Avery Akkineni on VaynerNFT’s Big VeeFriends News and the State of the Metaverse (Episode 278)
Avery Akkineni join us to discuss on VaynerNFT’s Big VeeFriends News and the State of the Metaverse.
On this episode, we sit down with Avery Akkineni from VaynerNFT to discuss the recent partnership between VeeFriends & Johnnie Walker, the developments at Coinbase NFT, and her take on the current state of the Metaverse. Settle in and get ready for a great show, because this episode is filled to the brim with great insights and plenty of Alpha!
Avery Akkineni serves as the President of VaynerNFT. She leads the company’s mission to build long-term strategic NFT projects for the world’s leading intellectual property owners serving brands, celebrities, athletes, and associations looking to incentivize and reward brand advocacy and customer loyalty. Avery previously led VaynerMedia’s expansion into APAC, growing a team from 0-150+, opening offices in Singapore, Bangkok, Tokyo, and Sydney, and was awarded SEA Independent Agency of the Year within years. Before joining Vayner, she worked at Google in both Silicon Valley and New York City. Avery will drive meaningful cultural relevance for others to unlock the potential of one of the technology shifts of our time.
To Connect with Avery & Stay Updated on VaynerNFT:
Follow Avery on Twitter: https://twitter.com/avery_akkineni
Follow VaynerNFT on Twitter: https://twitter.com/vaynernft
Learn More About VaynerNFT: https://vaynernft.co/
Want more resources around this podcast? Keep up to date on the latest articles here.
The following transcript was created using artificial intelligence. There will be some grammatical errors below.
00:01:12:15 – 00:01:28:22
Steven Miller: All right. What’s going on, everybody? For cryptocurrency. I’m Steven Miller and you’re watching the latest in our interview series where we introduce you and connect you to the thought leaders and builders who are shaping web3. Today I’m joined by Avery Akkineni. She is the president of Boner NFT. Avery, how are we doing?
00:01:29:09 – 00:01:31:24
Avery Akkineni: I am doing great. Thank you so much for having me here today, Steve.
00:01:32:07 – 00:01:57:00
Steven Miller: I’m absolutely thrilled to have you with us today. We’ve got an exciting show ahead. So for those that are new to the show, please do us a major favor. Make sure you’re following us wherever you get your favorite podcast. We released this video on YouTube as well, so make sure you subscribe. But after that little call to action, I want to jump right into things. So Avery, for those that are not super familiar with you and your work, can you tell me a little bit about yourself and how you originally got into Web3?
00:01:57:23 – 00:02:30:00
Avery Akkineni: Absolutely. I’m about community and originally from Nashville, Tennessee, currently based in Miami, Florida. And my journey has taken me from Nashville, San Diego, Silicon Valley and San Francisco, where I work to Google. New York City, where I first started working with Vagner to Singapore, where I opened up the VaynerMedia offices across the region and then back to the US. I’ve been living in Miami for almost a year and we have been building our NFT as a web3 consultancy focused on helping IP owners over the last year.
00:02:30:19 – 00:03:21:00
Avery Akkineni: So I began my journey into Web three several years ago. I sort of passively invested in crypto thanks to a friend of mine, and I really didn’t think about it for for many years. Obviously I saw the price like tank and I think it’s in 2013 and just kind of left it there. I literally forgot my Coinbase password. Then about mid 2020 something was happening. I was like, What’s going on with that Coinbase account? And got back in, realized things had really changed since I last looked into it and I started getting really interested in the world of NFT and in early 2021 I decided to shift my focus to being exclusively in the web3 sector, learning a lot with all of the folks on the beta team about all things NFT OG Crypto Web3 decentralization.
00:03:21:09 – 00:03:41:21
Avery Akkineni: And it really clicked in my mind this idea of digital ownership changing the way we think about internet usage. And we are going to be introduced in July officially, and it’s been a total pleasure to be in the thick of all things NFT and Web3 ever since then. From a professional focus standpoint.
00:03:42:19 – 00:04:12:15
Steven Miller: It’s awesome and I think that ends up being a really fantastic journey into where you are today. And I want everybody to kind of have a better idea of where you are today. And that of course is Adventure NFT. So as kind of a quick catch up and a little pitch for everybody, Boner NFT was created to help the world’s leading IP owners navigate the rapidly developing world of Nfts. But can you kind of elaborate on that for us a little bit and how you serve your clients broadly? So like how might you pitch banner NFT to a potential customer?
00:04:13:02 – 00:04:56:06
Avery Akkineni: Yeah. So the way I would explain banner NFT to a potential partner is first by helping them understand what’s happening in the world of Web3. If you’re a traditional institution, if you’re a celebrity, if you’re a sports association, if you’re a brand, you might have heard about it. But so many of them really don’t get it. So the beginning of our conversations really start with education. Hey, this is what’s happening in this world of Web three. You might know NFT was the word of the year in 2021, but you know what that actually means. And you know why people are actually interested in this stuff. And we almost try to like reverse psychology now by helping onboard people as people first into this, helping them get their first NFT, helping them understand what’s happening in this web3 culture on crypto, twitter and discord.
