Shark, Pickle, Cone Documentary Movie to Debut on May 29th at Consensus 2024, with Chris Waters and Neil Berkeley @ Stoopid Buddy Stoodios

[00:00:00] Hello everybody and welcome to the Crypto Hipster podcast. This is your host Jamil Hasan the Crypto Hipster where I interview founders entrepreneurs

[00:00:09] executives thought leaders and artists all around the world in crypto and blockchain

[00:00:14] And today I have two amazing guests for this podcast

[00:00:18] first is Chris Waters who is an animation industry executive and

[00:00:24] former head of development

[00:00:26] for stupid buddy studios

[00:00:29] Stupid buddy studios work with nouns to create a major art project that is the focus of the documentary

[00:00:36] shark pickle cone I

[00:00:39] also have Neil Berkeley who is an artist and director who has directed multiple documentaries

[00:00:47] Including the movie upcoming movie shark pickle cone which will debut at consensus

[00:00:54] 2024 this week

[00:00:57] Gentlemen welcome. It's an honor. Thank you for having us

[00:01:05] Very welcome. You're very welcome. Thanks for joining me

[00:01:08] I'm interested to find out first about your backgrounds. What are they and are they logical?

[00:01:13] You know what you're doing now and we'll start with Chris is not logical

[00:01:18] Not logical at all

[00:01:19] so my background is in animation I've worked in animation since I graduated college and

[00:01:26] You know

[00:01:27] That's how I got to stupid buddy studio. So prior to that I worked on

[00:01:31] mostly kids and family content for Nickelodeon and Dreamworks and Disney and then became head of development at stupid buddy studios where I

[00:01:39] Helped develop and package shows adult comedy mostly

[00:01:43] But we also did some kids stuff and family stuff and commercials and stupid buddy is very versatile

[00:01:49] studio in terms of the the types of projects that it works on and

[00:01:52] And so we did not have a background in

[00:01:56] Programming or finance or any of a lot of the ways that other people got into crypto

[00:02:00] It was really more as an artist that we discovered nouns and nouns is what really led us into

[00:02:07] Doing a deep dive on on how crypto could impact

[00:02:11] The way things get funded the way things get distributed and marketed and we found that really fascinating

[00:02:18] Yeah, and my name is Neil Berkeley, I'm a documentary filmmaker

[00:02:22] None of my work has been involved in crypto or web 3 up to this point

[00:02:27] But when they brought the project to me, I did spend enough of kovat

[00:02:32] Downtime learning about crypto and web 3 then teased I could at least have the conversation

[00:02:36] And I knew what they were doing with the Dow and I could I could make sense of it all in my head

[00:02:40] The next challenge was making that work in a documentary film

[00:02:44] so this is

[00:02:46] my first

[00:02:48] feature documentary in the crypto world

[00:02:51] But yeah, so I'm a traditional documentary filmmaker. I've made four features

[00:02:55] They're about artists comedians painters writers

[00:02:59] Which was also part of the appeal of this. I did realize how much the nouns community

[00:03:04] Favors and loves and supports the art world. So that was definitely part of my interest

[00:03:08] Very cool. So let's talk about you both are

[00:03:14] Bringing out a film next week, you know work together to create the film. That's going to be a consensus

[00:03:18] That's gonna be a consensus be there it's called shark pickle and cone

[00:03:23] But the company behind that are nouns and stupid buddy studios. So what are they all about and then we'll get into the movie

[00:03:32] Well stupid buddy studios

[00:03:34] Is best known for robot chicken, which is a sketch comedy show really an animated sketch comedy show

[00:03:41] Which was way ahead of its time originally

[00:03:43] Sony was a partner on that it was gonna be like a digital show back when

[00:03:48] Modems were still a thing and people were downloading things on the internet and very quickly. I think they realized that

[00:03:55] people would have to wait too long to download a two-minute sketch and

[00:03:58] eventually robot chicken made its way to adult swim and

[00:04:03] but I think that set the tone for stupid buddy as a studio that really is led by curiosity and

