The whining cords of Guns N’ Roses’ “Sweet Child O’ Mine” echoed across the dim, velvet-lined main stage of Radio City as attendees of the third-ever NFT.NYC conference filtered in to take their seats, before fading into the next track, Pitbull’s “Give Me Everything.” It was a strange soundtrack that would end up being totally appropriate for the awkward friction and manic messaging that permeates this kind of convention.
This year’s conference, perhaps the largest in the ever growing circuit of NFT events that have popped up across the globe, comes at a difficult time. Since topping out in January 2022, the cryptocurrency market has been rapidly declining during what some experts have described as a crash. Yet the community has put on a brave face, remaining optimistic as naysayers say “I told you so.” More than 15,000 attendees have registered for the conference, up from the 5,000 or so attendees who attended last year, when the market was in a much different place.
For a market that is built off community excitement and a willingness to take risks and weather slumps, the survival of the scene is dependent on events like these, where people can promise each other that that something enormous is coming soon.
‘New York Is the Place for NFTs’
“Many have said to me, ‘Why don’t you go to Austin or Vegas?’ And I say, ‘New York is the place for NFTs, New…
