Zima Red ep 133: Josie Bellini - CyberBrokers: Bringing the metaverse to life
Primer: Josie Bellini had one hell of a journey from a solo crypto artist to a founder of a multimedia and entertainment company. In this episode of Zima Red, she shares with Andrew how her perspective has changed over the past 5.5 years and her thoughts on various subjects.
Her Journey Into Crypto Art
Has already been 5.5 years
In the beginning, she created art with a Bitcoin theme
Afterward, she started creating Ethereum theme art
The beginning grind of creating art was special
“Because crypto did make me an artist. I wasn't doing art professionally before becoming a crypto artist.”
- Josie Bellini
Now, she’s running CyberBrokers with an entire team, with a larger collector/fan base
Insights From Running A Company
Launched CyberBrokers in March 2022
Have a tiny team compared to other projects
Important to listen more than you talk
Learned the 85% rule — if someone on your team is 85% as good as you can do it, let them lead it
“I want to create art, but I want to create something that is much bigger than just me by myself.”
- Josie Bellini
Describing Her Skill Set
💡 On one hand, she’s a creative. On the other hand, she’s now a Founder. These roles may be at odds with one another.
It’s about having the vision and sharing it properly with her team
There are some things she’s good at and other things that she’s weaker in
Have been able to surround herself with talented people in those categories
The vision is the solo thing that she has to sell to her team
CyberBrokers
Introduction
A multimedia and entertainment company
Have 3 main pillars:
Content — world-building stories. Planning an animated series/comics in the future
Collectibles — 10,001 CyberBroker collection.
Gaming — Both virtual and physical experiences. Crafting will be coming out
Why A Media And Entertainment Company Instead Of A PFP Project?
When they first started creating CyberBrokers, PFP projects did not exist/have been branded yet
The first PFP wave started with Hashmasks
Took a long time to launch CyberBrokers as she got pregnant
Started researching IP. Wanted it to be a brand that transcends what people watch on TV and in movies to become a part of their identity
“I really want to create a brand that is global and can touch all of these different aspects with the IP that we've built. So that's why I would call it a major media and entertainment company.”
- Josie Bellini
Why Did They Spend So Much Effort And Time To Build Their Website?
They are a digitally native brand, hence the need for an epic digital presence
Mechs And Drifters
Mechs is their gateway into gaming
CyberBrokers and Drifters will be used to pilot the mechs in their universe
Brief backstory:
The Earth had a crazy ice age and a huge number of the population died
The government decided to make a Metaverse
The CyberBrokers are the 10,0001 individuals who volunteered to live in the metaverse
In Chapter 4, it is revealed that the CyberBrokers are actually AI
The humans are still living in bunkers on earth
Each day, they plug into TPL to play and live. These people are the Drifters
Will be launching Drifters after Mechs. Drifters will be customizable with tons of digital fashion
Mechs are giant robots that people can travel and battle with
Players can earn resources and use them for crafting
What Can Mechs Do?
Going on missions — a simple text-based idle game
Mechs are fully rigged in 3D so that they are interoperable with other worlds and games
Could use the mech as an avatar to track one’s movements
Floor Price For Mechs
When they first launched CyberBrokers, they had writers writing the stories
People said to them that the majority of the community would be focused on the floor price instead of the stories
Will be focused on building instead of the floor price
How Is Their World Going To Evolve?
Want people to get deep into the content
Want to have tribes/factions like Game of Thrones and Lord of the Ring, where each group battles for resources
“I really want people to feel really connected with the part of the story that they want to fit in. And I want them to like go die-hard for it.”
- Josie Bellini
Biggest Inspirations For CyberBrokers
Love, Death & Robots and Mischief for their art and marketing
Marvel for being tried and true
Marketing
Her Views On Marketing
Her view on marketing has changed a lot
As a solo artist, she hated marketing
She only got social media when she became a crypto artist
Marketing her art was more about relationship-building and getting to know her collectors
For CyberBrokers, they took a different approach — wanted to prove it instead of talking about it
After a year, she realized the importance of shouting from the rooftops
Just started doubling down on their marketing efforts
Marketing Channels
Mostly on Twitter and Discord
Need to be on TikTok and Instagram as they are introducing digital fashion to non-Web3 natives
Thoughts On Hero Worship
It is dangerous but it isn’t always bad
Especially anonymous heroes/influencers that took advantage of people and came back with a new brand
Kind of worship Robin Schmidt of Supermassive
People should make their own decisions and educate themselves instead of following influencers
Thoughts On Cults
Fascinated by cults/religion in general
Crypto is sort of her religion, but she’s not extreme
Getting Pissed About Other Low-Effort NFT Projects Taking Off
Is not easily triggered
People are pumping a lot of things to make a quick return. Is not striving to have that happen to CyberBrokers
Her focus is on how her team could do better
Plans To Raise VC Funding?
Does not want to raise VC right now
If they were going to bring someone in, it has to be extremely strategic and a very deep partnership
Thoughts On AI
Excited about AI
Others were surprised about how interested she is in AI despite being an artist
Already figuring out how to use AI in their art pipeline
Testing ChatGPT for content production
Bullish And Bearish On
Bearish
Scammers
People totally cutting out royalties
Bullish
The crypto ecosystem
What Do People Misunderstand About Her?
Her sense of humour
Biggest Failure In Life
Not investing more in herself
Have been working full-time since she was a teenager and did not have enough time to educate herself on many things
How Does She Define Success
Happiness
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