really. I think we attracted the right group of people that are very chill, very wholesome, very welcoming to everybody.

So it's been pretty chill. We have moderators, but I don't think they have to do a lot of banning or warning people and stuff like that. I've been in much worse communities outside of NFTs as well. And, uh, ours is just very, very wholesome. They're welcoming, really love that. Are you guys both active on there?

Yeah. Every day. Yeah. We basically live on discord. Yeah. Yeah. It's tough on like, there's so much FOMO. You leave for like an hour. You have to catch up on all these messages. And is there a favorite room in the discord that you guys like to be in? For me, basically the team chat, because that's where the goodies are, right?

Yeah. Yeah. We actually launched something, uh, recently, uh, which is called the fan gout where we host game nights and such, uh, Heartland sparks. One of our mods has been taking care of it and it's actually a fun place to hang out. Like we have terrific games. We have, uh, what was the first one? Uh, we had a night of, uh, what was called the game helped me drinking, uh, party books, Jack party, Jack books, Jack Jack box.

So we have, uh, that's, that's also a way to keep the community engaged. That's something we really focus on. So the hangout is also a cool place. So me and Chris are going to have to join you guys on the next game night there. Yeah, that sounds like fun. I feel like we did that here at Benzinga one time, the, the Jac games, um, the different mini games.

So, uh, that, that could definitely be a fun night. So absolutely one last question about discord for you guys. So we have seen a lot of discourse get hacked. You know, they're posting these spam links, uh, anything that you guys are doing and take precaution with this and anything that you recommend to the community to just, you know, kind of as a guide, to not fall for these things.

Um, I've been community managing on this good for a six or seven years now. And I've recently actually posted a thread about this because I've seen so many surfers getting a hack and a scam. Like you said, if people lose a lot of money, um, I think it's a lot of teams may be new to discord. I don't know, to like the intricate details or the useful tips you can add to your server.

And basically it's all my trout. That's been to my profile page view. If people want to win the, read that all true. I've linked some very useful things in there. Okay, awesome. Yeah. We'll make sure to check that out because now more than ever, it's more important for all of these things to take precaution, you know?

Perfect. Yeah. And for anyone out there watching, if you're watching us on YouTube right now, you can follow pock on Junichi on Twitter. Those are in the description of this video below. Um, so make sure you check those out as well. Um, we do have some questions here from the chat, um, which is something we always like to do here on the show.

Um, we got a question from, uh, Quito, how did they meet David Horvitz and get him to do a one of one Fang stir David Horvath? Of course, uh, ugly Dallas founder. Uh, I believe, and I know ugly Dallas from having kids and they did that movie a couple of years ago. So, uh, tell us a little bit about how that came to be.

Uh, well, actually it's, uh, it's a pretty straightforward, uh, they, they be joined or discord and both a bunch of factors and started sharing them. And we were astonished by it because I've been following David's work for quite a while, as you, as you've been Chris. Uh, and, and actually we reached out to him.

It was the coolest dudes and just agreed to do it, like, just like that. So he is, he was a collector before he was collabing with us. So that's, that's, that's the best thing, I guess. So, and then the process was, was pretty straight forward. I'm sorry. He just picked one of his characters and it turned it into a fencer.

Like we didn't have to do much because it was his style and it was a perfect match for our colors and our, our, our theme. So it was pretty straight. That's awesome. Um, so we have another question from the chat here. This one is from third. I, Juan, he's asking, do you guys do this full time? And if so, what is your daily routine?

Um, yeah, I do this full time. Uh, I know PACA doesn't, but, uh, I recently, after we launched and we sold out, I made the choice to quit university and quit my part-time designer job. Uh, as I w I always wanted to go full-time NFD ever since I got into this space, because it's just so welcoming a super cool as you, as an artist, you can create so much and have such a big audience.

So I decided to bite the bullet and quit uni and quit my job and go full-time fan game. I do. I actually do a lot of juggling between my day job and thinking I'm 24 7 on this cord, but luckily my job allows me to, to balance things. So, uh, I can do my day job and still be fully committed to, to thinking.

So me and June, she worked perfectly, uh, with this, with this schedule. So not a lot of sleep hog guys. Yeah. Not, not really. Yeah. I feel like that was something we talked about in one of our other interviews of like, do you ever feel the need to, you know, take, take a break, maybe take a day off from the, the discord, um, you know, maybe, uh, a mental break.

Is that something you guys ever do or think about, or is this just, you know, 24, 7, uh, all in no breaks. Um, I do think about it. Uh, I rarely do it though. Um, but sometimes, you know, on a Sunday you sleep in a little and, well, I mean, this is just fun. It doesn't feel like work or anything. So I do check this every day, but I don't, sometimes I take one day off or something like that.

Yeah. Yeah. It's very important. Yep. Very important. Packa. How about, how about you juggling a, you know, two things right now? Um, you know, how, how do you take some mental breaks? Yeah, I probably need to take more of those. Uh, but uh, I tried to, as June, she said, I tried to enjoy a bit of the weekend, even though I'm always checking discord and Twitter, but, uh, I think I'm going to need a break, like after we release new thanks city and the March, probably some days off, but I know I won't be able to, to, to log off and, and skip on discord, but still, uh, probably less hands-on and more, uh, enjoying.

I guess I have a question for you guys. I'm curious to hear your guys' thoughts on the current NFT markets. You know, since we have seen, you know, gas go up volume kind of slowed down a little bit. Uh, what are your guys' thoughts on the market right now? Let's start with you PACA. Uh, well, I think, uh, market is going through a slow days and we've noticed that on, on thinking.

Uh, I don't, I honestly don't know if this is just a phase or if NFTs are starting to, to, to enter the real bear market, because so far we had like one or two weeks bear markets and then things start to spike up again. But, uh, all I know is if we keep on building communities and, and, uh, keep on working daily for those reasons, Those are the projects that will stand the test of time, you know?

So we, we gotta build when things are down. So we really enjoy when things are back up. So that's, that's at least my, my way of seeing things. And that's why we haven't stopped ever since we started, uh, I don't know where, I mean, I don't know if this is, this is changing anytime soon. I hope so because I've been seeing a lot of reds on every three Twitter threads, like.

Uh, but uh, people are still around. So I think that's, that's one of the things that matters the most and, and you see new people, uh, buying their first NFD every day. So I think that's, that's a bullish sign and then Christmas is coming and I, I truly believe that the NFTs are going to be these year's Christmas gifts.

So who knows. Yeah. Um, I'm looking for some gifts for the family and I'm definitely gonna give NSC. I hope I get some as gifts this Christmas too. So if my family's out there watching, I'll take some out of teas for Christmas. All right. We got another question here in the chat. Uh, this one, uh, along the same, you know, broad NFT lines, a question from Brenda, um, are they into other types of NFTs, like NBA, top shot or music?

Um, you know, we, we asked about your early days in NFTs and now that fan gangs going, I know you're busy guys, but you know, are there NFTs that you guys, uh, you know, collect, uh, you know, currently. Um, yeah, like you said, we're, we're busy and I was a died down definitely a little bit, but I'm still degenerate.

So I still browse open, see all the time looking for new stuff, but also still supporting my friends who we came up with, uh, from back in March, uh, people like crypto pers, uh, Marco, uh, those are still grinding every single day and they put out dope stuff. So I still check those out and sometimes buy one of them.

Uh, so yeah, definitely still collecting pocket. Yeah. About a top shot and music. Uh, well mainly tough shots. I was never, uh, much into it because first of all, we're in European. So, uh, basketball is not as huge as there over here. Uh, but, uh, I, I mostly collect, uh, the same stuff as June. She said, I, I do. Well, some 10 Ks.

I do. Someone wants, uh, I actually liked music, but I haven't found anything that, uh, really, uh, pushed me to it. Uh, like nothing NFD related that, that, that I think was it, uh, I think we still have a long way there. Uh, I've I've played for, for over 10 years. So music is something that interests me. Uh, but I'm yet to find a proper, uh, NFT, uh, about it.

I guess. I, I mean, there there's, there's good stuff. Uh, but nothing that has really spoken to me.

Awesome. And one more, uh, you know, just broad question here. Um, you know, uh, another topic we've hit on a lot with this show is obviously a lot of people know the current NFT marketplaces, you know, open, see super rare, rare bull and others. We have this elephant in the room of Coinbase launching an NFT marketplace.

Uh, what are your thoughts? You know, how big of a deal is this for the NFT market for Coinbase getting involved and have you guys, uh, you know, talk to a Coinbase at all about maybe, uh, getting fan gang on there? Um, yeah, we definitely want to, uh, because obviously it's a, it's a huge step. Uh, and I think it's about time to open C has got some real competition.

I think it's very healthy for the market over. Um, so I think that's very good how they develop it and how it all, uh, works out. That's yet to be seen of course, but it's a very promising, uh, company to be behind an empty marketplace. I get, I think, and if anyone's in the chat or anyone out there has any connections to Coinbase, please link us up because we've been reaching out, we've been shooting emails left and right.

But so far to know, I feel sadly, so

awesome. Well, June she and PACA, you know, thank you guys so much for joining us on the roadmap today and also shout out to the fan gang community, joining the chat. Um, you know, we want to thank you both for taking time out of what we know is your busy days. And we look forward to following the progress of fan gang along the way.

Awesome. Thank you guys. We'll talk to you soon. See ya. All right. May I ask, I mean, another great interview here on the roadmap, right? Which when we started this show, right. You know, the big things where it provides some education, talk about some upcoming projects and interview these great teams. Right.

And we get that behind the scenes. Look, that's what I really like. Right. Is hearing. I mean, where else are you going to hear it? What their high scores are on this game, or, you know, how much time they spend in the discord, you know, and their favorite traits. I always love getting that. And, you know, hearing what the artist thinks, you know, are their favorite traits.

What do you think mass? Yeah, one of my favorite things about these interviews is watching the chat. Now, seeing, you know, all these guys from the community, come on here and just ask questions or provide feedback. You know, I get a good sense of the community from this chat. So it's really cool to see that.

And if you guys enjoy this again, make sure to leave a thumbs up subscribe. We're trying to, you know, really push this as NFC is expand. So yeah, you know, I'm glad it was a great interview, great team. And I look forward to seeing where they're at in a couple months or following up with them in the future.

Definitely. And I mean, that's an exciting roadmap, right? To hear about Fang city, to hear about merge and, you know, there's this new artwork coming and also those, those, uh, costume contest, right. The Halloween one, and we got a Christmas one coming up. Um, so definitely excited. Mass before we get to the headlines, I'm seeing a, a, it looks like we got a shout out in the chat there and a tip.

So, uh, thank you, mark, for your super chat contribution. And the comment is, let me go ahead and pull this up on the screen. The comment is the floor for pudgy penguins is 1.2. Ethan robotics is 0.3 for any reason not to buy at these prices. Thanks guys. Uh, mark, thanks again for the shout-out here. Um, again, not financial advice.

Uh, you know, I was a former holder of robotics. Um, I do not have my Roboto any more. They just did the. Airdrop of the pet. Um, you know, and the price has come down since then. I love this artwork though. We had the team on, and this is one that I'm looking to get back in. I love the ones that have the animal is, you know, on the head.

Those are my favorite ones, but 0.3, four. Um, you know, I think maybe we dip a little bit more, but you know, I sold mine at 1.5 east. So, uh, it definitely was up there and pudgy penguins, I've never been in a, you know, I missed the run on that. Um, so I can't really speak to that. Maths. What do you think of a pudgy penguins and robots here at these levels?

Yeah, so great question, mark. Um, you know, not financial advice, but I think now, you know, We're kind of past that flipping phase right now, since we're kind of in a, we've slowed down a bit. So what I've focused more on is look at the community, right. And we've had the robotics team, you know, they're all docs, they're a great community there at New York, uh, you know, and the events, um, are they a great long-term hold?

Absolutely. In my opinion, I think they are so kind of, I think price is a lagging indicator right now. You know, floors are thin. There's not a lot of volume. I think these will pick up over time, you know, in a year or so. Can you see this as your profile picture and not worried if it dips? Absolutely same with budgie penguins.

I mean, I see them both on Twitter all the time. A lot of people use them as their profile pictures. Um, so, you know, that's the biggest thing. Can you, do you, would you hold on to this for a while? Is the community strong? Do you see the roadmap? These things matter now? A little more so than ever before in the last couple months I would say so in my opinion, I would definitely buy at these prices.

They look good. They may go down even more, a bit who knows, but, um, yeah, I mean, I like that. Definitely great insight there, math, uh, you know, I always love the call-out right. That you, you see these as profile pictures, right. And that is true with penguins and robotics and the communities are huge. You know, uh, we talked about that on a past show.

Robotics was that, you know, Um, and did some events there. Uh, Pablo is an amazing artist, right? Uh, shout out to Pablo. We had him on the show and they also do random airdrops different times. Um, you know, of just some of his artwork to, you know, give back. And I think, uh, after pets they've got more coming.

So, uh, I could definitely see some, some longterm value there. So again, not financial advice, but that's our thoughts on the overall price right now, again, mark, you know, thanks for the shout out there in the chat. Um, and again, guys drop your questions in the chat. If you have them, we'll try to get to some let's turn to some, uh, news and headlines.

Um, you know, there, there's not a ton of new stuff out there, mass, uh, but one of the big headlines I saw, you know, I, I occasionally watch, uh, late night television and I have watched Jimmy Fallon for awhile and he had people on last night. Right. So we got to hear all about NFTs, right? With people's latest, say.

And one of the things that was revealed during the interview was that Jimmy Fallon is now a board ape yacht club owner. So he said that he partnered with moon paid during the interview. And, uh, we're not sure if moon pay, you know, a, it was a sponsor at all, or if they just got that shout out from Jimmy Fallon.

Um, but so now I'm seeing on Twitter that based on it being through moon pay, it is most likely board ape number 5, 9, 9. If we can get that picture up here in a minute. Uh, so it is a six tray cream for eight. So 6% tray of cream for has a sea captain's hat, 3%. Uh, Navy Stripe, T3 percent and heart sunglasses, 4%.

Uh, this was purchased for 46.6 east or around $216,000 on November 8th by moon pay and then was transferred to an open sea account that had just been set up this month. So again, that's the one that they think that Jimmy Fallon got, it has not been confirmed. And also in that regards mass, Jimmy Fallon has not changed his profile picture to the ape yet.

So a great shout out on TV, but a well, he changed his Twitter picture, uh, to this APM. Yeah, that's a great point. You know, I have a feeling he doesn't fully understand it yet. It was just from, just from hearing him talk there. I feel like he just, how he described boom pay and how it worked. Hopefully it does.

And yeah, I mean, it would make a cool profile picture, you know, I'm sure the board answer glad that Jimmy is onboard. So that's awesome. Yeah. I'm curious, you don't mask. That's a great point. I'm curious to hear what the community thinks because you know, not too long ago, we were talking about a rumor of, you know, Kylie Jenner wanting to get a board ape.

Right. And a lot of people, you know, kind of shunned her, right. And now will Jimmy Fallon be welcomed, you know, with open arms and again, I mean, Jimmy Fallon, he's, he's a decent size name, right? He has a late night talk show that airs every night and mass where I get excited about this. It's not just for the eight community, but let's picture.

You know, Jimmy Fallon doing an interview in the future with, you know, Steph Curry or shack or Reese Witherspoon, people who have they own NFTs. What are the ads now that Fallon's going to talk about NFTs with them, you know, during the interview, like, I feel like that's pretty exciting to think, Hey, there could be more NFT talk during, you know, a late talk show.

What do you think? Yeah, I mean, I'm sure we should probably, I wouldn't be surprised if we see that I should say in the next, I would say year or two. Yeah, absolutely. We're starting to see some of those conversations happen on Twitter between celebs and between, you know, celebs and ape owners. So yeah, that'd be really cool.

Yeah. Definitely. Um, so let's talk a little bit about, so cool cats teased today. They tease their pets, right? So we'll pull up a picture right now. We'll show you guys what the pets are looking like, but I'm more interested in talking about the roadmap, right? So we're kind of at a point now where a lot of projects, you know, like the apes, the cool cats, these blue chips, they're building this economy around their original 10 K profile pictures, right?

So they're building, you know, utility, they're building a different, you know, you know, cartoons and pictures, and they're creating this big, you know, universe of, you know, the original 10 K. So I'm so curious to see how this evolves over the next year, right? When people come into the, you know, out of T we'll do the buy these pets as it may do, they make it a profile picture, does the cool cat universe sport, ape universe expand, you know, to all of these different things.

And, you know, seeing this come to life, Cool to see. So I'm excited for that. Yeah. I mean, that artwork is looking sweet, man, uh, you know, for the pet. So, uh, this, this is pretty exciting and, you know, uh, I definitely agree, right. The roadmap is looking good. Um, for cool cats. I mean, this has been a blue chip for a while, and I know that you're in this project.

Um, you know, do you think, you know, this, this has got that, that wonderful lasting touch of being, you know, one of the top blue chips. Cause right now, I mean, it's, it's a top five projects, top 10, I would say all time. Right. You know, for me, I don't look at the floor with this at all, you know, I can go up or down and I really don't care unless I'm trying to buy another one.

Uh, so to me that's always a good sign personally, you know, I just liked the project. Um, I liked the community and again, the roadmap we're so early man, and all these projects are building and there's only 10,000 pieces. Right. So when let's say a hundred thousand Coinbase has what, 2 million people on the, on the way.

So 2.5 million now 2.5 million, right? How many of those are going to want a cool cat? Yeah, that's a great 10,000 cats. You know, you can't, they start becoming unattainable at a certain point, but that's where the other, you know, that's where the cool cats universe comes to life, which is more bullish for these original pieces are the way I see it.

So I still think it's too early to call it. You know, it's too early to say, it's going to go to the moon. It's too early to say it's going to crash. You know, we're just kind of in that in-between phase the way I see it. Definitely. Well, so math, we just talked about a robotic is doing a, a pet, uh, you know, uh, airdrop.

We got cool cats doing pets. I saw another project that's launching a free pat mint. Um, this is bubblegum kids, which I think I talked about on the show, um, you know, a month or two ago. So this was one that I actually mentored. I have sold out of it, but I have seen some people on Twitter that I follow in the stock community using bubble gum kids as their profile picture.

So this isn't an inexpensive one, right? I think the floor is like 0.03. And they now said that they are doing bubble gum up. Uh, so, you know, along that same lines of, uh, you know, uh, Coinbase, right, and new people getting into NFTs, I'm wondering if some of these projects can, you know, gain some traction, right.

With seeing people have them as their profile picture and also having that cheaper price point. Right. Cause again, not that floors matter long-term but I think your initial people that get in that are new to the space, you're going to see some of these cheaper projects be, you know, good entry points and bubblegum kids.

I like what they've done. They did some honorary ones too. Um, Steph Curry, they made one for him, Andre Iguodala, another NBA player. They also made one for Reese Witherspoon. I don't think she has it. Um, so they're kind of going that approach too, to get celebrities. And, but again, doing there's that puppy there, I mean, I actually kinda liked this, uh, you know, the artwork on it.

So, and I have seen the bubblegum kids, you know, uh, and they're a little bit unique, right. That they have the, the bubble gum. Uh, what do you think maths, do you know this project at all? I don't know this project, but you know, you made a good point where when new people come into the NFT worlds, uh, you know, what are they gonna buy first?

Right. So that's always interesting to see, and I guess we'll, we'll find out, but to have projects starting to prepare for that would be cool. So, yeah, definitely. Um, so Chris, we talked on, we talked, was it yesterday or talked to any of this? You know, it seems so long ago. It was just, I can't tell my base.

Yeah. So the super rare board apes, uh, they're out for auction. There's actually two of them. We showed one yesterday, but I want to show this one today. This one. Dude, absolutely a banger. Um, and let's, they're both up for auction. And I think one of them has, is up for 13 Yves and the other one's for 16. Oh my goodness.

Look at that. Rolling stone cover through that is so my goodness. And that's the roadmap as the backdrop. So that's, I mean, that is sick right there. Yeah. I love that. And what did, how we got to look at the price here? What are we at for let's look at the top bid for this is 16, 8, 16 Eve on the mutant. So, and I think that's actually higher.

What is the, the banana board eight cover? I mean, I call it the banana cause we got the bananas floating around in the background. 14 east, uh, 14. Yeah, that mutant one. I hadn't even seen until today, mass. I completely missed that. Um, and these end, I think it is at four day. Four days. So, uh, what do you think Chris, over under 28th for both of these?

Oh, you know what? I almost feel like it's gonna split. I kind of think the mute, no, get to 20. And I feel like the regular one I'll call it. I'll call it 1720 and 17. I'll call. Um, I think, I think they both break 20 considering. Yeah. I think they both got 20 days left, so these are sick, dude. I think. Yeah.

Whatever ones. I'm not sure what the other one of ones have gone for, but if floor price is what like 38th right now for a board ape. I don't know. I think it breaks 20. Uh, I'm curious to hear from the chat though, which one would you guys pick? The mutant one or the regular one? Because they're both cool.

So, oh yeah. 32 eighth floor. Yeah. Great question mass. So yeah, let us know right now, type in the chat. Would you rather have the board ape or the mute and ape? Um, you know, uh, just solely based on the image, not based on the price, if you had to pick one, which would you rather own mass? I, I think I got go mute here.

Right? Uh, you know, that, that artwork, uh, it's dripping off the face, the roadmap in the background, which one would you rather have. I mean, the other one is cleaner though. It's just simpler and, and this one has a lot going on through their votes. Sick man. I want both of them. Let me just get both you going to play some bids right here on the show.

We're going to hear it here. All right. We're starting to get some votes and we got two votes for Mueller right now. No surprise. Um, let's keep those votes comment. Oh, I mean the OJI, right? It's clean. It's clean. Oh, another vote for boards. So, I mean, we're, we're seeing it split right now. Mass. Are you surprised by this vote?

They're both sick, man. So yeah, it's kind of like picking, it's kind of like picking, oh man. I think if I had to pick one probably original because looking at it now. Oh gee. But I don't know. I want this one too. They're both sick, man. So we'll, we'll update the chat when this thing is go for final sale.

Cause these should probably, I think they'll. Yeah. And I mean, mass, I think if you're, if you're rolling stone and also if you're other Meg, I mean, where are the other magazines that right time magazine partnered with cool cats. Now you got rolling stone partnering with board Abe. I mean, if you're a magazine, I mean, you're watching the show right now.

Stop watching. You should be on the phone. Right. You should be connecting with these NFT projects because look at this, I mean, you can get people to your space, right? You can bring new people to your magazine and you can also make some money and, you know, these just, they look so cool. And I mean, again, one of one, so, you know, mass, you just said that was cool cats, right?

10,000, you know, there's only 10,000. Well, now you've got something like this, there's only one, right? Like, and you can say you own the one of one, I mean, what a flex. That is two. So, uh, another vote here for mute due to the detail, again, that roadmap behind, I mean, the parrots constantly moving to. There's just so much going on in these covers, dude.

If I had this, I put it in my house and I'd have, I'd find a way to display it. Just like this all day, every day, all day people over just invite people to be like, Hey, come look at this. Got yeah. Oh man. That's awesome. So ends in four days. So we'll be able to talk about that final price next week on the show.

And again, I said 20 for the mutant 17 for the board ape and mass said both we'll hit 180, so we will see, um, you know, what the final price is. Our, you know, we were pretty close with our guests is on the Southerby's board, ape auction, mass. Remember that, uh, you know, we. Um, so, you know, again, uh, just a, an educated guests here.

Um, but we will see, well, we have a couple minutes left, so anyone, you know, watching this live, and again, if you're not watching this live or you're listening on the podcast, you know, that's great too. We're happy to have you as part of the. If you're watching live right now, though, uh, you know, let us know, what are you watching?

Um, drop it in the chat. Are there any upcoming minster you're looking at any recent NFT purchases that you had? I do see a comment from mark in the chat there talking about the Viveve star wars drop, um, which I believe is at three o'clock today, mass. I wrote about this a week or two ago, and I, I forgot.

I haven't even looked at these. Right. So Disney partnered with Vive to do star wars, Marvel and Disney related, um, NFTs. And they're they're collectibles. Right. And you have them in the Vive app then, you know, I saw, I think like a gold Bart Simpson skateboard. All right. Cause Disney now owns a Simpsons. I saw, um, you know, some Marvel ones as well.

Have you looked at the Vive and FTC? No, I have not, but I think we'll pull them up right here. So we can all look at the ass C3, POC, like, look at that, like again, Disney, I mean, one of the biggest media companies in the world getting into NFTs and look at this, I mean, what a way to monetize your intellectual property, the golden moments and Ft collection with the, um, the, this is pretty sweet.

Um, I might have to take a look at these because mass, if I remember right, I think you, it's kinda like a, uh, you know, like a normal NFT where you're just, you're, you're buying it and you don't know what you got until you open your pack. I think I, I feel like it's similar to top shot where, you know, you open it then, and it's an instant reveal, but, uh, I think that'd be wrong with that too.

So, but that's pretty exciting too. I mean, I've got kids who love. Getting blind bags, right. Where you don't know what you're going to get until you open it. And that's kind of the thrill of NFTs too. I mean, there, you got Homer choking bar. Uh, there's just so many great ones in this collection. So walk us through this, Chris.

So you pay, I'm assuming with cash or us dollar credit cards, us dollar through the Vive app. So that's a great point. Matt is another thing where, you know, maybe people new to the NFT. Get in through something like this, you know, top shop, we saw that, right? Cause they have the flow blockchain where you could, you could use a credit card.

I mean, my first top shots I ever bought, you know, I was using a debit card to buy those packs. I didn't have to get a theory. Um, um, you know, to make that transaction. So here you have. Yeah. Homer and Bart. Um, yeah, so I mean, and addition, so yet, uh, 12,333. So I mean, that's still not a crazy supply. I actually thought there was going to be more of these.

And that was the one thing that scared me away a little bit was like that inflated supply, but I mean, I've watched the Funko NFTs constantly sell out mass and I think Disney is going to sell all these out. So, is there a resell market for this? Or how does this work or do what, who do you think they're attracting just collectors from star wars that are going to come into this NMT?

Are they attracting current NFTE people or is it a mix of both? Yeah, so I think they're going after new people and collectors. Um, and I think the resale market is right there on the Vive app. I see a comment from lane in the chat though, saying from what I understand, you still can't cash out Vive.

That's an interesting comment. Um, that's something we've seen with newer apps before, right. And I think tap shot actually had that complaint for a while where you could bypass, you could buy moments, but you couldn't cash your money out for a while. Um, you know, cause again, just working out the, the processes and stuff.

So if that's true, I mean that could scare some people away as well. But um, I mean, mass being able to use U S D don't you think that just brings, you know, new people to the. Yeah, I do. I, I'm curious to see kind of like meaning when we bring people on most of the time we ask them how they got into this world, they say top shot.

Right. So, uh, absolutely. You know, absolutely. I'm curious to see I'm more, cause I didn't get in through top shot. I just got in through like straight Eve. So I'm curious to see how that works because like you said, yeah, it's going to bring a lot of, I'm sure a lot of Disney collectors to buy their first NFT and you know yeah.

I think it's great on looking back. So in one minute, mass, if that is true, we got a loyal, loyal fan, Mexican Crip. Shout out to you. I see that name all the time in the chat. So shout out to you for joining us saying that that Vive drop is sold out mass. What are we doing? Doing the show live right now? We could have been buying some, uh, some Disney NFTs.

So, uh, I, I mean, you said it that's bullish, right? If they're selling these out. I mean, and also, you know, so Disney, Hasbro, Mattel, all these companies getting in again, I just said it with the magazine companies, right? If you have not thought about getting into NFTs, what are you doing? Like, why are you not exploring how you can do it?

I mean, McDonald's even right. The McRib NFT, um, you know, isn't this just an extremely bullish sign for these companies. Yeah. I mean, seeing them come onto this world is it's, it's, it's exciting. I'm curious to see how they implement it though, but yeah. Seeing a star wars side in a minute, it's pretty crazy.

I want to look, is it mostly bots or how the process works? I'm going to do some research because I'm not sure we're going to, we're going to have to research that and see, and we'll have to try to get some, cause I mean, I, I'm a star wars fan. I'm a Marvel fan. Um, you know, so I wouldn't mind owning some just to collect them.

Right. But I'm, I'm curious about the resell market to, you know, also there was the draft Kings NFTs, right. I was able to buy some of those and you were able to use your existing balance, right? So you couldn't just use a credit card on the spot. You had to have money in your draft Kings account, but you could just pay with that money to buy the.

T. And I think that brought some new people to the space too, and those sold out, but they used to align process like top shot dead. Right? Where and Mexican Crip now saying it's mostly bots. Uh, you know, that would be the thing I would worry about. Yeah. Is, you know, if it's an instant sale and not align process, you're going to see a lot of bots get in there.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, man, these are all bullish. Just finding easier ways for people to get into that. If two worlds is exciting, I can't wait for Coinbase and see how that's going to work. If you're going to be able to use U S dollar from your Coinbase to buy NFTs. I mean, dude, that's gonna be huge. So yeah, I mean, mass with that being said, there was a rumor not too long ago, um, that open C uh, there, someone found in the code, I think visa, right.

That you would be able to use a credit card. And we talked about that on the show. I know we did, uh, of how, you know, potentially that could make it easier for people to buy, but also could be scary, right. If you could. Use a credit card and start buying all this stuff. Um, you know, you think that brings more people too.

And also with that being said, if, if open CCS competition coming from Coinbase could add in credit card payments, if open, see like announced that the same time Coinbase goes live, would that be like the ultimate way of, you know, trying to connect. Yeah. I mean, so there's been a lot of negative feedback for open C lately.

You know, they've made a lot of money and they're not the best at customer service. So there's opportunity for another big player to come in and take over. I think that's definitely a possibility. Um, I love the competition. I think it's going to create the best product for the consumers and make it easier for people to come on.

So, so game on baby. Yeah, and that's what we want to see. Right. We want it to be easier for the everyday person to be able to, you know, buy and sell NFTs. And I mean, you heard Fang gang say right. That, uh, you know, Coinbase, they welcomed the competition to open. See, so, uh, you know, I'm looking forward to Coinbase and again, you know, the, these different platforms like Vive partnering with Disney, I just think we're going to see more and more pop up and more and more ways for people to get involved with NFTs mass.

I think that's going to do it. Uh, you know, it's been a great week. Uh, we'll be back next week, right? Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, 2:00 PM. Eastern time. Uh, we've got some interviews, we'll be covering all the latest headlines and of course, interacting with our wonderful community here in the chat. Uh, anything you want to leave us off with today?

No. The only thing is we're still early, right? We are in a slow process of NFTs right now. But once these things pick up, man, I hope everyone watching is ready because it's going to be fun. All right. May I ask, do you see this comment right now from mark? I've got a secret spider for $7, a foot for tough.

Oh my goodness. We have got to look into, to even find out what this is all about, man. So next week we might have to do a whole segment on Vive. Maybe we take a look at that, but mark, that is awesome. Wonderful to hear happy for you. Um, and again, thanks to everyone in our chat for joining us today. And if you were watching this after we aired live, leave a comment on the video.

Madison, I always go back. We read the comments. So just because you're not watching live does not mean you are not a loyal member of our community. We love everyone out there. So we will see you all next week.

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Unedited Transcript:

Hey everyone. Welcome to the roadmap. Benzing. As new NFT show, we've had some great teams on past episodes. Pixel vault, art blocks, the vole collective robots, the dos pound owning force, crypto dads, dizzy dragons, sub doc, and mobile. Today we have the team from lazy lions joining us on the 6:00 PM Eastern time, special edition of the roadmap.

Stay tuned, everyone. We've got a great show coming up. This is the road.

All right, everyone. Yet, if you did not hear me at the start, Benzing his new show, the roadmap covering NFT news and doing interviews with top projects out there. And we've got a great interview coming up to night. But before I talk about that, let me go ahead and bring on my cohost mass mass. What's going on, buddy?

Yeah, what's going on? It's a pleasure to be here it's Monday. So it's throwing off stuff a little bit, you know, different time, you know, different day. Uh, it's going to be a great episode. Yeah. You know, we, we ere Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, 2:00 PM. Eastern time. We're three days a week now, but we had the opportunity to get this team on a stream live at night.

And we said, of course, let's go because mass lazy lions. I mean, we talk all the time about projects. We talk about community. I mean, this is a big one and they're showing up in the chat. They've got 6,000 people in the discord, almost 50,000 followers on Twitter. And this isn't a new project. I mean, this minted back in August and this community is just getting stronger and stronger.

Absolutely. So funny story, right. We first found out about this community when we shot an episode and then the comments, you know, they started, you know, talking to the cops. We tweeted something out when Zynga, I don't know if you remember that Chris and the crazy. So when Zynga is now, so, you know, thank you guys for tuning in.

It's going to be a great episode. Yeah. I mean, the chat spoke, right. And also, I mean, Matt, as you saw it, right, we put out a couple of tweets sharing the preview of this video. Right. And the engagement on those tweets was insane. And that's how we know that there is going to be a lot of people here. A lot of people excited for this interview when we get that kind of crazy engagement on Twitter.

So if you guys are new to the roadmap, please like this video, please subscribe to Benzinga channel. Again. We air the roadmap Tuesday, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, 2:00 PM. Eastern time. Mass before we get into the interview. I think we need everyone in the chat to roar. Right? I want to see some roars out there and we can play our trailer and get started with this interview again, mass, I mean this minted at 0.05, we've got a floor price of over one it's sold out in its first day.

And again, this was back in. You know, so a different time than what we're seeing now. There come the roars here. Uh, yeah,

go. And let's get those roars go. And guys it's Monday night here in the U S but I know everyone is joining us from different countries, different time zones. That's something we're going to get into in the interview later. I mean, they, they've got a nice base of users from different areas and I love that they break that down.

Um, but yeah, I think we've got enough roars now, mass, what do you think that's run it. Let's hear it. Let's see the trailer.

How about that at the end? Love it. I love it, man. I'm excited. Let's do it. All right. So joining us on the roadmap today, we have Asher the co-founder of lazy lions and nine. The developer got to go ahead, bring these guys on the stream. What's going on here.

We've been doing that lately, where we do these trailers. We love putting those trailers out, you know, on Twitter, getting some engagement built up, but it's a great way to bring on our guests, right? It's almost like entrance music to play you guys onto the stream. So we're glad that you liked it. And we're super excited to have you guys on the stream and also this loyal community in the chat.

Right.

Super excited for this one. So, uh, yeah, that's definitely going to be exciting. And I just noticed now, as I'm looking at this. I came in a bit more casual with my hoodie and I see you've got the Riyadh Madrid shirt and all that.

for this one. All right, guys. Well, let's dive into some questions, uh, before we get into Lacy lions, one of the first questions I always like to start with is. Tell us about your experience with NFTs prior to lazy lions where you collectors, where you investors, or was lazy lions, your first entry into the NFT space.

Uh, let's start with nine on this one and, uh, hear from you. Yeah, sure. Um, so T is for us was very interesting actually, because when we first started, we were very into sort of like, okay, Um, so we used to play a lot of games when we were younger, um, in that. And then we start to learn about, you know, crypto.

It first started when we got into cryptocurrencies. Uh, we got a little bit about that and it started to move into NFTs. I personally had an actual collected any of NFTs at the time, but it just tied in like the way that I understood it was like, oh yeah, it's on a blockchain, you know, proof of ownership.

There was rarely factor involved. And that just took me back to our younger days when we used to play games and it just resonated with us and we spoke about it and we're like, yeah, this is, this is space. And when you were, and then we started to work together and get into the NFV space and start looking.

I was building lazy lines from the ground up. Um, that's really how it started. I personally didn't collect any, I know Ash, I think he, I think he bought one, but yeah, he would touch on that more. Yeah. Ashley let's hear from you. Uh, what and FTS were you in before lazy lions? Yeah, for sure. Um, I mean, I just like to answer that question both.

Uh, code up different things and then, um, you know, taken to mark. And that was always a lot of fun, um, with crypto, for me, um, I wasn't like a big crypto guy, like even during the off season. Uh, David, is that the lie that really interested me because I saw the value of the metal sets. It still makes a lot of sense, but it didn't hit me as like, oh, this is going to be a really big thing because I couldn't see it being like a cultural impact, but NFTs for me, it was beginning of this year.

