Since June, I’ve been contributing to a small newsletter called “Cup of NFT”, where we feature the latest happenings in the NFT space. On every issue, we feature one artist that we think is super cool.
When I got the gig, I personally have a mission to feature various kinds of art styles or mediums. I, personally, don’t want to just see 3D renders forever looping as they move, something that I personally can’t create… yet. I do graphic design, so most of my works are text-heavy posters possibly mixed with stock photo or illustrations. I don’t illustrate. I don’t do 3D renders. I don’t see myself in the space (yet), and I don’t want others to feel the same.
What am I currently doing
I place all the artists I feature on a spreadsheet, and what kind of art do they make as an NFT. I also check and write from which countries do these artists come from. Not only do I want to be the kinds of artworks being made into NFTs be diverse, but also the people that we feature.
I am proud to say that I’ve featured artists from Asia, Africa, Europe, and North America. These artists have covered fields like photography, dancing, graphic design, watercolor, illustrations, doodles, and more.
To see who I have featured on the newsletter, you may check out my collection on Yup.
You may also scroll to the last part of this post to see their works.
Note: I have yet to check out the 18 issues sent before I entered the picture, and a couple more issues while I was already in Cup.
Some things I’ve noticed or I reflected on
Types of Media
I haven’t featured any music or video NFTs. For music, I think it will be just like sharing a song I like that I discovered on Spotify. For video, I’m looking for longer videos, not your usual 3D render loops or 10-second clips. JPEGs, PNGs, and GIFs had their spotlight for so long.
Platforms
All of the artists I’ve featured, I discovered through Foundation or Showtime. Just being able to follow people on the platform where you saw them is a great way for me to “bookmark” these artists.
It just happens to be a coincidence when we feature an artist that’s on H=N. It’s just not a platform that I check out. Although, thinking about it, I should… as well as with other marketplaces on different networks like Polygon, NEAR, and Flow. If I am in a position where I can possibly make an artist’s first sale through featuring them, I might as well do that for artists who have less capital.
What we can do better
With the various kinds of media and platforms to check out and feature, we must give more space for creators and not just limit it to one. Maybe we can start off with having one artist from various networks, or one from each kind of media (photo, video, music, graphics).
Featuring more artists may sound like an easy solution, but it isn’t if you’re just two people doing the newsletter with other parts to work on as well. I think that we should get more people to contribute, even if it’s just with the artist feature part, maybe representing a certain network or marketplace. But now, the problem is compensation.
I personally am being paid for my contributions for the newsletter, and I don’t really mind not being paid. I’m working on other projects in the space and those are the ones paying the bills. Privilege checked, I am pretty aware that this isn’t the case for everyone.
As much as I want to feature more artists and get more people to contribute and provide a different perspective, we can’t sustain that when our newsletter is free.
We’ve had some donations through Gitcoin, and I’m guessing that some of the money that I’m being paid with came from that, but the donations we got can’t even sustain getting more people too.
Send help!
We’d love to know what you think about the newsletter! If you’re not subscribed to Cup of NFT, why not try it out? And if you’ve been checking out the past issue, do give us some feedback!
We’re thinking of keeping the news part bulleted and not have a cover story, in exchange of featuring more artists. As a reader, do you want to see more artist features? Should we get rid of other parts in exchange of that? Should we consider doing an NFT crowdfund or a sponsorship NFT to generate revenue? We have so many questions, so feel free to send us your thoughts!
You may DM us on Twitter @0xElle, @belGIANgwaffles, and/or @cupofnft!
Anyways, that’s the end of this post. See you next Wednesday for another issue of Cup of NFT! We usually send out the newsletter around 9PM local time (UTC+8).
Just for kicks…