Subscribe:https://vagobond.substack.com
Archives:https://www.vagobond.com
Discord: https://discord.gg/2nBRJJvyeR
@vagobond
Got a scoop or want to join us? Reach out to me via DMs on Twitter or in the Vagobond Discord.

If your email has truncated this briefing – see the entire briefing at https://vagobond.com/

April 04, 2022

GM and Aloha Frens,

March was a month to remember. I was fortunate to meet so many great people and solidify metaverse friendships into real world friendships in Austin and then on my recent trip to L.A., I got to reconnect with family and friends, attend a pretty cool event put on by $LIT, and most importantly spend some amazingly fun days with my 10-year-old daughter as we explored fun things to do in SoCal.

Still, it hasn’t been an easy month. My aunt and uncle both passed away. My marriage has continued to follow suit – but with complications to outright ending it – which is really hard. My IRL business sits in a state of limbo as my CTO has abandoned his life (and work) and moved onto a sailboat – I love that he is doing what he needs to do for himself – but the consequences to our joint venture have been more than a little devastating. And – there are some other challenges that have at times put me seriously down in the dumps.

This is life though, right? I look at the challenges people are facing in other places or situations and my troubles pale by comparison – in fact, I need to remind myself to count my blessings – of which I have many. I hope you do as well.

~CD

Vagobond’s Recent NFT Acquisitions

I’m not minting anything these days unless it’s either free and gasless or an essential part of a collection I already hold. I feel like pfps and generative 10k collections have come as far as they can and now it’s the established winners in this space that will give us something new. Possibly like what BAYC is doing with $APE or BYO is doing with their universe. I don’t know – but I’m watching for it and looking for opportunities to either take profits or increase my stake in projects that I think might bring about the next wave of innovation.

At this point, it’s safe to assume that every new project is either a rug or a future failure. There are just too many unknowns and too many scams. Blue chip projects and solid teams are the safest bet – but even something like BAYC has an uncertain future in a space that has only developed over the past year. All of that being said – I did mint several new things over the past week.
I minted several of the free to holders of Bloot – Bloot Comic. https://opensea.io/assets/0xf12f0fd99e913fde707c449e488e67687ec1a7c4/947
I minted a SuperLocal Mayorship for the Disneyland Park – in the event that SuperLocal takes off this could be the best thing I’ve ever minted – if not, it was a waste of .07 ETH https://opensea.io/assets/0x31979f9d3f9af5171bfff403c9270d925d1b7f7d/185
And I minted Elysium at .4 ETH – at this point, minting anything that expensive feels really stupid. Time will tell – it could be a genius move but since I’m suffering some buyers remorse – at best it would be lucky if that is the case. Offering private jets and free apartment stays it definitely feels ‘too good to be true’ https://opensea.io/assets/0x446f86cd99d4c0f29380a2d8abde7822190c26bb/1319

News & Alpha

* ALPHA * – The Vagobond Discord is one of the best free alpha servers around. You might see it in this briefing, but you’ll definitely see it in the Alpha channel of our discord first.

Pour yourself a hot cup of Joe and settle in…this is everything you need to know about Nuclear Nerds and Roadmap 2.0. 🧵 pic.twitter.com/QKDGCItnyp

— Nuclear Nerds (@nuclearnerds) March 31, 2022

Terra’s Do Quon Planning on Dumping BTC to zero – can he do it? I hate seeing these kinds of stories but the bottom line is – you can’t count on anything.
Inverse Finance DeFi App drained for millions of $$
Elon Musk took a nearly 10% stake in Twitter – DOGE is spiking
DJ Kudos Crypto Round Up of all the top crypto stories last week
BAYC Land Drop Rumored to be priced in $APE
KYC for YugaLabs thing closed on April 01. Did you KYC? I missed it.
Here’s some serious Alpha for you. I’m going to be tokenizing and distributing my startup corporation to holders of Bald Jesus and Vagobond NFTs. Iwahai, Inc. is a Delaware C Corporation and the owner of Voic Musk Takes Nearly $3B Stake in Twitter; DOGE Spikes eMarkr which can be found in the the Apple and Android app stores. VoiceMarkr is a voice centered social media and communications platform which will be owned and developed further by the community – so if you want to be a part of it – you should join the Vagobond Discord ASAP.