And as soon as I like started. To me, I'm like, this is not going anyway. Like digital ownership. Like we grew up, you know, playing video games where you've spent all that time and energy and money as well, but you can never take that thing outside of the game. And it's like, now you can actually do that.

It's just, so for me, it's a no brainer. This is definitely not going anywhere. Um, one of my favorite entities actually like full AC lines. In our bungalow and a bungalow is an entity that we dropped where you can showcase your other entities. Um, it's actually forgotten ruins character. Um, and this probably ties in with what nine was saying, you know, would be gay.

This girl playing greenscape loved that game and that little. Like, he just reminds me so much of my childhood. I tell you, I don't know how much that could go up in value, but I don't think I'm ever going to sell it. So, um, I guess a collector before, before those lines, if you want to do, yeah, it sounds like he's not going to sell it.

Well, awesome love here in the video game. Talk as well. That's a common thing that we hear from different people behind NFT projects. Uh, you know, nine, you mentioned a little bit, uh, U2, uh, you know, getting involved together. Wondering if we can hear, or if we can hear more of the background, how did this team come to be and why the decision, you know, to, to launch lazy lions, uh, why a lion, why this type of artwork any a behind the scenes insight there?

Yeah, sure. So it was, it first started. I think it was actually my birthday when we first started discussing like, um, cryptocurrencies and. We started getting into it. And we were talking just back talking about different coins that we're interested in. Um, and then later down the track, I believe it was Ashley that came up to me was like, Hey man, have you heard of NFTs?

And I was like, yeah, I've heard of them. They pretty much just like JPEGs. Right. And he's like, yeah, but you can actually own, like, you could see these and there's a very flat line and it all started resonating for. And we're like, you know what? This makes sense. This makes sense to us being video game players, back in the days, it all like proof of ownership was a big thing for us being able to actually prove that you own this NFL, um, just made sense.

Uh, it just made sense to us and we started just discussing it and we sort of just branched out to the team as well. And they all understood the. And then pretty much from there, we just thought, you know what let's just think of, um, think of the next best thing. And with that with us, we always went back to our heritage.

So lions were pretty much a part of our heritage because of where we're from an student. So that just resonated with us and we just yet went full throttle with that. Yeah. I mean, just a few other things as well. Like the whole Kings and Queensland, hopefully my audio is working better now. I'm using AirPods and I realized it was a different setting.

Um, like just growing up, but we've always referred to each other as Kings, right. Like even just with mates around. Um, and I feel like that's something that's just hit off for you. What would the community, and, uh, it's probably a small thing. Like they might be people in the audience outside of the lazy lines community.

Going to their king or queen, but I think it goes more than that. Like it ties in with that values, which is yes, we're all Kings and Queens, but no one's above anyone else. And I feel like that's something that resonates with a lot of people in web three. Um, so yeah, just a few little things like that. A lot of that.

So guys, so the floor is over one eighth, you guys have over 86 K into. And the 49 K on Twitter. So how do you guys personally measure the success of this project? Uh, let's start with you Asher, if you can tell us a little bit more. Yeah. You know, it's, it's interesting. Like there are a few different ways you can, you can look at it.

Um, and that, and that we do track, right? Like obviously we've got our own KPIs that, you know, we had really, really smart people who know the ins and outs of, um, the whole economics behind it. Yeah. Tell us what metrics we should be looking. Um, and the community knows that, um, it, it ties in with down mission, which is simply it's to become the, the biggest and best entity community there is.

That's, that's our mission. Um, obviously we're a bit biased. We think we've already got one of those. Um, but to be the biggest, it's very black and white, so that's what we're aiming for. Not to put anyone else down. I, I love some of the other projects that are out there, but that's just our mission anyways.

Right. Um, so that's one way that we track success. Um, That's small quantitative like qualitative, just speaking with community members, the five, particularly in this dip right now. I feel like for me, um, that's what really just reassures me that we're on the right path. Just, you know, you jump into the discord, you see what's being posted.

You have chats with community members. I try to say. Um, spend a fair bit of my time just having those, like one-on-one chats with community members. Um, I feel like that's a really important thing. Like just, um, like really like, Hey, like how are things going? Like, you know, what do you feel is blocking us like real deeper conversation?

Um, and that's just been like, it's not obviously like all positive, like they're always things that we can be improving on, but overall it feels like we're on the right track. So that's, that's the way we measure it. Yes. We've got data that having those conversations with community members, um, tells me we were on the right track.

Love that. Yeah, same. I like to hop in a discord and you know, you see the activity level. You know, there's been so many discourse throughout this period that are just dead, you know, cause it's, we're kind of in a bearish market, so there's no one, you know, having a conversation, seeing you guys have this activity is amazing.

Uh, how about you, uh, nine? What, what, how do you measure the success of the. Yeah. So similar to what, similar to what Ash said. I think for me personally, it's during this fast success of the project, just jumping into the discord and seeing how active it is on a, on a daily basis, being able to hold these, um, conversations with, you know, my team members and, you know, moderators and community members.

And they're all, we're all on the same page. We all understand what the, you know, what we're here to do. And just, yeah, just seeing how active for me personally. Yeah, more on the community is just how active it actually is. And seeing the word being spread out, spread out on Twitter, spread out in discord.

That really just resonates with me. So I love that. So can you guys tell us a little bit more about bungalows and how they, uh, you know, come into the lazy lion world? Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Um, and so I guess when we started, right, like we had a few things, um, In mind for the roadmap. Um, and two, we didn't want to be different just for the sake of being different, but at the same time, it's like, it was very obvious to us that if we just, I guess, copied what other projects were doing, like we could find our own way.

I think that that was a bit lame. Like that's not what we're about. Um, we're in a new space. I think there's a really good opportunity for us to build something unique and that's fun to us. Right. And it's something that was that we noticed during our research of NFTs, like at the beginning of the year was like, how do you show these things?

Yeah, that was the question I had. Um, and I spent a fair bit of time looking into that. I still feel like there's no great solution, um, in real life, if anyone has something like, you know, a great way to like show them off in frames or whatever the ambulance put down, I'd love to know because I want to bring out obviously my line, um, and a few other odd pieces.

Yeah, that's in the real world. And, um, you know, in the digital world, you know, how do you show these things off? I've seen a few like, um, social media websites, but nothing great. So just to us, it was like, well, Twitter event is on being used profile photos are what if we could show off entities in the Twitter banner, um, and you know, sticking with our values as well, which is to be inclusive rather than being exclusive, which I think a lot of.

Projects really focus on, you know, they're trying to build this exclusive community, um, and that works for them and that's great, but where we're different to that, you know, we're trying to, you know, we're aiming to be inclusive. So, um, sticking with that nature, it's like, you don't just have to show off your lazy lines indices, um, without new bungalows DAP, which is on all these loans.

And if the.com you can edit any bungalow, you have to include any NFT that you weren't. Even if it's not lazy lines for later. So, um, yeah, that's, that's how it works. It's a bit of background as to that's awesome. So me and Chris liked to ask this question on a tour guests, every episode, what are some of your favorite traits from the lazy lion?

So are there any unique traits that you particularly liked that no one knows about let's start with United. Can you tell us a little bit more, you know, which lions do you like the best or what traits do you like the most. That's a good question. That's that's a great question. Um, which ones are the ones that are being slept on?

Let's let you will personally love, you know, uh, honestly I think I used to love the, I like actually like the, really like the lederhosen, um, Um, it is one of the ones that I had originally as my PFE or my line had it. You had the, um, lederhosen shirt out of my eyes and I believe it had the halo just look very innocent.

So I was like, yeah, this one, this one resonates with me. Um, but I think that one's a little bit slipped on as well. It's, it's, you know, it is one of the real ones as well, but you don't see too many people will actually actually with it. So

what about you Asher? Um, there's a couple other big. Um, a big party, that guy, just because of the whole childhood thing, but, um, basically these, uh, these leads of fire, I think. Um, and I know I'll get in. Um, I'll get a bit of stick if I, Aaron. And he's part of that team as well. He is a community manager. I know he loves the lazy hat.

Um, so that one should probably get some recognition as well. I think that one's probably a fan favorite. Yeah.

And some call-outs for us steak mouth in the chat as well. It looks like there's some fans of the meat and the steak out there in the chat right now that guy's going to get about 50 steak bouts. So that's why, that's why, that's why. So there's a little bit of a bias going on. Oh man. Well, Sorry. There's a little bit of a little trait combo that I like as well.

So if you have like a, if there's a scratch body and they have a ripped shirt, you can see the scratches underneath the shirt, which is what just comes out really nice. So it's a little thing that I sort of go for as well. I like that. Nice, nice call out there. What about you guys? You know, I see in them, I like the steak right there, you know, and again, I know there's someone in the chat, you know, bias towards that, but I like the steak.

I like the party hat. I know there was the halo, um, you know, some of the different, uh, the headpiece traits. Um, I like, but I also have seen some real clean ones. Uh, you know, that are impressive. Uh, what about UMass, um, football Jersey, you know, big football guy. And then I do like, so I do like anything Miriam based from any collection.

I'm always trying to find like, is there an Ethereum chain or anything like that? I saw you guys having a theorem business shirt. I like that one as well. So yeah, exactly that one right there. So always those little subtle pieces. I think that's cool. Definitely. All right. Well, you guys also have roar words for your owners to reward the community members.

Can you tell us a little bit about this? Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Um, this is probably what been one of the biggest, um, I guess catalysts of the project, particularly at the beginning, uh, at the early stage of, sorry. To put it simply, uh, rewards is what it sounds like it's a rewards program exclusively for lazy lion holders.

So this is one of the advantages, or I guess, utility of being a lazy lion NFT holder. Um, every month you're eligible for rewards in the form of eight by completing activities that, uh, That benefit the project. So, you know, community engaging activities and part of those, you know, they change from month to month, but one of those might be, you know, sending your profile photo on Twitter, to your lazy lion and they, um, and you know, I feel the little things like that.

And that might be why you see, you know, quite a few, um, you know, about how those changing their profile photo, um, to the lines, particularly the, the early stages, but what we found now, it's really interesting. Right. Um, And I should probably explain why we did this, but what we've seen is like, it was a good reason.

It was a reason why a lot of, um, people I guess, came to the project. Um, but what's happened now is like, it's become so insignificant where they just, they love their lines so much. They don't really care about rewards anymore. Like, that's a lot of the feedback that we get is like, yeah, that was really nice at the beginning, but it's like now I love my profile photo so much.

I'm not gonna change it. Even if you would've paid me to. So it's like, it's sort of changed, um, how they, how they view it. Um, but I think it's important to like, to explain why we did this. Um, it's sort of like a marketing expense, I guess if we, if we look at it that way, like from the project's point of view, like I know a lot of other collections and then this isn't me bashing anyone else.

Go down the route, which is the easy route of, you know, paying like an influence it's changed their profile better and, you know, paying a big amount, a large amount of Psalm, one influence, a change, that profile photo. Great. We saw that as a bit cringe and we're like, is there another way to do this? Um, but obviously we still need to do marketing.

Like obviously the project needs to be marketed and it was like, what if instead of just giving it to one celebrity or influencer. What if we just give that to the community and instead of just one big amount to one person, we just spread it out to the community. I'm like, well, that ties in with the whole, you know, web three N model.

So that's how we went. And we just created a system that allows us to do that. Essentially the community gets rewarded for, um, marketing the, the project. And I feel like that's worked one just for us and. Yeah. I mean, that's my, that's my opinion, but I think, you know, if you jump on Twitter and you just look at all the activity from lazy lion holdings, it feels like it's sort of evolved beyond that as well.

This is awesome, dude, this is some alpha for anybody looking to start a project. Seriously, notice that there's your marketing right there. And if you're looking to create an NFT project, yeah. I mean, what a great way, uh, love that. And, you know, look at the numbers you guys have too in building the community and the community.

I mean, being so loyal months after the launch. So clearly that rewards is worth. Um, I saw a picture on Twitter that you guys had a meetup in New York city, some lions holders. Um, were you guys involved in that? Have you met any, uh, lions holders and, uh, you know, talk to us about future events for lion? Hey, the Kings and I wish we were there.

So where, um, we're still in lock down here and study CD. Um, so I think we just now started to get out of lockdown, but as soon as we can fly out, like desperately, we'll be meeting up with laser line holders, but no, that was community led. Um, a lot of, a lot of really good feedback actually from that one.

Um, everybody seemed to really enjoy themselves. Um, but yeah, that was a little community, but we'll definitely look at doing more of those. Um, as soon as we're able to fly out. That's awesome. I mean, showing the initiative by the community there, I mean, that's something we don't see out of every project, uh, doing these, you know, these meetups.

So a, another great sign of how big this community really is. Um, I did see, you know, that there are quite a few celebrities that also own lazy lions. Um, that's something we talk about a lot on the show. A lot of athletes does Bryant, Josh Hart, Seth Curry, uh, Tyrese Haliber and also we've got Jake Paul John rule.

Uh, talk to us a little bit, you know, I know you guys didn't go after all these celebrities, what does it mean to see some of them get involved in the project in terms of validation going forward? Man, it's really cool. Uh, it's really cool, but. Uh, just in general, just with the community, like what I know it's sort of gone away from the question, but just what we love, 4,600 holders, like jumping into the, or like sometimes find him, must find myself just going like, well, is this sort of like a dream?

Like you sorta just have to step back. You're like, am I just going to wake up? And that damn like, went back in August, this never happened. Or just, you know, continuing on with whatever else we're doing. Um, so it's sort of surreal like that just with the community, which is a really cool thing. But, um, no, I mean like the celebrities in the.

Uh, the athletes, um, yeah, that's been organic or organic. Sorry. I'm like nothing from us anyways. Like the, the teams specifically bringing in those ones. Um, but yeah, I think it's really cool. Like it just goes to back, I guess they believe in either the project and the community or, you know, it's probably because they resonate with the art as well.

Um, like from a few of the things that I've seen. Um, which I guess makes sense. You know, everyone feels like a, you know, a lot of people feel like they're aligned, particularly athletes. Uh, um, yeah, it's it. Awesome. I got a highlight Tyrese Halliburton for a minute. Cause we talked about him last week on the show because the big news was that he, uh, wore a pair of sneakers during an NBA game, featuring his board ape on his shoe.

So my question for you is, you know, has there been any talks of Tyrese Haliber and having his lion on his shoe? Is that something you guys would love to see? And what has the reaction been from the community of that possible? I think that's so cool. Like now that we're seeing it, he's going into a culture like that.

Yeah. That's um, that's awesome. Um, I got a lot of respect for board apes as well. I mean, they've sort of paved the way for a lot of projects out outta here right now. I think it'd be really cool if you wanted to do something like that. And with the lazy. I mean, I don't know. How's the community feel about that when you recognize that guys in the chat, let us know.

I mean, I'm seeing a comment here when lion shoe, uh, you know, is that something you guys would love to see an NBA game with lazy lion sneakers being worn? Uh, you know, I know we got a ton of press about the board ape shoes last week, and it was really cool to just see an NFT, you know, on a shoe in real life.

The screen, um, you know, and Burton's changed his shoes, uh, you know, pretty much every game. So I have a feeling, you know, that he's not done and there's his lazy lie in there on screen. So, uh, can we get that on a shoe? I think that'd be pretty sweet. Yeah, that's awesome. You called it Chris. Let's see. Let's make it happen.

Let's make it happen. The crowd would be roaring. David says great comment. There. All right, guys. So back to the discord really quick. So again, you guys have over 80 K discord members, you know, I'm sure we've all been crazy. Discords where they're spamming and just out of control. So what do you guys do to manage the discord?

Yeah, we've got a great team, great team. And that's, um, you know, not just, uh, uh, just the community managers that we have in there, but even the moderators as well. And I think anyone in the community with. Um, you know, a lot of people I could shout out individually, but yeah, the modes, the community managers, um, support team, and even just like the w we've got like different roles.

Like we have one called like a role, uh, Royal king, sorry. And these are like community members that are sorta like self appointed by the community itself. It's funny. It's like, we don't even choose. It's like, it's very obvious it should be this role. And they're the ones that are sort of. The community outside of the actual moderators.

And I feel like the community itself just does a great job of like, self-governing like if somebody comes in and sends somebody that something that they shouldn't it's very quickly resolved by itself, which is just a beautiful thing. Um, so it's like, even though we have, you know, the more and more we scale up and grow, um, it hasn't been too much of the.

Um, but yeah, that's, that's how it sort of does it, so it doesn't get, like, it gets crazy at times, for sure. Especially on like, you know, Lauren's days and like rewards, especially. And we've got that one coming up this Friday, um, when the, uh, Downey's is sent out, you know, it gets pretty dense pretty well of that day because it's a bit of fun, but, uh, now it's all governed quite well.

I think. Um, that's awesome. How active are you guys? Both in the discord. And do you have any like favorite channels in there? I'm probably a bit too active in the, um, in the disc, like considering like, um, also, um, like leading up like the product team and obviously like, uh, just trying to keep my eyes on everything else in, uh, in the project.

Um, but man, it's just so addicting being in the discordant. Like what do you, I guess it's just like, it's hard not to be what up in the, in the moment. And then you're sitting there for like half an hour, just chatting back and forth with everybody in the. And the community. I think we get FOMO too. You want to scroll back and see what you've missed.

Finally, you said the scrolling through your phone for a little bit to try to catch up with everybody and what they're saying, but in terms of favorite channel, I would have to say it's probably, um, it's probably, it's probably cabana bar. That's our, that's our main channel for lazy line holders. Um, so it's sort of, you know, it's only available to them.

Um, but when that channel starts to pick up, it's really fast to pick up on. There's a lot of great discussions that, um, Uh, so yeah, you learn a lot and it's, it's great. Speaking of the community, uh, specifically lazy line holders and then, yeah, that would be probably my favorite channel. I'd say there's lots of London.

Yeah, love that. So we've seen a lot of discord hacks over the last couple of weeks. You know, this court, Twitter hacks, you know, different kinds of schemes going on there. Are you guys taking any precautions towards, you know, protecting the discord? Uh, let's start with you. Yeah. Sure. So recently we've done like a, an audit of our bots just to ensure that there is no, no left over bots that are lurking, that we sort of don't need.

Um, majority of our web hooks. I know they can be a little bit risky, um, in regards to, yeah. So I know that one of the discourse I apparently got, you know, got it. They got into it because of a web hook. So we started to, you know, just review the web books, make sure they're all clean. Make sure there's nothing we don't know about.

Um, we've started to leave sticky bots, uh, sort of sticky notes in each of our. I know that sometimes you can get DMS from fake collab land when you try to verify your NFTs. So we have sticky notes that, um, you know, just say, make sure, like, just confirm correct collab, land, which other scans, it leads the country, uh, of that channel.

So nobody can see like, so no collab then can sort of see who's typing, you know, exclamation mark join to verify that. And if they, so just little things here and there to really just clean up the discord, make sure there's nothing that's sort of. Leftover to ensure the safety of the community members.

That's, that's what we've been doing. And we'll continue to automate it just to make sure that nothing happens. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Pretty much that. And um, I mean, cause our discord is like so important to us as well, right? Like it's such like it's front and center of our. Um, like the project strategy, right?

It's like, that's what we're really trying to grow and build a community. Cause like we've always said that like the project is the community, the community is the project. And like we're making a, we're making our bed on the discord platform. Um, that's not to say it's perfect. Like I feel like there's, you know, there's a few things that I, you know, I'd love to suggest to the disco, um, team members and just, you know, things that I think would benefit the platform.

Um, Overall, particularly as like entity and crypto is becoming more and more of a thing that's using discord. Um, cause like we've let so many important, um, positives, like we've got like a professional networking section. Um, cause it's funny. It, it goes, it's sort of gone away from the question, but it sort of ties into like what's the value in an inequity?

Um, like that's a question that I've, you know, I had asked, uh, a few times basically for people that aren't in crypto, like why would you get an NFTA? Like what do you actually get out of it? Yeah. Uh, like one of the most obvious things is the community. And some people just look at that and go, oh, like, what is that?

It's like, well, like, you know, it's just because they're cartoon characters. I think the stigma is like, people think it's it's little children or like fat kids in their mother's basements that are buying these entities. Right. And it's like, that's not the, that's definitely not the case. Right. Like, Like we're speaking with, you know, with like C level executives with doctors, with lawyers, like whatever their industry they're in, you know, our reporters, like people at the top of their industry, right.

Are like really smart, intelligent people. So it's like, um, how much does it cost to get into like a professional networking? Um, uh, you know, like, oh, like, you know, how will, what's the cost of that to be a part of that? Create those kinds of connections. Right. And that's something we've doubled down on. So we have like a whole professional networking section and in the discord, um, like we have gaming sections, um, marketplace, um, like all these other things.

So it's really critical to us. And security is really important as well. Um, those hacks are pretty scary, so it's just things that were, yeah. Like , those are some of the things that we're doing to make sure that, that Allstate. Uh, secure love that. So you actually just led me on to the next question I had for you guys.

I'm going to have a list of pull up this chart here. So someone posted this in the tweet and the tweet last night, and it's interesting because it breaks down all the demographics, right? So there's, you know, 4.6 owners. Yeah. So this is really interesting, right? Gender, you know, 92% male, 8% female, top three age groups, 26 to 35 leads.

Uh, 36 to 45 is second. See, I wouldn't have guessed that 19 to 20 five-year-olds is third. Uh, this one to 53% are married. 44% are single 60%, no kids, 33%, one to two kids. Can you guys tell us a little bit more about all these stats, man? This is really cool. Yeah, it's really interesting. I think some of those numbers would love for them to be a little bit different, um, particularly cause we have.

I think if you compare that to the average would probably be a bit better. It's basically in terms of, you know, having more or, um, more females in the, in the project being inclusive is obviously one of our core values rather than being exclusive. But this was just part of a survey that we, we did a while back.

Um, Uh, yeah. And it's interesting, like target market is, you know, 25 to 45 year old males, obviously high disposable income as well. Um, but, um, yeah, it's definitely interesting. We thought other brands would be, you know, we'd love to see that kind of information, particularly now as we've got the collectibles, um, you know, probably sneak, peeking a bit too much of that.

Um, but just to look at about that, but that's something that we've got coming out. Um, Quite soon. Uh, and that, I think it's an opportunity for, you know, we've had so many requests to do like collabs, um, you know, so many projects that have hit us up and we're like, Hey, can we do something? And we just haven't done anything with them strictly because we just haven't wanted to pay like any influences.

That's not been our strategy on the really cringe. Um, it just goes against that values. So this is an opportunity for us to actually partner up with brands in a meaningful way. So that's why we shared that. That data. Um, and I think it's quite valuable daughter to Danielson and entities, but yeah, that's, that was the reasoning behind it.

Awesome. So one of the things we've talked a lot about on the roadmap, obviously NFTs have seen huge interest this year. And we also have news that Coinbase a leading crypto platform is launching their own NFT marketplace. So they actually pulled their audience asking for favorite NFT communities. And of course the lions community.

Came through and roared and Coinbase actually retweeted. And they said roar louder for the people in the back. Please. Uh, tell us what this means. Uh, you know, have you been in talks with Coinbase at all or is this just validation that Coinbase sees the large community here? Um, that's one of those things where I probably shouldn't say too much, maybe just because I can't say too much, but I think that might be enough there just to say that you can't comment.

So maybe we got it. We got it out of here anyway. But I think it's really cool. All right. I think it's really cool and it's really exciting time. So we'll see what, um, you know, we'll see what happens with the platform and then we've all got a lot of hopes. Um, but at the same time, you know, like we've got to be a little bit skeptical.

Like there's a bit of pressure on them to make sure everything comes out. Well, it's not a guarantee or anything. Like we saw what happened with like Google plus, right. Um, just because you're the biggest doesn't mean it's going to be a guarantee, but, um, I think the fact that they moving into NFT.

Entities and they're focusing on it is extremely bullish, right? Um, so I've got, I've got high hopes and they got my support. Love it, Google plus. Wow. Take taken me back there. I definitely, I definitely had a Google plus account where I would share links to articles that I wrote to try to get increased page views, but yeah, goo Google plus a diet and unfortunate death there.

But yeah, that's a phrase I haven't heard in a while. Um, I think we have AR in the chat and I believe there was a mention of a tattoo. We do have a picture and a video of this tattoo. Uh, again, we, we talked to a lot of NFTE teams, right? And w we occasionally see strong engagement and we do not see too many tattoos.

So tell us a little bit about, you know, uh, why this tattoo came to be, um, looks like AR you know, called out for the floor price and then got the tattoo. Is this something you guys do about at a time and how did the community. Uh, man, I think everybody loves it. Like look at how clean that thing. Like man, whoever the tattoo was like, yeah, he's got some really good work, but um, no that was all right.

That was something he called out back when we first, when we first launched it, I remember seeing that and it was like, why did he say it's like, when were you reached to a, I'm gonna get my live. And I remember looking at that and like, obviously, like I'm extremely bullish on what I've got completely.

Like from the early days, I was like, sure, like, you know, we can do, we can achieve whatever we set our minds to. Right. And I still believe that. Um, so I was like this, guy's going to have to get a tattoo of his life. That is a sweet looking tattoo. Uh, I mean, loved watching that video. So clean, so shout out to the artists too.

Um, but yeah, I mean, seeing someone get a tattoo, I mean, that's great validation for, for the longevity of this project and the community. So, uh, an AR in the chat, I mean, a nice looking tattoo and thanks for joining us for the stream today. Uh, along with the tattoo talk and validation, another area where we've seen NFT projects, you know, connect with their community.

As we just had Halloween and I saw some lazy lions, Halloween costumes. Um, you know, is that something that you guys, uh, you know, called for, did a contest at all? Or is this just people happen in because they wanted to dress as their lion. Yeah, this was just, this was purely community-based. Um, when I actually saw that image and retweeted it on the main Twitter account, that was absolutely awesome that people were getting so involved.

I really liked it. I'd love that lazy hat as well. It looks so clean. I want it personally, but it was, yeah, that was just completely community driven in hold a competition. They just went out of their way and yeah, it's just beautiful to see. That's awesome. Uh, yeah, I mean, what a cool Halloween costume.

That is a sweet looking hat too. Um, but keep that in mind, any lions in the chat, if you're looking for a Halloween costume next year, I know it's a year away, but start planning to work on your lion costume now. Um, so you can be ready. Uh, you mentioned a little bit about collectibles, right? So we got a little bit of a teaser.

One of the things we are called the roadmap after all is we always try to hear about, you know, what's next. So I know you guys can't share too much, but can we get a little bit more information on collectibles and maybe what's ahead for lion holders. Nine, if you don't have a problem. I mean, why not? Like I've got a lot of respect for this show, so it looks sneaky.

All right. So essentially this ties in with our values and our mission as well. Right. Which is obviously like our value is one of our values is, you know, rather than being an exclusive community, which you don't know a lot of. Uh, you know, focusing on being, which is fine and like that works really well.

And I've got a lot of respect for a lot of other projects. I would never bash another one, but I'm like ours is to be inclusive rather than exclusive. So, um, we're trying to build obviously the biggest and it's the community, that's our mission. And part of that is bringing new people that aren't necessarily in NSCS right now.

And I feel like we sort of shoulder that responsibility as we've become. Um, you know, just from what other people have told me, it seems like we were kind of one of the leading projects now, at least like in the top, you know, I think like on open seat, like top 40 or all the time traded those types of things.

So I feel like we have a responsibility to actually, um, you know, to try and lead the space and, and bring in new people into the community rather than just, you know, those existing members. We already have enough teas. And I think the challenge is. Because it's still so early, like the interfaces and everything, it's not super easy to get into it.

Like know just the act of having to create a wallet and minting and gas. It's sort of like, you know, I said, it's like, if you're telling a friend or family member of someone that you know, coworker about entities and they're not in it already, it's like, Hey, we've got a lazy lion. This community is amazing.

Oh, cool. How much is it? And he's like one eighth and I look up one eight. They're like what? That's not how I'm going to get started. Right. So it's like, okay, how can we say. I have those, um, people still become a part of the community without having to fork out that much straightaway. And that's where this sort of referral program collectible thing came to mind.

So essentially what it is is every community member or every new person that you invite to the community, all they have to do is join discord and they will get a pack of tokens for free that they can claim on our website. Um, and this pack will be a random, you know, it'll be a set of cards. Um, you know, like we had to have a lane, next one will be, um, uh, like, uh, Thanksgiving.

Right. Which is what we've got planned. So that's probably a sneak peek there more than I should. Um, so there'll be, you know, a set of eight, eight, uh, Thanksgiving cards. Um, and every pack that you open, you'll get two random ones. And the idea is complete the set and you enter to win a lazy lions. Um, so this way, anyone who's not in the community already can just join up, join the disco and get a pack.

And if they want to get more packs, they just invite more people. And we cover the gas company. These tokens appear on open. See they can list them free without having to pay any gas that's all covered. So someone could come in, not pay a single cent, get one of the rare tokens, list them, and then, you know, make a profit or try and complete the sentence, win a prize.

Um, and I think it just ties in, like we said, without values gives them an opportunity to experience what mentoring is. Um, and then, you know, bringing in the ecosystem and understand the true benefits of web three. So. A bit of a lengthy explanation, but yeah, that's, that's what the collectibles ideas. And what does that mean?

We appreciate the background there. Yeah, when's the launch. Yep. So right now that is in, um, if we've got like a soft Bader internally, um, that's scheduled for launch, uh, next with next week. So we've got rewards this week. Oh, wow. Is that a big thing? And then we've got this coming out next week. That's awesome.

That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, pretty excited. You'll definitely see. Um, I think this will, yeah, we'll see how it goes, but I can see it having a pretty positive effect. I think so. Yeah. I, we we've seen some of these card ones do well too, and that's a great way. Like you said, to bring new people into the community and also the referral program, uh, you know, I'm a big fan of that.

So. You know, uh, we wish you luck with that. And thanks for breaking that news here on the roadmap, it's always exciting to, you know, hear what's next from these projects. And, you know, I think that a community out there is loving this. Absolutely. I mean, that's amazing bringing new people in is the biggest part of the game.

That's that's really awesome. Uh, let's take it to, we have some questions from the chat here. Um, the first question that I saw earlier in the interview today, we had a question from Brendan bald. Uh, he's asking, do you guys have any plans or hopes to develop the IP into film or TV or even comic books?

So the cool thing is I've already seen a few projects do it. Um, and I think they're just, you know, they hold the, uh, lazy lines and if feed themselves, once you hold it, you're able to go and create these things yourself, um, are stressing. Like we're open to it, but there's no immediate plans for it, but I've seen a few cool things going around on Twitter.

Yeah. I love that. Um, let's see. Do we have any more questions from the chat here, Chris, that we want to think we got most of the questions answered. Well, you know, the, uh, people loved hearing the Coinbase conversation again, and people loving this roadmap talk. Um, we're seeing merge now asked from Morgan.

Um, you guys, I think you, do you have some merch already or ends for Merck in the works? Uh, we've got much in the works. So, um, you know, I've seen, what's been being worked on, um, I think the community's going to love what we, what we release with this. Um, so yeah, not, not quite yet, but that's in the works.

It's coming out soon. And then mass. How about that? A question there from a breezy in the chat, uh, that, that could be a fun one. Oh, yeah. So when Arizona ice tea collab, can you guys tell us more about that? Is that a rumor or, you know, is this question coming out of nowhere? Um, yeah, I mean, there's nothing like official going on.

Um, what's nice. Is it sort of ties back into the collective. Um, to is now like, again, if there are any brands listening as well, I feel like there's definitely an opportunity for the brands who are wanting to get into entities, particularly with like more established projects. Um, at least for us, this is an opportunity for us to actually partner up with brands in a way that's actually beneficial for everyone involved.

So, um, you know, if we were doing those, you know, biweekly, um, releases of collectible cards and one of them. The Arizona theme, just for the sake of argument. Um, but yeah, not nothing official, but we're definitely open. Perfect. Yeah, I did see Arizona as one of the owners mentioned in the, uh, celebrity spotlight, um, on that cool graphic and the facts that we shared.

So I think that's where maybe that rumor comes from. Um, but we'll wait. We'll wait to hear more details from you guys in the future. Well, I think that's going to do it for today's interview, you know, nine Asher big. Thank you for both of you coming on our show. I know it's early morning where you guys are at, um, your flexibility with doing that.

Also shout out to the latest science community. I mean, mass, look at them. They're in full force here in the chat during this whole interview. So a shout out to lazy. Absolutely. I mean, this has honestly been one of the biggest communities I've seen and I'm personally measured by the Twitter. You know, I see on my Twitter, the profile picture, I mean, I see a lie and I would say one out of every 10, if that, I mean, you guys are killing it.

I can't wait to have you guys come on again and just, you know, do some updates in the. Yeah, man, this is a lot of fun. Um, I have like, everyone's been waiting for it for a while. So this is tape spot. It went by a lot quicker than I thought it would. Alice. That's how you know, but, uh, yeah, not, King's definitely out to doing this.

Yeah, well, we will, we will have to have you guys back on. Um, so thanks again, nine and Asher, uh, before I let everyone go here, uh, mass, we do not have a show tomorrow. Um, I know I said we're going Tuesday, Wednesdays and Thursdays, 2:00 PM. Eastern time. Benzinga is hosting. PAC awards. And actually there's going to be some awards given in crypto, in NFT categories.

So if you're interested in the space, we have FinTech awards, airing live on YouTube, beginning at 9:00 AM, Eastern time and going all day. And also if you're into crypto, we do have our Monday night show. After this show is done with, through there, he will be talking some metaverse crypto plays. Um, so I know I'll be sticking around to hear more from Ruelle on.

But yeah. Thanks for everyone for tuning in and yeah. Thank you. I mean, let's chat, they're so appreciative to mass here. I am trying to tell them. Thank you. And they're all thinking. Yeah. Thank you guys. If you guys liked this content, you know, we're, Benzinga, there's there, we're starting to test this out.

We want to bring more NFT content, make sure to like subscribe, share this content. We're going to continue to bring more of it as the NFC community expands as well. So thank you guys for watching. We appreciate. Definitely. So stay tuned, everyone for a root welds report talking crypto plays, and we will see everyone on the roadmap on Wednesday, 2:00 PM.

Eastern time. Take care, everyone. And thanks again.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-roadmap/donations

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Episode Summary

Joining us today for a SPECIAL episode of The Roadmap - Lazy Lions! The NFT Community for Kings.

Guests:

Lazy Lions: https://twitter.com/LazyLionsNFT

Ashur, Co-Founder: https://twitter.com/AshurNFT

https://opensea.io/collection/lazy-lions

Hosts:

Chris Katje

Maz

https://bitclout.com/u/maz

Follow The Roadmap on Twitter!

Disclaimer: All of the information, material, and/or content contained in this program is for informational purposes only. Investing in stocks, options, and futures is risky and not suitable for all investors. Please consult your own independent financial adviser before making any investment decisions.

Unedited Transcript:

Welcome to the roadmap. Benzing. As new NFT show, we've had some great teams on past episodes. Pixel vault, art blocks, the Vogel collective robots, the dos pound owning force, crypto dads, dizzy dragons, sub doc, and.

Today. We have the team from lazy lions joining us on the 6:00 PM Eastern time, special edition of the roadmap. Stay tuned, everyone. We've got a great show coming up. This is the roadmap. All right, everyone. Yet, if you did not hear me at the start, Benzing his new show. The road. Covering NFT news and doing interviews with top projects out there.

And we've got a great interview coming up to night. But before I talk about that, let me go ahead and bring on my cohost mass mass. What's going on, buddy? Yeah, what's going on Chris? It's a pleasure to be here it's Monday. So it's throwing off stuff a little bit, you know, different time, you know, different day.

Uh, it's going to be a great episode. Yeah. You know, we, we ere Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, 2:00 PM. Eastern time. We're three days a week now, but we had the opportunity to get this team on a stream live at night. And we said, of course, let's go because mass lazy lions. I mean, we talk all the time about projects.

