Background
Mint Season 6 episode 13 welcomes Black Dave, the web3-native music artist, creative thinker, and self-proclaimed genius. From dropping free NFTs to setting records across crypto Twitter, I wish I had him on the podcast sooner. We had an awesome conversation on all things music NFTs, the early days of Clubhouse, building communities, designing experiences for collectors and so much more.
I hope you guys enjoy our conversation.
Time Stamps
- 00:13 – Intro
- 11:05 – Getting Started With Music NFTs
- 17:00 – The History of Black Dave
- 23:09 – Why Community Ownership is So Important
- 29:03 – Rent-Based NFTs
- 32:19 – Creating Experiences Around Drops
- 34:56 – Snoop Dogg’s NFT Drop
- 39:30 – Any Collaborations On Your Wish List?
- 43:00 – Free NFTs
- 58:26 – The Balance Between Documenting Processes and Creating Music
- 01:03:20 – How Do You Build a Legacy On Chain?
- 01:07:58 – New Things On Your Radar
- 01:15:29 – Outro
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Intro
Black Dave, the one and only, welcome to mint. What’s going on man?
Black Dave: Hey man, I’m about my girlfriend’s house. She’s watching industry and I’m chilling. How are you?
I’m feeling good. I’m doing well. It’s Wednesday, September 21, it’s the first episode we’re recording together. I feel like it’s long overdue. I’m a collector of yours across the different music NFTs that you’ve issued, and sort of just been like watching what you’ve been doing. So, I think a good place to start like Dave is who are you, man? What does a world need to know about you? And more specifically, how’d you get your start into web three?
Black Dave: So, I normally say my name is Dave, Black Dave in the streets. I got; I’ve been making music in varying forms for the last 20 years. Nothing crazy. I don’t have some like I went on tour with this person kind of story. But I’ve been making music just with my friends in Charleston where I live. I’m from Charleston, South Carolina. I got started in web three at the end of 2020. My story’s similar to a lot of people that just happened earlier. I was on clubhouse, someone was showing people how to make NFTs, it was Seer Sue, in case you know Seer Sue and he was doing a five-day course with, there’re like a few o G’s in there, Shawn, sometimes Sophie, his girlfriend was in there. There weren’t a lot of people. There’s like six or seven of us learning how to make NFTs at this time. And I started minting NFTs then, my first maybe 15 or so NFTs weren’t actually music. They were all images. And I started minting music in March of 2021. And then from there, I went full steam on music.
But you’ve been you’ve been a music artist for a minute now, right?
Black Dave: Yes, yes, I started out playing bass in pumping hardcore bands, which is why my music has like screaming and why music has guitars is because like, I’ve been trying to think a lot more about how to fuse all of my interests into one thing. And so that’s like what my musical goal and constant chases.
How would you explain, like your creative side to someone who’s not familiar with your work? Because I would consider you, not all over the place, but like artistically all over the place, which I really appreciate. How would you sort of explain it to someone, that isn’t maybe familiar with your work?
Black Dave: I tell people my goal like is like Virgil Abloh was a rapper who watched anime. My whole thing is that, I don’t want to be limited to a specific media, I really just want to be known for like my tastes and like the quality of work and the quality of ideas. So normally, I tell people that like I’m an all-around creative person, or I’ll say a lot of times, and I’m a creative director. But I like to just say, I’m a creative person, working out the intersection of anime, streetwear, rap music, sneakers, and fashion.
Walk me through more of like the early days of clubhouse. Because I think that was like an iconic moment for a lot of people who kind of came across NFTs in that era and clubhouse set the tone for a lot of new projects, a lot of like icons that maybe have set the tone for, yeah, like the standards of how to do drops, how to design websites, etc. And I remember all these like clubhouse spaces sort of activated that and considering you came into crypto through clubhouse, and you didn’t start with music, you started with images. I think that’s super interesting. Can you talk more about that?
Black Dave: Yes. So, in 2019, I had quit my job and decided that I was going to try to find a way to be a creative person for money, as opposed to working for somebody else for money. And so, when 2020 had started, I decided I was going to make more music. And so, I was making a three song EP every month and I was making a beat every day and uploading it and like putting it on my beat store. And so, when it got time to get into like crypto, web three, etc. I was already into crypto, I bought my first crypto and like 2017, with everybody else. And one of my friends early in the year was trying to get me into NFTs. He was like you could totally do this. And I was like, oh, I don’t do 3d art and that was pretty much the end of the conversation. And so, at the end of it. At the end of the year, I was going through the course and I minted a cover that I did use for one of my EPS is my first NFT. It was like December 19 or 20th. Right before Christmas, and it was a small clubhouse room. You know, Lady Phoenix, I think like, it was one of the big oh geez, who was on clubhouse at the time. Sirsi was a super old shrine, Israel. There was Cashmere, there like a handful of folks. And at that time.
There’s a ton. Yeah.
Black Dave: But at that time, there were a lot. I think, the early, early, earliest conversations I remember were all led by black people, which was kind of funny to think about now, just because of like, so much of the different race related things that happened throughout the space, but like, that was really interesting. And I just met lady Phoenix in New York. At NFT NYC, she’s amazing. I’ve met Seer Sue, before that, something I don’t know which one, somewhere, I’ve met all the people I named but I had minted an image, I didn’t sell it for about a month and a half. So, what happened was through that, I ended up teaching other people about NFTs, I joined the like, clubhouse crew NFTs dot tips, if you remember that, if you were around for that. So, I joined that crew a little bit after they started. And we would just onboard people for like 18 hours a day like literally like I would sit probably for like six- or seven-hours in time and when onboard people and we would just rotate like the like core team quote unquote and from there we just onboard so many people, you think about like the like the team for like Oni force like all of them were like pretty much on boarded by NF T’s tips like the OG team. I know they’re like, going through it as a project but like that team windboard APR club minted, it was still clubhouse time. So, all the rooms are happening on their, part of the reason that super Yeti is such like a meme is because that was clubhouse time. Just a bunch of stuff from that era. And then like something that I think is a little bit different now that was not, that was like, that was that, it was it’s different now but was really, I think important then was like the power of a crypto punk and owning a crypto punk. And like early 2021. Alan henna was like the only person we all knew who had a crypto punk at the time. And he was one of the people who was helping onboard tons and tons of folks and like, I would spend a lot of time like CO hosting rooms with Alan, which I think really informed like a lot of how I view the space because like, he’s such a deep thinker in general and was already working in crypto and like was already an engineer and all that stuff. So, hearing him describe the space versus hearing somebody who’s natively an artist described the space, I think really informed how I moved and thought.
How would you sort of explain to someone who wasn’t around the early like clubhouse days, the influence that black culture had on mainstream adoption? How would you sort of explain that narrative and kind of even reference examples?
