The Crypto Conversation

Andy Pickering is here with a weekly crypto market update where we look through the volatile world of crypto Twitter to tease out the most important narratives and data points. This week Bitcoin crashed overnight dropping 10% to US$43,000. The dump happened on the same day that El Salvador made Bitcoin legal tender and became the first nation-state to buy Bitcoin. Supporting links: Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

Jules Urbach is the CEO of OTOY, a leading cloud graphics company that is pioneering technology to redefine content creation and delivery. The work of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry is being cataloged in a new digital archive by OTOY. Why you should listen: RNDR, whose partners include Amazon, Google, Apple, and HBO, developed a cutting-edge platform based on underlying OTOY technology that allows individuals to create graphics at the same level as Hollywood studios. RNDR is revolutionizing visual effects by using the cloud to democratize GPUs and other rendering resources. It also seeks to provide energy-efficient solutions for creating NFTs. Jules' best friend from childhood is Rod Roddenberry. Jules is working on a new digital archive of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry's legacy. The Roddenberry Archive will feature the flagship Star Trek series, original films, and spinoffs in a variety of formats including digital and holographic renderings, documents, images, models, and blueprints. The archive will capture deep 3D asset metadata from assets, images, blueprints, and models using RNDR, OTOY's blockchain GPU computing network. In order to capture original studio and physical assets at the highest level of photographic fidelity, the archive will leverage OTOY's LightStage Academy-Award-winning facial scanning service, generating the first comprehensive lighting and reflectance data set for future archival use. Iconic artist Mike "Beeple" Winklemann is joining the Roddenberry Archive project as a creative consultant, and, alongside legendary painter and illustrator Alex Ross, will help commemorate the Roddenberry Archive and cross-link it to both the Alex Ross and Beeple RNDR Archives. Supporting links: OTOY Jules on Twitter Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

DFX is an Ethereum-based decentralized exchange protocol with a dynamically tuned bonding curve optimized for fiat-backed stablecoins using real-world FX price feeds. Mainstream adoption of Web 3.0 requires assets that are protected from price volatility. By focusing on fiat-backed stablecoins on the Ethereum blockchain, DFX leverages the existing defi ecosystem to bootstrap humanity's next-generation foreign exchange. Why you should listen: DFX is a decentralized foreign exchange protocol optimized for stablecoins. In building the protocol, DFX will bring liquidity and volume to fiat-backed stablecoins globally. The next generation of global finance cannot rely solely on USD-pegged stablecoins. A decentralized protocol where users can efficiently exchange stablecoins pegged to various foreign currencies is not only important but necessary. DFX has added the NZDs, the New Zealand Dollar Stable Coin to the protocol. NZDs is a New Zealand Dollar (NZD) Stable Coin backed 1:1 with physical New Zealand Dollars in a cash and cash equivalent treasury managed by a New Zealand registered financial services provider. New Zealand's currency is a leader in adaptability, resilience, and market trustworthiness. NZD is the 10th most traded currency globally. The NZD stable coin will offer cryptocurrency users the stability and utility of the New Zealand Dollar with the versatility of a cryptocurrency. The NZDs is issued by Techemynt. Supporting links: DFX NZD Stablecoin Techemynt Castle Island Stablecoin paper Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

Aaron McDonald and Brooke Howard-Smith are co-founders at Non-Fungible Labs, the team behind the FLUF World NFTs. FLUF World is home to 10,000 unique 3D animated rabbits. The FLUF metagame describes the emerging, expanding metaverse treasure hunt that the FLUFs exist in. Why you should listen: FLUFs have been programmatically generated from 270 attributes across 14 categories to be entirely unique by at least three degrees of separation. This also excludes their expression, dance, scene, and soundtrack. Non-Fungible Labs have an exciting roadmap that will continue to unlock ever-increasing, advanced functionality for FLUFs. The future of the digital world will be expansive and complex. Smart agents are needed to help navigate these always-on spaces. Altered State Machine is a framework to track ownership of AI agents in any digital environment. Supporting links: FLUF World Altered State Machine Non-Fungible Labs Aaron talks Centrality Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

