Pop Punk - Collector/Artist

Imagine a world where your most cherished possessions are digital, where art thrives beyond the physical and connects people across the globe. That's the realm PopPunk has delved into, and on today's show, he takes us through the vibrant corridors of crypto art and NFTs. From his nostalgic childhood collections to his art lost in Hurricane Katrina, PopPunk's story isn't just about collecting; it's about the rebirth of his passion within the pixels of blockchain technology. We wade through the significance of AI in art, the intricacies of NFT security, and how these digital treasures are reshaping our cultural landscape.

As we cast our eyes to the future, we grapple with the fascinating evolution of the NFT space and the enigmatic dance between digital and traditional art. PopPunk and I mull over the community-centric origins of NFTs and how they've forged a new frontier of connectivity for artists and collectors alike. Twitter buzzes at the heart of this movement, a digital agora where news and camaraderie flourish. Yet, as the NFT canvas stretches, we're left pondering the slow, deliberate march of institutional acceptance and the quest to beckon a wider audience into this electrifying ecosystem.

Closing our session, we share the rollercoaster of emotions that come with the crypto market's highs and lows. We chuckle at the bygone days when Bitcoin bought the mundane and Dogecoin was merely a pup in the digital kennel. But it's not all about the benjamins; it's about finding harmony in our busy lives, discovering the serenity that comes with balance, and embracing the continuous learning curve that is the NFT world. Join us for this kaleidoscopic journey through the heart of modern art collecting, where every pixel tells a story and every story echoes in the blockchain.

https://twitter.com/CryptoPopPunk

Transcript

NorCal Guy: 0:31

Hey everyone, welcome to this next episode of NoorCal and Shill. Today we have PopPunk. Poppunk grew up in the rural Midwest of the US with very little access to books and media. The initial information deficit inspired a deep curiosity about the wider world that he has carried forward throughout his life. He's been in crypto since 2012 and, as a collector, minted his first NFT in 2017. In 2021, he became interested in NFTs again, first through crypto punks and then rapidly got interested in the fine art space that has always been a passion.

NorCal Guy: 1:18

In early 2022, he started exploring AI as a tool to build on his photography background and has continued since exploring the AI space as an artist. While continuing to collect, he teaches NFT personal security classes weekly through boring security, which is a contributor to, and through his own PFP project, new wave surf club. He hosts weekly spaces focused on art and frequently has guests, including Clown Vamp, osf and Patrick Amadon. As an artist, he is constantly pushing the limits of the tools available to him and exploring the possibilities, including the use of AI. Everybody, please, welcome PopPunk. Hey, poppunk, welcome to the podcast. How are you doing today?

Pop Punk: 2:10

NoorCal, it's great to talk to you again. I always love to get to speak to you.

NorCal Guy: 2:16

It is great. The first time we met was out in New York this last year of 23. We had a great time. We were on a panel together. We had a great time at the black box.

Pop Punk: 2:27

I think that's right. Awesome Us in high-perspect yes in high-perspect.

NorCal Guy: 2:33

That was a great time. I enjoyed that. I enjoyed those small little get together, type chatting and getting to know artists and everything. It's really fun.

Pop Punk: 2:43

Absolutely.

NorCal Guy: 2:47

Let's jump in. What were your first thoughts when you heard about crypto art?

Pop Punk: 2:55

I think probably the first thing was way back with Rare Pepe's. Obviously they were on the. I don't even remember the chain. It was Bitcoin, but also you had to have something else I don't remember Counter Party, was it Counter Party?

NorCal Guy: 3:13

Yes.

Pop Punk: 3:14

I thought they were really cool and there wasn't a ton of traction on them, but I just kind of loved that they existed and it was cool to see it. I kind of come from a background of largely art appreciation, little creation and photography over the years, but when I go places to travel pre-crypto, pre-nfts, I always went to art museums and galleries just because I love art and it's something I really appreciate. It was cool even then to see, hey, people are trying to do some art here. And then crypto kitties was the next introduction but honestly I didn't get into it very deep. I met crypto kitties but I didn't get very deep into even PFPs or NFTs until about 2021.

NorCal Guy: 4:04

Yeah, that makes sense. I remember hearing about crypto kitties and I just was like what are they doing over there and playing and just didn't compute for me. It took for me just a little time to make the connection. I made sense of this digital rare money, but the digital art. It took extra time for me for some reason to make that connection.

Pop Punk: 4:34

Yeah, I totally get that. By the way, for me, being able to move value independently Bitcoin and crypto was absolutely super intuitive, and with art, I appreciate it. But I don't know until I took a couple years of not off. I mean, I was still in the space, in the sense I was listening to the podcast keeping up with a few people, but until DeFi summer came along, I checked out a bit and then DeFi occupied all my time and then it was coming out of DeFi I finally re-engaged with the NFT community and I was amazed at all the things that had gotten created and it was exciting at the time. Of course, there was a bit Shortly after I entered.

Pop Punk: 5:19

There was a bit of mania too, so that never hurts in getting interest out, but thankfully I've been able to stay engaged through this bear market as well.

NorCal Guy: 5:30

Right? Did you collect art or baseball cards or anything before you started collecting crypto?

