Speaker A: All right.

Speaker B: Hello and welcome everyone to another episode of Waiting to Be Signed, a special interview episode, an FX# emergency. interview episode. We're joined today by Bjørn Staal, who some of you may know as @nonfigurativ_ on Twitter and from some of his past releases. Trinity is here as well, and we are convening to talk about the first fxhash Vertex release, Entangled. How's it going everyone? Good morning. We're excited to talk about this release.

Speaker C: I'm excited.

Speaker A: Y'all, are you excited?

Speaker C: How much have you talked about this in the past?

Speaker A: Well, I mean, it's been a couple of interviews now and It's an ongoing process still. So I'm kind of working on it still, figuring things out and sort of the concept has been developing as I've been working on the actual implementation. So I guess we can find some new stuff to talk about as well.

Speaker B: I hope so. Well, we know that you spoke with Ken last year after your tweet blew up showing the 2 windows and the entangled particle systems kind of interacting with one another. Is there any other media that you want to plug? Any other resources people should go check out?

Speaker A: There's an upcoming video interview with Le Random that will be published soon, I think, probably before the release. And yeah, because I went to Belgium a couple of weeks ago, met with the fxhash team there, and we filmed an interview and we were looking at a space there because we're putting on an exhibition in relation to Entangled, where I'm working on this robotics installation to sort of have a kind of like a physical manifestation of the Entangled project. So there will be an exhibition there in September that we're working on as well. So really cool to meet the whole team there. And yeah, as I mentioned, we filmed an interview there and I think it will be released this or early next week.

Speaker B: I did not know there's gonna be a live component to this, so I think we should definitely dig into that.

Speaker C: more.

Speaker B: But before we jump into the project and the whole process behind it, you know, the first question is always to get your background in art and coding and how you came to NFTs. So I know, I know we got some of that on Ken's podcast, but for those who didn't hear it, take it away, Bjørn, and tell us how did you get here?

Speaker A: Depends how far back you want to go, but, uh, I got into coding, programming when I was a teenager, 12, 13 years old. I got exposed to Flash I was already really into drawing and making things with computers, all sorts of like early versions of 3D software and that kind of thing. And I got super stoked about Flash. I saw some websites that kind of blew my mind and I wanted to learn. So started first off animating things by hand, drawing things like that, and then gradually getting into ActionScript, just very simple things. And then that really pushed me into the sort of more technical side of art and design. I mean, Being an artist was not really something that was on the menu. You know, I come from this like kind of lower middle class family in this sort of working class city, and you know you have to think about what job are you going to have when you grow up, right? And being an artist was not really something that anyone considered to be a real opportunity. So for me, I studied art like you know in high school. I went to this special high school for art, and then I. Kind of understood that if I want to keep doing this or do this as a profession, I'd have to go into the design industry. So after high school, I studied photography, art photography for a year, and then I studied graphic design. And I was still programming as, you know, like a pastime thing. And while I was in design school, I got more and more into programming and I got exposed to Joshua Davis, who's one of the old timers. He's still in the, or he's like in the NFT scene now as well. It's pretty cool. Got super inspired and kind of delved into generative art a little bit back then and interactive projects in general. And then I got a job offer, so I quit school and I started working when I was like 20 and then worked for, I don't know, 8, 9 years in different design studios in Oslo before me and some close friends started Void in 2015. At the time I'd really gotten into the whole like OpenFrameworks scene. I'm not sure if you're aware, it's this C++ framework, kind of like Processing, but a little bit more hardcore and a little bit more—

Speaker C: Better.

Speaker A: Uh, yeah, better for some things, better for some things, not for all things actually. Yeah, yeah, more down to the metal. You can do more high performance stuff and, and specifically if you want to work with more hardware components, it's usually easier since most drivers and ways of communicating with different hardware components, they usually have like a C or C++ library. So yeah, that's like a really good framework that, amongst other, Zach Lieberman was one of the sort of early pioneers that helped develop it. And we use that a lot in the time at Void where we built physical interactive installations from varying from smaller sculpture-like things to large-scale public installations. Like, one of the last projects I finished before I quit the studio last year was this really huge light installation that is a permanent installation in the city center of Oslo where I live, where we have like 3D cameras tracking everyone that moves around and these like rivers of light passing through a whole city block of Oslo. So that was kind of at the height of my professional career, building my own studio with my friends. And, and I got into NFTs early '21, I guess. I'd read about it before, and I saw some friends from my Twitter sphere at the time, and they started, you know, getting into things. I was quite busy with my company, and I also have 2 kids, so I just started reading about it a little bit, learning a little bit, and I didn't really get it You know, with the whole JPEG thing. And it was first when I, when I got exposed to Art Blocks that I really felt like, okay, wow, this is actually a very interesting marriage of generative art and blockchain technology. And I was really stoked by this idea of on-chain, storing the script on-chain, and that sort of purity of the concept. So I did an experiment there in '21. You know, had to line up and wait for a couple of months to get reviewed. And then I released a project there in August of '21, the Lifts of Sisyphus. I chose a really hard name for it. And, you know, it was basically sort of an experiment to see how this platform works and writing JavaScript again. I hadn't written JavaScript for many years. And then since then, it's been a thing that I did, you know, in my spare time a little bit while I was working at Void still. Yeah. But I guess the idea grew on me over time that I've had this, you know, dream for a long time to do my own thing. Not so much get away from my colleagues, more than, more like, you know, be independent in the way I work and not do like client work. Because, you know, at the time I'd been doing client work for close to 15 years. So yeah, and it seemed like NFTs, or well, it did for many, you know, it sort of made this possible to earn a living on something that most people had just been doing as a hobby before and not really having any sort of financial upside to it. So April last year, the sort of decision came out of the blue, but I just felt like, okay, I just really want to try this and see if I can make a career for myself basically as an individual artist. And, you know, my plan At the time was to sort of experiment more, give myself the space to really explore ideas that I have and learn new techniques. And I'm very interested in the technical side of things as well as the artistic side. So just giving myself that kind of playground. Yeah, and released a couple of projects since, but I move quite slowly. I take my time. I really like to work everything to a level where I feel like it's really It's really good from my point of view. And also like in this specific project, the Entangled project, I've also, you know, worked with fx hash to get this physical component in place, which has taken a lot of time as well and going back and forth in terms of finding venue and, you know, all sorts of other things that are not directly connected to the piece itself. So the time that we've waited since you first saw that demo before Christmas, You know, a lot of time has gone into working on the series itself, but also a lot of time planning this installation and exhibition component. And fx hash has built this website, you know, like a mini website specifically for this project because it's a bit complex. So, you know, minting on both chains and seeing the entangled pairs and that kind of thing. So it's kind of grown out of, you know, from being like a simple experiment to a series and an exhibition and Yeah, but I'm really happy, happy about it. And I'm so grateful that fx hash has gotten involved to the level that they have, such an amazing team to work with.

