DK

Software, design, product.

[DK @panieldark]

This week we announced @nocturne_xyz was winding down. It’s disappointing—we felt it showed great promise for privacy, and we know many shared this sentiment.

I went into this endeavor with the understanding that real privacy adoption would require people to not have to make sacrifices or change behavior to get it (it should be as easy opt-in as Venmo private pay), but the reality is that, significant infra hurdles have to first be overcome here. Until then, to have their privacy, the payer either suffers hundreds in fees (for the computation—ZK is quite expensive), or must bridge and experience fragmented liquidity + anonymity set. If you wonder why the "infra must come before apps" meme continues to persist in crypto, it’s for reasons like this.

That being said, there are emerging areas today where crypto infra can be an enabler for hit consumer apps, not the bottleneck; a detail, not the feature. Given the sheer size of the industries, social, gaming, and entertainment apps are the biggest targets, and for good reason—they're what people use everyday.

When I think of why we don’t have mainstream crypto app in these categories, I believe it’s because approaches have all been a flavor of simply, "___ but onchain" (i.e, that’s the only reason for the app) that is usually a worse UX, or a flavor of "popular web2 brand cashing in on crypto hype" (think Starbucks x Polygon loyal rewards) that is short-lived. The apps that will win will be the ones where crypto is used to offer people a better experience than they would have had without it.

A team I believe that is best positioned to use crypto to enable this is @Azuki, so much so that I’ve chosen to join them to help shape their vision. If you don’t know, Azuki has entered the anime production and distribution space, and have launched an anime mini-series (first episode is already almost at 1M views!), and it really is just the starting form. Alongside @animecoin, the larger vision is to change the way anime fans are able to interact with and experience their favorite shows. Even if you’re not a fan of anime, adoption like this really does work to push web3 forward. (I’m excited to build this vision with @2pmflow @jojochuu @hoshiboyzen @locationtba @heyskylark @0xTraderJo @metag33 @0xseraph @elaineazuki14 and more!)

In reflecting on the past, and planning for the future, there are couple things I can’t help but mention:

• Working with @sebastienladuca and @luketchang has been an experience of a lifetime. Everyone familiar with either of them knows how talented they are, and I can validate that sentiment firsthand
• A long-awaited thank you note, to Vitalik, the whole team at Bain (one of the best leads you could ask for), our connects at Polychain, Hack, Robot, Bankless, and all of our angels—your inputs and support have been invaluable. Lastly, thank you to everyone who supported Nocturne’s mission in its lifetime.

[Chloe Park @chloepark]

burning tokens in peace

[Chloe Park @chloepark]

DESIGN.md is how we work with agents now, but a text file is a terrible way for a human to make a visual decision.

So we built our preview to give some of that control back: edit the file as text or pick colors visually, and the two stay in sync.

And swatches sit on the actual light and dark backgrounds because color only means something in the context you'll see it in.

[DK @panieldark]

@chloepark @MagicPathAI looks great

[DK @panieldark]

@luketchang My goat

[DK @panieldark]

@0xseraph hvob

[DK @panieldark]

@luketchang @Replit My goat

[DK @panieldark]

@DarkEliTomac @Ihartitz That’s awesome. Do you know where he said that?

[pplpleasr @pplpleasr1]

White Rabbit just became the first crypto project to win an Emmy

imagine telling 2021 CT that in a few years our producers and ETH would get a shoutout on stage at the Emmys

u wouldn't believe us
"૮₍ ˶•⤙•˶ ₎ა

[DK @panieldark]

@lemurf @PlasmaFDN Congrats man

[DK @panieldark]

@josephhhhz please

[DK @panieldark]

@josephhhhz link me

[DK @panieldark]

@djdabs_ lmao

[DK @panieldark]

@whizwang It's the best

[DK @panieldark]

@sadboobs_eth LOL

Has team been working hard on this drop?

[DK @panieldark]

@lemurf @eigencloud Can vouch, his designs are very complete and he’s proactive with code prototypes, a 10/10 pick-up steal here

[DK @panieldark]

@josephhhhz “And, therefore, no updates from me today.”

[DK @panieldark]

@Zagabond @emilyrosemcg @AzukiTCG LOL only you @emilyrosemcg

[DK @panieldark]

@sadboobs_eth CONGRAAAAAATTSSSSS

[DK @panieldark]

@Zagabond @elaineazuki14 uh oh

[DK @panieldark]

@emilyrosemcg @heyskylark 💀