I think crypto saved twitter

If you’re young and you make a lot of money this cycle this is an open letter to please actually go do something with your lives -Pay off debt -Be intentional and hang out with your family -Use financial freedom to learn new skills -Pursue a cool career arc without worrying about salary -Invest in being a great friend to people that matter to you -Start a company or a non-profit in an area you care about -Use existing capital to build an empire and extend your reach into the world (for good) -Be generous with your time -Get married & start your own family -Fund other people who are working on important projects -Make art Whatever it is… don’t fall for the psyops of lambos and watches and penthouses and first-class holidays and drugs and the mostly vapour bullshit version of rich person life that is sold to you. There’s nothing morally wrong in principle with having nice things, or any of the above stuff… go for it, but you won’t find much meaning there. I know a lot of staggeringly rich people who hate their lives. The answer instead is to act, to live, to create, to take risk, to face your life, to care, to build, to take advantage of the enormous gift of being in the right place at the right time with crypto + having the work ethic to recognize that & make use of the moment. You’ve basically been given a super mario invincibility powerup where life can now be played on easy mode & the framing shouldn’t be… "oh sick hell yeah now I can fuck off and do whatever I want at the beach"… instead it should be, "look at everything I’ve been given, I wonder just how much I could accomplish with this."

Man I’m just imagining Ledger trying to explain to his wife how he made $12.5m this evening because his British crypto friend has infinite aura points on the internet Up Only

I round tripped an uncomfortable amount of money in the last two months, humbling for sure

the best trader I know made two trades this cycle: long SOL from the FTX crash, then full port that into HYPE on the token launch (sold low $20s) good note to self that the best plays are simple... this person went ~100x and still had a life for 3 years

A giga-thread on how crypto redefines culture as an asset class 👇

Huss, GCR, Chiefing and CL vs. Donalt, Kang, Pentoshi and Ansem

NFT project founder meets DeFi project founder

Look mom I got a job 👽

Me walking to thanksgiving dinner in a month to talk about crypto with my family

remember to live your life

ok I'm actually going to take a step back from crypto over the next couple months long story, but I'm just genuinely burned out after so many years here + I'm not where I want to be with some health stuff tldr: need to be less plugged into the matrix, some notes below

The real trilemma in crypto is: a) working b) staying informed c) health Pick two.

1/ Can we talk about how many people in crypto grew up playing @RuneScape?

the supercycle was NFTs the whole time

Crypto dev versus crypto bizdev

It’s been real Farcon Feeling super grateful I got to spend the week with so many internet friends Special shout out to the @seedclub cabal toooo 💙

all my eth denver interactions in one picture

“Grandpa can you tell us about NFT summer 2021?” 🥺

Liquid Culture 📝 I’m officially another bro with a podcast (but I promise the co-host is cool) Today my friend @eclecticcapital and I are officially launching a podcast called Liquid Culture. It will focus on the intersection of crypto, culture, and creative industries, and it’s a production of the @seedclub media network. The inspiration for this was pretty simple. We both realized that there really isn’t a lot of media out there that we like listening to ourselves, both about crypto in general and specifically about the intersection of crypto and culture. So, we figured we would make our own podcast in this niche. In short, what we’re going to do is talk to founders and creatives across art, fashion, gaming, music, social and more, with a focus on how these industries are being changed by blockchains. We’ll be releasing episodes twice monthly (ish), and each show will run for 45-60 minutes. The target audience we have in mind is people working and playing in the crypto industry (as well as folks in tech). The tone we’re aiming for is more expert-oriented but casual, so less like a founder interview and more like us hanging out and exploring different themes & topics with cool guests that come through. Now, the name ‘Liquid Culture’ comes from this idea that blockchains have taken culture as an asset class and made it liquid, whether that’s via digital art, JPEGs of monkeys, cat memecoins, gaming items, or whatever else. While these categories are nascent, both Nat and I are convinced that blockchains are an important tool in changing how culture is created and consumed over the internet, and we’re stoked to have conversations connected to that as a theme. Please check out the podcast on Spotify (link in my bio & in the thread below), subscribe, and if you’re up for it please give us a friendly review! We did a little introduction episode which has some more background on Nat and I and why we’re excited about doing this together. The first interview episode is live as well where we hang out with with my friend @derekedws who is a partner at Collab + Currency. And we have several other episodes recorded that I am HYPED to share with the world. Finally, to commemorate the launch, we have a GIF of our podcast logo that is available to mint for free on @ourZORA over the next 7 days, you can find that in the thread below as well. For future updates please follow us on Twitter (@liquidculture_) and join us in /liquidculture on The Purple App. Thank you to the Seed Club team for making all of this possible.