Speaker C: That's good to hear. And I know, you know, we're just 8 days out from its launch date, which is super exciting, but clearly it's something that's been in the books for a really long time. It would be really awesome to know, maybe you already talked about this with Ken, but for people who didn't hear that yet, what is the history? Of Entangled. What was the evolution of the project itself? Because it's super fascinating and I think it's one of the biggest brain pieces of art that's come out on the blockchain. And, you know, obviously a big brain behind it. So we'd love to hear more.

Speaker A: Actually, I have a very small skull, so I don't think a big brain would fit in there, but—

Speaker B: Dense brain. Very dense brain.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's a very dense brain. I just think that as most of my projects, you know, that it's not like this grand narrative behind it from the get-go. It's very much an iterative process where sort of the visuals and the technical side and the concept is kind of like in this sort of feedback loop informing each other. And the genesis of this whole idea was just seeing that fxhash was launching 2.0 with support for, you know, both Tezos and Ethereum. And it just made me think that, wow, now we have like To my knowledge, the first platform that sort of merges these two communities that have been you know slightly separated, and I've loved both FXHash and and the Ethereum community. And to me, it's been a little bit strange to see this sort of division because I don't know in my mind I've I've used this analogy before, but I think to me it's like two different cities. Art Blocks is LA or something, and or Marfa, and then you know FXHash is like the Berlin. of the art world in a sense. And they all, they play different roles, but they have this symbiotic relationship. That just sparked the idea for me, is there some way that I can make a project that actually uses both chains and sort of makes these 2 communities interact with each other? So the first thing I did was more of a technical test, like researching whether or not it would be possible to have 2 interactive pieces running in a browser And have them interact with no server in between. Because obviously if you build some sort of backend into the system, then it doesn't really have that self-contained property that, you know, we love about on-chain generative art. So started out as a technical experiment. I'm not going to dwell on it for too long. I could, you know, I could, I could get stuck there. So I'm going to try to move on. But after I did some initial tests and found this way of kind of hacking this thing called local storage, which is sort of like a cookie, you can actually communicate between several instances that are hosted on the same domain. So I just made this simple example and just got me really fired up that, wow, I can make 2 pieces, 2 NFTs, regardless really of what chain they're on, because the communication happens locally, like on your computer when you open these 2. So I just got super fired up and started thinking about how ideas for a project. And I can't remember why or how, but this word entangled just came to me. These communities are entangled in a way. And I had a very keen interest in theoretical physics a while back. Like, I'm a bit rusty now, but I remember reading about these, these different concepts, you know, like quantum field theory. And there's this concept of entanglement, which in very simple terms means that 2 or more particles can have their state entangled in a way where you can separate them with an infinite distance between them, but they're still like, when you measure the properties of one of them, you can instantly tell something about the properties of the other one. So it's kind of like this. Yeah, these 2 things. And I just saw that as a cool analogy for these 2 communities. Like, no matter how far they seem apart, they are literally entangled. Like, there's so many artists that have started out on Tezos. And sort of built a career, gone over to Ethereum, but then come back again. And we have this interchange, you know, of talent. And obviously the financial side of it plays a role, but I just think it's very important that we have both. Like, Ethereum has sort of provided the collectors and the platforms that can— that you can actually make a living, you know, doing art. Tezos may have done that for a lot of people as well, maybe not to the same degree. But they've definitely been this playground where people come up and do experiments. And I think the community has been incredibly vivid and alive. And in many ways, I personally just really love hanging out. You know, that's sort of my community, the fx hash crowd and everyone on Twitter connected to the Tezos. And then it's more like, okay, when you're done with something that you've worked on for a really, really long time, obviously there's more, you know, financial incentives on Ethereum, or that's what it's been like for a while. But that's That's something I also find really interesting about this project. You know, it's sort of an experiment in the market dynamics. Is it possible by linking these 2 and having the value, obviously, like the value of owning a pair here is pretty obvious. And will it be possible, you know, to sort of link the prices as well? That will be interesting to see. You know, will people pay the same on Tezos in US dollars? You know, because it is actually— or if they don't, that's really weird in a way because it's 2 components of the same thing and the value proposition is really much linked to that specific connection between them. That's sort of more of a performative part of the project that I also have started to think about and find it to be almost like an interesting performance piece in a way. But I mean, I'm also very nervous about it, you know, maybe sells 5 mints and then the project is over and there was no dynamic or anything. So who knows these days? I mean, it's incredibly you know, a hard time for many and people are nervous about a lot of things these days. So it's very hard to predict.

