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- [00:00]
A
Welcome to the Crypto 101 podcast presented by Gemini, your bridge to the future of money.
- [00:15]
B
All right, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, gather round, gather round. I hope everybody's having a fantastic morning, noon or night, wherever you are in the world we know, certainly you're in the right place. You're at the Crypto 101 podcast. I'm your co host, Bryce, as always, joined by my good buddy out in Hurricaneville, Florida. How's it going, man?
- [00:35]
C
Speaking of hurricanes, Bryce, I've heard that there's a Cat four, maybe a cat five, not too far south of us here in Florida. So it's, it's funny, it's sunny out right now. I know that it's down by, I think, Jamaica, but could be on our way. Could be on our way.
- [00:50]
B
I know I've got, I've got a soft spot for Jamaica. I, I've been to Sandals over there and had a lot of fun. So hopefully, yeah, shout out to anybody who's, who's in Jamaica listening. Hopefully everybody's safe and sound. But we've got a great podcast episode and a fantastic guest here joining us today. Adam Hollander is joining us. He is the CMO Chief Marketing Officer of OpenSea. Adam, how are you doing?
- [01:15]
D
I am absolutely stellar. Thanks for having me.
- [01:17]
B
Awesome. No, we're, we're really excited to speak with you today. You know, opensea burst onto the scene a few years back. You guys were and still are the preeminent place to trade NFTs and so much more. So we want to dive into all of that and there's a lot of exciting things on the horizon. But let's just get acquainted here. Between us, the audience, tell us a little bit about yourself and how you found yourself running marketing at the largest, you know, NFT place in crypto.
- [01:50]
D
Sure. So I've got a varied professional background. Most notably, a number of years ago, I started a gamification software company that I sold off to Microsoft. I've done a number of things with a variety of companies since then, but about five years ago, I'd say that I really dove in deep into crypto and NFTs. And for the last five years, I have been living and breathing crypto, Twitter and buying and selling and trading NFTs, broader crypto meme coins, really participating in the culture and membership around this space. And it's something that I've become very passionate about in terms of really, really the basic premise of digital ownership and how that can affect a variety of markets and industries and Art and gaming and the like, and the way that I found myself into running marketing at OpenSea. Actually, it's kind of a funny story, but OpenSea made a decision last year that I didn't particularly agree with. And so I tweeted at Devin, the CEO of OpenSea, and said, hey, you guys really need somebody over there that, you know, better understands culture and marketing. And Devin actually really, to his credit, reached out to me directly. Somebody that really likes to have difficult discussions. And, you know, there's a lot of people, you know, I'd say in crypto, but broadly, just in the world in general, that only want to hear positive things and only want to hear when things are going well or you have compliments for them. Devin wanted to hear the, you know, very harsh, critical truth from me as to how I was feeling at the time. And we ended up spending hours going back and forth on really the opportunity and, you know, what opened has in front of it. And a couple weeks later, I joined on a cmo.
- [03:29]
B
That's incredible lore. I love that I did not know that story, but I'm gonna have to go back and pull up that Twitter exchange, because that's. That's gold right there. Well. Well, tell us. You know, for folks who are listening, they might have heard about NFTs and seen profile pictures, but they might not really understand what NFTs are at a high level. So could you kind of give us the 101 on NFTs?
- [03:49]
D
Yeah, sure. Happy to.
- [03:50]
C
So.
- [03:51]
D
So the analogy that I like to use for anybody that's seen me in one of these interviews before, but imagine you walk into a museum and you see a beautiful painting up on the wall, and you're told it's worth a million dollars. And so then you ask yourself, well, why is this worth a million dollars? And it's because it's the original, and you can prove that it's the original. And there's a lot of people in the world that covet and enjoy that artwork. Now, if you go to the gift shop and you buy a print of that particular artwork, it's not really worth very much if you take a snapshot photo of it with your phone and post it up on the Internet, it's not really worth very much. Now, it is, in fact, a copy of that artwork, but it's not the original. And of course, you can't prove that it's the original. And the basic premise here is that up until a few years ago, it was very difficult to place value on digital assets or digital art. And the reason for that is that you can generally take a digital file, you can copy paste it, you can post it to the Internet, you can put it up on social media, you can email it, share it with friends, and the copy is indiscernible from the original. And therefore, it's very difficult to place value on the original asset when you can't really prove that it is in fact the original. But with the blockchain and with NFTs, you can do exactly that. And so when you create an asset on the blockchain, it has a provable, infallible history that is associated with it, where you can truly prove that this is in fact, the first piece of artwork that was created by this artist and by this artist's wallet. And you can see everything that's happened with it since. And there's a number of implications that come along with this. One is, of course, just the fact you can prove that you are holding the original asset. But then through that proof, what else can you do with it?