gm

Ethereum is a Game Environment 📝 People describe Ethereum in a lot of different ways. It’s a smart contract platform, an asset ledger, an always-on financial system, a massive multiplayer online money game, and so on and so forth. The gaming metaphor is the one that I’ve always resonated with most. It helps tie together my entire engagement with this blockchain into a consolidated experience, that of a gamer. Think about it. There are different “levels,” starting with the main chain and followed by other execution environments that exist like layer 2s and aligned scaling solutions. There are different “players” active in these environments, from traders and speculators to investors and collectors. Some are retail, some are institutional, and each have different degrees of skill, awareness, and experience. There are different specializations, and players can “play” in NFTs, DeFi, memecoins, infrastructure, or other more niche domains. There are different “game modes” as well. One period of time will be talked about as player versus player (PvP) where the same actors are fighting over the same liquidity to make money. Then another period will be thought of as player versus environment (PvE) where it’s easier to trade profitably because net new users (and funds) enter the ecosystem and lift it up. The beginnings of a “gamer score” also exist with onchain transaction history converting into credentials like a wallet’s Degen Score or NFTs like POAPs from Proof of Attendance Protocol. Trackers like @nansen_ai even categorize wallet addresses into “whales” or “smart money” based on their activity. We see a unit of account for the game (i.e. Ether) as well as status symbols connected to the subculture that has formed around it (e.g. CryptoPunks), both of which are reminiscent of massively multiplayer online role playing games like RuneScape with its gold and party hats. Ethereum also has a loose parallel to mainstream games like Fortnite or Roblox in that it thrives on user generated content (UGC). People are naturally incentivized to create “content” including everything from art to applications and gaming assets because there is money to be made by building out extensions of the game. All of this is tied together in a “user interface” for Ethereum, which is how I think about the patchwork of block explorers (Etherscan), analytics platforms (Arkham), wallets (MetaMask), marketplaces (OpenSea), and relevant social media apps (Twitter, Discord, Telegram) that all players use to process and interact with the game. There are a lot of implications that arise from thinking about Ethereum in this way. In my view, the most important one is that all products, services, and experiences built onchain inherit this game environment as their primary context. People are drawn in by the global, open source game that we’ve created, and in this domain they behave in particular ways. Every builder, every artist, every team doing something in crypto land would be wise to design with those norms and behaviors in mind.