Here are the app store versions that exist now – soon to be updated: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/iwahai/id1441200141?mt=8 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.iwahai and finally here is the progressive web app that lets you listen to markers but doesn’t give you the ability to make them like the apps do. https://www.voicemarkr.com/

Literary NFT Beat

Find the latest at https://vagobond.com/literary-nft-beat/

Compiled and Shared by Greg R. Fishbone at Cryptoversal Books and the NFT Bookstore

Listings are not an endorsement of books or services.

Announcing Sitka World

Sitka World is an immersive project that’s setting new standards in Web3 storytelling. If the quality of a Discord deployment can make or break a project, the Sitka World server is a master class in doing things right, starting with an onboarding experience that sets the tone in a way I’ve never seen done before. Invite only at the moment, but if you score an invite, you will want to set aside the time and attention to appreciate the experience—you won’t be disappointed.

Sitka World has a vision of helping authors tell their stories while building Web3 platforms and communities, and a collaboration with Cryptoversal Books promises to advance their collective ability to help all creators to optimize their outreach efforts.

What I’m looking forward to most is having a front-row view as Rae brings the world she’s spent years building to life through NFT books and collectible art. It looks like such an amazing story and I’m very excited to watch it take off.

https://twitter.com/SitkaWorldNFT/status/1510832212605902852?s=20&t=aB9pbEw1rEV7BZr4QGawKQ

NFT Bookstore in Beta

As of April 1st, the NFT Bookstore on Polygon is in beta with an official launch scheduled for April 30th. Fiat credit and debit card purchases are being facilitated and carbon offsets will ensure that all transactions are carbon negative. Until NFT books can be minted directly into the bookstore later in the year, initial listings will include pre-order tokens, NFT-authenticated physical books, book-themed collectibles, and text-on-image NFT poetry. An NFT Bookstore on Ethereum will be announced upon the completion of that blockchain’s transition to a proof-of-stake system.

https://twitter.com/Cryptoversalbks/status/1510958052383547398?s=20&t=5fIGm5YyTuvHR3sbJa-0GA

The Web3 LinkTree and Blog

A promising beta for authors, app.bio from the makers of Cent is a decentralized linktree attached to an on-chain blog and blog entry NFT minter. A single URL collects social media and other links, allows fans to subscribe for updates, and to mint their as NFTs that can be traded with secondary royalties going to the author.

My app.bio can be found at http://greg.app.bio

Will Bookverse Be the Web3 Kindle Killer?

Another entry into an increasingly crowded field, Bookverse is an application that allows users to buy, sell, and trade licensed digital books. With Bookverse, users can obtain common, limited, rare, and autographed editions of their favorite books.

https://twitter.com/bookversexyz/status/1508853111091257358?s=20&t=aB9pbEw1rEV7BZr4QGawKQ

An Incubator for NFT Books

This looks interesting. Advants is a Web3 incubator for authors that seems to involve Kickstarter-style fundraising through NFTs and fan communities. If anyone finds out more, let me know.

“Advants is an incubator helping book authors to use web3 tools to fund their work.

“Before writing your book, you can use an NFT crowdfund to effectively earn an advance. After publishing, you can earn additional revenue by selling NFTs to passionate fans. Supporters buy these NFTs to publicly signal their support, join a community of fellow supporters, and own the digital collectible. The end result is more funding to tell the stories you want to tell.”

—GRF

Lit NFT Organizations:

So many formats, so many blockchains, so many promising experiments…

🆕 Advants (Website | Twitter) – A Web3 incubator for authors that offers Kickstarter-style fundraising through NFTs and fan communities.

Alexandria Labs (Website | Twitter | Discord) – Literary NFT publisher and marketplace. Enabling NFT annotations.

Annie’s Bookshop (Website | Twitter | Discord) – Publisher of generative NFT books in MP4 animation format.

The Atheneum Project (Website | Twitter | Discord) – AI-generated poetry creation tool and literary NFT publisher.

Barewords (Website | Twitter | Discord) – Publisher of NFT poetry in text-on-image format.

BookCoin (Website | Twitter | Discord) – Publisher and marketplace for books “tokenized” into NFT text-on-image format. Token: $BKCN (anticipated Q3 2022, Allow List Open)

BooksGoSocial (Website) – Publisher of centralized NFT books on the Wax blockchain with downloadable content stored in ZIP files on DropBox.

Cosmia (Website | Facebook) – Italian-based women’s literary NFT publisher and DAO on the NEAR blockchain.

Creatokia (Wesbite | Twitter | Discord) – Literary NFT publisher and marketplace from the parent company of book producer and distributor Bookwire. Token: $NFTBS

Crypto Poetry (Wesbite | Twitter | Discord) – Curated community of NFT poets with links to their works.