Pop Punk: 5:37

Yeah, absolutely. Probably the best gift I remember as a childhood is like I was the only child to my parents I got. Maybe this is not the norm, but I literally got a present for the last day of school and I think it was kindergarten, and it was like an entire box of TOPS cards and for me, that was exciting. You probably had some similar experiences, like a whole box. I would get excited when I got one pack but like getting a whole box. It was just like wow, did you have baseball? Card experiences too.

NorCal Guy: 6:11

Yeah, yeah, I remember because you'd always buy the packs and then you're like, but up on the shelf was like that box that you could buy, and you're like, man, that'd be awesome to have that box.

Pop Punk: 6:22

I totally feel that Like, yeah, the collecting bug was kind of early. My dad was. I mean, he wasn't a hoarder but he literally kind of he grew up telling stories. You know, he was actually a really good storyteller. I wish I was better at it because he was so good but like he literally, I think from like teenage years on, collected like swords and guns and he got kind of into that from his great grandmother. So there's kind of a lineage of collecting and for me I've always kind of collected regional artists to display, you know, in the home, to hang out in those scenes. My biggest collection was probably in glass art. I lived in Victoria, british Columbia, for a while and that whole Northeast US British Columbia area is very big on like hand blown glass art, and so I picked up, I started building quite a collection there, like took it with me. Unfortunately, I was living on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi in 2005 when Katrina hit and I literally lived a half block from the beach.

Pop Punk: 7:29

So I lost that whole collection and I think that losing it I kind of gave up on collecting. It was kind of I also had like a 3000, not record. I collected CDs so they weren't like super hip or anything, but I was kind of I was very into music, like 3000 CDs and you know I evacuated well you know days before and was fine. But I think losing what I had collected over you know a lot of years before didn't sour me on. I just didn't have the impulse to kind of collect anymore. And I do think I got picked up a bit when I got into the NFT space, although I was collecting quite a bit of regional you know art as well before that. But I just it kind of soured me.

Pop Punk: 8:14

I wasn't like I need to go out and rebuy this whole collection, kind of thing.

NorCal Guy: 8:18

Right Now I feel you on that, because I mean, I feel like there was also like there was that time period where you know CDs and stuff was like that's what we had, and then you started seeing like I remember seeing memory cards, albums and like Best Buy where you could like buy the album on a memory card type thing. Oh yeah, totally remember that and I was like, oh, that's interesting. I mean that makes sense, but I still want my CD yeah.

Pop Punk: 8:53

Like when Napster came around, like I was a huge user of that because it just had, I like to go kind of deep on things I'm into and like you could find rare B sides and you could just find, like if you had an artist you really liked, you could go pretty deep. And I I honestly I think I still do that a little bit. I probably, you know, I spend a lot of time looking in like secondary markets or if I get into an artist you know, quite a bit in this space, like the NFT space, like I want to go kind of understand and find everything they've created. That's just kind of how I am. It doesn't mean I'm going to collect it all, but I just I just have that kind of curiosity, so I still do that quite a bit.

NorCal Guy: 9:33

Yeah, I love it. It's great to go do the deep dive and find you know those. Hit those like relics. It's like they're like hidden in this space it does.

Pop Punk: 9:44

I'm like I've thought about, like you know, stuff deteriorates over time in the physical world and so you know, things are lost and things that then we have. We have some real things like that, but in the NFT space it's all kind of still there, at least at this point, like we haven't like lost a lot of you know NFTs because it's, you know, hopefully they're, you know, on the blockchain and at least pointed at some image that is going to be around for a while kind of thing. You know what I mean, right, but it's kind of hard to do it, and so I have kind of explored, you know, different ways that you would find stuff that other people aren't looking at, maybe because of the type of contract it's on, like you know maybe they only meant it on like foundation or the super rare contract, like the kind of group contracts or you know ASync or something like that or maybe they did.

Pop Punk: 10:34

You know something like that. And I think the broader I mean I know people do it individually, but I think in terms of like the broader market where you see liquidity, there's literally like one person that this has been done comprehensively and that's probably X copy. Everybody you know there's bids on every X copy piece that's you know ever been created, however obscure. But then you get into like packs and there's other people or it goes pretty deep but you know X copies of one. That's kind of like, no matter where you look, like somebody has kind of explored it. But honestly there's lots of artists who you know people haven't really explored as deeply. At least broadly. It isn't reflected in like the secondary market.

Pop Punk: 11:11

Yeah for sure.

NorCal Guy: 11:13

So what are the best things about Web 3 today, and do you have any concerns as it expands and grows?

Pop Punk: 11:22

I mean.

Pop Punk: 11:22

One thing that's probably not very scalable is that I feel like people are more accessible, like I certainly am not like a super insider, but I do acknowledge that, having collected and been in this space a while, I have, you know, a certain amount of privilege, and so it might not apply to everybody, but I do feel like if everyone isn't accessible, they're at least more, so much more accessible than they would be otherwise.

Pop Punk: 11:46

So, just to say, you might not immediately be able to reach the person that you want, but it's kind of like two degrees of separation, or maybe you end up in a group chat eventually or if you interact with them regularly, you can probably, you know, convey something to them. So I like, I think the size is pretty cool and I think it creates kind of a tie community. But even with this size and we're probably still even in this bear mark, you're talking about 10,000 plus artists I would guess there are certainly kind of groups that are formed, but I like the fact that in kind of the one of one like fine art space, that the associations are a little looser than PFPs, so you don't have to like just rep, like I mean, I love my CryptoPunk and I've been around a while so I'm sure, like you know, it's definitely a good identifier and things like that. But it's not like I only hang around with you know people have CryptoPunks, I know you have many but you don't even use it necessarily as your avatar.