- [05:42]
A
Then?
- [05:42]
D
You can tie benefits, you can tie utility, you can tie membership, you can tie all sorts of other interesting things to the fact that you are, in fact, the holder of this particular asset. And that just has implications for a variety of different markets and industries. You know, you could think of it in terms of gaming the, you know, assets that you earn inside of games. You know, we're starting to see rwas where people are collecting, you know, real world assets, Pokemon cards and the like, and they're able to digitize ownership of them in the form of NFT, NFTs and on the blockchain. And so anyway, I'm going on and on. I could ramble all day about digital ownership, but hopefully that gives people at least a cursory understanding.
- [06:24]
A
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- [10:29]
C
Thank you.
- [10:30]
B
Totally. I definitely think it does. That made sense. Brendan, what do you think about that?
- [10:35]
C
Well, it got me thinking, you know, because OpenSea has evolved a lot over the last couple of years, right? And now we see NFTs and this whole space even as it relates to NFTs. Because now NFTs have ties to tokens and real products and it's been this kind of expanding ecosystem. Are you allowed to say if you have a favorite blockchain for this kind of thing or is that kind of like choosing a favorite child? I don't want to get you in trouble here.
- [11:00]
D
No, I probably better not. But we support 23 chains on OpenSea and we really love all of our partners and the people that are behind them.
- [11:09]
B
That's. That's a good question. I thought you were going to say what's your favorite nft? So. So I'm going to ask that question next. And you might not be again, it's probably similar vein. Do you have like a profile picture that's a certain NFT community.
- [11:22]
D
Look, I'm a Very deep collector of many years. I'd have to really think if I have one favorite NFT that sits in my wallet. I use a CryptoPunk as my PFP, but, you know, I also own a 001 Opeppen from Jack Butcher that I treasure. I have a squiggle from Snowfro and art blocks that I treasure. I've got my, you know, Bored Ape and a bunch of others that I feel pretty attached to at this point, emotionally. So I guess I would probably leave it at that.
- [11:53]
B
No, it's cool because NFTs could really, like, just take so many different shapes and sizes. Like, for instance, the Bored Ape stuff. Like, you know, you could get, you know, certain utility and, you know, access to events. And with the squiggles, it's almost like, you know, just pure artwork. Right. And so they derive their value in really so many different ways. And, you know, it's really incredible. I feel like things have evolved a lot. And maybe you could comment on, on, like, the last cycle of NFTs in 2021 to, like, where you think NFTs are today. Like, what's changed?
- [12:28]
D
Yeah, that's an interesting question. So I think what you're really asking is, you know, what's the difference between the bull market in 2021 when, you know, everyone and their second cousin were talking about NFTs around the. Thanks. And where we are today? It's interesting. Back in 2021, I would argue, at least in hindsight, that a large portion of the people that were buying NFTs were not doing it for the love of membership or art or community or utility. They were really speculatively gambling on the future price of those assets. And by the way, look, a lot of the blockchain is financialized, and there's a lot of people that trade every day with profit in mind. You can do both. I have a bunch of NFTs that I probably will never sell because I'm emotionally attached to them. I love the art, I love the community, I love the utility attached. Or I just have, you know, this. I'd say emotional historical attachment to them. But at the same time, I trade every day. I, you know, do that, you know, for profit. I have been for years. And that's something that I also enjoy about the space. So there's no right or wrong. I would simply say that years ago, a huge number of people that came into the space came in with that mindset. And now what I would say is that while that still of course, exists, and nobody would be naive enough to say that that's not a part of NFTs or blockchain or meme coins or trading crypto. I think that more and more of the conversation now is in fact about the art and the utility and the community and the membership and really the power of the technology of proving digital ownership of assets and the effect that that can have. And that's something that I think is a lot more encouraging to people that are building and innovating and trying to figure out how to really create things in the space, which is something that, as somebody that's been here for a long time, is very exciting.