Cryptoversal Books (Website | Twitter | Facebook | Discord) – Author community and publisher of author-centric, marketplace-portable, carbon-neutral, NFT-first smart-books.

Jenkins the Valet (Website | Twitter | Discord) – Multimedia studio creating content, including literary NFTs, from licensed characters from the BAYC and MAYC collections and from an upcoming collection of original PFPs.

KOTA (Website | Twitter | Discord) – Literary NFT minter, marketplace, and mobile app planned to deploy on a blockchain being developed through the European Blockchain Services Infrastructure project of the EU’s European Blockchain Partnership.

LIT DAO (ICO | Twitter | Discord | Telegram) – A cultural DAO including literary, artistic, musical, and fashion NFTs. Token: $LIT

Medusa Writer’s Studio (Website | Discord) – A community-directed space for holders of the Medusa Collection to direct the creation of an original novel and collection lore.

Mirror (Website | Twitter | Discord) – Literary web publisher and NFT minter and marketplace on the Ethereum blockchain with an integrated crowdsource funding platform. Token: $WRITE

NFTBooks (Website | Twitter | Telegram) – Upcoming literary NFT publisher and marketplace. Token: $NFTBS

NFT Bookstore on Polygon (Website | Twitter | Facebook) – Carbon-negative marketplace for NFT books, poetry, and collectibles.

Nuclear Nerds (Website | Twitter | Discord) – A lore generation project integrated into a generative NFT art collection. Holders respond to prompts about their character to build the story world.

PageDAO (Website | Twitter | Discord) – A DAO for authors innovating the formats and accessibility of NFT books. Minter on Polygon blockchain now open to DAO members. Token: $PAGE

Readl (Website | Twitter | Discord) – Literary NFT minter and marketplace on Moonriver blockchain. Beta marketplace now open. Token: Rumored by End of Year 2022.

Soltype (Website | Twitter | Discord) – Literary NFT minter and marketplace on Solana blockchain. Beta minter and marketplace now open.

sonnet/work (Website | Twitter | Discord) – NFT Poetry platform on Polygon blockchain.

TimeWriter (Website | Twitter | Discord) – A collaborative writing experiment starting at the midpoint of a story that expands forward and backward in matching steps.

Token Literary (Discord) – Focused on helping creators with marketing, logistics, and tokenomics.

The VerseVerse (Website | Twitter | Instagram) – Community of NFT Poets with links to their curated works.

WIP Publishing (Website) – The publishing arm of PageDAO.

Zang (Website | Twitter | Discord) – NFT Poetry minter on Polygon blockchain.

Literary NFT Podcasts and Discussions:

The Creative Penn (Website | Spotify | Apple) – Hosted by Joanna Penn, covering multiple aspects of writing but often including valuable information about NFT publishing.

Creatokia: Blockchain for Publishers (Creatokia: Spotify | Apple) – Hosted by John Ruhrmann, Jens Klingelhöfer, and Videl Bar-Kar of Bookwire.

Crypto Writer Talks (Crypto Writers: Spotify | Apple) – Hosted by members of the Crypto Writers Discord.

Soltype Podcast (Soltype: Youtube) – Hosted by Paco Puylaert, Juan Pablo Briceno, and Donald Frederick of Soltype.

Literary NFT Format Guide:

Animated: The cover or content of the NFT includes animated elements.

Audiobook: The NFT includes voice narration.

Centralized: Content stored and accessed from a hard drive, cloud server, or other single-point system.

Decentralized: Content stored and accessed from a network of hundreds or thousands of nodes, designed as a more durable, secure, and tamper-proof system.

ERC-20: A digital token representing an asset that is fungible, or identical to others of its kind, and which may be used to purchase or unlock content, establish governance rights in an organization, or qualify recipients of airdropped content. ERC-20 tokens that operate as the native currency of a blockchain can also be called coins.

ERC-721: A digital token representing an asset that is non-fungible, or unique, describing a digital file or physical object to which it is linked. ERC-721 tokens are one type of NFT.

ERC-1155: A digital token representing an asset that may be either fungible or non-fungible describing a digital file or physical object to which it is linked. ERC-1155 tokens are considered NFTs even in fungible implementations.

Gated Reader: The NFT can be read by the holder through a token-gated website or marketplace feature.

Generative: The title, content, and/or design of the work includes randomly generated traits within a collection of unique works.