Konstantin is the founder and CEO of Vaulty Finance - a vault that bridges Defi and NFTs on the Binance Smart chain. The Vaulty platform is a yield aggregator that offers multiple strategies to optimize yield farming through regular auto-compounding. Why you should listen: Vaulty is a decentralized platform designed to enable automatic asset allocation across DeFi instruments. Every vault has its own smart contract with predetermined logic. Choose your vault and passively earn yields or NFTs stress-free. Vaults allow users to minimize network fees and time spent researching the best instruments. Vaulty unites the power of DeFi and NFT. Vaulty is a unique profit-sharing yield aggregator that incorporates both traditional DeFi and NFT yield strategies into the same decentralized platform. Konstantin shares some fascinating stories on what it was like to grow up in rural Russia and why so many talented poker and chess players are Russian. Supporting links: Vaulty Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

Bill Barhydt is the CEO of Abra, a platform that enables crypto banking services for consumers and institutions in over 100 countries. Abra's mission is to become a crypto bank that replaces the need for legacy banking services. Bill was a member of the Cryptography Mailing List where Satoshi first released the Bitcoin White Paper. Bill started his career working in cryptography for the CIA. Why you should listen: Abra is making cryptocurrency investing simple. Abra operates an easy-to-use smartphone-based wallet, exchange, high yield interest accounts, and lending service supporting 125 digital assets. Users can buy, sell, store, and invest in cryptocurrencies and manage their crypto investments, in one app. Their vision is an open, global financial system that is easily accessible to everyone. Bill is a globally recognized technology pioneer with a unique perspective on the early days of the internet and blockchain. Bill started his career working in R&D at the CIA and NASA. Bill was one of the early team members at Netscape where he was involved in building the core infrastructure that helped grow the consumer Internet we use today. Supporting links: Abra Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

Andy Pickering is here with a weekly crypto market update where we look through the volatile world of crypto Twitter to tease out the most important narratives and data points. This week Morgan Stanley's SEC Filings reveal it has purchased a large holding of Bitcoin via the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust. Only Fans has reversed its decision to ban sexually explicit content, and the NFT market continues to boom as a new wave of Generative Art is released. Supporting links: Nexo Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

Zach Burks is the CEO and founder of NFT marketplace Mintable. Mintable is the first NFT platform to pioneer 'gasless minting', enabling content creators to mint NFTs without prohibitive transaction fees. Zach says he is building Mintable with Mom in mind. If his Mom finds it easy to use Mintable to mint and trade NFTs, then anyone can use Mintable. Zach is applying the best features from e-commerce sites such as Amazon to make Mintable one of the most exciting and feature-rich marketplaces of the future. Why you should listen: Mintable is the first NFT platform to pioneer 'gasless minting', enabling content creators to mint NFTs without being burdened by prohibitive transaction fees. When the Mark Cuban-backed platform recently completed its US$13 million Series A funding round, it also announced an upcoming integration with Ripple's XRP ledger to enable a new breed of ecologically friendly NFTs. Supporting links: Mintable Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

Manu Alzuru is a humanist, a solarpunk, and the founder of DoinGud - a next-gen NFT platform designed to empower creators and collectors to create meaningful impact. Why you should listen: DoinGud is an NFT ecosystem where passion has the ability to create social impact. NFT creators can donate at least 5% of their profits from every sale to charitable causes benefiting the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals. These goals include creating gender equality, ending world hunger, ensuring all individuals have good health and well-being, and quality education for all. Invited creators can onboard colleagues. Brands and communities can open meta-galleries to house their artists. Anyone can submit their artwork to a pool to be represented by a community gallery. Solarpunk is an art movement that envisions how the future might look if humanity succeeds in solving climate change. The iconography of Solarpunk focuses on renewable energies such as solar and wind power. It is the flipside to Cyberpunk. Supporting links: DoinGud Solar Power Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

Victor David is co-founder and CEO of Epik, a global agency that connects brands with video games to offer unique and immersive digital experiences using NFTs. Why you should listen: Epik is putting brands into video games to offer unique and immersive digital experiences to more than a billion fans worldwide. Epik is solving the problem of building interconnectivity between metaverses so that metaverses will be able to talk to each other in ways never possible before. Called the "Epikverse," this technology will span across multiple virtual worlds, including, one day, Facebook. Epik's core mission is to improve the experience of gamers, making them feel the nostalgia of collecting in-game items that are accessible across different games, allowing them to interact with their assets outside of the game, and be able to trade them anytime. The opportunities we see in NFTs are not only limited to arts and music. Most of our NFT collections are based on collaborations with the leading gaming companies, and these unique digital assets will give the players distinctive benefits when playing the game (special offers, skins, accessories, playable characters, etc) giving real-world value in real life. Supporting links: Epik Nexo Andy on Twitter Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.