INTERVIEW

A conversation with Steve Aoki

Steve Aoki is a DJ with nearly 10 billion lifetime streams and 20,000+ cakes thrown at fans. Earlier this month, Aoki released a miniseries NFT on the Ethereum blockchain. 

The EDM artist teamed up with Stoopid Buddy Stoodios, the production house behind Robot Chicken, to launch Dominion X on Nifty Gateway (an NFT marketplace owned by the Winklevoss twins’ Gemini). Buyers received digital collectibles of scenes from the show. 

By the way: If there was a summer lull in NFT momentum, it’s o-v-e-r (for now). Axie Infinity, the NFT game taking the world by storm, has generated over $200 million in the last week. And OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, has seen ~$1.2 billion in trading volume over the last month. 

But back to Aoki... 

Emerging Tech Brew sat down with the DJ last week. Here’s what we discussed. 

Why make an episodic NFT series? “We're trying to bring more people in. We thought this would be the best way to do that, since everyone loves TV and media series.” 

On seeing like a DJ: “We have to find and discover songs that will connect with crowds. ...I have to be a very good predictor. If I'm a shitty predictor, I'm a shitty future thinker.” 

• That dynamic applies well to the NFT space, Aoki added.

What’s the creative process for NFTs like? “Dominion X is fun and happy. It’s Yo Gabba Gabba! and very eight bit.....I want it to be playful. I have feelings of gratitude now for being able to play shows again.”

On NFTs and IRL functionality: Aoki offered free Lollapalooza tickets to his ~2,000 NFT holders. He also runs a Discord server for owners that's invitation only. “We have a tiered structure: The more NFTs you buy, the more functionality and access you get,” he said.

Our favorite quote: “We are absolutely going digital. It’s inevitable. We will all be cyborgs at one point.”

Click here to read the full Q&A.—RD 

WEARABLES

Galactic Alliance

Realizing two tech giants are better than one, Samsung unveiled on Wednesday the first smart watch since striking a deeper partnership with Google in May. The Galaxy Watch4 is Samsung’s bet that combining the lessons it learned from its previous Tizen OS watches with Google’s redesigned smart watch software is key to taking a slice out of Apple's market share pie. 

The deets: The watch comes in two models, the Galaxy Watch4 and Galaxy Watch4 Classic. It costs $250 on the low end—$50 more than Apple Watch Series 3, the almost four-year-old model Apple uses as an entry point. 

• The new watches are the first to be powered by Google’s revamped Wear OS and One UI Watch interface, which syncs apps and settings between Samsung phones and watches.

More specs: 40-hour battery life, 30% faster app launch times than previous Wear OS watches, and rejuvenated health features. The BioActive Sensor houses the Galaxy Watch4’s heart rate monitor, blood oxygen monitor and body composition measurement tool.

Apple dominates the smart watch market, accounting for nearly 34% of it in Q1 2021, but the consolidation of Samsung’s Tizen, Google-owned Fitbit, and Google’s Wear OS—which makes up 15.7% of the smart watch market—could be a huge opportunity for Samsung and Google.

“Until now, Apple Watch has been the gold standard and a very good hook to attract premium Android users to the Apple ecosystem,” Neil Shah, VP of research at Counterpoint Research, told Emerging Tech Brew. “However, with the [Samsung and Google] partnership, we should see advanced experiences in both hardware and software on the Wear OS-powered watches, which should reduce the churn to Apple.” 

Big picture: Samsung still has a long way to go to come for the king (Apple). The South Korean tech giant can be content with its #2 smart watch status. But with Facebook rumored to be entering the smart watch market sometime in mid-2022, Samsung can’t get complacent.—JM

SPONSORED BY NADEX

The Answers to Your Market Questions

Nadex’s US-regulated exchange offers prediction markets on the world’s largest financial markets.

AKA, when there’s a lot of noise around a hot topic, Nadex can help you sort fact from fiction.

Take the market’s current obsession with crude oil. Instead of assuming that means you should go all-in, how about opening up a Nadex practice account? That way, you can test your theories and learn by paper trading in a simulated environment with $10k in practice funds.

That’s just one example of how Nadex helps cut through the noise and creates a simpler, less complex experience for traders looking to diversify their trading.