Black Dave: I think the easiest example, especially for like clubhouse in particular, was clubhouse really took off when Atlanta rap music showed up on the app. So, I got on clubhouse in November of 2020, which was still far before a lot of people and I got one of my friends on before me because he like he made more, he was further along in the music journey than I am. And so, I was like, yo, you should get on clubhouse. I know your manager lives in Atlanta. Let’s see if you can get somebody to get you on. And so, he ended up getting on like a month and a half before me. And Neezy who’s 21 savage’s managers had like a really booming club on there. Sonny digital had a really booming club on there. And then what happened was clubhouse sort of, I remember tweeting, like, where all the white people on clubhouse at a point. And obviously, they’re all there. But this space, it was just such a different like space and territory. I think once like web three was kind of that thing that I think allowed race like to sort of be obfuscated a little bit and then all sorts of people started joining. But I think when people started joining, they also started creating and looking for communities like within their identity.
So, like when I had joined there was a cohort called one off and they had crypto voxels show that was all black NFTs like NFTs by black art. As the NFTs weren’t black, but yeah and so that was like kind of one of my early entrances into it. And so, through that, and then through float, which is like a music based collective, or music-based project, founder of that black, lady Phoenix, of course. You know, Alan, and then black NFT art, the community, that community whom a diamond etc., etc., popped up around that time. And so, there were a lot of like, I think the first spaces that really catered towards certain demographics of people were all the black spaces, and then and then you started to see the women and NFTs, then you started to see, you know, people in Asia, especially in NFTs, and even at that point in time, we were like, through NFTs tips, people were like translating for other people. And so, we were teaching people about NFTs in another language, even through clubhouse. So, I think, I want to say like Japan had started onboarding maybe. And so that that kind of happened.
Getting Started With Music NFTs
Okay, so at what point did you sort of get involved on the music NFT front? Because you started with more of like, digital art, right? Yeah, I’m curious around the time, like the year, right, so was it like 2020, 2019, or more of like, 2021?
Black Dave: it was 2021, for sure. I saw my very first collection. So, I had done a whole collection before I’d done music. The collection was called flips. It’s like, if you just search flips on open sea, you’ll find it. But they were all logo flips of just popular brands. And they would just say like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Doge, etc. And what happened was I did that. And then I remember someone being like, oh, these are just like cheerio cards. And then I was like, shit. And then I like I still do; I still do them. But like I do them far less just because I know that there’s like a project that kind of already pushed the logo flip narrative for me. I ran a brand in Charleston, or I ran a brand in Charleston, called Charleston hype, which essentially did the exact same thing. But I would flip logos of companies and they would say Charleston instead. So, like, I had a Nike T for instance. And people it said Charleston and like in big cities, Nike does collaboration shirts, like are they do city shirts, but people would go to the Nike store and be like, I saw a Charleston Nike T, can I get that? And people would be like, oh, no, that’s not here. And like, the idea was that like, it was like tourists’ tees for locals. And, and I kind of felt the same way about the project. The flips project was it was like tourists’ tees for locals or tourists designs for locals. Were like, if you knew about the cryptocurrencies, you would get it. But if you knew about the brands, you would also want to get it because of the brands associated. So, like it was a nod to my streetwear. And then in March, I think I mentioned my first music project. And what I did with that, I think is kind of unique, even still is, I had minted a collection of 2d artworks, a collection of 3d artworks. And then just like the straight up audio file, like with the cover art, and I did that. And every, all the unlockable content was a download link to the song. So, it’s just an IPFS link, hash, I guess I should say, to the song. And that was like my first NFT drop. And because I was doing so much onboarding and stuff through NFTs tips, I decided to do like a, you know, clubhouse drop room. And I think I sold out, like that night of that whole project, which was really sick.
You know, it’s cool, just hearing you’d say this story in, like walking me through your process and the details that went into sort of creating the drop using IPFS to sort of figuring out what the dynamic would be between doing, like minting the audio file separately and whatnot. Like, it seems so complex on the surface, it also seems like you know exactly what you’re doing. And what’s interesting is that a lot of creators that you talk to, they’re just like sort of focused on just like minting the music NFT, but that’s also why you’re here today. Like, why I wanted to feature you is because like, I feel like you think so critically and so in depth on how you’re going to construct the drop and you also know some of the tech stack and infrastructure that’s related to kind of minting and bringing these pieces to life.
Black Dave: You know, so I think lazy minting on open sea might have happened December 29. So, like my very first NFT was on wearable, I paid full gas, it might have been like $4 at the time and I know like right now, you know Ethereum is low, transactions are low. So, gas is low as well but like that, it was so cheap to do and I already had crypto from buying in 2017 that I just it was like a no brainer for me. But then like, you know, I said earlier like the whole like Virgil Abloh kind of reference, I feel like when you design something, and when you create something, the details are what really matters. I like to say that luxury is in the details. Like one of my recent cars, I go through cars like hotcakes, I guess. I had a BMW 323; it was a 2001. It’s like last year, they did the 323 series. And I remember when I got it, I would crank the car, and the radio wouldn’t turn off, while the car crank. So, you’d like most cars, when you crank the car, the radio turns off, and then it turns back on when your car cranks up all the way. My BMW didn’t do that. And I was like, wow. And like that sort of clicked to me that like, all the best parts of things are in the details. Even like more BMW stuff, like, under my passenger seat, there was a whole first aid kit, you know, and so it’s just like, just like little things that would make it better. You know, when you switch lanes, it would automatically turn the signal light off. And like in 2001, that was crazy. You know, like, just little stuff like that is really what makes things special. And so like, I always wanted to have attention to detail. And I always wanted to like, create stuff that like resonated with me because even like that first song was all anime themed, I use a sample from anime, my pet tag is anime. A lot of the images I was using were anime. But then like, trying to make it more like, considered, I guess, I think considered is probably the best word to explain. Like, I wanted to do things. And so, and then, like you said on the tech stack end, right. Like, I think my number one question this whole time has always been, why does this need to be an NFT? And why can’t this exist in a traditional sense? And so that’s what I’m always like, pushing for through every project I do.
The History of Black Dave
So that ended up being the first music NFT, what was the next one? Like walk me through the history like Dave, and sort of how you curated your drops shortly after.
Black Dave: So, the next NF T. One thing that’s crazy about the first NFT drop that I failed at, I was learning unreal Engine at the time, when I was trying to build a little Metaverse, that was an art gallery, and then upload it to my website, I failed. I didn’t sleep for a lot of days, I had burnout. And then in July, was in July, maybe June, the end of June, I had minted my second collection of works. And this time I’m into two songs, and that I mentioned a bunch of 2d artworks, some 3d artworks, and then the cover arts. What I did this time was, I created a special edition cover for the songs. And this is my second drop. I did a special edition cover for the songs, everybody who had my first song got that for free. So, I was already like doing versions of airdropping. And then the 25 editions of each song I had available as NFTs. And the special thing about this drop was, I had a token that was called the Black Dave verse token. And what that token was, is whoever owned that token, can get a rap verse for me, whenever they want.
I remember like thinking about like another like, why NFTs, why web three and thinking about like, when I’m like one of the biggest artists in the world. And it’s really hard to get a rap first from me, somebody who bought this token really early, still has access to me through that token. And like I was thinking about this idea of like a service based NFT, so the person who want it, was the only person who bid on it. And he was like, I bid on it to start the auction but I thought this was a genius idea and that it would sell for a lot of money. And so, they paid point three Ethereum which was around $1,000 at the time and I think that’s going to be a great deal in the future. But I think like more than anything it opened up the idea of like services rendered by NFT ownership, so like, I had I had a discord back then but I don’t think my Discord was token gated, my Discord still not token gated. But I’ve token gated like channels, but it’s like open to all and but like even that, like is a service, right? Discord access as a service. And so, like just thinking about all the different services I could do. So, I did two songs, I had Airdropped all my previous collectors, a special edition version of the song. And then I had released two new songs and did the verse token. So that was my second music NFT drop and that was still on open sea like everything I did so far up to this point was on open sea, except my very first NFT which was on rare able and it was mostly because lazy minting came to be and I was like all right, cool. Let’s just run that. So that was my second drop.
Right. And then and then sound that XYZ comes into the picture? Yep.
Black Dave: Sound catalog. I minted on catalog first, before sound. And I minted on catalog in November of 2021. And I minted a song called sharp. And I feel like every story has like some obnoxious like, this is what NFTs can do thing to it. But like, I minted that song sharp and it was priced at three Ethereum, party bid was like a big thing at the time, especially for people making rap music, we were all, not we were all, a lot of people were like minting music videos and selling that for one Ethereum or two Ethereum. But getting the whole community to buy in on it, community ownership is like, definitely one of those things that I think web three enables really well. So, what I did was sharp was three Ethereum priced NFT. And I set it up as a party bid, 42 people got in on it. And from there, I gave governing power of the song to the collectors. So, everyone who bought in a fraction of the NFT, I gave him governing ability, the NFT didn’t sell in total for about two months, I was going on this crazy like run of like Twitter threads, Twitter spaces, clubhouse rooms, like, just like explaining the gospel of like, why this NFT matters, why I matter. Like making like NFT like music NFT hot takes, which is still like a thing that I do. And an NFT sold in January.
So, like, I think at the beginning of January, it sold the same day, I’d gotten on the 22 artists to watch in 2022 lists by NFT now, so I got on that list the same day, the NFT sold, I was doing a space called why isn’t your NFT selling, where people would come in and talk to me about why their NFTs weren’t selling and we would just talk about it. And at the end of the space, somebody pretty much like paid the whole like last one Eth that was remaining. So, I was at like 2.1 out of three. And at the end of the space. Eric Spivak was like, Yo, I just ran up the last point nine NFTs done. And I was like, oh shit, and so 42 people in total, it was a crazy like, because he was like, did you notice you got on this list? And I was like No, not until after the room. And then the guy who collected the verse token, he hits me up every so often with like different ideas about like, what he could do, where he just wants to talk about, whatever. And he was like, he was like, did this sell because you got on the list. And I was like no, the list came out after I sold. And so, it’s like crazy timing. Because maybe if that didn’t happen, it would have ended up selling through like me getting that notoriety of being on the NFT analysis, which I also made it on the NFT 10 in 2021, which was sick or 2022, I guess.
Why Community Ownership is So Important
Wild. You know, earlier in the story, you sort of talked about this concept of community ownership. I’m curious why you decided to use that keyword and what that sort of means in the grand scheme of things, as you’re building communities and building like a fan base, the collector base in crypto, like why is community ownership so important?
Black Dave: I think like, the thing about communities owning things is, in a lot of ways communities haven’t really had an opportunity to own something together. This is going to be like a probably reach of a metaphor. But I live in Charleston, and I live on land that’s owned by my family. And my aunt is my neighbor. And I live with my mom and my great aunt’s my neighbor and I live with my mom and my aunt, her sister, and my grandma is going to build a house in front of us and my sister might build a house beside us and I might build a house somewhere. And like the idea that like my family is the community has this opportunity to own land provides a lot of new opportunities for us, but also allows us to create things we couldn’t create before. I think with web three, when community’s own thing, communities can benefit from owning a thing. So, like even with sharp, the whole idea of this project was that, we would do governing things around the song, so like stuff like the music video treatment, stuff like marketing, stuff like you know the budget for the song, stuff like you know, whatever and like when the song ended up going crazy in whatever form it did, we could sell the NFT in the community that supported me, now got a return on their support. And I think that’s something that’s really special about communities owning thing is that, if we all own something, we all can benefit from the ownership, either through participating and whatever the thing is that we get by owning it, or participating in the sale of that thing. And because we’re all owners, we all get to benefit from the sale of that thing.
That makes sense. I think a lot of creators still don’t understand the beauty and the value behind ownership, let alone like majority of people that exist on this planet. I think NFTs might have maybe educated people on what the value of ownership really means and what you can do once you own something. But I think it kind of comes down to like being financially literate, to an extent, right, or just being literate in general of why it’s better to own versus rent. Would you agree? Would you disagree? What do you think about that?
Black Dave: I think it depends, right? Like there are massively rich people who say don’t own things, because as soon as you own something, it’s worth less. And they’re like, you just lost money, because like driving a car off the lot, you know, depreciates the price of the car by a bunch of students, you get off the lot. I think that this is different. I think digital assets don’t depreciate and then a lot of ways only appreciate, especially when you factor in the blockchain, and like provenance, and like trackable ownership. Things really, in a lot of cases can only go up in value if shepherded the right way. When I was talking about the first token, and I made the comment about being the greatest artist in the world, and you know, what I’m doing being worth a bunch of money. If a community had owned that token, a community could benefit from the sale of that token, to a record label, to a rapper, or the community could benefit from, you know, getting one of their friends a song with me, and maybe it’s the same thing as getting a Drake verse, you know, in 2022.
I think like, you know, owning things, and not only owning things, but understanding that there’s power to ownership, and that, especially using this tech, you can enable special things for that ownership is the thing. You know, I know, we’re like going through my journey, but one of the most recent NFTs that I dropped, I had split the sale of that NFT with all of my collectors, it’s like the, I want to say, it is the and I hate using superlatives like this, but the largest on chain split for an NFT sale, it’s 159 wallets. And all 159 people are wallets involved in this, get a percentage of the sale of this NFT and varying amounts. And so just by being an owner, and something that like, you know, links back to me, you receive benefit through ownership, I think digital ownership is so different. I was on a call today, and someone used the phrase digital supply chain. And I thought that that was really interesting. And I think that there are all these like digital forms of things that are natively physical, that we’re coming to terms with. And because they’re digital, they have different properties. And we really need to be aware of what those properties are and what those properties mean. And so, I think owning is far more important. I do think that digital renting, you know, we’ve been doing that with like renting movies, you know, through like Apple TV and stuff like that. I think that that is useful. Because in a lot of ways that utility, right? Like the utility of owning the token that represents that you rented this movie is that you can watch the movie. And once you start the movie, you have 24 hours to finish the movie. I think that that’s really sick and so digital ownership through, digital ownership, I think matters most when utility is applied or used case or experience or whatever, I try not to use the word utility. I like to use the word experience.
