Women on the NFT Frontier (Continued)
Whether you’re completely new to digital art or a seasoned collector or creator, understanding their origins and future in the Bitcoin space is key. We’re picking up from where we left off in last week’s interview with Heaven Quiban of DIBA, Digital Bitcoin Art and Assets.
Today, we’ll speak about the exciting things happening in the Bitcoin digital asset space and what makes Heaven hopeful for the future of digital art in the hands of diverse and ever-evolving, women-led communities.
SAS: So what is the wallet that the Bitcoin UDA is connected to?
HQ: We built something called BitMask…and we made it super user friendly so that people will be able to exchange Bitcoin and digital art on top of Bitcoin.
What’s really going to change the game is that, first of all, in order to receive a digital asset into your wallet, you have to actually accept it.
The way it exists on Ethereum is that if I have your wallet address, I could…air drop you NFTs that you don’t want. There are people that just spam really famous wallets — like if I wanted to have my NFT show up in Gary Vee’s wallet, I could make that happen.
There’s a layer of privacy that comes with using our Bitcoin UDAs because you have to actually accept it before it shows up there. So there’s way more privacy and security with your wallet than what exists currently.
SAS: Wow. So aside from DIBA — are there other groups trying to accomplish similar things? Before speaking with you, I never knew any of this existed.
HQ: A lot of people don’t know that it exists because we’re the only ones building this right now, that we’re aware of. We also know that once RGB smart contract protocol is released, there will be tons of people that will try to use it and build their own things.
We understand that a big thing that we’re going to need to focus on is the education piece of this. It’s structurally different than how people are used to trading NFTs.
One more piece I wanted to share about the wallet…is that the owner of the wallet has the decision to show what’s in their wallet.
SAS: That’s really interesting! In terms of security and privacy, it’s something I didn’t even think was missing from other options.
HQ: It wasn’t received positively at first because people like the transparency of the blockchain so much. We can hold people accountable this way; we can see if an influencer has been gifted NFTs in order to promote it — [and] I agree that there are definitely benefits to transparency. But also, on the flipside…
SAS: It’s nice to have transparency — but morally, where does that really fall?
HQ: Exactly…and when we talk about full transparency and potentially government or some kind of authoritative force needing to see what people own to seize assets?
Let’s talk about how scary that can be — that somebody can just click on my wallet and see everything.
When we’re talking about governments or nations banning and controlling the way that crypto moves, it’s really scary to think about how much access they have to what’s in your wallet.
That’s not to say though that it’s completely private, because the blockchain’s still the blockchain. Technically if I wanted to attach an asset to UTXO, you can still see on the blockchain that UTXO is moving around. You just can’t see the asset that’s attached to it.
SAS: So it sounds to me in keeping with the way that Bitcoin already operates. There’s transparency and anonymity, but there are some aspects that have to be visible and others that can be made private.
HQ: Yes. And we’re still giving people the option to reveal assets if they want to, because that’s kind of the fun part of collecting is to show off your collection. But it’s just up to the person…with us everything is private by default.
It’s going to be a really big change in the ecosystem, once it catches on.
SAS: What are your expectations in terms of a timeline? Are you looking forward to a point in time where things may come to fruition?
HQ: Roadmap, right? This is all very tentative because it is dependent on…the developement of RGB. They’re going to be integrating lightning (a layer two solution on top of Bitcoin). What lightning allows is really cheap transactions, fast transactions.
So when we’re talking about transactions and minting, we’re currently talking about less than $10. And when we’re talking about lightning transactions, we’re talking practically free.
SAS: Oh my gosh, these gas fees! The one thing that I don’t like about NFTs on Ethereum, the one caveat, is these fees.
HQ: We’re talking about the same fees that would happen on the regular Bitcoin blockchain — next to nothing.
And sometimes those fees [on Ethereum, etc.] don’t guarantee you the NFT you’re trying to buy.
SAS: That would be such a cool solution. So how could artists or buyers use the platform?
HQ: We’re going to be an open platform and have a curated section. We want to function like OpenSea, so people can come and pick [artwork] as soon as the platform’s available. We are also integrating a curated section — and there will be a submission form, similar to SuperRare [or] Nifty Gateway.
Something we’re also trying out is allowing for curators to submit. Whether that’s a NFT art community leader [or] galleries, museums. So that they can receive a profit from being a curator.
There’s a lot of curators putting together these drops but they don’t have any incentive or reward from doing that. So let’s give people who are good storytellers or are doing the work of onboarding the artists…an opportunity to do that.
SAS: I try to keep an open mind with everything in this ecosystem, and I want to see everything succeed. But at the end of the day it would be nice to see more digital art innovation brought to the Bitcoin blockchain.
HQ: People really aren’t going to believe it until they see it. Don’t trust, verify, right?
We’re trying to build something that’s actually going to last, and that will actually make sense. It’s great that so many things are happening right now…but will it be there in five years? We actually don’t know.
SAS: I’m all for longevity in the NFT space. Thank you, Heaven, all of this has been so wonderful!
As a woman in this space, do you have any words of wisdom based on your experience working for DIBA and working in Bitcoin — in terms of your journey?
HQ: I think being a woman, being a woman of color — being a queer woman of color, that is my strength in all of this. Of course there are people that will have their doubts because of my identity being in a more marginalized category, but all the things that make people different are what make them unique and special. Which I know sounds cliché, but…
SAS: It’s true.
HQ: These identities of ours are our lived experience. And it’s something we’re conscious of when we’re creating the platform. There’s enough of an understanding that there are marginalized groups of people left out of this space, so we’re going to intentionally make space for them.
It’s a conscious effort that we’re trying to make, and I love that this is a conversation that even gets to happen with the founder of a company.
SAS: It’s very encouraging and inspiring to know that the decision makers of this exciting tech are people who consider these pain points. I think that that’s already a win.
HQ: Sometimes I question it, because I came into crypto at the beginning of 2021…like, how did I end up being the one making these calls? How did I get here? And when I question myself, my friends [say], “if it’s not going to be you, then who is it going to be?”