ALTRA SHARP🪡

bless whoever is buying art in these moments, bless whoever is selling art in times like these, and most of all bless the artists who are benefiting. but now for the real talk... private sales becoming the new narrative is the full snake eating itself moment. with each "new product" this movement whores itself newsletter by newsletter, app by app, into a gaping hole of repetition. at each crossroad (enforcing royalties; free mints; private sales) we step farther away from the true ethos of this movement. why? transparency and power. digital ownership without transparency creates hierarchies of power that are antithetical to the decentralization of blockchain. without transparency we conceptually slip into Proof of Authority vs Proof of Stake. transparency: all knowledge is shared. the public ledger has allowed me to analyze the gender paygap of artworks on-chain and do something to improve it. maybe that's not your thing, fine. but from the pov of the artist (and the collector), how is more data harmful? wouldn't it behoove all of us to know how much a work transacted for? who benefits from the secrecy? one or many? two or a collective? power: private sales are inherently bad for collective action. private sales keep people in secrecy and competition, the act of who is buying who is not buying becomes hierarchical. private sales can protect individual anonymity without the shared collective assurance of reputation (anons are accountable by their identity however "real" that is.) the meta shift to private sales finally acknowledges we've lost face: dunno who would be surprised by this but private sales have already been happening - shout out to the people who actually handle them delicately because sometimes a private sale is what people want so of course they should have it - they have not however been openly embraced as the standard. encouraging more private sales benefits artists only in times of desperation like these. we've deeply fallen into the * the S Curve Model * as a movement cryptoart: whats good for a network owner conflicts with what's best for network participants (yes - we are all still participants in the blockchain ecosystem, but artists are still participants in platforms. we do not own them. they are their own networks). highly suggest diving into Chris Dixon's Read Write Own for more. OONA OVER & OUT: always happy for people buying, selling, and making money from art. & don't forget your backbone - blockchain. use it or lose it.