Rent-Based NFTs
Okay, let’s talk about more rent based NFTs for the music sector. What do you think are some interesting experiences that can be created around renting NFTs?
Black Dave: I think on the music sense, a lot of its going to be tied to things like access to, I think a lot about seasons. And I know like seasons isn’t normally like a fashion or television thing. But I think a lot about seasons of music, especially as we move or we have moved more into a single driven economy for music and a lot less of an album driven economy for music, especially for independent and smaller artists. You know, every single is a chance at that in a sense. I think being able to be involved in different seasons of artists is really interesting. I know that’s not quite a rental. But if you think about something being seasonal, then it runs out something that’s been on mind a lot, is creating work in seasons and allowing people access to my work for that season. And then if you didn’t participate in that season, then the only thing that exists for you to do is get it on the secondary market. It’s to me a lot like street wear, you know, when supreme drops, and you don’t get the supreme item, you gotta go on stock X or eBay or Grail to get it. And I think this is kind of the same thing, where you have an NFT, the NFT is usable for a period of time, which would be the season, you can collect work from that artists or you receive work from the artist during that season, and then the season ends and all the work that you’ve received during that season. Is that’s just the work. And then you need to get a new token for the next season. I think something similar is like, I wish I could remember the name, when Moon birds does their artists, series drops where like, if you own a moon bird in that time, then you can get the artwork that drops in that time period. And yeah, that’s, I think rental is interesting.
And I think more so, I think NFTs that are consumable might be better, right? Where, you know, with kudos, which I know is another project that I haven’t talked about that I did, with Matt Monday, we made a physical digital NFT and the commonly used case for a physical digital NFT is you get the NFT, you burn the NFT, you receive the item, what we did was you get the NFT, you go through a claim process and the metadata on the NF T changes. And the metadata represents the status of shipping. And if you think about changing metadata to make something consumable, in the same way that you think about like an HP bar, that you could put onto an NFT that becomes consumable if you put it into a game, for instance, then that becomes really interesting used case for NFTs, where something’s not rentable, but it’s consumable. And I don’t quite know, you know, what platform needs to exist to create that or how that could work. But I think thinking about the different ways to consume NFTs. And renting could be time, could be the thing that changes the status of the NFT, just as much as metadata itself.
Creating Experiences Around Drops
I think you do a good job of sort of like really thinking about not utility, but you’d like to use the word experiences. Okay, so let’s continue on that path. So, sort of creating experiences around. Yeah, collecting something and what sort of gets unlocked once you enter the black data ecosystem. How do you get your ideas for sort of creating experiences around your drops? That was one of the questions that somebody asked on Twitter?
Black Dave: For me, it’s funny, because I was reading the questions to my girlfriend the other day, and she was like, how do you, like I read it and she was like, what’s the answer? And I was like, I don’t know. I just think, I guess. And it feels like, I think what happens is, and this is another virtual vibe, you’ll hear me hit a lot of vibes like that reference other people. And I think there are lots of vibes in art, that are the same thing is this. Looking at things that you think are sick, and then trying to execute that with your own version is really important to me. When I think about like fan clubs, and when I think about, especially video games, I think a lot about, I remember explaining NFTs to my mom, and saying, okay, you know what fortnight is? And there’s a skin in fortnight, and what if you could sell that skin to somebody else, but only that the person who owns the, like digital skin could use it in the game. And she was like, oh, okay, I get it. And so like, for me, it’s always been like trying to find different used cases. But really challenging the idea of what an NFT could be. I actually, like, I’ve had a few like, I don’t want to say like confrontations but like conversations, I’ll say, now I feel like, yeah, and about, like the type of work I make and then it’s all anime referential. And they’re like, aren’t you just stealing other people’s ideas? And I’m like, sometimes, but I’m also like, I think that context matters. And especially like, art, right? Like, when you think about art, putting you know, putting a basketball in the middle of a museum versus putting a basketball on the basketball court. They have completely different values. And you would do completely different things to each of those basketballs, even if they’re the exact same ball. And so, I think that is, it’s kind of my energy going into this space is just like, a ton of reference and a ton of ideas, stuff like that.
Snoop Dogg’s NFT Drop
So that’s actually pretty interesting and I think experience can maybe extend beyond unlockable content, right? Or like Token gate, I think the experience can sort of extend into the art itself. And something that you did that was very experience based, was sort of record a song and mint a song with Snoop Dogg, amongst other independent artists on sound, which, that was an iconic drop within itself, hands down. And the fact that you got to participate in that was also even cooler. Can you talk about that entire experience? Because I remember when that came out, we were all just like, yo, like, that’s legit. Like we’re certified like everybody that’s been dumping money on NFTs like Snoop Dogg came in like, and he’s bringing up all these independent artists with him as well to sort of make this track. Like, I just remember it being like a very iconic moment. And you got to be a part of it. Can you talk to me more about that story and share how that came together?
Black Dave: You know, yes. So, what’s crazy about that specific drop was, that was Snoop second drop on sound. His first drop was a mix, and the second drop was a mix. And today, actually, they announced Snoops, third drop on sound, which is actually a free mint, which is crazy. But so, when Snoop dropped the first mix, I heavily critiqued it publicly on Twitter. I, you know, I remember the first song on the first Snoop mix, had Cray Shawn on it, who I love. I’m obsessed with Cray Shawn; I think she’s amazing. And she was on it. And I was looking at it. And I was like, man, like, I don’t know how the splits are working for this. But knowing like Cray Shawn label situation, she had that song Gucci, Gucci that was really popular in like, 2012. She got pregnant, got dropped from the label, but still owes them a ton of money Gucci, Gucci went viral again, and 2021. And she was like, hey, guys, like thank you. But I still owe my label $100,000. So, I get none of that money. And I was thinking about how the blockchain could enable an opportunity for someone like her to be able to get money for her work. And I didn’t see any of the splits on chain. They weren’t really trackable. And then I complained about that. And then I complained about, I won’t say complaint, I had recognized an opportunity with that. And I had also said something about, well, why doesn’t Snoop Dogg add web three artists, like he came into web three, and he’s not going to work with us. And David from sound actually called me and was like, he was like, you make some good points, blah, blah.