We talk about community. I mean, this is a big one and they're showing up in the chat. They've got 6,000 people in the discord, almost 50,000 followers on Twitter. And this isn't a new project. I mean, this minted back in August and this community is just getting stronger and stronger. Absolutely. So funny story, right.

We first found out about this community when we shot an episode and then the comments, you know, they started, you know, talking to them. We tweeted something out when Zynga, I don't know if you remember that Chris and went crazy. So when Zynga is now, so, you know, thank you guys for tuning in. It's going to be a great episode.

Yeah. I mean, the chat spoke, right. And also, I mean, mass, you saw it, right. We put out a couple of tweets sharing the preview of this video. Right. And the engagement on those tweets was insane. And that's how we know that there is going to be a lot of people here. A lot of people excited for this interview when we get that kind of crazy engagement on Twitter.

So if you guys are new to the roadmap, please like this video, please subscribe to Benzinga channel. Again. We air the roadmap Tuesday, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, 2:00 PM. Eastern time. Mass before we get into the interview. I think we need everyone in the chat to roar. Right? I want to see some roars out there and we can play our trailer and get started with this interview again, mass, I mean this minted at 0.05, we've got a floor price of over one it's sold out in its first day.

And again, this was back in. You know, so a different time than what we're seeing now. All right. So joining us on the roadmap today, we have Asher the co-founder of lazy lions and nine. The developer got to go ahead, bring these guys on the stream. What's going on here.

We've been doing that lately, where we do these trailers. We love putting those trailers out, you know, on Twitter, getting some engagement built up, but it's a great way to bring on our guests, right? It's almost like entrance music to play you guys onto the stream. So we're glad that you liked it. And we're super excited to have you guys on the stream and also this loyal community in the chat.

Right.

Super excited for this one. So yeah, that's definitely going to be exciting. And I just noticed now, as I'm looking at this. I came in a bit more casual with my hoodie and I see you've got the real Madrid shirt and all that.

All right, guys. Well, let's dive into some questions. Uh, before we get into Lacy lions, one of the first questions I always like to start with is. Tell us about your experience with NFTs prior to lazy lions, where you collectors, were you investors or was lazy lions, your first entry into the NFT space? Uh, let's start with nine on this one and, uh, hear from you.

Yeah, sure. Um, so NFTs for us was very interesting actually, because when we first started, we were very into sort of like. Um, so we used to play a lot of games when we were younger. Um, and that, and then we start to learn about, you know, crypto it first started when we got into cryptocurrencies. Uh, we know a little bit about that and it started to move into NFTs.

I personally had an action collected any NFTs at the time, but it just tied in like the way that I understood it was like, oh yeah, it's on a blockchain, you know, proof of ownership. There was rarely factor involved. And that just took me back to our younger days when we used to play games and it just resonated with us and we spoke about it and we're like, yeah, this is, this is the space.

And when you were, and then we started to work together and getting to the NFV space and start looking like building lazy lines from the ground up. Um, that's really how it started. I personally didn't collect any, I know Ash, I think you've, I think you've bought one, but yeah, he touch on that more. Yeah.

Ashley let's hear from you and FTS. Were you in before lazy lions? Yeah, for sure. Um, I mean, just.

Uh, code up different things and then, um, you know, taken to market. That was always a lot of fun. Um, with crypto, for me, um, I wasn't like a big crypto guy, like even during the. Um, it is that the, the vibe that really interested me, cause I saw the value of the metal offsets. It still makes a lot of sense, but it didn't hit me as like, oh, this is going to be a really big thing.

Cause I couldn't see it being like a cultural impact, but NFTs for me, it was beginning of this year. And as soon as I like started that. To me, I'm like, this is not going anyway. Like digital ownership. Like we grew up, you know, playing video games where you've spent all that time and energy and money as well, but you can never take that thing outside of the game.

And it's like, now you can actually do that. It's just, so for me, it's a no brainer. This is definitely not going anywhere. Um, one of my favorite entities actually like a full lights. In our bungalow and a bungalow is an NFC that we dropped where you can showcase your other entities. Um, it's actually forgotten ruins character.

Um, and this probably ties in with what nine was saying. You know, we'd be gay. This girl playing greenscape loved that game and that little guy. Like, he just reminds me so much of my childhood. I tell you, I don't know how much that could go up in value, but I don't think I'm ever going to sell it. So, um, I guess a collector before, before these lines, if you want to.

Yeah, it sounds like he's not going to sell it. Well, awesome love here in the video game. Talk as well. That's a common thing that we hear from different people behind NFT projects. Uh, you know, nine, you mentioned a little bit, uh, U2, uh, you know, getting involved together. Wondering if we can hear, or if we can hear more of the background, how did this team come to be and why the decision, you know, to, to launch lazy lions, uh, why a lion, why this type of artwork any a behind the scenes insight there?

Yeah, sure. So it was, it first started. I think it was actually my birthday when we first started discussing like, um, cryptocurrencies and. It's a lot of getting into it. And we were talking just back talking about different coins that we were interested in. Um, and then later down the track, I believe it was Ashley that came up to me was like, Hey man, have you heard of NFTs?

And I was like, yeah, I've heard of them. They pretty much just like JPEGs. Right. And he's like, yeah, but you can actually own, like, you could see those as NFTs and there's a very flexible and it all started resonating. And we're like, you know what? This makes sense. This makes sense to us being video game players, back in the days, it all like proof of ownership was a big thing for us being able to actually prove that you own this NFT just made sense.

Uh, just made sense to us and we thought, you know, just discussing it. And we sort of just branched out to the team as well. And they all understood the. And then pretty much from there, we just thought, you know what let's just think of, um, think of the next best thing. And with that with us, we always went back to our heritage.

So lions were pretty much a part of our heritage cause we were from an, a student. So that just resonated with us and we just yet went full throttle with that. Yeah. I mean, just a few other things as well. Like the whole Kings and Queensland, hopefully my audio is working better now. I'm using AirPods and I realized it was a different setting.

Um, like just growing up, we've always referred to each other as Kings, right. Like even just with mates around. Um, and I feel like that's something that's just hit off for you. What would the community, and it's probably a small thing. Like there might be people in the audience outside of the lazy lions community.

Coming to their king or queen, but I think it goes more than that. Like it ties in with that values, which is yes, we're all Kings and Queens, but no one's above anyone else. And I feel like that's something that resonates with a lot of people in web three. Um, so yeah, just a few little things like that.

Love that. So guys, so the floor is over one eighth, you guys have over 86 K into this school. And the 49 K on Twitter. So how do you guys personally measure the success of this project? Let's start with you Asher, if you can tell us a little bit more. Yeah. You know, it's, it's interesting. Like there are a few different ways you can, you can look at it.

Um, and that, and that we do track, right? Like obviously we've got our own KPIs that, you know, we had really, really smart people who know the ins and outs of, um, the whole economics behind it. Yeah. Tell us what metrics we should be looking. Um, and the community knows that, um, it, it ties in with that mission, which is pretty simply it's to become the, the biggest and best entity community there is.

That's, that's our mission. Um, obviously we're a bit biased. We think we've already got one of those. Um, but to be the biggest, it's very black and white, so that's what we're aiming for. Not to put anyone else down. I, I love some of the other projects that are out there, but that's just our mission anyways.

Right. Um, so that's one way that we track success. Um, That's small quantitative like qualitative, just speaking with community members, the five, particularly in this dip right now. I feel like for me, um, that's what really just reassures me that we're on the right path. Just, you know, you jump into the discord, you see what's being posted.

You have chats with community members. I try to say. Um, spend a fair bit of my time just having those, like one-on-one chats with community members. Um, I feel like that's a really important thing. Like just, um, like really like, Hey, like how are things going? Like, you know what he feels blocking us, like real deeper conversation.

Um, and that's just been like, it's not obviously like all positive, like they're always things that we can be improving on, but overall it feels like we're on the right track. So that's, that's the way we measure it. Yes. We've got data that having those conversations with community members, um, tells me we're on the right track.

I love that. Yeah, same. I like to hop in a discord and you know, you see the activity level. You know, there's been so many discourse throughout this period that are just dead, you know? Cause it's, we're kind of an embarrassed market, so there's no one, you know, having conversation, seeing you guys have this activity is amazing.

Uh, how about you a nine? What, what, how do you measure the success of the. Yeah. So similar to what, similar to what Ash said. I think for me personally, it's during this fast success of the project, just jumping into the discord and seeing how active it is on a, on a daily basis. Being able to hold these, um, conversations with, you know, my team members and, you know, moderators and community members.

And they're all, we're all on the same page. We all understand what the, you know, what we're here to do. And just, yeah, just seeing how active for me personally, because I'm more on the community is just how active it actually is. And seeing the word being spread out, spread out on Twitter, spread out in discord.

That really just resonates with me. So I love that. So can you guys tell us a little bit more about bungalows and how they, uh, you know, coming to the lazy lion world? Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Um, and so I guess when we started, right, like we had a few things, um, In mind for the roadmap. Um, and we didn't want to be different just for the sake of being different, but at the same time, it's, it was very obvious to us that if we just, I guess, copied what other projects were doing, like we could find our own way.

I think that that was a bit lane. Like that's not what we're about. Um, we're in a new space. I think there's a really good opportunity for us to build something unique and that's fun to us. Right. And it's something that was that we noticed during our research of NFTs, like at the beginning of the year was like, how do you show these things?

Yeah, that was the question I had. Um, and I spent a fair bit of time looking into that. I still feel like there's no great solution, um, in real life, if anyone has something like, you know, a great way to like show them off in frames or whatever the ambulance go down, I'd love to know. Cause I want to bring out obviously my line, um, and a few other odd faces.

Yeah, that's in the real world. And, um, you know, in the digital world, you know, how do you show these things off? I've seen a few like, um, social media websites, but nothing great. So just to us, it was like, well, Twitter ban is not being used. Profile photos are what if we could show off NFTs in the Twitter banner, um, and you know, sticking with our values as well, which is to be inclusive rather than.

Being exclusive, which I think a lot of other projects really focused on, you know, they're trying to build this exclusive community, um, and that works for them and that's great, but where we're different to that, you know, we're trying to, you know, we're aiming to be inclusive. So, um, sticking with that nature, it's like, you don't just have to show off your lazy lines and, um, without new bungalows DAP, which is on dot com, you can edit any bungle.

It, you have to include any NFT that you weren't. Even if it's not lazy lions related. So, um, yeah, that's, that's how it works. It's a bit of background as to why. That's awesome. So me and Chris liked to ask this question on to our guests, every episode, what are some of your favorite traits from the lazy lion?

So were there any unique traits that you particularly liked that no one knows about? Let's start with you nine. Can you tell us a little bit more, you know, which lions do you like the best or what traits do you like the most. That's a good question. That's that's a great question. Um, which ones are the ones that are being slept on?

Let's let you personally love, you know, honestly, I think I used to love the, I like actually like the, really like the lederhosen. Um, it is one of the ones that I had originally as my PFE or my line had it. You had the better hosing shirt out of my eyes, and I believe it had the halo just look very innocent.

So I was like, yeah, this one, this one resonates with me. Um, but I think that one's a little bit slipped on as well. It's, it's, you know, it is one of the rare ones as well, but you don't see too many people will actually actually with it. So

what about you Asher? Um, there's a couple big. Uh, a big party guide just because of the whole childhood thing, but, um, basically these, uh, these sorts of fire, I think, um, and I know I'll get in. Um, I'll get a bit of stick if I, Aaron, and he's proud of that team as well. He is a community manager. I know he loves the lazy hat.

Um, so that one should probably get some recognition as well. I think that one's probably a fan favorite. Yeah. That's been some call-outs for us, steak mouth in the chat as well. It looks like there's some fans of the meat and the steak out there in the chat right now that guy's going to get about 50 steak bouts.

So that's why, that's why, that's why. So there's a little bit of a bias going on. Oh man. Well, Sorry. There's a little bit of a little trait combo that I like as well. So if you have like a, if there's a scratch body and they have a ripped shirt, you can see the scratches underneath the shirt, which is what just comes out really nice.

So it's a little thing that I sort of go for as well. I like the nice, nice call out there. What about you guys? Yeah. You know, I seeing them, I like the steak right there, you know, and again, I, I know there's someone in the chat, you know, bias towards that, but I liked the steak. I liked the party hat. I know there was the halo, um, you know, some of the different, uh, the headpiece traits.

Um, I liked, but I also have seen some real clean ones too. Uh, you know, that are impressive. Uh, what about. Um, football Jersey, you know, big football guy. And then I do like, so I do like anything theorem based from any collection. I'm always trying to find like, is there a theme chain or anything like that?

I saw you guys having it there in business shirt. I like that one as well. So yeah, exactly. That one right there. So always those little subtle pieces. I think that's cool. Definitely. All right. Well, you guys also have roar words for your owners to reward the community members. Can you tell us a little bit about.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Um, this is probably what been one of the biggest, uh, I guess like catalysts of the project, particularly at the beginning, uh, at the early stage of, sorry. To put it simply, uh, rewards is what it sounds like it's a rewards program exclusively for lazy lion holders. So this is one of the advantages, or I guess, utility of being a lion NFT holder.

Um, every month you're eligible for rewards in the form of eight by completing activities that, uh, That benefit the project. So, you know, community engaging activities and part of those, you know, they change from month to month, but one of those might be, you know, setting your profile photo or on Twitter to your lazy lion entity.

Um, and you know, I feel the little things like that, and that might be why you see, you know, quite a few, um, you know, about how those changing their profile photo, um, to the lines, particularly the, the early stages, but what we found now, it's really interesting, right. Um, And I should probably explain why we did this, but what we've seen is like, it was a good reason.

It was a reason why a lot of, um, people I guess, came to the project. Um, but what's happened now is like, it's becomes so insignificant where they just, they love their lines so much. They don't really care about rewards anymore. Like, that's a lot of the feedback that we get is like, yeah, that was really nice at the beginning, but it's like now I love my profile photo so much.

I'm not gonna change it. Even if you would've paid me to. So it's like, it's sort of changed, um, how they, how they view it. Um, but I think it's important to like, to explain why we did this. Um, it's sort of like a marketing expense, I guess if we, if we look at it that way, like from the project's point of view, like I know a lot of other collections and then this isn't me bashing anyone else.

Go down the route, which is the easy route of, you know, paying like an influencer to change their profile better and, you know, paying a big amount, a large amount of Psalm, one influence, a change, that profile photo. Great. We saw that as a big crunch and we're like, is there another way to do this? Um, but obviously we still need to do marketing.

Like obviously the project needs to be marketed. Um, and we're like, what if instead of just giving it to one celebrity or influencer. What if we just give that to the community and instead of just one big amount to one person, we just spread it out to the community. I'm like, well, that ties in with the whole, you know, web three N model.

So that's how we went. And we just created a system that allows us to do that. Essentially the community gets rewarded for, um, marketing the, the project. And I feel like that's worked one just for us. Yeah. I mean, that's my, that's my opinion, but I think, you know, if you jump on Twitter and you just look at all the activity from lazy lion holders, it feels like it's sort of evolved beyond that as well.

This is awesome, dude, this is some alpha for anybody looking to start a project. Seriously. I noticed that there's your marketing right there. And if you're looking to create an NFT project, yeah. I mean, what a great way, love that. And, you know, look at the numbers you guys have too in building the community and the community.

I mean, being so loyal months after the launch. So clearly that rewards is working. Um, I saw a picture on Twitter. That you guys had a meetup in New York city, some lions holders. Um, were you guys involved in that? Have you met any, uh, lions holders and, uh, you know, talk to us about future events for lion?

Hey, the Kings and I wish we were that. So where, um, we're still in lockdown here and study CD. Um, so I think we're just now starting to get out of lockdown, but as soon as we can fly out, like desperately, we'll be meeting up with laser line holders, but no, that was community led. Um, a lot of, a lot of really good feedback actually from that one.

Um, everybody seemed to really enjoy themselves. Um, but yeah, that was a little community, but we'll definitely look at doing more of that. Um, as soon as we're able to fly out. That's awesome. I mean, showing the initiative by the community there, I mean, that's something we don't see out of every project, uh, doing these, you know, these meetups.

So a, another great sign of how big this community really is. Um, I did see, you know, that there are quite a few celebrities that also own lazy lions. Um, that's something we talk about a lot on the show. A lot of athletes does Bryant, Josh Hart, Seth Curry, uh, Tyrese Haliber and also we've got Jake Paul John rule.

Uh, talk to us a little bit, you know, I know you guys didn't go after all these celebrities, what does it mean to see some of them get involved in the project in terms of validation going forward? Man, it's really cool. Uh, it's really cool, but you. Uh, just in general, just with the community, like what I know it's sort of gone away from the question, but just what we love, 4,600 holders, like jumping into the, or like I sometimes find, must find myself just going like, well, is this sort of like a dream?

Like you sorta just have to step back. You're like, well, I'm just going to wake up. And that damn like went back in August. This never happened. Or just, you know, continuing on with whatever else we're doing. Um, so it's sort of surreal like that just with the community, which is a really cool thing. But, um, no, I mean like the celebrities in the.

Uh, the athletes, um, yeah, that's been all organic or organic. Sorry. I'm like nothing from us anyways. Like the, the teams specifically bringing in those ones. Um, but yeah, I think it's really cool. Like, it just goes to back, I guess they had belief in either the project and the community or, you know, it's probably because they resonate with the art as well.

Um, like from a few of the things that I've seen. Um, which I guess makes sense. You know, everyone feels like, you know, a lot of people feel like they're aligned, particularly athletes. Uh, um, yeah. It's, uh, Awesome. I got a highlight Tyrese Halliburton for a minute. Cause we talked about him last week on the show because the big news was that he, uh, wore a pair of sneakers during an NBA game, featuring his board ape on his shoe.

So my question for you is, you know, has there been any talks of Tyrese Haliber and having his lion on his shoe? Is that something you guys would love to see? And what has the reaction been from the community of that possible? I think that's so cool. Hey, like now that we're seeing it as he's going into a culture like that.

Yeah. That's um, no, that's awesome. Um, I got a lot of respect for board apps as well. I mean, they sort of paved the way for a lot of projects out outta here right now. I think it'd be really cool if you wanted to do something like that. And with the lazy lines, I mean, I dunno, how's the community feel about that?

That guys in the chat, let us know. I mean, I'm seeing a comment here when lion shoe, uh, you know, if that's something you guys would love to see an NBA game with lazy lion, uh, sneakers being worn, uh, you know, I know we got a ton of press about the board apes shoes last week, and it was really cool to just see an NFT, you know, on a shoe in real life.

There it is on screen. Um, you know, and I love her and changed his shoes. Uh, you know, pretty much every game. So I have a feeling, you know, that he's not done and there's his lazy lion there on screen. So, uh, can we get that on a shoe? I think that'd be pretty sweet. Yeah, that's awesome. You called it Chris.

Let's see it let's make it happen. The crowd would be roaring. David says great comment there, Dave. All right, guys. So back to the discord really quick. So again, you guys have over 80 K discord members, you know, I'm sure we've all been crazy. Discords where they're spamming and just out of control. What do you guys do to manage the discord?

Now we've got a great team, great team, and that's, um, you know, not just, uh, uh, in just the community managers that we have in there, but even the moderators as well. And I think anyone in the community with. Um, you know, a lot of people I could shout out individually, but yeah, the mods, the community managers, um, I support team and even just like the RA, we've got like different roles.

Like we have one called like a role, uh, Royal king, sorry. And these are like community members that are sorta like self appointed by the community itself. It's funny. It's like we don't even choose. It's like, it's very obvious it should be this role. And they're the ones that are sort of. The community outside of the actual moderators.

And I feel like the community itself just does a great job of like, self-governing like if somebody comes in and sends somebody that something that they shouldn't it's very quickly resolved by itself, which is just a beautiful thing. Um, so it's like, even though we, you know, the more and more we scale up and grow, um, it hasn't been too much of the.

Um, but yeah, that's, that's how it sort of does it, so it doesn't get, like, it gets crazy at times, for sure. Especially on like, you know, Lauren's days and like rewards, especially. And we've got that one coming up this Friday. Um, when the, uh, Downey's sent out, it gets pretty, did pretty well on that day because it's a bit of fun, but, uh, now it's all governed quite well.

I think that's awesome. How active are you guys? Both in the discord. And do you have any like favorite channels in there? I'm probably a bit too active in the, um, in the disc, like considering, like I'm also, I'm like leading up like the product team and obviously like, uh, just trying to keep my eyes on everything else in the, in the project.

Um, but man, it's just so addicting being in the discordant. Like what do you, I guess it's just like, it's hard not to be what up in the, in the moment. And then you're sitting there for like half an hour, just chatting back and forth with everybody in the. And the community. I think you get FOMO too. Like you want to scroll back and see what you've missed.

You said this falling through your phone for a little bit to try to catch up with everybody and what they're saying, but in terms of favorite channel, I would have to say it's probably, um, it's probably, it's probably cabana bar. That's our, that's our main channel for lazy line holders. Um, so it's sort of, you know, it's only available to them.

Um, but when that channel starts to pick up, it's really fast to pick up on. There's a lot of great discussions that, um, Uh, so yeah, you learn a lot and it's, it's great speaking with the community, uh, specifically lazy line holders. And then, yeah, that would be probably my favorite channel. I'd say there's lots of learning.

Yeah, love that. So we've seen a lot of discord hacks over the last couple of weeks, you know, discord, Twitter, hacks, you know, different kinds of schemes going on there. Are you guys taking any precautions towards, you know, protecting the discord? Uh, let's start with you. Yeah. Sure. So recently we've done like a, an audit of our bots just to ensure that there's no, no leftover bots that are lurking, that we sort of don't need.

Um, majority of our web hooks. I know they can be either a bit risky, um, in regards to, yeah. So I know that one of the disciplines I apparently got, you know, got it. They got into it because of a web hook. So we started to, you know, just review the web books, make sure they're all clean. Make sure there's nothing we don't know about.

Um, we've started to leave sticky bots, uh, sticky notes in each of our. I know that sometimes you can get DMS from fake collab land. Can you try to verify your NFTs? So we have sticky notes that, um, you know, just say, make sure, like, just confirm correct collab, land, which other scams, it leads the country, uh, of that channel so nobody can see like, so no collab then can sort of see who's typing, you know, exclamation mark join to verify that.

And if they, so just little things here and there to reach clean up the discord, make sure there's nothing that's sort of, you know, leftover to ensure the safety of the community. That's what we've been doing, just to make sure that nothing happens. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Pretty much that. And um, I mean, cause our discord is like so important to us as well, right?

Like it's such like it's front and center of our. Um, like the project strategy, right? It's like, that's what we're really trying to grow and build a community. Cause like we've always said that like the project is the community, the community is the project. And like we're making a, we're making our bed on the discolored platform.

Um, that's not to say it's perfect. Like I feel like there's, you know, there's a few things that I, you know, I'd love to suggest as a disco, um, team members and just, you know, things that I think would benefit the. Um, overall, particularly as entity and crypto is becoming more and more of a thing that's using discord.

Um, cause like we've let so many important, um, possibly it's like we've got like a professional networking section. Um, cause it's funny. It goes, it's sort of gone away from the question, but it sort of ties into like what's the value in an annotate? Um, like that's a question that I've, you know, I had asked her a few times basically for people that aren't encrypted, like why would you get an NFTA?

Like what do you actually get out of it? Yeah. Uh, like one of the most obvious things is the community. And some people just look at that and go, oh, like, what is that? It's like, well, like, you know, it's just because they're cartoon characters. I think the stigma is like, people think it's it's little children or like fat kids in their mother's basements that are buying these entities.

Right. And it's like, that's not the, that's definitely not the case. Right. Like, Like we're speaking with, you know, mid like C level executives with doctors, with lawyers, like whatever their industry they're in, you know, our reporters, like people at the top of their industry, right. Are like really smart, intelligent people.

So it's like, um, how much does it cost to get into like a professional networking? Um, uh, you know, like, oh, like, you know, how will, what's the cost of that to be a part of that? Create those kinds of connections. Right. And that's something we've doubled down on. So we have like a whole professional networking section and in the discord, um, like we have gaming sections, um, marketplace, uh, like all of these other things.

So it's really critical to us. And security is really important as well. Um, those hacks are pretty scary. So it's just things that were, yeah. Like what, what nine said, those are some of the things that we're doing to make sure that, that Allstate. Uh, secure love that. So you actually just led me on to the next question I had for you guys.

I'm going to have a list of pull up this chart here. So someone posted this in the tweet and the tweet last night, and it's interesting because it breaks down all the demographics, right? So there's, you know, 4.6 owners. Yeah. So this is really interesting, right? Gender, you know, 92% male, 8% female, top three age groups, 26 to 35 leads.

Uh, 36 to 45 is second. See, I wouldn't have guessed that 19 to 20 five-year-olds is third. Uh, this one to 53% are married. 44% are single 60%, no kids, 33%, one to two kids. Can you guys tell us a little bit more about all these stats, man? This is really cool. Yeah, it's really interesting. I think some of those numbers would love for them to be a little bit different, um, particularly cause we have.

And I think if you compare it to the average would probably be a bit better. It's basically in terms of, you know, having more or, um, more females in the, in the project being inclusive as obviously one of our core values rather than being exclusive. Um, but this was just part of a survey that we, we did a while back, um, Uh, yeah.

And it's interesting, like target market is, you know, 25 to 45 year old males, obviously high disposable income as well. Um, but, uh, yeah, it's definitely interesting. We thought other brands would be, you know, would love to see that kind of information, particularly now as we've got the collectibles, um, you know, probably sneak thinking a bit too much of that.

Um, but just to look at about that, but that's something that we've got coming out. Um, Quite soon. Uh, and that, I think it's an opportunity for, you know, we've had so many requests to do like collabs, um, you know, so many projects that have hit us up and we're like, Hey, can we do something? And we just haven't done anything with them strictly because we just haven't wanted to pay like any influences.

That's not been our strategy on the really cringe. Um, it just goes against that values. So this is an opportunity for us to actually partner up with brands in a meaningful way. So that's why we shared that. That data. Um, and I think it's quite valuable daughter to, to anyone in any entities, but yeah, that's, that was the reasoning behind it.

Awesome. So one of the things we've talked a lot about on the roadmap, obviously NFTs have seen huge interest this year. And we also have news that Coinbase a leading crypto platform is launching their own NFT marketplace. So they actually pulled their audience asking for favorite NFT communities. And of course the lions community.

Came through and roared and Coinbase actually retweeted. And they said roar louder for the people in the back. Please. Uh, tell us what this means. Uh, you know, have you been in talks with Coinbase at all or is this just validation that Coinbase sees the large community here? Um, that's one of those things where I probably shouldn't say too much, maybe just because I can't say too much, but I think, yeah, that might be enough there just to say that you can't comment.

So maybe we got it. We got it out of Yeti. But I think it's really cool. All right. I think it's really cool and it's really exciting time. So we'll see what, um, you know, we'll see what happens with the platform. And then we will got a lot of hopes. Um, but at the same time, you know, like we've got to be a little bit skeptical.

Like there's a bit of pressure on them to make sure everything comes out. Well, it's not a guarantee or anything. Like we saw what happened with like Google plus, right. Um, just because you're the biggest doesn't mean it's going to be a guarantee, but, um, I think the fact that they moving into entity.

Entities and they're focusing on it as is extremely bullish. Right. Um, so I've got, I've got high hopes and they got my support. Love at Google plus. Wow. Take taken me back there. I definitely, I definitely had a Google plus account where I would share links to articles that I wrote to try to get increased page views, but yeah, goo Google plus a diet and unfortunate death there.

But yeah, that's a phrase I haven't heard in a while. Um, I think we have AR in the chat and I believe there was a mention of a tattoo. We do have a picture and a video of this tattoo. Uh, again, we, we talked to a lot of NFTE teams, right? And w we occasionally see strong engagement and we do not see too many tattoos.

So tell us a little bit about, you know, uh, why this tattoo came to be, um, looks like AR you know, called out for the floor price and then got the tattoo. Is this something you guys do about at a time and how did the community. Man. I think everybody loves it. Like look at how clean that thing. Like man, whoever the tattoo was like.

Yeah. He's, that's a really good word. But um, no, that was all right. That was something he called out back when we first, when we first launched it, I remember seeing that and it was like, um, did he say it's like, when were you reached to a, I'm going to get my live. And I remember looking at that and like, obviously, like I'm extremely bullish on what Wade I've got completely.

Like from the early days, I was like, sure, like, you know, we can do, we can achieve whatever we set our minds to. Right. And I still believe that. Um, so I was like this, guy's going to have to get a tattoo of his life. That is a sweet looking tattoo. Uh, I mean, loved watching that video. So clean, so shout out to the artists too.

Um, but yeah, I mean, seeing someone get a tattoo, I mean, that's great validation for, for the longevity of this project and the community. So, uh, an AR in the chat, I mean, a nice looking tattoo and thanks for joining us for the stream today. Uh, along with the tattoo talk and validation, another area where we've seen NFT projects, you know, connect with their community.

As we just had Halloween and I saw some lazy lions, Halloween costumes. Um, you know, is that something that you guys, uh, you know, called for, did a contest at all? Or is this just people happen in because they wanted to dress as their lion. Yeah, this was just, this was purely community-based. Um, when I actually saw that image and retweeted it on the main Twitter account, that was absolutely awesome that people were getting so involved.

I really liked it. I'd love that lazy hat as well. It looks so clean. I want it personally, but it was, yeah, that was just completely community driven in hold a competition. They just went out of their way and yeah, it was just beautiful to see. That's awesome. Uh, yeah, I mean, what a cool Halloween costume.

That is a sweet looking hat too. Um, but keep that in mind, any lions in the chat, if you're looking for a Halloween costume next year, I know it's a year away, but start planning to work on your lion costume now. Um, so you can be ready. Uh, you mentioned a little bit about collectibles, right? So we got a little bit of a teaser.

One of the things we are called the roadmap after all is we always try to hear about, you know, what's next. So I know you guys can't share too much, but can we get a little bit more information on collectibles and maybe what's ahead for lion holders. Nine, if you don't have a problem. I mean, why not? Like I've got a lot of respect for these show, so, yeah.

All right. So essentially this ties in without values and mission as well. Right. Which is obviously like our value is one of our values is, you know, rather than being an exclusive community, which you don't know a lot of other. Uh, you know, focusing on being, which is fine and like that works really well.

And I've got a lot of respect for a lot. A lot of other projects, I would never bash another one, but, um, like ours is to be inclusive rather than exclusive. So, um, we're trying to build obviously the biggest and it's the community, that's our mission. And part of that is bringing new people that aren't necessarily in entities right now.

And I feel like we sort of shoulder that responsibility as well. Um, you know, just from what other people have told me, it seems like we kind of, one of the leading projects now, at least like in the top, you know, I think like on open slate, like top 40 or all time trader those types of things. So I feel like we have a responsibility to actually, um, you know, to try and lead the space and, and bring in new people into the community rather than just, you know, those existing members who already have entities.

And I think the challenge is. Because it's still so early, like the interfaces and everything, it's not super easy to get into it. Like I just, the act of having to create a wallet and minting and gas, it's sort of like, you know, I said, it's like, if you're telling a friend or family member of someone that you know, coworker about entities and they're not in it already, it's like, Hey, we've got a lazy lion.

This community is amazing. Oh, cool. How much is it? And he's like one eighth and I look up one eight. They're like what? That's not how I'm going to get started. Right. So it's like, okay, how can we say. I have those, um, people still become a part of the community without having to fork out that much straightaway.

And that's where this sort of referral program collectibles thing came to mind. So essentially what it is is every community member or every new person that you invite to the community, all they have to do is join discord and they will get a pack of tokens for free that they can claim on our website.

Um, and this pack will be a random, you know, it'll be a set of cards. Um, you know, like we had to have a lane, next one will be, um, uh, like, uh, Thanksgiving. Right. Which is what we've got planned. So that's probably a sneak peek there more than I should. Um, so there'll be, you know, a set of eight, eight, uh, Thanksgiving cards.

Um, and every pack that you open, you'll get two random ones. And the idea is complete the set and you enter to win a lazy lines. Um, so this way, anyone who's not in the community already can just join up, join the discord, get a pack. And if they want to get more packs, they just invite more people. And we cover the gas company.

These tokens appear on open. See they can list them free without having to pay any gas that's all covered. So someone could come in, not pay a single cent, get one of the rare tokens, list them and then, you know, make a profit or try and complete the set and win a prize. Um, and I think it just ties in, like we said, without values gives them an opportunity to experience what minting is.

Um, and then, you know, bringing in the ecosystem and understand the true benefits of web three. So. A bit of a lengthy explanation, but yeah, that's, that's what the collectibles ideas. We appreciate the background there. Yeah. When's the launch. Yep. So right now that is in, um, we've got like a soft bed or internally.

Um, that's scheduled for launch, uh, next week, next week. So we've got rewards this week. Oh, wow. Is that a big thing? And then we've got this coming out next week. That's awesome. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, pretty excited. You'll definitely see. Um, I think this will, yeah, we'll see how it goes, but I can see it having a pretty positive effect.

I think so. Yeah. I, we we've seen some of these card ones do well too, and that's a great way. Like you said, to bring new people into the community and also the referral program, uh, you know, I'm a big fan of that. So. You know, uh, we wish you luck with that. And thanks for breaking that news here on the roadmap, it's always exciting to, you know, hear what's next from these projects.

And, you know, I think that, uh, community out there is loving. Absolutely. I mean, that's amazing bringing new people in is the biggest part of the game. That's that's really awesome. Uh, let's take it to, we have some questions from the chat here. Um, the first question that I saw earlier in the interview today, we had a question from Brendan bald.

Uh, he's asking, do you guys have any plans or hopes to develop the IP into film or TV or even comic books?

So the cool thing is I've already seen a few projects do it. Um, and I think they're just, you know, they hold the, uh, lazy lines and, uh, feed themselves once you hold it, you're able to go and create these things yourself. Um, I suppose things like we're open to it, but there's no immediate plans for it, but I've seen a few cool things going around on Twitter.

Yeah. I love that. Um, let's see. Do we have any more questions from the chat here, Chris, that we want to think we got most of the questions answered. Well, you know, uh, people loved hearing the Coinbase conversation again, and people loving this roadmap talk. Um, we're seeing merge now asked from Morgan. Um, you guys, I think you, do you have some merch already or pens for Merck in the works?

Uh, we've got much in the works. So, um, you know, I've seen, what's been being worked on, um, I think the community's going to love what we, what we release with this. Um, so yeah, not, not quite yet, but that's in the works. It's coming out soon. And then mass. How about that? A question there from a breezy in the chat, uh, that, that could be a fun one.

Oh, yeah. So when Arizona ice tea collab, can you guys tell us more about that? Is that a rumor or, you know, is this question coming out of nowhere? Um, yeah, I mean, there's nothing like official going on. Um, what's nice. Is it sort of ties back into the collective. Um, to cause now, like again, if there are any brands listening as well, I feel like there's definitely an opportunity for the brands who are wanting to get into entities, particularly with like more established projects.

Um, at least for us, this is an opportunity for us to actually partner up with brands in a way that's actually beneficial for everyone involved. So, um, you know, if we were doing those, you know, biweekly, um, releases of collectible cards and one of them. The Arizona theme, just for the sake of argument. Um, but yeah, not nothing official, but we're definitely open.

Perfect. Yeah, I did see Arizona as one of the owners mentioned in the, uh, celebrity spotlight, um, on that cool graphic and the facts that we shared. So I think that's where maybe that rumor comes from. Um, but we'll wait. We'll wait to hear more details from you guys in the future. Well, I think that's going to do it for today's interview, you know, nine Asher big.

Thank you for both of you coming on our show. I know it's early morning where you guys are at, um, your flexibility with doing that. Also shout out to the latest science community. I mean, mass, look at them. They're in full force here in the chat during this whole interview. So a shout out to lazy.

Absolutely. I mean, this has honestly been one of the biggest communities I've seen and I'm personally measured by the Twitter. You know, I see on my Twitter, the profile picture, I mean, I see a lion, I would say one out of every 10. If that, I mean, you guys are killing it. I can't wait to have you guys come on again and just, you know, do some updates in the.