Pop Punk: 12:46

So I just feel like people are more about the art and you don't have to be like in a certain group. It's kind of more freeform and you can interact with so many different people.

NorCal Guy: 12:56

Yeah, no, that's one great aspect and you can usually somehow, you know, eventually get in contact with the person you're trying to talk to. It's been nice because I remember when I started out. You know you feel like you're just this little fly on the wall type thing there, but you know people are willing to talk to you and help you out and answer questions and whatnot. It's a great space for that currently.

Pop Punk: 13:27

It's probably some type of case that a Twitter should have because, honestly, there's probably very few more engaged groups on Twitter than, like, people who are into NFTs and maybe, like I mean, I guess, to some degree, crypto. I know there's lots of quote, you know like there's finance Twitter and venture capital Twitter or X or whatever it's called now, but I do think like people have stuck around and actually like use the features. Like when you see people who are using spaces, you know certainly there's lots of people, but so many people in the crypto and NFT space actually use the X slash Twitter products that I feel like we should get more credit for like being almost like beta testers. I don't know if you feel that way, but like we actually like use the product and care about it because it's, you know, one way that we're able to communicate and that's kind of it leads to that more open field. I think a little bit.

NorCal Guy: 14:25

Yeah, no, I do agree on that, because it's like Twitter is like the only place that anyone communicates from this niche market. Like our news is from Twitter. Anything that is going on in the community is on Twitter. Like you're not like going to some website to see what the news is for the day, you're just on Twitter and seeing what's going on.

Pop Punk: 14:50

I mean, it very much feels like that. To the second part of your question, I just say I don't. I'm not really that great at predicting the future. I'm more. It's usually pretty far out.

Pop Punk: 15:01

I would say one thing that I've seen is a lot of people are very idealistic, which I think is awesome. Like you know, this can change everything, etc. Etc. I just someone who's been through like crypto for a decade, I just know that very few things change significantly because we're all still kind of humans in the end and all of the same thinking and biases and patterns and just routines still exist. So I do think NFTs have nudged us in a good direction. You know, making it more accessible, things like that.

Pop Punk: 15:36

I just I wouldn't project a lot of hope that this is like absolutely like a ground changing thing that's going to change everything about our. I mean, that's just my take on it. I think you'll still have you know, strata, you know strata's and like there will be, you know, in crowds and things like that, and I think you already see it to some degree. I just think, at least now and maybe hopefully in the future, it'll be a little looser and certainly the distribution mechanism is a lot better than what we have traditionally. Like you can create anything, it might become more and more difficult to get in front of people, but I still think it's going to be, you know, much better than the traditional art market, which is, you know, very small, at least at the top.

NorCal Guy: 16:22

Yeah, no, I agree, I think it always takes longer than people expect, like I remember when crypto came out in some of the early days and I was just like, oh, it's just right around the corner that we get hyper Bitcoinization, and then, and then it's now. You know, it's been forever. It's like, yeah, I just got to be patient.

Pop Punk: 16:50

It's crazy. Crypto. We literally kind of got the institutions last cycle and then we lost a lot of them. Like literally everybody kind of backed out in the US, it's just so you know the US, it's so difficult for banks to be involved, like I'm not like a big conspiracy theorist but like I literally believe in like the choke point 2.0. Like there's literally no doubt that through kind of executive power, like you know, it's very difficult for like super legit, like institutions that are essentially are too big to fail, who are the biggest financial institutions in the US. It's difficult for them to do crypto based on kind of the regulations that have been handed down.

Pop Punk: 17:30

So I feel like we kind of got there in the sort of last cycle and then it's kind of went away and I'm I'm hoping there's, I'm hoping we can gradually get in there. I think in the rest of the world it's gotten slightly better, but I don't know, and that's still the rails and it's also a lot of the money that comes into the art scene. So I think it's, at least you know, tangentially related.

NorCal Guy: 17:51

Right. What would you like to see more of in the NFT space? It's a really like.

Pop Punk: 17:58

it's a really good question. Just because it's hard to it's, it's hard to say I I'm generally I'm pretty happy with things. I would certainly like to see more collectors. Like I think everybody would like to see more collectors. I don't think there's any doubt about that. We need more money in the space to keep more artists going. I think they're. The quality of work is up there high enough even now that that would be justified. Like I think you know there's some real quality work being created, so I think it would be awesome to have more collectors.

Pop Punk: 18:35

I do not have answers to that. The best I have done is, in some of the art that I've created and I literally had some of this week say, you know, they tweet out kind of their history and they're like, and then I'm like, and then pop punk. You know I was doing PFP into PFPs and then pop punk kind of got me interested in you know, more traditional art. So I don't that's about. The only thing I can claim is I've shifted some PFP people over into traditional art, but I don't know more broadly how to do it.

Pop Punk: 19:02

Like I talk about it, I think like a lot of people at the collecting level are still hobbyist and so when I talk to people in real life, you know I'm not like a big. I was never a big evangelist Like especially with crypto for so long. Everybody thought it was just like so dumb and stupid. So I, you know, plus, I'm a little bit more reserved when I'm not in my community, so I didn't hype up a lot. But I'll talk to people about you know the art and talk about how cool experiences, how you can get into different collections, while you might, you know, lose all the money you put in, you might not end up getting back for a long time or ever, but there's a little more liquidity than the traditional art market. So I talk it up but I don't know quite, you know, how to get there.