And so, when it came time for Snoop to do a second drop, they pretty much threw the idea at him and was like, yo, you should add some web three artists. And, and I was at my girlfriend’s house, it was like, had to be like, midnight, 12:30, I might have been just leaving her house. And Iman calls me and it’s like, yo, Snoop is going to add a few of our songs to the mix. Can you send me a song? And I was like, I’m in my car. I don’t have any of my files. But as soon as I get home, and I sent two songs over. And he picked one, and threw it on the mix. And so like, and then I think what was even better was like, he took the criticism. And then like, did everything I said, right. So, he did the mix, added web three native artists to the mix. It was myself Maroof, Heno, and Iman, and then gave us a percent of the sales. And so, it’s like, you listen to me on like, all fronts. And like, I think from that moment, I had like a really, like, a new respect for Snoop in web three, my previous Snoop experiences weren’t as great. You know, his first drop was with crypto.com. And that drop was a mess. It sold a lot, I think Snoop had made like, like $20 million, or something obnoxious through it. And but what happened was, it was such a mess. The customer service was bad. No one understood the blockchain it was on, et cetera, et cetera. And so, I kinda was like, another rapper coming in and make money and he kept going. And so, when he did that drop on sound, I was like, oh, Snoops, like, really doing this. And I know he was already doing like, I don’t know, is it, I guess he, I don’t know if he was or wasn’t Cosmo, Dima de chi, but like that whole thing. And then like collecting a lot of works and talking about NFTs and stuff like that, and really digging in. The sound drops really like I think was the cherry on top of my respect for Snoop in web three.
Any Collaborations On Your Wish List?
That’s actually crazy, because I remember when that got announced, it was like it was a big moment for the space. And it’s so funny how you like you publicly critique him, despite doing a drop with him. And I think you being so vocal and being so honest on your feelings, and not sort of keeping that in, is sort of what maybe got you or at least kind of contributed to you getting that opportunity. I’m curious as to, is there are there any more collaborations that are going to be happening between you and him or any other, I guess more mainstream type of artists that are going to be coming into web three? And if not, are there any artists that you sort of like have on your maybe like, I guess, like wish list?
Black Dave: I don’t have anything planned. My main focus right now and I do want to work with more big artists and I definitely have like a bucket list. Someone who’s collected NFTs, that I really want to work with is Jaden Smith. He’s collected a couple of sound NFTs, he’s picked up a few other NFTs. So, he’s like in the space, I don’t quite know his wallet address, or I’m tracking him. But I’ve heard people say that he’s collected their stuff before. That’s somebody that I’m super interested in working with. I just think he’s like my favorite rapper in general. But I think Childish Gambino, as well, as somebody that I really want to work with, Donald Glover, he, there was a clip of him talking about like NFTs and he was talking about, like, just the things that blockchain can enable from like, an authentication standpoint, so he understands it from the tech perspective. It’s really tough, I think, to get mainstream artists to enter the space because they have a lot on the line, like they have a lot at stake, when they drop in the space, you know, I think the merge is going to help a lot of people on that front, when we can start to educate people on the enhancements to the environmental impact, that’s through proof of stake.
So, I’m super pumped for that to happen. And artists who fan bases were complaining about the environment saying, hey, look like I think it said, the stat said that in in a one-year period Ethereum will use 126 of what Pay Pal uses. And so, I’m really excited for that to come to be, I do want to work with more large artists, I think, an ultimate cheat code. And I don’t know how many industry people listen to your podcast to like steal ideas, but an industry cheat code is exactly what Snoop Dogg did. Call one of us on the ground in web three, and do a song with us. And let’s put it out. And you will be like it’s the easy stamp. I think for like, a mainstream artist entering web three, and it’s probably a lot less paperwork. So yeah, like, you know, it’s like, and that was my whole thing was Snoop was like, meet us where we are, don’t hover over us, you know, don’t celebrity yourself in. And I think he’s done a really great job of that. And I think any, literally any artist who wants to enter web three, call us, I’ll do a record like, you know, I know a lot of people would do records with a lot of artists that they look up to. So, it’s about finding the artists and then doing collaboration with them. And I think that’s like the perfect way for almost anyone to enter the web three space.
Free NFTs
I completely agree like 1,000%, I think too many mainstream artists overthink it. And I think the best way, like you said to get a stamp of approval, is to sort of lock arms with those who are already doing really well on the space. Because just like web two streaming is a completely different beast. The same thing applies to web three music, right? Like, there’s people who are doing really well in web three music that might not see the light of day, and like across streaming platforms, for example, right. But they built this like brand, they built this virality, they built a collector base. And they’ve generated like hundreds of 1000s of primary and secondary sales combined, that someone new entering the space, that maybe has clout in the streaming side of things, might need to sort of latch on to kind of fit in with the quote unquote, cool kids of the web three music scene. Right. And I think you’re absolutely right. And we have yet to see another mainstream artist’s sort of latch on to that strategy. I think mainly because there’s ego involved. There’s pride involved. But I guess what people don’t understand that in crypto, it’s like a level playing field. Like, there are no rules like everybody’s new here, right? And if you bring your cloud and you try to use your cloud, it will only get you so far in the traditional world, if you try to apply it in crypto, right and at some point, like authenticity is going to kind of like prevail and people are gonna see like whether you’re here for like the short term or the long term, despite what happened with crypto.com And in your opinion around that like Snoop continuously showed up over and over and over again right and came through with consistency and even now, introduced his third drop and he’s probably as mainstream as it can come right and now, he’s a legend Yacht Club. And the whole Yeah, he killed it. He killed it and he continues to kill it. He continues to reinvent himself which is really, really impressive to see. Especially as you kind of like join more and more industries, whether it be from like brand deals to acting to now, crypto to music to all these different sectors. Yeah, we can go all day. I want to talk to you about free NFTs because you brought that up during Snoops drop. And I think it’s a great segue. Because you sort of experimented with your NFTs. It’s something that I’m very vocal about. I’ve written a lot about; I’ve been talking a lot about on the podcast. I’d love to get your perspective because I know you did a free NFT drop. You were the first artist, if I recall correctly, to do a free NFT drop on sound that XYZ, it did really well. And the secondaries are actually like, really, really popping and even like generated maybe like, I don’t know, if more, more value than they would have in the primary sale. But yeah, I’ll just shut up. What are your thoughts on free NFTs? Talk to me about that first drop that you did? And we can just start there?
Black Dave: Yeah, so the free mint meta had just started. And David of sound does a really good job of like, hitting me up and asking me about like trends in the space. I remember, at the time, he was like, what do you think about them? He was like, I think he could work for music. And I was like, I’m interested to see because, you know, you lose out on the primary. And I think one of my actual complaints about music NFTs, and especially music NFT pricing is that we price at the max that people are willing to pay. And that kind of flattens the music secondary market. So, if you think about like, the secondary market of music outside of sound, there isn’t one, right. But the secondary market of art, there is and I think that artists aren’t pricing at the very edge of what people are willing to pay for something and that’s why. And so, you know, I was just like, okay, let’s try it. I was like, I got a song. Let’s try it. Like that was literally the conversation. And, and I was fine being the guinea pig. And as I thought about it more and more, I thought, okay, cool. This is an opportunity for community to happen. This is an opportunity for people who couldn’t get in, especially on sound because of price. Because that was still when NFTs were all point one Ethereum on sound, then they have an opportunity here. I think it went super well, one special story about that drop in specific is, the person who won the golden egg, he was in NFTs for about two months, he won my golden egg and sold the golden egg point7.