- [14:28]
C
Kind of along Those same lines, OpenSea is now expanding. And I think that's one of the cool things that's obviously the main reason why you have, why we're having you on here is because OpenSea for a long time has been known as the NFT platform. You guys were really the first group to come in here and do this and be like a popular hub for people to transact all this. But as you're just saying, I mean, a lot's evolved since 2021 when I think that this really came onto people's radar. So catch us up to speed. How are you guys expanding? I don't want to be the one spoiling it here.
- [15:03]
D
Well, I appreciate the layup question there. So we'll get into a little bit about what's going on at OpenSea. So look, our vision is to be the web3 home for everything that you do on blockchain and crypto. And so NFTs are one very important asset type and they hold a lot of value and a lot of benefits and are used for a variety of things. But most people that hold NFTs also trade broader crypto. They hold Ethereum, they hold Bitcoin, they hold Solana, they trade Meme coins. And you know, recently we're starting to see some other examples of things that can exist on chain that are really powerful. I mentioned RWAs, you know, earlier where, you know, now people are tokenizing real world assets like a Pokemon card that, you know, PSA graded and that allows you to hold, hold it safely inside of your crypto wallet. It allows you to trade it back and forth without having the physical asset needing to be mailed overseas to the new owner and then allows you to burn the asset if you want access to it out of its Brinks vault or wherever it's being stored. And I think what we're going to see over the next five years, ten years, hundred years, is that this concept of digital ownership is very foundationally important to where the world is headed as we are spending more and more of our time online. I know the concept of a metaverse world now has a little bit of almost asterisk or smile stigma around it, but I do genuinely believe that at some point we are going to spend more and more of our time in a digital world interacting with each other. And whether that's playing games, whether that's conducting commerce, whether that's doing any number of things, I think that will take place in virtual spaces. And that means that the concept of digital ownership becomes more and more important. And so what opensea really believes is that if you are going to be doing all of these things, it needs to be easy, it needs to be seamless, and you need to be able to do it all in one place. And so a very almost remedial example today would be that if you are trading meme coins and crypto and you do hold NFTs, you should be able to see them in one portfolio, portfolio across all of your wallets, all in one place. You should be able to have all of your blockchains seamlessly in one app, where it doesn't matter if you own ETH on Base or ETH on mainnet, or if you want Solana or if you want, you know, Abstract or whatever it might be, you actually have the ability to just easily, seamlessly transact with all of your asset types, all of your wallets, across all chains, very easily, very reliably, very seamlessly, all in one place that you call home. And that is the vision that we have for OpenSea. Most people still know OpenSea as the world's largest NFT marketplace, and we are the world's largest NFT marketplace. And I believe we will always be the world's largest NFT marketplace. But people are doing so much more with blockchain and crypto, and there are so many good reasons why they should want to have all of their assets in one portfolio, one place again, across wallets, across platforms, mobile desktop, across different blockchains, and be able to do that and transact securely, seamlessly, all in one place.
- [18:19]
C
Yeah, I mean, you make a great point, because anybody who's interacting with NFTs, clearly they have to have a good understanding of crypto. Right, because you can interact with crypto and you can go and say, buy and hold Ethereum, but not understand NFTs. And you can have a very, very basic understanding and still get exposure to Ethereum. You cannot, however, have, like, no understanding of Ethereum and go and get an nft. Like you have to just know what you're doing a little bit more because you have to. Typically speaking, I know they've made it, you guys have made it a lot easier in recent days, but. Or in recent years. But you know, you basically used to have to go buy Ethereum, then transfer it to a wallet, connect the wallet to an NFT marketplace and you go through all these different things and it makes sense. Like the people who are interacting with this stuff are obviously plugged into all these different areas, whether it's normal crypto, whether it's meme coins, whether it's these communities or whatever it may be. And so it makes sense. And this is one of the big things that we've been talking about for years on here. You know, me and Bryce, we brought in a lot of leaders and it really does come down to, I think, two areas. It's ease of access and it's interoperability. How can we, and you all, how can the crypto space in general make itself available to anyone? The my 80 year old grandma, how can she be able to do this thing? Because it's so easy and then at the same time, how can it be so seamless where they can view everything in one place, where it can be just as seamless as they're probably used to it in their like basic Schwab account, right? When someone goes into that, they say, okay, I can see all my investments in here, I can see everything in here. And I think we were playing a little bit of a game of catch up with crypto to say, how can we kind of get to that same point? And so when I hear you kind of talking about this, that's where my brain goes. Because a couple of years ago, obviously we weren't there yet. And I think it's really easy for people to forget where they kind of come in in the modern day. They get really comfortable and used to how things are now, but they forget that even a couple of years ago we weren't at that. And it's the same kind of argument that people go and they say, oh well, why don't you just buy bitcoin back in like 2011 or 2012, it's like, well, number one, it was really hard to, it was sketchy, it wasn't easy, there wasn't a great interface. Like there was all these things. But anyway, I don't want to rant too much, but that's kind of what it reminds me of.
