Actually Interesting NFTs

brands like Gucci and Prada. Tiffany's, the iconic retailer, even announced a jewelry partnership with Crypto Punks, one of the biggest and most popular collections. That partnership means that Tiffany is going to sell pendants based on those Crypto Punk and f T s for around fifty thou dollars each. During July Bloomberg Live Cryptosummit right here in New York City, I spoke with industry leaders about why they're confident that n f t s will continue to be perceived as

valuable and as useful. Up next, my conversation with Avery Acnemy, who's the president of Veyner. Three n s are something that people can understand immediately. They understand a piece of art, they understand a digital collectible. Helen High, Executive VP and head of Charity at Finance. In my opinion, this is

lowering the barrier for artists entering into the world. This is a technological render song and digital artists people pleaser sometimes known as Emily Yatton, the wonderful youth of blockchain technology, can be um utilized for a much more. When we were first thinking about this panel, n FC prices were higher, is what I would say, And I wanted to start by reading from the statements that the CEO of Open Sea put out when they had to let go their team.

And there's one thing in here that I that I want to pull out because I think it's very relevant to what we're all going to talk about, and it's this. During this winter, I expect we'll see an explosion in innovation and utility across n f T s. With the hard but important changes that we meet today, we're in an even better position to capture what will soon become the largest market on the planet. Now is our time

to build. Winter is our time to build. I highlighted the words you know innovation and utility, because I feel like there's a certainly a perception, perhaps a misperception depends on your perspective, that all n f T s are are overvalued pictures of apes or things that celebrities will shill on their Instagrams and then denial later to what

we're hoping to achieve. This panel is more of a discussion around the real potential possibility of what we like to say, the underlying technology, but also actual use cases. Welcome to the stage, Vainer three, President avery An Any Finance Executive, ICE resident and head of charity Helen High and digital artists people please her with Bloomberg's stacy Marie Ishmael,

I want to start with you, Helen. One of the perhaps stranger things to happen in the first couple of days after Russia invaded Ukraine was this outpouring of crypto philanthropy that ultimately resulted in several hundreds of millions of dollars being raised to support the States of Ukraine, but also their soldiers and also their their populous, to the extent that Ukraine's digital minister was like talking about, Hey, we're going to mince and sell our own and FT

and you know, the chariteable arm of finance was one of the entities that was very present in all those conversations. Can you talk more about what actually cryptophilanthropy is and not just in like the sam bankment freed wait fantastic today. If you want to donate hundred dollars to somebody, let's say Ukraine or Africa, give me a number, how much do you think out of your hundred dollars will be and in the hand of the beneficiaries probably ninety were

not even even talking about corruptions. So that's the reality. This is white technology actually add values into this because crypto fundamentally it's transparency and it's trackable. Four years ago when we started by Next Charity, we were doing project in Africa doing lunches. Out of the hundred dollars without need, nineties three percent of them turn into the food down children's played. The other seven percent are the local cost. So this is why technology can really bringing real values

into the society. One of the things we worked with the United Nations to offer is the refugee Crypto card. Offer them a cryptal i D and then they actually they can receive cryptos from even one dollars you know everything around the world. I want to ask you about that because dona think five dollars in crypto can also cost you five dollars in crypto right Like there, there are still significances and complexity for a lot of folks

associated with these things. What has to change about the ecosystem in order to make what you're describing more of a reality. Infrastructure and education are the two most important fundamentals. I think when we were doing the project, even in Africa. Today we're talking about in the traditional world, we're talking about financial inclusions for generations, and even we're looking at what actually happened for the certain industrial revolution, which is

internet based. The world didn't become a better place. One percent of the population is holding ninety percent of the global wealth. This is actually why blockchain is so popular, because people believe with the folks in revolution, that the financial system is going to change get rid of a lot of the intermediaries. This is why blockchain is going to play a far more important real in the society

to achieve the final free trance of values. With scriptal everything is possible, everything is possible, Everything is not yet practical, And I want talk to somebody who spends a lot of time in like the practical elements of this space.

So people, please a You've had an interesting career. Um. You when we were talking in the green room, you said that one of the things you've really done is trying to push the boundaries of crypto and art, and in your most recent project, Shibilia, you had a very interesting medium boost, very based be like, well, most of this is like speculation and none of it makes sense and it's not sustainable long term. However, here are the

interesting things. What for you? Are those actually interesting things in an environment perhaps less right now, but in an environment where there was so much kind of like speculative activity. Yeah, personally, you know, I've felt that the n f T space for the past um year and a half at least has been more stagnant on just sort of you know, speculative assets and focusing on you know, floor prices and who's the next person who's going to buy um this

n f T and the price goes up. But you know, the floor price that you're seeing is not actually what every asset is worth, because once somebody sells them, the floor point price goes down. So just because you have the asset doesn't mean that you, um, you know, have

actually that much ethereum in your or value. And so this really got me thinking, you know, why have we created a culture where everyone is so obsessed with this floor price when we the wonderful use of blockchain technology can be UM utilized for a much more And part of the UM socibia is kind of like decentralized Netflix slash Kickstarter. So just to translate that some practice, UM, the example that you use in that post was you are creating a story. That story might have two arcs.

