Crypto/Digital Art/NFT's, What's actually going on? – ISSUE N.03
Digitally Minted Art selling for millions of dollars. I'm officially an unpaid artist. Sky Lou thinks she is a tiger. Weekly emails are hard. Let's dive in.
Oh Glorious Parenthood…
This week has flown by. We are looking at a couple of daycares for Sky Lou. It’s hard because I want her to be home. But then it’s also important for her to meet other toddlers. Let’s just say COVID has not made socialising easy. Let’s see how things goes, we have a couple of good options on the table.
She still don’t have any teeth breaking through. But it’s very close now. We are going through a hilarious phase where Sky Lou thinks she is a Tiger or Lion, she crawls around roaring, and grabbing clothes, toys or random things in her mouth. She loves crawling around and to butt heads with you and growl. Really acting like a little cub. I’m having so much fun with her every single day.
Food wise I’m making progress with my tolerance of how messy the eating situation can be. I know I should not care about this. But I find it hard when it gets messy at the dining table. But this week she has had free reign at the dining table. I feel she has improved her eating a lot just by allowing her to eat as she wants, even if that means eating with the entire body. We’ll continue with the experimenting and giving her more kinds of food.
Here is a not so messy morning prior to getting her oats.
Here we are, eating with whole body and directly on the table. See you next week.
Digital Art is booming
Digital art / Crypto Art or its more elusive name Non-Fungible Tokens (NFT’s for short) are booming. If you have not already come across it on the internet, you will probably do so quite soon. It’s everywhere.
Art in general is a strange thing. The actual value of the material behind an artwork is negligible, compared to the millions a painting could potentially sell for. Just to be stowed away in a Freeport until the next buyer wants to get their hands on it.
With that mindset, digital art is also quite strange. Because you can view the art anywhere, download a copy to your computer, screen grab a video etc, but the key difference is that there is a cryptographic way to verify who the real owner is. And that the proof of authenticity can not be forged. The art is minted into existence by the artists. Verified by the blockchain. And is then forever existing in the chain itself. Each future transaction or change of owner will be captured and stored in the chain too.
There are some other interesting aspects to NFT’. On some platforms you can put future royalties into your NFT’s. So whenever an artwork re-sells, the artist gets a small royalty paid out.
I’m not going to debate the recent prices of NFT’s selling for millions, because it’s simply the way art works. The collective believe a piece to be worth something, and once someone buys the piece the price is set and validated. I simply think it’s fascinating to see this unfold right before our eyes.
In a way most things work like this. Currencies only works as long as everyone using it believes in its value. The moment they don’t we reach a state of hyperinflation (Look at recent events in Venezuela as an example where the overall inflation rate since 2016 has reached a staggering 53,798,500%).
And just like with art, it’s not the most technical and advanced painters or creators that are getting a spot in the lime light now. But really artists that are producing things that people like to look at. It could be strange abstract 3D renders, or internet memes etc. So while there are legions of amazing 3D artists and professionals out there, the current winner are the underdogs and lesser known digital artists that produce things people want to own.
There are a couple of platforms where you can devour art and find new and exciting artists, Foundation, SuperRare, OpenSea, Rarible to mention a few.
I found Blender Gurus (Andrew Price) point of view quite interesting. Below is a 14min clip from his latest podcast. Or you can watch the full episode (45min).
NBA Top Shots – NFT’s
Then we have some other interesting takes on the NFT world. Like NBA Top Shots. From the same creators (Dapper labs) as CryptoKitties and Cheese Wizards. NBA Top Shots are digital “basketball cards” that are sold in batches, and it’s a bit of a gamble on what cards you’ll get once a pack drops. But the craze has been real. Last drop there was over +150.000 people in the queue.
I’m writing this Friday 5th of March. So there will be a drop today. Unfortunately if you where thinking about getting in on the drop, it’s impossible to create a new account due to high demand.
I’m still not fully grasping the longer term prospects of NFT’s - I feel like I’m just starting to open up my mind to what it could mean for a lot of things in the future. Especially digital goods in general.
I’ve minted my first NFT.
I obviously do not see myself as an artist any more than I see myself as a carpenter. But I’m not afraid of trying. So after a bit of trial and error I managed to get an invite to Foundation. I figured I needed an alter ego, so I go by the name of TNGS (things).
Why don’t you try to own my first piece of art? Place a bid today. It would mean I went from non artist to paid artist in less time than I finish a game of Monopoly.
In between jobs
Spending quality time with Sky Lou and trying to figure out what to do next. If you followed here, you know a couple of side hustles going. Hoping to get to talk more about them soon. I also want to spend some more time on crafting these emails. Would love to get more feedback and hear what you want me to write about. Last week was a bit of a fuck up and bad planning on my end so I left your inbox vacant. Trying to learn from this, can’t promise it won’t happen again… I spend a decent amount of time writing these emails and want to make sure you find them valuable.
This week’s tidbits
My Weekly Spotify playlist - brought to you by the Spotify AI
Volvo launches a new car, the C40 Recharge. Volvos website.
Square, yes the payment app, buys a majority stake in Tidal. Jack and Jay-z hangs out on a Yacht, the Yacht Boys. Om shines in on the deal.
Dispo that I mentioned 2 weeks ago has now raised $20m dollars in a new round of Investment. Dispo is a photo sharing app from YouTube Celeb David Dobrik.
This video showing the life of a nurse working inside an Covid ICU unit is great journalism by the New York Times.
This track by Jim-E Stack and Bon Iver, and this track by Novo Amor, and this track by The Shadowboxers are great. If you like Francis and the Lights, you’ll dig this.
This API service can help you automate screenshots of websites.
I’m looking at Craft to be my new weapon of choice for keeping notes in one place. If you use it, let me know what you think.
Sneaker Heads losing their minds over inside trading of MAGS.
Any feedback or ideas on how I can make this better is most welcome. Thank you for reading.
Written by Linus Ekenstam, trouble maker at sensive.xyz – You can find me on Twitter & Instagram
Thank you Jennie for proof reading.