[00:04:09] And like what you know, and they're big obviously big collectors, right? You're dealing with toy nostalgia

[00:04:14] You're dealing with pop culture and so that was a really natural extension for two of the founders really Seth Green and Eric Towner

[00:04:22] To look at at NFTs during that like real big bubble in in 20 and 21 and say like, oh this is interesting

[00:04:28] This is like a new form of collecting so that just naturally appealed to their personal sensibilities

[00:04:33] And then as a studio, I think the idea of you know getting to play in a new sandbox getting to leverage new technologies

[00:04:43] You know that that also just appealed to the culture of the studio

[00:04:46] So that's that's really the the all the DNA was there in terms of stupid buddy

[00:04:52] To to do a deep dive and I think what we loved about nouns was

[00:04:57] In an era where there was a lot of froth and a lot of scams and a lot of people making money

[00:05:02] Sort of in bizarre ways and crypto this like felt very purist. The founders didn't make any money

[00:05:08] There was no there was no like talking up the book. There was no like secondary market really for nouns. It was really

[00:05:17] this gathering of people that felt like

[00:05:21] This was an experiment worth undertaking an experiment in decentralized governance an experiment in

[00:05:28] empowering communities from the bottom up and an experiment in seeing how you could leverage crypto and blockchain technology to

[00:05:36] really

[00:05:37] motivate and and

[00:05:40] Empower communities from around the world to get behind ideas

[00:05:44] And that's that really inspired us and made us want to you know, do do

[00:05:49] Make a film and make a float so we can get into that the story of how all that came together

[00:05:54] But Neil maybe you could talk a little bit about why why the nouns appeal to you

[00:05:58] Yeah

[00:05:58] well

[00:05:59] The nouns appeal to me because it was a DAO in almost the there's a lot of DAOs that are

[00:06:04] Either decentralized or autonomous

[00:06:07] But this one was as close to that as I think I had seen so that was exciting

[00:06:11] but also it was stupid buddy to be honest real like for real like I think there was a I think is a fine line between

[00:06:17] risk friendly and risk ignorant that I think you guys are fine

[00:06:21] Being in the middle of because there was always this feeling of well, we don't know how to do it

[00:06:25] No one knows how to do it. But let's if it's fun, let's try it

[00:06:28] So that was always a cool part of working with stupid buddy because it always felt like there were no bad ideas

[00:06:34] like

[00:06:35] Let's just try it and see if it works as long as it's fun

[00:06:39] But I think nouns especially coming from the documentary world where money starting to get hard to come by

[00:06:45] I there's a lot to unlock and the film goes into it as far as how to navigate those waters

[00:06:49] But I do think the idea of pooling cash

[00:06:53] For resources that have a benefit is a good idea and DAOs are able to do that in a really charming way, especially

[00:07:00] Nouns who is all algorithmically based so the idea that this thing can exist and support

[00:07:07] art community

[00:07:10] Public works

[00:07:11] Is very very cool

[00:07:13] And I think building something that gets the word out on that or introduces it to new people is a great idea

[00:07:19] So i'm really glad we're able to do that

[00:07:23] awesome

[00:07:25] During my normal crypto podcast. I would dive down the doubt. I would dive down the dow rabbit hole

[00:07:29] I'm not gonna do that

[00:07:32] I could do that later, but I want to find out first of all

[00:07:35] About the movie, you know about the documentary shark pickle cone

[00:07:39] You know, what can people discover by watching it and what's been what was your journey?

[00:07:44] with the documentary

[00:07:46] um

[00:07:47] Maybe I can talk about the origins and then you talk

[00:07:50] You know as the director but from an origin standpoint

[00:07:53] We you know when we discovered nouns eric towner and and I

[00:07:57] I think it was just this really fascinating

[00:08:01] Prospect of they were looking for attention. They were like hey, we're a brand that has no ce

[00:08:07] Has no marketing department. We just have a treasury and at the time the treasury was

[00:08:11] 50 million dollars

[00:08:13] And we want to do interesting things

[00:08:15] and uh, you know, we were sort of purpose-built for doing

[00:08:19] Bizarre interesting things we you know, just as a studio

[00:08:23] So we thought of like what would be the most outlandish thing we could do and it would be to build a float and put