I don't normally talk about specific coins & NFTs... But I'm awake, I have 34 tabs open & I feel like writing... so buckle up for 1000 words on crypto + speculation + how I'm thinking about current projects & opportunities 😂 To front load here: 🔹I own some but not all of this stuff 🔹I don't have enough size to matter or dump on people 🔹I swing "trade" mostly i.e. speculate over longer time horizons (often 3-6 months or more... I'm washed up and old now haha) 🔹I have no particular qualifications or skills 🔹I'm not endorsing any of this - this is just me experimenting once with open sourcing some of my thinking for the few people who follow me 🔹nfa, you could lose everything if you buy any of these things, think for yourself, etc. Now, let's get to it (this is going to jump around a lot): -It sounds very mid maybe, but I'll start by saying I'm bullish on gaming x crypto... split into a barbell of "mainstream" (focused on mAsS aDoPtIoN and "indie" focused on "crypto people" -In the mass adoption camp, I think Parallel is incredibly cool & $PRIME will turbo send through the entire cycle. The TCG is top notch & @ParallelColony with its AI agent concept will help pioneer an entirely new category of gaming -On the indie side, I'm very bullish on @playcambria. The traction it has already gotten just by releasing a mini game on @BuildOnBase with very stripped down dueling is impressive. RPGs + crypto have always felt like a natural match to me. I think we see more energy around this because you're able to a) play a fun RPG with friends and b) be part of a gaming environment that leverages the unique liquidity and energy and CULTure of crypto as piping for the game to build on top of -I think it's possible @MadLadsNFT re-runs what happened to @BoredApeYC in 2021 in that price grinds higher and higher past most people's expectations. Many ETH NFT people will commit Seppuku as this happens because of their cognitive dissonance that a) they are digital culture makers & tastemakers but b) they missed a pretty obvious play with Lads. -The ratio of Autoglyphs to Colorglyphs is too dam high and will correct at some point... 250:1 is too much & it should be at least something like 75:1 if you think NFT history matters -I think @tensor_hq continues to follow Blur's playbook & drops a version of NFT lending soon, making @SharkyFi obsolete -I think we'll see a major shake up in onchain lending markets for fungible tokens in 2024. I think people way overestimate the "moat" Aave and Compound have... I think with both Robert and Stani gone to focus on their next start ups those teams stop innovating or meaningfully slow down. My best bet is that @eulerfinance's v2 really changes the game here - they are one of the only teams that has the brainpower in both economics and computer science to make novel contributions to onchain lending. -I think certain BRC-20s run up as Bitcoin has its moment in the spotlight, this won't be because the tech matters that much but more because exchanges want to represent BRC-20s as a category for the volume and novelty. $TRAC is one coin that has some theoretical use and is interesting to me - it has yet to be listed anywhere meaningful. But man, buying stuff onchain on Bitcoin is laughably difficult 🤣 -I think if @udiWertheimer ever actually launches Taproot Wizards they do better than people expect because Bitcoiners still have the most capital onchain of any L1 community & as we've seen in Ethereum land people will do stupid things and spend stupid amounts of money to own status symbols. -It seems like @TokenReactor and @redactedcartel (coins I lost money on in the past 😂) might actually make comebacks with their liquidity & LSD focused products coming out respectively. Not entirely sure how this shakes out, but the teams seem to have been building this whole time and that could actually surprise people when old tickers start pumping vs. just the "new coin gud" thesis. -I think @LootRealms ends up giga sending both because it will be a cool ecosystem + it'll be the only interesting alt on Starknet, which means I think it will behave similarly to how @Treasure_DAO did in early Arbitrum history. Liquid alt, proxy exposure to underlying chain, NGU. -I find the @Blast_L2 stuff somewhat distasteful to be honest, but I do think they are just taking crypto to it's logical end state, ripping off the veil, and simply going max ponzi. The points per second thing with staking is 😅 -On this point, I find it interesting that @PacmanBlur and the team are basically trying to own the whole stack & become a "prime brokerage" for all NFT finance related activities. I think we see Blast become the degen chain for a season because of this, while @ourZORA probably grows as more of an arts & culture L2 in parallel. -I'm very bullish on @monad_xyz because it gives ETH & EVM maxi types an intellectually coherent way to be pro integrated systems/parallelization without needing to capitulate to Solana + the SVM & its rise - $TAO is being shilled a lot right now, but I do think it does well as a core AI infra coin... it's often easier to just own some of the market leader vs. buying forks and adjacent shitcoins -People who talk about Solana having value accrual issues would do well to check out 2019 crypto twitter... where the popular view was that ETH had no value and was just "digital oil" & given that, folks should store value in BTC and only convert to ETH when they needed to. Then the narrative changed. These coins don't have value because there's a burn and shit... put your excel spreadsheets away. Everything is just tokenized attention h/t @QwQiao for the term. When common beliefs change about a coin's value, the price changes... Those beliefs have started to change about Sol, what happens to price in the next 12-18 months will follow suit. -@pudgypenguins end up as the only additional "veblen good" PFP on ETH this cycle beyond Punks (and maybe Apes) i.e. something that people buy to flex status. They have the right mix of history + holders with huge reach + new ideas for toys and games and things. That's all for now, if you made it this far and actually read all that writing, feel free to hit me up anytime with a DM & say hi 🫵👑 Good luck out there + goodnight ✌️

A lot of chats that I'm in are filled with people who are trying to figure out if anything in crypto is real/meaningful after all ...whether L1 blockspace is even valuable, whether NFTs were just a grift in the end, whether any apps with crypto rails will ever transcend being just another ponzi game to play etc. Part of this, yes, is bear market vibes & people wishing they sold earlier. Part of it is real, and the nihilism is coming from people who've been around crypto a long time, hoped + wanted to see very material change, but still don't see much that's inspiring... & it's wearing on them. For what it's worth, I don't think this is a "skill issue" thing. I think there are very real reasons to be bummed about the industry & I think some folks will entirely leave this time around (especially if they made a bag) - the whole "you're stuck here forever" meme is overplayed. That said, for the rest of us, I think it's a bit of a soul searching moment re: "Why crypto?" Even veterans go through this internal doubt spiral every once in a while. Why is this industry worth spending time in? What keeps you here other than making money? For some people it's the OG cypherpunk values. Cool. For others it's just better markets & trading. Sure. For other's it's the promise of real DeFi + stablecoins. Also good. For others it's art and culture on the internet and so on. I think no matter what your "why" is, the move right now is to double down on it... to care, to build, to advocate & and to start being louder about the actually cool people, projects & possibilities in this industry. I'm just tired of the nihilism man. It's time to plant a flag and be hopeful + show the veterans and newcomers alike that crypto is (and can be) something special as an expansion pack for the internet.