Yeah, man, this is a lot of fun. Um, I have like, everyone's been waiting for it for a while. So this is tape spot. It went by a lot quicker than I thought it would. you know, but, uh, yeah, not, King's definitely out there doing this. Yeah, well, we will, we will have to have you guys back on. Um, so thanks again, nine and Asher, uh, before I let everyone go here, uh, mass, we do not have a show tomorrow.

Um, I know I said we're going Tuesday, Wednesdays and Thursdays, 2:00 PM. Eastern time. Benzinga is hosting. PAC awards. And actually there's going to be some awards given in crypto and NFT categories. So if you're interested in the space, we have FinTech awards, airing live on YouTube, beginning at 9:00 AM, Eastern time and going all day.

And also if you're into crypto, we do have our Monday night show. After this show is done with, through there, he will be talking some metaverse crypto plays. Um, so I know I'll be sticking around to hear more from Ruelle on. But yeah. Thanks for everyone for tuning in and yeah. Thank you. I mean, let's chat, they're so appreciative to mass here.

I am trying to tell them. Thank you. And they're all thinking. Yeah. Thank you guys. If you guys liked this content, you know, we're, Benzinga, there's, we're starting to test this out. We want to bring more NFT content, make sure to like subscribe, share this content. We're going to continue to bring more of it as the NFC community expands as well.

So thank you guys for watching. We appreciate it. Definitely. So stay tuned, everyone for a root welds report talking crypto plays, and we will see everyone on the roadmap on Wednesday, 2:00 PM, Eastern time. Take care, everyone. And thanks again.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-roadmap/donations

How To Buy NFTs

What is a Non-Fungible Token NFT

How To Make Your Own NFT

Best NFT Investments

Episode Summary

On today's Roadmap - NFT downtrend, floor prices on several projects are down as Ethereum skyrockets... Kylie Jenner blocked by Bored Ape Yacht Club???

PLUS the latest NFT news, BAYC x Rolling Stones, BAYC Apefest, and more!

Hosts:

Chris Katje

Maz

https://bitclout.com/u/maz

Follow The Roadmap on Twitter!

Disclaimer: All of the information, material, and/or content contained in this program is for informational purposes only. Investing in stocks, options, and futures is risky and not suitable for all investors. Please consult your own independent financial adviser before making any investment decisions.

Unedited Transcript:

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-roadmap/donations

How To Buy NFTs

What is a Non-Fungible Token NFT

How To Make Your Own NFT

Best NFT Investments

Episode Summary

The Cryptodads are BACK for another exclusive interview! Grab a cold one, sit back in your recliner, and listen in as your favorite Dads talk about Cryptomoms, Roadmap 2.0, and MORE!

Guests:

CryptoDads NFT: https://twitter.com/CryptoDadsNFT

Anthony Jay: https://twitter.com/NFTViking

JCrypto: https://twitter.com/DegenApeLife

https://opensea.io/collection/thecryptodads

Hosts:

Chris Katje

Maz

https://bitclout.com/u/maz

Follow The Roadmap on Twitter!

Disclaimer: All of the information, material, and/or content contained in this program is for informational purposes only. Investing in stocks, options, and futures is risky and not suitable for all investors. Please consult your own independent financial adviser before making any investment decisions.

Unedited Transcript:

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-roadmap/donations

How To Buy NFTs

What is a Non-Fungible Token NFT

How To Make Your Own NFT

Best NFT Investments

Episode Summary

Joining us today, Mig, artist for SVS, Bored Ape Yacht Club, & Hall of Fame Goat Lodge. and Woof!

Follow SVS on Twitter:

Mig: https://twitter.com/notthetechguy

SVS: https://twitter.com/SVSNFT

The Sneaky Vampire Syndicate consists of 8,888 Vampires living their best life in The Lair - away from any burning sunlight or pesky Vampire Hunters.

https://opensea.io/collection/sneaky-vampire-syndicate

Hosts:

Chris Katje

Maz

https://bitclout.com/u/maz

Follow The Roadmap on Twitter!

Disclaimer: All of the information, material, and/or content contained in this program is for informational purposes only. Investing in stocks, options, and futures is risky and not suitable for all investors. Please consult your own independent financial adviser before making any investment decisions.

Unedited Transcript:

Hey everyone. Welcome to the roadmap. Benzing. As new NFT show, we've had some great teams already interviewed in past episodes.

The teams behind pixel vault, art blocks, the Vogel collective robots, that dose pound only force crypto dads, dizzy dragons, sub doc, and more. We've also done an NFT giveaway. Stay tuned for future NFT giveaways coming soon. We've got a great show today. Sneaky vampire syndicate joins us to talk about their project and what's ahead.

This is the road. Hey guys. Yeah. As you heard me say, the roadmap Benzing as new NFT show, uh, airing Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays 2:00 PM. Eastern time. We've had some amazing interviews with some big teams and we have another one coming today. Let me bring on my cohost mass mass. It's been a long time, but it's great to see.

What's up Chris we're back, man. It's been forever. It's been forever. It has no shows last week, but the big news, of course, we're expanding. We've got three shows this week, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. Um, so we've got some big interviews this week and I mean, man, we we've talked to some great teams, some projects with some big followings.

And of course today we have SVS on and they have a huge community, right? I mean, we're talking, uh, 45,000 followers on Twitter, over 38,000 in their discord. Uh, you know, looking forward to, to SBS today as. Exactly. Yeah. I'm a big fan of the project. I know we talked about it. We mentioned it before they meant it out.

Um, you know, how big the project could be. So it's great to see it come along in the last couple of weeks or so. Um, but yeah, man, I'm excited for this interview. I'm excited to be back. Let's get empties back and running. Yeah, definitely. I mean, this, this is a big one to talk about, but yeah, we have seen NFTs pull back a little bit, which we'll get into later with our news and headlines.

Also. I do see a comment in the chat from Randall about my mic. Thank you. I did just fix it. So I, it should sound better. I switched over to the right mix, so we should be good to go. Uh, before we bring on a team from SVS, I know let's bring on the team. So joining us on the show today, we have Wolf the lead developer, and we have MIG the artists behind SPS and also an artist from boredom yacht club and hall of fame goes welcome to the show guys.

What's going on, sir? Thanks for having us. Thank you for having us. It's a great, yeah, of course. I mean, what a cool project we've been talking about this one for a while, we talked about it with our Halloween NFT focused show once before, um, we got vampires now we got bats. So we got a lot to get into and of course get into, you know, what's ahead.

Right? We're always looking forward to the roadmap after all. It is the name of our show. But before we get into SVS, just wondering, you know, if a Wolf and Meg, if you guys can give us, you know, your history in the NFT space prior to this project, I'll start with you Wolf. Well, personally, I, um, my introduction and thesis it's been a while actually, but I've never made my.

But I've been involved in development of with like a software program and stuff like that too, for a decade now, um, crypto since 2014, but I, uh, I've always had this interest in salute in a decentralized programming because it's like this whole new, all new, um, experience because you have to make sure everything's secure.

Everything can be exploited, stuff like that. So, yeah, I've been, um, I've been buying entities like, like for a while now, just, uh, messing around with them. And, uh, personally I think it's more than just art. Um, I've also developed a ticketing system, for example, with NFTs. Um, so I think, and if these can be just more than AR and that's something I really want to go.

Perfect and MIG, you know, we know you as an artist for board ape yacht club and hall of fame goat. Can, can you tell us, you know, uh, what was your experience with NFTs before those projects and then talk about creating the art for those projects prior to SVS? Um, so prior to BC, I didn't even know what an NFC was.

Um, I've been a freelance illustrator for most of my life. Uh, so almost 20 years now, but, um, yeah, I had no idea what an NFT was. I didn't know, uh, anything about crypto. Uh, so it was only after, um, Basey started really taking off that, uh, I delved into it and, um, started reading up on NFTs and, uh, yeah. You know, uh, it kind of boggles the mind, how quickly things, uh, develop in the NFD space.

And, um, yeah, I guess, uh, so creating the artwork, uh it's uh, SVS is pretty much the first project, uh, worked on NFT project. I worked on where I had most, uh, the most control over what's being, uh, presented. Um, I mean the guys came up and I came to me with a list of traits and, uh, and they just, um, told me to do whatever I, you know, uh, just, uh, go wild.

Uh, they really didn't want to, um, You know, just, uh, hold me back. They just wanted me to go crazy with my imagination and yeah. Sort of came up with, but with, uh, with goat lodge and, um, Basey, I was on the more direction there. So, uh, yeah. Awesome. So Wolf talk to us, you know, how did the idea of SVS come to be and you know, how were you able to bring a well-known artists like MIG onto the team?

Yeah, so, um, initially the idea was to create an empty, uh, well, we didn't have the idea to create an empty, but, uh, the other team members are friends of mine for a couple of years already. And one of them introduced me to me and like the whole group. And then we, uh, cause we were thinking of making something crypto anywhere like a project.

And we were, we like building like everyone in my. My friend group is like, they, there, they have already had jobs in different businesses, different niches, stuff like that. Like community management, um, of course development. We have, um, we have two developers and a UX designer, like a full blown team. Like we've known them for years already.

And then we got introduced to me. Um, of course he's a great artist with a great track record. So we thought, oh, that that's a perfect combo with the team. We have to create something, something special and what makes it that he had full control over the creative aspect. That's something we really wanted to keep because we didn't want to limit his creative.

For example. So, so that was one of our main key points to focus on to just give me every possibility he wants to. And then he gave us like a couple sketches in the beginning and we select the one we all like liked the most. And that's how we started. We see. Perfect. So, Meg, I mean, you touched on the, the artwork a little bit and, you know, having more control versus prior projects, you were on.

Talk to us about, you know, the inspiration, the artwork here. Is this something that, you know, came to you immediately was that, you know, a trial and error process, um, how many different, uh, you know, uh, variations of the vampire did you come up with? Okay. Uh, I came up with about 12 different vampires that are presented to the team and, uh, eventually set along the one that you see now, but, uh, the inspiration for it, uh, I guess.

Um, Bruce, Tim is a huge inspiration. Uh he's he's the guy who created, uh, the Batman animated series in the nineties. Um, so basically just a goofy looking vampire that you would, uh, that goes well with like a Saturday morning cartoon, uh, yeah. That something goofy, not too serious. And, uh, hopefully something that appeals to a lot of people love that.

Um, so there was an SVS and eight, eight collab that launched on Monday for, you know, it at eight holders and SVS holders. Can you guys tell us a little bit more about that? You know, how the project came to be? And I know there's like a staking or burning mechanism behind it as well. Um, so yeah, a today is, um, we've been talking to him for a while and he's invested in our project.

Uh, he also has a whole nerd. He's like a good friend of ours. So you can say, um, Yeah. So the PR the idea between the collaboration with eight and eight is that, uh, we've dropped in a unique piece of art by me. And it's basically, uh, the sort of vampire model we use for our, um, profile pictures, but then also with a little bit of eight, eight style with it.

So he's like all about this magic stuff. Like, um, like there, the X stuff, like angels, like eight and eight, stuff like that. And then we dry, we basically made it so you can claim one of these per SVS, token, you hold and eight and eight Genesis token. And then we added a game fighting aspect where you basically, you can burn through them to go to next year and then there's rewards for the seven and eight.

So, um, so that's the entire collaboration is basically reborn two communities together this way, because they have to work together to get the 120. Love that. And if you get the 128, what is the reward? I think it's a, one of one drawing, if I'm correct. Or can you tell us a little more, more about that and sort of rewards is you, um, you basically have white lists for next generation.

Um, also you get access for the first aid to the top tier. I think it's that. And then you get access to the ADA Genesis group, like his inner circle group, where you get always, uh, collaborations. Like you can get them for free. And then also the one of one. Yeah, I think. And did we have some, yeah, I think that, was it the one of one, a white list and access to his gender Genesis inner circle.

Yeah. So I'm in the 8, 8, 8, uh, discord. And I saw that a couple of people from the SVS, they collapse, they joined forces to be able to death the 128. So that's cool to see the community come together and, you know, yeah, definitely not something we want to do because community is one of our biggest, uh, key points.

Love that. So Halloween just was over. So there was a contest derivative. Right. So can you guys tell us a little bit more about some of your favorite derivative derivatives that you saw of the SVS, uh, uh, drawings, um, made you pick those, right? Uh, yeah, I picked some of them. Uh, this one, we really love this one.

Uh, I mean, most of the, um, most of the, uh, competitions we've had have been just drawings, but this was special because it was a 3d sculpture by one of our community members. And we really love the effort that she took to bring this life look great. And the one to the left, uh, it just, I, uh, as an artist, I can see how much time and effort he put into this.

And he adds some new references yet. I think about 20 movie references in the. An actual picture. So it had to be in there. It had to be a winner for us. Yeah. That one's sick. Look at that. You got the little clown in the background. That's awesome. How does it feel to see, you know, a lot of, you know, the community drawing, you know, these pieces, uh, to you as an artist makes it's, uh, it's pretty mind blowing sometimes, uh, to think that people are doing all these derivatives of, uh, something I've created, uh, it D you know, always put a smile on my face, no matter how, how little effort went into it, or how much effort, uh, I get a kick out of it this year.

That's awesome. Um, so we, I was looking and I saw that you can stake your vampires and then you get the blood token. Can you guys tell us a little bit more about blood token, the utility behind it and how it benefits the SBS. Yeah. So the bot token will be, um, purely used for you to like it's a it's in our ecosystem.

Right? So, um, for example, in our next generation, we're going to introduce a breeding aspect. Well, we kind of call it breeding as that's the pros of putting two and two together and then getting something out of it, but it won't be exactly that. So blood will be heavily use there. Um, we'll have like an increasing cost whenever you breed with one, which is already brand, so we'll go up and like use it.

And then we also plan to have more, uh, in real life collaborations with blood. So you get access to that item, meaning a physical item with blood. So we have, we have one collaboration running right now, which is in progress. Uh, it takes a while to actually produce, but that's, uh, we've partnered with, uh, One of the biggest champagne creators or like most famous ones, like really good at it and stuff.

I am like skilled. Um, and we'll, we'll be giving access to that champagne through blood. So that's one of the things we want to provide. Um, well, it's, we're looking to do like merged for like bloods. You can get so emerged for free, if you could just use the butter into claim it, for example. That's awesome.

So I can essentially exchange my blood token from staking to get wine or apparel. Yeah, for example. Yeah. We're looking to do more, uh, fiscal collaborations, right. Ready have some stuff lined up, which will be in the later months. That's okay. Yeah. I love that. That's awesome. Awesome. Well, you know, one of the things that recently launched was you guys also did the bats.

So we have sneaky bat. This was a free mint for anyone who owned SVS, a Wolf, I'll start with you. You know, why was it important to do you know, a, a free meant here for holders of SDS? Well, I think we shouldn't charge any holder who is already bought an SVS or invested in the project. I think it's fair to do a free companion drop because that wasn't our roadmap always.

And it's a great way to give everyone another rare or not. So rare Coleman piece of art. And it's just fun to do, right, man. Tons of fun. MIG, talk to us about the, the artwork here, right? So not only did you get to develop the vampire, but you also got to develop this bat. Um, walk us through the process here on, you know, this cool free companion drop.

Um, I just wanted to create a sort of mini and or side kick for the vampire. Uh, yeah. I went through a few sketches to get it done, but, uh, I already knew in my mind that it was going to be a very, uh, like a mischievous kind of character, um, yeah, similar to, um, Dick dastardly and, uh, muddly, you know, um, Motley is this, this kind of, he's a sidekick to, uh, Dick dastardly, but he's, he's kind of mischievous on his own.

He doesn't always. And he's got that constant loft and I wanted to bring that kind of, uh, that kind of spirit, uh, into the bat. So yeah, that's the origin for, I guess. Awesome. Love that. Yeah. The old Hanna-Barbera cartoon reference there. Uh, you know, I remember watching that as a kid, definitely in my kids now are getting into that.

So love the reference there. Um, you know, we got into the roadmap a little bit, right? With the staking of the blood token, you know, there's also a call for a gen two breeding, uh, you know, a vampire hunt, a vampire meetup, uh, you know, with, uh, give us the background, you know, what can holders expect, uh, as part of the roadmap, uh, any timeline updates on gen two, maybe for us as well.

So of course we're doing the gen two, a mint, which will be. I dunno because of the current state of the market, we don't want to bring in their collection so fast. So we might look to delay that if needed and then we'll just try and create as much value for the Genesis collection. Of course. So we're looking to do gen two, which will then come with breeding, which will be after that.

Cause Meg has to draw the R we have to settle on, like while we're going to make as a result. Cause we don't want to do, uh, just a simple like baby vampire, stuff like that. So we want to do something cool. We can eventually do something with which makes, which makes for another grave roadmap item, for example.

Um, so. And then we're going to do gen two companions as the same way as our Genesis companions. We're planning to do a in real life meetups. Once you're more established, like the board app yacht club one, that was really cool to see that come into action. Um, and then we're going to do some, uh, of course they're going to keep our community contests running the art derivatives.

It's cool to see every what everyone does. And yeah, that's basically what we've planned right now. And obviously there's always stuff going around, which is not on the roadmap. So the champagne wasn't on the roadmap. We have that game in development, which was on the roadmap and yeah, there's more to come.

Meg, walk us through, you know, the, the gen two development process and what this means for, for you as an artist to, you know, have to create more artwork. Oh, a whole nother series. Uh, well, I actually can't say much just yet. Uh, uh, right now we're just formulating a lot of ideas, uh, gathering, um, info on what traits we want to do.

Uh, but, um, yeah, once, once I get going then perhaps the limo sneak peaks, but until then, I don't really want to say too much. I want to blow the surprise. That's perfect. Yeah. We always try to get stuff out, but we understand if we can't. So, uh, one of the things we, we do like to ask, and this can always be a tough question, right?

Cause it's like a, you know, picking your favorite kid is we talk about favorite traits, right? So, uh, going to the vampires, you know, uh, Wolf, I'll start with you, uh, cause it, maybe it's easier for you than the artist himself, uh, share with us, you know, what are some of your favorite traits for the SVS? Uh, So I think my favorite, um, well I have my own, well, I think the shadow skin's one of the coolest we've done, uh, personally, even though it's not the most rare.

And then I really liked the whole load glasses and the laser eyes, but, uh, this one doesn't have, you know, the whole low-class. I was one of the, one of the things where we had to move our generation process entirely because they wouldn't, uh, export properly. So now that I think that was like, uh, two days before we, um, revealed or drop the collection.

Oh, nice. Oh yeah. I, yeah, those are cool. Yeah. Perfect. And MIG, I mean, this, I don't know if this is a tough question for you. I'm assuming it is. Uh, but any favorite traits to call out, uh, for, for SDS here? Um, uh, I think. Uh, it's really hard to pick. I mean, those glosses that I did big, uh, those triangular glasses, uh, were from an anime called, uh, grew in Lygon, um, and, uh, really like the character to use those glasses.

And I love have, uh, being able to add that into SPS. Another cool one was that actually on, on the right there, the laser moth. Um, so one of our guys, uh, 2d van came up with some of the traits and one of them was a giant moth and, uh, so out of the giant moth. And then, um, I thought, you know, why not give it lasers too?

And so I put it on there and it, and it works

love that. Um, so one thing I wanted to touch on was community. So I kind of wanted to paraphrase this really quick about your guys's launch. So when you guys launched, people were able to mint three vampires, um, you know, you guys wanted to keep it as organic as possible and have the distribution spread as possible from the beginning.

Um, so immediately after you met your unique holder percentage was around 52%, right? So we've seen the community, you know, it's, it's, it's very spread out. There's not just big whales that own the project, you know, there's over 45, count Twitter, over 30 K on discord. Uh, how do you manage the community and what do you love about the community the most?

Um, well, we have a bunch of people who actually like active all day in our discord chat, which is amazing to see because people. They've genuinely like they started talking to each other in the DMS actually. So it's great to see people connect with each other, um, community manage wise. We have a team of malts to keep the chat in like intact, like, but the there's not really that much like need to moderate all than like spamming, like invite links, stuff like that.

Um, I think the community we have right now is actually really great. And it's one of our main, main success points I think, to have as engaging community. Absolutely. Uh, how active are both of you in the district? Well, personally, I've been really busy myself working on like everything around SVS, getting these partnerships and stuff.

But, uh, so I haven't been around this much in this good lately, but I used to be very active, but Meg is around daily to talk to people in the joints, this voice chats. Every, we have a voice chat with, um, with one of our community members who is really good at investing, for example, in play through end games like strategies.

And he does a talk every Tuesday to like talk about investment strategies and how it helping people out. So that's something really great, which just came from the community. And we really, uh, really like that because that's how the community is supposed to work. Like they build it, they build each other and help each other.

Yeah. Um, if you'll notice in a lot of the, um, NFT projects in the, in the discord, uh, a lot of the time the artist doesn't really interact with the. Uh, community members, you know, and I find that really weird, uh, and it could be a sign of a rug pool who knows, but, uh, yeah, I, I, I don't want to be a person that you can never contact.

You can never interact with. I'm just this presence that's there. I just did the artwork and that's it. I want to be a part of the community on a lo I love joking around with the people there love, hanging around, uh, listening to whatever they have to say. Um, and they really, the lifeblood of any project.

Uh, it doesn't matter what we do. Um, doesn't matter how many collabs, uh, we bring, uh, how many, how much new utility we bring to the project. If you don't have a strong community, then, uh, it's. Exactly. I love hearing that, man, because I've been in a lot of discourse where the team comes on, just when they want to show stuff to this, to see you guys active day in and day out, embraces the community.

And I know you do weekly AMS, which is super important, you know, I've been in cool cats, they do it every week and I see the community rile up from that. So I love to see that. Um, what do you guys think of the current discord hacks? You know, are you guys taking any precautions towards that? You know, we've seen a lot of that in the last week or so.

Oh yeah. Uh, from day one we have, um, we've locked. Our are down basically. So, but these hacks. Uh, I feel like they just, uh, they bribe one of, uh, members with some special permission. So a lot of these discords, they forgot, forget, like, um, make it sell malts cannot give people certain roles or announce in these general, like admin channels, like announcements, for example, where it looks really official.

Um, and they also forget to disable the create webhook permission, which allows you to send a message through a web hook through these channels as well. So from day one, we've basically locked everything down except for the admin admin members. And we've forced everyone with substantial permissions to enable to have a, so that way in case someone gets hacked by some sort of malware key logger, uh, unless they get bribe, but then they don't have permissions.

They can't do anything which will harm the community. Lots of see it, man. Yeah, it's been crazy. Couple of weeks, man. I've seen so many, discords get hacked. It's been crazy. Yeah. Uh, the, these, uh, people getting really sophisticated with the way they work. Uh, we actually will. Some people actually attempted the same thing on me, uh, first by, uh, getting me banned from the Basey discord.

Uh, and then, uh, they going to pretend that their staff from the, uh, basically discord and attempt to fix the situation. And, uh, they'll try to get you to go either click on something or, uh, go on a video call. And, uh, once you click on the video, you know, that's when you start getting fished or hacked or whatever.

Uh, so just a reminder for everyone to stay vigilant and not click on anything, uh, always use a hardware wallet, uh, yeah, just be cautious. Yeah, the suspicious definitely great warning out there from you guys. It looks like people calling out, uh, Freddy, uh, XXX Al in the chat. Um, so I'm guessing that's a member of the discord as well.

There. Uh, want to talk a little, uh, broadly here? Um, you know, you mentioned maybe delaying a gen two, depending on the state of the market. Uh, talk to us a little bit, you know, where do you see the NFT market headed? Right. We saw a huge demand. We saw this big wave and now we're starting to see a little bit of a pull back as you know, the theory and price goes up and the sheer volume of NFT projects increases.

So, uh, we'll, I'll, I'll start with you just overall thoughts on the NFT. So I think, um, yeah, of course, what you've noticed that the theorem price is going up as soon, like severely affected like the volume traded at empties as well. Because, uh, if you look at the gas, like constant it's, I haven't seen it drop under a hundred gray in the past week, past two weeks, maybe.

So it's really, you lose so much value by just purchasing any theory right now from the like total price. So it has massively like dropped the volume of sales as well, and people are trying to get out of course, because they want to write the w the way for the price increase because they think, oh, it's going to, let's say 10 grand.

So they're trying to get out. And then that drops the four pies of maybe like, I think I've seen every project go down so far. But, yeah. So I think the current state of the market, you ever, probably going to see some more downside if it keeps going and Bitcoin, of course, but I think eventually it will settle down and people, uh, reinvest their money in, in NFS because right now a lot of like good projects are like on a discount, definitely.

And MIG, any thoughts on the overall NFT market here? Uh, ever every project's flaw has taken a battering? Uh, yeah, like will said, uh, crypto is pumping right now. So, uh, and if these are down, but, uh, what, what you'll see is, um, the, the teams that are really dedicated to delivering on their roadmap and just continuing to push forward, those are the projects that will outlast them.

Uh, there's a lot of projects that come out every day and it's sad to say, but, uh, you know, 95, 90 8% of them, aren't going to make it. That's just the way it is. Uh, you need a good strong team to, uh, to just weather the storm and keep going. And that's what we're going to do. Perfect. And, you know, uh, on that note, you know, you mentioned that there are some projects, you know, trading at a discount and some that, you know, maybe you're fans of.

So we always like to ask, you know, towards the end of the interview, are there any, you know, NFTs that you own that you want to call out or projects that, you know, you really like, I'll start with you Wolf, um, you know, what NFT projects outside of SVS for you? Um, I don't really own that many other keys sleep is the one that I really like is Kinesis art.

It's one of these generative, uh, well, like program the arts. So it's like a. I think it's like our book, but it's a little different because they're all animated and stuff. And another one is EPO name. It's a, I don't know if you heard about that one. It was this, um, project where you put in any worn, for example, and then AI generates an image.

I think they used Google, like images, like the 10 search results and then merged them together by day AI. And the results of them are pretty crazy. So that's the two and a few porters. I am, uh, I have some of, and I look forward to seeing what they can do. Awesome. And then MIG, you know, as an artist, you mentioned you, you weren't into NFTs prior to, you know, doing the artwork.

Uh, now that you're fully into the space, you know, are there other projects that you, uh, collect or anything you'd like to call out in terms of artwork? Um, Hm. I actually still don't collect many NFTs. I only had, uh, three NFTs that I've purchased. And, um, this week I, I gave them away because, uh, the sheer amount of people getting hacked and scammed, uh, really annoyed me.

So, uh, I gave them away to, uh, people from our community just because why not? You know, uh, they lost everything. They, hopefully this little token will help get them back on their feet. Uh, so I don't have any, uh, I don't have any FTEs right now, but, uh, and I don't really pay too much attention to other projects.

I like to pay attention to the mistakes of other projects so we know what not to do, but, uh, if I were. To namedrop. Uh, I'd say I really like dead fellows. I'm enjoying artwork there. Um, yeah. So that's something that, that, yeah, it gets my sense. Yeah. No, that's fine. Not everyone, you know, collects all of them.

Uh, you're a pretty busy guy, Meg, so we understand it. Uh, yeah, I, I, I don't collect any, I don't even own any vamps. I don't have any bases. I don't have any goats. Uh, and my reasoning for that is, um, if I were to own a vampire, for example, that would, uh, effectively take away, uh, one person away from the community.

And I I'd rather have, uh, an active member of the community rather than owning about myself. And, uh, there's so many great people in the community that, uh, you know, who knows maybe that one person that joined the community because of. Um, may not owning a vampire. It turns out to be, uh, a celeb or someone who's really helpful to everyone or, yeah, just the overall good person.

Yeah, definitely. All right. Well, masse, I think we've got some, uh, questions here, um, from the chat and some followers of Benzinga. So I'll let you, uh, take it away. Absolutely. First of all, MIG, you are the people's champ, man. That is awesome. Uh, we have a question from Scott here, he's asking. So what are the steps that you guys would recommend to a new project to secure their discord?

Um, so first of all, make sure, like, except you like the admin role has permissions to access announcement and stuff like that. So most of you, this Corptax. Go to a moderator. I give them like 10 grand to get access to their account, maybe, or get some permissions to post in those channels. And they'll add everyone with, um, with a fake site to meet that project again, for example.

So that's recently what's been going on in a lot of your SIS scores and a lot of people are falling for that. So make sure nobody has access to any like substantial, official channel to post an except like maybe the team or like you only asked the owner of this score and make sure moderators don't have access to create web hooks or manage roles.

So that that's one of the, like the most steps you can take. And eventually when you're big enough, you, if you applied to discord as a discord or partner, it will force everyone to, to have a, um, so that that's another great, uh, step you can take eventually. Love that. Do you guys think some projects are taking bribes considering how frequent these are happening or is it just the same thing over and over that people are falling?

Well, it seems to be the same person I've been following this personal Twitter. Um, let me find his name. So he's, uh, yeah, his name is NFP herder and he posts these treads on these discord hangs and it seems to be the same person every time who's been fooling off these hacks recently and it's discord. So, so either they're falling for the same bribe, like the moderators or, or they're being hacked.

So by the same, like maybe a piece of malware, they click like a link. I don't know what the attack vector is here. Yeah. So, yeah. And it's really bad situation for the product as well because, uh, The the, your, your loose, so much trust in a team. If they, if people lose money to you through like a scam like that, if you don't like take time to properly secure to this cortisol.

Exactly. And MIGS, you said that you gave some NFTs away to some of the SVS community. Did some of them get hacked through other projects they were in? Um, I'm not sure. I don't really know the full details of what happened. Uh, I just, uh, I just felt really bad for them. So, uh, yeah, I, I just want to do a little something.

I don't have much. I'd just give them something to, uh, get them back on their feet. Yeah. Amazing. All right. Let's see, Chris, I think, is there more questions from the chat here? Yeah. So we've got this question from, uh, de-bone in the chat. Uh, what are some of the other pop culture, Easter eggs we can find in the SVS bat.

Um, usually I like to encourage people to just look at the artwork and discover for themselves. Yeah. I mean, when it comes to Easter eggs sometimes yeah. You can't give everything away. So maybe you can share maybe one thing to look for. Uh, one of my favorite traits from the bats was creating, uh, um, a Walkman, uh, that, uh, if you've seen guardians of the galaxy style load has a Walkman, uh, that it's super ancient.

And I wanted, I wanted something like that, uh, to be kind of a success of trait to the headphones that we have for the vampires. So I, I created a Walkman pretty much in inspired from stall loads. Walkman, but yeah, I couldn't use, we might get DMC aid by Sony or something, so I couldn't use the exact name.

I changed it to SVS walkout wing man instead. Perfect. Well, thanks for sharing that. De-bone, there's your answer. You, you might have to look for the rest, but look for that Walkman. Absolutely. So we have another question here from Scott, who wants to know, uh, for new people coming into the NMT space as investors or collectors, what's the best way for them to, uh, do research and find quality projects versus avoiding scams or quick cash grabs.

Um, so there's a couple of red flags of you see. So first of all, if I were to invest in your project, I would look at maybe like, um, like any of their like team members to see if they're well established. Of course. So, and maybe look at their website, maybe. So a lot of these ex like scams recently, um, they, um, they tend to just maintain and run off, for example.

So it's really hard in, and if these spaces is not as simple as like a, like, uh, like checking a crypto Rockpool. So for an NFC space, a lot of people jump, try to jump on the hive because it's this one-time event where you can buy in this NFT, like at a really low price. So a lot of people tend to not do like their research because the event is going to happen anyway.

And there's so many people getting in and you're trying to flip it. Um, but the thing is with NMT project, you're only gonna see whether it's a rug pool, like most definitely, or like in the future, because it's whether they're going to work on the project in the future or not. So it's, it's a bit harder to do here than in normal token.

For example, a token you're buying through. Yeah. And of course settling, it's going to selling, it's going to be harder because you can't just go through union swap incentive there, but you have to actually find a buyer. So that's another factor you can look at. Yeah. And I've seen projects, they sell out and then these devs, they go to another project and they launch it and another one and they repeat the cycle, they just sell out and just kind of leave the community, sell out, leave the community.

So it's interesting to see, hopefully we start taking more, you know, doing more research before just jumping onto the hype, you know? Yeah. It's a, it's the wild west out here. And, uh, yeah, I think what was said is, um, you should really, um, do some research on the team. Um, that's exactly what I did before I joined, uh, uh, the team.

Um, so before joining SVS, I was, I was screening a lot of, uh, Proposals to me. And, uh, a lot of people wanted me to join their project. And I, uh, one of the deciding factors of joining SVS was, uh, choosing the right team who had, uh, who were well-established, who had a good, uh, Twitter presence. And, um, just the team that could get the job done and I chose correctly and, uh, yeah, so always, uh, do a bit of research on, on the team members.

And, um, but other than that, uh, yeah, just always, always be cautious. Perfect. Well guys, you know, thanks so much for, for sharing insights into SVS what's to come and also, you know, just the advice for NFT, uh, people out there, right? That's something we really wanted to do with this show was bringing the interviews to talk about big projects, but also, you know, provide that education segment for people, maybe new to the NFT space.

And I definitely think we, we shared some education today via you guys in terms of what to look for in projects and also, you know, managing a discord. So shout out to both of you for that. But, you know, we look forward to following this progress, you know, it's far from over gen two coming, uh, you know, I'm really excited to, to see what that looks like.

So Wolf and MIG, thank you so much for taking time out of your busy schedules and joining us today. Thanks guys. It's a, it's been a pleasure to talk with you and, um, just, uh, share our knowledge on everything. We know about crypto and NFTs and, uh, yeah, just, uh, stay vigilant out there. It's the wild west. So keep that in mind.

Absolutely. Thank you guys so much for coming on. We appreciate you and the SBS community. You guys are awesome. Yeah. And we will love to have you guys back when, you know, it gets closer to the next event. So, uh, thank you both. It definitely will be back, I think. Yeah. Awesome. Awesome. Shout out to, to MIG and to Wolf for joining us today on the show, and also shout out to the SVS community, showing up in full force mass in the chat, some great questions there.

Um, you know, the question from Debo and of course about the Easter egg, um, you know, traits, I, I loved that loved hearing about the, the guardians of the galaxy reference there. Um, you know, I, I loved hearing about the artwork, um, right. So the inspiration, uh, you know, from some different cartoons. So this was a fun interview and a exciting project, uh, with a lot to come back.

Absolutely. Yeah. You know, it's great to see these authentic projects that are really here for the community and not just trying to, you know, cash, grab everything. You can see it in the way they represent themselves and make the artists who doesn't own any NFTs. Who'd rather, you know, give his SVS to someone else that can be a part of the community.

Um, really great guys, really great community. I'm excited for them. And I cannot wait to see the progression over the next couple of months. Yeah. Definitely. I can't even get all these comments up on the screen cause they're coming in fast. Um, only fangs also got a call out here, mass that we should come join one of the AMA.

So, uh, we might have to try to set that up with SBS. So let's mass. Uh, another great interview here. We got more great interviews coming up this week before we leave today. Um, let's get into some news and headlines, right? We didn't do a show last week. So we got a full week, but also we saw, you know, the NFT market, uh, trading a little bit slower.

Right? So, uh, we, we still have some big news out there though, but the thing we always like to start with brightest, the top 10 weekly sales volume leaders. So I do this article for Benzinga every Sunday and it's based on data from crypto slam, which tracks NFT sales via. So no surprise mass. I know you're not going to be surprised by this one.

Number one in sales volume last week, ACCE infinity, $113.2 million in sales volume, and then followed by crypto punk sport, a yacht club, and then a couple of projects on the wax block chain, which actually was a surprise farming, tales and farming world then followed by art blocks. We of course had, you know, a snow fro from art blacks on the show two weeks ago.

And then, uh, the one I want to talk about here though, eighth place last week up 125% in sales volume. Uh she's right. This was the project that launched using dose killer. Um, also known as leash, which is the second coin in the sheet. And ecosystem system, which we've seen, you know, S H I B the coin absolutely ripping.

So this was a 10,000 Ft project. It had a sliding scale for the, for the pricing mass. I don't know if you saw that the first 3000 for 0.1, ease the next 5,000 per 0.2 and the last 2000 for 0.3. And if you own the leash, you got early access to this, it sold out pretty fast. We saw high gas. But this was in mid-October and now the floor price on this project has, has ripped.

