From NFT.NYC 2024 in New York City, BlockchainJournal.com editor-in-chief David Berlind interviews Sam Whitaker, the founder of Quixotish, a newly launched startup focused on the usage of blockchain to drive the success of charities and non-profits. Given how Blockchain Journal is focused on implementations of blockchain meant to drive new or improved business outcomes for big brands and enterprises, Quixotish's first customer – St. Jude Children's Research Hospital – caught David's eye as one of the most well-known non-profits on the planet. During the interview, Whitaker explains how Quixotish's novel blockchain-based approach to driving charitable donations works.
The general idea, as Whitaker describes it, is for a charity like St. Jude to curate donations of valuable blockchain-based assets (e.g., NFTs) and then for the charity to conduct an auction where those assets are sold on the secondary market with the proceeds flowing to St. Judes as fiat currency. On the surface, it sounds pretty simple. But it's also important for donors to know that when they're dealing with a relatively anonymized address on a blockchain, that address actually belongs to the intended charity. In other words, it can be a bit more complicated than it sounds.
To ensure accountability, Whitaker highlights the steps he took with St. Jude, including the video recording of wallet setup sessions involving St. Jude representatives and the subsequent publication of these videos on Quixotish's platforms. The interview touches upon the significance of St. Jude's reputation and operational scale, framing it as the "Google" or "Apple" of the charity world, given the charity's multi-million dollar daily cash flow. Whitaker underscores the hospital's commitment to providing free care to children and openly sharing its research.
Towards the end, Whitaker discusses the practical aspects of the auction, including its timing and accessibility to both crypto and fiat currency users by virtue of St. Jude's reliance on a combined NFT marketplace and custodial wallet solution from Magic Eden. By supporting crypto users across a long list of public blockchains as well as non-crypto users who prefer to deal in fiat currencies like the US dollar, he underscores the initiative's inclusivity, welcoming participation from individuals regardless of their familiarity with blockchain technology.
To watch the video version of this podcast or read its full-text transcript, go to:
https://blockchainjournal.com/interview/how-quixotish-is-helping-st-jude-charity-raise-money-blockchain-technology
The video can also be watched on Blockchain Journal's YouTube Channel at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHr3gx8Jy78
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From NFT.NYC 2024 in New York City, BlockchainJournal.com editor-in-chief David Berlind interviews Sam Whitaker, the founder of Quixotish, a newly launched startup focused on the usage of blockchain to drive the success of charities and non-profits. Given how Blockchain Journal is focused on implementations of blockchain meant to drive new or improved business outcomes for big brands and enterprises, Quixotish's first customer – St. Jude Children's Research Hospital – caught David's eye as one of the most well-known non-profits on the planet. During the interview, Whitaker explains how Quixotish's novel blockchain-based approach to driving charitable donations works.
The general idea, as Whitaker describes it, is for a charity like St. Jude to curate donations of valuable blockchain-based assets (e.g., NFTs) and then for the charity to conduct an auction where those assets are sold on the secondary market with the proceeds flowing to St. Judes as fiat currency. On the surface, it sounds pretty simple. But it's also important for donors to know that when they're dealing with a relatively anonymized address on a blockchain, that address actually belongs to the intended charity. In other words, it can be a bit more complicated than it sounds.
To ensure accountability, Whitaker highlights the steps he took with St. Jude, including the video recording of wallet setup sessions involving St. Jude representatives and the subsequent publication of these videos on Quixotish's platforms. The interview touches upon the significance of St. Jude's reputation and operational scale, framing it as the "Google" or "Apple" of the charity world, given the charity's multi-million dollar daily cash flow. Whitaker underscores the hospital's commitment to providing free care to children and openly sharing its research.
Towards the end, Whitaker discusses the practical aspects of the auction, including its timing and accessibility to both crypto and fiat currency users by virtue of St. Jude's reliance on a combined NFT marketplace and custodial wallet solution from Magic Eden. By supporting crypto users across a long list of public blockchains as well as non-crypto users who prefer to deal in fiat currencies like the US dollar, he underscores the initiative's inclusivity, welcoming participation from individuals regardless of their familiarity with blockchain technology.