Haven’t felt this gross about crypto since the day FTX collapsed

Let’s Talk About Scams, Baby 📝 Last week I lost $50,000 USD, which was fun. I signed two malicious transactions on Ethereum and one of my wallets got drained, which felt like the digital equivalent of getting mugged… except instead of losing a phone and credit cards, you lose an average American’s entire yearly salary. Not great. I want to talk about what happened for a couple reasons. First, I hope that this reminds people to brush up on their security practices (don’t worry we won’t be talking about that in depth because it’s boring, but just a general nudge). Second, I hope as I share the story that people who have lost money in one way or another would feel less alone. Loads of folks I know have been phished, socially engineered, or they’ve signed transactions without thinking (I am here), and there can be a lot of shame in that… so if this is you, know that you’re in good company. Ok let’s get to it. What happened? To start, it’s tax season, and I needed to sell some coins so that I could cash out and pay the government. I went to do this late at night, which was my first mistake because I was tired. I moved some funds off a blockchain I don’t often use, into a wallet I don’t typically use, on a browser I don’t normally use… this only matters because I didn’t have an anti-scam browser extension set up there, which would have been a life saver. After swapping my coins to USDC, I paused before sending that money to an exchange and taking it out. Why? Well, markets were dumping, and I saw a token that was undervalued given what I know about the team, so I wanted to use some of this money to buy a small position in that token. To do this, I needed to bridge to another blockchain (Base), then use a decentralized exchange on that network called Aerodrome, but for some reason my wallet wasn’t connecting to the site. This happens all the time, crypto is a nascent industry, but this is where I started getting sloppy. To connect to an application on a blockchain you need to make sure your wallet is using the right “RPC.” In normal person speak this means that you need to “point” your wallet at the correct network, and often, when you’re unable to connect to an app, it’s because your wallet isn’t using the correct RPC. After tinkering in settings, I confirmed that I was connected to Base, but Aerodrome still wasn’t working, so I went to try one final thing. A trick to make sure your wallet is connected to the right network is to go to a different application on that network and sign in (this prompts you to switch to the relevant network if you’re not already using the right one). So, since Aerodrome wasn’t working, I went to Fren Pet, which is this Tamagotchi-ish game on Base… but my mistake was googling to find the site instead of going to it via their verified Twitter. The top result when searching for Fren Pet on Google is a “sponsored” link, which seems to present a credible URL, but serves you a scam site instead that is a mirror of the Fren Pet app. In short, because the URL and site looked legit at first glance, I signed two transactions there, which my tired brain thought was me signing into the app, but this gave the scam contract permission to drain my USDC on Ethereum. I figured out what happened quickly. That second transaction seemed fishy, wait… oh shit, ok I’m cooked. I checked a block explorer and saw the draining transactions, then had all the stages of grief in the span of about 2 hours. Denial. Did I really lose, like, $50,000 in two clicks just now? No chance that actually happened, let me check my wallet again. Anger. Nah, fuck that. You have got to be kidding me. Pacing around the kitchen. Bargaining. What if I had just gone to sleep instead? What if I was using a different browser? etc. Depression. I’ve put so much time and work into earning this money. I’ll never make it back. Also no one cares. This was my fault. I should probably sell everything and quit the industry. Acceptance. Actually whatever, fuck the North Koreans. Live and learn, charge it to the game. Crypto is like minesweeper and I just hit a mine. I’ll rally, play again, and make it all back. After reflecting on this experience for a few days, my lessons from it are fairly straightforward: don’t do transactions after 8pm, always have an anti-scam browser extension installed, double check URLs, and find websites via Twitter and never Google (so they’re official). That said, no matter what your security hygiene is, the real challenge here is the meat computer in our heads is just flawed sometimes: we miss things and/or we move too quickly. So, stay safe out there. When in doubt, move slow. If you’ve lost money have some grace with yourself. And if you’re rekt and need to talk to someone, please feel free to reach out. Thank you to all the people who have messaged me and offered encouragement over the past few days, all love.

How to trade memecoins (100 IQ edition): 🔹see new coin on Twitter 🔹react with disgust, you're too smart to buy this 🔹fade it at a low market cap 🔹coin pumps 🔹keep fading in principle because you're now late 🔹number go up more 🔹cope phase one starts 🔹keep fading because you're coping 🔹cope more because you're fading 🔹capitulate & buy some 🔹price immediately nukes 🔹sell at a loss as a noodle handoooor, it's over 🔹coin turns around & *turbo* sends to Valhalla 🔹elementary school dropouts print 7 figure gains 🔹you feel existential pain & total incompetence 🔹write tweet of your experience for engagement 🔹touch grass Happy Saturday 😄

ok I manually unfollowed 7000 accounts, was time to declutter I'm sure some people got caught in the crossfire so if I know you or you interact w/ me for real, will follow you back etc.

