Aprendizajes... Learnings.

I’m a curious person who loves to explore, learn and adapt.

During university in my Californian hometown, something called me to study abroad. I ended up in South Korea, China, and Brazil for a total of about two years. I had an amazing time building relationships with people from all over the world, expressing myself and listening to others.

Marcelo writes about learning another language in the aprendizajes project writeup. In my experience, learning another language shows respect to people who speak that language and allows you to understand and relate with more people on earth.

“Learn a new language because other people, as equally important and respectable as you are, speak not your mother tongue.”

He writes further about how being wrong and making mistakes are part of a learning process.

“The act of learning comes hand in hand with the need to be wrong..... there is no chance of learning more and progressing without the friction of being wrong.”

Being wrong is something I’ve feared, and that’s likely motivated me to not take certain chances in life. My ego wants to be right, and I can feel it flare up when I fail at something, or consider undertaking a task where I might not find success.

“Life itself is an act of trying out something new, yet many of us remain wary of the unknown, just because it is unknown. However, embracing the mistake, the possibility of not being wrong as an experience to learn from, is essential. Inspecting what didn't work as expected, reflecting on it, being able to act on it and change”

I have control over my reaction to mistakes. How do I react? Discouraged from being wrong, or motivated by the challenge?

To me, aprendizajes is a reminder to learn voraciously; to give 100% effort to my learning process, and that mistakes are an integral part of that process. It’s also about having humility and understanding others.

“Mistakes open doors that are difficult to locate otherwise, and oftentimes would remain invisible.”

Thank you, Marcelo, for your creative expression.

In this article, I’ll share some of the art I’ve collected and dive into why I like it. It’s important to me to reflect and think about why I’ve collected something. What aspects about this work do I like? Would I buy this again?

This article is focuses on a few specific artworks I’ve recently collected, and why I’ve collected them. Let’s go!

Dmarchi - Bravura

In each unique iteration of the Bravura project by Dmarchi, the generator paints several layers of digital pigment to produce an abstract output. I love how this turned out, and the artist shares details about the project in the link above. I appreciate artists who provide a writeup on their project because it helps educate motivated collectors and fans. In this link, you can watch the code run in live view as the art is created by the generator and randomness triggered by the unique transaction hash.

Flockaroo - Mountain Moves

The mountains and the ocean have served as sacred places for me. Mountains represent strength and resilience while the ocean is dynamic and chaotic. This artwork, Mountain Moves by Flockaroo, feels to me like a blend of the two environments, especially when viewed in live mode.

Iskra Velitchkova - Uninhabitable

I’m a happy owner of a 1/1 artwork by Iskra Velitchkova, and there’s a few reasons I like this project, Uninhabitable, and the specific output I bought on the secondary market. The artist has programmed different strokeweight options into the generator, making the output sets look very different, yet still all belonging to the same project. Since the mints were revealed, I have been drawn to the lightest strokeweight (0.01) outputs.

Looking into a generator’s code is a fun way to get to know the artist better. I understand very little programming, yet it’s fun to see the artist name some of her variables in Spanish and some in English. I get the sense the artist was perhaps thinking in multiple languages (or idiomas, perhaps) while creating this generator. My unique output #47 is a “city” feature, and it feels like an international one.

I also admire Iskra’s artistic journey. She appears to be always learning and reading a wide range of books and supporting other artists on twitter while interacting with collectors and others in the generative art space. Her experimentation with digital art and physical work using pen plotters is inspiring to watch. I’m very happy to now own a 1/1 by Iskra.

jjjjjohn - Gatorade and Apples

John Karel’s work is distinct. His work on the Tezos blockchain has garnered much attention for his unique style and I’m grateful he minted a generative token on (fx)hash. I was able to collect two unique iterations of his project - Gatorade and Apples. Gatorade (frost) and apples makes me nostalgic for the days of playing junior golf in the hot sun for hours.

Thanks for reading and joining my journey of art appreciation. I appreciate any constructive feedback you may have. I hope to continue educating myself and highlighting more artists in future articles.

I sold it for 13 tezos, a ~50% gross margin after royalties and transaction fees. Sounds good, right? 💰

To my amusement and dismay, the floor price continued to rise.📈 This, folks, is what we call “paperhands.”

💡 Paper hands refers to a person who sells an asset too early, and therefore, represents an asset of incredible potential that is sold on for a quick gain

Each time I checked the value increasing, I felt a sick feeling in my gut. Watching the gains you could have realized is not a good feeling for us human beings. As of this writing, the floor price is 600tez and may continue to rise.

