Ethereum at the intersection of Hollywood and Creators 👤 Impact of Ethereum Summit - Camila Russo

foreign [Applause] [Music] excited to be back I hope you enjoyed some Lo-Fi beats during that break um and yeah really excited to say that uh we have Camille Russo with us uh who's going to be joining us in just a second um when I was thinking about putting together the summit you know one of the creek ways in which ethereum has had a huge impact and the key people that they have as creators and you know Camilla has been a Creator not only as a journalist but also in her work at the Defiance and also now as a producer of an exciting new documentary that's coming up or actually full exciting feature-like film that's coming up actually about the uh the creation of ethereum so um instead of making myself uh look like an idiot on stage I'll probably enjoy I'll just invite Camilla up right away um to chat about this and and her work um both of the documentary and how ethereum has been able to impact the creation of it um so come on when you're ready feel free to share your videos share your audio and really excited to have you join us on stage all right uh hi hi is okay yeah everything's great okay cool um super excited to be here thank you thank you for inviting me uh thanks for the intro um yeah and uh it's it's really crazy that I'm seeing my book being turned into a movie so yeah excited to to chat about that awesome yeah I mean I think on on my side I was you know really inspired to hear uh you know a bit about um just the process of turning um you know from you know journalists to you know basically company startup Creator to then you know um now now book writer um and and now movie producer I think this like been a crazy Journey uh maybe it'd be great to kind of walk through a little bit on the the timelines of kind of how you just started out and just kind of getting into it um and then we'll have to kind of dive a little bit more into kind of the new the new stuff that you've been working on but I think it'd be great to just for everybody to recognize how quick that Journey was for you um to go and just kind of get a sense of those uh those milestones for you yeah sure um so my my background you know I uh I'm a I'm a journalist I started my career well in a news we bring Chile but then they came to the US and was at Bloomberg news for for eight years covering all sorts of markets um it was based in in Argentina and Spain and in New York where I'm at now and my final two years at Bloomberg were focused on crypto I actually kind of wrote my first crypto story in 2013 in Argentina about kind of this growing Bitcoin Community there but was able to really focus day to day in kind of the crypto beat starting in 2017 and then covering kind of uh all the craziness of that time everything was really boring in comparison and decided you know I would just stay in crypto and and that's where kind of the idea of the book came about so this was like end of 2017 I had always wanted to write a book and I you know covering crypto it was like there has to be a book idea here somewhere and um I started thinking about what the biggest stories in the space were and it was pretty clear that that was ethereum that there was uh there was a gap there in that there were no books on ethereum at the time or at least notebooks kind of telling the story of how ethereum had come to be how it was founded and created and so I decided to take that on and and that's kind of how the book idea came about and luckily I found a publisher um harpercollins interested in seeing it come to life and um and then you know started working uh on on the book all through 2018 and and left Bloomberg in January of 2019 to finish writing the infinite machine and because you know I had been kind of at the same spot for too long for eight years I decided I wanted to be an independent writer um and then you know that kind of evolved into just the idea of the defiant yeah so like the infinite machine and the defined are pretty kind of tied uh because it was researching for the infinite machine that you know I was like following the ethereum community around like all all the hackathons all the global hackathons um conferences and just like was seeing all this uh Innovation coming from the ethereum community uh and especially D5 emerging and I realized like it was super undercover like to meet if I in 2018 was by far the most interesting thing happening in crypto and so I decided to start a T5 Focus newsletter with the defined in June of 2019 and yeah that that came that really stemmed from my research of of the infinite machine so that's kind of how you know everything uh came together amazing and I think you know the timing of that should be should be noted that like you know I think uh you know to recognize that D5 was you know such an important part of this ecosystem um I think in a lot of ways like you know early right like I think 2020 is like when D5 summer hit and it was you know absolutely chaos and you know a lot of people were you know it was just like an amazing period of like you know explosion of new things happening in D5 but you know to have noticed that a year early and then you know be I think in the right position and have built the brand over that that year in between to be able to like really report on everything that was happening in a really like measured way I think was you know something that the ecosystem really needed uh in in summer 2020 and of course Beyond um but yeah I mean it was uh amazing to have you be a part of that and very helpful I think for these parts yeah I'm glad I I really hope so like my my goal with the defiant was to to bring the just like high quality objective on by highest reporting that I had learned at Bloomberg bring that into crypto and and just like just focus it on specifically Finance which you know I think there are some great crypto media and Publications out there you know coin desk the blog um they do great work but I I I I was seeing kind of this missing space of just like Finance focused uh information and D5 focused information uh that was really just like had really high standards um so yeah that's that's what we've been trying to do at the Define really well I think you've been very successful in doing so yeah very exciting to see that happen and then as you were sort of kind of you know in