WHAT MAKES [thing] COLLECTIBLE? Sometimes I can’t help but 🤦🏽‍♂️ when a company says “check out this collectible [thing] we created”. The [thing] is very often [junk]. We all have “edge skills” where we possess a natural talent, usually supported by countless hours of passionate hard work, that out performs 99.9% of humans. A deep understanding of collectibility, the mindset of collectors, and the best value drivers across a wide range of collectible genres, is one of those edge skills for me. I miss often but I have an established track record of being right a lot more than I’m wrong. A lot of it comes from all that experience (and learning from my many misses) but there are some basics anyone can apply. For [thing] to HAVE A CHANCE at proving to be collectible (i.e., have, hold and grow value), you must ensure that the components are in place for someone else to formulate a thesis (for themselves) on why they can also believe in [thing]. This is by no means an exhaustive list…but some stuff I look at (when I create - and when I collect): - Can the provenance be trusted? Have you undertaken measures to ensure future buyers are confident [thing] is authentic and unaltered? - What are the potential catalysts for future demand of [thing], and how "far-fetched" are they? You only need one catalyst if it's potentially powerful and/or far reaching. However, in most cases, it's a combination of potential catalysts that solidify a strongly held thesis. - Will [thing] be difficult to obtain once demand reaches the catalyst driven projections? Many people fumble here because they grossly under-estimate “catalyst driven demand” because current demand skews their perception. It’s critical that you utilize these lower demand windows to accumulate if you believe in [thing]. From there, trust your thesis’ catalyst to take care of that future demand. **TIP - if you don’t see a POTENTIAL catalyst for 10x future demand - question your overall thesis.** - Does [thing] forge an emotional connection with the owner for the duration of their ownership? Or might [thing] just end up in a junk drawer of apathy after a brief honeymoon phase? (We will skip the counterplay of including "trash bin deflation" from the potential thesis.) - Is one of the emotions [thing] sparks a sense of "pride"? Collectibles can create a wide array of emotions and be successful but if one of them isn’t a sense of pride…tough sledding. - Does [thing] help the owner to create a new community or fit neatly into an existing one? - Are there enough units of [thing] for a market to form with reliable sales comparisons over time? - How does the uniqueness of [thing] contribute to its perceived value? Is there something inherently special or rare about [thing] that cannot be easily replicated? - What is the historical significance or potential future historical importance of [thing]? Does it represent a moment in time, a cultural movement, or an innovative breakthrough? - How does the craftsmanship or artistic merit of [thing] add to its collectibility? Is it made with exceptional skill or creativity that sets it apart from other similar options? - Is there a story or narrative associated with [thing] that enhances its appeal? - Does [thing] have the potential for cross-collectibility, appealing to collectors across different interests or demographics? This is a good starting framework. If you form your thesis for [thing] using this checklist and then have patience…I think you will win a lot more than you lose. 1/2

NEWSFLASH: NFTs are Worthless A little over 3 years ago, I took out the largest onchain loan against an NFT for $25k. Today, I am taking what might be the biggest loan against a single CryptoPunk (possibly a single NFT, but not sure and don't have time to fact check). 1/9

Brandon, we put an instruction here - for each collection there are just 2 hashes to pin (one for all image data, one for metadata) support.sloika.xyz/en/articl…

We want to thank our community for being with us for 3 years. We have made a decision to sunset Sloika as a curated photography platform. We strongly believe in the power of the art community. However, we were unable to find a sustainable and scalable way to serve our community.

I’ve just minted a project that has been in the works since last December, called First Film.  It is the entirety of my first body of work: every frame from start to finish, of my journey into Svaneti, a secluded mountain region in the Caucasus mountains of Georgia (1998-2000).  This collection of 732 film strips documents the evolution of my photographic eye, and shows frame by frame my birth as a photographer.  Every blurry frame and boring thought and hesitation of that journey, but also every risk and breakthrough and reward that made me the photographer I am today. The mint was made possible by @TransientLabs and with the support of my greatest and most patient advocate in web3 @lifeofc, who spent countless hours helping me sort, catalog, and wrangle, and who also built in his “spare time” an incredible public website that makes this archive accessible and searchable for the people of Svaneti and non-Web3 public.  That website is in the links below. I am so grateful for your support brother! The journey represented on these film strips forever changed how I made pictures.  In this film, I begin as a backpacker with a handful of slide film and no vision for storytelling, but over the course of 107 rolls, taken in three journeys over three years, I learned to see. The result was my first photo story, and one that would lead to my career as a National Geographic photographer. As a collection First Film was split into six randomized batches of 122 film strips (plus seven 1/1 easter eggs per batch) and is now owned by four different collectors (who purchases each batch for 2 ETH each), who I would say are MUCH more than collectors and are more like stewards of this archive:  @lifeofc, @GuyNorcal, @14thCenturyFund, and @AlphaTrilogy (who collected two batches).  The 6th and final batch will be auctioned off with a 0 ETH reserve to one last collector in the coming week on @Foundation. (stay tuned!) The movement of such a large collection was made possible by @benstraussphoto and @TransientLabs who were able to batch mint the first 5 parts of the collection (each with 129x ERC-721TL tokens), for a total of 645 tokens for a total gas cost of only 0.032 ETH!!! (other market solutions: 0.5 ETH) Links and more details about this drop in the thread below.

“People will never use Crypto”