So, he got it for free, sold it .75. Shout out to Cooper. And that point 75 Ethereum was the money for him to fly from Germany to NFT NYC. I think it was his first time in America. He met me at the wave world event. And he was like, it was crazy. He met me at wave road. And he was like, dude, you’re the whole reason I’m here. And I was like, oh, dude, I’m pumped. You came to see me, you know, like, oh, I didn’t, you know, I didn’t realize that. That’s what happened. And he was like, yeah, I sold your NFT that I had. And I was like, dude, I’m super pumped that you’re able to make money from my work. And, and he was like, yeah, and so I’m here and I was like, well, you can’t see me since you sold my NFT. So, I got him and all his friends NFTs. And they saw my wave world set. And I didn’t realize until like right before my set that he sold it to fly to America. And so like, that story sits with me forever. It’s definitely one of my like top web three stories. One of the greatest things that this happened to me like as an artist in general, and so like, that made me believe in free mints. Because what happened was someone who didn’t have the point one Eth to buy my NFT. Got to create this really special experience, not only for him, but for me, like utility aside, like, this is a truly special experience that two real people experience together. I even said like one thing that’s funny about me is like I’ve never smoked weed in my life. I’ve long dreadlocks, everyone thinks they smoke weed, but I’ve never smoked in my life. And I told him I was like, look, if I ever go on tour in Germany, I’ll come smoke weed with you. And he’s like, super pumped and like, I’ll probably end up smoking. Because like, he’ll remember. It’s like, I’ll be like, okay, like, this is my first time, so just laugh at me. I guess so. Yeah.
That’s hilarious. And it’s not if you toured Germany, it’s when you tour Germany, I’m a big believer in manifesting things into reality. I think like you sort of nailed it, like, the whole point of my opinion. Okay. Maybe a hot take. But I think the whole point or at least a big part of sort of having these mechanics and being like, being open to kind of like publicly selling your work and having secondary markets is so that collectors who support you, can have the opportunity to make a buck, right, and make some type of financial sort of yeah, I guess like, profit and benefit that extends beyond just kind of enjoying you as a collector, or as a creator, excuse me. Now I know people have controversial opinions and like maybe some platform founders don’t even want there to be secondary volume around music NFTs because their whole bed is like this thing is designed to kind of reconnect fans and bring them closer together and sort of like bridge the gap of, of your biggest, most passionate listeners. But I think a lot of the fun comes when you’re able to share and have experiences like that. And your fans are able to sort of like profit, right and gain value beyond just like the music that they enjoy from you specifically, right? So, I think you nailed the head, like, like being very cognizant of how you price your things, and allowing the secondary market to kick in, and it’s sort of like consume some of that value as well. And enjoy that value will just like play, like so much in your benefit, right, long term. So, I love your perspective on that. And I couldn’t agree agree more.
Black Dave: I appreciate it, you know, to that effect, I dropped into NFT that is an open edition, that’s available until the end of the year. And the price is point 01 Ethereum. And the idea is that, of course, I’ll deliver some sort of experience down the line. But anyone who wants to get in, can get in and price is not the thing that restricts you, you know, it’s mostly just your ability to get Ethereum and get on the blockchain, I think, you know, people are so caught up in making money, that they aren’t caught up in making communities. And what’s happening is people are saying they’re creating community, but they’re just creating customers. And I really want to find more and more ways to create communities. Because I think at the end of the day, those are going to be the people and the experiences that we have together individually through my work, are going to be the things that keep me around and keep me alive and keep me paid forever. But also keep them satisfied. Like here’s something that I always talk about is like, you know, a ticket to a concert could be 100 bucks. But people when they go to the concert, they don’t want to try to resell the ticket, you know, they got 100 bucks worth of experience. And I think as long as you’re delivering an experience that’s worth, whatever the person paid for the thing, they’re not even going to have a desire to resell it.
It’s like keeping a ticket stub from a movie, right? Like, if you know, if I think about the first date, I had was my girlfriend, another Virgil Abloh reference, I went to go see figures or speech in Atlanta. And keeping the ticket from that has value to me, I got the money out of it, whether it’s through the day with my girlfriend or through seeing the work. And so, I really don’t want to sell the ticket because the value, I already captured the value but having the thing like continues to hold that value for me, no matter how much other people want for it. And I think it’s going to be the same thing with music, where if you have this token, you’re able to get the experience, you’re going to want to keep it as a as a memory of that experience. But I think that music NFTs especially, and I noticed this in the music NFT but especially popups, I believe popups are going to be the tour t shirt of NFTs, like in the in the music use case. Because if I’m only making popups at my shows, then you have the shirt that only has the date of that show, theoretically, and it’s tradable. And it never deteriorates in quality. And it has you know, it can possibly have its own utility that comes with having it, I used to always make this comment about like if Travis Scott’s AstroWorld tour, if every date had its own popups, but then you had to have seven popups in order to get a limited-edition t shirt, then what happens is the popup has a secondary value. And it was the NFT that you got for free just by being there. And I don’t think that it has to be like that. But I think that it’s really cool. And there gonna be people who want, who are going to say, I don’t want to get rid of my poll app, because I want other people to know that I was at the concert, and they’re going to people that are gonna say, I don’t care if other people know that I’m at the concert, I want the money. And I think both options are fine. And just thinking about, continuing to think about experience, delivering experiences is the real thing. And in trying to figure that out at a price point, that allows your common fans to be involved and allows people who are willing to spend a bunch of money to be involved, is worth it as well.
You know, I, it makes me so happy to hear how you sort of talk about your strategy and how you use sort of like create your own mental models and understanding like different ways to create values or value in general for your collectors and kind of recognizing that there is a market for both while, I think it may scare a lot of creators, right that sort of enter web three. They see the secondary market and they maybe feel pressured that they need to have like high primary and secondary sales to be seen as a success. While partially true, right? You’re just like, you’re just so open, I can tell it like, you’re just like, you’re like, have a bucket mentality. You know, like, if something sounds like something sounds cool to explore, maybe worth experimenting, like, you’ll double down, you’ll give it a shot. And you’ll see what happens, right. And I think that that energy, that mentality will obviously take you a long way. Another thing that’s really cool that you brought up earlier, is having something for anybody to collect. At any point in time, you have an NFT, whose timestamp kind of like expires at the end of the year. And for whatever reason, in case you go viral, right, or you have a spur of Twitter followers, or we have a new type, you have a new level of engagement, a song goes viral, whatever it may be, you will have some type of collectible to capture value. The second you are kind of like, hit that mark, like you’re ready, like you’re here loaded, you lock, you’re locked and loaded. And I love that. And you’re the first person that I’ve sort of seen approach that and think that far in advance. And I really appreciate that. I commend you on that. That’s really cool.