00:04:56:16 – 00:05:32:22
Avery Akkineni: And then once they understand it themselves, it really sells itself that this is a tremendous opportunity that they need to be a part of. So we try to do a lot of individual onboarding as a mechanism to help sort of parlay into our business from an institutional standpoint. So we start by education and then that light bulb goes off just like it did for me with other executives, with other entrepreneurs, with other celebrities and people of influence who are like, Okay, I understand now that this is a big thing. How can I be a part of it? And then we say, Oh, okay, this is all the ways that we can can help you and your organization navigate this new world.
00:05:33:22 – 00:06:07:24
Steven Miller: That’s awesome. Yeah, I think the more companies need to be starting with education, and that’s one of the things that we pride ourselves on here at cryptocurrencies. We’re really focused on the educational side of things first and then helping people find their way down each of these little rabbit holes. So I love that you start with that in discovery in terms of helping your clients figure that out. But I guess on the personal side of things, before we dive into a little bit more of the news around being NFT, what as it is today, again, because you’ve already kind of told me a little bit about how Nfts started for you, but what about Nfts drives you today? Just at the marketplace level.
00:06:08:29 – 00:06:39:26
Avery Akkineni: Every single day that I’m in the space, I’m more and more convicted that this is the future of how people are going to use the Internet and people are going to express themselves digitally. So I’m lucky that I’ve continued to get more and more bought into this and bought into what we’re building and doing. And I think it comes through in the way that we communicate with partners, the way that we communicate about our own projects. What excites me is that we’re at the very, very early stages of this journey. Things today are such a convoluted and long process to even buy an NFT and so many cases.
00:06:40:04 – 00:07:12:07
Avery Akkineni: There are so many scams and broad polls and just various things, and some people can be very disheartened or turned off by that. But to me it just is an illustration of how incredibly early we are and how fortunate we are to be part of this sort of initial building period. And it excites me that there’s so much more goal. I think about where we are today is like, you know, very much that like the iPhone adopter where like you found but it wasn’t even really better than a BlackBerry, but you knew it could be potential for it to dramatically change.
00:07:12:09 – 00:07:52:17
Avery Akkineni: Maybe all your friends were still on BBM and you had them text and they were like, Oh, you don’t even have BBM. We were like, No, but this is going to change the game. And now I’m holding my hands. Like, this is like the iPhone is dramatically changed. The way users access information, how they communicate is one single device has put a computer in the pocket of billions of people. And I think and it’s weird that same stage where it’s really it’s almost not better than the sort of web two alternative but the people who see the potential, see how decentralization and how some sort of individual user sovereignty and individual user ownership is a major shift.
00:07:52:19 – 00:08:02:00
Avery Akkineni: And those people are looking to recruit their their communities to get on board. And I’m just excited for everything that we have the potential to build and and fulfill and where I think this thing is going to go.
00:08:03:00 – 00:08:38:03
Avery Akkineni: You know, it’s fantastic. I mean, really, the. The idea that there’s so much in front of us we then have to use is something that has excited me over the past year and a half that I’ve been in it myself. I mean, I fancy myself as something of an NFT nerd. I think I’m one on our team that is most NFT invested at this point. So getting the chance to hear from somebody who was extremely passionate about it and how they see the future of it certainly excites me. So for everybody at home, it’s kind of curious about what Boner NFT is doing out in the world, because I think that a lot of people hear Varner NFT and they immediately think be friends.
00:08:38:11 – 00:08:49:14
Avery Akkineni: Right? It’s kind of an immediate connection. So what news is going on with EA friends and boner NFT right now? Because I think that you guys had a pretty big announcement just recently, right?
00:08:50:05 – 00:09:27:03
Avery Akkineni: Yeah. So one little clarification, my friends, is actually its own now. It’s it’s own complete company led by indie critics so vagner and it’s he’s still part of the interactive ecosystem and we are really Web3 consultants be friends is one specific project that obviously we collaborate on on time. Z Friends just announced their series too. This is a pretty long 55,000 pieces that are going to a combination of holders who are able to claim one for free, book game holders who are entered into a raffle to be able to one a public raffle, which actually just concluded yesterday and this sort of spectacular auction.
00:09:27:05 – 00:09:51:02
Avery Akkineni: So it’s a complicated system, but all 55,000 are allocated and it’s been going really, really well. Incredible feedback from the community, from new holders who are getting to be a part of the friends world. And we’re really happy with that invention of T and we specialize in sort of helping institutions navigate their web3 journey. So whether that are companies like Ford or Coinbase or Budweiser
00:09:52:17 – 00:10:06:24
Avery Akkineni: or American Eagle, there are so many of our different partners. We really focus on helping those partners navigate this world of web3 while of course getting a ton of cross-pollination of learnings from the Be Friends team and helping them with things like Bitcoin and some of their collaborations.