[00:08:28] It in the rose parade. This is the 134th rose parade. It's a classic

[00:08:33] It's an institution in the united states to celebrate new years. It's sponsored by a fortune 500 company in honda

[00:08:39] It has just this long history and we thought it was so funny to juxtapose that kind of

[00:08:45] You know that tradition with this new found startup kind of mentality of the nouns

[00:08:51] And it was we thought it'd be a fun culture clash. And so

[00:08:54] As part of that, you know, we knew 30 40 million people from around the world watched that parade

[00:08:59] But we also wanted to to really tell that story of the journey of making the float

[00:09:05] And so as part of our proposal to nouns, we said hey, we'll make a fun documentary about the whole process and in doing that

[00:09:12] I think we can shed light on what nouns is all about

[00:09:15] We had never made a documentary

[00:09:16] So we uh, we called neil and that's how we got hooked in with neil and we're like, hey we have this crazy idea

[00:09:22] We're making a float

[00:09:23] And will you help us make the film and thankfully neil said yes

[00:09:27] Yeah, that that was the real challenge

[00:09:29] I mean definitely the thing about the float is when you build a parade float

[00:09:32] You kind of have to get someone that really knows what they're doing. So

[00:09:36] That story sort of told itself

[00:09:38] Um, but um, yeah, we realized early on that the most interesting or peculiar part about this is the dow

[00:09:45] So just figuring out how to explain the intricacies of a dow and how it works and how you get a prop on chain

[00:09:51] And how you do all these things

[00:09:53] Was really and how you how you tell those stories in a way that someone that's never heard of these things could sort of understand

[00:10:01] That was the hardest part

[00:10:02] Um, like earlier when you said we're gonna talk about you might would normally talk about dow's I thought well

[00:10:07] How much time do we have because?

[00:10:09] That's a long conversation

[00:10:12] But yeah, so the challenge was telling a story that is about this parade float

[00:10:17] That's sort of gonna happen no matter what like this thing has to get ready

[00:10:20] And then also tell this story about this thing that paid for it and it's

[00:10:24] hard to understand

[00:10:26] um

[00:10:27] So yeah, I think we did a good job. I think we explained things without feeling

[00:10:30] uh, like we're overstaying her welcome on some of these ideas, but

[00:10:33] Um, it was definitely not easy

[00:10:37] Well, you didn't tell a room of um, crypt of natives

[00:10:41] About the dow right you told

[00:10:43] People who've never heard about crypto at all that christian. Yeah, that was a challenge, right?

[00:10:48] How what was that challenge like and then what was some of the others?

[00:10:52] big yeah, the biggest challenge was typically, you know, if you're if you're a corporation like disney or

[00:10:59] Uh, you know singapore airlines or any other corporations that put floats into the rose parade

[00:11:04] You have a ceo you have a head of marketing you have a head of publicity

[00:11:07] You know for this it was really helping them wrap their head around that nouns is like a headless

[00:11:14] Uh, you know organization there is no there's no one seat of accountability

[00:11:19] And of course that made them really nervous because normally you you sort of have very clear lines of hierarchy and accountability

[00:11:25] But but I think it helped that stupid buddy was behind that we're an established company 12 years

[00:11:32] uh in in burbank

[00:11:34] Which is another you know

[00:11:37] Community in los angeles and so I think they were able to wrap their head around

[00:11:40] Okay, we know who seth green is and we know that stupid buddy exists and there's an actual place of business. We can go fine

[00:11:47] Uh, so that helped and then I also think they were really trying to appeal to younger demographic

[00:11:52] They're trying to do interesting new things get fresh blood into the parade

[00:11:56] So I think ultimately they decided that risk was was worth it

[00:11:59] Um in order to to do something new and perhaps attract a new

[00:12:04] You know a new audience and and make the the parade feel fresh and and and innovative

[00:12:09] So those two things were probably the keys to us getting this across the line

[00:12:14] But all the way till the end, I don't think they understood at one point