Black Dave: Thank you. I agree. I think that’s the goal is, like, I always want people to have some sort of access. I think scarcity matters. But I think openness matters, right? Like, we don’t need to hide songs from people. But I also think that a song that only one person can hear, is cool. For me, I want to make sure that people who are getting involved or people who want to get involved have an opportunity. The scarcity of assets model that we’ve been running on, is great, but it’s not sustainable for something that needs to play Madison Square Garden, for something that needs to perform at Coachella, you know, like, I need as many people as possible there. If I want to be on the stage at Coachella, I don’t want to say like, you know, only if you hold insert NFT, can you show up to my set, because then I’m limiting myself. And I just really want to be as open as possible. And like, you know, I talked earlier about seasonal NFTs, when this time period runs out. That’s it, you know, my goal for this drop is 100, I’m at about 55, 60. Right now, my goal is 100. If I get to 100, by the end of the year, I’ll be happy. And what happens is those 100 people, when next season’s drop happens, and I have a fan base, or collector base of 1000 or 500 or 200 or 300, people are going to want to have that previous season because you better believe, I’m going to say if you have season one and season two, you get something because I think like you’re able to play this game of thank you for supporting me early. Or if you want to look like you support me early, you got to pay and then offering experiences those people the same way that I was able to with the free mint, the same way that I was able to with the special edition cover of my second music NFT, the same way that I’ll be able to do with, you know, sharp whenever that song goes crazy. I just want to like people who support me early, they’re always going to be the biggest winner. So, I think, you know, crypto rewards you being early. And I want myself to be a reflection of that.
The Balance Between Documenting Processes and Creating Music
Yeah, I think another way you sort of build community is through content. And you’re very active when it comes to writing mirror posts. And like blog posts, just sharing your thoughts and also like tweet threads that you sort of compose every so often. Which is not something to sort of take for granted because I think a lot of creators lack the ability to sort of document their process, as they’re experimenting, as they’re creating. Right? Can you walk me through how you find the balance between documenting your process and sharing your thoughts versus like creating music, dropping NFTs in sort of like yeah, thinking about the whole, I guess monetization side of using these crypto primitives as a creator.
Black Dave: Something that Gary Vee once said, he says that a lot. Because he says everything, he says a lot. That’s what he does. But like, he says, I can tell you everything that I do every day and 95% of you aren’t going to do it. So why not share it right? If there’s a benefit for me being giving of my information and my knowledge. Why not? Most of you aren’t going to use it anyway. And I’m not competing with you anyway, right? The only person that I’m really competing with this myself, I say that right now, but I literally compare myself to people all the time. But I’m like, that’s the whole idea behind it. I think. You know, I’ve given away enough ideas in Twitter spaces, in clubhouse rooms, in threads on podcasts, et cetera, et cetera. That could probably build people really profitable businesses, which I’m cool with. Because I know that I can keep coming up with ideas, and I can keep doing things. And there’s always new information to be gotten. And I just want to be like a beacon of that information. And then I think, on top of that, something that I’ve learned about, you know, web three and NFTs, I’m trying to stop saying space, the space. I haven’t figured out a proper word yet. But something I’ve learned about being in this in this world is like, people resonate with, like, you being for real, and you’re not trying to sell me on stuff. And so, me just coming in and saying, hey, I’m Dave, these are the things that I’m doing. These are the hardships I’m facing. These are the positives I’m having. This is what I’m thinking about. This is how I’m thinking about, I tweeted earlier, before this space, before this space, before this podcast. I said, you know, reminder, genius isn’t what you know, but it’s how you think about things. It’s how you think through things.
And I really think that that’s the thing, and I like, I almost turned that into a thread because like, I always make this joke to my friends that I’m a genius. And then I took the test to be a genius. And when I was in, like elementary school, especially, I had moved a bunch of times, but I was always in like those special student programs. And all of those tests that you take, have nothing to do with knowledge, right? They hand you a bunch of shapes, and say build this thing. They show you something and say, move this from here to here, following these rules, do this do that, if I have this, how do I get to that? And taking that test, and then being like, oh, you know, Dave’s mom, I think your son’s a genius, like, made me realize that genius isn’t what you know, genius is how you think. And if I can share that with other people, and hopefully inspire genius within them, knowing that genius isn’t what you know, but it’s how you think, then that’s really sick. And one of my biggest goals as an individual and as a creative, is to inspire other people. So, like, if someone ever comes to me and says, like, Dave, you inspired me, like that’s the day I can go to sleep like right then. So yeah.
Would you would you consider yourself a genius?
Black Dave: I like to say I am. But I try not to say I am like with a serious tone. So, like, my friends, like you guys know I’m a genius. I took the test. But I didn’t take the test, I really took the test. So, I don’t know if genius is the right thing. I definitely, I have an appreciation for how I think about things. And I think that the way that I think about things, is going to allow me to create great things and be remembered as a great person. I’m like, another like, blockchain thing is like legacy. And I think that, like what I’ll leave to the world, even if it is just through art is going to be really, really important. In the same way that I think what Virgil Abloh left behind, in terms of what inspires me, is really important.
How Do You Build a Legacy On Chain?
How do you think you build legacy on chain? So, in the reason I emphasize on chain is because we are so consumed in crypto culture, but there’s going to be a wave and a generation of users that sort of haven’t experienced the moments in a time that we’re sort of living through, right. But there still needs to be a way to sort of like prove provenance, right? History, legacy, etc. How would you measure legacy on chain? What does that look like, exactly?
Black Dave: Something, another tweet, Dave tweets, this episode of Dave’s tweets, like, I tweeted, a lot of people, so I guess for context, mint songs, the platform is going through its sort of shutdown phase, and they closed their minting. And they’re just no shutting down. They migrate all their NFTs, et cetera, et cetera. I said people who migrated their NFTs off of mint songs have ruined the provenance of the NFT and have such ruin the value because there’s no longer proof that you minted on a defunct platform. I think what’s going to happen and a lot of artists, I think, in response to this tweet, a lot of artists don’t understand what provenance is right? They don’t understand that the trail of who collected, who held for how long and when, really matters. I think one way that I was explaining it to someone is that the Ultra Rich, they buy art as a status symbol, as a flex, the same way that We buy NFTs, right? People want to own art because of Rockefeller previously owned that art. People want to own art because an institution previously owned that art. There’s something to be said about the impact of who owned something, for how long, how much they paid for it, and how much you paid for it. And I think that, in the long term, especially as the chain becomes easier to read and easier to translate, they’re going to be a lot of people who are going to be able to quickly look at something and be like, hey, did you see that, Dave sold this NFT, as a fraction of 42 people in this was that song. And then they sold it after the song blew up. And that story is the legacy or people will say, did you know that that person got it for free, and that person is now this person. And when they sell it, it’s going to be worth money or because it’s an addition piece, then everyone who owns that automatically has an inherent increased value, because the cool person also owns that, it’s kind of like when celebrities wear a certain clothing brand, and that clothing brand pops off. I think, you know, when you look at the long-term history of that brand.
