Cre8or • \krē-ˈā-tər \ • noun
A person or thing that brings (something) new into existence. 👋 Welcome to the 243 new Cre8ors who are reading this newsletter.

🧠 This weeks big idea is…

PFP’s and Identity in Web3

This week’s oped is written by Dom, Cre8ors talk show co-host, and community manager.

⏱️Time to read: 4 minutes

I’m Dom. A self-proclaimed snob, who lives in Eastern Europe. 

I’m full-time in web3, and I’m beyond grateful to be in this position. But let’s go back and reflect on my journey and how I got here. How NFTs saved my identity.

Since I was a teenager, I had the luxury of living an interesting, passionate life. I got into sports & entertainment management - and because of that, I’ve had the chance to meet people I had no business meeting. I attended events that I was not supposed to be at. I experienced things that I couldn’t even dream of. One could say that I was living the dream. But… like every good story, some shit had to happen. My perfect world got crushed in a second - everything that I planned and thought was going to be my path in life, crumbled. I had to go back to the drawing board and try to find out how to make my life interesting again.

I started flipping cars. It was fun and interesting in the beginning. But then it got monotonous. Same cars, same processes, same locations and the same people. I was living in my comfort zone, but as time went on, my inner creator started dying. A quote by Benjamin Franklin started knocking on my heart louder and louder:

“Some people die at 25, but aren’t buried until they are 75.”

I started asking myself - “What happened to you, man?”. The guy, who was all about moving forward, experimenting and enjoying life to the fullest, was forgotten. It felt like the world around me started losing color. I felt lost, I felt like I didn’t have a purpose anymore.

During my search for color in life, I’ve tried a lot of things. I even spent quite a bit of time on Reddit, showing off my “loss porn” on WallStreetBets. That was the place where I’ve stumbled upon things such as NBA Top Shot. Then it was the Ape JPEGs trading for 2ETH, which seemed absolutely insane at that time. Unfortunately, like a true degen, I faded the idea of generational wealth, the idea of buying a BAYC. Quickly, I forgot about the mysterious world of NFTs and went on to continue my search for purpose in life.

After the Summer of NFTs had passed, and I was still clueless where I should move forward, I was talking to a friend on a warm September night. We were discussing some shitcoins, and then he enthusiastically started talking about how he is currently “tryharding for a WL” on a Discord server, talking to Dez Bryant on Discord daily. I wanted in, you know, to make a quick flip, maybe buy a new car or something. I didn’t think much of it then. The quick flip part, of course, didn’t work out. But it was the start. That night, I minted my first NFT with the help of my friend and my web3 journey was off to the races.

Days and months went by, I spent more and more time researching projects, dipping my toes in the world of Twitter, learning the lingo and how the space functions. I tried joining a few communities, but despite my efforts, I still felt like an outcast. There was no sense of belonging. I didn’t find my people, my community, my tribe. Just like I lost my identity in real life, I couldn’t find one in web3 either. Not yet.

But in December of 2021, I finally found one. One, that just spoke to me. Starting from the people that I found and fell in love with - the community, the art. I found my people, my tribe and most importantly…my digital identity. The Owl.

It absorbed me, in a good way. It made me take a leap of faith into something that has been the most exciting journey of my life. Once again, my life was filled with things that I was chasing since my days in the world of sports & entertainment management. Again, it seemed like I was attending events that I wasn’t supposed to be in. Experiencing things that I couldn’t dream of. And most importantly - my life was full of connections, full of amazing individuals that I met and hope to have by my side until I give out my last breath.

Every single day that I spent in the space of NFTs, I got more and more addicted to it. Once I found my digital identity, I went back to the same places where I didn’t feel like I belonged at first, and I thrived. I could joke around, I could learn, I could meet people from all over the globe and most importantly, I could create. I found opportunities to work and grow as a personality and as a professional. Being behind my Owl, just flying around in the world of NFTs, I found what I was looking for - my real life identity - a wild, passionate soul, who wants to create.

What was supposed to be a quick flip, ended up becoming the purpose of my life. A wild mix of something that is hard to explain with words. A mix of communities, technology, IRL experiences and countless hours on Twitter. Because of NFTs, my life was colorful again. Colors were more vivid than ever. I found myself because of a JPEG.

If there is one thing that I have as a goal, as my personal mission in the space of NFTs, it’s to give the opportunity for people to find their tribe, to find their community, and to find their digital identity.

For similar souls like me - maybe even their IRL identity.

That’s my personal goal for Cre8ors. To help create a place where everyone can feel like they belong. A place, which inspires them to (re)discover their inner Cre8or.

Dom

@_klimavicius

🗞 In The News

Y00ts bridged to Polygon

DeGods bridged to Ethereum 

CFTC goes after Binance and CZ

Polygon launched Polygon zkEVM network and invited Vitalik to send out the very first transaction. He included a hidden message (and of course set gas limit to 69420).

Safemoon proved it was not so safe after all. It's liquidity pool LP Exploited for $8.9M.

📊 Quick Question

📌 Major milestones

This week, we are proud to announce that Cre8ors spent almost 2000 minutes on Spaces! Here's to 2000 more this week :cheers:

We are also proud that our discord stages daily call has been growing every day! Nothing is better than seeing Cre8ors tackling their public speaking fears, while having fun and building relationships!

We held an AMA in discord, and made sure the community know everything there is to know about the Cre8ors team!

Most importantly, all Cre8ors came together to build more lore, because that is exactly what Cre8ors do. They create.

👟 Next-steps

Putting the community first means asking for feedback!

Fill out this survey and drop your wallet in the form to receive your participation awards.

Stacking them up might come in handy soon! 🧬

🤝 Favors/Asks

Show us your Cre8ors DNA and like & RT our pinned tweet and win 3 participation NFT’s!

🗣 Shoutouts

Massive shoutout to @Angeliki_NFT for creating these AWESOME Cre8ors stickers:

Netern made us smile with this tweet about Cre8ors:

Shoutout to Craig for hanging out with us every day on Twitter spaces and discord stages, and generally being an awesome person.

Check out Al! Great person and a Cre8ors Participation NFT whale!

Special mention to Dom for running 10km live on Cre8ors spaces. Legend 👇

Until next week,

the Cre8or