I mean, when I wrote about it, it was 1.7. Then I did an article. It was 1.9. And when I looked today, 2.25 east floor now on , um, and the top sales, we had two 50 east to sales. Um, if we can get those up on screen, the Batman and the iron man based shimbashi there it is right there, mass. Uh, that's pretty cool.

Did you know this project mass? And what do you think about a Shabbos she's here? You think? Because it's the first really one tied to, um, you know, the, the ship coin that it's getting all this attention, all of a sudden, you know, it's funny. I heard it. I didn't really look into it till right now. These are pretty cool.

And I do like the connection to the Sheba coin. Um, Yeah. I mean, it's holding its price fairly well. And as far as art goes, those are, they're pretty cute. They fit that PFP style. That's a trending right now. Um, I like them. Yeah. I mean, this should have been one where I think everyone could have predicted right.

As ship gets hot, it looks like this NFT project is going to follow along. So it's definitely on my watch list, uh, based on the strong community behind the coin. Absolutely. You know, so speaking of community and if T Fest, you know, it starting this week or this weekend it's been going on. So I don't know if you guys saw the board ape yacht club, they had an actual.

And, you know, the party looked really awesome. You know, people were partying on the yacht. It's great to see the community come together. Um, there's a couple of videos and pictures on Twitter and man, I have FOMO from it. It just, it just looks like a great time. It does, it looks like a full-on party. Right.

And I really, yeah. You know, I, I had some big FOMO mez, uh, you know, not being able to be there and we, we saw it, not just board apes, right. But a bunch of different MFT projects, you know, just really rallying around this, this event. Right. Bringing your community together, bringing your teams there to meet your community.

And then, yeah, I mean, who could forget the, the party on the yacht, right board, a yacht club, a full-on party on the yacht. Also, I saw some, uh, billboards, right? We always talk about, you know, the, the times square billboards, right. That costs a lot of money, but get a ton of eyeballs on them. We saw some NFTs featured on those billboards.

Um, I know our friends from robotics were actually on those billboards, uh, throughout the event. And I know that they traveled to New York as well. So, uh, there, there it is right there on the billboard, uh, shout out to the robotics. Okay. You know, I wonder if this starts scaling up to like a comic con style, you know, as the years go by, you know, people come with their communities, they represent, you know, the board apes or bottles, cool cats.

And it's just a cool time meeting people in real life when we just talk digitally every day. So I love saying it. Yeah. I think it definitely a trend to watch. The, the big question is, you know, will it be, you know, You know, for NFTs all together, will it be for one event at a time where we see some regional events as well?

Right. And that's something with Comicons as you kind of see them spread out throughout the country, you know, are the big cities like New York, uh, you know, big meeting places like Las Vegas, are those going to be the places, you know, to host these events, but exciting times, uh, for, for meetups and, and speaking of board eight yacht club mass, I don't know if you saw this, but it, you know, the cover of rolling stone, right?

We, we talked recently about cool cats getting a collaboration with time magazine. Now you have board ape yacht club on the cover of rolling stone. I mean, and a full featured article inside the magazine talking about this. If, if you're out there and you didn't think NFTs were mainstream yet, I mean, if you're a musician, you always dream about being on the cover of rolling stone and here you have now an NFTE on it.

What do you think is this is a sweet looking cover. I mean, it looks awesome straight up the board API cover, like the rock stars of the NFC world and this, you know, rolling stone cover kind of a embraces that I thought it was really cool. I love the cover. Um, I love seeing more people, you know, by apes, I saw a couple of rappers, you know, they made it their profile picture.

Um, so again, we see more and more celebs start buying these profile pictures and making it, you know, their identity. I think it's great. Definitely. So speaking of, you know, we talked a little bit earlier with SBS. Discord hacks. You know, there's been a lot of discord hacks, and I think we should talk about, you know, what to avoid.

You know, when these projects do get hacked by, you know, however they're getting hacked, you know, what's happening is they're posting a link and people are minting through a fake website and just sending them Eve and they're just rug polling. So, you know, what are, what are the best tips that we can recommend Chris, for people watching to avoid?

You know, these, these scams that are happening consistently now? Yeah. I mean, I really loved hearing from the SVS team, right? Talking about, you know, the, the discord safety. And I think the biggest thing, anyone who's been in discord for a while, you see the sheer volume of messages that you get sometimes, right?

And a lot of them are invite link spam, right? Where people need, you know, a certain number of invites to get on the white list of a project. Um, you know, those aren't necessarily a, you know, a. Right at someone, you know, most likely trying to get you to join a discord, but also remember that those links are coming from someone you've never met.

Um, so I would always caution that, you know, I would try to join a discord, find a community, and you can talk about upcoming projects there. And, you know, it's a lot safer rather than just clicking on links from people. Then the other big thing, you know, as, uh, Megan Wolf said, right, is that most of these projects, their announcement channel, right?

It's the one that's locked just to the admin and pay attention to that. Right. They're going to update and they're going to say, Hey, this is our mint date, right? This is when we're going to mint. If all of a sudden, you know, you're getting messages saying, Hey, minting is live. And it's three days before the project's supposed to mint.

That should be an immediate red flag. Right. Unless if it was a now. And you really know that that's true. It's not a stealth drop, right? This is someone looking for you to connect your wallet to that site. And, you know, unfortunately you could be a victim in this way, so I would stay away from the messages you get in discord and make sure you're following and know that it is the admins posting in announcement channels, um, to stay safe.

Absolutely. You know, and they try to get you to mint emotionally, right? They create this sort of FOMO of mint now, you know, stealth drop, you know, get right away. So you don't really think about it twice. And I've realized that now, especially since the market has been slower, is we should take our time when we mint.

We shouldn't just rush into things just because, you know, you get the sense of FOMO. It's okay to miss things, you know, especially considering the environment we're in, where, you know, there's so many scams going on on day to day basis. Take your time. Do your research. You know, there's always opportunities out there.

Don't ever feel like you're missing out because we've seen people. You know, a substantial amounts of Eve coming into the NFT world and imagine if they're new, they're more susceptible to it. And they may just have a bad experience and not come back, you know? Yeah. And that's the unfortunate part. Matt has you, you hit it right on the, on the head there at the end, right?

Is the most likely victims of this are the newer people. And with that being said, it could mean two things, either a they're probably don't have a ton of liquidity. Right. So if they mint out on one of these fake projects, they might not have money left to get into other projects. And then on the flip side, it also may turn them away from NFTs completely.

Right. I mean, if I got hacked, if I was victim, I mean, I might just not want to pay attention to NFTs anymore. Right. Because it's a, you know, an unsafe market, so it's important. And that's why we try to educate people on the show. Um, so great insights, you know, from us in the education, but also you heard it directly from a team today.

Right? So great segment there. Mass. I want to talk a little bit about some of the major brands, right? So we just mentioned, you know, rolling stone of course, having an NFT on their cover. But aside from that, we're seeing major brands actually launch NFTs now, and this is something that we thought was coming, you know, for months, right?

Some of these big media companies monetizing their intellectual property. So Disney announced a collaboration with ViiV right. They're going to launch NFTs from star wars, Pixar, Marvel, and Disney characters. Um, you know, on that leading mobile platform, we have Hasbro is launching power ranger at FTS, right?

Uh, capitalizing on that brand that they have. Mattel which owns hot wheels. They're launching hot wheels NFTs, right? Similar to Funko where you collect the digital, um, you know, the NFTs. And if you get a certain rarity, you actually get the physical version of the hot wheel as well, which is what Funko did.

Right? If you got the chase version, you get mail, they physical Funko that you can only get from the NFT collection. And then mass, we got news this week, that one of the largest companies, most well-known brands in the world. Right. McDonald's McDonald's is getting into the NFT game. There it is the MC rib NFT, and these are limited.

You can't just go and buy these. They started a sweepstakes, um, today through November 7th, where you can enter and only 10 people will be awarded this NFT. I'm going to go ahead and drop the article I wrote on this, in the chat. So if you're interested, um, you can see how you can possibly, uh, you know, when one of those NFTs also on screen, you can see right now the rules and how to enter, but mass, those are some big names, right?

Disney, Mattel, Hasbro. And now McDonald's, I mean, it looks like we are going to make it right. Absolutely. I love seeing it. And I definitely retweeted that post and shout. You know, if we win, I already told our chick, I'm taking her out to get my grips. So hopefully there you go. There's the cloud right there with the mic rib, NFT.

Think of all that you can do with that. I love that. Exactly. Um, so moving on, Chris, I don't know if you saw last week, there was a huge sale for a crypto punk. Um, there was a crypto punk that was purchased for $530 million last Thursday night. So this broke headlines on Twitter, right? So we saw that everyone was like, whoa, freaking out.

But crypto Twitter was quick to point out that the sale was from authentic crypto punk, 9, 9, 9, 9, 8. Uh, so yeah, they, they kind of pointed out that it was, they sold it to themselves. They were able to get alone. Uh, they paid it back right after the sale and it just kind of created, it made headlines and it created this new, all time high price for the crypto.

Uh, what do we think about that? Yeah, I mean, th this, I think is the unfortunate side of NFTs, right. And, you know, we see it in crypto. We see it in NFTs where there's always going to be talks about, you know, regulation. And I don't love seeing this cause I think it draws more attention to possibly getting regulation involved, which is one of the things that's been nice about, you know, NFTs, you know, being able to, to operate on their own.

But I mean, a huge red flag, right? That this was a record price of over 124,000 a theory. Um, when the previous record for crypto punks was 4,200 a theory, I mean, that's a huge jump. We've seen some records this year, but not of this level. Um, but on the flip side, We did see crypto punks trending on Twitter.

So we did get some attention to NFTs, but I think unfortunately it was the wrong kind of attention. Um, I just, I didn't love this a headline, a news. Cause again, I think it's a, a bigger negative for the space than I would've liked to see. Absolutely. Yeah. I saw a couple, you know, people on YouTube that don't normally talk about NFTs bringing us up and you know, they don't understand.

And if T's, and what they were saying is just kind of looks, it's a bad look, you know, from someone on the outside, looking in, I see it as a publicity stunt, they wanted people to talk about their specific punk. Um, but yeah, it's not a great look overall, but interestingly, the. Yeah. And then I actually see a comment here, uh, on that note from a TEALS peels in the chat, I did actually see this headline as well, mass, that there was a punk listed for 4.4 EAs, um, on a most likely fat finger.

Um, but that is another topic too. We saw this with board ape, where there was one sold for a significantly low price. And the question is, you know, is it a fat finger or is it a possible tax wash sale? So there's kind of this debate going on. What do you think of the low prices here? Is that a fat finger or is that a, a tax, uh, benefit here, man?

And it's just, it's hard to say, but I can see the benefits of, uh, you know, from a tax perspective, you know, you accidentally fat finger and someone else buys it. You know, we don't know who that someone else is. That's where the mystery lies. Um, I would hate it for it to be a fat finger cause that would really hurt.

I'm not sure, but both suck. Definitely. And then maths, uh, another interesting topic and we could probably go on this one for a long time too, but just, uh, for anyone out there who doesn't know, we saw the floor price of an NFT project, uh, get pretty much wiped out over the last 24 to 48 hours. And that is jungle freaks.

So this was a highly anticipated project. And one of the big reasons that people were drawn into this was that, uh, a former artist for hustler was behind the artwork for this project. And we also saw a lot of, uh, you know, celebrities and NFT, you know, influencers, let's say right rally behind this project before the mint.

So w the floor price went up a ton last night. It actually hits 0.15. Um, it looks like it's recovered a little bit to 0.3. But the reason was because decades ago, the artist who is attached to this project, uh, George, Tracy, , uh, he drew some rather, um, let's call them racist cartoons. Right. And I don't want to get into the debate of, you know, what makes a racist cartoon, but the, the debate I wanted to get into is, you know, how much influence one person can have on a project.

Um, you mentioned it a little bit during the interview, Matt, you know, when developers leap from one project to the next, what it can do to a floor price and the community. Right. Well, what about something like this, where now there is just a negative cloud over this project? Can it recover or can one person, you know, ultimately just, just do them an NFT, you know, It's I think we still see volatility in this project.

We'll see some highs and lows because there's just so much money to be made. And, you know, people can ski the, the, the, the, the narrative, however, it benefits them monetarily. Right? So I'm sure people holding this project, they're trying their best to, you know, damage control it. As soon as they salad, they may switch sides.

But I will say that I don't, you know, anything that's, you know, racist towards anything should be, it's something I don't mess with. So I personally will not, you know, touch that, but I do see, thank people will still, uh, take the opportunity to buy and sell this project. Yeah, that's, that's a great point.

Right? And it turns into a moral one. For some people I I'm with you, right. Where I just kind of want to distance myself from this project. I was never in it. Um, but you know, eh, here in the stock market world, we talk about buying the dip, right. And that's a term that passed on to cryptocurrency and now NFTs, and you could have bought the dip yesterday.

But again, I just don't know if this project is going to have lasting power now with this negativity and, and a lot of the NFT influencers that were involved with this project, they've also distanced themselves, which, you know, isn't a great look. So, uh, um, we, we wish the best for teams, but, you know, I just don't know if this one is going to have a, as bright of a future as originally predicted exactly.

You know, and the big thing with crypto and NFTs decentralized and, you know, kind of against cancel culture. You know, I do think that we all can all make the decision, whether we agree with it or not. I personally don't, I won't buy the project. I won't talk about the project, but you know, people are still free to do what they want, so we will see what happens.

But yeah, it's unfortunate. Always do your research is what I'll say. You know, you can figure it out, cause I'm sure if you Google the artists, you know, how quick was it to find that, you know, so people may have not looked because again, monetarily incentivized, I'm not sure, but always do your research. Um, and other news though, Chris, it theory I'm hit an all time high today, man.

It just keeps on pushing gas keeps going high. Oh man, what is going on? Yeah, I mean, we, we talked about this weeks ago, right? How a theory I'm hitting all time highs. Great. For anyone who's invested in a theory of bad for the NFT market. Right. And you heard Wolf and Meg talk about that too. Right? How, when the price of a theory goes up, you know, impacts the prices of NFTs, right?

Because the majority of them are based in ease. I think until a pullback happens in Eve, I think we're just going to kind of see this current NFTE cycle happening, right. Where people don't necessarily want to mint new projects and sacrifice their. When he could be headed to 5,000 sooner than later, uh, what do you think mass, you know, uh, how close are we to 5,000?

You know, and what does a pullback possibly mean for, for NFT? You know, for me personally, eat is eat for me still, you know, unless I plan to take profits Eve one eighth is one eighth. What I think the biggest problem is is the gas, right? The problem with the gas is that anytime you try to mint something, buy something, sell something, you're paying this enormous amount.

That's not going to the dev. That's not going to the team. It's just, you know, being paid in gas fees. And I think that's been such a big disruptor in the NFT market so far. I mean, we've seen gas stay at over a hundred for the last week and a half or so. Um, but I do hope that he does stabilize and again, we're seeing what's happening.

You know, we've never really been in this situation before. Hopefully eats stabilizes gas comes down a bit. Um, and then we can start seeing the real, you know, market demand for NFTE. Uh, when, when Eve two, man, we've been hearing about this for awhile for a long time, right? Yeah. The actually going to happen.

And, you know, with that being said in the high gas prices, mass, I think that's something where, again, some of these other coins and platforms, like if they could really launch a great project that can, you know, eliminate gas fees or lower them, now's the time to take a theory. I'm head-on because I think you could win some fans.

Um, you know, I prefer the east based NFTs cause that's where I've always been. But I know some of these other platforms, you know, have lower gas fees. Um, but man gas, gas is brutal out there. It is, man. I do hope that we see Eve too sometime. I mean she in the next hopefully year, um, but Eve is the place to be, you know, the reason we're all still here in the eighth world and that's the dominant factor it's because it's the place to be.

It's where the top artists top projects are. So hopefully we do find a solution for this, but congratulations to anybody holding a theory them for the last, I mean, I remember it was $600 last year, you know, about a year ago. So congratulations. It's a great time to be in the crypto space. Great time to be in the NFT space.

Uh, I'm excited for 2022, definitely. Well, mass. I love our community and our fans out here. I don't know if you saw this, uh, this comment here. Um, I'll just throw that up there on the screen again, not to start a debate about McDonald's, but a shout out to hacks in the chat for that great comment on the McRib NFT.

That's going to do it for today's show. And as I said, we we've got some great interviews lined up and we actually welcome back to Morrow and we're back a team that we've had on before. And I know there's some loyal fans out there. May I ask who's going to be on the roadmap tomorrow, tomorrow. That's a great point.

I'm actually not sure I haven't checked it. Who is going to be on, so we are welcoming back crypto dad, right? So the dad team, we saw moms, right. The free mint of moms. So we'll be able to talk about moms and also what's ahead on the roadmap. So a very exciting one looking forward to this one. I own a couple of dads and a couple of moms still.

Um, so I'm excited. Um, but I know we will have a lively chat like we did before. Oh, yeah, one of the best communities from the get-go. Um, I'm curious to hear their perspective now that we've been in somewhat of a bearish market for the last couple of weeks. So awesome. Well guys, that is going to do it for us today.

Again, we had the team from SV S on shout out to MIG and Wolf for joining us on the show. Great insight into their project, the artwork. I mean, one of the most well-known artists in the NFT space now in MIG, um, we also got to hear their thoughts on the NFT market overall, right. And discord safety. I thought that was very, very important.

We don't always get that behind the scenes from the teams. So shout out to them and shout out to all of you in the chat, or if you are listening, this is also available on podcast. Um, so shout out to anyone or, you know, listening to them. As a podcast, if you are, you know, let us know you can reach out at Benzinga.

Um, and we would love to hear from you if you are loving the podcast, but that is going to do it for us. We will be back 2:00 PM Eastern time tomorrow. And as I said, crypto dads back on the show. Uh, thanks everyone, and have a great rest of your day. See you guys tomorrow.

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How To Buy NFTs

What is a Non-Fungible Token NFT

How To Make Your Own NFT

Best NFT Investments

Episode Summary

Joining us today! Erick aka Snowfro, Founder of ArtBlocks. Creator of the Squiggle.

Follow ArtBlocks on Twitter:

Erick/Snowfro: https://twitter.com/ArtOnBlockchain

Artblocks: https://twitter.com/artblocks_io

Art Blocks is a first of its kind platform focused on genuinely programmable on demand generative content that is stored immutably on the Ethereum Blockchain. You pick a style that you like, pay for the work, and a randomly generated version of the content is created by an algorithm and sent to your Ethereum account. The resulting piece might be a static image, 3D model, or an interactive experience. Each output is different and there are endless possibilities for the types of content that can be created on the platform.

https://www.artblocks.io/

Hosts:

Chris Katje

Maz

https://bitclout.com/u/maz

Follow The Roadmap on Twitter!

Disclaimer: All of the information, material, and/or content contained in this program is for informational purposes only. Investing in stocks, options, and futures is risky and not suitable for all investors. Please consult your own independent financial adviser before making any investment decisions.

Unedited Transcript:

What's up everyone. It's Chris we're live Benzing as new NFT show the roadmap. We've had some great projects already on our episodes. We've talked to the teams behind the Vogue collective robotics, the dos pound Oni force. Oh, dads, dizzy dragons, sub doc, pixel vault, and also an NFT giveaway. Stay tuned. We got more NFTE giveaways coming up soon, and we've got a big, exciting show today.

Uh, following up our interview with G funk from pixel vault on Tuesday, we are, we'll be joined today by another huge, uh, you know, well-known project. We are talking art blocks with the founder. Project. Uh, let me go ahead and bring on mass. My cohost mass. What's going on, buddy? How you doing today? Yo, what's up Chris?

I'm so excited for this episode, man. I'm glad to be here. I know you've been looking forward to this one. We've been trying to get the team on. We've had some, you know, scheduling issues on Benzinga and, and we were able to finally nail down, you know, a date and again, mass talk about a big week, right? We had pixel vault, G funk on Tuesday.

And now Eric, from art blacks today, two of the most well-known projects out there in the same week on the roadmap. Exactly. Yeah. And one of the first projects that I was into when I got into NFTs has been art blogs. I've been a big fan ever since, and I love the work that they put out. So I'm super excited for this episode.

So yeah, without further ado, man, let's play the trailer. Let's get.

Love that love those trailers, our creative team. You know, we, we had a cool one earlier this week and now another specific trailer for this interview, mass. I think it's time. Let's go ahead and bring on Eric. AKA snow fro the founder of art, blacks. How we doing Eric? I'm good. Thank you guys for having me.

That trailer was like, it made me blush. That's awesome. Well, we're glad, we're glad you like it. Yeah. Our creative team has been doing these trailers and we love it. Brings some great personality for our show here. Um, you know, So I think we're going to have math kick off the questions here. If you're ready to go, Eric, super excited.

You guys are. Yeah, let's do it. So, Eric, first question for you, man. So how did you get involved, you know, into the NFT world? You know, tell us a little bit about the backstory. Um, you know, we know crypto punks have something to do with that. So for people that may not know, just tell us a little bit about how that started.

Uh, uh, okay. Yeah. So dinner of art 10 years ago, I started coding, creating art with code. I was using projectors and writing really weird scripts in a software platform called touch designer. Um, it's just something that kind of blew my mind when I saw it live at Coachella. And I was like, oh, I want to do something like that.

So that's kind of how I got into generative art. Um, fast forward, like six years, uh, I was reading Reddit and I ran across a link that the creators of larva labs posted, I assume it was them that posted and said, Hey, come check out our project. It might've just been another Redditor, uh, to the, to the claiming of the crypto.

Uh, what I thought was really cool was that it was a generative art project. Um, and also for the first time being able to prove ownership of a digital asset felt really special, uh, as well. And, uh, I think something kind of interesting is that I, by no means had come up with the concept of an NFT or even like the formation of it.

But I had spoken to friends and be like, man, there's something here where like, maybe you could have like a magic together in card on like the blockchain or some way of proving something that has rarities. And, uh, but of course it was all kind of speculative. Uh, and then I got that link to claim the punks and I was like, holy crap, this is it.

Like, they nailed it. This is exactly what the world needs. And I got real excited about claiming crypto punks. Um, I attribute 95% of everything that's happening now to the Matt and John from our larval labs. They, they lived the fuse. Uh, we wouldn't be here today without them. And that's kinda like where things where things were.

That's awesome. And how much was it to claim a crypto punk when you claim them? In my mind, it was 35 cents or the gas, but I also was feeling kind of foolish for spending money. And I don't know that I would've felt foolish spending 35 cents. So maybe it was like 35 bucks or $3 50 cents. In fact, I guess I can just check ether, scan.

I know exactly how much it was, but I did claim 30 for crypto punks. And during that process, um, you know, I, I realized I was being incredibly selfish cause I claimed all the zombies that were left. And of course, if I didn't like the next person would have, but, uh, it was actually during that process that I thought, man, like the Ethereum blockchain can actually decide for me whether I get a super rare zombie or maybe even an alien or an ape or just to a floor crypto punk.

Right. And so that, that was actually one of the very first moments where I was like, oh, I want to, I think it'd be fun to build a platform that presents you with rarities instead of you getting to. That's awesome. And you said you claimed 34 crypto punks. Do you still hold them all to this day? Or tell us a little bit more about what happened today?

Yeah, so early on, um, a couple other things happened that that kind of gave me more inspiration for our blocks. And then eventually I was like, okay, let's do this. And when I did finally pull the trigger, uh, I, I've never really kind of been in a financial position to just like spend 10, 15, $20,000 on development.

And so people were starting to place bids on my zombies and I was in utter shock. The first time someone offered to pay me $200 for this digital thing that I had, you know, especially because in the early days of NFTs, you know, like the true, some of the, some of the innovators beyond that were like no origin, for example, that, that had marketplaces.

Things felt expensive. If they were 200, 300 bucks back then it felt very expensive actually, compared to like, you know, a lot of pieces were like 20 bucks and 30 bucks. And so the fact someone was willing to pay me 200 bucks was significant. And so I, um, decided to hire a team of really brilliant developers, a company called block rocket tech, uh, to help me ideate the original version of our products, our box version one, which is very, very different than what our blocks looks like today.

Uh, and I was selling crypto punt zombies to pay that habit, uh, the developer habit. So, you know, I remember on at least one occasion, I was like, okay, I'm going to have to accept this offer for, for 300 bucks or 200 bucks. I will give you this zombie for $200 with the credit, but like, trust me, like. I don't want to, like, I shouldn't have to accept this offer.

Like it's worth way more than 200 bucks, but like, they're like, I mean, we don't want, we want to be being in zombies. We just totally respectable. Um, but I just remember thinking, man, like I wasn't, you know, I didn't want to do it the other way around. So I ended up selling Ms. Obvious for like 200, 300, 400 bucks a pop to pay for their developer fees, um, at the beginning.

Wow. That's awesome. So, you know, tell us a little bit more about, you know, we know that crypto punks help to launch art blogs. When did art blogs launch and how has it changed over time? You know, looking back at it, you know, from when it first began the F the first version of our blocks in 2018, that first smart contract, I mean, there's, first of all, every art project had its own smart contract, which was a complete cluster in and of itself.

Um, Probably the biggest innovation since then was that we put everything on the same contract. Um, but yeah, it was basically, it was called an art node and an artist would create a generative script that would listen to the most recent block hash of the Ethereum blockchain. And so the generative script would just change every block and there was slightly more complicated ways for people to intervene and inject their own hash into the script and generate a specific output kind of similar to what happens with our box today.

But it was through a very different mechanism where there was a token that stored a hash that you just kind of permanently owned that hash. And you would interact with other projects with that token. It was, it was so many more layers of complication than what we have today. Um, it evolved to what we see now, which launched in November of 2020, just last year, almost a year ago, uh, where the artist.

Deploys, uh, uh, our project on the same contract and the user comes and purchases a minted token, and that minted token, uh, contains a pseudo, random generated, uh, string of characters. And that's what controls the randomness of the token itself. So today when you purchase an AR buck piece, it's being purchased on demand, it didn't exist before you purchased it, which is kind of one of our key things that I think is really kind of special.

You're creating the body of work that the artist intended, but has never seen before at the moment of minting. Uh, and at the end, your takeaway is ERC 7 21 and NFT, uh, that represents that experience of printing. That's awesome fun fact, man. I actually bought a squiggle because it came out on my birthday last year and you know, I saw the date and I was like, oh, you know, I need to have this piece and I've had it ever since.

So I'm excited for that. No, wait a minute. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. Um, tell us a little bit more about how you guys transitioned to like a Dutch Dutch auction. Oh man. The emphasis, the infamous attractions. Uh, so th there was a lot of things involved and, uh, you know, I'd like to state that we don't think Dutch auctions are like the solution for everything in the world, but, um, we think we still think they are like the best approach to this.

A couple of things were happening. Number one, we were having, we were having gas wars and we still have gas wars and, uh, gas wars, or, you know, when more people want something, then the amount of there is. And so they paid, uh, increase their place in line to get there faster. And some people were paying more than the price of the art.

In fact, uh, when we kind of like drew the line and said, that's it to gas. Uh, we had a drop or 80% of the money that was sent to the smart contract or 80% of the money that was spent on the drop, went to minors. And 20% of it went to the artists and we felt like that was just kind of egregious and weird.

And like, it just wasn't very art forward, which is kind of our intent. Um, now with Dutch auctions, you still have gas wars, but those gas wars usually end up at a higher price point to where yes, a significant amount of money is going to the miner, but never more than half. And in fact, most of the time, like significantly less than half of the drop list of minors.

And so it just feels less kind of anti artists and like more artists forward. The other thing was that we weren't having any price discovery at all. And so, you know, we were kind of controlling artists to keep their prices between point, well, we never really set a low price. I always had the lowest price at 0.035 E for a squiggle.

I mean, when schools came out, they were 40 bucks. Um, but you know, we kind of, we kind of had this like 0.2, five, eight. You know, and that was kind of her curate. We reserve that even more for curated. I mean, if an artist and the fact that you want it to drop at 0.25, they could. But you know, it was very hard to justify a 0.2, five eats like as a selling price at, or in the early days of our blocks.

And sometimes those projects wouldn't really sell too quickly, which again, we don't mind because we liked the art to kind of sit there on a platform for a little bit, but there was no price discovery. So part of this gas war was that people knew that the moment that a drop happened, if the price was low enough, artificially set to 0.1 Eve and the least expensive price in the curated section on open seat was one eith that there was an instant kind of arbitrage opportunity there.

Like it, this is completely separate for any subjective appreciation of art. It was this completely financial instrument of something generically designated as art box curated is for sale an open seat for one week. And that's the cheapest, that's the floor and something. Arbitrarily designated as art books, it is about to sell for 0.1, Ethan.

So even if I add point for Ethan gas, it's still 0.5 each and there's that margin to be made on the secondary market. So to us, that means that there was no price discovery. We were essentially creating a, a, um, environment for wholesalers to come in and buy the product from us and then resell it on the secondary market for what kind of would eventually become the going rate after the drop for that piece.

Of course, what happens a day, five days and five weeks after that is actually more in line with price discovery in terms of people's appreciation of the art. Um, and we have kind of grown to let that market handle itself, but yeah, the Dutch auction was just there to help with gas wars, but also to like divert more funds to the artist.

Um, and so that art box wasn't artificially setting prices for something on the market. Perfect. So, you know, we have art blocks, uh, factory curated and playground. Can you talk a little bit about, you know, the differences in these different art blacks and how artists are selected for curated? Yeah. So, you know, in the end, the factory is this beautiful place for people to just kind of drop awesome generative art and something that I think is really important to note that's changed with our box is that originally our box was meant to be this place for anybody that can write an algorithm.

Like if you were going to create a script that drew a circle on the screen, we were going to let you, because I was just so excited and geeking out about the potential for this type of work to exist. Also, I had spent so many years at this 0.2 and a half years. Basically kind of like begging artists to participate in was not very successful, partly because it was a pretty complicated process to participate early on.

Um, that I was like, okay, crazy. Like, like let's just create somewhere where anybody that knows how to write an algorithm can deploy an art piece on bucks. Well, that's changed now. Uh, we have, we always seem to have like hundreds of people in the application queue and, um, we now have such brilliant works of art on the platform that we think that allowing low, like something that it's not even that it has to be low effort, but something that might be deemed low effort or something that's already appeared on, uh, on the platform like three or four times as a kind of like a trope, no matter how good it might be or how like generic, it might be.

Uh, we feel like eventually it becomes a little bit of a disservice to like the truly exceptionally brilliant projects that have come up in the platform. And those projects exist in the factory, in the playground. And then curated the difference is that a project that ends up getting selected for curated, which admittedly.

The bar has been raised over the course of the platform for curated as well, um, is a project that demonstrates something new or fresh, or like an incredible technical proficiency. It can be really, really simple, but if it's really, really simple, it has to be perfectly executed and defined it. Can't already exist on our blocks.

Curated, no matter how well it's executed, we don't want to projects that are using the same exact kind of algorithm or technology or not even the same exact, but something that could be confused between the two. Um, and there's also like a little element there of projects that have that come from people that have participated in the generative art world for a long time.

So, uh, what we have in the curated section or originally was projects where we were a little bit more protective of price. We were a little bit more, uh, you know, we would tell an artist, Hey, And this was well above what the factory was commanding, but we would say, Hey, okay, like you can set your price and iterations to whatever you want, but we want the max that this project would draw from it, from the ecosystem to be like a hundred thousand dollars or $200,000, which is significantly more than the artist might've ever made before using generative algorithms.

Not always but often. Um, and, uh, so we were controlling on price. We were controlling on, um, features and we were just a little bit more strict. Um, and so what that leads to is the third category, which is the playground, which is more of a badge than anything. And what that is, is a designation. Artist has previously participated as a curated artist on their own.

So, you know, we have a couple outliers, for example, if somebody was doing a collaboration in the playground and they presented as a single, a solo artist and curated, then that still has to go to the factory. Like, but you know, if you have two artists that have previously been curated and they want to collaborate on the playground, we would allow them to collaborate playground.

It's just a badge that says, Hey, like this artist really stepped it up and pushed really, really hard, uh, to present something to a board of 25, uh, relatively neutral curators. And I say relatively, because some of them are very passionate about generative art and like advancing the medium forward. Uh, and those curators decided, Hey, like this meets the expectation and the criteria for something that we would want to set aside as like a flagship project for our.

Awesome. I want to talk about Cromey squiggles. Um, you know, so that is the, you know, one of the most well-known art Black's projects, right? Uh, you know, when people talk about art, blacks, you know, a lot are familiar with that. We also see, you know, these huge sales for them. So can you just talk to us, you know, about, you know, Cromey squiggles, uh, how this came to be and why you think there's so much interest in, uh, this art Black's project.

Okay. So the squiggle was originally a proof of concept. It was never meant to be an art project. It was meant to prove how much variation you could get from the hash string with stored in a token. And to do that, I said, okay, well, let's find point data, because if you can have seemingly unlimited number of points along an access axis, and then, you know, Another limited unlimited.

There's actually more of a controlled range on the y-axis on the x-axis like the number of points on the x-axis. And then I can come up with like trillions of possible combinations of crummy, squiggles, and yeah, some of them might start to look very similar to each other. When you get into the billions and trillions, they would start like you would have that same squiggle, but like the green point in the middle might go down two notches, but everything else might be very similar, but in an edition of 10,000, it's actually.

Kind of uncanny how differentiated they look, if you don't know the collection well, and you just look at a squiggle, they all kind of look like squiggles, but when you start to explore them, you realize that they're all very different from each other. Um, that proof of concept was in 2018. In fact, my brother, so I originally wrote the chromic school in three JS.

My brother helped me convert the squiggle to processing, uh, dot, JS, uh, not just processing, um, because of a project where I, uh, gave a 2000 interior designers and architects in Houston, the opportunity to claim a chromium, Google of which 14 claimed them, uh, and were awarded with a real Promius squiggle in November of last year.

Um, and that was kind of version two of our blocks where, uh, it used the processing language, uh, on a local computer and just stored the hash of that script as proof of this. Um, the two years after that, I found myself kind of like. I don't know when you're a generative artist, you just like to tinker and iterate.

And I found myself kind of shaping the squiggle and tweaking it and modifying it. And also noticing that it kind of stood out from a lot of the things, not just in the NFP space, but just in the traditional world. Like I never, in two years ran across something and thought, man, that looks like a crummy squiggle.

In fact, I started doing Google image, image searches of squiggles, and didn't really find much that felt like it represented a crummy squiggle. So then I found this beauty in like the, the discernible nature of the squiggle and how it actually can represent something that people can relate to. And then in the end, I started adding all the extra features like the, like the pipe in the rib, and those didn't happen until right before, um, our box launched.

But that was kind of where I got excited and really inspired about the fact that our box was actually going to happen and decided to implement some extra little. Awesome. And then, you know, the other, uh, big art blacks, not that they're not all big, but the one that, you know, people talk about a lot. Cause again, the big sales is cadenzas.

Uh, so give us a little bit of the background and you know, the artists behind Fidessa is, and you know what, maybe draws people to this art box project. Well, and this one here isn't Meridian, but similar in level of beauty. So the Bonanza project by Tyler Hobbs is pretty special to me just cause Tyler is someone that I've been following for a long time.

So like there's a very clear distinction, um, of artists that I've been following and inspired by over the course of the last, let's say 10 years of being kind of in the space of creative coding. Um, and he's one of them. And so it's, it was really special to see. To have him agree to put something on the platform.

Uh, he's in Austin. And, uh, I've actually seen his physical murals before, because I live in Houston, so I'm down the street. And so I always kind of felt that it was even more special because he was in Texas. Um, and just his style is so special. He did something with Fidessa that demonstrated the depth of what can happen in the generation of a, a body of work using an algorithm where the artist gives up curation, sets the rules to where they're satisfied with anything that's going to come out of that mentor.

And, uh, just sets it free to the world and lets the world kind of tinker with it. Uh, he, he amongst like, just like any other architects, artists, they, they take these huge risks, like in the generative space prior to our blocks, you, you had the script living on your computer and you, you could generate thousands of outputs and then pick the one that you wanted to supply.