a way of doing both of these as you mentioned they're very kind of interrelated uh both the book and the Defiance like um I guess kind of curious like as you were going through and and chatting with people um and interviewing and meeting the community and as you mentioned um for for kind of working towards this this book like I guess like what comes to mind is like maybe a story or an anecdote or something that you learned like as you were doing this that like you hadn't heard before that was like really unexpected that like um either was like really positive or really negative I don't know however you want to take it um but I guess like really curious like what was like a really cool story that you had heard um that you hadn't heard before um while you're kind of researching for for the book um uh that's that's that's so hard I I think you know I I did like over 100 interviews uh for for the book so um let's see um like to me like when I was researching uh for the infinite machine a lot of just like the ethereum founding story um I I had no idea like I I came into this a pretty you know like uh knowing of course about about Vitality like knowing uh just like what an exceptional and just you know charismatic a person he is and I I thought you know like there's this really great character that can drive this story um and I knew some about kind of the other uh co-founders at the time like I had interviewed Charles hoskinson for you know at Bloomberg um but I really didn't know about like all the the drama uh that happened in ethereum in in its early days um and you know as a writer that I was like really happy to to see that was the case um well Source material right yeah so I I guess like it you know these things are well known now but at the time you know 2018 when when I started researching for this I hadn't seen this written anywhere you know kind of this uh this tension between ethereum being a for-profit company and a non-profit a foundation The Fallout with kind of different factions between Founders kind of um you know this what what I call in in my book this kind of red wedding situation you know um all of that tension and yeah I I thought was so so interesting and kind of you know at the core it really spoke to just the values that later made ethereum what it is you know the the fact that uh this vision for a non-profit Foundation this you know open protocol uh that that um vision for ethereum was what finally kind of won out uh was of course what has uh driven and shaped uh the network and the community to be what it is today it's a it's amazing to hear yeah and definitely like I imagine that that sort of um I guess kind of that you know pivotal thing at the at the foundation story at the beginning um it does make for a an interesting opportunity to like you know write and be able to like tell that story and that kind of foundation Journey a little bit of like a hero's quest in some way um yeah I I think like you know just to kind of pause and reflect a little bit on that like the community is you know largely built up of like at least at the beginning of you know kind of idealists but you know largely just people who you know really excited about technology and you know often like weren't writers I think right and I think like this in a way like is a testament to like the importance of like having writers in the space to be able to like go back and like tell those stories because like at some point like and that that feels like now a long time ago the kind of foundation story but like at some point like the story of like the merge for instance will need to be told in a much more cohesive like really easy way to read and it's so fresh and so new right now um but it you know of course that's going to be like a big kind of another big kind of pivotal moment in the ethereum story um so yeah I think just a you know I guess a shout out to to all writers not not just to you in the space but just uh you know being able to to tell that story for uh people who I would say are not often too worried about telling that story themselves um and I think it's still you know an important story to be told um kind of maybe transitioning from the book to um to now your kind of new project that you're working on that you announced recently um which is the movie um or the adaptation of that book uh I guess maybe it'd be cool to actually kind of hear a little bit more about kind of just how did that even start like how do you uh like I have no idea how to turn I have no idea how to write a book I have no idea how to turn a book into a movie either um so I guess like how does that Journey even start for you and and where did that uh where did that begin yeah so um I mean it's been pretty crazy you know I didn't really expect a my book to be turned into a movie I mean I could like only dream of that happening and now that it is it's really crazy so uh basically you know I we published a book in July of 2020 and about you know a few months after that um I started getting some you know inquiries from a couple of um you know movie studios about the rights of of my blog so so how how it works is that um the the authors uh the author usually keeps owns the rights to sell their their books to uh uh producers who want to turn uh you know that that book into into a film and and so I I held those rights and so I was getting inquiries as to you know potentially selling them to different uh money movie studios and producers um so I had some initial conversations um and uh and you know it was fine but it was like I didn't get a sense of uh these uh groups having like a real understanding of you know what crypto was about or just didn't see kind of a a commitment to actually you know making it happen like my agent told me of like all the movies that get sold maybe like one percent actually get turned into a movie so it's like you know movie studios kind of like buy these uh these rights as like an option so it's like okay maybe we will like one day take this and and turn this into a movie but it's not a sure thing that if you sell your rights your your book will actually be shown on screen and so that was like really hard for me to decide it's like okay do I give this up and and maybe you know lose the an actual chance of seeing this on screen um and then there this uh spain-based Production Studio I have reached out to me um