00:10:07:20 – 00:10:20:24
Steven Miller: You. So essentially when you see that crossover happening, you’re helping them on the collaboration side. And I believe just the other day, based on what I’m hearing, the news US have a pretty big announcement with Johnnie Walker, isn’t that right?
00:10:21:14 – 00:10:55:00
Avery Akkineni: Exactly. So one of Gary’s big ambitions is to take the be friends characters and start to cross them over into mainstream society. So real products, real entertainment platforms that exist outside of the world of Web three. And on May 3rd, we actually debuted this new collaboration, which is a gift to our gift holders. Each gift card holder received this incredible NFT, which is designed by this artist called D.K. MacShane, who is famous for his Let’s Walk series and just does this fantastic animation.
00:10:55:08 – 00:11:28:05
Avery Akkineni: So when Johnnie Walker came to veteran of T and said, Hey, we really want to do something in the NFT space, we said, let’s think about the right authentic entry point for you. And Johnnie Walker is, I don’t know if you’ve ever received this as a gift, but it’s actually very often given as a gift, things like Father’s Day, birthdays, etc., etc.. And they were a big gifting culture. We said we actually have this part of the friends, which is called the gift go program and gift card holders. There are 555 of them are entitled to a certain number of gifts every year from curate.
00:11:28:11 – 00:11:58:21
Avery Akkineni: What about if we gave these gift card holders an NFT and an actual specific customized box of Johnnie Walker, which includes a couple of amazing things like coasters, glassware, a custom bottle, custom sort of box, really awesome. So this whole package is going to be on display at Bitcoin ship down to all the holders and they’ll be airdropped this pretty amazing piece of art which sort of nods to both gift go and Johnnie Walker.
00:11:58:23 – 00:12:13:02
Avery Akkineni: But it’s actually a piece of art designed by GK Motion, so it’s a pretty fun collaboration, a great way for a brand to enter this NFT space super authentically in a way that surprises and delights holders begin to build their equity in the world of three.
00:12:13:22 – 00:12:50:07
Steven Miller: As suffice to say, the entire drop itself is something that’s mind blowing. I mean, we like to say within the NFT space, a lot of the time that we get wrapped up in utility and how we can wrap value back into collections. I’m not trying to just blow smoke here or kind of, you know, pump up what you guys are doing, a vain or empty and be friends. But this may actually be one of the biggest value ads and givebacks I’ve ever heard of. Because for those that are not totally familiar is one of the biggest motion graphic artists in the space. And his art is sought after so much that people like Cosmo de Medici drop over $1,000,000 to get his one on ones.
00:12:50:23 – 00:13:23:00
Steven Miller: So that is something that can be easily overlooked in this news. But the fact that that entire thing is wrapped into this, Johnnie Walker V Friends partnership is truly something remarkable. So I can’t tell you how much that kind of impresses me. And I think the impact of that is going to be felt around the space. Right. I think you could probably get the idea that this is going to set a new precedent for like the ripple effects of what utility can mean and what giving back to community can be. Do you think big? We’re going to see a lot more of the standard being raised in that department as we go forward with the NFTS.
00:13:25:22 – 00:13:57:02
Steven Miller: Hey, everyone. Just wanted to let you know about all the amazing content that we’re making for you exclusively over on YouTube. You can stay connected to Crypto’s. Top stories and trending topics with the aftershock every Wednesday, join cryptocurrency, Steve Miller and myself for a brand new discussion on what’s going on in the wild world of Web3. If you want to learn more about cryptocurrency and blockchain but don’t know where to start crypto decrypt it will cover everything from basics and fundamental analysis to the advanced concepts of technical analysis. Join Chris Kay every Thursday exclusively on YouTube to get this content.
00:13:57:10 – 00:14:23:14
Steven Miller: Finally, if you want to take a deeper dive into the world of Nfts and learn more about all the latest and greatest what’s happening in that space while capturing Alpha, join Stephen on NFT Thurs exclusively on Twitter spaces on Thursdays at 6 p.m. Central Standard Time. We hope you’re enjoying our content and if you’re enjoying it, please like subscribe, share and leave comments so that we can continue to give you the content to keep you cryptocurrency.
00:14:24:17 – 00:14:59:26
Avery Akkineni: Absolutely. I think that the standard gets raised every day, whether it is airdrops or land drops or claims or token drops or really smart collaborations that really look to do one plus one equals 11. I think that’s where this space is pushing. I love right now how people are constantly looking to get server every single time. And you know what, banner? We try to do the same thing. We try to always outdo ourselves. Every single drop we take a learning of like, great. This is one thing we would change if we had the opportunity to do it over again. And the good news that we often have the chance to to repeat and sharpen up our our delivery.