Speaker B: 100%. But I mean, with Vertex now, I mean, this seems to represent a shift and I think we're hopeful that we'll have an interview with Cypher soon too, because we tend to talk to him every 6 months or so. It's a kind of a shift in what fxhash is doing philosophically with the platform where, yes, it's still an open platform, but they're kind of starting this new brand impression on top of it. Where they're gonna work really closely with artists like yourself to like do things like get an exhibition maybe going and do a lot of technical work behind the scenes, you know, create that standalone-ish website that's gonna have all of the project-specific information for Entangled. I, I saw a little preview of what that circular graphic is gonna look like. That's gonna show—

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: Which pieces are Entangled. So hopefully with like that push and, you know, you're, you're making the rounds on, you know, you're doing the, the, the Random interview, obviously you're gonna get the Waiting to Be Signed bump here. So there's a marketing push behind this in a way that there hasn't been forever. fx hash releases before. Was this always intended for fx hash because of that duality? When you first talked to them last year, did they say, hey, we're thinking of doing this kind of soft curated thing and you'd be a great candidate for this? Like, what was that kind of process? Like, how'd this become Vertex? What did you hear about Vertex? I mean, I've got so many questions about it, but like, let's just talk about that side of it first.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker A: I've been in touch with them since last summer. I did like a small show here in Oslo with like this huge projection where We put some, some of Andreas and Kim Asendorf and my own work in. Yeah, and Toxy, Carson Smith was there as well. And they saw that and they reached out to me and said like, hey, you know, this looks cool. And, you know, if you ever want to do something like this again, we might help you out with that. So we had a bit of a dialogue there and that didn't materialize at the time, but I still had sort of this thing in the back of my mind that I'd really like to do an FXHash project again. And at the time, you know, around the time of the release of 2.0, I didn't feel like, you know, I didn't have like this sort of— the viral post has really, you know, pushed my name out into this sphere. So I didn't feel like I was at a point in my career where I could just call up anyone and say, hey, do you want to do this thing with me? So it was more of like the building that demo, you know, to show that, hey, I have this idea, I think it will be pretty cool. But I didn't really have this expectation or idea that it needed anything extra. You know, I just— my plan was to finish this project in a month or 2 and just release 2 projects on Tezos and Ethereum and do the communication myself. But then, you know, obviously the post went like super viral. And to be honest, got a lot of people out of the woodworks. Like, so I was approached by several people and yeah, lots of different platforms and curators and people wanted to talk to me there for a while. And that was cool. And I think, you know, I've met a lot of people in the sort of aftermath of that. And, you know, new projects might come out of those conversations. But for me, it was very clear, like this idea was based on this platform, these 2 chains, And I've stuck to that all along. And I mean, in many ways it's been a little bit hard because there's obviously other things that would have been more lucrative or something, you know, like I could have jumped into the Ordinals thing or whatever to try to maximize that. But I mean, as important as money is to survive, I think it's something about keeping a little bit of that vision alive. If you have a great idea, like just just stick to it, you know, and try to work it through. And then fx hash, they contacted me just before Christmas and suggested that we do an exhibition in relation to the launch. So that's how our conversation started. And then I think it was just after Christmas that they mentioned that, you know, we have this new program that we've been thinking about. And we want your project, if you want to be on board, to be sort of like the first project in this kind of collaborative effort that we're developing. I think it's really cool, actually. I just want to say that because for some people it might sound like, oh, they're also doing curated now in a sense. But, uh, you know, I've had talks with them and I've sort of been a fly on the wall actually when the whole team is discussing this. And I think it's so cool that they're trying to keep— they're staying really true to their ethos in the sense that they're not playing curators here. They're not like elevating one project saying this is like better than anything else necessarily. It's more like they're seeing someone who wants to do something that pushes some boundaries, you know, in some way. And then they're like, hey, we want to help you out to do that, you know. So it's more really like, I think they're all super energetic people and they all have this like, hey, let's make things happen, you know. And Baptiste himself is a hardcore programmer and he loves anything that challenges the tech side of things as well. So for them, it's just a new way to like support the community, you know, help push generative art forward and try to just keep moving, right? You know, they put quite an extensive effort into this project, and I'm not sure what their plans are with other projects, but obviously it's not something that they can do too many of in a year. I don't really know the plans, but I just think it's a very, very cool opportunity that If someone really has a good idea, and of course they need to also have the means to execute it, but I think, you know, it's going to be such a great resource for people who want to do something beyond sort of the limits that are already existing. And fxhash can obviously support a lot in terms of customizing things on their platform, building in new features, that kind of thing. Like in this case, when I had the idea of doing a physical installation, they're really like, Yeah, let's make this happen, you know, and they use their network to figure out who we can work with to make it happen. And they're out there all the time, you know, on different, you know, these art fairs and stuff, and they meet people. So they have a good network as well. So yeah, it's been such a cool process.