To watch the video version of this podcast or read its full-text transcript, go to:
https://blockchainjournal.com/interview/how-quixotish-is-helping-st-jude-charity-raise-money-blockchain-technology
The video can also be watched on Blockchain Journal's YouTube Channel at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHr3gx8Jy78
Dematerialzd Researcher Marc Baumann Discusses the Post Starbucks Business Value of NFTs at NFT.NYC
Blockchain Journal with David Berlind
18 minutes 18 seconds
1 year ago
Dematerialzd Researcher Marc Baumann Discusses the Post Starbucks Business Value of NFTs at NFT.NYC
During the NFT.NYC 2024 Conference in New York, Blockchain Journal editor-in-chief David Berlind interviews one of the speakers at the event: Marc Baumann, founder of FiftyOne Ventures and Dematerialzd.xyz. Baumann is well-known for his opinionated analyses regarding the NFT-based customer loyalty and engagement programs operated by some of the world's biggest brands. The discussion delves into the evolution of NFT use cases, which famously (or infamously, depending on your point of view) began with collectible digital images. Baumann responds to David's questions with a walk down memory lane, examining the past and current NFT landscapes, and eventually ends with some predictions about some of the more nuanced use cases, focusing on tangible business outcomes.
Baumann identifies four key verticals where NFTs are making waves in business applications. The first, tokenization and phygitals, involves the 1:1 marriage of physical items with their digital counterparts on-chain, often facilitated by near-field communication (NFC) chips. According to Baumann, this results in myriad possibilities for post-purchase activations and direct consumer engagement, such as unlocking rewards or exclusive experiences tied to the possession of specific products. Baumann talks about how physical items become proxies for their digital counterparts and vice versa, paving the way towards the idea of token-gating, a fusion of the physical and digital realms where either "twin" grants the holder exclusive, "velvet rope" style access to real or virtual world (a.k.a. "metaverse") customer journeys.
Baumann also leans into loyalty and rewards, community and commerce, and data insights as the other three key verticals. Baumann emphasizes the need for brands to move beyond the allure of NFTs as standalone collectibles and instead focus on solving real business problems, creating value for consumers, and generating measurable ROI.
Baumann and David spend a fair amount of time discussing the history of the recently scuttled Starbucks Odyssey NFT program as a bit of a stain on the NFT landscape. This leaves open the question of how, if a big brand like Starbucks can't make NFTs work, what enterprise can? This brings the discussion full circle back to the challenges associated with collectibility (one of the main features of the Odyssey program).
To watch the video version of this podcast or read its full-text transcript, go to:
https://blockchainjournal.com/interview/dematerialzd-researcher-marc-baumann-discusses-post-starbucks-business-value-nfts-nftnyc
The video can also be watched on Blockchain Journal's YouTube Channel at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rV2ZBY7vuOk
Blockchain Journal with David Berlind
From NFT.NYC 2024 in New York City, BlockchainJournal.com editor-in-chief David Berlind interviews Sam Whitaker, the founder of Quixotish, a newly launched startup focused on the usage of blockchain to drive the success of charities and non-profits. Given how Blockchain Journal is focused on implementations of blockchain meant to drive new or improved business outcomes for big brands and enterprises, Quixotish's first customer – St. Jude Children's Research Hospital – caught David's eye as one of the most well-known non-profits on the planet. During the interview, Whitaker explains how Quixotish's novel blockchain-based approach to driving charitable donations works.
The general idea, as Whitaker describes it, is for a charity like St. Jude to curate donations of valuable blockchain-based assets (e.g., NFTs) and then for the charity to conduct an auction where those assets are sold on the secondary market with the proceeds flowing to St. Judes as fiat currency. On the surface, it sounds pretty simple. But it's also important for donors to know that when they're dealing with a relatively anonymized address on a blockchain, that address actually belongs to the intended charity. In other words, it can be a bit more complicated than it sounds.
To ensure accountability, Whitaker highlights the steps he took with St. Jude, including the video recording of wallet setup sessions involving St. Jude representatives and the subsequent publication of these videos on Quixotish's platforms. The interview touches upon the significance of St. Jude's reputation and operational scale, framing it as the "Google" or "Apple" of the charity world, given the charity's multi-million dollar daily cash flow. Whitaker underscores the hospital's commitment to providing free care to children and openly sharing its research.
Towards the end, Whitaker discusses the practical aspects of the auction, including its timing and accessibility to both crypto and fiat currency users by virtue of St. Jude's reliance on a combined NFT marketplace and custodial wallet solution from Magic Eden. By supporting crypto users across a long list of public blockchains as well as non-crypto users who prefer to deal in fiat currencies like the US dollar, he underscores the initiative's inclusivity, welcoming participation from individuals regardless of their familiarity with blockchain technology.
To watch the video version of this podcast or read its full-text transcript, go to:
https://blockchainjournal.com/interview/how-quixotish-is-helping-st-jude-charity-raise-money-blockchain-technology
The video can also be watched on Blockchain Journal's YouTube Channel at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHr3gx8Jy78