- [20:39]
D
No, look, I agree with everything that you just said. And I would simply say that it is our goal at OpenSea to get a lot further into solving that problem over the course of the next year. And so, for example, we're working on OS Mobile, which will be out by hopefully the end of the year, and OS Mobile, we are building to be the simple, best native experience that anyone has ever seen in crypto. And so you'll be able to double click Apple Pay and get your first Meme coin, you'll be able to double click Apple Pay and you're going to be able to buy your first nft. You're going to be able to buy Ethereum and not worry about whether you're buying it on Base or Mainnet or any number of other chains. And then you're going to be able to transact across all of those different chains in a way where you don't necessarily need to understand that that is in fact what you're doing. You're going to have everything all in one place that feels like it is your web3 home in your pocket. And reducing that level of friction and those barriers is a really, really important thing for us to get much broader adoption. And that's one of the most important ways that we're going to grow. We want to make sure that we're building products that appeal to those that are very crypto native and very savvy. And you know, you can go into OpenSea today and you can zoom in on your charts for all your meme coins and you can use a bunch of data to make really important decisions. But at the same time, to your point, you know, when your grandmother does go in and wants to go and buy some token that her grandson told her about, we want that to be extremely easy and seamless and we want everybody when they say, well, how do I do this? How do I get started? The goal for us is that instead of saying go and do X, Y, Z, that you might do today, we want people to say go and install the OpenC.
- [22:24]
B
Yeah, no, it's, it's incredible and it almost feels a little bit like a competitor to like your, your standard crypto exchange, you know, your Coinbase or your, your Kraken or Binance, whatever. Because now you could have this on, you know, on ramp and off ramp, you could have all of these different tokens at your disposal. But the best part is you don't have to trust, you know, an exchange with, you know, your funds, you kind of keep it self custody as well.
- [22:48]
D
That's exactly the Point is that yes, you know, there are competitive aspects to some of the examples that you mentioned, but those are centralized exchanges. And so that means they're controlling what you can do, what you can trade. They have custody of your crypto, you do not. And there's just a lot more you can do in the world when you take self custody of your own crypto. Now that is a big challenge because there's a lot of complexity that comes along with it, there's a lot of security challenge that can come along with it and you know, a number of other hurdles, education. And so those are the big challenges that we are trying to address because we believe very strongly that you should have custody over your own crypto. You should be able to do more with it. And we're going to be the playground that provides you the ability to do that. But do it in a reliable way, do it in a secure way, and do it in a way where you have all of your assets in one place as your web3 home.
- [23:39]
C
In getting to this point, have there been any acquisitions to enhance your platform build out?
- [23:45]
D
Yeah, well, most recently we acquired Rally, if you're not familiar, and Rally had an unbelievable mobile experience for token trading and that really is exciting, accelerated the development of OS mobile and we're really excited about that. But admittedly it was actually less the tech, which is great. It was more about just the incredible team that we brought on board. And so you've got Chris Mattern who came over as our cto, you've got Christine who came over as our chief of staff, and a number of just expert developers and marketers that came over that are really accelerating our growth and development into this space. And so that was something that was really pivotal for us and happened even just a few months ago. But I almost can't imagine opensea anymore without those folks on board.
- [24:31]
B
That's awesome. I'm curious, you know, is there plans to integrate DeFi, you know, being able to borrow against NFTs or you know, get leverage in order to buy that one NFT that you really want? Or is that something that might be, you know, a little further, you know, further away?
- [24:50]
D
Look, it's a, it's a really interesting question and obviously there's a lot of really cool stuff that's happening in our space around those areas that you just mentioned. We have not announced anything specific to that. We did announce that we are working on hyper liquid perps. And so for those that are interested in futures markets, that is something that will be coming over the coming months at OpenSea. And look, at the end of the day when we say that we want to be your web3 home for everything, that means everything. And it means that we will consider all of the things. It's just a matter of prioritization and opportunity cost and what are we going to do next? And right now we're very focused on putting out a really beautiful, delightful mobile experience. We're focused on bringing perps, we're focused on adding token trading features and doing some really interesting things to bring that side of our product. I'd say really up to par with the tools that people are used to, even those that are doing pretty deep token trading inside of our space. And of course, we're going to be doing a lot with AI. We've got our plates pretty full between that and all the other chains that we're adding, etc. Etc.