🥹

what is the best way to mass unfollow people on this app? think it's time to for a cleanse, my algo is a dumpster fire

So it finally happened to me after 5 years I had a wallet get drained last night, low 5 figs My fault, I was up way too late + wasn't paying attention & ended up signing a transaction on a scam instance of an app on @base 😫 I'll be ok financially but what a gross feeling

A @clairesilver appreciation post 🌸 I had the good fortune of meeting Claire ~3 years ago TLDR: 🔹She had ~300 followers on Twitter 🔹I was starting @accelerateart + looking for a creative cofounder 🔹I liked her art & vibes (similar today as back then) 🔹So I cold DMed her, she said she was interested & we've been internet friends ever since Now, Claire has a great reputation in the crypto, art & AI industries already, so what I have to say here won't be news to people But, I just want to add to the Claire lore 😈 & offer a bit of public encouragement as she attends to some health challenges nitter.app/ClaireSilver12/s… After working closely with Claire I've consistently found... She is one of the most innovative people I know at the intersection of art & tech. I've never seen someone learn & experiment with so much new technology. Some of that comes out in her tweets, but it's more impressive than most people understand I think & she works very very hard. Claire is also one of the most creative people around our scene 👩‍🎨 She slams together all sorts of technologies (like 65 AI tools, graphic design, sculpting, animation, code, gen art, and on and on)... All while simultaneously playing with a wide variety of themes (transcendence, youth, memory, nostalgia, world building, etc.). There aren't many people creating today that have her level of gifting around storytelling imho. Finally, I really think she is one of the most caring people on the internet. I feel confident her friends from @spumma to @jlindsayfilm to @CharliCohen to @funghibull to @DeeZe to @CozomoMedici and everybody in between would attest to this too. Even as her career has taken off, she continues to make time for friends, gives of her time and money to support smaller creators, creates educational content and on and on. So, given all of this, here are some things I'd like to suggest to anyone who has read this far: First, if you've ever been encouraged by Claire or inspired by her work, I think it would be a fun time to share that, either with a message to her directly, a comment on this thread, or however you'd like. And... ▫️If you get a chance to collect her work, do that ▫️If you get a chance to listen to her talk, do that ▫️If you get a chance to learn from her content, do that I really think this woman represents some of the best of our industry, it's been a gift working with her over the years, and because of that I just want to shine a spotlight on her today in a tough season ✨

Today is my birthday 😏

Can you (unironically) shill me some art? This could be your own work or someone else's that you've seen recently & liked Preference to: glitch, generative art, AI art, photography Could be for sale or not, any chain is valid too ✊

This tweet stuck with me I look at the shortlist of tokens that I think about owning & there are definitely some that I WANT more than others Want to own, want to be affiliated with, etc. Study the stickiness that creates, both in terms of price action & community formation

Sad day for me & my family as we had to put our dog down. He lived a great little life for 14 years and just got a sudden/rapid cancer, which can obviously happen at that age. His name was Wallace when we got him a few months into his life from the breeder, but my little brother - 8 years old at the time - decided that we couldn’t have a dog with such a boomer name, so he shortened it to WallE (after the robot movie) and that stuck. Everyone says this about their pets, but I truly think WallE was special. I’ve never interacted with a more low-key animal, and it made him the perfect therapy dog. Every week for most of his life he would volunteer with my mom at the children’s hospital here in Vancouver and just hang out with kids who were sick or dealing with health complications. He touched hundreds of lives there, and kids would routinely ask if they could see him specifically. In my 20s, when I went through my own journey with pretty severe health issues and was stuck at home just trying to make it through… this dog was my main little homie: watching Netflix with me, chilling on the couch, just always always around. We’ll miss him. I hope you’re in dog heaven buddy 💙

for the first time in history I'm in a leverage trade and the coin is going up

I still think NFTs are cool because they’re one of the few domains where qualitative people can compete with quantitative people

I wonder if in hindsight $DEGEN ends up being the kingmaker for @farcaster_xyz beating out @LensProtocol Having a coin people can rally around is so powerful in terms of cult formation & alignment

hope like gen x work like a boomer care like a millennial shitpost like a zoomer

pain aside, there is no funnier place on the internet than crypto twitter when markets are getting obliterated

I will always trust a crypto founder who played Runescape

This is my overall rank in @fantasy_top_... and you're bearish?