[00:12:17] We needed to show proof of funds and I sent them our wallet address

[00:12:20] And they were like what is this? We need to see like a bank account and I was like, oh this is

[00:12:26] This is uh, yeah, I thought they'd be impressed saying, you know, these funds are immutable and they're on the blockchain

[00:12:31] But they were like no, no, no, we need to see a bank account. So

[00:12:39] Interesting interesting. Yeah, not everybody knows what a wallet is actually a lot of people

[00:12:43] I talked to who I grew up with who want to know more about crypto don't even know what point base is

[00:12:48] Yeah, so yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's a lot

[00:12:51] It's a lot to unpack and most of these people were sort of retirees and volunteers and

[00:12:57] Certainly not on the cutting edge of technology

[00:13:00] Yeah still early

[00:13:02] Yeah, it's still

[00:13:03] Um beer your movie sharp pickle cone helps various artists communities and projects foster community driven innovation, right?

[00:13:10] So make an impact and there's lots of different examples of that. So what are some what are some of those?

[00:13:16] examples

[00:13:17] And how do you see your film helping content creators, you know?

[00:13:23] Develop your mission and vision

[00:13:26] I think

[00:13:27] So many I think in the movie they we talk about they've given away eight million dollars in charitable money

[00:13:33] They've supported over 150 million dollars

[00:13:36] in

[00:13:37] groups that are doing good work, they've fed

[00:13:40] villages in africa they've

[00:13:44] built skate parks they've

[00:13:47] given kit glasses to kids that have

[00:13:49] Seeing issues like the project and these are all in the film the projects they've done

[00:13:54] It's really incredible. It's also incredible that word hasn't gotten out

[00:13:58] I mean it's it's it has and hopefully the movie helps that

[00:14:01] Because it's still it does still feel a little

[00:14:06] Insult i'm correct me wrong chris but still feels kind of small even though they've done so much

[00:14:11] Uh, but the great and as far as artists go the cool thing is when you figure out how to put a prop on

[00:14:17] If your prop

[00:14:18] Let's say it's an art piece. Whatever it is if there's some sort of

[00:14:22] Altruism to it is more likely to go ahead

[00:14:24] But once you're funded and even this film normally if a film was funded by the people that were in it

[00:14:29] That's usually not a good idea. There's a some objectivity issues there

[00:14:33] But it's a dow so there's really no one to make notes

[00:14:36] So once you have those funds you're on your own

[00:14:39] I mean they're there to help and advise but they won't tell you what to do

[00:14:42] They won't tell you what kind of art to make

[00:14:45] Or they won't tell you how to run your thing because there's no one to do that. It's decentralized

[00:14:49] That's the first letter of the d of the dow that that makes it really interesting

[00:14:54] Especially for artists. So it's this way to get funded

[00:14:57] Without having to have a boss which I think is a very very cool and interesting

[00:15:03] Concept. I mean if you're if you're making things that's the ideal, right?

[00:15:08] So yeah that that that was the fascinating part

[00:15:10] That's that i would tell artists to spend some time and figure out

[00:15:13] How to get something on chain because it's a great opportunity to get something made

[00:15:18] That's purely what you want to make

[00:15:23] And what's the role of the dow in all this are they are they voting on whether your project is good and should be

[00:15:29] So does this or how how does it?

[00:15:32] Relation to what you would

[00:15:34] So the simplest and this is you know part part of our objective with the film was to describe

[00:15:39] How nouns works to people that don't know anything about crypto?