- [25:54]
B
No, the AI stuff, man, that, that's super hot. A lot of, a lot of projects are integrating it in some capacity. Could you give us a little sneak peek or a little taste of, of how AI is going to kind of come to bear on the platform?
- [26:05]
D
Yeah. You know, what's interesting about OpenSea is that internally at OpenSea, we are very, very deeply AI pilled. What I mean by that is that every single employee of OpenSea doesn't matter if you're working in engineering or marketing or finance or operations, you are using AI as a pretty core part of your day to day to accelerate what you do. I think it's a superpower. It enables everybody at OpenSea to do the work of three times the people that are actually waking up every day to build and do cool things on behalf of the company. Now, when that comes to the product, what it means is we want to take a step back and say, well, how can AI really empower the experience that you have when you are trading on and using OpenSea? And there's a variety of ideas that we have here. We have one thing that we're already begun working on, which is what we're calling OS intelligence, and think of it as a trading companion. So as you are deciding whether or not to buy that nft, maybe you want to ask a question around, you know, what's the price been historically for this collection over the last couple of months, or when was the last time that this particular trait was traded and at what price? You might start asking, you know, a variety of questions around, hey, this is my risk tolerance and, you know, I really need some recommendations about, you know, what's really being talked about on the social sphere right now related to crypto. And so I'm not going to go too deep into detail because we just haven't shared a whole heck of a lot yet. But I do think that there is a world in the near future where people will view OpenSea not only as their place to trade, but essentially as their co pilot or companion in terms of how they trade and how they interact with their own assets on chain.
- [27:47]
B
It's going to be incredible. No, I've seen a couple different LLMs integrated with crypto wallets and what they're doing is pretty incredible. I saw one where it was like, you know, you could basically say, okay, look at my crypto wallet and you know, which liquidity pools are going to provide the highest yield based on the assets that I have. And then it'll go look everything and then you can say, okay, you know, deposit to that one. And then, you know, you kind of give the AI agent, if you will, like a little bit of, a little bit of leeway. And now I'm seeing Coinbase coming out with X402, some new protocol to help AI agents interact with wallets. And so, yeah, that, that stuff's not slowing down. It feels like you guys are also really ahead of the curve on that. But I wanted to kind of get your not opinion, but your, your sort of ideas behind this flagship reserve. The NFT treasuries have started to become a little bit of a thing we know about, like MicroStrategy. They're accumulating a bunch of Bitcoin and you know, Sharplink Gaming's accumulated a bunch of Ethereum and so on. But tell us a little bit about what's going on with the creation of this NFT treasury.
- [28:53]
D
Yeah, so there's a reason that we called it our flagship collection and not the OpenSea Strategic Reserve. And that is that strategic reserve has a financial connotation to it and indicates that you're doing this to hopefully profit in some way. We actually are not with our flagship collection. And in fact, the entire reason that we created it was more or less a love letter to the creators and artists and, you know, founders that have just truly been foundational for Web3 and the space that we love and serve at OpenSea. And so it's our way of providing recognition to those individuals. It's our way of creating a foundation of, you know, some of the most historical and revered assets in Web3, like, you know, cryptopunks and bored apes and pudgy penguin and squiggles and then being able to put emerging artists and creators shoulder to shoulder with them so that it's an opportunity for us to shine a spotlight and really provide some visibility into those that are doing interesting and innovative things, artistic things, inside of our space. And so this is something that we're really doing as more of a community based program than anything else. I'd say one of the areas that we get value from it is that we're starting to create a lot more content for marketing at OpenSea. And it's really great when we have our own squiggle and our own Bored ape and our own Pudgy Penguin and the like that we can incorporate into those kinds of assets and really show support for those projects when they're doing interesting, exciting things. But the purpose of the flagship is not financial. We have no intention of selling these assets, profiting from these assets. It really is just about OpenSea providing recognition of those that we believe deserve to be recognized.