A little public service announcement 🫡

Main lesson from @elonmusk's takeover of this app is that social graphs are INSANELY durable Every part of the UX here has degraded, but people keep coming back 'cause the folks they want to connect with *also* keep coming back It's like a big social ponzi that feeds on itself

I still think NFTs are cool

gm from me & the average Ben Roy @fantasy_top_ cardholder

There was a time where I listened to ~30 audiobooks over 6 months when I had to drive around a lot And now I’ll visit parts of the city & get triggered right back into different books by environmental queues Spatial memory is wild, convinced we only use a fraction of our brains

3 family friends have died in the last year, all under 25 years old, two from cancer and the other from unknown causes a close friend's little brother also just got diagnosed with stage 4 brain cancer, he's in his 20s too + has a surgery tomorrow, so prayers are appreciated if you're that kind of person I just don't know what to say any more... life is so unfair and so fragile, don't take it for granted

Did I sell the top? No. But did I at least take some profits so I can chill over the summer? Also no.

Someone asked me how I originally chose my pfp The TLDR is I think Chromie Squiggles represent a combination of... -optimism in technology -creator empowerment -the importance of community -and a sense of life as play Those are simply values I want to associate myself with 🤷‍♂️

That feel when someone asks you if NFTs are going to make a comeback

Some thots about @fantasy_top_ I'm already tired of my timeline i.e. tired of hero engagement farming, tired of seeing my own tweets even tbh 😅 TLDR: 🔹it's a cool game 🔹team is crushing it 🔹fantasy "sports" for social media makes sense 🔹getting DMed by my card(bag)holders is lame tho 🔹And it sucks feeling like I need to perform (or I'm letting people down) That said, I'd be up for doing some kind of royal champion's league jamboree week-long tournament kind of thing, once per month maybe Getting all these "heroes" to actually go hard over one week each month could turn into a fun little crypto twitter norm i.e. people come with their best bangers, make it a whole thing, etc. But going beyond that is going to feel tiresome, unless I just completely stop thinking about it & tweet what I want + when I want + dgaf (this is likely the answer)

Three thoughts from smart people at Farcon/Free WiFi that are stuck in my head atm: "Your reputation among industry peers is more important than being clouted by the general population" "Minting is a checkpoint in the universe" "Be less precious with blockspace"

me looking at the "aesthetic" NFTs I minted in 2021 and held to $0

The Magic of Marfa 📝 Marfa doesn’t really make sense until you get there. At first glance, it’s this unremarkable little town of ~1500 people in west Texas, but as soon as you arrive and acclimatize, something clicks. The buildings that look run down on the outside have thoughtful interior design. The food is higher quality than you’d expect. There are little art galleries scattered around the town and the owners are often from LA or NYC. It feels like an odd mash up between urban energy and small town serenity that somehow just works. The reason I went to Marfa was for Art Blocks Weekend, which is a 3 day “conference” focused on generative art and the culture that has grown around it. Of all the crypto-related gatherings I’ve been to this was the most unique and by far my favorite. I want to try and capture why that’s the case as I kill some time waiting to catch my flight home. Since Marfa is so far away (I drove from Austin which took 6.5 hours), Art Blocks Weekend ended up only attracting people who truly wanted to be there. So, I found that automatically everyone I met was cool & shared a lot of the same interests. It was so fun to refresh old relationships and meet some online friends for the first time as well. Nothing beats seeing the look on people’s faces when they meet in real life and realize they’ve known each other for ages on the internet. I don’t know exact numbers, but I heard about 500 people attended this year and that sounds right. The small size made the weekend feel approachable and community driven. It was basically summer camp for digital art and culture nerds – in the best way – and that stands in contrast to the more mainstream conferences where thousands of folks attend, and everybody is scattered across their own tracks and side events. I spent most of my time in Marfa volunteering with Glitch which is a digital art gallery run by friends of mine Derek, Maddy, Steve, and Zack. There were panels, mixers, parties, art displays, and artist signings. The events covered generative art, digital fashion, AR/VR, art markets, and more. And in my down time, I checked out Art Blocks programming which consisted of multiple activations, panels, displays, meals, and other shenanigans. What sticks out to me about all these different events across the whole weekend is the through line was celebrating digital artists and their work. But more than that… it actually felt authentic: artists, collectors, VCs, traders, enthusiasts all coming together to pause for a moment and realize that together we’ve built a little scene on the internet (and in real life) that is magical. I’ll be back next year. Credit to @ethereum_dapps, @jonathancolon + @pridesai for the pictures ✊

I really just love crypto What a totally insane and cool industry + group of people Violent lows and euphoric highs Pure degeneracy but then real systems change at the same time There is no second best