Integrated Reader: The NFT can be openly read in the marketplace.

Interactive: The user’s actions or choices affect the reading experience.

Print on Demand: Holders can have a physical copy shipped to their address.

Text-on-Image: A poem or book excerpt presented in a visual format, often with a complementary background.

Unlockable Content: Holders unlock textual content in the metadata of the NFT.

Unlockable Downloadable: Holders unlock an access code, discount code, or instructions for accessing content from a centralized source.

NFT Textbooks/Guides:

Tim Boucher, NFT Books: Publishing & Promotion Guide (Lost Books: OpenSea) – Unlockable downloadable NFT book on the Polygon blockchain, providing guidance to authors on using blockchain technology to produce and promote their works.

Gary K. Michelson, et al., Copyright Basics (PageDAO: OpenSea) – NFT textbook chapter with integrated reader on Polygon blockchain.

Neil Strauss, Survive All Apocalypses (LIT DAO: OpenSea) – NFT survival guide in integrated reader on Ethereum blockchain, notable for assigning copyright interests to a randomly selected holder.

NFT Scripture:

1455 Gutenberg Bible (PageDAO/OpenSea) – NFT scripture with integrated reader on Polygon blockchain.

1611 KJV Book of Genesis (PageDAO/OpenSea) – NFT scripture with integrated reader on Polygon blockchain.

Vagobond, Holy Bjble–AB Edition (PageDAO/OpenSea) – NFT scripture with integrated reader on Polygon blockchain.

NFT Poetry Books:

Indefatigable, Peace of Mind (PageDAO/OpenSea) – NFT spoken poetry collection with integrated reader on Polygon blockchain.

wordstobecrossroad, puff (Soltype) – Genesis NFT poetry collection with integrated reader on Solana blockchain.

NFT Novels:

Dazerine, T. Dylan Daniel, SpartTwain, White Chocolate, The Mask of Ganymede (PageDao/NFT Book Bazaar) – NFT book and audiobook in gated reader with print-on-demand feature on Ethereum blockchain.

Brian Toups, Drifter (OpenSea) – NFT book in integrated reader on Ethereum blockchain.

Literary NFT Collections:

Greg R. Fishbone, “Mad Messages” Collection (OpenSea) – Unlockable content NFT book chapters of Galaxy Games series book The Mad Messenger on Polygon blockchain.

Saami Heyes, “Night Creatures” Collection (Objkt) – Text-on-image NFT poetry on Tezos blockchain.

Saami Heyes, “Saami’s Journal” Collection (Foundation) – Text-on-image NFT poetry on Ethereum blockchain.

Mark Manson, “The Subtle Art…” Collection (BookCoin | OpenSea) – Text-on-image NFT tokenization of NYT bestseller The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck on Ethereum blockchain.

OddWritings, “Oddness 2022” Collection (OpenSea) – Text-on-image NFT poetry on Polygon blockchain.

OddWritings, “EmergentPoems” Collection (OpenSea) – Text-on-image NFT poetry on Ethereum blockchain.

Enzo Chul Ortega, “Tales from the Blockchain” Collection (OpenSea) – Unlockable content NFT short stories on Polygon blockchain.

Various, “Barewords” Collection (Barewords/OpenSea) – Text-on-image NFT poetry on Polygon blockchain.

Various, “Genesis” Collection (WIP Publishing/OpenSea) – NFT books in an integrated reader on Ethereum blockchain.

Various, “Genesis v2” Collection (WIP Publishing/OpenSea) – NFT books in an integrated reader on Polygon blockchain.

Various, “Limited First NFT Ebook Edition” Collection (Winehouse Publishing: OpenSea) – nearly 100 public domain classics presented as unlockable content links to decentralized ePub files in NFTs on the Ethereum blockchain. Each book has its own ISBN.

Various, “Readme” Collection (PageDAO/OpenSea) – NFT books in integrated reader on Polygon blockchain.

Literary NFTs (Anticipated):

Neil Struass, Jenkins the Valet (Jenkins the Valet) –Holders may choose to burn or stake the book for rewards. Anticipated April-ish.

Literary NFT Collections (Anticipated):

Bailey Bridgewater, Various Titles (Annie’s Bookshop) – 1,984 unique generative titles of animated MP4 books in the Crime genre. Currently pre-sale.

Mary Esther Farnstrom, Various Titles (Annie’s Bookshop) – 1,984 unique generative titles of animated MP4 books in the Horror genre. Currently pre-sale.

