When I first joined the Dreams Never Die community I was wholeheartedly committed to the mission of creating sustainability around new artists and their careers. Additionally, the “community-owned” component of such an endeavor was highly appealing to me. Upon entering the community I was welcomed in with open arms by many of the community members who were pushed out in this last week. What I learned over the course of my active engagement with the community is that dreams do die. In fact, they die repeatedly through consistent failures in alignment with the goals established from the outset.

Over and over I found myself being disappointed with the decisions being made by the core team. First it was the acceptance of the VC funding from Polychain Capital – it was this funding that ostensibly ousted any semblance of community ownership in the label. In this moment there was a discursive shift in the messaging coming from the team: no longer was it community-owned, rather it was ‘community-led’.  In my gut I felt a lot of hesitation, ‘maybe this could be a good thing for the community?’ or ‘perhaps we will all see an upside in this?’  In hindsight, I should have followed my gut, and yet I remained. 

I stayed in the community because of the connections that I made with different members. Many of those who were laid off and/or resigned are people who I built and still maintain great relationships with. After the release of the founders' pass there was an influx of new people into the community, no longer did we seem to be aligned with a mission of supporting artists, instead there was a growth in questions about when our tokens will increase in value.

The sudden departure of co-founder Cole was a shock to many in the community, the limited communication and vague messaging instilled a sense of doubt in the commitment to the values that we cultivated as a community. After the layoff of the rest of the core team I knew that Dreams Never Die was not what it used to be. 

Whether it was the failure to stay committed to the mission of a community-owned label, or the ease in which they ousted the core team that truly made Dreams Never Die what it was. The result of all of this is a shell of a community that now only works to serve Chad and Sloe Jack. With Chris Anokute as the puppet master of it all. 

To say that I’m disappointed would be an understatement to the highest degree. What I’m most disappointed in is the vile misogyny perpetrated by Chris, and the utter disrespect to his former team members from Sloe Jack – all the while Chad elicits sympathy for Chris on twitter. These things have no space in web3 music. It has been a delight to know that there are community members who are willing to step up and make their voice heard, even in the face of such an absurd display of patriarchal aggression. 

I hope we come out of this on the other side as a stronger web3 music community. I hope Chris, Chad, and Jack are able to reckon with the damage they have caused. I hope all artists that still have deals with Dreams Never Die are given the option to end them, and pursue their careers free from a toxic label environment. I hope we do better, or else dreams will continue to die.

When I first joined the Dreams Never Die community I was wholeheartedly committed to the mission of creating sustainability around new artists and their careers. Additionally, the “community-owned” component of such an endeavor was highly appealing to me. Upon entering the community I was welcomed in with open arms by many of the community members who were pushed out in this last week. What I learned over the course of my active engagement with the community is that dreams do die. In fact, they die repeatedly through consistent failures in alignment with the goals established from the outset.

Over and over I found myself being disappointed with the decisions being made by the core team. First it was the acceptance of the VC funding from Polychain Capital – it was this funding that ostensibly ousted any semblance of community ownership in the label. In this moment there was a discursive shift in the messaging coming from the team: no longer was it community-owned, rather it was ‘community-led’.  In my gut I felt a lot of hesitation, ‘maybe this could be a good thing for the community?’ or ‘perhaps we will all see an upside in this?’  In hindsight, I should have followed my gut, and yet I remained. 

I stayed in the community because of the connections that I made with different members. Many of those who were laid off and/or resigned are people who I built and still maintain great relationships with. After the release of the founders' pass there was an influx of new people into the community, no longer did we seem to be aligned with a mission of supporting artists, instead there was a growth in questions about when our tokens will increase in value.

The sudden departure of co-founder Cole was a shock to many in the community, the limited communication and vague messaging instilled a sense of doubt in the commitment to the values that we cultivated as a community. After the layoff of the rest of the core team I knew that Dreams Never Die was not what it used to be. 

Whether it was the failure to stay committed to the mission of a community-owned label, or the ease in which they ousted the core team that truly made Dreams Never Die what it was. The result of all of this is a shell of a community that now only works to serve Chad and Sloe Jack. With Chris Anokute as the puppet master of it all. 

To say that I’m disappointed would be an understatement to the highest degree. What I’m most disappointed in is the vile misogyny perpetrated by Chris, and the utter disrespect to his former team members from Sloe Jack – all the while Chad elicits sympathy for Chris on twitter. These things have no space in web3 music. It has been a delight to know that there are community members who are willing to step up and make their voice heard, even in the face of such an absurd display of patriarchal aggression. 

I hope we come out of this on the other side as a stronger web3 music community. I hope Chris, Chad, and Jack are able to reckon with the damage they have caused. I hope all artists that still have deals with Dreams Never Die are given the option to end them, and pursue their careers free from a toxic label environment. I hope we do better, or else dreams will continue to die.