So the gallery, or if you were just going to post it on Instagram, whatever it might be, you, you had this. Built in curation. And I think what makes our books special is that that curation is out the window. That curation has to be done all on the front end. And the artist has to really tweak and massage their piece to where their, their algorithm to where every single piece that comes out of the Minter Minter represents them as an artist and that they're digitally signing something before they've even seen what comes out and, um, our blocks.

Um, uh, Tyler has really, I think, demonstrated that, uh, like as a, as a top project on our blocks. Perfect. Yeah. Love that. So to people that may not be familiar with generative art that are listening, um, can you tell us a little bit more of how the art is actually minted on our blocks when people meant it?

Yeah. So, um, generative art is a form of algorithmic art algorithm. The garden basically means that it instructions. Are given to a computer and the computer spits out an output, uh, algorithmic art might be that you were never intending to have more than one output, right? So you just write code and it produces something different than using a brush, even brush on like a tablet.

So generative artists, where you take that code that produces that thing and you assign a bunch of variables. So the background color, instead of just being blue is actually set to a variable so that every time that you generate a new one, it could be a blue or red or green or whatever. And when you assign various variables to an algorithmic work to where every time that it generates it sort of at random generate something fresh and different, that's where it crosses the line.

At least in my opinion of what would be considered a degenerative project. And I think something really beautiful to look at is that a generative project in my mind doesn't have to be algorithmic. Uh, one of my favorite pieces of art of all time is a piece in Marfa, Texas, by Donald Jonah, it's called a hundred boxes, a hundred untitled boxes and milled aluminum.

And it's. You know, Donald Judd, drew architectural drawings for a hundred sculptures and they were created, but there was rules. They all have the same length within height, and then he just modified the internals of them. So when you walk around them, you see these blocks, they're all the same size. And like the site modifications to me, that's a generative project, but made by hand and then generative art on our blocks is a generative project that's generated by code generated.

Algorithmically. The end results are very similar. So, you know, the, whereas a generative project, like the a hundred, uh, on a named boxes, uh, in milled aluminum, if you just have one piece, it looks really cool. It's like a beautiful sculpture. Um, but without exploring the entire collection of a hundred, it actually just doesn't feel the same.

Like you need to see all of the other iterations to really appreciate that one that you're standing right in front of. Otherwise, it just looks like a metal box. And I think a lot of that kind of happens on our blocks where, you know, Can you can become attached and really fall in love with a specific output or iteration, but then when you see the entire, um, uh, output, when you see the entire body of work, that's when it really sinks in.

The time and effort that the artists went into into creating this like beautiful piece. Uh, so what happens is the algorithmic artist, the artists creates an algorithm that algorithm is, is stored on the blockchain immutably. So like on the Ethereum blockchain, and that algorithm is missing the variability component.

So like, when I talk about the background being red or blue or green, the algorithm is waiting for you to tell it whether it's going to be a blue background or a red background by providing it inputs that are stored on the token itself. So the NFT, the non-refundable Dugan, all it stores is a bunch of strings of characters.

The algorithm that's stored in the blockchain without the information stored on the token is useless. And the information stored on the token without the information stored on the blockchain is also useless. It's those two things combined that create a visual output. So when a user. So the project, all they have to look at besides maybe some tweets from some artists that they might've kind of teased their work.

All they have to look at is all of the previously generated additions of that artwork. And that is the information that they have to decide whether they like those outputs and then want to mint another one. So when you go and you look at the beginning of a project and all you see is met number zero, you actually have very limited information.

To me, it's usually enough information to know whether I like this artist's style in case I wasn't familiar with them before. Uh, but then after that, you know, after 50 of them are minted, now you have this body of work and you can start to see the nuances between the different pieces. And that slowly builds until the edition sells out at whatever the cap that the artists set for the, for the artwork is.

And once that edition sells out, no more iterations can be purchased. And that's when you get the final body of work, the entirety of the, uh, Love that. And like how you mentioned earlier, right? So the artist doesn't know what the final body work's gonna look like until it's minted, which makes it pretty quick.

Correct. And one of, well, I'll just kinda touch on this here too. Cause I mean, we, we get really excited about we get, we get really nerdy about the blockchain component, right? So generative artists, like I mentioned, could have pressed the space bar before our bucks existed and generated unlimited number of iterations for a generative piece.

And so what the blockchain does is it kind of creates a finite amount of iterations to something that has historically been unlimited. Uh, and that's kind of something that couldn't happen without the blockchain. I mean, yeah. You could trust an artist to generate a hundred outputs generatively and then drag the algorithm to the recycle bin on their computer.

But for some reason that feels really weird, like to destroy code like that, like, you know, artists also iterate on the code and they kind of build on it, but it's not that different than like a screen printer taking and saying, this is in addition to 10. And then destroying the screens after 10 and kind of proving that no more are going to be created unless you go back and recreate the screens.

Got it. Uh, where do you see generative art going from here? Well, we're enjoying generative art, um, as kind of generative art fans here. And I think we're introducing a lot of people to not just generative art, but art in general. We're really enjoying the fact that people, you know, in our, in our discord, we have this need and that's, I came for the flip state for the art.

And I think that, I mean, people laugh about that, but I really think that genuinely has happened if that has happened with a hundred people in the last 11 months, I consider that like a major victory, right? Like what else in this world is so, uh, intentionally introducing people to art, um, then, then that kind of experience.

So, uh, I think that art in the generative world will kind of get, you know, it's been around since the sixties. Uh, but might get a new level of recognition, not just because of our box, but because of other generative art projects, uh, on, uh, um, in the space. In fact, I always like to joke that like I've been watching people buy generative NFTs on super rare known origin for years, but the word generative wasn't part of the equation.

Cause it just wasn't part of the equation. The artists was creating it, algorithmically, minting it and putting it on the platform. Um, and it's really nice to now see the word generative is part of the equation to the degree, maybe overdone in a couple cases, but that's okay. Like that's an, that's an indication that people are kind of drawn to that beyond generative art.

I think there's a lot of opportunities for generative. So a lot of the time that I spent ideated art blocks was not just for art. Although art has always kind of been our forward and our first kind of step, but also for the concept of generative design and generative content. In fact, you know, um, early versions of our website said, you know, generative content, regenerative design hosted immediately on the Ethereum, blockchain.

The idea here, being that just like, so art is the easiest implementation of generative, uh, content, uh, because it's, it's digital, it's flat. It's, uh, it's a file. Start on a computer or an algorithm stored on a computer. I think there's opportunities similar to the a hundred, uh, untitled boxes of in milled aluminum, where like you might have a really talented, uh, furniture designer, uh, industrial designer that creates an algorithm that creates a coffee table.

And, you know, you're going to be happy with anything that that algorithm produces because you've seen this designers work and you will go and you'll spend 2000. On a coffee table, which is actually a lot of money for a copy stable, but somehow not a lot of money in the NFT space. So I think we're eventually going to reach this kind of homeostasis, where we realized that, you know, you could spend half an Eve and actually maybe have somebody manufacturer a coffee table and have it delivered to your door that uses CNCS to follow some features that an algorithm dictated that was created by, by an industrial designer or a graphic designer.

So I think we're going to see generative applications in industry, uh, furniture, manufacturing, and then also gaming. I think that, you know, if, if every time I went and bought my, my sword on Zelda, if it was just a slightly different pixel configuration, I think that would be pretty cool. Uh, but then on top of that, if I could level up that sword and then it's available and open sea and, you know, it's unique from the start, but then on top of that, it can be built on, um, and you know, you can sell it and then go mint another sword.

Uh, I think there's a really beautiful opportunity for video game companies to have. The entire catalog of objects in a game existing on a single smart contract, kind of like the Bible of that project. So like, you know, every sort, every suit, every character exists as a generatively created piece. And no matter what happens to that game, that that catalog exists immutably because of the way our box works.

We store the scripts on chain. It has more longevity than your traditional NFT or the traditional video game that was hosted in 1995 on a server that no longer exists. There's that immutability that I could go back to in 20 years and be like, oh man, I remember when I got that character and know, play that game, and it's not dependent on the success of that video game, even though I might've dedicated 40 or 50 hours of my life to that video game.

And now that video game doesn't exist anymore, or that company went out of business. I can still go have the memory of that experience and maybe even own those pieces. So I think there's opportunities in the video game space as well. And we will definitely want to explore those with our blocks. Once we kind of get our inner stuff together and get to explore outside of.

That's awesome. So are you teasing out of art blocks, video games coming soon? Um, you know, we have one developer already Hindu, uh, dropped a piece on our box that, uh, is a game. It's a little game of pong and it's super, super sweet. It's like super smooth, clean 3d. Um, and you know, when, when he created that, I kind of hinted at him creating our blocks arcade and kind of creating like a standardized output for these games where another website could actually listen to outputs from the algorithm that would post scores and kind of create a home for people to like, kind of all play the games together, these like blockchain mini games.

Uh, we are absolutely going to focus on art for the foreseeable future. There's there's, you know, there's so much bandwidth that can be dedicated just to improving the art part of the platform. And that is our roots and that's where we started. And it's so easy to get excited about all these other opportunities and we'll we'll approach them, but.

For now you're going to have to live with like, you know, a couple, a couple of games hosted in the outbox factory. And, you know, I'd love to see like a putt putt golf thing, or like a generates a golf course, like a tiny little golf course with a hole in a random location and rocks and random locations.

And maybe you can't even beat that because the algorithm created an impossible level. I think there's a lot of fun to be had there. Uh, we're just, uh, we, we really are just wanting to take a step back with the exploration and focus strongly on just making sure that our product is as user-friendly and, um, buildable as possible.

Love that. So we've seen those become a hot topic in the NFT world lately. Uh, what are your thoughts on Dow's? Um, I hated the idea of Dow's, uh, early on. Uh, in fact it took two very smart humans reaching out to me and, uh, Proving that, that there was humanity in the concept of a Dow. So I, you know, I I've always been so grossed out by like the incredibly speculative nature of everything in the crypto space.

I shouldn't say grossed out, but that's not the right word. I just, uh, I really discouraged, I guess, by just how everything has to be associated with the valuation. Um, there's a market. I mean, there's market cap on squiggles, right? Like it's a work of art, but like they're, you know, schools are referred to as having a market cabin.

I'm not offended by that. I just, you know, like everything has that like dollar value associated with it. And to me, um, in my early days of crypto, which is 2017 and participating in new coins and startups and, uh, master nodes and, you know, trusting other people to dedicate time to a project. And people really like, I just, I think enough times I would be participating in some kind of like all coin project and the value would spike and like half the team would go away because it would just sell their shit.

They made it, like they made a bunch of money and I, and I felt like Dow's were just going to be an automatic perpetuation of that. Uh, and then I met the beautiful people of the Flamingo Dow and, um, I just remember, uh, pre reached out early because she's like, Hey, I just wanna let you know, we're the ones who've been getting all these squiggles.

Cause there was somebody that was just minting them up to squiggles. There was a few different people that were minting squiggles. And I was like, man, I hope these people, uh, realize like there's no guaranteed value of these things. Like this is just like, you know, um, my little art project, but she reached out and she was like, Hey, I just wanna let you know, we're really excited about our blocks and we really love your squiggles.

And I was very cordial and I was very excited. And then, and this is before I knew she was even part of a doubt. And I, I specifically remember she was like, have you ever heard of Flamingo Dow? And my response was like, oh, I'm not into douse. And we kept talking and. I mean, I love my fellow degenerates in the space.

I've spent four years, like on discord and the crypto punch discord, literally like meeting everybody as they stumbled into crypto because, or in the NFTs. Cause that was kind of like the, the home, uh, you know, the birthplace of all the projects. And I just, you know, I love all my degenerates, but I definitely felt alongside them, like very degenerate in the empty space.

And so little by little talking to Priyanka, I just kind of started feeling like I was talking to a human, like someone from the outside world, uh, someone that understands law and uh, just not just normal procedures. And so I. Decided to kind of consider working with Flamingo Dao. And I did, and I joined and I just remember joining and being like, this is, this is like pure magic.

Like there's dozens of people inside the Flamingo Dow talking about all the projects that are coming out, giving opinions, voting, thumbs up, thumbs down. And there's 50 something members and maybe only 13 active members. And like, I was maybe more than 13, but you know, I was originally an active member and I felt like I was contributing now.

I feel like a just useless number just because of the box has completely taken over my life. But, you know, I have this dream that I would one day get to a point where I can wake up in the morning, uh, open up like the philosophical newspaper, which is like the Flamingo discord with a cup of coffee. And just look at all the comments from the day before and participate in all of these things.

The exploratory, uh, nature of Dallas, I think is an incredible by having that many people from that many different backgrounds, all contributing to a project. I think that there's just like just, I, I just think it's a beautiful thing and I don't think. Our operate the same way. And I don't think all Dallas will be successful longterm, but I, my, I definitely did 180 degree pivot when I met Flamingo and realized that there actually was a humanity behind these dials and like their way of collecting art.

I mean, yeah, I think there is a financial long-term horizon, just like there is with just about anybody in this space, but they seem to respect the NFTs and the value and the artists, um, a lot more than others. And so I have like, there's a special place in my heart for, for Flamingo down, love that honesty I on Dows and also, you know, admitting to the 180 there.

So, uh, uh, thanks for that, Eric. Uh, you know, I know you mentioned, uh, you know, the market cap of art blocks. We talk about floor price on the show and, you know, putting the, the east value aside, how do you measure, you know, the success of art blocks? What makes it a successful project in your eyes? And that you're most proud of.

Uh, after w w what I consider a successful art work is when you drop the word crypto, and when you drop the word generative and you just call it art. And, um, you know, w if you go back to like Tyler House for Danza, all of those pieces, they look really great in the body of work, but they actually look pretty awesome independently too.

Like, even if it was just a, one-on-one like, that's a really delicate, beautiful piece. And so the success of it, of an artwork for me is a, like my interest in mentoring, a bunch of them, which obviously, since our box has gone through like a growth mode that has significantly reduced, like I mentioned, seven mentored in purchased $1,700 bucks pieces between November and may, and then subsequently minted in purchase, maybe like 50 from, uh, June or July to today.

So obviously, like my fund has dropped significantly on that and in the process, but. To me, the sign of success is like how degenerative early. I decided that I wanted to mint that piece. Like whether I wanted one or 10 or 20 or in some cases like, like poor, uh, Alexis, Andre, uh, he dropped it. He did a piece called messengers and I, I mean, I went deep.

I think I bought 40 of them. Cause I wonder one of every color that to me is like success. Uh, in terms of like an art piece, but that's just me as like a curator of my art collection. Um, the other sign of success is like really watching people from the outside world coming in and purchasing. These are box pieces.

Some of them have very significant valuations and people that have zero short-term horizon, like, you know, that the person that's buying these pieces of this price point is not expecting to turn around and sell it for like 10 X next week. Like at those prices, there is a fundamental ceiling. Like we talked about floors all the time, but there must also be a ceiling.

Right. And so whether that fundamental ceiling is the total sum of all of the dollars in the world, or whether it's some other factor of, you know, um, you know, wealth, uh, we, I do think that as you, as you sell pieces for higher, you're getting closer to that fundamental ceiling. And so watching people buy pieces at that kind of fundamental, I mean, that's not the ceiling, but as close to the ceiling, as we've seen, uh, that has zero intention of moving those pieces for the next few years.

Uh, I think is really a pretty solid sign of success as well, because that long-term, these are being recognized as like isolated individual, um, successful works of just generative and not just crypto, but just art. They stand on their own. And the, like the goose ringer is a really good example of that.

Like, it became a very well-known piece, uh, within our box, you know, um, you know, Dimitri showed a lot of favor to it, but then it also kind of looked like a goose and like people recognize it. And, you know, the owner of it was just so proud of that piece and it became world famous, I guess, maybe just in the NFT space, but it's a pretty big space these days.

And then watching the. Expand to end up in a collection of someone else collecting just like the finest pieces of not just our plots, but like all, uh, appease, uh, really I think solidified the, the long-term, uh, success of, of our box. Perfect. So one of our favorite things to ask on the show, um, you know, when we have the creators of projects on is to talk about their favorite traits, right?

So art blocks obviously has so many different projects. So I know you probably can't pick, you know, your favorite ones, but maybe give us some favorite traits for Cromey squiggles or some of the other big names. What do you think, uh, what are some of your favorite traits out there? It's easy with the squiggles.

Um, I really liked the closed terminal ribbed, um, as the community has so nicely dubbed it. I just love the words that the community can use to describe these pieces. And so like, ultimately. They've, uh, they've named it and it's just the rib squiggle, um, that doesn't have an open end on the end that you don't see color on the end.

You just see like the same color of the squiggle, uh, that I, there was a time where any of them that were for sale under five, under 0.5 each on open. See, I was snagging them and I built up a little extra padding on the, on those. I love those pieces a lot, uh, outside of the squiggle, I think I remember, um, you know, early on in our blocks traits were important, but they weren't like this intensity like they are now.

And I remember, uh, the archetype drop shuttle created this trait called the cube and the corner. And then, you know, like the rest of them were just the archetypes and there was something to me that just felt really special about like zooming out. Otherwise flat field and seeing the corner and that special, and then having the whole Cuban, making that extra special, uh, that really stood out to me as a really special trait.

And when I say that it's like, I ended up chasing those traits and then spending more money on that than I've ever spent on anything else in my life. And to date the most expensive things I've ever purchased in my life other than a house is an archetype cube. Uh, and, um, two sub scape star falls. So the Starfall was another trait that just, it just struck me and yellow and black and my favorite colors.

Uh, and so there was just something, when I first saw it, I didn't even know, you know, that was when our box was starting to kind of move faster and I stopped getting to literally nerd out and dive into every single Testnet. I mean, there was a time when our bus was getting started. I knew every single test in that piece from every drop, Dimitri mentioned a thousand tests that visas, I probably explored like 300 or 400 of them.

And then I got consumed by our box and I didn't really get to appreciate. Fun stuff that was happening. And I just remember seeing the Starfall piece, uh, from subscribes, from that Deloitte piece and after the mint and being like, I have to have that. And so I went in and I bought one and then I bought a second one.

And, um, just, you know, those two really stood out to me as like, like more in a sentimental way than just like, oh, these are rare. Like they touch the cord and I really, I really appreciate them. And there's many, many more, but those in particular, like stand up. That's awesome. I mean, I know it's hard to pick on some of these, uh, so, you know, I hate to ask that question, but we always like to try to get it out there.

So, um, Eric talking, uh, you know, broadly about the NFT market, right? You mentioned, uh, uh, I think rebel earlier, you mentioned open sea. We obviously have this, this overhanging elephant in the room of Coinbase getting into an NFT marketplace. Um, you know, what are you thoughts on, you know, a big crypto name, like.

Getting into NFTs and, you know, well, art blocks have a place in that. I say, bring it on. I mean, their, their user base is significantly bigger than the existing NFT space. Um, you know, and, uh, you know, I'm, I'm having some early conversations with them and like just learning about their integrations and kind of how they're going to, uh, deploy their project and like their MVP.

And I really think that they have an approach that's, that's different than your standard kind of NMT marketplace. And I think that it'll find a lot of love and a lot of success. Uh, I think if they act as a, as a ex like introduction to NFTs to 1% of their many, many millions of user bases user base, uh, I think we will all enjoy, um, uh, just a new generation of people entering the space.

And I think that's, that's pretty cool. Um, Marketplaces are hard. They're very hard, you know, and, and, and as, as, as I spoke to, for example, uh, Coinbase the other day, and I was like, look guys, like a lot of people, like to kind of shit on open seat, but like, can you imagine being in the position that open C was in like in August where not only do you have like a massive amount of sales and a massive amount of activity, but then you also have a new influx of people trying to deploy projects.

And everybody has their own little special case and their own little customer service requests. And yeah, you can try to grow your company, but like I experienced the same thing in our books. No matter how fast you try to grow, like you can't just pick people off the street and stick it behind a computer and started coding.

And so I think that there's just so much there that, uh, it's so easy, I think, uh, for the general public and that might've been me before I started our box, right. Like kind of come complaining and like, you know, yelling about the inefficiencies of, of, of open sea. But, you know, I remember open sea at NYC in 2019, you know, with a very humble table and, you know, three, four dudes that literally just were huge NFT nerds and that conviction that they had that early on, uh, I think, you know, they, they get all of the love and the market share that they deserve.

And I think it's going to be up to everybody else to either develop a better product or a different direction, um, a different environment, a different experience altogether for NFTs in order to kind of capture some of that market. But I do caution people. Like when you, you know, it's like, I feel like projects could come out, um, to compete with our box right now.

It'd be like, well, you know, we're not going to tell you how many additions do you have to do? Like they can, they can basically like pick all the things that our blogs is, has struggling with and say, we're going to create this new marketplace. That's going to fix all that. But like that basically is saying that, you know, our blocks is just naive and or dense and not understanding those conditions and just plowing through things.

When in reality, there's a very specific reason why the things that are deficient on our pots are actually deficient on our parts and they have to do with scaling and they have to do with like, Supply and demand. And, um, I think what I, what I appreciate about Coinbase is that they're not coming out and saying, okay, like we're going to do everything.

You know, we're going to pick all the things that open C's doing and do them a completely different way. They're just going to do their own thing. And I think that's how healthy competition happens in the crypto space. It's just do your thing, bring to the table, bring to market, whatever you are passionate about, whatever you feel strongly about.

And if it fits people will come to you. And if it doesn't then, um, you know, that that's part of like startups and entrepreneurship love that. Eric, one of my favorite things that come out of NFTs are the communities. Uh, you know, how do you communicate with, uh, our blocks community, you know, right now is that their discord Twitter.

And if so, are you active on a daily basis in those communities? Our discord community? I think if it hasn't hit 40,000, cause there's is about two, which is just like bonkers. It was a thousand during the archetype drop. In fact, we kind of. W when we were first panicking about oversubscribed drops, we did like a white list and the, our bucks discord, just like we did a user, why not a white list, but like a user list of all the users.

So that in case we needed to implement a white list, we had a way of doing it. That couldn't necessarily be cheated too easily. And then we did that a few weeks later and it was 4,000 I can remember was after some other drop. And then we eventually just gave up like there's 40,000 people that have joined.

Um, I. I spent a little bit less time in the discord than I used to because now there's, uh, 14, 15 of us at our box. And, uh, I spend a significant amount of time on like one-on-ones with the team to make sure that, you know, we can kind of keep her stuff together and continue building and growing the platform.

But, um, as a result of growing the team, cause you know, I got to a point where, I mean, I, I was on the, I was on the verge of breaking myself. I mean, you know, I was easily 80, 90, maybe sometimes more hours a week, you know, I'd wake up, I'd spend the entire time on our blocks and I'd put my kids to sleep and then I'd stay up until three on our blocks.

And it got to this point where it was just like so overwhelming and excessive. And a lot of that time was, you know, uh, you know, one-on-ones with people in the discord, like trying to defend what we're doing and, you know, standing up for what our blocks believed in and not trying to like get swept into like this whole crypto speculative madness and, um, the, the cool thing about growing the team, uh, where right now, I spent a lot of time with the team is that I'm hoping that by growing the team and being able to kind of offload a lot of the responsibilities that I had on a day-to-day basis, I can go back into the discord and fight it out with people again.

And I love fighting it out with people, as long as they're respectful. I don't like talking to people that are accusing us of being money grabby. And like, no, that's just not a fun conversation. Like, I don't think we've indicated in anything but Goodwill for the community. Like we really want the community to thrive and we want the artists to thrive and we want the platform to thrive.

So it sticks around how many platforms existed in 2008 at the peak of like the crypto cycle. And then that's when they were thriving and it, you know, everything fell apart and they went with it, you know, so it's good to be thriving in good times and also be very conservative so that we can vent exist during the slow times.

And that's when we can build. And right now things are cooling off a little bit. And so it's giving me some time to get back into the discord and have some nice little bouts with people which I can kind of miss. I mean, I don't, I don't miss the one. We were having an August, uh, but I missed the ones that we're having today.

Um, and, and it's going to give us time to take a step back and build and, and, and, and literally just continue trying to build like the best NLP platform that can exist, like the most crypto native piece. So, um, you know, that's, that's kinda where we're at, but I love my community. Uh, we're very lucky that I could not be more grateful for the team on our blocks.

They are the community, they all came. And majority of the art blogs team came from the community, which is just completely mind blowing as well. Um, and, and together, you know, uh, I think, I think we, I think we're going to do some fun stuff, love that. And you actually talked about, you know, how Adam teas can be mentally straining, which they can absolutely be that, you know, how do you balance your work and personal life?

You know, now. Th there there's a, there's a story I'll tell you. So we, we actually engaged with a mental health expert, um, because we started feeling like the quality, the mental health quality, and our discord was actually starting to be strained. Like people were saying things that just made us nervous.

I could just, you know, it just felt weird. Like there was the emotions that were, there were being really worn, um, in public and, and more importantly, the way the public was reacting to them maybe felt immature and felt troubling to us. And so we started working with this mental health expert, um, who we started explaining this is discord, and this is the madness that we shared discord.

And it was like, these are the examples of the things that make us really nervous. Um, and during that conversation, he's like, Hey, can, can we just step back a little bit and talk about your team? And like, I remember specifically hearing that and like, just like I was in complete shock because he was like, you're worried about like the mental health of your community.

But like, how has your team's mental health, like you guys are on here 24 7, duking it out with people and worrying about the artists. Cause I mean, you, you have, I mean the amount of time that goes into deploying projects now artists are becoming veterans because they've already deployed before. So it's a little smoother, but there's so much time that goes, especially early on into auditing scripts and vetting the artists and like just the entire process.

Everything was 24, 7 hands-on. Um, and it hit me pretty hard to be questioned about my mental health when we were there to like find out and help the mental health of our community and people were questioning our mental health and we took a step back and I'm like, yeah, this is, this is actually a problem.

And we are all suffering from this, not just the community, there's an addiction. Mentality like in discord and if Ts there's this speculative nature, there's the instant customer service on demand, or I'm going to tweet about how your platform is terrible thing, you know, which I mean, we definitely do not appreciate when people threaten us like that.

Like, I think it's completely unreasonable considering how transparent we are and how public we are about our mistakes and our issues. Like it's just completely unreasonable. Um, so yeah, so mental health is so it's so important in this space and everybody should take a step back every now and then. Um, and you know, we've, we've implemented no drops on the weekends.

Uh, that's been, that's probably been like the number one, like biggest mental health, uh, positive for me, uh, because I can actually kind of, I mean, I'll still LORIC I always learn like you can't not work in this course, but like, I'll take a step back and. And, uh, and not feel like I have to participate every single day of the week.

And so my, my kids are experiencing more of me, which, you know, there was a time there where like, I just really wasn't, it wasn't there. It wasn't very present as a dad. So things have come a long way. I'm hoping that things, uh, continue to get better. Uh, for the team. My target would be 60 hours a week. Like I'm not even looking for 40.

I would just be perfectly happy with 60. Uh, and you know, w we have a lot of team members that have joined, uh, one of them in particular, Jake Rockland is our CTO that came in and was like, okay, no more drops on weekends. Like we, you know, you, you need to set a good example. Like how many days off have you taken Eric?

Because if you're, if you're trying to set an example, You know, mental health, like if you don't do it, then no one else is going to do it too. Or they might take that as like the lead. And I was like, well, I haven't taken any days off. I literally haven't been off discord and 270 days. So, you know, um, we, we, I, like I said, our team is just really special and, um, everybody's looking out for everybody and, uh, we're, we're just really lucky.

And, um, if, if, if in the next five years, our blocks can get to a point where it can even be considered for like the top 100 companies to work for in the United States. Like that would be my next goal, um, because if we can have like the best artists and the best artworks and the best team, and on top of that, be recognized for like having internal, like positive company culture, um, and, uh, and just like a wonderful place to work.

Like there's really nothing else that I'm looking for in life at this point, uh, in terms of, uh, like business or entrepreneurial achievement, like I, I, at that point will have reached, reached my goals and, um, and, uh, I can't wait for that. That's awesome. Erica, thank you so much for your honesty. Right? We talk about these NFTs all the time.

And so many times we probably forget that there is real people, right? Real people behind these projects that have, have real lives. Um, so, uh, I love your honesty. W we kept you along. Uh, this was a great interview, a long one. So Eric, uh, that's going to do it for questions. We appreciate you, you know, joining us on the roadmap.

We look forward to talking to you soon and hearing more about, you know, art blacks in the future. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you to everybody out there, listening our community or our team and our artists. Like, you know, couldn't be here without y'all and thanks for taking the time to chat. I think.

Awesome. Well guys, another great interview here on the roadmap. I mean, mass a huge week, right? We had G funk from pixel and now Eric, from art blocks, two of the biggest projects out there and, you know, mass, I gotta repeat it. Right. I love the honesty from Eric, you know, whether it was the conversation about Dows and, you know, having the 180 there to the mental health aspects, right.

That was something G funk touched on on Tuesday, right. Was the mental health aspect and the needing to take breaks. And I just love the honesty there. Uh, you know, behind this project. Yeah. You know, in two things that I've noticed from the last two episodes that we've done is you can see the passion in the way these guys talk about their projects, you know, and they see it more than just, you know, just a cash grab or just, you know, putting a price on it, which I love, you know, seeing that aspect of NFTs because we get lost in the floor prices and, you know, and you know, is it gonna pump?

Is it not? Why is it dumping? You know, why is there no new news? So I love seeing these two projects that have been around for awhile, you know, provide that insight that we often forget in this fast moving environment. And then if two world perfect, well mass, uh, before we head out today, what do you think if we get to some headlines and talk about some of the big stories out there, let's break it down now, let's go.

What do we have? All right. So last, this actually happened last week, but we haven't had a chance to digest this news yet. So mass, there was a crypto punk record purchase that was turned down. So a $9.49 million bid, um, turned down by punk owner at Richard, R I C H E R D on Twitter, before the bid, he had said that his punk was not for sale.

Don't care, what anyone offers me. And then it was almost like someone out there taunted him. Right. And they put this bid out there. There was also some rumors that maybe, you know, this was a PR move. The big thing here is that this was a punk. That's not even one of the most rare, right. It has the 3d glasses, um, which is a decent trait.

You can see it there on the screen, the cigarette. Um, but the big key here for Richard was he said that over the past six months, I have used 6 0, 4, 6 as my identity, and have built up a significant brand around. To me, my brand identity and what I'm building in the NFT space will be way more valuable in the long run.

And this would have broke the record by a lot, right? The top sales 7.5 8000007.5 7000005.45 million. So I made a significant bump up from the record and I mean, mass, what do you think of this? And how important is it? If an anonymous person out there, you know, makes their PFP and NFT and builds a community, are they ever going to be able to see.

Well, you know, that's a great point, but a lot of these guys they've had their punks, you know, through the cycles where they've 10 X, 500 X, a thousand X, and they've held for this long, which tells us, you know, they identify with it in more of a, you know, like you said, brand instead of just a monetary thing.

So it's curious to see that, um, build around it as opposed to selling it for profit. Right? So this guy can build his brand and, you know, monetize it without having to sell his punk, which I think is cool. But having that offer, I mean, that's tempting, man. I don't know how, you know, that's a big offer. So yeah, I mean, we say diamond hands and, you know, NFTs and stacks all the time, but I'm a big fan of taking some profits too.

And I mean, you talk about a profit that's, that's a big one. Uh, you know, that's, that's, that's a big one to pass up behind, but, uh, again, more power to Richard out there for, for holding onto that. Exactly. Yeah. So yeah, as I was, that was huge. Um, let's see, in other news though, we have Mecca verse, right? So Mecca verse has taken a slight dip in value over the last week.

Uh, we've seen some controversy here, Chris. We've seen people talk about, you know, You know, they don't look, they don't, you can't tell them apart or, you know, the profile pictures, you know, don't look as good from a aesthetic level. What are your thoughts? Yeah, I mean, that one I'm screen here. I still love the Lego ones.

Right. But that one before it, the silver one, if you look at some of the, the difference between, you know, a silver, you know, uh, the different. It's hard to tell on some of them, right. It's like slight tweaks of color. Um, so, you know, they've been kind of accused of, you know, not really having differentiating factors.

There was also some accusations of insider trading before the reveal, which we never liked to see in the NFT space, but I mean, mass, these were selling for five to 10 east pre reveal, and then they dipped. Right. And we have a floor, I think right now of 1.83, that silver one that was on screen, um, I think was a 60 eith purchase.

The Lego style one, there was a 50th purchase. So I mean still some big purchases, but this, this project for being as big of an event as it was, you know, 200,000, the disk or 200,000 on Twitter, the hype has completely just died out. I haven't really seen anyone make a Mecca there. PFP. What about you, man? I have not.

And that just comes down to the question. You know, my self included, all I knew about Mecca was that it was very hyped and that you can sell it for a profit. Right. I didn't, I don't know much about what they're doing. You know, I, I feel like that message got lost with all this hype, you know, the community aspect, what their goals are, what the roadmap looks like.

I feel like that got lost and pushed in the backend, which doesn't mean they can't make a comeback and turn it around and, you know, focus on that now. Um, but you know what? Those hype drops, we tend to just be, you know, more concerned about the price. And once the price drops, we tend to look at it as a, you know, I wouldn't say this is a failed project, but definitely it's lost a lot of its hype and community behind it.

Yeah. That's what I was going to say. I think the important thing here still is that anyone that won the lottery, right. And you were able to mint these, your costs was still 0.2 plus gas, and there wasn't a huge gas war. Cause you had six hours. So 0.2 and you essentially could have sold it pre reveal for five to 10 east, or if you hold it, you could probably sell it for two or 1.8 floor now throughout the last couple of weeks.

So you still could have made a huge profit, the people that, you know, probably aren't too happy about the project hype dying down is anyone who bought after the lottery, right. That was buying, you know, for five east pre reveal. Um, but yeah, I mean this project, I, I wish it the best. Maybe it'll come back to life, but, uh, for now I just think the cycle is kind of over there.

Uh, mass, we, I talked for a minute about crypto dad, right? We had crypto dads on the street. So one of the big events is finally happening, right? If you own a crypto dab, you can mint a crypto mom for free plus gas, one mom per wallet. So there is mom acts right to a little take on space X. Um, w we have some other moms they've, they've released some sneak peaks.

Uh, we've got some rainbow lips there, the, the flower hat. Um, and then I think that that is the OJI, their maths. They're calling that the mom, oh, gee, that one right there. I think that's going to be the big one, right? So they will be revealing starting tonight at 7:00 PM. So this happened last night. You have a week to mint if you own a crypto dad.

Um, so I have not mentored my moms yet cause I keep waiting for, for gas to die down, but I kind of want to mint before the reveal tonight. Um, but I'll be following these at a 7:00 PM Eastern time when these start to show up and we'll see, uh, what I get out of this, uh, Love that, you know, we love the dads, such a great community.

Uh, you know, seeing them come out with the moms so quick because their project is only a couple of weeks old. So seeing them launch so quick is great to see. Um, so let's move on here. We have some big board ape yacht club sales. So Matt , who was the DraftKings co-founder he sold the board ape for 696.969 E.

You know, I love the numbers there, uh, which is a third, highest Eve amount ever paid for board apes. So that's huge. We've seen two top sales where it's 7 69, 8, 7 48. And then this one is a third one here. So this ape has a trippy for which I believe only points 77%. I have it, which is 77 apes and then has a King's crown as well, only 77 apes have it.

And the floor right now is 29 E uh, what do we think about this, Chris? Yeah, I mean, I love the sale price, right. Again, I mean, it's hard to pass up on these big numbers. So, um, I didn't look at when those other top two sales happen, but based on a theory I'm rising. I mean, this might actually be the top eight sale in, you know, USD, right.

Um, cause that's one of the things with these sales is it's based in ease, but if a theory was 3000 versus 4,000 today, same with the floor price, right? The floor pack price on apes is 29 eighth right now, which is actually mostly. Then, you know, a floor price of say 33 34, a couple of weeks ago. Um, but I like this, the draft Kings co-founder Matt Kelly.

She's been, he's been pretty vocal and bullish on a board apes. Uh, he still has some, in fact, I think his profile picture on Twitter is, is a board ape still, um, draft Kings has also gotten into board apes, right. They bought one to give away for a contest. So, I mean, I, I like the sale here. I love that trippy for too, uh, you know, as one of the traits.