Patrick Garrett, Various Titles (Annie’s Bookshop) – 1,984 unique generative titles of animated MP4 books in the Post-Apocalyptic genre. Currently pre-sale.

Alicia Suastika, Various Titles (Annie’s Bookshop) – 1,984 unique generative titles of animated MP4 books in the Romance genre. Currently pre-sale.

Alan Watts, The Wisdom of Insecurity and There Is Never Anything But the Present (BookCoin) – Anticipated Q1 2022.

Shawn Whitney, Various Titles (Annie’s Bookshop) – 1,984 unique generative titles of animated MP4 books in the Sci-Fi genre. Currently in a pre-sale phase.

Lit NFT Projects in Hibernation:

Organizations with no apparent activity in over six months.

Bookchain (Website | Twitter | Facebook) – Literary NFT bookseller offering ERC-20 tokens linked to ebooks.

Publica (Website | Twitter | Facebook) – Early pioneer in blockchain publishing, issuing ERC-20 tokens on a proprietary exchange to unlock content in a proprietary wallet.

Winehouse Publishing (Website | Twitter | Facebook) – Sweden-based traditional-crypto hybrid multilingual publisher of public domain classics on the Ethereum blockchain. Each book has its own ISBN. The collection represents a great investment in work, but no sales or new listings since June 2021.

Bubbling Up:

Organizations with potential to enter the space.

🆕 Bookverse (Website | Twitter) – An app currently in development that promises an NFT book marketplace and integrated reader.

The First NFT/Metaverse Religion- Bald Jesusism

April Holidays

There are no formal or regular holidays in Bald Jesusism for the month of April beyond the full moon and this year, fasting for Ramadan along with our Muslim frens. The full details of the fast can be found in the Holy Bjble – but essentially it is this – during daylight hours you don’t eat or drink anything – not even water. At night, you can feast and have a blast. Meditate on happiness. Gather with friends and enjoy the feeling of light deprivation – and then consider those who don’t get to make a choice in the matter!

The Full Moon Holiday this month is very special. Not only is it occurring during the month of Ramadan, but it is also a Pink Moon and the Paschal Full Moon aka the first full moon of Spring! April 16th is the day to celebrate this. Take the day off from drudgery and work, get outside, enjoy life with the people you love! The week following the Pascal Full Moon is a special holiday for our Christian Frens – Easter! Now, don’t get confused between Bald Jesus and the Christian Jesus – not the same dude but just like we love the Ramadan fast in BJism, we also love the idea of renewal, rebirth, and saving the entire world – so make sure you celebrate with some chocolate and a few colorful rabbit eggs!

The holidays of Bald Jesusism are meant to be fun and healthy for you and your fam. Enjoy them!

https://www.baldjesus.com | Bald Jesus Twitter | Holy Bjble Twitter

https://www.baldjesusdrinkingclub.com – Minting Now!- for Bald Jesus Drinking Club

.04 ETH limited to 777 total

Holy Bjble – AB version – Readable on OS! Only .001 ETH on Polygon so no gas

Bald Jesus is Your Bro! Don’t Be a Dick

Useful Info

I periodically move all of this to the NFT 101 page on Vagobond.com https://vagobond.com/nft-101/

Watchlist for upcoming projects:

Art Heads – I won a free mint of this project, so I’m watching for the mint.

Evmos Punks – The failure of the Evmos Chain the first go around is not promising – but since they learn as they go – this is still a great project to be watching for iteration and innovation.

Great Projects I’m Not In or Following:

aka projects I missed and am salty about. There are too many – see the whole list at:

https://vagobond.com/nft-101/great-nft-projects-ive-missed/

Missed in April: Probably quite a lot

Tokens & Staking

These are the tokens and crypto/defi projects that NFTs have led me to. Bizarre when you think about it. See the full list at here

These are projects that I wanted to believe in that simply seem like they are dead. I bought into many of these instead of the winning projects above. Take that as a warning. I sincerely hope that they resurrect – but when I put them here, it means that I’ve stopped believing and looking. I hope to someday have a section at the top called ‘Resurrections’ for when projects in the Graveyard manage to rise up again. As time goes on, I have no doubt this will be the biggest section of this newsletter and I will let it keep growing so that those who care to look can understand that the majority of projects fail and investors lose money. Pick wisely, my friends, and good luck!

Newly Buried: See the huge full list at https://vagobond.com/nft-101/nft-project-graveyard/