Speaker C: Yeah, that's so cool to hear. And I think that everything you just said really resonates with kind of how we see some of the different And Art Blocks or Verse, for example, they're definitely more like art world focused in many respects. And I feel like fx hash, they're like the fun techie startups in the mix. And as you said, they're just willing to get in there, get their hands dirty to get stuff done. For artists who might be looking to work with fx hash on like a Vertex project, what are the sorts of things that they specifically helped out with? Obviously, did they do their website? Did they provide programming input on the project itself? What about things like art direction, marketing, and pricing aid? Because I think that's something that we would expect from more of an Art Blocks. It'd be really cool to hear more about the benefits of working with Vertex and how it might differ from some of the other platforms that are out there. Not trying to shill Vertex.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker C: I think it's just about getting more of it out there about your firsthand experiences working with them on this?

Speaker A: You know, I can't really speak to what their plan is from now on or what sort of process they'll put in place to handle applications, or, you know, I'm not sure how that will work. In my case, they reached out to me and I know they're already working with some other artists and they're very different projects. So I think my impression is that it will vary a lot from project to project. Because it will not be a very, you know, it's not like a box where you put them through this program. That's my experience. It's more like, what is the vision that we're trying to realize here? And then what is needed to make that happen? And in my case, I mean, they had no sort of heavy-handed approach in terms of telling me how the project should look or behave or anything like that. But they'll give feedback and ideas if they see, you know, an opportunity. You know, like have you considered this or that? And a lot of technical support just in terms of integration with the platform. And they've also built this separate website. I'm not even sure that's needed for all projects, but for this project, it made a lot of sense because the minting dynamic could be a little bit hard for people to understand. And also this pairing and all of these things. And it's really cool. Like, you know, Cypher was working. He has made this circular visualizer that you talked about, and it's just, it's like a small art piece in and of itself. And then in terms of marketing, they're, of course, they're using their channels, they're helping make content, like, you know, filming these interviews in collaboration with Le Random and getting that out there. I'm pretty like sort of organic on Twitter. I'm hard to control in that sense. So I haven't stuck to any sort of marketing plan, but— Yeah. You know, we're doing these, these things that they've— some things they've set up, some things I've set up just to sort of get the word out there. I think for me, the most important thing is that everyone who has shown interest become aware that it's launching now, because I understand that it's been a while since that first teaser came out. And also to communicate clearly how it's going to work. And I'm going to try to do that over the next couple of days so that it's clear for people how this will work, you know. And in terms of the exhibition part, they've been super helpful. I mean, they've arranged for a venue that has a robot arm, and we have an engineer that we work with there to do this installation. And, you know, handling all of that communication and stuff is very time-consuming. It's been time-consuming for me as well. But, you know, the people, especially Olga from fx hash, has been just working nonstop to make this happen. So it's almost like I've been part of the company and they're just like, hey, what do you need? You know, what are we going to do next? And we just make it happen. So hopefully that can continue. I think it depends, you know, I mean, if it works long-term for them to put this much effort into each project. Yeah, who knows? But I definitely get a feeling that they really want to help in any way they can.

Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I'm keen to jump in with a technical question here. I mean, you've already kind of explained a little bit about the local storage of how the particles can interact between the windows, but it's one thing to kind of just like spin that up in your own browser locally. It's another thing to have one contract on ETH minting tokens and another contract on Tez minting tokens. It plays into the whole entanglement thing, right? There's these 2 things that seem infinitely far apart. They're not even. chains that use the same coding language to write their contracts. That's like one of the big things that people hate about Tezos is it's not Solidity. So, well, first of all, like, is it guaranteed that there will always be a pair? So is every single piece going to have a pair? And like, if that's the case, like, what kind of work went on behind the scenes? Like, how are you pulling this off? Like, is it too much to ask you to kind of reveal the trick? Is it too technical? Or like, how can you guarantee it? Like, what work went into making it work?

Speaker A: What I'm afraid of when I tell you is that you'll be very underwhelmed, to be honest, because remember that I had this idea and I wanted to launch this even before I knew that I would have any help from the fxhash side. So it needed to work out of the box. So basically there's no, there's nothing going on in the contracts. It's just a completely normal fxhash contract on both chains. There's none of the entanglement is in the contract, so to speak. That's a, you know, real-time element. And the nice thing about generative art stored on-chain is that the contract really only handles the storage of the code, right? And then the code is run in your browser in real time. So in one sense, when you open these 2, it doesn't matter where they're stored, you know, it's at the time when you open 2 windows or more, these are real-time applications running in your browser on your desktop. And that's where the sort of magic happens of them communicating with each other. So obviously this has some limitations. It's not like you can open your pair, like one iteration on your computer and another one on your phone, and then they will start interacting. You know, that, that would require some technology that it just wouldn't work in this context. So of course there are some, some very clear limitations here. So you need to open them in the same browser on the same computer, basically. And they need to be hosted on the same domain. And that is not really— doesn't have anything to do with the contract. That's more like what domain delivers the content to your browser, right? And in this case, that's fx hash as a platform. So this wouldn't work if I put one project on fx hash and another on art blocks, because you open the two and they would be hosted on two different domains. And there's a security thing that, you know, these 2 can't access the same part of the local storage memory, basically. To answer your other question in terms of which pairs are entangled, and that's like, yeah, it's completely one-to-one, 256 on each chain, and they all have a pair. So they're paired randomly, but all of them have a pair. There's like kind of 3 different levels to the pairing in a sense. It's like, if you mint one and you open that one, It's just like one orb basically doing its thing as a, as sort of like a solo object. And then if someone else mints the corresponding pair on the other chain, you can open these 2 alongside each other. You don't have to own both of them. As long as you just open the 2 mints on this, you know, side by side, they will start interacting, communicating with each other. But then there's this 3rd level that if both are owned by the same collector, then it will have like this extra visual element to it. So there will be sort of a visual effect, if, yeah, for lack of a better word, that will show that this pair is like sort of, we call it a perfect pair, you know, a pair that is entangled and owned by the same collector. I don't know how technical you want to go, but that information about The collectors—it's just sent to the JavaScript application through URL parameters. But that's how everything on FXHash works: they send all their data to the JavaScript through URL parameters.