NorCal Guy: 19:48

Right, no, that's a good, some good points. I mean, I don't have an answer, that either, so it's nice to discuss it though the dream. So when you're collecting, what makes you decide to buy a piece? I mean, do you watch the artist for a while or is there like? I need that now If you like to let it marinate?

Pop Punk: 20:14

I think there's probably a couple of different ones. One is it just strikes me so hard, like in my mind or whatever, that I'm like at least want to do like a minute of due diligence and then buy it. That certainly does happen. I have that reaction. I would say some pieces, I need multiple exposures. I'm one of the I mean, I'm not one of the few Lots of people are on art share threads. I still run them because I like them and I don't like to be DMed, particularly about art and so I like to do them occasionally.

Pop Punk: 20:47

I think literally I've done. I do them with kind of artists. Who's a friend I'm Clayte every week, which is a different theme, so we do those weekly and she does a cool spotlight thread out of it. So even if nothing's collected which I often collect from it anyway, you know, there's a spotlight thread but just kind of like actual, like collecting threads. I do those probably more than most people who are considered like legit collectors. I know it's a cliche that and it's true that probably like 90% of them are just people trying to engage in a farm. But that's kind of you know how I like to see it. So all of that is to say sometimes it'll take me three times before I finally decide to purchase the piece. Sometimes I like multiple exposures. I think that's probably true in photography more than some things, although I've certainly bought things immediately. So definitely that. And then sometimes, like I was telling you know we were talking about earlier, I just like to explore someone's work and see all the different things they do and it absolutely is the case that when people have shared art with me probably greater than 50% of the time if I collect from them, I end up collecting something else, just because that was enough to generate the interest to like look into it. But then, after I kind of did a deep dive, I found another piece resonated with me more for whatever reason. So I ended up kind of collecting that. So I don't know, that's kind of a little bit of my process.

Pop Punk: 22:10

And then I do collect a little, and collecting is probably not the right word but I do. I am in more liquid markets sometimes, you know popular editions, the stuff that's not necessarily trending, because I don't like to be involved in stuff that's too trending because that's when you end up holding things. But I do dabble in kind of the offer and resell market which I honestly that has like expanded my knowledge in the space because there's areas I wouldn't really have gone into that I went into because of it. Like you know, memes by 6529. I thought they were, you know, cool but it just wasn't my thing.

Pop Punk: 22:49

But I've, you know, become more aware of those type of things out of this and then maybe some artists that I wouldn't traditionally, maybe they're a lot side of my budget, but when the liquidity is there and you know the potential is there, so it's helped me learn a little bit. I would say Rupé Renisto is one where I really liked his work, but it's, you know, at the edge of my kind of budget. But because there's some liquidity there, I learned more, you know about it, became more familiar with the market and then actually literally just for collecting purposes, not for, you know, a flip or anything like that have collected more just because it made me more familiar. So I don't know there's some benefits to even that, but that's probably kind of like a third category.

NorCal Guy: 23:33

Oh nice. No, I like that a lot and I'm with you on like usually, if I like an artist, I'll usually buy a couple pieces at least.

Pop Punk: 23:43

I saw recently you you like joint collective piece, which I hadn't seen that for a while. That was pretty cool.

NorCal Guy: 23:52

Oh yeah, me and clutch recently did that. We did that with Beholding Eye I'm blinking on his name. Why am I blinking on his name? But yes, we did co-collect his Genesis. That was pretty cool. But, yeah, that was awesome. And you know, and since we have like this, we already have a shared wallet for the project that we have. So I was like, oh yeah, we'll just add another wallet onto that ledger and we can just co-collect on that. That's awesome, I love that. But yeah, that was fun. So what's the bet? Do you have a piece of advice or a mantra that you like always comes back to you, something that you might live by, or just something that you always think of and keeps reminding you?

Pop Punk: 24:41

Yeah, for sure I'm, like I'm a big believer in a sustainable pace, like, I think, sustainability in general, but it's probably more specific and sustainable pace, and I think it's a good one for me because and for others, so, like for me, I kind of do, I hang out in this space full time. I create art, I collect art, I write a newsletter, I do spaces. You know, I do some trading, so this is kind of my full time thing. So that gives me, you know, quite a bit of capacity. But even then I really have to be careful to try to find things a sustainable pace, because I don't want to get burned out, I want to make sure I have time for other things in my life, and so I really like the idea of sustain a sustainable pace.

Pop Punk: 25:31

And then for someone who's like you know, they have, like you know, I think about art a lot, but an artist has, like literally four hours a week to create art. You know, let's, like you know, find a pace that's sustainable for you. If that's what you can do, you know, do that, and then maybe it has to decrease sometimes, maybe it has to increase. Maybe you have, you know, 30 minutes a week to be on Twitter just kind of keep active. You know there's lots of artists who just kind of good morning every day and I think literally Twitter rewards that. Now, like Twitter wants tweets to have space to breathe. So like I think the people who tweet like once a day are doing like absolutely fine. Like you know, it gets shown to a bunch of people.

Pop Punk: 26:09

But, I like that idea of like finding a sustainable pace, and it doesn't mean you can't sprint.

