Greetings from sunny Tel Aviv! If you're in the area I'd love to meet up for lunch or coffee
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Yalla! Let's kick it off with an important update.
🛍️The MetaBirkins Trial - What's the Latest?
Last week a nine-person federal jury in Manhattan determined that Mason Rothschild, creator of MetaBirkins NFT, had infringed on the company’s trademark rights and awarded Hermès $133,000 in total damages.
What you should know:
The jury ruled that MetaBirkins were not artistic commentary and therefore were not protected by the first amendment
Rothschild was found guilty of trademark infringement, trademark dilution, and cybersquatting.
This sets a precedent for many future cases around consumer products and digital art
Rothschild plans to appeal the ruling
🪟A Portal to the Future of Ecommerce
Last week, I met with a college student writing a research paper on innovation within the retail industry. I sang the praises of augmented reality (the technology that I'm personally the most bullish on).
Digital Fashion Group 🤝 CLO Scholarship Program
I'm a firm believer that every fashion designer should be learning the basics of 3D tools like CLO. Unfortunately, along with the learning curve comes a pretty hefty price tag (especially for non-students).
The Digital Fashion Group has joined forces with CLO to give access and training to designers in developing countries, specifically Africa.
The one-year program will award five scholarships each month, with candidates being heavily vetted by both parties and The Fashion Collective Naija.
Onwards and upwards.
🧔 Ready Player Me taps DALLE-2 for Generative Avatars
When speaking to Webaverse founder Ahad Shams, he shared his vision for the intersection of artificial intelligence and user-generated content. Already popular in gaming, Ready Player Me launching an experimental trial where players can leverage Open AI's DALLE-2 to craft their avatar outfits.
For the uninitiated, text-to-image generative AI works as the name suggests. Simply type in a prompt ( e.g "red jacket with white stripes) and watch your creation come to life. It's scary good.
The trial is a product of Ready Player Me labs, the innovation division of the avatar company, which has rapidly grown in the last few years.
👾 Pixels and Threads:
Pinko launches it's 'New Milan Boutique' metaverse store, developed by Emperia
Nike's .Swoosh (more on this next issue) releases it's first contest
Artist 3Dystopia created a virtual environment of an ultrarealistic French street. Would you know this wasn't real if I didn't tell you?
That's all I got for you this week. As always, any feedback is welcomed and appreciated :)
See you next Tuesday,
Randy