Ready for the live action? Make a first time deposit of $1,000 or more and receive a $100 account credit today.*

CRYPTO

Master of coin?

US financial regulators have said that stablecoin issuers should be treated like banks. Circle, the world’s second-largest issuer, has responded, “Okay, sure.” Last week, the company announced its intentions to become a full-reserve, federally chartered crypto bank. 

Let’s parse each part  

• Stablecoins: Price-stable digital assets pegged to fiat currency
• Circle: A crypto payments startup that aims to SPAC. Circle’s main role in the crypto ecosystem is creating tokenized greenbacks via USD Coin (USDC). There is nearly $28 billion in USDC in circulation. 
• Full-reserve bank: Not a fractional reserve bank. Circle would be holding all of its deposits in reserve. 

Now, let’s read the room

Circle’s dream seems unlikely to happen. One reason why? The Fed is thinking about releasing its own central bank digital currency (CBDC). In any event, Circle will continue to position itself as a more regulated and reliable alternative to the world’s largest stablecoin: That would be Tether (USDT), which has nearly $64 billion in circulation.—RD

BITS & BYTES

Stat: Crypto’s market cap has topped $2 trillion for the first time since May. 

Quote: “A lot of people these days seem very interested in bringing this near-future vision of a virtual world to life, including some of the biggest names in technology and gaming. But [Snow Crash and Ready Player One] served as warnings about a dystopian future of technology gone wrong.”—Niantic CEO John Hanke, dishing up thoughts on the m-word

Listen: Ryan talked about all of you, electrification, driverless robotaxis, hydrogen drones, and more on the Future of Mobility podcast. Listen on: Spotify | Apple | Google

Money secrets? We want to know what you wish you knew about money, what you’re nervous about, or what you haven’t told anyone about your finances. We’ll use your answers to create more helpful financial content for you. Tell us here.* 

SPONSORED BY TRANSPARENTBUSINESS

You’ve worked hard for your money, now it's time for your money to work even harder for you. With TransparentBusiness high-yield notes, you earn interest at a higher rate than with most fixed-income instruments. Protect your funds from inflation and start earning 20% a year. Limited time offer. Learn more today.

WHAT ELSE IS BREWING

• Crypto miners won’t be treated as brokers in new tax reporting requirements, Bloomberg reports. 
• T-Mobile is looking into claims of a breach that could include the personal data of 100+ million customers. 
• Coinbase says ether trading volumes surpassed those of bitcoin in Q2. On the institutional side, investors are pushing financial firms for more ETH offerings, per The Block. 
• Joby’s stock soared 40+% on its Wednesday NYSE debut, before falling back to Earth. The stock erased its gains and finished the week below its SPAC merger price. 
• Huawei stands accused of IP theft and building backdoors into a Pakistani project, according to a federal lawsuit filed by a California-based contractor. 
• Apple is in damage control mode, following the iPhone maker’s controversial announcement of a client device-side scanning system that would search for child sexual abuse material (CSAM). 
• Ford and GM are really, truly, deeply at an impasse over the word “cruise.”
• Pony.ai, a Chinese self-driving startup, has shelved plans for a SPAC in the US markets. 

THREE THINGS WE'RE WATCHING

Today: Roblox reports earnings. We’ll be treating the company’s key metrics—engagement, user base, and bookings—as a true barometer for virtual world-building. (Notice how we didn’t say the m-word.)

Tomorrow: China’s legislative body considers a new data privacy bill that could dramatically change how the country’s top mobile apps, from Didi to WeChat, are operated. 

• Related, on Wednesday: Tencent earnings. Chinese state-run media recently branded gaming as “spiritual opium,” which has taken its toll on Tencent stock. 

Thursday: Tesla AI Day. Our bingo card includes Dojo supercomputer, vision-only architecture, Full Self-Driving Beta, Tesla’s in-house compute hardware, and a glimpse into the company’s automated manufacturing processes. 

ICYMI

Catch up on the top Emerging Tech Brew stories from the past few editions: 

• How governments are exploring digital currencies
• Finally, a flying car SPAC
• Biden’s EV goals meet reality

*A Note from Nadex:

*Trading on Nadex involves risk and may not be appropriate for all market participants.  

*Initial deposit offer terms and conditions