Announcing... that I'll be announcing something tomorrow morning that I've been working on for a couple months 😈

New Post: "Consider the Chromie Squiggle" Covers: ▫️Chromie Squiggles 101 ▫️The rise of the set in crypto subculture ▫️My personal reflections on the collection ▫️Some thoughts about potential futures Published in @PageOneGG (link in the next tweet 👇)

I like NFTs and wish they would come back

My Squiggle in @VinnieHager style 😍

116 quality people you should follow in crypto 🤌 I'll split this into 4 parts 🔹arts & culture 🔹venture & trading 🔹founders & builders 🔹storytellers & community folks

Checks are the most interesting project I've seen this year... ▫️Simple conceptually ▫️Derivative friendly ▫️NFTs as performance art ▫️Great commentary on internet culture ▫️Clean Good. Game. 🫡

Hayden Adams logging on to crypto twitter in 2025 after @Uniswap shellacks the SEC in court

Is this “mass adoption” in the room with us right now?

How is this real life? 🥲

The attention-to-market cap ratio for Bitcoin Puppets is way off These mfers are everywhere in my replies - one of the few pfp communities that feels alive (+ no roadmap to screw up) Think when markets come back they pump as a mix of BTC beta, "NFTs" & DGAF crypto energy

Can you (unironically) shill me some art? This could be your own work or someone else's that you've liked recently Open to all categories, all chains are valid, could be for sale (or not) TLDR: I'd like more art in my feed again + want to see some new stuff this week 🫡

Imagine being an adult with a Chromie Squiggle & not using it as your email signature Couldn't be me

NFT project founders trying to sell their "IP"

SO COBIE LOGGED IN AND SAID IT'S BEARISH CAUSE OF MACRO BUT THAT'S COUNTER TO GCR WHO SAID DON'T BE A BITCH AND GET SHAKEN OUT SO WE WERE STUCK TRYING TO FIGURE OUT POSITIONING AND THEN ROARING KITTY LOGS ON AND STARTS DROPPING SICK MEMES SO YEAH ANYWAY WE'RE VERY FUCKING BACK

For the first time in 5 years, crypto has lost its magic for me Can finally see how the real OGs got so cynical Everyone is just here to make $, few real problems are being solved, almost nothing actually needs a token, etc.

The biggest risk for Farcaster (and what to do about it)

Thinking about her (NFT summer 2021)

"So what is this gap in your resume from 2021-2025?" "I was uh involved with several experimental fintech communities that were part of uhm an emerging economic movement"

gm from me & all Ben Roy @fantasy_top_ card holders

Stop people pleasing

you can feel how tired crypto is as an industry just by scrolling the timeline

"So you're an athlete, but for social media posting?"

I think Ethereum is going to have a big comeback arc over the next ~12-18 months in terms of mindshare, vibe & price

Crypto is an expansion pack for the internet 📝

This is who you're trading against in 2024 - if you don't make money that's on you 😅

