This week’s Web3 Wrap features an assortment of news and happenings from NFY.NYC, which describes itself as “the leading annual non-fungible token event,” as well as Holly Herndon’s mind-blowing Holly+ lecture and performance, news that Catalog records can now be streamed and viewed on Opensea, and more.
Check it all out below.
NFT.NYC Parties Go Off—With FWB’s New Gatekeeper Technology
Friends With Benefits (FWB) rolled out a new token-gated ticketing technology at NFT.NYC, called FWB Gatekeeper.
The Web3 ticketing and RSVP solution was first rolled out for FWB Paris in July and has since been in relatively private beta. Gatekeeper allows for token gating of IRL events and works by verifying that the correct token and amount of tokens are held by the RSVPing wallet. Once that is verified, the signer (attendee) will be assigned a ticket with a QR code that can be scanned for admission at the event. Gatekeeper also collects all attending wallet addresses for follow-ups, such as POAP (Proof Of Attendance Protocol) NFTs, the airdropping of performance recordings to attendees, and data visualization.
Gatekeeper was rolled out more widely at NFT.NYC, with numerous events using the technology to anecdotal success. Some of the events including The Heart Party Vol. 2 NYC, which featured DJ sets by Baauer and D33J, among others; Gn, which hosted DJ sets from Claude Von Stroke and Nala, as well as renowned digital artists Tyler Hobbs, IX Shells, and xCopy; Offchain, a party hosted by SquiggleDAO and TileDAO, which featured Sextile, Naeem and Pictureplane, and Alan Palomo of Neon Indian; and FWB’s own event, which hosted live performances by Haleek Maul and Pussy Riot, and DJ sets from Caroline Polachek, Doss, Chanel Tres, Ghostly International’s Sam Valenti IV, and many more.
You can find out more about FWB Gatekeeper here.
Announcements and Happenings at NFT.NYC
There were more than a handful of big announcements at NFT.NYC this week.
Some of the biggest artists, communities, and brands operating in Web3 attended NFT.NYC, which ran from November 1 to 4, using it as a springboard to announce new projects and to host events and exclusive drops.
Key happenings and announcements included Quintin Tarrantino’s NFT drop, which would be in an edition of seven and include never-before-seen content and uncut scenes from Pulp Fiction, and “secrets” that the NFT owners could choose to unveil to the public; Bored Ape Yacht Club’s Ape Fest, which included a yacht and warehouse party, charity dinner, and a BAYC merch pop-up; a Web3 Times Square takeover, which included hosted billboards featuring art and logos from xCOPY, Tyler Hobbs, FWB, Adam Bomb Squad, Utpoia, Gremplin, CryptoPunks, and many more; shadowy creator and designer Pak’s IRL face-reveal stunt, which invited followers into Times Square to take selfies with a masked character that turned out to be actor Ezra Miller; and the massive Dreamverse gallery, which hosted musical performances and art from over 150 artists.
Catalog Records Can Now Be Streamed and Viewed on Opensea
Catalog Records can now be viewed, streamed, and sold on Opensea.
Catalog Records are one-of-one records minted using a customized framework of Zora’s protocol. Late this week, Catalog shared that records minted and hosted on Catalog can now be featured in collections on Opensea, the NFT space’s biggest marketplace and aggregator—last month Opensea had close to 300,000 active traders on Ethereum alone. This is a monumental development for music NFTs and their wider adoption in the Web3 space.
Holly Herndon Hosts a Lecture and Performance Detailing Her Holly+ Project at Sonar Festival
Holly Herndon shared details about and performed with Holly+, her AI twin, at Sonar Festival, giving attendees an in-depth look into the project.
We first featured Holly+ just after the project’s launch in our first Web3 Weekly Wrap. Holly+ is essentially an AI version of Herndon and a tool that allows creators to create music and art with Herndon’s voice and image. One of main features of Holly+ utilizes what Herndon refers to as Spawning, which, according to Herndon, gives users the “ability to create works in the likeness of others by interacting with a model trained on them”—Herndon also used Spawning for her self-portrait series Classified. Artists can create works with Holly+ and officially publish them if run through the Holly+DAO, which is a governance structure that verifies official usage—anyone can use Holly+ but only those signed by the DAO will be considered official works.
During the lecture, the IRL usage of the Holly+ technology and tools were showcased, with Tarta Relena and Maria Arnal signing live with and through Holly+. In a further display of the applications of Holly+, Herndon’s partner Mat Dryhurst sang through Holly+ in a jaw-dropping display of the spawning technology.
You can read more about the event on Herndon’s Twitter, and try Holly+ for yourself here.
Legacy Brands and Platforms Continue to Enter the Metaverse
This week more legacy brands and platforms made clear that they were committing to Web3.
In a slightly undercover move, Nike made clear their plans to enter the metaverse with a new trademark filing on October 27 that included “downloadable virtual goods” in “computer programs featuring digital footwear” that would be “for use online and in online virtual worlds,” as reported by NFT Now. Nike’s job listing also shows that the company is looking for three Virtual Material Designer IIs.
Reddit also announced that it plans to onboard its 500 million users to Web3, as stated by its new crypto engineer Rahul. This follows Reddit’s “The Great Reddit Scaling Bake-Off,” which invited Ethereum teams to develop an L2 solution, with Offchain Lab’s Arbitrum deemed the winner. As Rahul explains, the plan is to tokenize Reddit to become a fully decentralized social media platform, giving ownership and governance to the users and members that use the service. Reportedly, everything will be “permissionless, open-source and decentralized,” and tokenized community points are already in use by at least two subreddits.
What to Join and Who to Follow:
Pak: designer, developer, and creator of Lost Poets and Undream.
The Willow Tree: a DAO with a mission to “co-own and co-create the global home for underground electronic culture.”
Jess Sloss: co-creator at Seed Club and SquiggleDAO member.
Refraction DAO: a decentralized festival and community of artists, curators, technicians, and fans. You can also join the Discord.