I think here’s a great example, black scale the clothing brand. When mega the guy who founded black scale talks about the brand, he says there’s pre-ASAP Rocky in this post ASAP Rocky, and he uses that as a reference point for the brand. And so, the legacy of black scale has ASAP Rocky included, the legacy of ASAP Rocky has black scale included. And they both are like huge pivot points. And really important. And I think that ASAP Rocky’s involvement in black scale, will always contribute to the value of black scale. And then if you’re in street wear first, then the value of ASAP Rocky will always be valuable because he was involved with black scale, something that you place a lot of value in. So, I think Providence is the thing that we won’t think anything about for a long, long time. Because it doesn’t actually matter for a long, long time. We do it in small amounts, right? Like when prank C bought 1200 board apes, which I think was the actual catalyst to board API clips selling out. Like when he bought 1200 apes, there are what we call prank C apes out there. And so, owning an ape that prank C owned has a value to it, whether that’s why you positive or negative, it has a value to it, and prank C legacy is going to be tied to 1200 apes and the legacy of born ape Yacht Club is always going to be tied to prank C, if you believe the theory that I believe that prank C buying, you know, one 1/8 of the supply of board API club, is what pushed them to sell out in the last few days. Yeah, so provenance matters, people just don’t see it yet.
New Things On Your Radar
Wow. That’s really well put. That’s really, really well put, I haven’t thought about that. I guess, when I, sometimes when I collect stuff, I sort of look at who else bought it. But I’ve never went back in time to kind of further analyze and peel through the layers of seeing who has bought this from the gecko. Right? Like I’ve never, when I collected something, I never sort of thought like, this is a blockchain Brett NFT or this is a cooper music NFT right. Assuming these guys never sell their music NFTs but it actually makes a lot of sense. What you kind of use the analogies comparing it to, the fashion brand and ASAP Rocky, and how they sort of uplift each other’s legacies, as they kind of evolve over time. I think that’s a really, really interesting perspective. I’m curious, before we sort of wrap up like because I feel like we’ve been going like for about like, what, like, an hour in 15 minutes. Now, I think it might be the longest, one of the longest episodes of the season. So what other things are on your radar right now, that you think people should be sort of like paying more attention to, that you’re maybe thinking about, that you haven’t maybe talked about publicly yet? Fill me in on that.
Black Dave: Most immediately on the front of my mind, is enhancing what service base NFTs look like. I’m soon going to be coming out with a platform slash idea that’s specific to me. So, it’s not quite a platform. It’s a platform for me, but I’m thinking about trying to build it maybe as a platform that other people can use called minutes, where you mint NFTs that allow you a certain amount of minutes with someone, whether that’s minutes in consultation, whether that’s minutes in you playing your music for someone, whether that’s minutes in advisement, or anything and you’ll mint an NFT that then granted you token gated access, to schedule meetings on my calendar. That’s something that’s like front of mind for me, because I’m literally building it. I hope to announce it in the next week or so. But consider this the announcement. And so, I am going to be doing that soon. That’s really important.
Let’s go. We got we got Black Dave’s product launch on mint. I love it. All right, yeah.
Black Dave: So, that’s like, that’s really front of mind for me is, how do we continue to enhance the service economy of NFTs. Second to that, something that I have seen. And I think these are the only people doing it, E commerce completely run through smart contracts. The Quantum tech team, they created something called rug supply, it’s rug dot supply, where if you have one of a bunch of different NFT projects, you can get a rug of your NFT. And you pay for it in USDC, you get a soul bound token, that is your receipt and the soul bound token updates with like shipping confirmation, you can actually take a picture of your rug when you get it and put it on the corner of the receipt, which is a soul bound token. I think that that’s really, really cool. I think like, you know, blockchain, and this is what Donald Glover was saying, blockchain is proof of receipt is gonna help with fraud detection. You know, and I think in the same way that you think about Digi mint this from that smart contract, or that smart contract, is the same thing. And so, I think that’s really important. Enhancing the physical to digital experience. I think it’s going to be really important as well, I think burn to claim, should find a way to exit existence. And then I think, lastly, looking at gaming and NFTs, I think a lot, I have a couple of game ideas that I want to try to put into the ether and, and play with.
And then I have one more, curation, I’ve been thinking a lot about curation. Just like for everybody listening, hopefully, in sort of three methods, the idea of curation from like a centralized stance where like, platforms let artists in, and if the platform has that artists are then that sort of like, their sign like that, like we rock with them, thinking about community based, like fully, like community-based curation, where like, I really want to build a platform, where, and I’ve been DMing people about this, but I’m just gonna put it out there. And if someone builds it great, where you can put an NFT up, and then people can rate that NFT and comment on that NFT, whether it’s a song, whether it’s an artwork, whether it’s a collection, whether it’s like let’s say, for instance, you know, as a key, for instance, like if someone could go to the ASCII collection and rate it, and then leave comments on what they think about it, kind of like, like Amazon reviews, but then people can go to specific ASCII NFTs and say, this one has three out of four the same traits as that one.
So, one star, you know, or this one has, this is the only one that has a red shirt, and this hairstyle, five stars, or whatever. I think that that could be really interesting way of curation. Even along the lines of music. This is Dave’s best song, five stars. I think Dave has better songs in this, two stars. I think Dave shouldn’t have used this word. I think the production is great, but the lyrics are weak. I think that that’s going to be a really big thing that allows the mass influencers, to lose power, I think decentralization has an opportunity to give power to people, to individuals. And if individuals can use a tool to empower themselves in mass, then I think that’s really going to change the face of the space. It makes you wonder if your favorite NFT artist is your favorite NFT artist because of the work or because of what an influencer said about it. And if the influencer is the only person who feels that way about it, then you can realize that you’re being gamed by an influencer and have a different feeling on the work or at least approach it from your own individual perspective.
And so, I really want to create some sort of platform that empowers individuals in their opinions and hopefully like we get, you know, true critics right, like real art critic show up and say, you know, I study 3d artwork. I studied generative artwork, and I believe this and then you can go to their profile and see all the generative artwork they’ve reviewed, and really have like people who are becoming influential because of their tastes, because tastes matter so much, another virtual Kanye, like Pat, I think tastes is so important. So those, all of those things are front of mind and then just empowering and enhancing the community for koodos. KOODOS, which is an NFT that I dropped with Matt Monday, that dropped the same week as headless chaos, so it didn’t sell well, but we’re still pushing forward and trying to get that out as far as possible.
Outro
You have really quality ideas. And I’m getting incredibly stimulated just listening to you sort of like think through these problems, and how you could sort of solve them. I’m so upset I haven’t had you on the podcast earlier. I’m really happy we did this episode. We’re gonna have to run it again very soon. But before I let you go Black Dave, where can we find you? Where can we learn more? Where can we stay up to date? Show it away.
Black Dave: I’m at Black Dave on Twitter. I am Black Dave, Black Dave on Instagram. And also, on Tik Tok, I promise I’m going to start using Tik Tok, everyone’s yelling at me. You can head to Black Dave dot XYZ, to check me out, especially on the web three side and then also Black Dave Black Dave.com, to check out some of my music and then I’ll be posting also a lot of my other work because I am a multi-disciplined, creative person. And so, I’ll be showing more of my photo work, more of my video work, more graphic design, etc., etc. So, feel free to follow me on Twitter. I am most active there.
Amazing. Thanks again. We’ll have to do this again soon. But till next time.
Black Dave: Thank you, man.