[00:15:42] So we've gotten pretty good at explaining it. But the simplest form is

[00:15:46] They auction of digital

[00:15:49] Uh piece of art every single day all the proceeds from that auction

[00:15:53] Go towards the treasury which the dow controls and the dow is just made up of people that have either purchased

[00:15:59] nouns in the past through auction

[00:16:01] or

[00:16:02] That have been delegated those nouns

[00:16:04] So if you own one you could delegate it to somebody that that hasn't bought one and they can be your surrogate voter

[00:16:10] And you put a proposal on chain

[00:16:13] And so everything's transparent. It's opening where the money's going what you're promising to do how you're going to achieve your objectives

[00:16:20] And then anyone that either has bought a noun or has been delegated a noun

[00:16:24] Can vote on that proposal in this three-day window and if your proposal passes with the majority of votes

[00:16:31] then the funds automatically get transferred to the wallet that you've

[00:16:35] Indicated as your as your home wallet and you are off and running and from that point forward

[00:16:41] Any reporting that you do back to the dow is voluntary. There's no notes. There's no feedback. There's no

[00:16:48] Uh, there's no one telling you how or what to do. It really is a trust system and an honor system

[00:16:54] And that is to neil's point. That's what's really novel about this

[00:16:58] Now what is the dow want the dow wants?

[00:17:01] To be as well known that wants the nouns

[00:17:05] Iconography the nouns brand to be as well known as nike or any other big brand, right?

[00:17:09] Their their mission is to do that in a way that's not centralized so

[00:17:13] Empower communities to do interesting things that will then flow back up to people going

[00:17:18] Oh, I want to know more about what this nouns thing is and so

[00:17:21] That's really it and for artists to get money with no strings attached

[00:17:26] Very rare. I mean we're going back to like rants and you know artists back in you know

[00:17:31] Hundreds of years ago that we're getting uh, you know commissions but this this really is like a very novel way

[00:17:38] For artists to get funded and by the way nouns is funding a short film festival

[00:17:42] They fund short films animated films every week. They have a feature film

[00:17:47] That's in production right now all funded by the dow

[00:17:54] Excellent

[00:17:55] excellent

[00:17:56] um

[00:17:57] Neil what are your thoughts?

[00:17:59] Uh, I I get same same like like I was saying I think the the dow is this

[00:18:04] Incredible place to to get things made. Um, start with not having a boss or someone telling you what to do

[00:18:10] As far as their role

[00:18:12] That was it once once I you know when I came on board the film had been funded the film had been up and running

[00:18:18] Uh, so we really didn't have any interaction with the dow other than wanting to talk to them about being in the film

[00:18:23] I mean we interviewed everybody the person that started punk 4156

[00:18:28] He's a pretty major character throughout the whole film

[00:18:30] But at no point were they telling us what to do or what story to tell it was pretty hands-off

[00:18:36] Some of them will see it for the first time at consensus most of them most of them. Yeah, most of them

[00:18:41] Yeah

[00:18:43] I'm looking forward to consensus next week. That's going to be great

[00:18:47] uh

[00:18:48] I recently I said it was a year ago. I had a conversation with someone we talked about rebooting hollywood

[00:18:55] right

[00:18:56] um

[00:18:57] Because hollywood still is this kind of like

[00:19:00] ivory tower corporate kind of environment, right, you know

[00:19:04] How do you gentlemen feel that the dow?

[00:19:07] Structure can make an impact and effect on maybe possibly

[00:19:12] Rebooting hollywood and going back to the days of the independents and getting to independent creators notoriety

[00:19:19] And leveling that that juggernaut

[00:19:23] Um, I think it still needs some form of decentralized distribution

[00:19:29] Right now youtube is the closest version of that. I think

[00:19:33] Um, but it not you know, it's not on the it's not blockchain based

[00:19:36] It's not but as far as like being able to put something out there without the guardrails or the gatekeepers of the typical system

[00:19:43] um

[00:19:44] Funding I think dow's and crypto can help immensely

[00:19:48] Um, I think marketing it can help immensely but there's still not any way for someone to make something

[00:19:55] And then put it somewhere that it can immediately be everywhere

[00:19:59] I think that's the next step is some some sort of way to

[00:20:04] Like right the example right now would be if I could put my film up somewhere and it's on netflix hulu disney youtube

[00:20:10] It goes everywhere or just just delivered to your desktop or your phone that that still doesn't exist

[00:20:16] There's still that those walled gardens everywhere

[00:20:20] Um that I think would be the next big step

[00:20:24] yeah, but in terms of in terms of rebooting

[00:20:28] Some of the things that are

[00:20:30] Challenging with hollywood. I think what hollywood has proven it does really well is like big tent pole