Pop Punk: 26:14

Like I come from kind of a little bit of the venture capital world and certainly entrepreneurs and a lot of people who are artists are, you know, they're kind of entrepreneurs in a sense. There are times, yeah, you have to buckle down and do more and really focus, but I don't think those should be like the norm. It should probably be sustainability, and then maybe if you're young or if it's super important, then you can kind of sprint at times, and by that I mean just do more. But I just think if you find that sustainable level, then you also don't judge yourself as much, like you're not like oh, I missed out on that. You know you missed out on that because you were doing a sustainable pace, or you know these artists are having all these sales. I mean it could be a lot of reasons, but in part you know you have to do what is sustainable for you and that allows someone to kind of stay in this space longer. So that's kind of one of my mantras, for sure.

NorCal Guy: 27:04

No, I love that, because when there is that, I mean it's like the dollar cost averaging, like you're like just set it, forget it. You want is like sustainable pace. You have your set, like this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to do this. I'm not going to get caught up in the hype cycle right now, because that definitely happens and people get wrecked when they don't realize what's going on and they don't pace themselves, like you say.

Pop Punk: 27:37

Yeah, I love that. And comparing it to dollar cost averages is awesome too, because, like even in this last kind of bear cycle, I've been dollar cost averaging into the area, you know, for a very small amount compared to maybe what I did in the past, just because I just, you know, believe in it, and I think that's a similar thing. It's like that's a sustainable amount for me. Maybe sometimes I'm able to put more money in, maybe sometimes I'm not, but like that's kind of my baseline sustainable. So I love that comparison.

NorCal Guy: 28:06

Yeah, if you could live or move anywhere, where would you live, and why?

Pop Punk: 28:14

Probably Hawaii, because this is a real thought I've had. My wife and I don't have children, so we're a little less. You know, we're not like well, we can't leave until they're out of school, but we have nieces and nephews that we're close to. So there is kind of a thing. I live in the Midwest and so we're kind of we probably will be here for a long time and I don't dislike where I live. I live in a college town or release region has a good art scene, you know interesting people and things like that. So it's fine.

Pop Punk: 28:45

But I love Hawaii quite a bit. I like the weather, I love the ocean. My PFP project was is New Wave Surf Club and it was literally around surfing. So I'm a super novice surfer, but I mean like super novice, but usually take a class, might do it because I just need so much ballad soap. But I'm very into the water, like even the surfing part's awesome, like that's a transcending experience. But I still just love the water. And for me, like, hawaii is pretty wonderful and we've been fortunate to spend a decent amount of time there on pretty much all the islands and I love it and that's a place I'd love to go. The time zone's a little rough for keeping up with, like Europe, and North.

Pop Punk: 29:33

America, you know You're kind of almost, you're like almost Australians, so I feel like are often treated like black sheep in our space, like all times. Work for Europeans. North America, Africa, maybe even starting to get into like Middle East and India, but Australia, sorry, you're out of luck, and I'm sure that's true of like a lot of places in Asia in general, but I don't know.

NorCal Guy: 29:55

It's very true, it's very true. So what island, though? What island is your favorite?

Pop Punk: 30:01

If I had to oh, that's a hard one, honestly I like, so I probably might top probably like either Kauai or the Big Island. The Big Island's probably most reasonable, like if this was like a reasonable exercise. It's less costly because it's bigger, spread out a little more. I come from the Midwest and where I'm at is very much a car culture, so it's kind of a car culture there too because you have to kind of drive everywhere. So there's a familiarity element. So that would probably be the one that's most reasonable, cost wise and home prices and things like that. But I like Kauai a lot and then I like Oahu as well. I mean, I've honestly spent very little time in God, I'm blanking of the name, the capital, or at least.

NorCal Guy: 31:03

Oh, is a what? No, maui. No, it's another island, haululu. Sorry, I don't even know if I think that is the capital.

Pop Punk: 31:11

But I'm like I've spent very little time in Haululu, which is where the vast population on Hawaii, who is at some good restaurants, things like that, but like the rest of the island, is just unbelievable like North Shore, obviously, with the surfing, but the whole thing. We've done many loops around it, driving and hanging out at different places. So I guess nobody asked for it, but my one piece of advice is, if you go to Oahu, you definitely get out of Haululu. It's a cool place, but the Oahu is so much more than that, so I do like Oahu too. Yeah, nice.

NorCal Guy: 31:49

I know it's your show, but I want to ask where would you live at, If I could ask?

Pop Punk: 31:55

Oh man, for me that's a hard one.

NorCal Guy: 31:59

Like recently with the kids and everything we definitely want to like. I don't know if it necessarily needs to be anywhere specific, but get a few acres have like, just so the kids can go out and run around Like they do so well outside. They love being outside and if we had like a place where we could go and if we had like a place with like a creek or a stream of some sort or a pond, they would be out there for hours and just loving life.

Pop Punk: 32:34

I love that and it's probably like a really good way to situate, given how digital things are. If you start with that, they get familiar with that and really enjoy it, so I think that's pretty cool.

NorCal Guy: 32:46

Right, right. And as far as where that's going to be in the US, I feel like maybe Texas, arkansas, tennessee. Those are like some of the states that we've looked at.

Pop Punk: 33:01

I totally get that. I have a friend who's kind of a Bitcoin whale and we go way back. He bought a lot more at the beginning than I did. I wish I bought as much as you bought, but he's been kind of looking to relocate and a lot of those places were in there and I think he's a little bit more city oriented, so he ended up in Nashville, but that whole area is really cool.