Speaker C: I think I'm confused about some other things, and if I'm an idiot, that's fine. I will own my idiocy. But one of the things I understand about FXHash is that there's no linking to like outside libraries. Everything is pretty much self-contained. So how does it work? Let's get into a little bit more of the technical side of things for, you know, what is different about this to enable the entanglement versus what might be available out of the box, so to speak, for other fxhash projects.

Speaker A: I mean, there isn't anything and that's maybe confusing.

Speaker C: All right, cool. That is confusing.

Speaker A: Yeah. I'm going to reveal something that is actually, you know, it takes a little bit of the magic away, but it has a cool side effect actually. This will be the same exact code stored on both chains. So in one sense, it's the same project on both chains. So what's cool about that is that obviously it sort of has— it's double-backed in a way. So if for some reason one chain dies, the code is still there, the project can be spun up and it will work. And then all the data that it needs to know, like what chain is it on and what collectors own it. That will be sent to the application through like URL parameters. So when you click the link from the fxhash website, they will just like open this mint with, you know, the URL parameters. And that's the same thing they do already with the hash, right? Because it's one piece of code and you send it the random hash. And that is the data you usually need to know which mint you're on and do the corresponding randomness. But it's always just the same script that is being—

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: processed. So really what they're doing is just sending more data in that URL. And this is, from what I know, they will implement this so that it can be accessed in any fxhash project from now on. So if you want to do things where you differentiate based on collectors, for instance, that's something that you can do. So basically, yeah, like I said, it's the same code on both chains, and I basically do a little bit of trickery in there to pre-generate a list of pairs. So I already know upfront which numbers are paired, basically. And then when you open 2 of them, they'll start communicating basically like, hey, is there any other windows open? Right. And if there is, okay, so you're this mint hash, you're this mint number, which one am I? And, and they have a list where they see, oh, are we a pair? And then they go like, yeah, we're a pair. And then we can start communicating. That's like very simply put the way it works.

Speaker B: I think that's a great explanation. And I think the other half of this, which you've already kind of hinted at, is the general market dynamic and kind of the performance of the 2 chains and how people tend to collect on ETH and maybe not collect on Tezos, or if they do, they're collecting on Tezos at much lower price points. So we've seen the prices picked for this. And well, I guess my first question is like, did you ever consider like that if you mint one on ETH, you get a free Tez or vice versa, you know, mint on Tez, get a free to kind of ensure that there's not this asymmetry? Or now are you kind of like looking forward to that asymmetry that maybe ETH mints out first and Tez takes longer as kind of still part of that performance? And then how long do you intend to keep it open? Like, will this ever be closed? Do you intend to put pressure on people to mint the project out or maybe lose the potential for their pair if they are only minting on one chain versus the other?

Speaker A: First of all, in terms of pricing, of course, I mean, this is not my field of expertise at all. So I've been working closely with fx hash there. And they have so much data on what's going on on their platform already. So prices are kind of set based on what we think is the right price for this project in the current environment. And obviously, it's You know, pretty high-priced project, I guess, for fx hash. But I mean, it's also a project that has been put considerable effort, you know, both for me and the whole team there. So there's also a certain level of revenue needed to do something like this successfully. So it's a bit of an experiment in that sense as well. If it doesn't work out, it's obvious to me that I can't really invest this much time in a project, you know. But in terms of the buy one, get 2 thing, it's not something I've considered because I think to me that the interesting part is how these different communities collect. And also in a sense, like maybe annoying collectors a little bit, to be honest. Like I'm not a huge fan of this sort of very commercialized way of selling art where it's like buy one, get another one for free, that kind of thing. Although I understand, you know, why it would make sense in this specific case. I think it's also, since the pairs are random anyway, we wouldn't ensure that you buy one and you actually get a pair. And I think that part is also, you know, fun that people will have to sort of look around a little bit and maybe there will be some new dynamics. I mean, if 2 people have a mint on both chains and they have the corresponding pairs, I mean, they could swap.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker A: You know, without paying for it, I guess. But, you know, you might also see other interesting dynamics where 2 people who have the entangled pair, they just decide that they want to keep theirs and they're kind of like buddies, you know, they have this thing that links us together and I don't have to own both of them, you know. So I can't really predict where this will go. But to me, part of it has been this sort of open experimental nature and I'm really hoping there will be some, you know, interesting surprises there. And so far I haven't really— no one's attacked me or anything to tell me that this is completely ridiculous. So I feel like most people find this whole dynamic an interesting aspect to the project.

Speaker B: Yeah, definitely. I think anything that encourages collectors to talk to each other, talk about the project, what they like, and like also to seek out their complementary pieces, even if they don't trade, like you said, I mean, this, this whole thing will be like this giant Mobius strip web of like, if I mint one on each chain, even if they're not a pair, each one is gonna connect me to someone different and they're all gonna be connected to different people through their pairings. And so it's truly gonna create this network effect beyond just like the type we typically talk about in gen art, where it's just the network effect of owning stuff. Ours are literally connected, are literally entangled in a way that other projects haven't done. So I think that's really, really cool. Really elegant execution.

Speaker A: Sorry, you had one more question, I think, that I didn't reply to in terms of how long we'll keep the minting open for.