[00:20:35] Blockbuster, you know 200 million dollar movies that that that are very very broad have general audiences

[00:20:43] Where I think the squeeze has been is in lower budget indy films documentaries

[00:20:50] And you know a lot of people have turned to things like kickstarter or patreon to get their things funded and I think

[00:20:57] Uh web 3 presents a real opportunity for niche communities and smaller communities to get behind things that they really believe in

[00:21:04] And I think naturally, you know those things are going to have to find their audience

[00:21:08] That's a challenge in traditional as well as in digital content

[00:21:11] How do you how do you find an audience?

[00:21:13] And I think part of that's going to be on filmmakers to say

[00:21:16] Hey if you get funded for this you also have to now really put your marketing cap on and think about how

[00:21:20] Are you going to get this thing seen and how are you going to get people?

[00:21:24] Aware of it and how are you going to monetize it? And so we're early days in that process

[00:21:29] But we're working with zora and bonfire

[00:21:32] To create ways that super fans can mint the film and then get behind the scenes access to you know

[00:21:38] We have hundreds of hours of interviews

[00:21:41] And we have tons of behind the scenes footage stuff that just can't make a

[00:21:45] You know a 65 minute film so super fans will be able to get access to all of that unlock all of that and

[00:21:51] Watch the film on you know their phone or or cast it to their tv

[00:21:56] We're also launching the film on x which you know in terms of reach has global reach

[00:22:03] But the exciting thing for me is when you put a film on the blockchain

[00:22:08] It can be seen anywhere all across the world. There's no firewalls

[00:22:11] There's no there's nothing that can stop people from from seeing that film

[00:22:15] And so that's what I hope I hope this really opens up an avenue for filmmakers like neil

[00:22:21] Indy filmmakers that have communities that can then find ways novel ways to get their films out and funded

[00:22:30] Sounds good to me. Um, I want to

[00:22:34] I want to talk about that a little bit further. Um, there's going to be a festival

[00:22:38] I believe coming up. I think september. I'll just say called nouns fest october 10. Yes

[00:22:44] Yeah

[00:22:45] Very cool. How can various creators take part in that festival?

[00:22:49] So

[00:22:50] You know, this is our second annual. So the first one was 17 films

[00:22:55] This one is going to be 53 films. We're doing it at the united theater on broadway downtown los angeles october 10th

[00:23:01] Be there go to nouns fest tv and you can buy tickets

[00:23:05] But you know, we opened it up. We had over 400 submissions from filmmakers and animators all across the world

[00:23:12] Uh, so there was a huge appetite for the festival and we went through every one of those submissions and there were so

[00:23:18] many high quality

[00:23:19] Submissions it was very difficult to decide so we know there's huge demand for this festival and we're even having talks with with

[00:23:27] You know some interesting conversations with more traditional distributors

[00:23:30] Um, but short form animation, you know going back to spike and mike and liquid television and adult swim

[00:23:36] There's you know, there's a um, it's a great way to find talent

[00:23:40] It's a great way to get new voices heard and it lends itself really well in animation

[00:23:45] So we're excited to be stepping into a gap that we think

[00:23:49] Kind of never got filled after some of those festivals went away and and certainly adult swim isn't doing as much as they used to do

[00:23:56] And we think that this can be a huge brand in animation

[00:24:00] And really we can help find the next matt graining and

[00:24:04] And you know the next great animator the next great series and so we're really excited

[00:24:08] It's early days, but even just the step up from season one to season two

[00:24:14] And for artists that are interested in participating in next season

[00:24:17] Go to announce fest tv sign up for the newsletter and you'll be the first to hear when we open up submissions for the next round

[00:24:26] Very cool. And then I wanted this

[00:24:29] From my own knowledge, right? You have short form animation. You have long form animation

[00:24:35] Both invited what's the difference and and you know, what's the benefit for both of those kind of both groups of artists?

