The Revolution Will Be Tokenized

There’s been a familiar stir on the internet for the better part of the last decade. Those of us who remember the Y2K era know the vibes. The murmuring of “something new.” The bleeding-edge technology that only a few know what to do with. The mad dash for a seat at the table. But Web3 is more than the latest buzzword; it’s the third coming of the Internet, a new frontier that promises to revolutionize how information and assets are governed, freeing users from the chains of Big Tech. But what the fuck is an NFT? We decided to ask a brilliant Black woman.

Her bio would lead you to believe she has a devoted niche, but the self-proclaimed “maker” affectionately known as mec is a poster child for the term “multi-hyphenate.” She sings, she raps, she started an all-Black punk band in Atlanta. She built an entire building in Brooklyn out of shipping pallets, makes custom furniture and builds websites. Now, thanks to the rise of Twitter Spaces over the past few years, mec has become a notable NFT and Web3 educator and community builder. There, on the set of our cover shoot co-starring a 1982 DeLorean, mec sat down with CRWNMAG founder Nkrumah Farrar to discuss doing the hard things, pioneering in the Metaverse, and how Black women can help bridge the digital divide.

So, I was today-years-old when I found out you can sing and rap. How long have you been into music?

For as long as I can remember? There was [always] music in my house. So I kind of fell in love with singing. And I think at some point in my adulthood, I was just like, I should be doing this. I always wanted to make music. I think I started rapping when I was thirteen, which turned into the underground scene.

But also, that was the first abusive relationship I was ever in— first and only. Because [rap] was one of those things where I never felt like the music was speaking to me or about me. And so I kind of fell out of love with hip hop and went in another direction and started singing more and finding that voice.

Those are only a few of your talents, and you have many. What does it mean to be a multi-hyphenate?

To me, being a multi-hyphenate feels organic. It feels like just doing the things that I want to do. I think at fifteen, I remember writing the hierarchy of this enterprise, and it always had TV and film and music. I think just wanting to make things was at the core. So I realized it wasn't music, and it wasn't art or photography. It was having an internal idea be executed and made tangible.

I witnessed you hosting an NFT chat on Clubhouse, which can be very male-dominated, and you seemed to hold your own effortlessly. What do you say to Black women about how to bring confidence into spaces like that?

Yeah, it comes from trial and error. You have to try despite whatever other people's opinions might be because you have to touch that stove. It doesn't matter what anybody's telling you about what you can or can't do when you touch it. How long can you hold it there? Is it something you're gonna do again? This is an experience that you have to mitigate for you and not have anybody else determine. Until you experience those things for yourself, you won't ever really understand what you're capable of.

Ok, so what the fuck is Web3?

It's the future.

Web3 is one plus two. So web one was, “Information is king,” and we learned how information can divide us. And Web2 was social and commerce, and we understood how not having the ability to participate in that commerce could also divide us. Now you have one plus two; those two things are given to the people now. So you have information, and you understand commerce, and now you have tools to build your own models to explore for the first time. So you don't have to depend on a brand to employ you to make art. You can make art and leverage that for your own people.

What are the possibilities in Web3 right now? Why is this moment so important for Black women?

It’s super important because as we go into Web3, there's sort of this “Web 2.5,” and Black women, in the US at least, are in a position where we're the most educated, where we have the most disposable income, we're building businesses. And if we're not innovating the ways that we build those businesses up, if we're not front-running this movement, then we're only going to get whatever trickles down. We're going to get the second wave of it. And we're not going to be in the position to shape the space.

For the first time in my life, I'm disrupting where the cement isn’t dry. I've come into spaces — tech and fashion — where all those things were established. [Web3] is not established. So I actually get to decide how it’s shaped and who it affects.

Talk to me about some of the challenges of innovating in a new environment?

There are a lot of challenges. For me, the first layer of friction was information. I'm not quick to pick up an instruction manual. I'm going to just intuitively feel like I understand how this works because I know enough about many different things. But I definitely was like, Oh no, I need the instruction manual for this.

There were layers of friction that I'm not used to. There's the financial hurdle, if you don't come from crypto. I was lucky enough to get in early, in 2013, accidentally buying Bitcoin. And then really trying to understand how to play in that game in 2016 and then better in 2018. So coming from that, I had optics for what crypto was. I understood art, but when you put those two things together, there's still that friction.

Why do you think crypto and Web3 are so difficult for people to grasp?

It’s theoretical. What are the tangibles? [How do] you look at what people are doing and have a point of reference? Because it's so new, it's like, how do you use those things in real life? As I started to traverse that hurdle, I understood enough about how I could operate, but then I could see that there would be a difficulty for the layman.

That's the hardest part; distilling all of the mechanics and making it consumable for somebody who isn't coming from a wealth of knowledge because that's who's going to lose out if they don't get it.

Let’s unpack the digital divide.

The digital divide is still a thing. There are people right now who won't ever really understand Web3 because they barely have a good signal, so they don't have access to the internet in a real way. I think about all the kids who were sent home during the pandemic, who had to get computers given to them because they didn't have one at home.

The hurdle that I see is not just the financial but to understand how to even get crypto. And then once you do understand that, and you understand the mechanics of a market maker mentality, how do you expand beyond that? Those mechanics are more difficult. Because you maybe need somebody who can code, you need somebody who is good at marketing. And some people, specifically artists, are not great marketers. You have to advocate for yourself in this space. It's really the only way that anybody notices you.

Jack Dorsey said venture capitalists are eating up Web3 and what that means to the regular person. What are your thoughts on that notion?

VCs have eaten Web3. Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) is in everything. Everything Web2 and 3. But to say that, I would rule myself out of the running because Web3 is all eaten up is not the case.

The fact of the matter is when people talk about the metaverse, that's many things. Think about it, how many solar systems are there in the universe? There can be a new metaverse tomorrow. They all can exist and co-exist. The question is, do you want to go and buy land in someone else's metaverse, or do you want to start your own? So you need the VC to bring that amount of capital that's required to bring your own metaverse to the table.

So there's a lot of conversation around people being interested in this space and wanting to invest in folks, specifically Black women, because we are in a very specific position in the world today. Companies wanting to invest in Black women are clutch, and most of the VCs that are in my sphere are Black and are interested in investing in any smart idea.

Why do you think the VC space is so touchy for Black women specifically?

Often you hear people who are in VC hide behind the phrase, “I don't understand the problem.” A woman comes in with an amazing product for Black women, and they don't understand the problem, so they don't move fast. I have friends who started The Lip Bar. They went to Shark Tank, and none of the sharks wanted it. So they figured another way, and they’re in Target stores now.

You have to figure out how to advocate for yourself and say, “This is what is needed, and if you don't understand it, I'm not going to argue with you about it.”

You got so much going on. Why did it feel necessary to talk with CRWNMAG?

Honestly, I've done a terrible job of archiving my work. When we think about the anthropological component of building the future, the story is told by those who document it. I think CRWNMAG is going to encapsulate the story in a way that maintains its efficacy and the value that it has to folks like me.

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