 We are fighting to go towards the future, but it's a global economy and the opportunities for a person from a village is the same as, you know, an opportunity someone gets if he's born in, say, a town in the United States. Hey, folks. I'm Adam B. Levine, and this is Speaking of Bitcoin. Today, we've got a special episode for you, so we'll get right into it. As always, I'm joined by the other host of the show, Stephanie Murphy. Hi. And Andreas M. Antonopoulos. Hello. Jonathan Mohan is out today. On this episode of Speaking of Bitcoin, we're joined by Vignesh Sunuresan, a past guest of the show, and the real-life personality behind MetaPERS, and the MetaCoven, let's call it Avatar. For those of you who haven't been following closely, MetaPERS is the fund earlier this month won the Christie's Auction, the Beeple first 5,000 piece. So he's got the dual distinction of outbidding tron's Justin Sun and also of having spent the third largest amount of money ever on a piece of art from a living artist. MetaCoven, thank you very much for joining us today, and welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. One of the projects that you started before the Christie's Auction, before you gained some of the notoriety that you have today, was the B20 Project. And I'm going to try to summarize it. I did not know about it until after all of this happened, but in doing some research about you. So as far as I can tell, the B20 Project was a fractionalization or a tokenization of a collection of NFTs, a collection of virtual world real estate and architecture in the form of these museums that you're talking about. And then also, I believe that there was like a multimedia element to it. And so you created this token, you did a token sale around it. What's the thinking here? I can understand the thinking like from your side in terms of you don't have to give up ownership of these things in order to get some liquidity out of them. But what was the purpose of that project and what do you hope to accomplish with it? I understand that even with the mainstream media, there is a lot of this narrative that's been built around this B20 Project. And it's almost like the narrative has been taken in its own direction because of the perception, right? Because we want to understand everything in a simple way. Okay, so taking a step back, then I'd become Metacoan and started collecting all these pieces of art. The thesis that was still like in my head was being a collector. That means that, you know, I'm buying up some piece of art and that artist is making some money here. But that's where it stops because this is all digital and no one is seeing it. It's in my wallet and at best it's vain, right? Like I spend money and not being able to display them or even me able to enjoy these pieces of art. That's why a lot of people don't get digital art also because, you know, we don't know how to enjoy it, right? And so when this Beeple auction came closer, what we were thinking is, so this is me and Tuberdu, right? So Tuberdu had been in the metaverse for a while now. He had become his own character also by just writing, right? Like no one knew about him. He just started writing and people accepted him and he became a journalist in the metaverse. And I was observing him and I was so impressed by how much he could connect with the artist. So what we did was we joined hands and I said, okay, I'm investing my money into buying up NFTs and I might not be the best person to collect art because my taste is very commercial at best. So I asked him whether he could do something. So he started collecting art and then after a couple of months when this Beeple auction is going to happen, we were sitting together and thinking what we should do here because I also feel like the collector is part of the piece because it's all a story, right? Like how this game and what's happening now and what's going to happen is all going to get sucked into this NFT and the NFT is all that it's the story. So with Beeple coming out, what I thought was it'd be an interesting time to capture the attention of the small crowd that's just within the metaverse by surprising them totally. So what we did was instead of buying one piece of art, Beeple had 20 pieces and one summary piece of all this 20, we tried to buy all the 20, right? And Beeple was already quite famous so it was not easy. So we created our own system where we created 10 accounts and bought all these pieces without people noticing and by the 20th piece when the auction was going on, people started noticing, right? Like that one guy was buying it and it became a story, right? Like on how we acquired it. So after that becoming news because that was kind of the most amount anyone had spent on NFTs till that date, again, like as you said, it's a way to signal, right? Like that we are more serious about this. We took everything together and from the day of the sale, in 45 days, 27 people came together. I took a role as a producer so where I could bring together people and Tuberdour was the executive producer of this whole project where I thought about this as a movie, right? So we take these pieces, Beeple is the star and I'm going to bring in other artists who are the other artists, the person who builds the museum himself as an artist. He designed the museum and he had a team of seven people build these museums within 40 days and I know like we can think about is it just 3D model? In CryptoAxel, you had to build it brick by brick, literally like the real world. So when the museum was being built, if you go in CryptoAxel, you could see someone standing there and putting these pixel blocks together, right? And it was amazing and it took around 440 manhours just to build the museum. We worked on the