[00:24:42] Well, you know we have two forms we call them short shorts and tall shorts

[00:24:45] They're both short form right one is three minutes plus one is under two minutes

[00:24:50] And we just think there's you know

[00:24:53] Making animated films usually requires big teams making animated tv shows requires big teams

[00:24:59] But making shorts you have a lot of creators out there that are working with themselves or maybe two or three other people

[00:25:04] So we wanted to make sure that we could get as many artists

[00:25:08] Um available to do this and a lot of them have jobs so to give them an opportunity to do a 30 second short

[00:25:14] They can definitely do that, right? And um, but we also then wanted to get more into storytelling which you know

[00:25:19] You need a couple minutes to to really tell a story and establish characters

[00:25:23] So this was kind of our balance is we want to make this easy for filmmakers to participate

[00:25:29] And then for those that really have a little bit more time and a little more ambition in terms of what they want

[00:25:33] To pull off from a story standpoint. We want to start opening things up there

[00:25:37] So again in the future, maybe we'll get to seven eight ten 12 minute films

[00:25:41] That would be amazing that that we could then submit to the academy awards and things like that

[00:25:46] But for now this is this felt like a great way for us to get as many artists involved as possible

[00:25:52] Awesome. Awesome. I'm

[00:25:55] I'm thinking back to when I was in my 20s

[00:25:58] My art house films independent films all the time and I wanted to be a director and that that that dream, you know

[00:26:04] That ended up being a dream, but there are you know, um, there are a lot of nft creators

[00:26:10] There are a lot of artists who once nfts came out

[00:26:14] In the early, you know 2021 22 and 22 when they got hot were making money for the very first time

[00:26:21] You know and the nfts went a little bit down as far as market, you know, but now they're coming back

[00:26:28] Uh, what words of wisdom do you have for artists who might be?

[00:26:32] On the fence, you know might not be you know who are about pursuing their dreams

[00:26:38] What words of wisdom do you have for them now that we have this technology now that we have the dow now that they now

[00:26:44] That you are out in the market. What what can you offer? What what can what words of wisdom do you have for those?

[00:26:49] There's artists well, i'll go first and then neil you can go because i'll have to jump after this answer

[00:26:53] But i'll say I think

[00:26:56] There's no shortcuts

[00:26:58] So build an audience curate your content

[00:27:01] Don't expect to get rich quickly and really have respect for the medium and have respect for what the technology can do

[00:27:08] And that really is like if you focus on making great art focus on

[00:27:13] Building an audience that's really invested in what you're doing

[00:27:17] There's you know, that's going to be the key

[00:27:19] This isn't a magic technology that that all of a sudden is going to make you rich

[00:27:23] That was a but that was like a bubble and there was a lot of speculative investment

[00:27:27] But none of that investment was emotional or that had really much to do with the artists themselves

[00:27:31] It was people trying to get in early and make a quick buck

[00:27:35] So I think you have to be in it for the long haul you have to be committed to understanding and learning the technology

[00:27:41] There's a lot of great tools. I would start with zora that make minting things really easy now, but that that's a tool

[00:27:48] Really your job is to build an audience make great art and service that audience and and get them to

[00:27:54] To be excited about the art you're making not about making money themselves in the near term

[00:27:59] So my recommendation would be

[00:28:01] You know, it's just another tool in your tool belt in terms of marketing and promotion and monetizing things

[00:28:07] But you still got to do the work and you still got to make great art

[00:28:11] Thank you very much

[00:28:14] Um, yeah, I will second everything he said the one thing i'll also

[00:28:19] Recommend is is the thing that got me into it was discovering smart contracts because

[00:28:24] I think once you realize what smart contracts are and what they do

[00:28:28] And you look at a call sheet from the director to the principals producers as execs all the way down to grips and gaffers

[00:28:35] That smart contracts allow for a seamless payment system for all these people

[00:28:40] So

[00:28:41] Anytime a project does well or makes money that royalty or that future payment can get automatically distributed to these people and it's all in the blockchain

[00:28:50] It's all lives there forever. Yeah, it can be changed but once it's done

[00:28:56] It's this thing you don't have to think about so it kind of reduces the the friction of payments