💡 The "floor" price is the lowest price of any NFT in a certain category

For my mental health, I had to step back and use mindfulness to re-frame my perspective. There are many things to be grateful for, despite paperhanding a valuable piece of art:

• Being early in the web3 space

• Learning about technologies like NFTs, the blockchain, and creative coding methods

• Being surrounded by beautiful creative energy

• Building community

• Feeling the pain and learning this lesson early

• Having the means to be active in the Web3 space. If you're reading this, you are probably have alot to be grateful for

• Being surrounded by opportunities with non-linear outcomes. In fact, I found one in the Lepideptora example! Others will come.

💡 Nonlinearity is a term used in statistics to describe a situation where there is not a straight-line or direct relationship between variables

Speaking of non-linear outcomes:

https://twitter.com/naval/status/1464788767953154058

This resonated after my Lepidoptera experience. In fact, Naval tweeted it the day after this happened. Was he tweeting directly to me?! 😆 Holding would have been the right call in this case. However, Naval gives valid reasons to sell an investment, which make sense to me:

https://twitter.com/naval/status/1465124744856961027

When we start "Paperhands Anonymous," let's look at the positives. What did we redeploy our capital into? Were those investments fruitful?

I urge you to be gentle with yourself, take a step back, and learn from our experiences. Let's support each other on the way.

🙏🏼

Last cohort, I learned how smart contracts empower digital artists to earn royalties as their artwork continues to transact over time. Since, I've started investing in and interacting with artists from around the globe. You can see some of the art I've collected at my gallery here. I think it's awesome how much creative energy is flowing right now.

https://oncyber.io/jasonp

fxhash

I owe this wave of personal excitement to the fxhash, an open platform to create and collect generative NFTs on the Tezos blockchain.

fxhash is an open platform where artists can mint Generative Tokens which are stored on the Tezos blockchain. Generative Tokens are programs designed to produce random outputs. Once a Generative Token is enabled (when the artist decides it), anyone with a tezos wallet can mint its own unique iteration of the Generative Token. Each iteration produces a unique piece that is stored as a NFT on the tezos blockchain. The NFT are FA2 compliant, which means that they can be exchanged like any other NFT.

I stumbled upon fxhash in the generative art section of the gm.xyz network, when MJ Lindow made a post about his upcoming one of his upcoming projects.

The philosophy of fxhash is simple: provide tools so that generative artists can have a space in which they can mint their pieces meant to be generative. No curation, open to everyone.

Before you transact on fxhash, you need a wallet holding Tezos. Most collectors on fxhash use Temple or Kukai wallets, and Tezos may be bought or converted from crypto exchanges like Coinbase. It is also advisable to own a cold wallet for secure storage

Once your wallet is loaded up, there are two ways you transact on fx hash.

Minting

During "open" hours, you can mint a unique token. Clicking "mint" generates a unique transaction hash on the Tezos blockchain.

Artists will have uploaded and minted their Generative Token, a set of html/css/javascript documents which can be interpreted by a web browser. Your unique transaction hash is injected into a new copy of the index.html, and a new project is created with all the same files along with the new index.html file. Metadata is generated and associated with the smart contract, and your "signed" unique token will forever live on the blockchain.

Marketplace

Open at all times, unique tokens can be listed, de-listed, bought and sold.

You can own incredible and valuable art with either of these methods. Popular artists drop GTs that can "mint out" within minutes, so you need to be ready to act quickly in those situations. Some projects mint slowly and then appreciate over time. Each GT has its own journey and different acceleration points.

Community

The fxhash platform is run by a team of moderators and the community. My appreciation has grown as the community recognizes, raises, and responds to issues in a respectful, transparent, and aggressive manner.

Fun

I've had fun interacting in the discord with the entire fxhash community. It’s been a great learning experience for me at the intersection of art and technology.

I'm thankful to be a part of this community of artists, art collectors, platform developers, flippers and more. I'm thankful to be fortunate enough to support great artists and their creative expression.

Most days, I start with a ten minute guided meditation. This gives me time to notice what's going on inside of me. How is my attitude? How is my physical body? What thoughts are present? How is the energy flowing through me? How natural and free-flowing is my breathing? These are the things I am able to simply recognize.

Then, I start to write. I begin my writing with at least three things I'm grateful for, in an effort to cultivate an attitude of gratitude. Expressing your appreciation is underrated. Sometimes I start with just three nuggets of gratitude, and the writing starts to flow. I may have a whole page full of gratitude if I’m called to keep the gratitude train rolling.