design. We also hired people who could write content about it. So I was thinking if it's a movie, there has to be promotions. There has to be ways of a launch. There has to be a way for people to enjoy. But then the other part which really blew my mind was the fact that we were all on top of Crypto and there is the Ethereum smart contract which removes the need for an accountant, a lawyer and I can directly use all these NFTs as part of an Ethereum smart contract and without anyone having to trust me, they can own part of the museum. So instead of I owning the museum and I accruing all the value, the first initial thought was everyone who worked on this project, the 27 people and the staff whose people here had to get a part of this piece because they spent so much energy. We are actually making a documentary which is going to be aired over time of how people felt during this production happening. So all these 27 people individually received some B20s because how else can I share the ownership of this? And so that was the starting point and the idea grew to a point where I was thinking maybe it will be interesting if the visitors of the museum, the first real monument in the metaverse which is this commercial could also have the upside to whatever the story becomes without having to trust me. So we then took 10% of it and I didn't sell it for 10x. Like I didn't make money out of this. I'm not even broken even from B20s by the way. So I spent $2.5 million and I sold $1.4 million worth of tokens at a rate which was a 25 to 30% premium. That's because I just put in the cost of building it and that's it. So I've not recovered and I've not sold any B20s after that because that was not the point. We just let it be and I didn't talk about it like B20s price or something because again that was not the point because when we started this project, crypto or NFTs were still behind the screens and after this project when this B20 started coming out and a lot of people got to visit these museums. Around 2500 people participated during the launch. We had a party called Metapolosa where 2500 people visited these museums along with us. So three virtual worlds, Crypto Voxels, Decentral and Somnium. We had a tour of 20-30 minutes and Blau who's an audio artist was playing a DJ set during that time. It was an event like one of the best events during COVID. So all this put together is what B20 is. And yeah, I've not sold any of my B20s after the event. So I'm just planning to keep it because it's art history for me. So all this speculation of I doing something, it's all very short-sighted at best. So that's the idea of B20. Meta Kovan, you speak so poetically and passionately about this idea of art and intangible value, which is so important. But you said something that really, really touched the nerve, which was the idea that you own digital assets because you cannot own physical assets because of where you come from. And this relates to the conversation we had many months ago about the potential ban in India. And it's a topic that we've been discussing for a while on this show. And we did a series of shows, in fact, on the demonetization in 2018 and on the continuous threats, the ban by the central bank on crypto banking that took the entire sector down for two years and the more recent attempts to ban it. For all of the passion and clear thoughts that you bring on this topic, anytime I hear from the Indian government, it seems like they simply don't get it. And such a knee-jerk reaction. Do you think there's going to be a ban this time? Why is that tone so jarring? I don't think there'll be a ban. It's a very wishful and hopeful feeling I have because there has been some time, right? Like all we can do is buy more and more time while there is more people within India or Indians who can really be the other side of the conversation, right? Like, of the ban. Because, like, eight years ago, when I discovered Bitcoin and thanks to you, Andreas, I started eating the apple, I guess, where, you know, like, your passion is what really got me into this industry. And after that, I went back to India in 2013, end of 2013, and I wanted to do a meetup where I wanted to talk to people about, you know, Bitcoin. Like, long ago. And when I started at ATM Company, I wanted to put an ATM machine in India, 2014, in fact. But all the time, like, my advice is in India, right? Like, my friends, everyone used to say, no, don't do that, don't do that, right? Why? It was because, like, it's a political understanding again, but a single person is always a minority, right? You can be anyone you want, but if you're just one, you are a minority anyway. So that's the hard part here, because as we get started with crypto, obviously, there's going to be huge opposition, not just to the concept, but also after there's money involved, a lot of people could be just envious about this technology, right? Of a lot of people having made money without them, right? So what we should understand here, that's why I've been using this word of the rise of the decentralized class. So this is a kind of a class struggle. So if you look at it from that perspective, I think we should accept this struggle instead of wanting it to just go away, right? Like wanting them to understand or people to understand, be like, why don't you let me live? It's my right, but you know, that's not going to happen, definitely. So it's going to be a hard struggle. And India is probably the first place where this struggle is going to be played out. So right now, as you see, from the last time we spoke, I think it was 2019, I spoke on this podcast, from then to now, because of the number of people who have increased, who have crypto now, it's becoming more difficult for the