marianasanchez | .lens

🚨NO LINKS INCLUDED IN THIS THREAD🚨 As our precious ecosystem expands it is necessary to more granularly define roles (and subsequently intentions) of the individuals and entities that participate within. In a perfect world, operating in a homogenous space, we can all simply participate as human individuals. But the world is not perfect, our ecosystem has evolved and matured significantly, and the practice of digital art is experiencing an unprecedented disruption through innovation presented from blockchain technology. This, in turn, is defining a clear track for what many consider to be a “killer use” of blockchain technology: the NFT. Within the subsection of blockchain technology defined by the NFT, there are multiple tracks that participants can choose to follow, and these tracks transparently define their participation in the space. Each of those tracks is perfectly “fair game” at the protocol level, but it becomes increasingly more complicated to define what constitutes “fair” or “good” or “net positive” behavior at the social and cultural level. This is the nature of the technology on top of which the practice of digital art is thriving, and as creators we cannot “have our cake and eat it too”. I feel strongly that the pure value proposition of authentication and provenance associated with utilizing blockchain technology to represent digitally native artworks alone is a massive win for digital artists, and we must not take that for granted. Furthermore, this movement of blockchain powered digital art did not invent the concept of a creator royalty. Instead, a general acknowledgement within our society and emergent arts culture of the power of an artist being able to participate in their own success has coincided with the innovation presented by the NFT, which catalyzed a cultural shift towards supporting creators in a novel and transparent way facilitated meaningfully by blockchain technology. Ideally this cultural shift can and should spread into the non-digitally native art space as well, but blockchain technology should not be a prerequisite for that to succeed in either the digital or the physical space. Some individuals participate as clear patrons and supporters of the arts and culture. These individuals are objectively stewards of artists, platforms, projects, communities, and our cherished ecosystem as a whole. They recognize the value proposition of creators and platforms participating in the dialogue adjacent to an initial release by supporting them with the social and cultural construct of royalties as designated by the artist and/or platform. They generally also recognize that there are net positive economic and democratization impacts resulting from the royalty model that potentially enable them to participate in an artist’s career which might otherwise be inaccessible to them if an artist or platform was forced to encapsulate the entire value of a release in the primary sale. These individuals should be recognized, or more precisely, I personally would like to recognize these individuals and their contributions to elevating the practice of digital (and generative) art. You know who you are. THANK YOU. I encourage every participant in our ecosystem to self reflect and be honest with themselves as to whether this is the role they want to embrace within this emergent digital art economy. This is a decision each individual must make for themselves, and I would note that as far as I’m concerned there is no “right way” to participate. Suggesting what is “right or wrong” would be an arbitrary and hypocritical stance as someone fully cognizant of the intricacies of what is and is not possible through NFT technology. However some roles and tracks are clearly more aligned with my personal values, conviction, and vision of a world where digital art continues to thrive catalyzed by the invention of the NFT. 👇

🚨 Video drop alert! Yesterday we dropped a step-by-step video guide on how to create your own Ethereum NFT collection, mint NFTs, and list them on @foundation. 💻 Own your NFT contract, own your art! 🔗 Watch now: youtu.be/KCS4M0SAxZ4