[00:29:00] And and I think that that's something that any artist should be excited about

[00:29:05] Um

[00:29:06] I know that royalty payments on nfts aren't what they used to be but smart contracts as a concept to me is

[00:29:13] Fascinating and probably in my mind the way

[00:29:17] Any any agreement that I think the idea of the concept of smart contracts before you get into blockchain and

[00:29:24] Web3 and nfts before you get too deep down the rabbit hole. I think

[00:29:28] That for me discovering that concept that you can lock in

[00:29:33] Payments for these things and then it's controlled by the network or the algorithm

[00:29:37] To me that was fascinating. I mean even learning about nouns that all that money that's in their treasury

[00:29:43] Isn't touched by anybody

[00:29:45] Um, if a proposal passes that money gets sent to them algorithmically

[00:29:51] And I think that's with the way it should be in all payments

[00:29:55] Um a low touch less human interaction with payments is great and I think smart contracts that that's what I would say is learn about

[00:30:02] Those and it'll probably rabbit hole from there. But to me that was the that's what opened up the world when I discovered that idea

[00:30:14] awesome

[00:30:16] So one last question for you. Sure. Um, there's lots of classes with there's gonna be a lot of events of consensus

[00:30:22] You know, um a lot of different videos. Why should people?

[00:30:27] watch shark pickle cone

[00:30:29] while consensus next week, I think everyone at consensus should come watch this movie because

[00:30:35] So i'll be honest like selling this movie in the market was difficult because the the general market everyone that's not at consensus

[00:30:42] Wants crypto to fail

[00:30:44] They think it's all rugs. They think it's all thieves. They think it's all criminals

[00:30:48] They think most people and I will say most people think this is a seedy scary horrible world

[00:30:54] um, and because we didn't have a lot of that in our film

[00:30:58] We do talk a little bit about how bad it can be but

[00:31:01] Not a lot went bad again nouns is controlled by an algorithm

[00:31:04] There's not a lot of people that can you can't steal from it. You can't steal from people

[00:31:08] So I think it would be refreshing for everyone at consensus to see a film

[00:31:13] That really does show the power of these communities

[00:31:16] the power of blockchain the power of of

[00:31:21] Web3

[00:31:22] um that how much it can do to organize a group of people around an idea

[00:31:27] And make sure the money is there when they need it

[00:31:31] uh is fascinating and I think it's something you could probably give watch and then give to your

[00:31:35] Mom who has no idea what you're doing at your computer all day

[00:31:39] And say here's what i'm supporting. Here's the world I live in because

[00:31:42] I only met really wonderful people trying to do wonderful things

[00:31:47] very ambitious in their goals of

[00:31:50] Putting art in the world and affecting the world and changing the world

[00:31:55] And they're they're putting their money where their digital mouths are I think

[00:32:01] So I think it would just be a

[00:32:03] Refreshing reminder for a lot of people at consensus that

[00:32:07] Despite what everyone thinks there is a there are a lot of good cool fun

[00:32:12] Things being done at scale

[00:32:17] Awesome. Awesome

[00:32:19] Um, I want to thank you very much for your time today. I enjoyed this conversation a lot

[00:32:24] My last question for you, um, i'm looking forward to hopefully meeting you next

[00:32:29] Yeah, say hi

[00:32:32] How can how can people find out more information about you about stupid buddy studios about nouns fest about nouns

[00:32:41] How can they do that?

[00:32:42] Yeah, I think um, i'm not sure nouns fest has been announced yet

[00:32:47] um the

[00:32:49] Website for the film is sharkpicklecone.wtf

[00:32:52] Um, and me they can you know, neil berkeley i'm i'm easy to find

[00:32:57] I'm only on instagram very little on twitter

[00:33:00] um, but yeah if it's just

[00:33:02] Google i hate to say google me but i'm i'm very available

[00:33:06] Uh and nouns fest. I think it's probably going to be on stupid buddy studios website

[00:33:09] Thank you gentlemen very much for your time today

[00:33:12] Nice meeting you. Thank you very much