government to consider because they have to figure out a plan to take Bitcoin away from people, right? So even if there's a million people with Bitcoin, it's hard because how do you make sure that they don't have it? And they're also understanding with all these people from around the world, like even Elon Musk signaling about Bitcoin would mean something to India, right? Where India is thinking, why will I go against the billionaire, the world's richest person, right? So those kind of things are definitely now going on, but it's not going to be easy. It's going to be hard where this is going to be a fight between the decentralized class and the centralized class. I couldn't agree with you more. I visited India a few times and I've spoken about Bitcoin in India. And most people don't know this because I don't make this public generally, but from early on in my journey in Bitcoin, I advised Indian startups and companies in the space that were doing Bitcoin work because I felt that India is probably one of the most important locations in the world for Bitcoin. And whenever anybody asked me, where is Bitcoin important in the world and which part of the world is important for Bitcoin? I always said, well, it's not North America. It's India, it's Southeast Asia and it's South America. And once you shift your perspective and start paying attention to what a billion people are doing in a place where money and politics and banking has been problematic forever, then you get the value. And I'm so hurt on behalf of my Indian friends that there is always this uphill battle to find ways to fight against the government and the regulators, to give opportunities for an industry that has done so many interesting things in India. I hope that your optimism is well-placed because I still think India is the most important place. Yeah, definitely. One good part about India is that, at least we had English, right? Where I could access the internet. So I'm also for cultural decentralization, which I think is a mood for centralizing markets again, that's a different topic, but I still felt like English was one of the important reasons why I could discover Bitcoin itself, right? And that's true for a lot of people now, also living in India. But we should understand the risk here of what's happening to India because what we saw as India in the last, say, few decades is not the same India we are getting. And there is more instinct to look towards China and point out that China had this phenomenal economical development and it took away so many people out of poverty. So we should also do something similar, right? So that narrative has been really flowing into India a lot and there is a lot of protectionist sentiments even in terms of going back to a country where it might even not want English, right? And just adopt one language as its national language and just want its citizens to not know anything without the government actually having looked into it first, right? So I'm not saying it's going to happen now, but that is the tendency. So if you understand that tendency and that world where they've completely censored that all the information that can get to the citizens in that world, Bitcoin will never exist, right? So because Bitcoin travels as information to people. So that's what we are fighting against. The idea of going back to a glorious past, a time in history when we had glory, right? And we are fighting to go towards the future where it's a global economy and the opportunities for a person from a village is the same as an opportunity when someone gets, if he's born in a town in the United States and that world is possible, but the political situation might not want that to happen because if you think about this bad side of politics, they also want to make sure who can get richer, right? Like which subset of their population should be richer so that they can keep supporting this government, right? So they choose who should be the rich person and Bitcoin just totally bypasses that process and lets you accumulate wealth without going through your own government and that's really something that does not go well with the government. So that's the endpoint where India is trying to go, but in the meanwhile, because there is opposition now to Bitcoin being banned and it's getting stronger from people around the world, even say people who have left India and made a name for themselves in other fields, they've also been speaking about it and maybe my story also, if it can positively impact the citizen, right? If it can say, tell one person that maybe he can also do the same and that's why I bring up NFTs a lot because how do people get started? Because you need to have some money to get started and NFTs is a way where maybe you can sell one NFT and you now have 500 dollars of crypto, right? And so those kind of ideas, if it reaches people more and more, it might tell people in a grassroots way to talk to their local representatives and talk to their government to not ban this technology. Well, folks, that's a wrap on another episode of Speaking of Bitcoin. This is the end of this episode but not the end of our discussion with Metacoban. Join us again next week as we continue the conversation with one of the most important voices in token collectibles today. Today's episode featured Metacoban, Andreas M. Antonopoulos, Stephanie Murphy and myself, Adam Beatleveen. This episode featured music by Jared Rubens with editing by Jonas. If you enjoyed this episode, send us an email at adamatspeakingofbitcoin.show and to all of you listening, we really can't thank you enough. In an increasingly strange world, it's really important to find your tribe but especially those of you who have been listening since the early days, thank you.