00:15:00:15 – 00:15:31:29
Avery Akkineni: So I’m really proud of this decay motion Johnnie Walker and be friends get go collaboration because I think it’s something that really adds value to each of these parties and it gives decay a new group of really high value collectors. It gives Johnnie Walker really authentic entrance into the space in a way that links in their product. And it gives the defense holders a way to start to tell their story into the more mainstream products. I think the bottle itself will also be a collectible that you just really well, particularly because it features the original go drawing, which was hands on by Jerry.
00:15:32:09 – 00:15:41:21
Avery Akkineni: And the gift code has now sort of evolved into this new, more animated character. So I think it’s really like an O.G. kind of gift that. It could eat very well over time.
00:15:42:17 – 00:16:01:01
Steven Miller: Yeah, no, I certainly hope that it happens just that way. And I think one of the other places that Boehner has had a lot of impacting has had its own small I guess contribution to is within Coinbase NFT. Can you tell me a little bit about, I guess how the NFT is being involved with Coinbase, NFT and its early beta launch here?
00:16:01:21 – 00:16:39:01
Steven Miller: Yeah, we’ve been really fortunate to work with the Coinbase team on helping to onboard creators and collectors onto their platform and helping them with their strategies. They get ready to launch their NFT beta, which officially launched on 420, which as you know, seven is a very significant date in the world of NFT culture. And, you know, we’ve had an incredible time working with with their team to help design a product that’s going to be loved by creators and collectors from helping kind of gather groups of creators together to share their feedback and helping sort of Coinbase put on events that that can start to foster this excitement and energy in the community around the product that they’re building.
00:16:39:03 – 00:17:05:09
Steven Miller: So we are thrilled with the beta launch. Might encourage all of your listeners to check out NFT dot coinbase dot com, give it a spin. Beta access will be rolling out to more and more people, so hope you all check it out and enjoy what they’ve designed, which I think has the potential to be a game changer for the NFT space in making sort of nfts a little bit more social in nature with a comment feature, a follow up feature and sort of a verified handle feature.
00:17:06:01 – 00:17:42:19
Steven Miller: Yeah, I, I’ve already been on the platform a little bit. I’ve had the opportunity to get in there and see what they’ve truly tried to innovate around. I think it is really interesting how they’re trying to bring a more social element to the world of NFT buying and NFT marketplace engagement. So for those that have not checked it out, you’re absolutely right. You absolutely should go check out Coinbase NFT when you get a chance. I think it’s also one of those things that kind of has been in waiting, right? A lot of people have been anticipating Coinbase, NFT, and now that it’s out, I think a lot more of the marketplaces are being forced to look at themselves in the mirror and say, okay, look, you have a real competitor now.
00:17:43:07 – 00:17:59:09
Steven Miller: So I’m kind of curious, just based on another recent piece of news, what you think of the open see acquisition of Gem dot, x, y, z. I know this is not something that we had on our radar, but I’m kind of curious of what you think of now. That happening is kind of a market competition feature.
00:17:59:21 – 00:18:06:18
Steven Miller: I think it was very smart by Opensea. I also think competition is a good thing. I think it helps create product.
00:18:08:09 – 00:18:49:11
Steven Miller: Improvements and product developments that move things in the direction of the consumer. I think having a monopoly for sort of one marketplace in the space is not healthy for anyone. It’s not healthy for the development of the space either. And I think it has unjustly sort of delivered a lot of like criticism and critique towards Opensea also in a space that’s so entirely decentralized, having one marketplace really hold such a large percentage of the secondary trading activity is probably not sustainable. But we’ll see how that goes over time. I think that the acquisition of GM was really, really smart by Opensea as a way to start moving, to start developing their product in a direction that’s a little bit more sort of shareable.
00:18:49:13 – 00:19:20:13
Steven Miller: And also to show the community that they are taking active steps to improve their product. And they are serious about I mean, obviously, they’ve made a fortune over the past couple of years and everybody can see that. So it’s good for the community as well, even just for us from a perception standpoint to understand that Opensea is very actively looking at acquisitions, is looking at integrating other leading, leading companies in their interface and in their platform. So I think it was very, very well received by the market. It also creates a little bit of that one too.
00:19:20:15 – 00:19:29:03
Steven Miller: With with Coinbase, with looks rare, with Rarible, with NFT icon that was just announced very recently. I think there’s some real competition in the market now.