and through and it was through uh someone who uh was like actually in crypto like he has to this day like Francisco Gordillo has a a hedge fund that invests in the space and he's been kind of around since like 2014 like really kind of early on involved in crypto so that was a really good sign to me it's like okay they they get it they're like you know literally invested in in the space um and and they were also uh they also offered to make me a part of production so they offered me an executive producer role uh in in the movie so even though you know they weren't like like a Hollywood uh Studio I decided to go with them because I I saw just like a bigger chance of my book actually making it and to be to be a movie and because I would be more involved in in production so that's how how that happened um still you know I I was really clear with them like okay I'll go with you guys but I still want uh this movie to be like like a Hollywood movie uh like I want this to be shown like all over uh all over the world like it's it like I wrote this book for a mainstream audience and for this story to reach everyone and so I want the movie to have like that same kind of impact so like the the big like like the the vision for this movie is for it to be like the social network but for crypto so like you know a dramatized story that's that's meant to be like a blockbuster is is kind of the the big dream so that's that's what we're going for amazing and I I guess that has to be like a very like uh like I think like a very emotional journey I would imagine because like the book I'm guessing is like you know you put so much work into that that you know it must feel like in a way like you know a little bit of like a piece of you right into then kind of license that out to somebody else where maybe you're not totally sure exactly like how they'll respect that the amount of work that you put into it honestly um especially in the case where like you said I didn't know that like you know only one percent of of these things get uh get often turned into movies um these agreements so yeah I I imagine that must have been quite a an emotional journey to kind of go through and I I like really happy to hear that you found somebody that's uh that you can trust and also that you're you're part of the movie I think in a lot of ways too right as a producer um maybe we're speaking to like what kind of influence and maybe kind of impact you get to have as a producer because I'm I'm actually personally not too familiar either yeah um so so that's uh that's a good question because I didn't I had no idea about this about the film world and but executive producer sounds like like okay like that should be at the top but it really isn't it's like it sounds very fancy yeah yeah but it's um it's it's really kind of when you're the producer and then then you actually have like Hands-On influence on on how things are are made um executive producers are more like like an advisor kind of role um so executive producers usually kind of help with uh bringing in um investors or bringing in kind of their their Network you know it's like okay maybe they're they're really well connected with with with actors and they can get a good cast or maybe they're well connected with investors or you know it it's really like more of an advisor roller or maybe they can just like weigh in on on the script which of course like I want to do um but it's not like a like I don't get like um like a real say actually on on how the movie gets made but I do at least get a get a chance to kind of look behind the scenes at how it is getting made so I I I'd rather take that but nothing so um so yeah what it does is like I can be involved and I am involved in in in the funding uh of the movie and so we can get into that you know how yeah I yeah I I wanted to bring in nfts um and then I luckily get to at least look at the script and and kind of give my opinion although I am not kind of directly involved in in writing yeah that makes sense gotcha so yeah everything every time I said producers so far I suppose I should have said executive producer because the fancier title means advisor instead of the actual yeah got it okay cool uh awesome learn something new every day um yeah I mean that's a perfect segue I mean I think you know one of the reasons why I in particular thought about having you on was um was was part of that that kind of fundraising process or um even mobilizing the community that you've been able to build over the years um to be a part of this movie so yeah maybe it makes uh I think it totally makes sense to segue into uh yeah talking a little bit more about that like you know how as you mentioned did you use kind of nfts and and the community that you built over the years to to be a part of this this movie um and be part of that Journey with you yeah so when we started having kind of the first conversations about funding um you know I immediately thought we should uh we should do this with nfts uh you know like this is going to be the first a feature film about ethereum um we should bring in the ethereum community and and bring in ethereum kind of Technology somehow into the production process and nfts uh seem like a good fit so um you know the the other producers agreed and we started to brainstorm on how this nft project would actually work so that's kind of the Genesis of that awesome and then yeah can you maybe speak more to like maybe even just the thought process about that I know that you know over the last couple of years like um a lot of creators like individual creators have basically gone through this exact Mental Math of just sort of like thinking about how they can you know get their work into more of the hands of people that uh that support them and and do so in a more direct fashion using nfts using blockchain using different like um Primitives to kind of do that um yeah maybe even diving into a little bit more about the kind of the different kind of options or different ways that that people could help be a part of it through the the nfts that you were offering yeah um so so when we started thinking about um the nft side of of like the movie the first thing was like um we we want these nfts to be a way to involve the ethereum community into the production process so by giving these tokens some some sort of utility or kind of reward attached to them