So there's only 77 out there and actually the top sale ever in EAs, right there was also, I believe a trippy first. So that, that, that trade is definitely one to keep on watch with two of the top three sales of all time and, and, and mass speaking of board apes. Right? So, as I said, you know, we w we saw, um, you know, DraftKings do a, uh, not a giveaway, but you could enter a daily fantasy contest.

And the winner got a board ape, right? Huge value. If you were. We are now seeing that Coinbase is giving away a board ape yacht club NFT right there on screen. That is number 4,609. This is if you download the Coinbase wallet app, you import or set up a new wallet, and then you tweet your Twitter username and the hashtag Coinbase wallet sweepstakes you have until October 26th.

And you also have to follow Coinbase on Twitter through November 15th. This isn't a rare age by any means. Um, the, the key trait here, uh, is that service close, right? The, the shirt and the hat. So that is a 1% trait. So it's a decent one. The floor for a service ape right now is 33 east, which has more than $135,000 mass.

I think this just adds to the Coinbase field, right? They've already had over 2 million people sign up for their NFT. Wait. They already have an app to trade a crypto. Now they have a separate wallet app. I mean, I think Coinbase, they're just going all in on NFTs here. What do you think? Absolutely like snow for a set earlier.

Bring it on. So I can't wait to see that. Um, you know, with that though, if they're in price has been soaring, man, it's hit over 4,100, you know, in the last couple hours. Um, and it's affecting that FTE market. It seems like people are taking profits. It seems like people are not buying as much. You know, we've started to see a trend where, you know, when Eve rises, we do see NFTs kinda drop in floor price or stay stagnant for a bit.

Um, so what are your thoughts on this? As far as the NFT market? I mean, I own some Ethereum, so I'm always happy to see a theory, some go up, but on the flip side, as you said, when a theory goes. A lot of times we see NFT floor prices fall. Right. We see people want to sell their NFTs to take a profit or because they'd rather hold the theory.

I'm right. I mean, it's hard not to own a theory. I'm right now when it's ripping and when people are thinking, you know, that it's going to go higher by the end of the year and next year. Um, so this is just a continued cycle, right? We talked about this on the show before. It's one of those things where again, if you're in NFTs, you gotta be patient.

Um, you gotta know your plan, right? You gotta know your, your risk reward, similar to stocks, right. Um, if you get into a project and the floor drops or it drops, you got to know, Hey, am I going to cut my losses and get out? Or am I going to hold because the value could go back up. Um, you know, I, I just think, you know, it's one of those things, again, Ethereum 4,100 and NFT floor prices.

No, just falling, uh, as a, as a pair trade there. So, uh, uh, another hot topic though, mass, uh, team that we had on the show a couple of times now, uh, the dose. So they have delivered, right? I mean, this is a project where they started, the, the floor price has gone up. They built a good community. They launched puppies, right?

So everyone who had a doge pound guy, puppy, they have a Halloween drop coming up. If you own a dose, oh gee. And a puppy, they have an app they've. Uh, launched early access to some other projects. They have a new roadmap coming out at 7:00 PM Eastern time tonight. Um, so they tweeted that. So again, seven o'clock tonight.

I don't have any early details. Um, the one thing I, I think is part of that, uh, we've seen some athletes get into NFTs and doge pound has kind of been teasing over the last couple of weeks, um, that they have signed some NBA players up for a new NFTE series. So I think maybe that'll tie in maybe dosha pound owners will get early access to that.

Um, but maybe we're getting some new dogs or some new puppies or something down the road again. I mean, I just feel like this team has well exceeded expectations and I'm excited to see what this new roadmap has. Same. Yeah. You know, the doge pound team. They're one of the few teams that I see that are constantly well aware of the markets and are providing utility and value for current holders and marketing themselves to bring on new holders by, you know, all these things that they're doing.

So we'll find out and we'll report in our next episode, what this is here, but so today, this morning, Chris, I don't know if you saw Reese Witherspoon. She changed her Twitter profile pig. Uh, it was a world of woman picks. So that's her new profile picture. Yeah. So we see this here. Um, you know, this is big cause we saw her come on a couple of weeks ago on Twitter and ask about, you know, NFTs and Eve and she wanted to get involved in it.

So seeing her change, her profile picture, we've seen Shaq, you know, and her and a couple of other celebs do this. Uh, you know, do we see this move forward with others? I think definitely the, the thing I liked about, you know, Reese Witherspoon was she, she definitely said from the start, she wanted to know more about women led NFT projects, right.

And again, that's no slight of hand or, you know, offense to the, the male projects out there, but there's been kind of a drive, you know, especially with some of these celebrities and finding the, the female, that projects. I still, I love world of women. Mazza, it's one of those ones where I kicked myself about right.

We've talked about this before I posted about it at 0.06 east in a discord, we watched it go up to three. I think it's above two east today for the floor. I mean, Gary, V's in it, uh, art chicks in it, uh, Logan Paul's in it. Um, now Reese Witherspoon, you got some big names in there and I just, I liked the artwork.

I like their community. And again, a woman led project and mass to your point, you know, celebrities, athletes, they're, they're changing their profile pictures. Right? That can really, you know, build a project up. Right. And it, and it can do more, it can build the floor price, but also if the athlete or the, the celebrity engages in the discord, you know, interacts with the community.

I mean, it really shows that some of these communities have, you know, staying power, um, you know, going forward. Absolutely. And first of all, every time that I look at the world of women, a floor price, Chris, I think of you, man. So for better or worse, I mean, I'm glad that you say that, but yeah. I mean, I had a hard time looking at it today.

As soon as I saw a recent post, I was like, no, oh man. I was like, of course she picked that one. I am curious if we get the backstory or if we hear from Reese, right. There was actually a post about that today. You know, we'll Reese, do you know at Twitter spaces, will she do an interview? Will she start talking about, you know, NFTs?

And I'm curious to hear if she says, you know, why world. You know, was that people posting that on her Twitter, did the team reach out to her? Did she find it herself? Right? How did this come to be? Because mass, I don't know if you remember that, but when she posted that tweet and it was like, what NFT should I look at?

I mean, might as well not post that. Right? Cause she got thousands of responses. She got shilled. She had people not even talking about NFTs. I mean, posting ridiculous things like that. That's what happens. Right. When you're a celebrity, you're always going to get a ton of responses, but I'm curious, you know, so Reese, if you happen to be watching, I mean, we'd love to have you on and hear about world of women.

Cause I want to know, you know, why this project and how did you find it? Um, and again, we could talk more about celebrities with their PFPs let's tag her on Twitter. We'll break this, cook down, posted on Twitter and tag her. So hopefully she. Yeah. And, you know, mass, I didn't happen to look, uh, at her wallet.

I guess that would be the other thing is now that you see the world of women a picture there, you could probably find it right on open, see, based on the traits. And you could probably find the wallet. And I'm curious if anyone has done that yet. And maybe we see, is this the first one, did, how long has she owned this for?

Um, you know, and is there going to be more purchases down the road? Uh, you know, part of that conversation with, uh, with snow fro, right? It was talking about the big investors, but we've also seen, you know, some celebrities buying up art blocks, right. Buying up crypto punks, um, uh, again, and is it a store of value?

Is it, you know, a flax? Is it for the PFP? I think it's a combination, right? Of all those. Absolutely. You know, and I've seen some feedback about celebs joining, you know, I've seen criticism where, you know, we've have seen celebs join, you know, they buy, you know, a hyped project, you know, they, they, they come into that empty space and then a couple of weeks later they launched their own project and just kind of cash grab it and then they just leave.

Right. So we've seen that a couple of times. Uh, it's gonna be interesting to see if that continues to happen or if we see people that actually love the space, for example, Steph Curry joined the board apes, you know, he put it in his bio he's part of the community he's in the discourse sometimes. Um, so I'm curious to see, you know, which directions certain celebs take, you know, with their platform because they have an influence.

So we'll see where that goes as well. So yeah. Um, recess, she put out a tweet, right? It was GM friends and tagged world of women. You saw Barry V retweet it, uh, saying, well, and then Reese retweeted, Gary V's tweet. Um, but to your point about the bio, it looks like Reese Witherspoon does not have a Twitter by.

Um, so we'll see if maybe she, she adds something there, but, uh, I think, you know, this is definitely along that that big conversation we can have on every show matters, right? Celebrities, athletes getting into NFTs. I still think, you know, we're early, we are going to make it because the fact that these people want in, um, and are just now getting in.

I mean, when some of us were in this for months or years, I think shows, you know, the life cycle continuing for NFTs mass. I think that was all our headlines. Is there anything else out there, any, uh, you know, upcoming projects, we haven't talked really about any upcoming mint, um, or new projects. Uh, what do you think anything catch your eye on.

You know, that's funny that you mentioned that because there it's been slow, you know, I probably haven't mentioned projects in awhile that I've, unless there's stealth drops. So what I've realized is the best thing to do now with the downtrending market is to join these. Discords try to get on these white lists and do your research on these projects before you just, you know, mindlessly throw, if that, uh, um, I think it, we can change that and, you know, start doing more of this.

We may see less, you know, just junk coming out and more, you know, uh, projects that are actually focused on the community and the arts. So that's kind of where I'm headed towards in my direction, instead of just trying to mint projects in the last couple of weeks or so. Yeah. I mean, I feel like for a while we were seeing, you know, maybe three or four minutes a day and then it got up, uh, 15, 16, 20 minutes a day, right.

Maybe if we can see the trends continue down. They can be more focused, right. And then, you know, we'll see more people meant them when you're having 20 minutes a day and people are keeping their ease cause they don't want to lose it right now with the bull market. You're not selling out these projects and you're just not getting the interest.

And those projects are losing momentum real fast. So I'm with UMass, haven't done much minting, um, but have done some discord, joining some white lists, uh, searches, some contests, some scavenger hunts, right. Whatever I can do to, to get on these white lists. And again, I mean, look for those discords, um, find those communities where you think this project is, you know, going to last, I mean, I'll even use the example with.

Snow fro, right? He said the art blacks discord was only a thousand when they dropped one of their most successful projects. There's over 40,000 now. And then on the flip side you saw, you know, makeovers had over 200,000, but I haven't looked lately, but I'm guessing there's a lot less than 200,000 in there now.

Um, so that's the other thing is maybe find some of these NFTs that have already mentored, um, that may still have the strong communities and that staying power going forward. Absolutely. Awesome. Well, guys, that's going to do it for us. Another exciting episode of the roadmap. I mean, man, we had a killer week right today.

G funk from pixel vault. We got to talk about punks comic Mehta hero. Um, we got to talk, you know, about that, that talent deal. Maybe we get some movies, some TV in the future. We had a snow fro from art blacks on today. We also got through all those exciting headlines, uh, you know, mass, it's hard to pick, you know, a favorite moment or a, a big event from this week.

Uh, it was just so full of them. Yeah. You know, these are two episodes that I personally will go back and just listen to them and watch them over again, just as there's so much alpha and info from these two guys that are killing it in space. And I see them having long-term value in that empty world. So, yeah, great week for us and great week for people watching and the guests.

Okay, great. Definitely will. We will be back next Tuesday, 2:00 PM. Eastern time. Um, I know we've still got more guests on the docket for October and November. I don't know who off the top of my head, so it's going to be a surprise for everyone out there, including myself, uh, and for mass and less of, he knows off the top of his head, but mass, we will be back on Tuesday.

So thanks for everyone who tuned in or is watching this. We do have all our episodes available as podcast as well, but if you are watching on YouTube, make sure you like this video and you subscribe to Benzingers YouTube channel, uh, and let Benzinga know. Hey, I want more episodes of the roadmap. I want more NFT content so we can keep pushing forward with our show.

Absolutely. See you guys on Tuesday.

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Episode Summary

GFunk.eth aka Comicman joins us for an exclusive interview! Learn about the MetaHero Universe, PUNKS comic, and more!

Twitter follows!

GFunk: https://twitter.com/Gfunkera86

Pixel Vault: https://twitter.com/pixelvault_

PUNKS Comic: https://twitter.com/punkscomic

MetaHero Universe: https://twitter.com/MetaHero_

MetaHero Identities are a collection of heroes, villains, and mutants native to the MetaHero Universe. The Core Collection consists of 146 fully-matched MetaHero concept characters, including two special mints, collaboratively designed by project creatives Chris Wahl and Odious. Generative MetaHero Identities (max supply of 9,678) can be minted at any time by redeeming MintPass #1, the signature NFT reservation system developed by Pixel Vault.

https://opensea.io/collection/metahero-generative

https://punkscomic.com/

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https://bitclout.com/u/maz

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Unedited Transcript:

What's up everyone. Welcome to the roadmap. Benzingers new NFT show. Last few episodes. We've had some great interviews, some great teams, the Vogue collective robotics, the dos pound owning force, crypto dads, dizzy dragons, suck doc, and more. We also did an NFT giveaway. Definitely stay tuned for more NFT giveaways in the future.

We've got a great show today. A great interview. Pixel vault, founder G funk. Joining us guys. This is the roadmap

All right, guys, you heard me say at Benzinga is new NFT show covering the latest news headlines and top interviews from top projects in the NFT world. If you're new here, we currently air Tuesdays and Thursdays, 2:00 PM. Eastern time. We're working on getting more shows going. Uh, we we've got an exciting show coming up today.

Before I talk about that, I want to bring on my cohost mass, mass. What's going on, buddy. Chris, a exciting episode today. It feels like we haven't been here in a while. It's been a week since we did our last show, but today's episode is going to be amazing. I'm doing great. Yeah, we've got a great week planned.

And before, I mean, for those of you who follow Benzinga on Twitter or read the articles, you probably already heard who our interview guest is on Thursday. If not, we'll talk about that at the end of today's show, but we have two of the biggest NFT projects out there. Both joining us this week. I mean, one week to catch two of these big projects.

So if you're new here, go ahead. Smash that like subscribe to Benzinga his YouTube channel. That's where you're going to get notifications. When we're live. You're going to hear all about our great guests. So mass, uh, before we bring on our guests, let let's talk a little bit. Who do we have coming on the roadmap?

Yeah. So we have G funk AK the comic man joining us today. And you know, I've been in the space for a couple months and I hear his name all the time, nothing but good things, you know, love the pixel bolt, project, love what they're doing with the planets. And just, there's just so many things to talk about, which, you know, I'm excited for that.

And, uh, yeah. So yeah, I feel great. I mean, this is one of those projects where yeah. If you, if you're, you've been in the NFT space for a little while, if you're not completely new, you've likely heard of pixel vault, punks comics, Mehta hero. You've heard those names right. Well, today we're going to dive into the background, right?

How did those come to be? And what's ahead. I mean, you talk about NFT projects that could have lasting value and lasting pixel vault is building, I mean, an entire NFTE ecosystem. I am so, so excited to get into the, and for anyone, you know, here in the chat, we're going to be taking questions for G funk.

And if we have time at the end of the interview, one of the things we're doing on the show, right? Mass is asking questions right from the chat. So feel free, drop those questions in a me mass, and the producers will try to get to those, you know, at the end and pull up some of our favorite questions. So you never know what's going to get, but mass, I know there is a ton of people here excited and ready to hear from the man himself, chief funk.

But before we bring him on, we have this trailer that we made to get everyone hyped. So everyone out there mash the, like, sit back and get ready to hear about pixels. Let's go

all right. Hyped, right? It's time. I mean, hopefully everyone hyped up. We're ready to go. We we've got a great show. So without further ado, let me bring on to the roadmap. G funk, Hey, what's going on? What's up man. Loving the walk-in music. I appreciate that. We made you a hold for a whole trailer and everything.

I mean, that's how big this episode is. We appreciate you coming on. Um, again, as Matt said, you know, one of those names in the space that is very familiar, you know, to anyone who's been following NFTs for awhile. So we have respect for you and we are so excited to talk all things pixel vault today. So let's dive into some questions.

So I'm going to kick it off here, you know, G funk before we get in to pixel vault. Uh, let's hear a little bit about your experience in the NFT world before you created pixel. Yeah. So I've been in crypto since 2014. Um, I'm an entrepreneur in real life. And so a lot of those gains, uh, unfortunately were a bit muted.

I was, as I was, uh, taking profits on the way up. And I started to get exposure to the NFT space at the end of last year. Um, I got really into top shot, started to get into crypto punks, pretty similar, uh, pathway into the NFT world is I think a lot of our collectors have had, um, and I have a background in the entertainment space.

Um, so you know, very familiar with developing IP. And I saw this opportunity that, that, uh, was starting to become clear early this year that certain people on Twitter were starting to develop personalities. You know, whether they be beanie or G money guys like that, where they had these avatars and we're starting to kind of connect their personal brands to them.

But at that point in time, nobody had, had really started to develop IP in a traditional sense behind. And so that was the birth of pixel vault. Um, it's basically a business designed to, to drive intellectual property drive value, to NFTs, which are otherwise, obviously stagnant on chain. Um, so that was sort of the birth of the comic in the run.

Run-up there to that first Christie's auction, uh, very exciting time. Uh, and yeah, I mean, it it's crazy how much has happened in the last six months or so, but, uh, super happy to be here and see all the progress that has been made. And, uh, only up from here, I think that's right. And it's hard to believe it's only been, you know, sick like that.

And I mean, it seems like a lifetime, um, with all this stuff that has been created. So one of the things, when we talk about NFT projects, a lot is artwork, right? And. That you have Chris wall, a former, you know, Marvel, DC and other artists. Uh, how did that relationship come to be? And how involved is Chris wall on the current and future?

Yeah. So that's actually a really funny story. So, um, when I approached beanie with this idea, uh, for the punks comic, he actually just sent out a tweet saying like, basically money is no object. Like we want the best artists in the world. Uh, we're thinking of developing a project. I don't know if he mentioned, uh, that it was, uh, like a comic book based on crypto punks or not, but, um, yeah.

And Chris was one of the people that responded to that tweet and, uh, I just started talking to him and looking through his work. Um, obviously he's been a part of, a lot of great projects, but tank girl is sort of like what he's most notable for and very quickly and looking at his work, I just knew it was the perfect fit for, uh, what we were trying to create with the punks comic.

And yeah, he, he's the, he's the chief comic artists moving forward. Uh, we have issue two well underway. We have a large corporate partner that's, uh, As much as I love them slowing the process down a bit. So, uh, issue two is currently planned for sometime in November. We'll, we'll see how the dates change. Uh, but yeah, Chris is very much a big part of the future of pixel.

Awesome. Yeah. And we're going to show some of those images here throughout the interview. Love the artwork. I know there's a lot of big fans out there as well. W you mentioned that this, you know, six months, so it's when punk's comic first launched, it was not a fast sellout, um, you know, something we're seeing now in the NFT space.

So what was it like in the beginning? Was there always a belief, you know, that this project would sell out and find an audience? Yeah. So, I mean, you know, for sure I believed in the vision, right. And I think that time has, has really paid dividends to the people that understood the. But I think still today, you know, I mean, if you look at the planets, there's still supply available.

Granted, we, we intentionally designed it to, to make it available to anybody that wanted to join the community. But I think you're really seeing people focus on kind of this like lotto scratcher field. Right. Everybody wants those rarity traits and it's all PFPs and stuff that seemed to be selling out instantly.

Now, regardless of if the project is moving the community forward, you know, I think, unfortunately you're seeing like a lot of copy paste type stuff happening, but, uh, with that said, you know, with, with great risk comes great reward. So yeah, it took like five weeks for the comic to sell out. Um, but really sort of building on this idea of a quote unquote decentralized Disney is like this buzzword you'll hear, um, Giving the community, the opportunity to have fractional ownership in these underlying 16 crypto punks that we're actively developing story around.

Right. Um, as we succeed the community succeeds. And I think that just as sort of an overall theme for web three, that that's going to be very powerful and be a really disruptive force within traditional media. And, you know, as things have progressed over the last six months starting to approach these traditional media partners, um, you know, it's been, it's been interesting, the reception, and I think that a lot of them are fearful of being the next blockbuster, right.

Blockbuster didn't want to adapt to the Netflix model. So, um, there's actually been a pretty great willingness so far with, uh, major media partners to, to start exploring, developing this IP in the traditional sense. But yeah, I mean, yeah. Trying to blaze new frontiers. I think this is the way things are going.

And, um, you know, the people that have believed have been rewarded so far, but certainly some sleepless nights along the way. I totally love that, man. Um, can you walk us through the decision to make a burning mechanism for the comics? Yeah, so, um, at the time I don't, I don't think really anybody was doing this, but sort of a core proposition of pixel vault is this idea that when you're collecting the, the end result of your collection is very much going to be a result of your own decisions.

So trying to create as many 50, 50 toss up decisions as we can, you know, are you somebody that, uh, leans into risk? Are you risk averse? You know, do you love the comic? Do you like gaming? Um, all sorts of decisions that I think ultimately reflect the choices of the individual, the risks they want to take.

How they see their collection shaping how actively they want to be engaged in the community. Right? The game that we're building is very much going to be a community built project with all these Dows. So, you know, we, we like to introduce as many decisions as we can and, you know, some people love it. Some people hate it.

It's certainly, uh, a frequent complaint I hear about pixel vaults is that it's, it's too complicated. And so, you know, I take that, I take that criticism to heart and I'm going to try and find ways to make things more clear. Uh, but certainly, you know what, we've tried to do weekly spaces. We're trying to lay out everything very clearly on the website.

But, uh, I really liked this sort of like Willy Wonka nature of pixel hall. Um, I think it makes it a lot of fun and it's really built a very strong community, but you know, it's not going to be for everyone. You have to sort of be engaged with things of Walt to, to get and catch everything that. Exactly.

Yeah. You're building a whole universe around it, which is awesome. So speaking to that ma meta heroes, uh, how close to a game are we? Yeah, so, I mean, the game is going to take quite a bit of time, um, with that said we're looking to stagger it intelligently so that, you know, people aren't waiting two, three years to see any sort of game development.

Um, so sort of this first look and first, uh, action with characters, we're looking to hopefully be about a year out, but you know, it it's really too early to confirm any sort of timeline because we're, we're really actively engaged right now in the process of, of working with different game development studios.

So, um, myself and the virtual knot and a couple of other members of our team are taking, you know, a handful of meetings every week with, with different game dev shops. And, uh, there are a couple that stick out, uh, hopefully more news coming on this in the near future. You know, leveraging some of our own contacts and, uh, our team's experiencing game development.

And then also the relationship with WME, they're opening some doors that actually have a meeting with, um, our rep in, in gaming with WME tonight. So just continuing to look for potential partners. And, uh, certainly we're going to bring on a lot of experienced individuals in game dev. So it will not just be our, our team right now of 18, or we're either going to be hiring probably a team of 50 or working more likely with an experienced in dev shop.

So, um, still too early to commit to timelines, but, uh, you know, we have the resources that we need and the expertise right now on the team. And we'll be hiring a few other key individuals on the team, uh, to execute on this. So very exciting. Um, but still, definitely early days in that love that though. It's coming though.

Right. So that's awesome to hear for sure, for sure. In the beginning when you were launching punks comics, was this always the plan to create this, you know, world and game around the meta heroes? Yeah, so the, the games sort of developed over time, but there was always this idea to expand, uh, the universe of IP that tied in with the comic.

So if you look at like early days of DC and Marvel, right originally comics were just humans, right. And then with the introduction of Superman and then eventually Batman, et cetera. Now comics are pretty much synonymous with superheroes. So beginning in issue three, we're going to sort of merge the two worlds of punks comic and medic hero.

And there's the potential that there may be some offshoot comics as well. But, um, yeah, I, I think it's going to be really fun seeing the, those two worlds intertwined and, uh, in the interim, we're going to be releasing this project called origin stories, which will be, you know, every two to four weeks, we'll be sort of like.

Like a backstory on maybe a more minor character, uh, origin stories, being a nod to origin city, which is where the headquarters of the pixel vault is, uh, in crypto voxels. So, um, that's going to let us sort of interact with the community more frequently, really build the IP, um, in a serious way as we look to develop, you know, animated series and whatnot with traditional media partners.

So, um, I think that that's going to be a really beneficial thing as we build out the comic and the lore there. Uh, and you'll see a lot more backstory on the heroes and the pumps themselves love that. Can you share any details on how different heroes will be utilized in the game? Uh, specifically speaking of, you know, ones from different planets, uh, any advantages or disadvantages, disadvantages that the.

Yeah. So, uh, the virtue Mount has talked about this quite a bit. We don't want to create a situation where it's like a pay to win mechanic. We want to reward, uh, our early collectors in a way that it distinguishes the character in game and maybe provides like a very minor benefit. But, um, you know, there are also intelligent ways that, you know, maybe they earn at a, at a higher rate.

So with the, the play to earn mechanics that are becoming popular, that you see with ACCE and stuff, you know, maybe the identities and sidekicks, uh, are able to have, you know, a small advantage in that realm as well. But overall, you know, you can think of it as like a skin, like a very, um, high level notable skin, uh, being sort of, uh, at the, at the very forefront of developing this game.

Um, As part of that, right. We wanted to tie them to these planet tokens because for these original identity holders, it's not just about driving value to their identity and Ft. Right. They're also very much an owner developer participant in the game itself. So as the game succeeds, so to do these early NFT holders, so it was important for us to sort of tie those together so that it wasn't kind of like a diluted experience as we expanded the game verse and whatnot.

But, um, yeah, try trying to make it so that future entrance can, can still get into the game and have fun. We don't want to take the fun out of it, or it won't be a success. So, you know, there's a balancing act there, but I think having these early holders also have Dow tokens is a sort of an important aspect in, in balancing the reward system there.

Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, one thing we've noticed teas lately, and I'm sure you've seen this G funk is that the NFT space is moving so fast and people are, you know, looking for news updates on a daily cycle. They want, you know, the next big project they want the immediate reward. So what is it like, you know, to take the long route here building with one of the largest teams in NFT is when the NFT world is kind of moving more to the short term side of things.

Yeah. I mean, it's tough and I I've been tweeting a lot about this in the last couple of weeks. I mean, you're seeing like a lot of really prominent NFTE sort of personalities talking about being burned out in. You know, it's real. I mean, I feel the need to sort of like constantly be providing updates and, you know, people put a lot of time, effort and money into this project.

Right. So I take that extremely seriously, but you don't really want to be building, uh, a business worried about the floor price of an NFT. Right. So, um, you know, the people that bought punks comic right, as it sat there on the shelf for five weeks, ultimately it's, uh, you know, 50, a hundred X on, on their original, uh, purchase.

Right. So, you know, if ultimately you try and sort of block out the noise and understand that there are going to be peaks and valleys in every cycle and try to just keep like a mid to long-term viewpoint on this. Um, you know, right now the floor is down, right. Uh, across most projects and, you know, I have people.

You know, messaging me all the time, sort of in a panic, but it's like, you know, if, if they knew the meetings I was taking every day, I'm sure they wouldn't be panicking. Right. But like, that's also not how you run a business. So, um, you know, just, just, I think patients will be rewarded. Uh, certainly the partners that we're working with are working at like a breakneck pace for these traditional corporations, but it's not like how NFTs work.

So trying to balance it, trying to give people sort of like a peek behind the curtain, as much as I can. Um, while remembering, you know, it's about the long game don't give into the FID, just like keep building, but it's hard. Uh, Yeah, definitely. Um, so, you know, you mentioned that people who bought comic, you know, saw a big return, right?

50 X, a hundred X. And with that said, it may have priced some people out of, you know, the pixel vault ecosystem. So there was the recent planet launch. Why was it important to offer access to people who maybe missed out on comics and pixel vault before, you know, the opportunity to buy into the planets at the lower tier?

Yeah. So I mean, as much as we love rewarding our existing community, and we've done that a bunch of times already, uh, you know, expanding into this game versus, I mean, ultimately there will need to be hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people in this game burst to be for it to be truly successful.

Yeah. I don't think you're, you're seeing, I think you need to connect meta mask to see like the updated numbers, but, um, Yeah. So, I mean, we wanted the price to be low enough for new people to join the community. Uh, obviously that was a very common question. I would get on Twitter discord, like, Hey, I'm interested.

But you know, I think at the, I think right now, like the comic has seven and a half feet or something. Right. Um, it's a ton of money. So, um, you know, pricing the lowest comic or the lowest planet at 0.5, either giving them the opportunity to get now two different planets, right. Whatever they meant. Plus Jupiter, if you follow it along with that story and lower that we developed there, uh, that was, that was kind of fun on Twitter.

Um, but yeah, two planets and ultimately two sidekicks, again, all of these original participants in the ecosystem, we wanted them to, to ultimately have a character that they could use engaging. You know, if you're taking the time resources, effort to build the game, like you should probably have a character.

So, um, yeah, I mean, for 0.5 east, you can participate in two different planetary Dows and have either two different sidekicks or an upgraded sidekick, uh, with the burn mechanism there, you know, ultimately companies need to grow. Uh, we can't always just sort of reinforce the existing community. So we tried to have like a huge supply again, to avoid gas wars, to let anybody that wanted to get in in, um, and then find like interesting ways to create a deflationary supply with that Jupiter mechanic.

And then ultimately whatever doesn't sell we'll, we'll be taken back to the uptown, which is sort of this like central governance mechanism for the game. And the community will decide when they want to sort of release future trenches for, for funding, the development of the game. Perfect. You mentioned side.

Is there, I want to talk a little bit about this. So, um, can you share any update on the timeline for when sidekicks will be released and talk a little bit about leveling we'll work, um, with being able to burn kicks? Yeah, so the sidekick mint pass will be coming soon. So that'll probably be the first couple of weeks of November.

So similar to what we did with the generative identities, you'll first get them in pass, um, to the community based on what you're holding. Uh, and then later you'll be able to burn that and then pass for your sidekicks. Um, so the sidekicks themselves, I would say are probably not until Q1 of next year. Um, given the larger supply of sidekicks, uh, it's going to take some time.

Uh, we, we do have like a fun way to interact with the community coming up in the development of these sites. Um, and then to your point, there's also going to be this fun sort of deflationary mechanic where you'll be able to level up your sidekick. So right now the concept is five different levels of sidekicks and we haven't finalized the total burn counts, but whether it be one to five minute passes or one to 20, um, there's a chance we, you sort of scale it, interestingly there, but, um, yeah, again, creating an environment where the community shapes the ultimate, uh, experience and ecosystem, uh, is, is really important to us.

So seeing, you know, how people want to play it, right. Do you want five low-level sidekicks or do you want one premium? So it'll be fun to see where the final numbers end up. I assume, um, you know, the, the maximum supply was something like 115,000. The way we're creating it was to try and get down to somewhere around a 50,000 number, but, you know, we plan and the community does what it will.

Uh, so it's, it should be interesting. Awesome. Uh, one thing that, you know, pixel vault, uh, become known for is adding surprise value to mentors. So, you know, we saw punks comic mentors get a mint pass for a, met a hero, met a hero, met pass holders, had the opportunity to win a free core hero. Um, you know, and now the planet mentors also getting a free Jupiter planet and sidekick.

Can you talk about, you know, why this is important and how it adds value to those early adapters? Yeah. So, I mean, from, from a price perspective, obviously every time we, we reward the community, obviously the price of everything reacts. Right. So, so that's awesome to the existing community, but from more of like a structural standpoint, right?

Like. As we release things into the community, who does it make the most sense to, to have those items go to, you know, ultimately a lot of them will sell in the secondary and take some profit along the way. And in turn that expands the community to those people that are picking it up on secondary. But you know, you really do want to reward those people that are actually helping you build the thing.

Um, again, turning back to those five weeks of sleepless nights where I was like, well, you know, did I make a mistake? Um, yeah, I was literally all in with everything I owned, uh, to launch this project. Uh, and then some honestly, so, you know, it it's, it's been a wild year, but like I take these people's support, like incredibly seriously and to heart.

So, you know, wanting to see the community sort of succeed alongside the project just makes sense, providing these reward metrics. And also, you know, it defeats kind of like the gas wars and the bonding and all of that. So finding interesting ways to here and there expand into a public sale, but for the most part, trying to reward existing community and we have some more stuff up our sleeve, but I'm going to leave people to speculate.

Nice. So G funk Dow is a term that we're hearing in NFTs a lot lately. Um, I'm curious to hear, can you tell us a little bit more about the Dow and the pixel vault, you know, like when will voting begin and, uh, you know, where are they being set up? Yeah. So, uh, so the, the founders dial, right, which is sort of our art Val, but really kind of like a, a core community of like long-term collectors.

I mean, I don't really know that any NFT project was, was interacting with a Dow in that way when we launched it. But certainly you're seeing them like everywhere now. And I mean, our, our game vers, you know, they're, they're 10 they're alone. So, um, I don't, I don't know if you've been following sort of the drama with the moon, the moon bird, but 17 people, uh, tried to interact directly with the contract, ended up burning their comics, just poof gone.

Uh, and that's like 30 K a pop. So, uh, that will be the first use case for, for voting for any of these Dows, uh, we're going to get the moon voting up and ultimately the community of token holders for the moon will decide, you know, if they want to make them whole with this supply, we've set aside of 17 moons.

Um, and you know, I have some opinions in that. You know, most of these people weren't flippers, right? They were just like sort of panicked that they were going to get locked out because the button wasn't working for a couple minutes, I was telling them like, just wait, it's fine. You'll be okay. But you know, people will do what they will.

FOMO is a hell of a drug. So, uh, we're going to get this vote probably initially using a mechanic, like snapshot. And then ultimately we're going to, to develop like a custom UI experience across all of our Dows and that's something the virtue not has spoken about a lot. Um, so that's something that's going to be built sort of in conjunction as, as we're building out the game verse, but probably initially, um, snapshot through our website and, uh, and then more of like a custom build over time.

But, uh, I would say that all of them should be up in the next few months. Um, they all have already been established. Uh, from a legal standpoint with R R from Fenwick and west who have done just like an awesome job given sort of the unique nature of these 10,000 interacting with one another. But from a, from the technical implementation standpoint, that's going to be, um, like a primary focus after we get staking out for, for the Medicare identities and the comic here in, I dunno, roughly the next two weeks.

Nice. Do you see the discord community for the Dows, uh, being able to expand to more channels for more complex coordination and projects in the future? Sure. Yeah. So we just recently opened up a planetary channels. Uh, so we had only ever had two channels, sort of the main, uh, non gated channel. And then the things about founder's Dow channel, which you had to have the founders token to get in.

Uh, and now you can get into these gated, uh, you know, earth Pluto. Um, so, you know, we see a lot of interaction happening there. Um, but ultimately, you know, we would like it all to be built into sort of like a cohesive voting experience. I mean, with what you see with snapshot, I mean, there are, there are ways for the community to interact there, but it's, it's all a bit limited.

Right. Um, Erin and we're early days. I, I actually think what Snapchat has is really great, but finding ways to make it a more social experience I think is going to be really important for Dows moving forward. Um, so, you know, we're going to try our hand at that. I am sure there will be, uh, more products and services that come along on the way, but, uh, trying to find ways to allow the community, to like really interact in the decision-making is going to be hugely important in the development of the game among other things, uh, We're going to try our hand at that, but at the outset here, there'll be snapshot.

Right. Um, there's a lot of game theory around picks of all products, you know? So how do we explain the punks comic, the fund, the founder's Dow, uh, you know, a Metta here on the planets to someone that is just joining the NFT world. Like what's the best way. Yeah. I mean the rabbit hole is deep here, so this could take a second, but, uh, I would say that it's, it's a project based around IP, right at its very core.

What picks of all aims to do is develop IP in the web three environment in a way that not only will the company succeed, but so will the community. And along that journey, um, your faced with choices for how you want your collection to, to be tilted. Do you want to have exposure to this very unique collection?

And participate more broadly along with, you know, 5,000 of your closest friends and really everything takes them all. That's the founders. Now that was the choice to burn the comic for the founders now, or, you know, do you want to have more of a direct control over some Lords as it relates to the IP in the punks tokens, right?

These factionalized 16 crypto things. Well, that would be staking the comic and some of the people in that route, it wasn't even so much that they wanted the punks tokens, but they really wanted this physical. So there's the physical comic that will be shipped. Uh, and the fulfillment for that is going to start probably in early.

