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Tokenizing Taylor Swift's Eras Tour: A Thought Experiment

The Power of a Tokenized Community for Artists and GenZ Fans

By: Lauren Tierney, Venture Investor, Decasonic

Who better to delve into the world of community tokenization than the Swifties, the devoted fanbase of Taylor Swift? In recent times, Taylor Swift's tour has taken the nation by storm. Industry experts are already predicting that Swift's tour, which commenced on March 17, is on track to shatter records.

Projections suggest that it will surpass the milestone of $1 billion in revenue, encompassing ticket sales, merchandise, and lucrative marketing opportunities, thus outstripping Elton John's record of $853 million achieved during his Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour. Let’s break down further the impact this tour has had worldwide:

• In Cincinnati, spending related to Swift’s tour reached an estimated $48 million, according to the city’s tourism office, Visit Cincy.

• In Chicago, Swift’s 3 nights of shows at Soldier Field broke hotel occupancy records accounting for 44,000 hotel rooms occupied over the course of the weekend resulting in $39 million in total hotel revenue.

• In Nashville, Tenn., the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum worked quickly to have a Taylor Swift pop-up exhibit ready for her May stop resulting in the museum’s best month in its 65-year history, with 114,000 people buying tickets.

• When Swift announced her Australia show, Air New Zealand said it experienced a “Swift surge”—people rushing to book flights to Australia. The airline had to add 14 more flights to accommodate 3,000 more people.

These stats just graze the surface of the proud financial impact Taylor Swift is having with her Eras Tour.

Swift's Eras Tour has become such a sensation that even the U.S. Federal Reserve has attributed its positive impact to the singer, heralding her role in transforming the economic landscape of major cities across the country.

However, amidst this billion-dollar success lies a tantalizing thought experiment: Could community tokenization have unlocked even greater potential, leaving us to ponder the money left on the table and the missed opportunity of tokenizing her tour?

Blockchain For The Billions Podcast

BFTB Podcast Season 2 is here! This season is packed with web3 insights, AI breakthroughs, and forward-looking gaming forecasts.

We kick things off with an exciting community-focused episode, ”Aligning incentives to rally a Community, online and offline”, which perfectly aligns with our September Spotlight: The Power of Community. Our guest, Laura Cunningham of NEAR Foundation, joins us to delve into NEAR's mission to empower web3 founders and how the strength of community plays a pivotal role in the success of these ventures.

Top of Mind

• Generative AI is in high demand with vast potential, but current products need improvement to retain users. As it evolves, integrating blockchain, web3, and the metaverse could usher in a transformative era for generative AI. Read more about Paul Hsu’s thoughts on this here.

• Gucci is embracing the metaverse with its "Dream Big" team, creating a unique global experience across platforms like Roblox, Zepeto, and QQ. Mobile gaming is a driving force in digital game consumption. Lauren Tierney shares more about that here.

• The post discusses the evolving landscape of NFTs, acknowledging that the era of speculative JPEGs is fading, but highlighting the emergence of NFTs with real durable value. Dive more into this with Danny Pantuso here.

Where to Find Us  

• Paul Hsu will be sitting down with Bloomberg to discuss the latest in Web3 VC and the current state of the ecosystem on Thursday, September 27th at 4:45 PM EST.

• Danny Pantuso sat down with Shiv Mehta on the Proof of Work Podcast to discuss Hollywood's view of Generative AI, navigating the Silicon Valley zeitgeist, the buzz around web3 gaming, and more. Listen here.

• Paul Hsu chatted with Laura Cunningham of NEAR Foundation on the state of web3 VC and how to raise a seed round. Look out for the recording on LinkedIn coming soon.

Thanks for reading!

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Are you or someone you know building in crypto or web3? Get in touch with the investment team here.

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