NorCal Guy: 33:25

Yeah, for sure. Do you have a favorite movie quote or music lyric? I?

Pop Punk: 33:32

don't. I'm the worst at quoting things Somebody talked about it but for me, sometimes I get the lyrics, but oftentimes for me the lyrics and this is probably like outing myself it's super, not very deep, but sometimes the lyrics are almost more another instrument and the voices are just like an instrument.

Pop Punk: 33:53

I listen to a lot of techno where there's repetition and things like that, so I'm like horrible at remembering things. I will tell you that I love the Big Short as a movie. I literally can't quote anything from it but for some reason, I mean a lot of my life has been in speculative industries and I just love the idea of a trade that goes against everybody else, that succeeds, and obviously that era was something I was very aware of that 2008, 2009, housing bubble and plus I mean it has had so many good actors, so much good humor. It goes from humor to really serious stuff. So that's an absolute favorite movie.

NorCal Guy: 34:43

Nice, so this is going to be a fun one. What's the best thing and the silliest thing you've spent money on? And you can stick to just the crypto space, or you can go beyond that.

Pop Punk: 34:59

Well, one that comes to mind is like I had a. You know, I married, I had a wedding ring, but I wasn't super like and to my wife's not one of those people it's like oh, it's the most important thing, because this is it. So, like I looked at some other rings I don't know.

Pop Punk: 35:19

this was probably back in 2015, maybe and at the time, overstock, which is like a retailer in the US who you know, they tend to sell literal Overstock, but also I wouldn't say like it's not super sketchy or anything, but it's not like a super high-end, consistent place. But they did sell a lot of jewelry that was legit and so they started taking Bitcoin and I'm like you know it'd be cool to actually because we're like at that time we're in the. You know, we had like the run up to 2014,. We ran up to like 1100, 1200, 1300. And then we had kind of come back down to like 200, $300. I think we got it and got up to like maybe like 600 before in 2017. We had another kind of run up. So like it was in that time and I'm like it'd be cool, you know it's showing that.

Pop Punk: 36:15

You know I was still at the era where, like, bitcoin can be used as money. You know we'll buy something with it. I'll show support for it. So I spent two Bitcoin on this gold ring, which I don't even wear now because, like my dogs, I had them on a leash sometimes and, while they're semi-behaved, like if they pull really hard, I find it kind of smashes my fingers together. So I don't even wear it. But I paid two Bitcoin for this gold ring and you know, at the time that was like $675. Of course now it's worth. I don't even keep track I still hold that coin but honestly I try not to keep track of almost anything but I think it's like above $35,000. So it's like a $70,000, you know. Equivalent ring now.

NorCal Guy: 37:01

I haven't purchased it.

Pop Punk: 37:02

But, yeah, right, right, I don't know Like, do you have one that comes to mind, even if it's like? Nft or just some random contract.

NorCal Guy: 37:13

No, I mean with like Bitcoin. I was like on Cripsy back in the day and I was like, just not making any trades, like I was not winning any trades, and I was just like, whatever, I'm just going to leave it on this exchange and I'll come back later. And like it was a significant amount of time later and I was like, oh, it went under, or the dude rugged and I was lost like three Bitcoin on there. Oh my God, okay, dang it.

Pop Punk: 37:44

That's rough. I have. I don't want to, I'm not trying to. I went up you, but literally like the only exchange. I think there's probably been others because God knows I was on a lot of them, but the one I remember is the same one. It was called Cripsy.

NorCal Guy: 37:58

Yeah, like Cripsy, yeah I don't know like they.

Pop Punk: 38:02

Um, they accepted Dogecoin and I had. You know, I was part of the Reddit community back when we were really trying to early Dogecoin. We were like sponsoring the Bob Slud team from Jamaica. We did a.

Pop Punk: 38:16

NASCAR sponsorship. But there used to be this site and I can't remember exactly what it was called. It was like just bet or something like that, but what it was. It was one of the early um gambling sites where you were essentially betting on a number. So these were pretty common early in Bitcoin. We're like, whatever the blockchain number was between zero and a hundred, you could or I guess it'd be one in a hundred or zero, 99,. However you do it, you could bet on what it would be. So it was kind of independently verifiable because it was a number and whatever something related to the blockchain.

Pop Punk: 38:50

And this guy in Canada, we think, uh, it was one guy running this site and it had like I had six Bitcoin on it once. I had 200, no, not 200. I had between two and five million Dogecoin, which was not worth hardly anything at the time, but he offered Bitcoin and Dogecoin. Well, he didn't rub people, but he closed down. He's like, hey, everybody, I'm closing down, which is probably a huge move. I mean, he made a godly amount of money but you could put money there because you could be the house. He would let you put up your money almost sort of his liquidity and be the house with him, oh, wow, Okay. So I wasn't like playing the games, but I was acting as the house with you know, hundreds thousands of other people. But he's like, okay, I'm ending it.

Pop Punk: 39:33

And he was, did it super well, gave people, you know, tons of time, and so I had this Dogecoin.

Pop Punk: 39:39

I didn't know where to put it and so I put it on that Cripsy site because I didn't have like a native wallet or anything and not, you know, similar to you, you know, I just was not paying attention to it and then found out that they went under and now that was gone.