Speaker B: Oh yeah, please.

Speaker A: I have actually not considered that at all, to be honest. And I have a project, like my last fxhash project, the face we had, it was open for like 6 months before it minted out. So I think there's this idea in the whole NFT scene, which is a bit corrosive, that you have to sell out, you know, as soon as humanly possible. If not, the project is considered a failure. Personally, I don't have any rush in that sense, but our expectation is that people will participate in this and that it will sell out. But, you know, as we've already discussed, it's very hard to know. There's been very few projects that has gotten this sort of attention, but I've also said that before that, I mean, To me, it was very clear that all this attention the project got when it went viral, that wasn't necessarily people that were in the NFT scene at all. It kind of got the attention of a lot of people that just find the thing technically interesting, a lot of like developers and tech people and that kind of thing. And, you know, onboarding people to buy NFTs, I think that's a hard, hard sale still. So we'll see. I don't pay too much attention to the market in general, but it's hard not to notice that things are slower these days. But I have decided personally to not let the market decide what I do and when I do it and how I do it. So for me, it's like, if this whole NFT scene is, you know, if it's going to be a place where people can actually build art careers, then if you make your best efforts and you really put a lot of work into a project, I think, you know, either it should pay off. And if it doesn't, then I'm questioning whether or not the whole space is healthy enough, you know. And I'm hoping in general, I feel in general that the space has matured in a way where speculation is out of the picture in a lot of ways, not at all to the degree that it was before, at least. And then I feel like the people that are left are the people that really want to make things and the people that are really interested in collecting and, and so on.

Speaker B: So No, I think that's definitely the case. And speculation, to the extent that it exists now, at least in code-based generative art, seems to be a lot more healthy in like the 5 to 10 to 20-year outlook instead of the hourly or daily outlook that it used to be on during its height a couple years ago. So you want to believe, you want to think we've created something special. A whole team came together to make this happen. We're going to ask the price to make it worth the time. And also like, because it's really cool and this is how you should value it. Like, this is a, it's a big statement, right? It's a big statement for you as the artist. It's a big statement for fx hash, the platform, to say like, hey, look at this. So I hope this episode will also encourage people to take a look and consider minting because it is gonna be a singular piece, right?

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker B: Like, I imagine this will inspire other people to kind of do some of this type of thing, especially If they can kind of take a peek at the code, if that's, you know, depending on how you've minimized it or not, I don't know. Well, actually, isn't that part of this whole Vertex thing?

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Is to make the code available and open so people can learn from it.

Speaker A: And I mean, that's been my plan all along. Like, my goal here long term is to sort of merge my interest in open source software with making a living selling digital art. And I think it could be possible. I've seen, you know, some setbacks in terms of open source since NFTs came about, and I don't see why it needs to be like that. But obviously, I mean, if you put your code out and lots of people rip it off and then try to make spin-offs and that kind of thing, it's obviously a problem in a sense. But for me, it's like the project is out there, people have interacted with it, they know who made it, and if other people can learn from the code, that's just like, for me, essential, because that's how I learned what I'm doing and Without the open source pioneers showing the way, then, you know, very few of us would be here today making these projects, right? And I'm using Three.js a lot in this and really want to give back to the people that are building that library and the whole community there as well. Yeah, so that's important for me. But as I've stated in this interview that I did with Fake Whale before Christmas, for me, it's just important that when you put code out there, that it has a certain quality and that people can understand it. And that will be a real challenge for me because now that I'm working for myself, there's no other people on my team. I don't really need to write sustainable code like I used to do when I had colleagues and we had more long-term projects. So my code is a huge mess. I'm working more as a sort of a painter with code, just throwing things around. So My plan is to try to clean it up and publish it and maybe also either just do like an interview with someone who really wants to get into the deep dive of the technical side of things, you know, or just write an article about it. But historically, I've been really bad at writing things. It takes a lot of time and I'm always like working on something new and then it's hard to—

Speaker C: Mm-hmm.

Speaker A: Yeah. But the plan here is really for people to to get access to the code and for me to make it understandable.

Speaker B: I don't know if you listened to our interview with Alejandro Campos from some weeks ago. He recently released a project called Fantasia on, uh, Verse.

Speaker C: Oh yeah.

Speaker B: And after a couple projects, he took a break to publish his library, his p5.brush library. And it took him, like, in the interview we talk about how long it took him to actually clean up the code, then then document the code and then do the writing needed to publish it. And it is almost, you know, it's basically an art piece in itself, right? When it's all said and done, because of the amount of effort that goes into making it comprehensible to someone who's now coming along. And just even last week, there was an artist who published a project in fxhash using that library, which is super cool. So good luck with that. It's an endeavor.

Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. For me personally, at least, it also connects to the financial side of things. If I'm doing this, you know, full-time and selling my art is my only income, then whether or not I'm able to do that work and put the code out there and clean it up and all of those things is just dependent on whether or not I can afford to or if I have to jump straight into the next project, you know. And I think maybe that's— it's a different discussion, but I feel like there's some parts of the whole discussion around the finances of NFTs that are, you know, very much focused on the markets. And, you know, it seems like people have no lower limit to how low they want to go in price, which doesn't make sense to me. I think we would— we should expand our idea of how long a project could be on-chain unminted and just have stock like they have in, you know, one of the traditional art worlds instead of lowering prices to a level where it just doesn't make sense anymore. But obviously, there's a lot of people in this space that have very different approaches. And some people are doing this more as, you know, fun experiments here and there. And, you know, it can make a buck and that can sort of, you know, they can buy some new equipment or more of this like micro economy, which I think is, you know, super cool.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker A: But then there's this other side of, you know, I've decided to step out of my company that I built for 9 years and try to do this full time. And then the financial aspect of it is also important in terms of making this way of working sustainable, you know.

