wavWRLD's Weekly Wavs 🌊🌐🎶 Issue #18
Your Guide to the Best Emerging Artists & Songs in Music x New Internet
gm to the waviest fam of them all!
Holy guacamole has this been a big week. Not to mention the fact that we were all hot messes this past Halloweekend (you can lie to me, but not to yourself!), web3 is back in national headlines as some of the largest companies in the world double-down on decentralized technology.
Now is an exceptional time for a state of the union on current social media platforms. Twitter has been bought and immediately set aflame by—hate him or love him—the meme daddy himself (I hope nobody actually needed that link). Meta, after having its lunch eaten for the past two years by a certain Chinese-based “entertainment platform,” is investing in its creators in an attempt to re-establish its dominance (see below). TikTok is still tik tokkin’, but concerns about the safety of app data are leading to renewed calls for its ban in the good old US of A.
What a mess! Buckle up, though, buckaroo—opportunities abound for the enterprising artist.
wavNEWS 📰
As a part of a whole new suite of new creator tools, Meta is rolling out features that allow creators to sell NFTs on Instagram. NFTs will be on the Polygon blockchain, and currently a select group of creators are testing the update. With 2.5 billion (with a b) users, Instagram is the fourth-largest social platform in the world behind Facebook, YouTube, and WhatsApp—making this the biggest news in mainstream NFT adoption perhaps ever. So why now?
It’s super important to consider where Meta currently sits relative to other social platforms. Its stock price dropped by 25% last week as quarterly earnings underwhelmed once again. Ad revenues—the foundation of Meta’s business—are down, especially among the small-to-medium-business category it has dominated for so long.
Even as Meta sees minor success cannibalizing features like Stories and Reels, it’s too slow to keep up with a platform like Tik Tok—where the time users spend on the app is growing by over 200% year over year.
As a result, Meta is going all-in on the metaverse. Reality Labs, the unit responsible for building AR and VR tech that will underpin the to-be-built metaverse, has already posted $9.4 billion (also with a b) in losses so far this year. And guess what: Investors are out of their minds pissed off at what they see is a total waste of money that doesn’t connect to the core business they originally paid for.
So let’s take a bird’s eye view. Meta, the longstanding kings of the internet, are seeing their reign slowly decline as people get more and more tired of increasingly ad-ruined experiences. Tik Tok is the conductor of the hype train dead-set on running tired old Mark Zuckerberg into the ground, so he’s gone all-in on the metaverse—hoping that he can pull a rabbit out of the hat and basically build the infrastructure for the next phase of virtual connectivity.
Given that landscape, Meta is heavily incentivizing itself to bring about the metaverse ASAP—and that starts with getting people comfortable with existing blockchain technology. Meta is forcing mainstream culture to play its hand: it’s betting that NFTs are just a little cold right now and as soon as things heat up they can be there to reap the rewards.
In theory, it’s not a bad bet. Hell, it’s the same one that each of us are making by spending time in this space. But the key difference is that we’re not under multi-billion-dollar (one last time, with a b) pressure from the biggest stockholders in the world to deliver on our metaverse promises ahead of schedule.
So, as this news is coated in the calming pink-purple of Instagram’s branding, keep your nose out for the underlying stench of desperation that accompanies it. If Meta has once again predicted the future, then mastering this new feature early on could lead to immense success for the inspired artist.
But, as we’ve so often seen, the hype pendulum swings both ways. There’s always that chance that …….. IT’S A RUG!!!
Also of note! Beats—the project of major fren of wavWRLD watcher.eth—is officially live! Beats brings music to Lens Protocol to enable on-chain music discovery and interaction. Artists have a range of creation tools at their disposal while collectors can follow both artists and curators for a feed that reflects their unique taste and style.
If you’re an artist, submit to this form for a chance to join the platform. If you’re a collector, don’t you have your Lens profile yet? 😉
wavLIST 🎶
Fresh wavs & what we’re listening to this week from the WRLD:
FUTRxLGND (aka Rocky Snyda x JAYPROB)’s first record on Sound, “WHISTLE WHILE YOU HURT”
SOLD OUT, but there may be NFTs for sale on Sound market.
