Poets in chains

Your first steps into the metaverse - entry 10 in this poet's travelogue

Okay, that title was just meant to sound dramatic. To attract your attention. Here's another dramatic way to put it: poetry unchained onchain.

Chain. That's the key. Chain as in blockchain. And onchain as in poetry published on blockchains. Then why unchained? Well, you can take control. You can break free from your dependence on publishers, magazines, curators, editors and so-called experts who live to tell you how badly written your latest work is. And they will make you wait at least 6 months for it, too.

Sure, we saw that promise before: break free from those institutions that stand between you and the income you deserve to make from your work. But it didn't really work. So far. Web3 is changing that. You can literally start earning without spending one cent. All you have to do is to go onchain. But how do you do that? Well, you install a wallet extension, create a wallet (WRITE DOWN YOUR SEED PHRASE AND KEEP IT SAFE), and pick a site on which you can lazy mint. Sure, that's not all of them. Actually, most are not, but there is at least one: Zora. Zora lets you create and put onchain an NFT for free. There is absolutely no cost. Normally, there are transaction costs, because recording things forever on the blockchain costs computing power and energy and that needs to be paid. But not on Zora.

Browse the markets

That does not mean, by the way, that it is best for you to go on Zora and stay there. Zora is, what is called, a level 2 (L2) blockchain based on Ethereum. It's a quite technical story which is not really important for this conversation. The thing you need to know about this is that the world of blockchains can seem a little tribal. The tribes are formed around the different blockchains there are. There is of course Bitcoin (with the Bitcoin maxie tribe) and Ethereum. But there's also Tezos, Solana, AVAX and many more. Many more. So far, I've found that for art, and more specifically poetry, the best chains to look at are Ethereum and its L2s, Tezos and Solana. All these come with their own community, mostly active on social networks such as Twitter, but increasingly also on Farcaster and Lens, and in several Discord servers.

It is good to venture out a bit. See what kind of art you like and feel comfortable with. There are basically three steps to do so. Find the main NFT marketplaces for these blockchains and browse a bit. There's Rarible and Open Sea for anything Ethereum, there's Objkt for anything Tezos and Exchange Art and Magic Eden for Solana. Sure, many of them are now multichain, but I find that you get their culture best if you browse from their strong point of origin.

Find your tribe

The second step is to see if you can find the artists you like on social networks. Probably they have a profile with links on the marketplaces mentioned above. Click the links, follow and explore. You will quickly figure out which artist feels close to you. Connect with them. Build conversations. Ask questions.

Dip your toe

The third step is to dip your toe in. See where your new friends mint their art and get a wallet on that chain first. Put a few Euros in your wallet, converted to the native currency. Collect a few pieces you like. Really, just one or two. Just to see how that feels. Then publish your first work onchain. Make an NFT. Mint it.

Now, all you have to do is tell the world about it and convince people to collect your piece of art. This is the hard part. This is what publishers and editors normally are for. But if you choose to cut them out of the equation, you have to do that work yourself.

Of course, if you want to promote your freshly minted work, or first start exploring onchain poetry, I have a shortcut for you. Here's a link to my Onchain Poetry Digest. In it, I publish links to the latest poetry published on blockchains. The digest comes out every 2 weeks.

Now, ask me anything if you're a paid subscriber.

Terms to get used to

NFT

Non-Fungible Token. But that’s not saying much to most. Basically, it’s a digital art piece that is stored in such a way on a blockchain that everybody can see by who it is created and when, and who has owned it, and when. A great way to record the provenance of digital art.

Minting

The process of putting a (Non-Fungible) token in a blockchain forever.

Marketplace

A (virtual) place where you can buy and sell things, such as digital art pieces.

L2

A level 2 blockchain, is a similar mechanism that stores transactions on a blockchain in a smarter way so that it is cheaper.

Wallet

A thing to keep your assets safe in. It’s an address on a blockchain of which a ledger is kept. Publicly. Many work online, but there are also safer options that work with hardware.

Seed phrase

This is the key to your safe, where your wallet is your safe. The seed phase is unique, super secret and generated when you create your wallet. You need to record it and keep it safe. Preferably not in a place that is accessible via the internet. So, a piece of paper in a safe works. Or, better yet, 3 pieces of paper that in any combination of 2 will give you the full seed phrase stored in 3 different physical locations. If you store digital art on it of a very high value. Seriously, your seed phrase is yours, should never be shared and is the key to your wealth.

Gas

The cost of recording a transaction on a blockchain. This recording is a complicated matter, and people have invested capital to be able to do it, so all our things get recorded properly. To compensate these people for their investments, they get paid for executing the transaction. The payment is called gas and is dependent on a market mechanism. If there are more transactions and fewer people to execute them, the price goes up, and vice versa. This is not calculated in any price, so please look closely when you make a transaction. The estimated gas fees are always indicated before you finalise a transaction, and you can only make that transaction happen if you can pay the fee.