- [30:42]
A
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- [31:41]
C
It's. I do find it interesting. It's almost kind of like a museum, right, where you're collecting these things because you know they're valuable. You want to make sure you have them for the long term. You kind of want them on display and it's showing some of the most like significant and impactful projects that have come through. So I'm sure from a creator end creators probably look at this and they say it's kind of like the stamp of approval to get featured inside of here. I don't know if you're allowed to say that, but that's how I would view it as a creator, if I was making something.
- [32:11]
D
Look, there are thousands of creators that deserve recognition, and we're not going to be able to recognize all of them inside of the flagship. So I don't want to indicate that if you're not in the flagship collection, you're not worthy in some way. But we are absolutely trying to put a process in place that enables us to historically look at those that have really made an impact and to look at those that are innovating and building really unique and cool things today and giving them their spotlight. I love the characterization of building a museum collection. I would love to see the flagship collection showcased digitally and physically in the real world as we build it up. And I could imagine, you know, lending it to, you know, actual museums that want to show the impact of, you know, Digital Art and Web3 and Blockchain. And so, yeah, look, we're relatively early. I think we've acquired something in the range of a dozen or so assets so far for our flagship, but it's something that we're very committed to, something we'll continue adding to. And I definitely think six to 12 months from now, we're. When you look at the entire collection that we have in the flagship, you know, left to right, it's going to be pretty impressive. And there's probably a lot that we could do there to raise awareness for all the amazing things that are happening in our space.
- [33:26]
C
And I think we'll get there. I think we'll get to a point where, like, traditional museums that, like, a lot of us know and go to it. I think it's just a matter of time whether it's like a history museum where they're like, at this moment in time, like crypto, I'm sure, like 20 years down the right, down the line, maybe 10 years down the line, maybe even less than that. There's going to be museums that are like, hey, blockchain was this incredible thing. And it came out kind of like in the same way where we go to museums and, like, this is like the historical landmarks of, like, the Internet boom. And we all remember these kind of keystones. You could have that.
- [34:02]
D
Yeah. Museum, you know, has their whole exhibition and a lot of really amazing things that are featured there and people that have been involved from the space. I was out at Marfa at the Art Blocks weekend about a week, week and a half ago now. And, you know, there were just exhibition after exhibition in real world of digital assets, digital art and these projects that are making a difference inside of our space. And I think that this is something we will see more and more of. As I mentioned, the whole world starts, you know, spending more and more time of digitally and starts really gaining more appreciation for the fact that digital art is, in fact, a very real artistic medium.
- [34:43]
B
Yeah, no, I know. It's. It's been at the LACMA too, down here in la. There's been some exhibits and stuff, so. Brennan, it's not five years away. It's now.
- [34:53]
D
It's now. Right now.
- [34:54]
B
The future is freaking here. Look, Adam, this is incredible, but while we still have you, I want to get as much info as we possibly can on the sea. The SEA Token. Of course I do. Crypto traders. Us damn traders. No, we're just, you know, you guys have put out a big, you know, post on everything going on, and so we could link to any sort of, you know, public releases and statements that you guys have put out. But, you know, for those of us who aren't big readers and just want to hear the. The short pitch or the short and sweet version of what you guys are planning, can you kind of give us like a, you know, 30,000 foot view of. Of what's going on?
- [35:35]
D
Yeah, I'll start with the legal asterisk of we're not planning anything. This is the Foundation's token, but of course, it is something that OpenSea is greatly supporting. And so what I can say is that the token is coming in Q1. We've already announced that a couple of weeks back. What I can say is that if you are an OG trader of OpenSea and you used the site for years and you drove a lot of volume through the platform, then you're going to be meaningfully considered by the foundation at tge and we see you. What I can say is that those that are currently using the platform, those that never left, those that are participating in our rewards programs, those that are trying out new features of OpenSea, like not just trading NFTs, but also trading tokens and meme coins and the like that we also see you and we really appreciate those that are currently leveraging and using the platform as well. And so the last thing I'll note is that we're working very hard with the foundation to ensure that SEA is not just released as a meme coin to be dropped and forgotten, that it will be deeply integrated into the product and the ecosystem of OpenSea. There will be reasons for you to hold it and to use it, and it's something That I think when people finally see what the foundation has been working on and planning and what we've been working with them on, I think they will appreciate that. We took our time with this because we wanted to really get it right and we wanted to create something that was lasting and sustainable and adds value to our ecosystem, adds value to web3 as a whole. And with that said, if I go any further, I'm probably going to get myself into legal trouble. I'll just pause.