00:19:30:10 – 00:20:08:29
Steven Miller: And I couldn’t agree more with you on the fact that the market needed competition. I think it’s going to make for a lot better product offerings as we go forward. That to me is the biggest value add when I look at the consumer’s perspective because we all want to see the space grow and we need better tools for it. So speaking of the space, I kind of want to move into the direction of looking at Web3 at the whole and like looking at kind of almost the alpha in the space at the moment. So I want to give you kind of a hypothetical here. So if I were to tell you that you’ve been tapped to deliver this, your State of the Metaverse address, what would you say to the following while we’re still early right now, what has the NFT landscape accomplished thus far, in your opinion?
00:20:09:27 – 00:20:11:22
Steven Miller: It has accomplished. Onboarding.
00:20:13:18 – 00:20:44:01
Steven Miller: An extremely dedicated user base. I think the NFT user raised a couple million, is so passionate and dedicated to the space. It’s taken up 1% of conversations on Twitter. So entities have managed to really capture the mindshare of the people who are in the community today. I would also note, though, that that level of commitment to specifically to the NFT space is likely going to dilute as we get a larger number of folks on board. So I think right now we’ve got a really vocal small community who’s very active in building.
00:20:44:03 – 00:20:58:18
Steven Miller: They’re spending your whole lives on Twitter and discord. This is their their life. And they’ve made a lot of their best friends through the NFT community, which is amazing. I think it’s still small, though, and that level of commitment is probably not sustainable as we look to onboard the next billion users.
00:21:00:18 – 00:21:09:26
Steven Miller: Also in to follow up on that. I’m curious as to what you would say the NFT and Metaverse spaces are direly in need of right now. Is there anything that stands out?
00:21:10:13 – 00:21:40:20
Steven Miller: Users I think users is the number one thing that I would say to that, actually. Can we go back to the first question? I want to add one more thing. Would you mind if I repeat? I think another thing that the NFT space has accomplished is creating a tremendous amount of validation that this is something that people need to take note of this year. Dollar amounts that are floating in the NFT world really are are waking people up to the fact that this is a real thing. The numbers are too big to be ignored from a purely, purely financial perspective.
00:21:41:02 – 00:22:25:26
Steven Miller: And anyone who looks at crypto slam IO can see these projects are launching and Bloomberg’s being an example. And a week later, with $500 million of secondary trading activity, that is just an unprecedented financial outcome that I think has served to wake up business people, entertainment folks and average consumers to say what is going on in this NFT space. So I think what the NFT space has accomplished now is building an incredibly dedicated community of early adopters and also driving these tremendous amount of value that has gotten business people and curious folks all around the world to really take note of what’s happening here and want to learn more.
00:22:27:06 – 00:22:51:23
Steven Miller: Awesome. I think that was the exact right expansion. So I’m right there with you. But back to what the spaces direly in need of you were saying users and I’m curious about what you think in that sort of world what types of users and kind of what is the space specifically need when it comes to user base? Are we looking for just strictly volume or are you looking for more equity? What is the way that you do it?
00:22:52:04 – 00:23:31:14
Steven Miller: I think it’s a volume of users to really make these projects of scale and be meaningful. I also think that we need users, particularly in the metaverse space, in order for a lot of these platforms to work. We’ve seen the early days and early developments of platforms like Decentraland Sandbox, you know, the Open Metaverse, Facebooks, meta. But right now we haven’t yet seen a number of users that make this a real place for people to go and hang out repeatedly at scale. I think particularly in the world of the metaverse, we really need to see that user growth on those platforms in order for this to be a meaningful place where users should be investing in place and things like land.
00:23:31:16 – 00:23:59:24
Steven Miller: A lot of it’s really speculation right now and secondarily where entertainment companies and traditional IPR should be building because right now the user base is a little bit too small to justify going all in. I think we need to see some users come into those spaces and and also help shape the culture of each of those metaverse so that they can define who they are and what this space is all about. In the same way that we’ve seen really successful video games build that culture in that community. We need to see that happen in the world of Metaverse as well.
00:24:01:02 – 00:24:29:21
Steven Miller: I think it’s a really great perspective to have. So for those, again, cause I want to shift out of your state of the metaverse now, because I think that while you’ve already earned my vote for President of the metaverse, I think the world right now wants to live in the present, in the present and learn a little bit more about, I guess, what the metaverse means to them. So for those that are just learning about Nfts right now in this moment and about the metaverse who’ve yet to take their real first steps in, where should they start? In your opinion.
00:24:30:26 – 00:25:09:12
Steven Miller: They should start by educating themselves hands on directly. Start by buying your NFT is getting your wallet set up, checking on a couple of different marketplaces. Do you buy the claims then? If you like opensea, maybe you like Rarible. Maybe you really believe in the flow blockchain. Maybe you believe in Cardano. I think each individual person needs to spend their own ten, 20, 4000 hours really learning this piece for themselves versus taking, you know, advice from just one single person. So I recommend every person who’s listening to this right now spends the time to really educate themselves and understand what your unique perspective is on it so you can invest your time in a place that makes sense to you.