so what we decided is that we would treat these tokens as kind of backstage passes into production and so um there's like different Easter eggs attached to these nfts so you know some of them will give you um the ability to to be named in in the credits uh of the movie so you know your name appears at the end um some of them give you an invite to a to the premiere of the film others give you um make you an extra there's like 20 nfts that allow you to be an extra in the movie and yeah and and what else oh and there's also like an invitation to visit like a shooting location uh so that was kind of our way of just like involving contributors to to the like the funding process into production um I'll say that um ideally uh the kind of the obvious and right way I think to do this would have been to uh share kind of the royalties an actual kind of equity in the film with the nft holders uh of course kind of discussing that uh with lawyers it was like impractical to do I am like yeah nobody wants to go to jail but um you know it's this situation we're in with kind of like lack of regulatory Clarity that we have to just like be careful and how we do things and so you know we we found this way of of like adding value to to nfts and without having to just you know step into kind of murky regulatory waters you know um so that's kind of on on the on the Utility side and then on kind of the actual um you know just like visual aspect like the design aspect uh it's one of my favorite things about the project so um you know we we said we decided on kind of this is the utility and then and I I reached out to uh to one of the the the the people who had been involved in in the creation of the ethereum logo and I thought you know it'd be really cool if this guy also designs our nfts and then it happened that he is involved in a group of artists in Cuba and like he he organizes uh uh this uh this group of artists together with a professor at the University of Havana and they make sure that these artists are able to um to sell their work in kind of like a global market via nfts and I thought it was an amazing project so I said you know why not bring in this group of artists to to to make the visual kind of side of our project and then we just decided to open up uh that that process to any artist but but especially artists in emerging Nations um so you know you know this is just like very close to me like I'm originally from from Chile I lived a long time in Argentina and I really do believe that crypto has the the opportunity to actually change lives in in emerging Nations um you know and Mika a bigger impact like I I like of course like in in developed Nations uh crypto has the opportunity to like upend the financial system and make it much more efficient and and also be there be more inclusive but for countries where you know you really have a deeply devalued currency where you have currency controls where uh you have a a extremely corrupt government um that's where crypto can can make an even bigger impact so I just wanted to bring in artists from from those areas and and regions of the world um and provide kind of a platform for them so so we opened up the the process for uh for any artists to to apply um and we ended up with a group of 36 artists from Cuba Argentina team Venezuela Kenya India and and a few other places and they designed the collection which is um each artist designed 10 versions of the ethereum logo and then we divided that into like mosaics and then like programmatically combined these tiles and so the result is like a really cool just like explosion of ethereum it's like really colorful and different textures and Styles um it's just really cool so really happy with how that turned out so basically I I took a look at them after um I saw you chat about this the first time and ended together absolutely beautiful I think it's the mosaics of just explosions like you said of colors and shapes and everything it's they're really beautiful so that that's awesome and I think like one other thing that's like worth noting is I just realized like I think you've been doing interesting stuff with nfts for for actually a while like I remember one of the first nfts I got aside from like a crypto Kitty way back when was when I pre-purchased uh your your book in 2020. and you did these kind of voice notes for everybody and minted those as nfps um and I wrote that was the first time I ever realized that and then a few could be more than just like a picture I didn't realize it could be also yeah so that was like a really cool unlock for me back then too um and and yeah cool kind of like full circle there yeah you're right I I kind of like even forget that that I did that I did this kind of proof of pre-order it was awesome yeah yeah you're right it was really cool um awesome well I don't want to take up too much more of your time I know that we're at uh the kind of scheduled time here but um well thank you so much for for being a part of this I'd love to just give you a second if you can shout out where uh we can learn more about the movie if there's any place that uh that's like a resource for us to learn um as we kind of wait for it to it's revealed but uh yeah where should we turn to to hear more about that movie yeah thanks for giving me the the opportunity to share um so we have like our website is uh the infinity machinemovie.com um and Twitter I guess is uh the other best place at 8th movie and then you're you'll find links to the Discord as well amazing okay well thank you so much people I cannot wait to watch the movie um and thank you so much for being a part of this um super excited and uh yeah thank you so much and I think that actually brings us to the end of our day today um so I'll just kind of quickly share thanks again Camila for your time um and I just want to kind of give a quick overview for everybody else uh as a big thank you for being a part of this um of course if you're part of the hackathon that is going on right now I do want to note that submissions are due um on Sunday at 3 P.M so uh get your uh your pencils going and get your submissions in uh you can start now submissions are open um and yeah otherwise Happy hacking and thank you so much for everybody for being a part of this nice uh thanks and also good luck to everyone participating in the hackathon bye thanks Gabby see you everybody