Why Polina Marinova should add her memories to the blockchain

Originally posted here.
By: Jun Loayza

The Post

tl;dr : I believe your most important memories, like this one , should be preserved forever on the blockchain, giving you two benefits: 1) so that future generations can learn and grow from your experiences; 2) to turn your memories into collectibles, giving you another monetization stream.

Hi Polina,

I’m Jun , Founder of Metablox , and I’m a subscriber and fan of your work.

I particular enjoyed this article: Why You’ll Never Win the Status Game .

Over time, luxury beliefs are embraced down the social ladder — at which point, the upper class abandons its old luxury beliefs and embraces new ones. Which explains why the beliefs of the upper class are constantly changing. It’s easy to see how this works if we look at actual fashion. The author Quentin Bell, in On Human Finery , wrote “Try to look like the people above you; if you’re at the top, try to look different from the people below you.” This got me thinking about NFTs, which is largely another game of status.

I’m sure you’ve heard of Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC). Here are just some of the celebrity owners of a BAYC:

Tom Brady: BAYC #3667 — purchased for 133ETH Madonna: BAYC #4988 — purchased for 180 ETH Ben Simmons: BAYC #5164 — purchased for 100 ETH Justin Bieber: BAYC #3001 — purchased for 500ETH Jimmy Fallon: BAYC #599 — purchased for 46.6 ETH Why are BAYC so valuable? We can debate about all of the reasons why BAYC are so valuable, but ultimately it boils down to two core drives:

Status Scarcity (only 10,000 BAYC were created) Which is why I love the article you wrote — it’s this game of status that is driving up the price of all NFTs.

And now we arrive to the point of me writing to you , which is the idea of “[playing] with good intent:

Although it’s impossible to opt-out of the status game, remember that you can always play with good intent. And, most importantly, you don’t need an overpriced Canada Goose coat to do it. How will you pass on your most important memories to future generations? I saw this Tweet this morning and it really made an impact on me:

 — @polina_marinova

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My question to you :

How will you pass on this memory to your children, grandchildren, or even great grandchildren? If you’re like me, this memory lives on Google Photos or Dropbox. This presents a few challenges:

It’s centralized : What happens to your memory if Google Photos or Dropbox were to shut down? Single-point of failure : What happens if your grandchildren or great grandchildren lose your username and password or stop paying for your Google or Dropbox account? My great grandparents immigrated from Japan to Peru in 1908. And that’s it; I know nothing else about my great grandparents or beyond. I wish I knew who they were because their memories are part of my history, making me who I am today.

Our mission at Metablox Our mission at Metablox is to preserve humanity’s most important memories. Our platform enables users to add their memories to the blockchain, decentralizing the storage of that data, removing any single point of failure.

Polina, your memory deserves to live on forever.

Playing the status game with good intent In your article , you wrote:

Although it’s impossible to opt-out of the status game, remember that you can always play with good intent. This resonates greatly with me because this is aligned with the mission and mechanics of Metablox .

Metablox turns memories into collectibles, allowing anyone to own the most important memories of the celebrities or influential people that they follow.

How it works in detail Let’s use this Tweet as an example:

 — @polina_marinova

function notifyResize(height) {height = height ? height : document.documentElement.offsetHeight; var resized = false; if (window.donkey && donkey.resize) {donkey.resize(height);resized = true;}if (parent && parent._resizeIframe) {var obj = {iframe: window.frameElement, height: height}; parent._resizeIframe(obj); resized = true;}if (window.location && window.location.hash === “#amp=1” && window.parent && window.parent.postMessage) {window.parent.postMessage({sentinel: “amp”, type: “embed-size”, height: height}, “*”);}if (window.webkit && window.webkit.messageHandlers && window.webkit.messageHandlers.resize) {window.webkit.messageHandlers.resize.postMessage(height); resized = true;}return resized;}twttr.events.bind(‘rendered’, function (event) {notifyResize();}); twttr.events.bind(‘resize’, function (event) {notifyResize();}); if (parent && parent._resizeIframe) {var maxWidth = parseInt(window.frameElement.getAttribute(“width”)); if ( 500 Using Metablox, you can Root this Memory to the school in Atlanta (Important: we’re not yet launched in Atlanta, but plan to launch this year) Because this Memory is important to you, then it will be important to your 120K+ followers on Twitter One of your fans may want to own the virtual land where this Memory is Rooted Owning your Memory can give the owner special benefits designed by you For example, one of your most popular posts is: I quit my job at the start of the pandemic to launch a company. Here’s what I’ve learned in the first 90 days .

Example benefit : Owners of your Memory get 1:1 coaching with you about how to become a writer.

Note : This of course is just an example; it’s up to each creator/influencer to come up with their own benefits.

Your Memory and the benefits for owning your Memory can drive up the value of the NFT, giving you a new monetization model.

Why this is playing the status game with good intent I believe Metablox is truly different from any other NFT project out there, heavily focusing on good intent:

We reward people who go into the real world and have amazing real life experiences The meaning of our NFTs is derived not by artwork, but by the meaningful memories that have occurred in that location Owning memories as collectibles gives the owner benefits from real people that are successful and influential in their own right Polina, join us at Metablox This paragraph from Why It’s So Hard to Create Original Work In the Face of Conventional Wisdom hit me hard:

In this life, we only have two options: create or imitate. Independent thought is hard and messy and often unpopular, but it’s also liberating. We trip up so many times because we care about the crowd’s opinion. There’s a “right time” to get married, have kids, quit your job, build a company, and eat pizza with a fork and a knife. Who decides that? Hopefully, it’s you. What is more original than the memories we have lived? Each person has the potential to create a meaningful, original life, and it is our mission to make sure hard work, perseverance, struggle, and success are remembered forever on the blockchain for the benefit of future generations.

Thank you.

Why Polina Marinova should add her memories to the blockchain was originally published in Metablox on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.