Pop Punk: 39:52

So when, like, Dogecoin hit like 10 cents, I was like, you know, that would have been a time I might have been 20 million, because at the time I was thinking that would have been a million dollars worth of Dogecoin, I probably wouldn't have held it. Honestly, ETH and BTC are the only things I've been super diamond handed with, like nothing else, I guess art I've been diamond handed with. I probably wouldn't have held it to, like, you know, 10 cents apiece or whatever it ended up being. But that's one I remember quite a bit because every time, you know, Dogecoin has that meme value and I always think about it, but probably, like you, I've been through so many would have, should have or this went wrong, things that like I thankfully get over them really quick because literally if I like hang on, hang on to them, it would be in the hundreds, if not thousands, of like missed opportunities or things like that so.

Pop Punk: 40:44

I think you learn to kind of let them go.

NorCal Guy: 40:47

Yeah, you have to. Otherwise you just would be like sitting in your room like crying about it Cause you're like dang it. I'm really screwed up.

Pop Punk: 40:57

Yeah, it's the way to be. You gotta let things go for sure.

NorCal Guy: 41:01

Yeah, so this is an interesting one. If you could commission a piece and have two artists collaborate on it, which two artists would it be?

Pop Punk: 41:12

I don't want to be judgey on your own show, nor can I, but that is a hard question, like you could ask. What one artist would you want to do it, and I would have trouble with it. Now you want me to take two artists together.

NorCal Guy: 41:24

Well, you just give me.

Pop Punk: 41:26

I just say that's a tough one. I mean your show. You should ask some tough questions. I mean it's really tough.

Pop Punk: 41:34

I'm in the fortunate situation where, you know, I had this AI collection called County Fair AI Nostalgia. It was kind of my first like synthetic post photography collection that did pretty well and I Christopher Shen, and there's been others, neve who have kind of commissioned artists to do pieces that are inspired by it. And you know Christopher Shen's the one I know. I know there's been others, neve and Color has done some as well. So I've been fortunate that you know I've been able to have commissioned artists to do pieces.

Pop Punk: 42:10

And so I guess I would just point to that, like you know, I can't, you know I'm not like going after the biggest names in the space, but I'm trying to go after kind of artists who are in my circle who you know I can afford because I'm paying everybody, obviously, and so I mean you have much more experience, you know collaborating with, you know a ton of people, you know with all the stuff, cool stuff you do, but that's something came to mind, that's kind of my outlet for it and I don't immediately know like two artists I could break together, of course, like I mean, tyler Hobbs is amazing. I just don't know who I would like, who I would like combine artists with, because artists are so distinct. But I think it's awesome question. You know what, like, someday I'm going to DM, it'll come to me and I'm going to DM you. The answer All right. That's fair, that's fair.

NorCal Guy: 43:03

Oh, all right, do you have any questions for me?

Pop Punk: 43:07

Well, honestly, every single one you asked I was kind of interested. I think, at least one, I was explicit in it, but I guess I would have two if you're, if you have the time, one I'd like to throw, you know the question you just asked back on back on. You like who would you like to artists you'd like to see collaborate on a commission piece?

NorCal Guy: 43:30

Oh man, that is so hard. So you know off the top of my head what comes to mind. I would. Maybe this would be like a physical, it would be like Zook and with her oil paintings, and who would?

Pop Punk: 44:04

she pair well with. See that's so hard. When I just wanted to throw, I just wanted to throw it back. I love your answer so far. I'm excited to hear where it ends up.

NorCal Guy: 44:14

I feel like we could do something a little off the wall, like a Zook and since you mentioned, like Tyler Hop, because, look, she only like paints, like figures. But it could be interesting if you're like, hey, let's get out of that box and like, what would you do if you got this code, this thing from like either like Tyler Hobbs or like Dmitri, and they like made off, made a one of one, or like maybe a edition of five off of some different code, and you like made it like a painting of some sort, not exactly like. I don't know how you would do this. I feel like it'd have to be like three dimensional in a way, so she could like give it depth and it would be more than just like her like copying over what they did. Or they could tell her like hey, this is what this program does, make something in your head that comes out like that.

NorCal Guy: 45:21

I think that would. That's how you would do it. You would have the generative artist be like hey, this is what this code does. How would you draw that, your version of that, randomly? I think that would work.

Pop Punk: 45:37

I think that's pretty cool. I like that. Okay, my other question, if you'll indulge me, is so click create has been really successful. So many cool artists. I guess it's two part, like is there anything that you would do differently? You know now that you've had this experience and you know how has the experience been. You know broadly.

NorCal Guy: 46:03

Oh, I don't know. That's a good question. I don't know if I would do anything differently. I felt like it went pretty well Overall. I think we would try and do things further ahead and get more curators and artists prepared earlier, Like we have our curators for season two already and, you know, maybe jump into the interviewing process, you know, two months early instead of like a month ahead, and just make sure everyone's on time and getting everything done, Because when you get those curveballs of someone's not ready or they don't have an artist or something, it's a little bit extra work to get to fill in the gaps.

Pop Punk: 46:56

No, that's cool. I appreciate hearing that. It makes sense. I just I love people who have experienced, like you, kind of hearing. You know both how the experience was, but like anything, they do differently and it sounds really reasonable.