00:25:09:19 – 00:25:41:18
Steven Miller: I have friends who love collecting art on Tezos. I have friends who really believe in topside the flow ecosystem. I also have friends who are total maxis and all of those are right. So what you as an individual person care about and what you see value in that should shape your collecting decisions and in certain cases your investment decisions in this world of NFT. So I recommend people get hands on, spend the time learning, spend the time in the discord, spend the time on crypto Twitter to keep your own perspective, because this is a space where you can make a lot of the right calls, but they have to be something that you personally believe in.
00:25:42:12 – 00:26:00:29
Steven Miller: Yeah, a lot of the things that we talk about in this space is all about conviction. It’s about making sure that you find the things that you can believe in long term, because truly it is a volatile space in that like things are changing almost weekly. I think that of all of the different investment spaces in the collecting spaces, nothing has been more fast moving than NFT and the you.
00:26:01:11 – 00:26:04:03
Steven Miller: It changes and you know, you’ve also got to have the stomach for it.
00:26:04:18 – 00:26:35:26
Steven Miller: Oh yeah. And I got to say, I absolutely love it, but I probably need to be seeing somebody about my stomach at some point. So that was for the beginner right now that we’re going into the more advanced side of things. What would you say that an advanced or somebody who’s been in the NFT metaverse space for a minute should be looking at how for what do you see as kind of these upcoming meta shifts and alpha type things that are going on in the space that people should be not taking for granted but take advantage of and see right now.
00:26:36:23 – 00:27:10:03
Steven Miller: I think there’s a couple of categories that are emerging that are really interesting. Utility Nfts I think are one thing that we’ve seen a little bit of and we’ll see a lot more that give you very clear utility in exchange for NFT. I think, you know, six months ago profile pictures were ripping and that was the hottest thing. We’ve certainly seen those continue to do well in certain cases, but it’s getting harder and harder for a fee collection to really break through. You need to have something really unique and meaningful. And I think for more advanced collectors, I would recommend starting to also look at ecosystems potentially beyond your primary chain.
00:27:10:05 – 00:27:40:25
Steven Miller: I think there’s a lot of interesting stuff that’s happening across the space, and for season collectors might know one ecosystem they almost have an advantage when they’re looking into another is like they know the things that they like. They know that the things that they learn. So I would recommend sort of branching out. Maybe you’re looking to the magic ecosystem that you’re looking into and into what’s happening on Solana. Maybe you’re looking to another marketplace. I recommend sort of broadening your focus into another area that you have high conviction in, whether that’s one of one art or a different chain.
00:27:41:03 – 00:27:44:13
Steven Miller: So that’s my recommendation for those sort of more seasoned collectors.
00:27:46:08 – 00:28:21:07
Steven Miller: And a great recommendation it is. So before we call this one a day, I do want to give a little bit of a shout out back to the namesake of Varner NAFTA. Gary, does this thing on a couple of his shows called Overrated or Underrated. It’s a game that gives you the opportunity to tell us what you think about a couple of different topics as to whether or not it’s currently overrated or currently underrated. So again, I know that these are going to be some bigger topics. Some of them may be a little bit contentious, but I wanted to throw them at you real quick. And you can tell us, just based on right now in the market, are they overrated or underrated? Sure.
00:28:22:01 – 00:28:32:29
Steven Miller: The first one that we have is named passes and collector passes like proof collective agreement as the two big ones in the market right now. Do you think this category is overrated or underrated?
00:28:34:06 – 00:28:57:08
Steven Miller: I think this category is properly rated. I think that supply matters a lot in these sort of passes. I think we’re to see a lot more that follow in this direction. Proof is very highly rated already today in the ecosystem. So I would say these are properly rated right now. I think we’re going to see a lot of projects that sort of follow in these two footsteps come do very well.
00:28:57:29 – 00:29:04:00
Steven Miller: So, all right. So the next category is going to be PSP or profile picture collections, overrated or underrated?
00:29:04:02 – 00:29:04:18
Steven Miller: Overrated.
00:29:05:21 – 00:29:09:21
Steven Miller: And do you think that’s going to be a short term thing or a long term thing, just out of curiosity?
00:29:10:20 – 00:29:21:03
Steven Miller: I think it will be. I think that PSP projects are the thing to do to do work. I think some of them are going to do really, really well over time. The vast majority of them will go to zero.
00:29:22:03 – 00:29:42:20
Steven Miller: Interesting. So the next piece that we have is the concept of buying art for art’s sake. A lot of people get really tied up in this and in the NFT space and get really opinionated about it. But think of this as art collections that are either generative editions one of the ones they don’t necessarily offer utility over in. So underrated.
00:29:43:01 – 00:29:43:16
Steven Miller: Yes.