Speaker B: It's challenging. I mean, I think it's— a lot of artists we talk to say exactly what you're kind of saying, which is like, I don't really want to keep track of the market. I don't necessarily want to do my own marketing. I kind of just want to focus on creating. And yeah, like the idea of even pricing my own work is either it's too difficult because I'm too close to it, or it's just distasteful, right? There's just a lot of reasons that people don't want to do it and think about it. It's also necessary because it's how you intend to subsist until your next project. But so we talked to a lot of artists, we also talked to a lot of platforms and the economics of platforms are really challenging. So the idea of saying, hey, let's price this really high and it's okay if it takes 18 months to mint out and we're going to message about it every 2 weeks or every 4 weeks and make sure that we're constantly putting out new editorials about it or getting you new interviews to kind of hopefully sell a few more pieces one month at a time economically doesn't work for them. Because I mean, to be honest, it sounds like most of them, if not all of them, are breaking even or losing money. And so the prospect of dedicating staff to like supporting a project for a year plus to mint it out at the price it should be minted at, it doesn't work right now.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: It worked for a very short period when a lot of these, I think, companies were founded. Or conceptualized. So then it's this laissez-faire, like it's on the artist to do things like try to get themselves on podcasts, just be out there blasting on Twitter every day. But the more you do that, the less time you have to create.

Speaker A: I really hope— I mean, of course, now that there's this push from fxhash to, of course, get the word out about this project, and I can't take credit for the teaser going that viral, but I do think there's an element here of if you do something at least that, you know, will push some boundaries or create something that is, um, where the project in itself can have that sort of marketing built into it, I think that helps. Although I don't— I wouldn't make that a consideration, of course, for all artists, that there has to be this element of innovation in all projects. But my approach has always been to just make things that I'm really interested in, trying to push, push myself to make something beyond what I was capable of doing yesterday, and then just posting about it, process and that kind of thing. And that has a tendency to pick up over time. And I would focus more on that than, you know, all of these sort of extra marketing activities. And I really get what you're saying about the platforms. Of course, it's sad, because I think a lot of companies and a lot of careers was started and built during a time that was, you know, probably unsustainable. And the pricing is so strange because it's like we've never really been on a normal level. It was like either batshit crazy or like, you know, nothing at all. So, you know, personally, I'm trying to find that balance where I just can make this feasible for me as a career.

Speaker C: Mm-hmm.

Speaker A: And I'm used to working in consulting, and it's very easy for me to just think like, how much is an hour worth? You know, because that's— I spend this much time on it, it needs to give this amount of revenue. If not, I'm losing money, and then I need to figure out— I need to take an extra job or something, you know. So if you're an adult and you have responsibilities, you need to take those things into account, you know. The financial and money aspect of things are really not interesting for the most part for, for any of us that works creatively. It's more just a necessity, you know, to be able to keep doing what we're doing, depending on your life situations, of course.

Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, we do the show part-time. We both have jobs, we both have families, and we have a little Patreon, and we get donations from artists and collectors from time to time. But if we sat down and tried to calculate the hourly rate, like, it really— yeah, yeah, yeah, would be hard to justify it. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, there she is. Trinity, I'm sorry if we've been talking over you. I assumed you weren't here because something, you just like went blank.

Speaker C: No, I've been here the whole time.

Speaker B: Oh, really? All right. Well, opine, jump in. What's the hourly rate? I didn't just leave.

Speaker C: I'm not that rude.

Speaker B: How do you think about it?

Speaker C: I think that there's a little bit of a difference. Like, you know, I think when you're in the consulting world, there's like a direct one-to-one correlation between the output that you're making now and the revenue that you're making. I think here there's a little bit of investment because when you're putting so much work and effort into a project and making sure that the code is clean and well-written, it's an investment into the future because it's something that's perpetually out there and has your name on it. When what you're doing with client work, as you were saying earlier, it's the client knows that you're doing the work and that it's great work and they'll work with you again in the future.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: But it's not as much public knowledge. So I think that having a project that's out there and having a great site that fxhash team is putting together with you, it's something that stands that test of time. And I think that in addition to all the great tweeting and marketing push that's been out there, it's something that will exist in perpetuity. And even if it doesn't mint out right away, it's something that will persist.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker C: I think that's wonderful and very aligned with what needs to happen from an art perspective throughout all of this.

Speaker A: I totally agree. And I wouldn't say that like an artist should think about like every hour they spend as an hourly rate. Definitely not think about it in a way where like my hourly rate is this amount because that's the market price for a consulting hour. But like you said, you have families and bills to pay and all of that stuff. And then you have like a burn rate. Basically, this is the amount of money I need to make every month to make ends meet. And then you have to sort of calculate backwards from that. But, you know, as most artists, you put a lot more work in than you ever get paid for usually. And for me, like going into a project with this much risk, like you put in so much time upfront with no, actually no guarantee that you will get any money back in return. So there needs to be a lot more in there for me as well, you know? And this has definitely been that, you know, just crazy interesting project to work on with really inspiring people. And getting the project out there is just, you know, that's the most important thing for me. And then the financial side will basically decide whether or not I can do this again. You know, it's that simple. That's the part that I don't see sort of nuanced discussion on. But no one owes anyone anything in that sense. It's not like collectors need to come and pick up my work because I have bills to pay or anything like that. But if people are getting used to a price level that no one would ever be able to build a career on, you know, then we have a bit of an unhealthy environment. And there's probably too many platforms and too many artists in the long run if things have normalized in the way they are now. And I think that is very similar to the art world in general. You know, very few artists can actually make a living full-time being professional artists. Why would the digital world be any different? We'll see, I guess. People are hoping for another market swing for the better and all of that, but I don't want to like base my decisions on those kinds of dynamics, you know, that would just wear me out completely.