After this practice, I flow right into writing whatever comes to mind; a brain-dump onto the page. It's a free-flowing practice of expression, allowing the sub-conscious to rise up and become conscious onto the page.

This doesn't always happen because life gets in the way. But, for me, this is the right way to start my days at this point in my life. It’s an important practice of self discipline. Overall, this process above takes about 15-30 minutes, and then I can let in the rest of the day.

What’s yours?

Check out the work I minted earlier on (fx)hash:

They look awesome but that's not the best part. Buying and minting a unique Plottable Mountain Moons NFT gives the owner the right to request a physical plot, blending digital and physical ownership of an artwork. He expands on this concept in this post, writing:

"The NFT vs physical art decoupling allows a business model that allows both the digital creator and the physical creator to be rewarded and makes the NFT truly interesting as a token that has a real-life action: to unlock physical pieces."

This is just so COOL! In fact, it looks like I was the first to request a physical artwork:

https://twitter.com/greweb/status/1466140759606845456

What's super duper cool is that buying the NFT gives you access to the SVG file. You could use that file (which seems to be just a loooong list of commands) to plot your own physical artwork using a plotter. Next level, for me.

As for the investment value of this project, I really don't care. It's been fun to play apart of this project, and it will be like Christmas when these babies arrive. What's also cool is how much fun the greweb seems to be having. He writes:

"Ok, this may be the best plot generator I have ever created so far. I have put so much effort. This is months of iterations and experiments concentrated into one generator. I had goosebumps exploring the results and plotting them. This is just an illegal amount of fun."

And guess what? Minting is still open on this project! Find yours here while mints last on his (fx)hash page.

Here’s an example of where I’m at today:

The skills and activities I’m working on are basic. However, documenting my journey will help me reflect on what activities were more and less effective. As my skillset grows, I plan to add other skills, or mix skills together in fun personal projects.

So, this is how I’m documenting my personal development journey!

Does anyone else do this or something similar?

You find a comfortable seated position, close your eyes, and try to focus on the sensations of breathing. Inhale, exhale. Inha.... Random thoughts carry your attention away from the breath, and you've forgotten why you're sitting on a cushion with your eyes closed. After some time you remember, "oh yes! I'm meditating." The practice of focusing on the breath begins again.

I feel like I'm in that beginner's meditation phase now with learning about Web3. I sit down to learn about how artists can build a royalty structure into their NFT's smart contract, and the next thing I know I'm in seven new discord channels aimlessly clicking around.

I set my intention to research DAO governance tools and the next thing I know I'm looking at all the Cryptopunks in the FlamingoDAO NFT collection.

I sit down to learn about queries on Dune Analytics and find myself pouring over a dashboard about top traders on OpenSea.

I'm still learning to set more specific intentions and recognize when my attention drifts from my intention. Everything in Web3 is so cool, new, and exciting it's hard to discipline my curious nature. And maybe it's okay to let curiosity run wild sometimes and explore. I think we all need to find the right balance for us. I wrote a few nuggets of self discipline to help me on my journey:

https://twitter.com/jasonpetersorg/status/1465120294104809474

I'm a natural explorer and endlessly curious. I'm working on learning to discipline myself towards creation and contribution, and pursuing excellence in a list of skills.

I'm getting better at recognizing when I'm deep inside an unintended rabbit hole. I take a breath and remember my mantra; "love, confidence, you got this." Then I redirect my attention and continue on.

It's unlikely that you'll be physically harmed in the Web3 environment, but attackers may focus on trying to capture your digital assets.

Instead of training , we can educate ourselves and then take appropriate action on how to secure our assets. A cryptocurrency wallet is a tool that allows you to interact with the blockchain network. Many kinds of crypto wallets exist in the market. They can take the form of a physical device, a software program or a digital service. When it comes to crypto wallets, they are divided into two categories: “hot” and “cold” wallets, which this article will further describe. Hot Wallets Hot wallets include crypto exchanges, online and software wallets which are accessible via mobile devices and personal computers. You can hold, transfer and manage your crypto assets through beginner-friendly interfaces, and it's simple for making transactions on the blockchain. Exposed to the internet, hot wallets are appealing targets for hackers to steal users’ funds by subverting the security measures of the administering third-party, however. I think of hot wallets like a physical wallet you'd take with you on a walk in a city. You may hold (hodl) some cash and a credit card, but there's no need to bring more than needed to transact. You won't carry anything close to your life's earnings in your physical or hot wallet. However, I'm also going to arm myself with education and understand how to spot potential scams and hack attempts on the internet. Ledger's learning academy is a great resource for this. There are many hot wallet products. Some serve different blockchains than others, and links to download may be found on many NFT exchange platforms. Cold Wallets A cold wallet refers to physical (usually small) objects like a hardware device in which you can store your private key. Cold wallets operate in an offline environment while guaranteeing access to your funds at any time. Being completely offline provides more security, but you sacrifice convenience and need to connect them before managing your assets. Two types of cold wallets are paper wallets and hardware wallets. Paper wallets are literally storing private keys on a piece of paper offline. Secure, but easy to lose. Hardware wallets are small devices that store your private key to your assets. Summary If you plan to hold assets for the long-term that you don't want to lose, use a cold wallet. Keep assets you plan to transact on the blockchain in your hot wallet. Thanks to ledger and klever, brands with products in this space and content on this subject that I used in this article.