NorCal Guy: 47:11

Yeah, no, it's been great. I think also this next season we're going to push, like the subpass to be prepay only, so you can prepay and get a certain price, instead of because what we have right now is like that 24 hour window for subpass holders and I think we just push it them to like, look, you can pay whenever you want, and then because that first 24 hours, like you're really marketing hard but public doesn't have access to it until the next 24 hours, and so I think if we did prepay, they all get those air dropped and then we go with maybe a phase for any addition holder and then a public phase or something like that I think is what we're working on for season two.

Pop Punk: 48:03

Love that. Congrats on all the success of that. It's been very cool and so many favorite artists are in there, so that's pretty awesome.

NorCal Guy: 48:12

Oh, thanks, thanks, yeah, I mean, and part of that is we wanted to decentralize it to an extent, the curation, because I mean I you know, I only see so many artists on my feed and you get stuck in these bubbles, and I've been introduced to new artists every month, which has been nice.

Pop Punk: 48:34

Yeah, that's one great thing about in the space as much as I like have put in so much time and like, literally, just like I mean the last probably two years has been all about, you know, art like literally every day there's somebody else that is interesting, so it's just like it feels pretty endless and I think that's pretty cool, Like when we get to discover new artists. There's just so much talent in the space.

NorCal Guy: 48:58

Right Now. That definitely is so. Do you have any upcoming projects or anything you'd like to talk about?

Pop Punk: 49:08

Well, I often don't talk about New Wave Surf Club and I think some of them let me mention it a bit. We don't have anything necessarily new. It's a very small PFP project. Not pushing it hard Like this is not like you need to get in, but I will say we've done a hell of a good job. Like I literally credit the community like a very small group. We've taught. We have an NFT security 101 class that we teach. It's, you know, created by my years of experience and the NFT security something I focus on a lot. But also we have lots of people in the community who have contributed and we've taken it to, I think, 60. Now let me down I don't want to use hyperbole For sure 40 different communities and we've taught probably 70 classes in the last year and a half on NFT security. So like we literally you know it's an advantage for potentially founders or people who have, you know, still engaged discord communities or, you know, the next bowl have engaged discord communities. Like we literally come in. It's super lightly branded. Like we talk about New Wave Surf Club like once in the middle and once at the end and it's an hour of just like here are the basics of security and, you know, not really even beyond basics. I mean it's like 99% of what you need. We go over. You know signatures and approvals and you know we talk about hardware, wallets and things of that nature and backups. But I'm pretty proud that we have done that and that's made possible by this community. We also just have lots of cool artists and collectors involved. So it's something that it has been a bit of a struggle because literally, like, our lead artist was one of the people who kind of left the space. I mean he gave notice that he was leaving and that we just never heard from him again. He's a super good guy but like, literally, like it's hard, like when you're he's kind of a co-founder and you're just, you're left with, you know, a great team. Like thankfully we have a great team too. That's beyond that. You know it's all part time and small, but it is a lot to take on. I'm not like what was being it, but it is a lot and I think we've accomplished quite a bit.

Pop Punk: 51:19

We're actually thinking about perhaps some benefit for those who hold a surfer if their account were to be hacked, that we would try to do some of the some of the flashbots, white hat recovery of NFTs in it, which is definitely possible. Usually you have to have very valuable NFTs and pay, kind of the white hats 10% to do it. We're thinking about adding that just because I've been doing that a bit for people just on a, you know, pro bono basis and you know I'd like to extend that out to people. But we also have and we also teach a discord security class. So literally like when people are thinking about who they want to hire, you know, to be mods or community managers, like they can have an on-chain certificate saying you know, I've taken this class. That kind of makes me at least aware of, like the core aspects of discord security, especially as a race day and after you encrypto and that's only for our holders.

Pop Punk: 52:12

So I probably don't talk about as much as I should, because I'm very into the art, but I'm still super active there and the teams active there and I think they should all be proud about the security stuff. But also, you know there are some benefits too. So I would, I would leave it that and of course I'm always working in AI, so maybe some you know, some art in the future, but just always active and starting to see the tiniest bits of bullishness. So I'm I'm pretty bullish. I'm not saying anybody else should like get super bullish, but I'm saying a little bit, so I'm getting excited about that.

NorCal Guy: 52:49

For sure. Sure, I've definitely certainly get excited too, and I thank you for sharing about that. I have definitely put a link to the surf club and security info when this pot goes live, because I definitely think that's a good thing and a big thing that doesn't get talked in enough about or even offered, as like a class is often.

Pop Punk: 53:13

Yep, we're always willing to come in discords if you're ever just like, let's, let's get the click create crew in and do a class, always open. I'll just do a hard sell right now. So keep in mind, right, it's been really good and it's been. I've definitely seen like artists who otherwise would have lost more or lost in general, kind of come out of it and you know kind of the knowledge and literally rabidly idea. You know, I was like on the screen, I was about to click approve and I realized, oh, this is like a signature and not a bit. You know that kind of thing.

Pop Punk: 53:46

So every little bit we can do, you know. I think it helps.

NorCal Guy: 53:51

No, I love that and thank you. Well, pop punk. I want to just thank you for this great conversation that we had. I really enjoyed it, Thank you.

Pop Punk: 54:00

This has been awesome. Norcal, I love all that you're doing in the space. It's just unbelievable, especially with all your family obligations, like you do so much. And it was even as an honor to get to meet you in New York and we talked about it a bit before and may not get to see you this year, but I'm hopeful in the coming years We'll get to hang out again. So it's been awesome. Thanks so much.