JED XO’s drop of his song “Can’t Stop” aka The JGEDNESIS, which he wrote when he was neglected by family and friends because he decided to pursue a career in Music. More details here!
Mint this Open Edition on Manifold until Nov 25th for 0.035 ETH
greydient’s new single that’s out!
Jackintheway’s ɴᴇᴡ ᴀʟʙᴜᴍ “ᴡᴀʏꜱᴘᴀᴄᴇ” ᴏᴜᴛ ɴᴏᴡ!! Listen to it on all platforms.
He also dropped the entire album as NFTs on his own super cool mint site.
Minting is closed, but there may be NFTs for sale on the secondary market.
Ghost Train’s release of an Art and Music NFT series on duality, in collaboration with Nifty Music App.
wavALPHA 👀
Upcoming drops & projects that you need to know about:
Only 5 more days to collect Karma.wav’s free NFT of his song “MOMENTS” on Showtime. It’s the 3rd ever Music Drop on Showtime—A free collectible for saving his song "MOMENTS" to your Spotify library.
Collect it until Nov 9th here & go listen to “MOMENTS” on any platform!
Ayotemi is doing something that’s never been done in the Web3 space before… On Monday, Nov 7th, he will be releasing ONLY 3️⃣3️⃣ GIV Tokens. It will be a FREE MINT.
Starting Nov 11th, he will be releasing 3️⃣ Live Pieces as collectible NFTs EACH FRIDAY.
If you manage to collect all 3️⃣ pieces before they sell out, you will be airdropped the below NFT and you will be mailed 📫 the Coveted, Limited Edition “Ruby Red Grapefruit Dompen.”
Set a reminder for his space on Monday, Nov 7th at 11am ET.
If you're into musicians innovating in web3, the legendary Saint Rien has started rolling out Les Pétales de la Genèse... 🥀 1,111 Editions | 0 ETH | SAINTLIST ONLY | 11/11 Will be the date.
Want to be eligible for the first round of Petales? 🥀🥀🥀 Make sure to collect one of his drops before 11.17.22—Sign up for more info here.
This is Suave’s third week in a row creating an open edition drop! He’ll be minting one track a week for the next three weeks :)
Open edition lasts 1 week at 0.005 on Manifold.
theBasement Discos are celebrating 10 years of theBasement Sound by issuing their first wave of NFTs 💃 It's the evolution of their label. LaCasita - A Limited Edition NFT Series—More on what it is & why you should get one here!
wavSPACES 🎙️
As fans of all things wavy you know we’re hyped on Hurric4n3’s WaveFest happening Friday, November 4th at 7pm CT! If you’re down and in or around H-Town just know that it’s a category 4 storm headed in your direction. Free tix for NFT holders—around here, we call that utility. Details here.
Also with an in-person spaces situation is tu tu tu tu tuuuulengua with the inaugural WELCOME TO LAS CALIFORNIAS festival crossing both the URL>IRL and USA>MX borders. On November 4th and 5th, Baja is the place for the bilingual and multicultural vibes. Vamos!! Tix and details here.
This Tuesday, Nov 8th on the BS Radio Podcast, shxdw and illuminatedbabe interview her majesty Charm MF Taylor! Listeners will have the chance to get to know Charm via fun and heartfelt segments that include rants, giving advice to people who didn’t ask for it and gratefulness. Episode airs this Tuesday, 11/8 at 9pm ET (EST now folks, not EDT)—set a reminder for the space here.
wavTIPs 💡
I’m actually a little impressed you made it this far, so here’s my tip for this week: take a load off. I hurt my back working out this morning, so I’m currently lying on the couch contemplating my life decisions. Not ideal.
-Spence the Guru, musician & senior writer at wavWRLD
Much love and talk to you all next week!
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Thanks to our contributing writer Spence & contributing curators Violetta & Jade!
It’s all about the wavs we make with friends along the way.
-wavWRLD 🌊🌐🌱
Awesome newsletter per usual 🖤