00:29:44:09 – 00:29:57:23
Steven Miller: Okay. Our next one on chain NFT collections. So these are projects that deployed their entire NFT collections completely and exclusively on the blockchain, like cyber brokers on chain monkey cryptopunks. What do you think?
00:29:58:24 – 00:30:00:03
Steven Miller: Grossly underrated.
00:30:01:12 – 00:30:10:27
Steven Miller: So I would love it if you’d expand on that for us a little bit, because I think that’s one of the big categories that people do not have a lot of understanding for. So why do you think it’s grossly underrated?
00:30:11:17 – 00:30:51:00
Steven Miller: I think what people don’t understand is that today a lot of NFT collections that you might perceive to be entirely on chain are in fact not they. They’re using a combination of Web two and Web three infrastructure. I love fully on chain NFT projects because those are going to be something that no single server can can take down over time. Right. And I think they really are aligned to the ethos of where Web three is heading. And I you know, I believe that Jimmy, who’s the founder of Nameless and NFT, 42, is the person who really got a lot of us at being educated on this and believing why on chain matters.
00:30:51:21 – 00:31:04:20
Steven Miller: But very few projects actually take the time and also the gas cost to set everything up fully on time. Avatars is another example. I think it might have been the first fully on the AP project that that is also grossly venerated.
00:31:05:20 – 00:31:21:16
Steven Miller: And I’m a huge fan of avatars and what Jimmy talks about, so I’m a big tip of the cap to them there. So I only have two more for you. I think that the first one is least in my opinion, a pretty clear answer. But music NFT is overrated or underrated music.
00:31:21:18 – 00:31:36:14
Steven Miller: And if keys are underrated, I think there’s a lot that can be disrupted in the music industry if you can serve to be that bridge of disruption. There have been very few that have been super successful yet, but I see the potential of music on a piece and I think they’re grossly underrated.
00:31:38:01 – 00:32:05:03
Steven Miller: And here’s the last one for you. And I honestly know that I’m saying this and I’m putting this on a tee for you right now. It’s a category that I think a lot more people need to start taking very seriously, because I think that it’s. Honestly, one of the things in our space that needs the most amount of change, and that is what I call the DCI collections. So anything that is all about diversity, equity and inclusion, what do you think about that? Overrated, underrated?
00:32:05:27 – 00:32:24:10
Steven Miller: I think those are those are underrated in general. I think the focus on diversity, equity and inclusion is something that the space grossly needs. We did see a big jump on sort of this project, specifically the women led projects a couple months ago, which is mostly kind of died off by now. Sorry, I’m going to. We actually have a puppy right now and my husband’s coming in.
00:32:25:25 – 00:32:28:18
Steven Miller: That’s all I get. I repeat this one kind
00:32:30:14 – 00:33:14:08
Steven Miller: of. RB Okay, so Dee Dee and I collections are also underrated things. Diversity inclusion in the space is something that we don’t talk enough about. When we talk about it, we don’t action enough of it. And I think some of the projects that have really led the way here have gotten a lot of credit and well-deserved credit, but there’s so much more to do in this space. We saw a huge pop on sort of women led projects a couple months ago following the some big world of women announcements. And that’s cooled off a little bit. But I believe that some of the projects that are continuing to really make an effort in this space and go beyond just sort of talking about it into actually actioning things by being an incredible example of of an NFT program that really puts their money where their mouth is.
00:33:14:10 – 00:33:47:25
Steven Miller: Airdropping NFT holders doing these educational sessions, creating these forums for people to actually learn and for women and non-binary individuals who are underrepresented in this space to actually benefit from this. Those projects are very underrated. We also see a group of projects that kind of act like they’re doing something about this but are putting their time and effort where their marketing is. I think some of those projects don’t always necessarily have the best intentions, but the ones that are really in it for the right reasons I think are grossly underrated and underrated for that.
00:33:48:12 – 00:33:50:17
Steven Miller: The work that they’re doing to further the NFT space.
00:33:51:20 – 00:34:03:15
Steven Miller: I would agree entirely. And again, I know that I keep that one up a little bit for you because I know that’s something that you’re very passionate about and I myself am extremely invested in it at this point. Like it’s something that I want to continue to help push forward.
00:34:03:17 – 00:34:04:02
Steven Miller: I love that.
00:34:04:12 – 00:34:33:22
Steven Miller: Yeah, I think that it’s just one of those things that we’re going to see a much healthier and better NFT world for it, especially because if we can be a catalyst for it on this side of things, my hope is that it can serve as a greater catalyst for the world at large to be able to see better improvement in die. So hopefully that’s the case. Just to again put the nail in the coffin on that one for one more second to pitch a couple more projects that people, if they can go ahead and take a look at a couple more, I would say that you should probably take a look at hug.
00:34:34:06 – 00:34:35:14
Steven Miller: Yeah. Really?