Who knows an amazing artist who's livelihood was crippled during COVID-19? My wife, kaoriphoto, specializes in adventure racing event photography and is one of the premier artists in her niche. You, too, may know an amazing and inspiring creative with a similar story. But what happens when events come to a screeching halt?

First you cry, then you pivot. You look for other opportunities. You make it happen.

Today I'm writing about the technology that's driving my optimism for the future of artists. Here are a few main definitions and links that may be valuable for creatives.

• Cryptoart is art that uses blockchain technology in its creation or distribution (this simple definition is sourced from Justin Cone's "The skeptics' introduction to cryptoart and NFTs for digital artists and designers" article - highly recommended).

• Blockchains are like giant databases that are great for recording transactions.

• NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) point toward a piece of digital art. NFTs start as digital art in the form of still images, video loops, gif's, music, combinations of these, and more. Artists can then tokenize their artwork, and that token can then be listed, purchased, owned and transacted. Here are links to examples of this art:

  • Tyler Hobbs - generative visual artist

  • Deafbeef - generative audiovisual artist

  • OpenSea - an NFT marketplace

  • cryptoart.io - galleries of well-known cryptoartists

  • Artblocks.io - a platform for generative artists

• Smart Contracts are executable programs that run on the blockchain. This matters because artists can build royalty structures into their work. Each time the artwork is transacted, they automatically earn a royalty from that transaction. This is awesome because if an artwork appreciates in value, the artist participates in that appreciation. In the future (if not already), artists can create a piece of work dedicated towards a charitable cause, and automatically distribute part of the piece's earnings toward that charity.

  • To read more about smart contracts, reference Ethereum.org's article on smart contracts.

  • Based on my research, royalties are only executable when transacted on the same platform the art was listed. This is changing, however, and here is an Ethereum Proposal that provides more detail.

This just barely scratches the surface of what is possible for cryptoartists. I can't wait to get to know, appreciate, support, and perhaps participate in creating cryptoart in the future.

Let’s start with tides. You may have heard about low tide or high tide, and each represent the level of the ocean surface. Tides change due to a combination of the gravitational forces exerted by the moon and sun, and the rotation of the earth. Tide height affects how much water is between the ocean surface and the sea floor, and have a profound affect on how the waves break. Tides can also affect current, and understanding them is necessary for safety.

Swell - Somewhere on earth, a storm is raging and wind energy is being transferred into the water to create swell. The swell may travel across open ocean for thousands of miles until the swell’s energy contacts the ocean floor. The swell energy then gets pushed up and falls over, creating a wave.

Swell height is measured in feet or meters and is literally how tall the waves are from peak to peak. Swell period is measured in seconds, and indicates the time interval between swell peaks. Swell direction is measured in degrees and indicates where the swell is traveling from.

Bathymetry is the surface of the earth underwater that the wave breaks on top of. There are beach breaks, point breaks, reef breaks and combinations of them all. Bathymetry is a major factor in how waves break.

Local winds affect the wave riding experience. Zero wind results in dreamy, oil-slick, glassy conditions that surfers dream about. Onshore winds, on the other hand, come from the ocean towards shore. They knock the wave down as it’s standing up and are generally unfavorable for surfing the wave face. Offshore winds travel from land towards the sea. As waves break, offshore winds can hold the wave face up for a few extra moments and create favorable surfing conditions.

There you have it. Regardless of location, the aspiring surfer can educate themself on how the ocean works and how waves break. The best part about surfing is interacting with nature in a dynamic environment where things are changing and moving all the time. Learning about these factors and being aware of them before you paddle out will help you find the appropriate spot to surf, stay safe, and have fun interacting with our Mother Ocean.