Somebody could choose to back one arc versus another arc by making decisions on a blockchain by saying, you know, I'm going to buy an n f T that's for door number one. Somebody else might buy an n f T for door number two, and then they can fight

it out creatively that way. UM. Yeah, And so you know, in this way, I think the community feels like not only are they financially supporting the creation of this i P, but also that they have us say and where the direction is going, and UM makes it more sort of inclusive and collaborative. And this sort of goes back to last summer where I helped crowdfund the Ethereum documentary by selling a serious amount of teas and then we raised over two million dollars in forty eight hours, and just

like that, the documentary was funded. And if anybody has ever tried to fundraise in the film industry or anything, you would know that it's usually a multi year long process. And similar to what Helen was saying, there's all this you know, paperwork and bank wires and everything that's involved. And so this is a wonderful um opportunity that Krypto

can open up for us. And this is something that I'm personally more interested in, and I definitely feel like more people will start to see this sort of value as we're headed towards a more bearer market and people

are focusing on things beyond just speculation. So one of the polls that we did on Twitter, we asked the question what would have to change about n f T s to kind of like bring them back, And one of the things that people identified was security features, which is to say, like not constantly getting hacked, not having not you know, having the verified Instagram accounts of boardy be compromised. And then people connect their wallets to it and lose all their n f t s or otherwise

engaged in fishing scams. And I raised that because everything that you all are describing is operating in like this almost like a countervailing wind of an environment, where like, here's a really interesting idea for philanthropy, here's a really interesting idea for creative fundraising. And then a bunch of people are there like what if we made your lives

really difficult? How are you and you know, if we're able to get your kind of perspective on this, like what are the kinds of things that you are seeing that is countering those difficulties. Yeah, that's a great question. So about a year and a half ago we started

it ter um like by Gary Fainer Tech. We started to get really into the world of n f t s, both through a collector perspective, launching Gary's project, which is called The Friends, and then launching Painer n f T which is a company that I run and just rebranded to Dain Earth Eat. And the reason that we continue to be extremely optimistic and excited about the space is we believe that the consumer blockchain is going to revolutionize not just the next iteration of the Internet, the next

iteration of consumer behavior. Um, we've talked about art, we've talked about philanthropy being too sort of immediate use cases which have propelled the early wave of n f t s. I think gaming and sports and collectibles kind of is included in some of the like examples of things that have already hit. But beyond that, there's a lot more

that the n f t s can be. As as humans, we spend it tremendous amount of our time on digital devices and digital screens, and that number is only going up up, up, But people don't actually own things in their digital experiences. UM, maybe some of your kids play roadblocks and you give them robots for their birthdays or something like that, So that's or you're into gaming and skins and um, those are examples where you can start to pay money for things digitally and for those digital experiences,

but it's not interoperable. Like you haven't you have your roadblocks within your existing that ecosystem. You can't take it with you, uh two meta, you can't take it with you to Fortnite. Those are all different experiences, and what we think is that n f t s are really the tip of the sphere for the broader web throe ecosystem. N f t s are something that people can understand immediately.

They understand a piece of art, they understand a digital collectible, they understand the concept of rarity um, and that then sort of opens up the broader ecosystem of metaverse and blockchain and crypto, which we think is going to be really fundamental in the next iteration of how consumers use

the Internet. With that said, in the last eighteen months has been a lot about speculation and hype and you know, flipping and trading, and there's been a ton of activity in that space that's cooled off tremendously in the past couple of weeks. We actually think that's healthy for the space to sort of take out some of that over financialization that scares away mainstream consumers, makes them think that crypto is incredibly speculative and risky and they're going to

get hacked. Because when you look at the broader ecosystem, even within n f t s, there are like for example, tess os Um and for example what Dapper has built, offer solutions that are not as risky as sort of ethereum main neet super expensive n f t s that's what grabs the headlines. But the reality is that is going to be a tiny fraction of the total user base of how people interact with n f T s in the future. So people these are I want to get back to this idea of art because art markets

are also prone to speculative frenzy of different kinds. How are you finding both as an artist but somebody who's working on art funding, the differences between you know, the traditional fine art markets and this sort of web three