Speaker C: That's fair. And again, I think we're going to still see what the normal is.

Speaker B: I do want to specify that you are duty-bound to support the podcast. So you should subscribe to the Patreon if you enjoy the show.

Speaker A: Definitely.

Speaker B: Yeah, but you don't have to support artists. So that's, I think that's your message, right, Bjørn?

Speaker A: Yeah. Support the podcast as well. Like, People producing content that you like, you know, just, I think it's important to support.

Speaker B: Well, let's start to wrap it up with some rapid fire. We've talked a ton about Entangled. We should remind everyone it's June 20th, cross-chain. It's going to be about $200-ish a mint at the bottom level of each, uh, it's Dutch auction, right? So I think it starts up around like $600 or $800. In its relative currencies and goes down. So be on the lookout for those. Consider trying to mint yourself a pair. Let's do some rapid fires, Trinity. Let's close this one out.

Speaker C: All right. I have a rapid fire. It's related to what we've been talking about. Apologies, but—

Speaker A: No, it's perfect.

Speaker C: What's going to mint out faster, ETH or TES?

Speaker A: Oh, that's a hard one. ETH. I actually have to add that the ETH auction opens 10 minutes before the Tezos auction. I personally wanted them to open at the same time. So people would be like super stressed out, but, you know, the fxhash team had the point that like, if you really want to mint on both, it would be nice to sort of like be able to take your time and just get it sorted on one first and then the other afterwards.

Speaker B: Yeah. Making people stressed out has been a historically bad strategy.

Speaker C: Or great.

Speaker A: Yeah, my strategy is pissing people off and hoping that that will work.

Speaker B: Well, I'll do one here then and ask, um, who would you like to hear us interview in the future?

Speaker A: Oh, there's so many, so many great ones. Have you talked to Darian Brito?

Speaker C: No.

Speaker A: Darian is a great artist. I think he made some of the best work on Art Blocks. And he's really quiet on social media, but he's an incredibly interesting person, super knowledgeable, hardcore coder and artist. So I think he would be very interesting to talk to.

Speaker B: Is he local to you?

Speaker A: No, no, he— I think he lives in Amsterdam. You know, we just know each other through Discord and Twitter. It's how you make friends these days.

Speaker B: That's true. All right, good recommendation there. Trinity, you want to do another one?

Speaker C: Well, we already talked about this as a big release, but are you already looking forward to something in the future? Is there already another work in progress?

Speaker A: I have too many ideas. And actually, I should have been working on other stuff already, but I've had to cancel some plans or postpone them because this has taken a bit more time than I first anticipated. But I also need like a good holiday. Like we have summer holiday in July and I'm going to travel with the family. So I think I really need a breather after this, but I already have a bunch of ideas for other things to do. So yeah, hoping to get fired up again in August. And of course the exhibition and finishing the installation will be sort of my main focus after this, besides cleaning up and open sourcing the code.

Speaker B: How old are your kids? Because I just traveled with a toddler and it was not relaxing.

Speaker A: Oh yeah, no, mine are 9 and 15 actually.

Speaker B: Oh, sick. Okay. Probably a little easier to kick back at those ages.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, probably in some sense. And then in other senses, not so much. Not so much. Some things get easier, some things get harder throughout this whole process of aging with children.

Speaker B: So everyone should be on the lookout for pictures from your vacation, and then hopefully you're coming back, you're cleaning up your code, and then perhaps we'll see something new from you before the end of the year. on fx hash or some other platform, who knows. Last one, just to take us out then, we always like to ask this one. What do you like to listen to while you work, while you code? Any music recommendations you want to throw out for us?

Speaker A: Oh yeah, I listen to music like nonstop. I mean, in general, I listen to a lot of like ambient music and electronic music in general, but I also have like black metal and some extreme metal stuff. the other end of the scale, and classical music as well. So I'm all over the place, really. I have these like playlists with like 40 hours of music.

Speaker B: I'm thinking like Sleep, Dope Throne, Nils Fromm.

Speaker A: Vladislav Delay, do you know him?

Speaker B: No.

Speaker A: It's incredible. It's almost like sound art as much as music, you know, using a lot of like field recording stuff and really pushing sound to these like weird places that no one else does. So it's been incredibly inspiring. It's actually directly inspired the sort of like particle visuals that I'm using in the Entangled piece, and I'm listening to it all the time and it gives me this sort of kind of noisy, particle-y feel. So, um, it's very inspiring.

Speaker B: Well, make sure to drop a link in Discord so we can include it in the— yeah, include it below for people so that they can listen to it while they play with their pieces after they mint.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: All right, well, let's wrap it up here. Trinity's having weird connectivity issues again, but that's okay because we're ending the episode. That was Bjørn Staal, aka _nonfigurativ_. Look forward to Entangled on fxhash, the first Vertex project of what we hope to be many really, really cool ones. June 20th again, for those of you who are considering collecting. That's it for this one, everyone. Hope you all enjoyed. We'll be back again soon with another episode. Bye-bye.

Speaker A: Bye everyone.