📝 Web3 Field Notes #9

"We forget, in our generation, that things don’t have to be physical. They can be digital, and they have meaning to people." — Bob Iger, CEO of Disney

📚 Readings:

• The crypto creator economy. Link

• How NFTs changed the art game. And whether you knew the old game or not makes no difference. Link

• Progressive decentralization: A playbook for building crypto applications. Link

• A primer on Web3 identity and reputation management. What if credentials and identity could be verified on-chain? Link

• Bloomberg: Mike Novogratz wants to punch disgraced crypto titans in the face. Entertaining read. Link

• Generative art & 1/1s vs. PfPs. Uhm… what? How different types of digital art evolved. Link

• ConsenSys: The state of NFT markets, December 2022. Link

• Liquidium: A lot of exchanges have started issuing proof-of-reserves. But that doesn’t take into account off-chain assets and liabilities. Liquidium might be an alternative. Link

🚨 What caught my eyes: 

• Crypto broker Genesis files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Let’s see what happens with DCG, Gemini, and Grayscale now. No price impact so far. Bad news is now good news? Link

• Monthly active devs grew to 23k+ or 5% y/y. The builders keep building. Link

• The flippening no one is talking about: Optimum overtakes Arbitrum with daily active addresses. I expect Layer 2s to gain huge momentum in 2023. Link

• Beeple, the most famous NFT artist, opens “Beeple Studios”, a physical gallery and event space. Link 

• Foundation launches “World”: A web3 native curation tool. Worlds allows anyone to coordinate with sellers, curate an on-chain exhibition, and share in the sales. Link Art X Machine

• N26, the German neobank, launches a crypto offering. Competition in the retail segment is heating up – and is being commoditized. The times are long over when such news would impact markets. Link

• EY and Polygon work together on privacy-preserving transactions on the Ethereum blockchain to enable enterprise blockchain solutions. “Enterprise” and “blockchain” – we’ve heard this many times. Be cautious. Link

• Bank of International Settlements (BIS) addresses the risks in crypto. Its approach is to ban, contain or regulate it. Nothing surprising, but still relevant. Link

🚀 Interesting Web3 start-ups: 

• Easy.me: the first social wallet ($14.2m seed funding)

• Obsess: Virtual stores for brands. 

• Lighthouse: The open metaverse navigation engine. 

• Oncyber: Build a metaverse gallery in 15 minutes. 

That’s all for now, folks. Back to building and learning! 🚀

– Marc

Bonus 💎 : Why NFTs? A list of use cases.

Artwork: obscure chroma by Ellie Pritts.

📈 Awesome charts to share with friends: