On
Tuesday,
I
wrote
and
published
a
column
breaking
the
news
of
and
reflecting
on
Dapper
Labs’
recently
announced
tie-up
with
Disney,
the
storied,
100-year-old
entertainment
company
which,
under
CEO
Bob
Iger’s
leadership,
has
become
even
more
of
an
intellectual
property
owning
powerhouse
and
tech
follower.
This
article
contained
a
few
errors.
This
is
an
excerpt
from
The
Node
newsletter,
a
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roundup
of
the
most
pivotal
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news
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here.
Most
embarrassingly
I
misspelled
the
surname
of
one
of
my
sources,
Dapper
Labs
vice
president
of
partnerships
Ridhima
Khan,
and
misattributed
one
of
her
quotes
to
CEO
Roham
Gharegozlou.
Those
errors
have
been
corrected,
and
are
regretted.
More
importantly,
however,
a
central
claim
of
the
article
—
that
Dapper
and
Disney
were
“partners”
in
a
venture
called
Disney
Pinnacle,
which
will
license
Disney
IP
and
sell
digital
tokens
modeled
after
collectible
pins
—
now
appears
to
be
incorrect.
As
per
Dapper
Labs
head
of
PR
Rachel
Rogers,
on
Thursday,
two
days
after
the
story
published:
“Also,
Disney
didn’t
launch
the
Disney
Pinnacle
platform.
Dapper
Labs
did
in
collaboration
with
Disney.
Can
you
update?
Disney
does
not
use
the
word
partner
–
only
collaborates
with
or
teams
up
with.”
The
news
was
picked
up
by
and
cited
by
a
number
of
widely-read
tech
news
outlets,
some
of
which
have
received
similar
requests
from
Dapper
to
wipe
the
term
partner
from
the
record.
I’m
writing
this
story,
in
part,
to
correct
the
record:
Disney
is
not
partnering
with
Dapper.
Disney,
which
has
not
responded
to
a
request
for
comment,
will
likely
never
partner
with
a
crypto
company.
Instead,
Disney
is
licensing
its
IP
to
Dapper.
The
terms
and
conditions
of
the
deal
are
unknown.
When
asked,
Dapper
said:
“Like
all
of
our
partnerships,
we
can’t
comment
on
financial
breakdowns.”
I
asked
a
few
different
ways,
a
few
different
times
in
a
call
with
Khan
and
Gharegozlou
as
well
as
in
emailed
follow
up
questions.
It’s
not
unreasonable
to
think
that
“a
licensed
partner
for
Disney,”
as
Dapper
also
initially
described
the
arrangement,
could
be
paying
for
the
privilege.
Such
financial
deals
are
not
uncommon
in
the
world
of
NFTs.
What
is
being
licensed
is
valuable
property.
In
a
call,
Gharegozlou
and
Khan
suggested
Disney
has
been
in
close
contact
with
Dapper
through
the
development
process
—
though
Dapper
is
doing
all
the
building.
The
mobile
app
is
not
yet
launched,
only
the
waitlist
opened
on
Tuesday.
In
my
article,
I
basically
argued
that
this
project
could
have
potential
to
be
one
of
the
few
non-cringy
NFT
experiments.
I
argued
that
Disney
has
a
large
fanbase,
full
of
people
who
like
to
collect
Disney
junk.
It
makes
sense
to
work
with
recognizable
content
that
people
already
have
an
emotional
connection
with,
rather
than
to
get
them
to
buy
what
could
be
described
as
a
JPEG
with
a
blockchain
pointer.
Otherwise,
you
end
up
with
something
like
the
Bored
Ape
Yacht
Club,
because
it’s
next
to
impossible
to
build
a
brand
from
the
ground
up.
And
the
Yacht
Club
is
essentially
the
most
successful
“bootstrapped”
NFT
project
to
date,
if
you
want
to
call
paying
or
otherwise
enticing
celebrities
to
shill
their
bags
bootstrapped.
I
mean,
as
I
argued,
Dapper’s
earlier
experience
could
also
be
called
successful
by
the
standards
of
crypto.
NBA
Top
Shots,
where
Dapper
pioneered
the
concept
of
licensing
beloved
IP
to
sell
tokens,
does
not
see
much
action
today,
but
at
one
time
it
was
essentially
the
crown
jewel
of
Dapper
properties
and
significant
part
of
the
reason
Dapper
was,
now
in
hindsight,
comically
overvalued.
Assuming
Disney
Pinnacle
is
still
happening
–
even
though
it
seems
like
Disney
chewed
Dapper
out
for
claiming
they
were
“partnered”
in
a
crypto
cash
grab
–
it
might
even
still
be
successful.
People
buy
Disney
merchandise
even
though
it
is
often
intrinsically
valueless,
and
it’s
not
yet
clear
whether
Disney
fanatics
have
a
guttural
hatred
of
NFTs
like
some
consumer
segments,
like
gamers.
See
also:
‘Probably
Nothing’:
Why
People
Still
Hate
Crypto
|
Opinion
It
could
work!
And
if
it
does,
it’ll
be
as
much
because
of
Dapper’s
design
work
as
Disney’s
property.
But
it’s
not
a
partnership.
I’m
not
exactly
sure
why
Gharegozlou,
Khan
and
Rogers
were
all
so
adamant
about
calling
it
a
partnership.
The
term
was
used
a
lot.
And
I
made
sure
to
ask
several
times
in
several
different
ways
how
to
describe
the
working
relationship
precisely
because
crypto
companies
often
incorrectly
use
the
term
partner
or
oversell
their
relationships
with
established
brands.
Like,
I’m
pretty
sure
I’ve
seen
a
company
call
a
Google
Cloud
subscription
a
deal.
Ethereum
is
reliant
on
Amazon,
but
Amazon
is
not
an
Ethereum
backer
in
any
traditional
sense.
And
I
get
it,
at
least
in
Dapper’s
case
I’m
sure
it
was
an
honest
mistake.
Khan
said
she
went
to
Disneyland
nearly
20
times
as
the
main
liaison
and
reason
the
non-partnership
happened
between
Disney
and
Dapper.
I
enjoyed
speaking
with
them,
and
thought
Gharegozlou
to
be
uncommonly
gregarious
for
someone
in
his
position.
.
But
I
do
find
the
request
to
essentially
retcon
the
story
morally
questionable.
As
I
told
Rogers
in
an
email,
“I
cannot
change
quotes,
and
I
cannot
change
the
fact
that
partner/partnership
was
the
term
used
by
Roham
and
Ridhima
and
in
written
communications
from
the
company.”
I
can’t
change
their
quotes.
At
the
time
of
publication
the
information
was
accurate.
We’re
not
in
the
business
of
doing
favors
for
companies,
and
if
we
granted
this
request
it
would
open
a
can
of
worms
for
everytime
a
source
says
something
on
the
record
they
come
to
regret.
The
part
of
the
job
I
like
best
is
calling
a
spade
a
spade.
Another
one
of
Dapper’s
ignominious
requests
was
to
change
a
comment
made
about
“investing”
in
NFTs
when
asked
about
the
differences
between
digital
and
tangible
collectibles.
I
get
it,
discussing
NFTs
as
financial
assets
opens
up
a
regulatory
attack
surface.
But
to
suggest
that
you
can
INVEST
in
physical
pins
but
only
COLLECT
digital
ones
is
silly.
NFTs
are
investments,
they’re
treated
as
investments
and
in
my
brief
communications
with
Dapper
we
spoke
about
them
as
investments
and
collectibles.
And
in
the
absence
of
any
solid
information
about
the
“pins,”
like
whether
they
come
with
perks
like
Disney
discounts
or
opportunities,
presumably
one
of
the
major
reasons
to
buy
one
is
because
it
could
appreciate
in
value.
Dapper
is
not
alone
here.
Crypto
has
an
honesty
crisis.
The
industry
is
not
only
overrun
with
fraud,
literal
measurable
fraud,
it
is
in
the
business
of
deceiving
people.
Crypto
is
a
technology
without
a
use
case,
which
is
promised
to
solve
every
problem
and
has
failed
by
nearly
every
measure.
The
thing
crypto
is
actually
good
for
—
buying
things
online
you
don’t
want
on
a
credit
card
statement
—
is
entirely
underplayed.
There
is
no
way
a
decade
of
misrepresentation
does
not
end
up
causing
collateral
damage.
In
many
ways
it
already
has.
Crypto
has
a
bad
reputation,
and
not
even
in
a
cool
way
—
in
a
way
that
screams
low
social
standing
and
dishonesty.
And
for
good
reason.
Millions
of
people
collectively
lost
billions
of
dollars.
A
technology
that
is
supposed
to
be
about
sticking
it
to
the
man
is
obsequious.
In
other
words:
Crypto
is
cringy
and
untrustworthy.
It
is
the
George
Santos
of
financial
technology.
And
it’s
not
going
to
get
better
unless
its
leaders
give
honesty
a
try.
Pretend
it’s
a
profession.