A friend texted me out of the blue today about @SBF_FTX 😅 Turns out he watched the 60 Minutes interview with Michael Lewis (link at the bottom of my post) This friend felt “the jury was still out on Sam” and that SBF may be innocent because “he seems like he was just in over his head” (effectively accepting all the talking points that came up) I found that irritating, so... Here is a (kind) note I wrote back to my buddy, which I’m sharing here because I figure some people who aren’t familiar with FTX might find it helpful re: learning more about why it’s such a pain point for crypto people. “Hey man, Thanks for the ping and for your takes here. I’ll give you some misc. thoughts back about SBF, Lewis, FTX, and what gets talked about in this. First off, I agree that everyone is innocent until proven guilty, so we’ll have to see how the trial shakes out. That said, I personally don’t think the jury is out on SBF (in a proverbial sense) & I think he’s guilty of various crimes, especially given his closest executives all admitted to criminal guilt. He also broke his bail for witness tampering and other shiet that reflects on his character here. As for Lewis, I've read 6 of his books, and I try to give him the benefit of the doubt, but I think he misses the mark. And that’s why you’re seeing so much vitriol from crypto folks in response to his takes. I think this comes down to two things: 1) Many millions of people from around the world had serious money directly stolen from them via FTX i.e. this wasn’t just ‘a bunch of silly gamblers playing in the Bahamas’ (which is a very patronizing take from Lewis) 2) A lot of Lewis’ commentary in the video is hitting the exact pro-SBF talking points that Sam wants in the media to shape the narrative, which in turn triggers the absolute fuck out of people from group 1. Mostly, this comes down to talking about Sam as being incompetent & naïve, which is basically the entire defense Sam has vs. being a sociopathic con-man. Important to note that his credibility was never questioned or mentioned before the collapse, by Lewis or other mainstream folks, Sam was “the brilliant saviour.” The TLDR here (in my view) is this is an ex post reframing of Sam’s character to downplay his intent, and Lewis plays into that big-ly. Lewis is basically like: ‘This poor guy Sam, shucks, he had bad dressing habits, good intentions and a video game obsession… he simply got over his skiis.’ And my response is, nah bro he stole billions of dollars and was a serial liar on everything from his involvement with Alameda and FTX co-mingling funds to being a vegan, sorry to report. The one quote from that interview most people take issue with is: “They actually had a great real business… if no one had ever cast aspersions on the business... if there hadn’t been a run on customer deposits, they’d still be sitting there making tons of money” Sorry, no. 1) In reality, FTX never had a business, they simply traded against their own customers (illegal activity case #1) plus directly misappropriated customer money (illegal activity case #2), then used both streams of funds as their personal revenue… redirecting it toward everything from luxury living to random venture checks to donating to politicians. 2) This was not a bank – exchanges are supposed to have segregated accounts where what you put in is what is custodied/stewarded on your behalf. Lewis should know that. What happened was… FTX took your coins, sold them for shitcoins, then took leveraged loans out against those shitcoins (all under the guise of maximizing returns because muh effective altruism) then lost much of the borrowed $ because they turned out to be garbage traders. It’s so many layers of degeneracy it’s actually funny lmao, but in short that meant they didn’t have enough $ on hand when people came to withdraw… and it’s not like a few million was missing… it was a multi B shortfall ‘cause they gambled the house away. And it wasn’t their house to begin with. 3) “Casting aspersions” (a reference to Binance calling FTX out) has nothing to do with FTX’s fate beyond being the initial cause for the “run.” Either you can pay what you say you have or you can’t. As Taleb even mentioned today on Twitter… saying liquidity is the issue is like blaming the bullet for the murder, not the gun. They got themselves into that position through criminal malfeasance. nitter.app/nntaleb/status/1709630… I take your point that Lewis should be given some benefit of the doubt since he spent so much time directly observing Sam over the past years i.e. first hand experience, but you have to remember… Madoff’s family didn’t know he was a scammer... his sons who worked directly with him didn’t know until papa told them and the sons then turned him in. It’s more likely to me Lewis has just been convinced to believe certain things by someone who was clearly a very effective storyteller (Sam). Overall, I would have expected more from someone of Lewis’ stature than saying exactly what Sam’s paid journalists have been saying since the week after the exchange blew up. Now, finally, yes, I remain bullish on crypto haha. No serious people look at FTX and think that is a reflection of the entire crypto industry. It definitely became the largest brand representative but the industry is far more than a single corrupt actor. At times aspects of crypto are criminal for sure and lots is idiotic - let me tell you lol - but it’s not that different than traditional finance where Citadel or a big 25 bank gets dinged for shitfuckery once a month. If anything, I’d actually say the legitimacy of crypto is quietly on the march, and excising the cancer of FTX is great moving forward. Politicians from both parties in the US House called out Chair Gensler for overreach recently; a slew of court cases have been rejected re: SEC shenanigans with respect to securities laws; Visa, PayPal, Shopify, Van Eck, BlackRock… many people and entities are pushing toward not away, and that’s just in the past couple months *in America.* Europe and Asia are also cautiously optimistic imo, clearer regulations, supportive of crypto firms, etc. Happy to chat more about any of this when I see you on the weekend. Hope some of it was helpful man. -B. Original video that is being referenced: nitter.app/60Minutes/status…

Being 30 years old at a crypto conference

No shade (at all) but this guy kind of looks like @farokh got forked into a Johnny Depp codebase

Only one memecoin community made me a custom pfp so send that one to trillions with haste

getting the 2021 bros chat back together for one final NFT bull run

The business model of every crypto project

The biggest alpha in crypto is: you just need to find 6-12 people to process the industry with People to bounce ideas off of People to celebrate wins with & commiserate L’s with etc. Find a crew, pool information flow, have fun, win together

think you need to reinvent yourself in crypto every 12-18 months or you stop being able to make $ BTC guys missed ETH, ICO bros missed DeFi, all those people missed NFTs, then the NFT people mostly missed memecoins, blah blah you get locked into one model of money game & most people never break out of that so the move is... -find new accounts who are sharp that joined the industry somewhat recently & are succeeding -figure out how they play + what they find interesting -rewire your brain accordingly h/t @0xsmac

Feeling unusually hopeful about life today Sending that energy to all reply guys 👊