- [37:18]
B
We want you to keep your job after this interview. We don't want to be on, you know, the CNN and, you know, showing us how we just ruined something great so that we'll keep it there. But, you know, what else can we expect from OpenSea? We know there's a big push with the new Upgrade with the OS, the mobile. We know there's, you know, Q1 is something to look out for. Is there anything else that we can take a look at?
- [37:46]
D
Yeah, look, we've talked about a lot of it in this interview, which I really appreciate. And so, you know, obviously we've got OS Mobile on the horizon, we've got Hyper Liquid Perps on the horizon, we've got several new chains that we'll be adding to opensea and be doing that consistently, probably perpetually into the future because we truly want to be the one place that you can go across all chains, all wallets, all asset types, all platforms. We are continuing to improve the token trading product. We've taken a lot of feedback recently on our rewards program and approach and are reevaluating some of the decisions we've made there. And hopefully we'll have some things, things to share there in a couple of weeks. But look, we're really excited for the future. We are building for the long term. We are really trying to create something that is special and sustainable and that can be used by millions and millions of people as the core application to conduct anything that they want to do within web3 and blockchain. We aspire to be that app that sits on the front page of your iPhone in the dock next to your phone and your messages and your email. You know, we really believe that OpenSea can be that. And with that, the future is very bright if we can achieve it. And I think that what we're building in terms of our product is going to surprise and impress a lot of people.
- [39:02]
B
Man, I can't wait. And for those who are listening, who are, you know, brand spanking new kind of to crypto or to NFTs, what would be One word of wisdom, one word of advice that you'd. Not financial advice, but just, you know, general life advice that you'd want to leave with maybe a newbie who's kind of coming into the space.
- [39:18]
D
Oh, wow, that's a, that's a good question. I'd say that my first reaction is to find your tribe. You know, there's a lot of different people that are here for a lot of different reasons. And some people are here for the art, some people are here for gaming, some people are here for the utility, some people are here for community membership. And so you want to find people that are here for the same reasons that excite you to be here. And you know what, if that's financial, if it's just profit, then that's okay. There are entire tribes and communities and telegrams that are just built and designed for that. But you know, I mentioned I was out at Marfa a few weeks ago. You know, there were 5, 600 people that drove out into the middle of the desert and it takes a lot of energy to get out to Marfa. I had to get in a car for eight hours to get out into the middle of the desert and, you know, really hang with all these people. But it was amazing to be with a community of like minded people that really believe in the power of blockchain and web3 and how it relates to digital ownership and art and to be able to have conversations with people that are in that mindset and that felt really special being out in that kind of environment where everybody had to work so hard to get out to this place, just to look around and realize that there are hundreds of other people that are just like you, that have the same convictions. And I was just awestruck by the entire experience. And so, yeah, that would probably be my first word of advice, is find some other people that are excited for the same reasons that you are and then use that as, you know, a springboard to really understand what community and membership really can mean in this space, what art can mean in this space, what financial incentives can mean in this space. Because it's really a very fun playground if you go about it the right way.
- [41:06]
B
Beautifully said. It kind of sounded like the burning man of Web3 and NFTs.
- [41:12]
D
If I could give one word of recommendation, if there is anybody here that is deeply in love with just the artistic side of our space, web3 and blockchain, Marfa weekend from Art Block should not be missed. That was a absolutely unforgettable experience that I've had really uncomparable to anything else in my last five years in crypto.
- [41:32]
A
Wow.
- [41:33]
C
Love it.
- [41:33]
B
Thank you so much, Adam for joining us and for speaking to our Crypto101 community today. Where can people find more? We'll put all those links in the in the show notes. You know your Twitter handle and I don't know if you got a blog or anything, but would love to let you kind of share with the community where people could find you and find OpenSea as well.
- [41:53]
D
Oh sure. Well look, OpenSea IO go use the product, go experience it. If you haven't experienced it for the last couple of months or especially years, go and check out the new OpenSea. I think you'll do a double take and be pleasantly surprised with the innovations and features and everything that we've been adding to it. Obviously follow OpenSea on Twitter. You can follow me on Twitter hollanderadam.
- [42:16]
B
Awesome. Thank you so much and everybody at home listening. Thank you you for your time and your attention for joining us today. Come back same time, same place next week. We'll have some more awesome guests for you. Take care.
- [42:39]
A
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- [43:10]
C
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D
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C
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D
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C
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D
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C
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