Um, so if you can state the comic, you can collect your physical and, you know, we hope that to be like a really cool collector's item. So I'd say staking and, you know, ownership over, uh, really everything as it pertains reward wise is, is directly going to you. Uh, that would be the comic route. Then you also recently had this opportunity to burn for the moon Dow.

And the moon Dow is, is sort of the same concept as the founders now, but applied to the game verse, right? So this is again, this like really loyal community of supporters who had to make this choice to burn a seven and a half east comic that they also were probably holding for quite some time. So we see the moon functioning in kind of like a similar.

Not necessarily governance because they're all equal, but kind of like, uh, having a really long-term perspective for the overall benefit of the game and the universe, um, that was the choice to burn the comic for the moon. And then each of these planetary Dow tokens, you know, you have direct exposure into the ultimate success of a gaming platform that we're trying to build together.

So, you know, you see products like sandbox, right? Uh, you see a lot of teasers. I, I think they're releasing soon, you know, not convoluted hopefully, but, um, ultimately all of those rewards flow back to sandbox and in a mocha, right. Um, here, what we're building together will actually flow back to the community.

So I think it's a really cool sort of technological and sociological experiment for the power of what web three can do, uh, Dow. Um, three NFTs, really trying to leverage all of these technologies in a way that I think is pretty clearly the direction for the future, but just doing it at kind of like this early stage in their development.

And then the medic heroes obviously are a really awesome way to actually be able to play in that game, but also participate in kind of like the comic ecosystem, given everything that we're doing there to, to develop the IP with, you know, traditional media partners, whether it be like a Netflix or a universal or, or whomever, we ended up deciding to partner with, um, you know, trying to get like an animated series.

That's, that's distributed more broadly to bring, you know, hopefully new people, not only into NFTs, but into the technology. Um, building value behind that IP. Uh, so that's kind of like the happy medium, I would say is the Medicare regenerative identities, because you get to participate in both the game, but also kind of the traditional IP path of the punks chronic well said, man.

And the game theory is what makes NMT so fun. So I'd love to hear how, you know, there's so much game theory here. Um, let's kind of switch a little bit, so, you know, let's talk a little bit about, you know, if you've been in the NFC space for a while, you've most likely heard of beanie, you know, so is anybody watching, how did your relationship with the beanie start and how's your relationship currently?

I know he is now an advisor to picks the vault. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, none of this would have been possible without him. I mean, I I've talked pretty publicly that I in crypto as of last November, so less than a year ago, I had 20. Right. Uh, and, and now we have like this very successful business. So I'm like really grateful that, that he saw the vision of what this could be.

Um, he put up something like $3 million in assets to make the founders now and all that collection of punks possible, which was really kind of the core of what the comic was. Right. We needed these fractionalized punks in order to sort of build this story, this decentralized Disney kind of project, um, and how we met, I mean, uh, in kind of like, I think he had just made a trade with prank C uh, on Twitter.

Like he had only like a hundred, 200 followers. Uh, and I messaged him the, the original interaction didn't go very well. Uh, you know, he was kind of a Dick and, but I stuck at it. Like, I thought that he knew some things and I was trying to learn at that point in time. Uh, and, you know, we sort of built a friendship, um, and then sports cheetah, Preston, another one of our original partners.

Um, he and I had had, uh, started to buy some NFTs together early this year. We had a crypto punk together. Uh, and then we decided we wanted to buy this, uh, this oiler beats. Oh, gee, I don't know if any of you are familiar with oiler beats, but um, really cool economic model. Uh, and you know, it's popped up here and there, we're actually planning to use some of that model, uh, with issue two and some of our collectible covers, but it was like this, this huge project that was kind of like the hot project of the moment.

Um, each of these OGs generated a royalty, right. And I think the first four days before they announced. Series two of enigma. Uh, we made like Tenny 70, 75, 8 in royalties, just off holding this NFT in, in four days. Um, so, uh, Preston and I decided that we wanted to buy this OJI from beanie beanie was selling it for a hundred eighth because he wanted to buy the LP one.

And, uh, it was my anniversary with my now fiance, then my girlfriend. And, um, we, so we're at dinner and beanie has decided, okay, like, he'll, he'll do this deal with Preston and I for a hundred eighth. Um, and like Preston's on a zoom with beanie I'm at dinner. Uh, for my anniversary, I have the email that I need to send to beanie my phone dies.

Uh, I'm like up at the, uh, Like the, the front desk, trying to get them to charge my phone and, and Preston and beanie are just like, you know, chatting on, on zoom. Uh, obviously trying to keep the deal alive because, you know, beanies, uh, beanie is a pretty tough negotiator at times. So he was like, all right, well, like if you can't do the deal, then like it's off, it's off.

Um, and so Preston was like keeping it alive and, uh, we ended up making the deal with him. Ultimately, I don't really know how, how that's turned out. At one point in time, we got an offer on that, whether it be for like 368th or something, we still hold it right now. But, uh, that was the start of the relationship really between, uh, Preston beanie and myself.

And it was during kind of those conversations that we, we started talking about this idea of building IP behind these crypto punks and, and that's how really we got his investment into the project. And the rest is this. Love it. That's always wild times. Yeah. Yeah. Love them or hate them. You know, Beanie's an awesome person to keep an eye on.

I always loved his thoughts. His tweets always keep me entertained and speaking. It's never boring. That's for sure. Speaking of tweets, he tweeted something earlier today, which we'll pull up on the screen right now. Uh, and that's going to lead me to my next question. Is your BGL D thing? Yes, exactly. So, well, yeah, so I, I had not spoken with him prior to him tweeting this.

So, you know, when, when blue had come out, um, you know, I, I think it's like a very fun community, right? Uh, there's a lot of like really positive people in the blue community and the BGL D thing. There was like a conversation that beanie and I had had about, okay. You know, maybe if, if blue holders or BGL D hold.

They had started to like come into the pixel vaults ecosystem and, you know, they were contributing a lot. So I thought, okay, you know, like let's find a way that maybe we can welcome them into the ecosystem and you'll see my tweet there. Um, and then the BGL D dev rubbed. Right. Uh, and that, that had nothing to do with beanie.

And I know he takes, he takes a lot of, uh SMACtalk. I don't know if this is a PG channel. Uh, but yeah. I mean, people talk a lot of trash to him on Twitter about BGL. And I know that he had nothing to do with that. Rugging, I mean, he still has like, I know 5 million tokens or something, but, uh, I don't know if we'll ever do anything with BGL GLD, you know, frankly, I don't really want to associate with BGL D because of that rug.

Um, but the bloop community, I, I liked, uh, I think there's good people in the blue community. So, you know, I would like to find a way for us to do something nice for them since I, you know, at that point in time when I said it, you know, I mean it, and I'm a man of my word. So, uh, I would like to find a way for us to do something for them since a lot of them have now become like really long time supporters of the project that I interact with a lot in discord and on Twitter.

So, you know, if we can find a way to do that in a way that's like true to pixel vault, you know, we're not going to be doing any sort of like weird blue type text, uh, stuff, but something true to rip, uh, where. We can somehow reward them and, and welcome them into the community. I'm all for it. But, you know, the thing would be GLD is, is unfortunate because I know a lot of people thought when it was high and then that dev rubbed like, like the entire, the entire reserve of Eve.

So, you know, it's, it's kind of a tough spot because I know he, he really cares about the people that sort of like followed his advice and, you know, granted, he says it's worthless, but you know, I, I know he really cares about the perception of the project and I know he wants to see it succeed. So, you know, if we can do something to, to, you know, work with that community in a way that's true to pixel vault, you know, I'm, I'm happy to do it, but I doubt it'll be through BGLB.

It would more likely be just like something in partnership with glutes. Um, But it would be something like that's like actually just like a pixel wall project that maybe we can reward blue folders with. Got it. Nice. So, yeah, we'll definitely keep our eyes on that. Um, you know, speaking of, you know, following, uh, how do you manage to discord?

You know, there's such a big following for the pixel community. Uh, you know, how often are you in the discord as well? Yeah, so, uh, I would say I'm pretty active in the discord granted, like the last few weeks, I, I haven't been able to interact a ton. Um, but I do, anytime people tag me, I do try to answer, but, uh, Podemus is, is our community manager.

He he's like a Saint he's in there all the time fighting the good fight, uh, dealing with the fighters. Um, So, you know, he leads a team of like really amazing, uh, community mods. We have too many to name right now, but I love you all. Uh, and yeah, I mean, I think that the, that the discord is like an amazing resource because the project is so complex and we do have so many different things happening at a given time that if you're not in the discord, I can see how people get lost, you know, so finding ways to improve our communication, you know, these weekly spaces, um, I was thinking of maybe having something on the website where it's kind of just like a running list of updates, because I mean, if some of these things, if you tweet it, I've seen beanie do it before.

And it was like 25 tweets long or something trying to explain what was happening. So I don't really think that's the way, but, you know, finding ways to have a running update on our website and through Twitter is important and, you know, definitely. Head into the discord. I mean, if you can get a founder's doubt token, I know the price is down right now.

I mean, I'm biased, but seems like a really good deal to me, the alpha and just that channel pays for itself. I mean, we have people that started with like one Ethan now have bought board apes and punks and stuff just off the basis of the different projects that they're flipping in, in the founders now channel.

So it's a really vibrant community and there, uh, love those people. I, I highly suggest getting in that channel if you can afford it. I agree. Love it. So one of the things we we've talked about, you know, in reference several times during this interview was a deal that pixel vault signed with w M E so that's something we're seeing more and more now in the NFT space we saw, uh, you know, crypto punk's parent company signed with UTA.

So I guess my first question here is, you know, uh, how soon will we see announcements on the TV and film side of things for monetization? You mentioned that things, you know, are you, you know, you're constantly talking, is that something that's going to be communicated, you know, through the founders discourt first?

Or will it be, you know, public information through press releases with these potential media partners? Yeah. So, um, I would say that that's really my primary focus right now is finding us a game development partner and a partner for developing the IP. Um, For example today I met with like a really amazing, uh, former top level executive at universal and Dreamworks.

And he's interested in coming on and sort of leading a team to, to actually develop the IP into an animated series, feature film, et cetera. So, you know, we're speaking with, uh, the who's who of, of Hollywood trying to develop a team, my personal background, I've worked in the entertainment space, but more of like support services, so communications, uh, financial tools, et cetera.

So I very much know what I don't know. And if we're going to be successful in developing this IP, I think we really need a seasoned, uh, production, executive producer type person. Um, so I'm actively taking meetings in that regard. And then shortly thereafter we'll be working with, um, I would be working with that person to try and find us, uh, a seasoned television or.

Uh, which has obviously different than a comic writer, but, um, you know, they're all going to need to be very much intertwined together. Right. So, uh, actively building out the creative team and, uh, yeah, I mean, I I'm, I couldn't be more thrilled with the conversations that are going on behind the scenes and, uh, you know, to all the flutters, like good luck, uh, cause I'm building.

So, uh, you know, I'll be here, rain or shine, uh, bear market bull market. Uh, it takes a while it's not going anywhere. So, uh, really, really excited for what the future is going to have love it. So, uh, you know, you mentioned your media background, so I'm guessing that w M E was not the only, uh, rap considered here.

What did that process look like? And maybe, you know, why was w M E picked over some of these other talent agencies for pixel. Yeah. So, uh, we took meetings with just about everyone. Um, uh, well I guess all of the large players, uh, in the agency space, we didn't speak to UTA, uh, who represent larval labs just because, you know, ultimately we're going to be developing kind of like a similar IP.

I really don't know what they're planning, but, um, we spoke with all the other major players and I wanted to get a sense for sort of their vision for the space. And, um, you know, I was also really impressed with CAA. I know they're doing a lot to, to build out kind of like an NFT division, but ultimately what really sort of differentiated WME for me.

Um, so Chris Jackman, he, he's kind of like, um, a leader in strategy for WME. Um, and first off to have like a CSO. Your call, your first meeting shows like some of the degree of, um, you know, seriousness with which they're taking your project. So, you know, having senior level executives on all of our initial calls was, was really impressive to me that they, they take the time and effort to do so.

And he's actually stayed like very highly engaged. So it's not just like a lip service that they're paying you off the bat, uh, too with WME. Um, you're not really just dealing with one agent you're dealing with subject matter expertise, uh, across a variety of verticals, right? So we have someone who is in like legacy publishing, whether that be comics, books, et cetera.

We have someone whose sole responsibility is television. We have film, we have, uh, like digital media. We have a gaming agent. You really have like a team of people that are going out and developing business for you. And, uh, while our team is now 18 people strong. I mean, having all of these people whose whose sole incentive is to develop business for you.

I mean, that's the only way they make money. They don't collect a check from us otherwise, uh, is really powerful. Right? So I think having subject matter experts makes a difference, but really sort of the key, uh, and touching again on this conversation with Chris, uh, in strategy for them, they don't look at pixel vaults as an NFT business, which I think pretty much everyone else.

Yes, NFTs are sort of the, the core of our business and what will allow us to differentiate ourselves from traditional media players. But ultimately we're an IP business leveraging kind of next generation technologies, right? We're still approaching IP in a way that is very similar to what these legacy institutions are doing, but we're doing it in a way that actually benefits the broader community, develops the IP for the benefit of all, uh, and sort of this collective mind, uh, of our community, all working together to develop this IP, I think is going to be tremendously disruptive to, to sort of like legacy institutions.

Um, I mean, you've seen, uh, Amazon and Netflix already disrupt what the traditional studios were doing. And I think this is the next logical progression of where that's going. And, uh, I, I touched on this a bit earlier. The, the opinions are different now, even in these legacy institutions, like nobody wants to be blockbuster, you know, they don't want to be disrupted again by the Netflix and Amazon of the world.

So people are taking our conversations very seriously. I think there's a lack of, of new IP. I mean, you know, the, the Harry potters and, um, you know, game of Thrones of the world have really been few and far between, uh, over the last, I'd say decade or two. I mean, Harry Potter now came out, I don't know, 25 years ago.

So you're seeing, um, a lot of, sort of repeat. You know, fast and the furious one to eight, 10, right? Exactly. I mean, they're cool. Like they're fun movies and $300 million movie is nothing to scoff at, but, um, there's a, there's a shortage of IP. And I think that you're going to see these traditional media players starting to look at the NFT space as kind of like these niche, but very strong and loyal communities where actual new IP is being developed, whether it be us or dates, et cetera.

Um, cool cats, you know, some of the other leaders in the space. I think, I think all of us are going to be successful in, in one way or another in developing and disrupting some of these traditional business. Awesome. You know, so one of the things we always try to do on here, we already got a ton of information from you.

Some updates on the timeline, you know, you're talking about taking meetings and all that different stuff, but I always try. So my question is, can you give the Benzinga audience one sneak peek detail about the Metta hero universe that hasn't been revealed anywhere yet?

Well, I mean, I would say that that was like a pretty big, uh, hint that I just dropped a minute ago. Right. Uh, bringing on, uh, an executive to, to develop this, this Medicare IP. It, uh, obviously it's going to tie to the pumps because it all works together, but you know, someone. Uh, sort of grew up under Steven Spielberg in the very early days of Dreamworks and his led like multi a hundred million dollar projects being interested in, in leading our IP.

I mean, if that's not bullish for our project and the space more broadly, I don't know what it is, but people see the value in what's being created here. And, uh, you know, this, this was the first, the first like big meeting, uh, bringing someone in house. But, uh, uh, I mean, I, I couldn't have been more impressed with that, with that call.

And I think it's really indicative of the direction that, um, you know, these conversations are going to go with WME. Making introductions across a variety of verticals tonight, I'm meeting with their gaming department. So, uh, yeah, really excited. But I think that if, if, if that meeting that I just spoke about is any indication of sort of the other people that we're talking to in, in traditional media to develop the project.

Like, you know, there, there are, are big household names that are, that are looking at, uh, developing the medical IP. So very, very bullish on the future. Perfect. We, we love the hints here. I love that. And the way you painted that too, you know, I just, you know, it's, it's so clear. I can see it in my head. Now we've seen a lot of, you know, YouTube and influencers take on movie roles to get more viewers.

I can totally see that happening with NFTs where, you know, the IP is going to be so important for, you know, to drive such a large audience. So, dude, I'm so excited for. Yeah. I mean, you know, as the IP succeeds in the broader media, obviously that returns value to the NFTs, but also we're definitely going to be finding creative ways to give exclusive content to NFTE holders, uh, you know, participation in events.

Uh, you know, there there's a whole host of different ways, but, uh, you know, focusing on, uh, driving kind of like the mainstream attention. While, uh, you know, making sure to reward that kind of like initial community of builders will be our focus moving love that. Uh, so between punks comic Mehta heroes and the planet sales, uh, pixel vault has done over 48,000 Ethereum in volume, top 12, all time on open seat with about over four with about over 5,000 unique holders.

Um, so what advice? Yeah. Secondary, what advice would you have for new projects launching today? Right. So in a market that's, you know, getting oversaturated, it's such a fast moving market, uh, what advice would you give to someone that wants to, you know, join that FTE community as a creator? Yeah, so, I mean, I first off, I think, you know, hearing those secondary numbers, I mean, I, I'm sure that stood out to groups like WME, right?

If you're in a legacy business and you're seeing how much more effectively things can be monetized in a web three environment, I mean, you'd be stupid not to pay attention in terms of. Uh, new projects, new collectors. I mean, I think everyone that, that has found the most success has brought something unique to the table, right.

While yeah, you can probably make like $3 million doing like a copy paste project that, you know, fades into oblivion in a few days, if you're doing something unique and actually dedicated and involved with your community and, and, you know, looking at things from like a long-term mindset, right. Again, I'll point to the cool cats and board apes.

Like I, I know for sure that those are teams of founders that like take the longterm success of their projects seriously. Uh, just like we do. So, you know, I think it's pretty clear, uh, when, when evaluating these projects, what, what people's intentions are. I mean, even if it's not a rug or something, even if the people like.

You know, well-intentioned and the founders are in chat. If really all they're doing is another, just like random PFP, you know what what's going to differentiate that long-term like, why is the market going to appreciate that project in one year, five years, 10 years. Right. So I think focusing on creators that are bringing something new and unique to the table, whether that be tech or, you know, vision for what can be done with the IP, uh, or even just have like a really unique community of supporters.

Um, I think that's sort of like the key, the key when evaluating new projects and what will, what will make successful teams moving into the future? Love that. So we've seen a picks of all cool cats, bore. Dave's a lot of these projects that started a couple months ago, you know, they've become blue chip. Do you have any projects that you like right now that are on their way there, or that are fairly new or that you've seen so far in the last couple weeks?

I don't mint a lot of projects these days. Um, I'm just like way, way too busy to even follow the mania. Um, but like, I've been following a handful of, uh, like photography projects. Um, so, uh, obviously twin planes was really awesome and now, you know, uh, Justin's kind of like blue chip, uh, Dave, uh Krogman I always mess up his last name would drive.

I mean, he, he, I didn't know it at the time, but he talked about how pixel vault and punks comic and like the weird mechanics were sort of inspiration for some of the things he was doing there. And then, uh, like where my vans go or whatever that guy that is just like taking pictures at like insane Heights and stuff.

Um, yeah. That's, I mean, those, those pictures make me nervous. So I think that you're going to see. A new crop of, oh, a cat simmered. I want to say her last name is, uh, with like sort of the outdoor landscape things. And she did like a really cool project. I don't know, a couple months ago where the winner would get to do some sort of like cool outdoor excursion with her.

So I, I think photography is going to be a thing that you're, you're seeing, uh, gain a lot of traction here. Um, you know, hopefully it's not just PFPs into oblivion, but I mean, again, it doing new things that inserts risk, right? Like if you could just do a copy paste PFP and make $3 million, like, like why do a comic that's going to sit there and nobody is going to get for five weeks, right?

Yeah. You have to have the vision. So again, you know, find founders that really believe in what they're doing and are doing something unique. I mean, yeah. Look at these photos. It's so. Uh, I, I was looking, I mean, it's already really expensive, so I kind of missed the boat. Um, but yeah, I heard, I heard some of his backstory, I think he's like former special ops or something.

Um, yeah, so he, and he's just climbing these things with, with like no harnesses, nothing. So, you know, more power to this guy. I, I hope, I hope he stays safe, but pretty cool collection of photos. I love that. Awesome. Well, G funk that did it for questions from myself and mass and some of our Benzing a team.

Uh, if you've got a couple minutes, we could try to rattle through some chat questions real quick. Um, I know we're already past three here, so only if you have time, um, we'll try to go fast here. So we had a question from Teresa. She said, well, the opportunity to win a core ever come up again, outside of the mint pack.

Oh, okay. No, uh, ever come up again. Yes. In November, the core giveaways will start again. Um, but no, you will need a med pass to get those cores. However, we do have kind of like a, another sort of core, like project coming up, that's tied to the planets. So, uh, you know, that's going to be something that the community can speculate about, but, uh, ODS and Chris are, are very much in the weeds there.

So that's going to be really cool and tied to the lore of the planets. There won't be as many, but a really cool set of characters. So yeah, finding new ways to reward collectors, but know that that original set of 146 cores is only going to be going to the mid pass holders, which I think there's like, I dunno, 4,000 or so.

Awesome. And then you, you mentioned snapshots before we did get a question from yogis in the chat. When will this, uh, pixel vault set snapshots be taken? So just any comment on maybe the timeline or how that will be communicated to everyone. Yeah. So we're going to be taking the planet snapshots for the sidekicks, uh, like the first week of November in terms of the sets.

So the, the sort of Genesis set being tied to the giveaway of the earth tokens. So again, that'll be like first week or so of November, and then kind of that, that like longer term sort of dangling carrot for the sets with the ultimate conversion, to a doubt, a public Dow for pixel vault itself. Uh, I mean, that's gonna take some time, you know, couldn't take a year, but the plan is for next year to formerly convert, to adapt.

And similar to what Sr did, where, you know, existing holders, people that have participated in the community to work, to reward those people. The PV Dao token will not be sold anywhere. So it's just going to go back to our original collectors and they'll have a stake in how the business is run. So, uh, really excited for, for that ultimate future.

Um, and that's sort of like the long-term benefit of these sets. Awesome. And then we have power the game currency. Uh, the question from Ben is will that be public or only available in the pixel vault ecosystem? Well, so, I mean, ultimately you'll be able to trade it like on, on sushi or whatnot. Um, but it's not a token that will ever be sold.

So, uh, it's, it's going to have a specific allocation to the identities. It will, there will be an allocation to the sidekicks, which will be also good, but not as good as the identities. Um, and then. Uh, the remaining tokens are going to flow to the uptown, which is sort of the governance mechanism for the gaming platform.

And that will decide, uh, based on a vote of the planets, um, how, and when they want to distribute the rest of those tokens, there will ultimately be a billion pound tokens. Um, and we'll be releasing more information here pretty soon, uh, because state game for, for the identities is going to start probably in the next two weeks.

Nice. So we have a question from Scott here who, uh, he's asking, you've mentioned, you know, the burnout being real and then another T world, uh, do you take personal days off? And if you do, how do you keep your mental health strong, you know, throughout these crazy times and then if T space? Yeah. Uh, unfortunately I, I, I mean, I've basically taken no days off.

I don't, I don't think there's ever been a day since this started, that I've unplugged. Uh, even, even the trip where I got engaged. I mean, I was like working that morning, so, you know, I try and find, uh, bits and pieces here and there where I can unplug for a few hours. I know beanie gives me, uh, a lot of grief over, you know, tweeting about sports, but, you know, even if I'm working right, if I'm watching sports, it gives me kind of like a little bit of a way to unplug.

And so I, I find that to be kind of like a useful mechanism to unplug, you know, get out, hit a bucket of golf balls, um, you know, exercise, you know, do you gotta do things to unplug, even if you're not going to unplug for extended periods of time, but that's it. I, I totally get that. You know, some people need to step away for, for more time than that.

And certainly I'm a. It feels like I've aged like 50 years in the last six months. But, um, yeah. I mean, finding some time in your day to unplug, I think is important, but I mean, with, with how fast this is growing, I, I really can't step away even for a day, so yeah, it's crazy. But they're trying to push through.

Yeah, no, I completely get it. Uh, definitely want to just get some movement and stuff. Some balance is always healthy, but yeah. Another question from Scott here. Yeah, exactly. Another question from Scott here is, uh, he's curious to know, has any of the team met in real life? Uh, you know, given that NFT communities largely exist on Twitter and discord?

Yeah. So. Preston, who again was, uh, was one of the founders of punks comic. Uh, he and I met on Twitter about, uh, 10 years ago. Uh, but then have since become like in real life friends, um, I have met some, like other members of the community in LA. We had like a meetup. I met, uh, Justin Arsano hunter, um, you know, Jacob, uh, the NFT attorney, like a big group of people, uh, in LA there's, there's actually like a pretty tight knit group of people there.

But for my, my pixel vault team, unfortunately we haven't had the opportunity to, to meet yet in person. Uh, I do have a ticket for NFT NYC and the virtual, not he, I got him a ticket as well. I don't have a flight or a place to stay yet, and I'm not a hundred percent sure I'm going to make it. But, uh, that would be, I guess, the first opportunity for me to meet anybody else.

The pixel wall team. I've had a lot of video chats with everybody on the team, but not, not face to face yet. Right. Uh, last question here from the chat. So if you had one choice, uh, you know, if you, if you had one comic, would you burn it for a moon Dow or hold the comic as a collector? That's really tough.

One comic. Um, I mean, I love the moon. I think it's an amazing token, but if I had just one comic, I would keep the one comic that's like,

yeah, we come with the hard getting questions here. So yeah, I mean, I think the moon Dal is going to be like immensely valuable for the development of the game. So if I had to, I would definitely burn one of them for the moon Dow, but since like ultimately everything in the ecosystem. All was kind of like birthed by that original punks comic.

I mean, I told you like my whole life was on the line, uh, with that comic. So it holds a special place in my heart. And, uh, I'm glad it worked out to say the least, gee Frank, before we let you go. Um, some of the discord was following along and we had to share this comment, uh, when G funk smiles, it makes me smile too.

You've got a lot of loyal fans out there. We also had a great comment in our chat here. Um, you know, as someone who talks about stocks, a lot, myself writing for Benzinga, we all know the name, Elan Musk, well, and someone compared you to the Elon Musk of NFTs. And I love that comparison. You know, I, I know you use the Willy Wonka one a lot, but I love the NFT.

Elon Musk being G funks. Yeah. I mean, I, I certainly have, uh, my, my hands in, in many different baskets like Ilum does, but I'm not going to pump those. So that's what that's, that's where the line is drawn. The line is drawn. No dope, no shit coins here. So, uh, awesome. Well, G funk, uh, we kept you longer than, you know, what we probably told you originally.

So we appreciate you going the extra time with us. We got through all our questions and then some, you know, as someone who again has been following the NFC community and you know, is fully invested and loves it. This was a great interview. We look up to you. Um, so we appreciate your time and we'd love to have you back on, you know, whenever there is new news and we get some more of that pixel vault, uh, ecosystem news pumping later this year, Any opportunity to come back out to that, that theme music I'm here.

Uh, maybe, maybe we'll make a new one. We'll have to, well, every time you come, we'll just have to add another song. So. Awesome. Well, thanks so much for joining us on the roadmap and we look forward to seeing you soon. Thank you. Awesome. Well, mass, I mean, we're, we're starting to run out of time here. We got the next show coming up at three 20.

So we have about seven minutes left. What do you think? Should we run through some news real quick? I mean, there's a lot to unpack from that interview too. I mean, uh, I loved it. I mean, G funk again is such a big voice in the NFT community. And this is someone whose you heard him say, right? Put everything in.

He pours his heart and soul into this project. And you know, that, that question we had about, you know, so many people looking for a short term NFT, right? They want immediate wins. When's my next mint. When's my next airdrop. What am I getting for immediate value? Pixel vault has delivered, but they have a long-term plan.

And I really liked that approach. And I think, you know, as we talk about NFTs, maybe not lasting forever, this is one where you look at and you say, this has got staying power. Absolutely. Well, first of all, shout out to G funk and a PV community. This has been probably one of my favorite interviews so far, uh, so much good info.

I'm probably, I'm probably going to replay it back and listen to it a couple more times. Uh, but yeah, exciting times, you know, so, uh, you know, seeing him just, you know, double down on the long-term growth of the project, it makes me bullish on entities. You know, they're not looking for short, you know, quick pump.

And I love seeing that. Yeah. And I mean that community, right. We saw it show up in the chat we had discords following along, watching this interview. I'd love that, you know, there, there is a lot of loyal fans out there and that's something, again, we talked about on our very first episode of the roadmap, right?

What do you look for in an NFT? You know, when you're looking to mint it or buy in you, Y you know, a project that has demand, but you also want a project that has that community, right? Because without the community, what happened. Yeah, it may take off, you know, pre reveal or post reveal, but then we see, you know, the floor drops out.

People leave the discord, they, you know, the interest goes away. I'd much rather be in one, you know, where maybe the floor isn't as high as it's been today, but it's got that lasting power in that community behind it. So I love, I love pixelated. And you want a great team running it. Right. So one thing I've realized is I'm not a big fan of anonymous teams so far as of late, just because of all the quick pump and dumps.

I do love seeing, you know, how G funk came out here. He showed himself, uh, you know, that makes me even more bullish on projects when people do that. Yeah. And talent representation matters. I mean, we talked about that with, you know, board apes, right. And, uh, crypto punks, both getting deals. Right. And now we have pixel vault, you know, signing a deal with w M E N S G funk said, he's got a media background.

So, I mean, it's not like he's new to media and getting into film and TV, but he was able to take these meetings with multiple talent agencies kind of pick, you know, Hey, and I love that comment about how, you know, w M E saw pixel ball, you know, maybe not as an NFT company, but as an IP company in an IP opportunity.

That's what, you know, he tried to build from the start and it shows now what that talent. Exactly. Absolutely. Chris, um, should we run through headlines? So we have time for that or, I mean, we can try real fast. We're probably not going to get to them all, but I mean, again, this interview was just so exciting.

So mass it's Tuesday. So last week's top 10. We always like to talk about the top 10 a little bit. Um, Axion infinity. I mean, uh, uh, you know, stop me if you've heard this one before Axion infinity was number one on crypto slam $120.8 million in sales volume, makeovers number two, cashew Kings three, crypto punks, mutant Katz, art blocks board eight yacht club NBA top shot came in eighth place.

That's the one I want to. $13.9 million in sales volume, up 135%. I mean, you heard G funk mentioned top shot, right? And we had the blue team on right. Hunter, Dylan Tropo. They all talked about how top shot was kind of, you know, one of the first projects that they got in. So they launched the, run it back 2005, 2006 pack series on Friday packs were $169 each.

I didn't get one because I didn't have a good enough spot in LA. But Dwayne Wade's Vince Carter, Tracy McGrady, Kevin Garnett, Shaquille O'Neal, Tim Duncan, Alan Iverson, Chris Paul. Those were some of the names available for the first time in these, you know, vintage packs, hard to believe that 2005 is considered vintage.

Um, but I mean the, the moment, I mean, Alan Iverson moments are going for $2,700, Dwayne Wade's for 2000. So again, if you are able to get one of those packs, I mean, you, you had a chance that a good profit and NBA season starts, uh, you know, this week. And, uh, I think, yeah, tonight, right. Top shot, I think is peaking again at the right time.

I mean, we saw that momentum fade in February, uh, or after February, but now it's starting to come back. Uh, what do you think exciting? You know, it's interesting to see how many people join the NFT community because of top shop, you know, like you said, any most guests we have on, we asked them, how did they get started?

It's through top shot, which is pretty cool. Awesome. Well, we talked about Coinbase the other day. What can you tell me about Coinbase NFTs mass? Yeah, so we'll probably be our last headline here at Coinbase now has over 2 million signed up. Uh, you know, so that's huge. We have the VP product of Coinbase. He tweeted out something here, which we'll pull up in a second, which he said, you know, it's open for all creators.

Uh, you know, creators and creativity can manifest from any place in the world. Uh, they're building an open marketplace where any creator will be able to join, create their profile, build the community and sell their NFCS. So they're really tackling that social aspect, right? Every NFT will be minted on chain.

Uh, from day one, you can take your NFT anywhere you want sell any NFT. If you already have your NFP minted someplace else, you can easily list them on Coinbase. I have T marketplace. If you prefer, you can also easily mint on Coinbase NFT. You can take then take those NFTs to any other marketplace of your choice and sell.

So if you prefer, there's no lock-in, which is cool. Uh, collectors will be able to buy an NFT using their preferred self custody wallet, you know, metal, bass, Coinbase, whatever, uh, or simply by signing where the custodian Combet Coinbase account, which is huge because then you just have your Coinbase account already there.

Uh, and then money will work too. So you can probably use, you know, fi up. So we'll see how that works. Uh, one interface for cross chain NFTs, we will start with the theorem chain and then our vision is to build single interface that allows collectors to buy any NFT from any chain that is big right there.

Yeah. There's a lot to unpack from that tweet, right? I mean this thread, I think the biggest points for me are, um, you know, that you can use your existing Coinbase account. Maybe rather than having a wallet also fee. And then the talk about the different coins. That's something I brought up when we first talked about this, you know, obviously we talk a lot about a theory based NFTs, but there's also, you know, Solana and other projects.

And I think, you know, if Coinbase integrates those, we may see those become more popular, um, down the road. Well, what do you take away from this Coinbase discussion mass? This is a big step towards mainstream adoption of NFTs. Yeah. Seeing how easy it's going to be for people that already have a Coinbase account, seeing how easy it's going to be for people that already have an open seat, you know, portfolio to transfer back and forth.

Uh, you know, just making it easy, I think is a key. And they're doing a great job at that, from what it seems. So I'm excited for that. Yeah. I mean, Coinbase is going to bring a ton of people to market. I mean, w we just talked about it mass, right? NBA, top shop brought a lot of people to market. And one of the things that top shot did right, was they used flow.

So you didn't have to worry about gas wars and also you could use your credit card. To purchase those packs. If Coinbase can do a similar approach, you're going to see new people, right. Get in. Cause you don't have to worry about wallets, a theory of gas, war, stuff like that. So maybe, you know, I mean, we're, we're still early, right?

We are going to make it. Coinbase is going to be a big event guys. We are out of time before we leave though mass, as I said at the start for anyone who doesn't follow Benzinga on Twitter, didn't see our posts. Hasn't read my article about this week's guest. Who do we have coming on? Thursday's show this week.

There's this episode's going to be one of my favorite. So far, we have the founder of our block, snow fro joining us. Uh, you know, this is going to be one of my favorite episodes. I'm a big art blogs fan. I have so many questions already. I want to ask. So make sure you guys tune in for that. It's going to be pretty good.

Yeah. I mean, talk about a big week, right? Pixel all an art block, same week. We've had some huge interviews before mass. I don't think we've ever had to as big in the same week though. Um, so if you're new out there, I mean, this, this is just the beginning, right? Make sure you come back to the roadmap on Thursday.

I mean, look at that squiggle there. Benzinga art, black squiggle there on the screen, but we're out of time, but coming up next, guys, we have at the close. So you're going to have Spencer and Joel talking about the top moving stocks of the day. If you are interested in stocks and then I'm excited mass at four o'clock.

We have earnings coming out from nest slugs. So we've got a big week right. Of earnings. So they're going to be breaking down all the latest earnings. So stay tuned, guys. Don't go anywhere at the close in that earnings recap coming up next and as all. We'll see you next time on the roadmap.

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Episode Summary

Coming at you with another NFT interview with Franky Aguilar, creator of SupDucks!

Follow SupDucks!

https://twitter.com/frankynines

https://twitter.com/realsupducks

"The SupDucks collection is painstakingly handcrafted from locally sourced, divinely inspired items that were carefully harvested from a free-range, organic plot of ether."

https://opensea.io/collection/supducks

Hosts:

Chris Katje

Maz

https://bitclout.com/u/maz

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Disclaimer: All of the information, material, and/or content contained in this program is for informational purposes only. Investing in stocks, options, and futures is risky and not suitable for all investors. Please consult your own independent financial adviser before making any investment decisions.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-roadmap/donations