ecosystem in which you're increasingly operising. I just think that, you know, in the past, maybe there has been some kind of stigma against digital art or people just don't see it as real art, and now, you know, I think there there's sort of more acceptance to it because at the end of the day, art is subjective and it's all about just expressing yourself through different mediums, right, and so people with digital art just do it on

a computer versus u in the traditional art market. In terms of the speculation, um parts, I think that's just always going to be part of something that is inherently subjective. It's very very hard to what makes an a beautiful exactly. But um but I think what I personally find interesting and this is just some personal passionate mine is the concept of storytelling and you can do that through digital

art or you know, traditional art. Stay tuned for more of our conversation about n f t S, originally recorded in July during the Bloomberg Live Crypto Summit in New York. If I'm an artist, I want to steal my aunt, I need to find the art gallery committing of my next ten years innings and then make sure they accepted me. And then there's a potential maybe I'm becoming to be known. So that's actually a very difficult journey. I mean, the probability of successful it is also very very small. But

today this ant is very different. For for example, in Binus, while we build a centralized platform, we only charge one percent of the fee as a platform, everybody you can exhibit art you know in there, and actually it's not Binus determine the price of your art. It's actually the market drives of the art. So in my opinion, this is lowering the barrier for artists entering into the world.

And also it's going to benefit the people who appreciate that this is a technology who render song I do find that and everyone to ask you this because like the history of Inner it's really about community, right, So like when Gary van Intertruck was like wine and then he had a media agency and was doing community management like whatever, the sort of the platform through which he's

expected he's expressing his various ideas. There's always been this idea of an ecosystem of community, a sense of solidarity for it for a particular in group. What about that are you seeing or is infusing as it were like Zanners three? Because what I'm hearing from both Hell and people Pleaser is this idea of doing something or participating in something bigger than you, whatever the financial incentives might be.

That's a very ustute observation that community and has been critical to Veneer's journey over the last like twelve years of of having the Vada company. Um and I think that what you're also getting at as cultural relevance. It's like where people are actually paying attention is where we've

structured a lot of our business opportunity. And certainly, like without a doubt, there's a community around sort of crypto traders and there's obviously varying levels of stabbiness within there there's also a community around n f T collectors UM, people who collect n f T s. Of course, some for sort of trading and that hobbyist activity, some because they're passionate around certain groups of artists or certain groups

of you know, intellectual property owners. Whether we're talking about Nickelodeon, or we're talking about MLB, or we're talking about Gary vs. V Friends, there are communities around each of these programs. And what I think is different this time around versus what we saw and Web too, which was the fostering of a community on social media and enabling people to communicate globally across the world someone they may have never met, having a direct one to one communication with a brand

or celebrity that they like, UM or an athlete. This time, when you participate in this n f T ecosystem, that

you actually have aligned incentives. Back to the example that Helen was just giving for that Latin American artist, if that Latin American artist had, you know, had a group of collectors, they would probably interact with them at different art shows, even if they're very successful, and you know, the first pieces would have sold for hundreds and a thousand and ten thousand but if that you know, first Genesis piece that originally sold for hundred was selling for

a million, that Latin American artist doesn't benefit from that. UM and n f t s unlock this ability for collectors and creators do have aligned incentives, and of course

that strengthens the bonds. But community um of people who are passionate around a specific subject, our hobby UM tokenized hobbyism is going to be something that we increasingly be very interesting coming up, like more and more, whether you're really into a game or you're really into an artist, a group of collectors having a form to engage and all sort of being in the wave together of benefiting from appreciation or depreciation is the case may be, UM,

I think that this is a really interesting use case for that community to actually have aligned financial incentives in the future. What about n f t s, what about these conversations about the environment and the ecosystems? Like have to actually change in order to better address these pretty robust criticisms. Maybe I will start with two things, regulation and education. We really think that actually the regulation is actually going to bring more successful rotation for the whole industry.

So actually in bindus particular things Lastly, we actively work up with regulators around the globe trying to develop the regulation to ourselfs if we believe in a society, we need to bring the whole penetration right, you're know, going up, So that's very important. And education is very important. I think today there's so much formal. Lots of people lost money because of formal because people don't really understand the

underlying sub sets. So it's very important actually to do the ducation, particularly is they use I think those two things that very close to our heart. It is honestly have stage genuinely interesting that most of the folks on all of the panels they have been like, please regulate me more. It's not something you may have expected coming in today. All right, With that, thank you all. We really appreciate you taking the time, like your friends, keeping

on the next episode of Bloomberg Crypto. The crypto universe can be complex, can be unpredictable, but our job as editors and reporters is to track every single one of these developments and translate the most interesting and importance of them into stories. Bloomberg Crypto senior editors Dave Lukta and Anna Airera will join me for another edition of Friday in the Editor's Room, we'll take a look at the

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