00:34:36:24 – 00:34:46:07
Steven Miller: Yeah. Randy and Deb have a fantastic project there. I would say Boss Beauties is another fantastic project. Do you have any others there off top of your head that you really enjoy?
00:34:47:15 – 00:35:20:25
Steven Miller: I really like women rise and I want to give Melina a huge shout out. I think she is an incredible creator, business person and does a lot to speak up on behalf of women and minority communities. And she also she also puts up with a bunch of sort of negativity in the space that there isn’t research at all. And she does all that with a smile and so much positivity. And, you know, even the collection titled Women Rise is really all about rising above all of it. So want to give her a major shout out as well. And of course, can’t forget the folks of world women.
00:35:20:27 – 00:35:34:02
Steven Miller: They’ve recently launched their Wild Galaxy project, which is a more accessible way to sort of get into their community. And I love everything that the Yemen RAF for building or one of my first first like really favorite projects.
00:35:35:02 – 00:36:09:27
Steven Miller: That’s awesome. And I think the last one that I want to mention is only because I was looking at it this morning and it was because I’ve been so frickin priced out of it for the last like three months. And officially we now have a really good time where I may actually be able to jump in. Is crypto coming on there? They are fantastic and tastic project. It’s really big about that. So I’m completely with you on that. Avery. Avery, it’s been great getting a chance to chat with you today. I want to give you one quick last moment to let everybody know at home what’s the best way our audience can connect with you to keep up with your work and the latest updates from Banner NFT.
00:36:10:12 – 00:36:39:10
Steven Miller: Yeah, at every underscore akkineni on Twitter, I’m always on Twitter and dinner and a T on all the social platforms. So Twitter and LinkedIn and Instagram and everywhere else. I’m also I should plug myself all of me at Coinbase nft t I’m Avery there so hopefully you can keep all along and thank you so much for hosting me. Thank you everybody for tuning in. I know all your listeners are busy and I appreciate them taking the time to hang out with us.
00:36:40:02 – 00:36:52:14
Steven Miller: It’s been an absolute pleasure. Avery, again, folks at home, make sure you are following the show. Make sure you’re following Avery and Banner NFT wherever they are putting out content. And we will, of course, see you next time. Stay cryptocurrency.
00:36:53:09 – 00:37:30:28
Steven Miller: Cryptocurrency Cryptoquant. We want to give a quick shout out to all of our faithful listeners out there. It’s been an amazing journey and we really appreciate your support throughout the years as we’ve been growing as a community. Each episode, we decided that we would start sharing some of the reviews that you were leaving for us for today. We would like to share this review. Today’s review comes from BG 93. Compelling content delivered in digestible format demystifies the crypto world by engaging participants from all corners in intelligent conversation. Remarkably interesting. We sincerely appreciate this review and all reviews and would like to ask that if you’re enjoying our show, please take a quick moment to go and leave a review on our podcast so that hopefully we can be highlighting your review next.
00:37:31:14 – 00:38:01:21
Steven Miller: Simply go to our show notes or go to our website where we have a link where you can share your review today. Hey, everyone. Hope you enjoy today’s episode. For more information on today’s episode and all of our episodes, please visit us at WW W Crypto. Dash Current, not SEO. You can also find a link in the show notes. Want to stay up to date on the latest news in cryptocurrency? Sign up for our newsletter today. You’ll receive daily emails Monday through Friday that are personalized and curated content specific to you and your interest.
00:38:01:28 – 00:38:33:15
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00:38:33:26 – 00:39:07:19
Steven Miller: For more information, go to Acacia Digital Dot EO. Again, that’s Acacia Digital that I am. Are you an accredited investor looking to invest in cryptocurrency? Crescent City Capital can help. Go to Crescent City Capital. Dot com for more information. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the quality of our podcast each week are improving. I can only thank my amazing producer, Andrew Ritter with the Ritter Productions, who has been putting all of this together. If you have any podcast, music or audio needs, please go to Ritter Productions dot com. That’s d r i t t e r productions dot com.
00:39:13:11 – 00:39:26:08
Steven Miller: Thanks for tuning into another episode of Crypto Crime with Richard Cardon. We’ll be back with more exciting developments from the world of blockchain and cryptocurrency next. But until then, stay cryptocurrency.
00:39:35:23 – 00:39:38:06
Steven Miller: Three U.S. troops now.
00:39:41:12 – 00:40:16:04
Steven Miller: Thank you for joining us for another episode of cryptocurrency. Just one quick reminder. Cryptocurrency is a cryptocurrency and blockchain education platform that’s bridging the gap between the curious newcomers who are just discovering the space and the thought leaders who are shaping its future. All opinions expressed by Richard on the crypto current team and their guests on this show are exclusively their own opinions. You should not treat any opinion expressed by Richard. The team and their guests as a specific inducement to make a particular investment or to follow as financial advice. This show and any other crypto current production is exclusively for informational purposes.
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