Welcome to GM, BFF, a newsletter hitting your inbox biweekly with key insights from Web3, crypto, our community and beyond. Subscribe here.
It’s Pride Month in the year 2023, and despite decades of political organizing and non-stop advancements in tech, we still witness the relentless erasure of people whose societal contributions enrich our lives.
From drag bans to Target’s failed attempt at rainbow capitalism, this year’s Pride Month hits differently, with U.S. state lawmakers audaciously targeting the trans and LGBTQIA+ communities in record numbers. Despite any good intentions of well-meaning allies and progressive corporations, the truth is that cultural change often incites vitriol and causes harm to the most vulnerable people.
To risk sounding like a tone-deaf decentralization maxi (we’re not), there is a budding question as to whether blockchain technology can play a role in empowering the LGBTQIA+ community. While Web3 is certainly not a cure-all, a number of artists and community organizers are exploring the use of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) as a tool of cultural preservation in a world that seems keen to uphold rigid heternormativity.
Rachel Rampleman, a Brooklyn-based video artist, is the creator of Life is Drag, the largest digital archive of drag in the United States. At a time when drag is under fire, Rampleman feels motivated to preserve the legacy of the art form with three-to-four-second NFT gifs that capture the essence of iconic performers.
“It feels really important,” she said. “It’s especially timely now.”
A long-time practitioner in the digital art space, Rampleman studied with Kevin McCoy, who is credited with minting the first NFT, as a graduate student at NYU.
“He was my professor 20 years ago,” she said. “Now we’re neighbors, and we’re still friends.”
Since then, Rampleman has enjoyed a long and varied career, and she spent the past four years interviewing and photographing more than 200 performance artists who do drag and neo-burlesque. Her project recently culminated in a six-month residency at New York’s the cell, where Rampleman says she took over the top floor of the “gorgeous” historic townhouse and picked the brains of McCoy and other technologists to decide on how she’d present her collection as NFTs.
Rampleman describes her interest in NFTs as born from the impulse to document “ephemeral” performances. Drag is ephemeral both because live theater is hard to capture and because conservative lawmakers are attempting to outlaw it. She hopes that putting drag on chain will establish provenance for her pieces, giving them value and making them collectible for years to come.
“I would love to partner with an institution or a museum,” said Rampleman. And now, with NFTs serving as the digital record of her work, she may be more easily able to do so.
The collection will drop in 2023, with a special preview at an upcoming Web3 Collector’s Salon hosted by the cultural organization CADAF and organized by CADAF founder and CEO Elena Zavelev. The panel will discuss “Pride as Performance: Preserving The Ephemeral” and feature distinguished artists, historians and drag performers including:
The discussion will take place in New York City on the evening of Thursday, June 8 from 6 to 9 pm ET. Tickets are free. RSVP here.
This month is meant to be a time for celebration and commemoration in which we honor the millions of LGBTQIA+ individuals across the world. But it’s also a moment for recognizing how we can work together more collaboratively to protect our colleagues, friends and family members in this global community.
New Yorkers: Get Tickets To The Pride Month Web3 Collectors Salon
The EU slaps Meta with a billion-dollar fine. Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) accused the tech giant of infringing upon the EU’s data protection regulations.
AI in 1,000 new languages. Meta’s new AI models can reportedly recognize and produce speech for many more languages than we see currently on most apps. The company will be posting its models for the public to see on GitHub.
Pixel Penguins scammers walk with $117k—what a bummer. Web3’s latest feel-good news story turned out to be just another rug pull.
Three Arrows Capital NFT sale raises $2.4 million. In the first of a series of Sotheby’s auctions, the bankrupt crypto hedge fund 3AC sold seven pieces from its NFT collection, including works from Tyler Hobbs, Larva Labs, Dmitri Cherniak and 0xDEAFBEEF.
A major NFT documentary will premiere at Tribeca. Directed by Nicholas Bruckman, the production team includes SheFi founder Maggie Love, Protocol Labs’ Molly Mackinlay and an impressive crew of creatives.
A quick regulation catch-up. We definitely can’t track every new regulatory development, but we provide an overarching summary on BFF Discover.
Rent the Runway CEO and Co-founder Jennifer Hyman spoke to Stanford Business School about the power of optimism.
AI Scientist and Entrepreneur Rana el Kaliouby was mentioned in this post on the female founders of AI startups.
Bobbie CEO and Co-founder Laura Modi was featured in The Business Post for hitting $100 million in revenue.
Thanks for reading! We’d love to hear from you. Feel free to let us know what you think of this newsletter and what you’d like to see from it in the future by emailing hello@mybff.com.
🚨 This newsletter and all the information in it does not constitute financial advice. If you don’t want to invest money or time in Web3, you don’t have to. As always: Do your own research.
Megan DeMatteo is BFF's Editorial Partner.
