Original subtitles

There are a lot of people creating hype.

We've all heard the story.

NFT could make you a millionaire overnight.

The crypto bro, the get rich fast, the let's party.

The global crypto space can seem packed full of ego. There's a lot of people

making very quick dollars without understanding what they're even doing.

I was just seeing a bunch of cowboys coming in and going, we can get rich

But who are the local innovators smashing those NFT stereotypes?

Scratch beneath the surface.

And there are wonderful communities across New Zealand putting in the

We're seeing more people coming into this with good values.

We meet the Kiwis killing it in the NFT scene and proving it's not all about the

cash. We really believe it can be a part of the change in this industry.

There are a lot of New Zealand creators who are trying to create something

bigger.

Maybe from the inside, we can start to turn it into something more accessible.

For Luke Ryan, the road to creating a sellout collection of NFTs was far from

easy, and it all started with his own journey of self -discovery.

I was born here in Tamaki Makaurau.

As a kid, I was definitely introverted.

And my big dream was to have my own computer. And I used to think to myself,

I've got a computer, I've made it. My identity was really tied to my Pākehā

side. I was essentially cut off from Māoridom for the first two decades of my

life.

I decided to go to university, and I thought that I should probably do

in corporate business.

So I went and studied business.

And that was the beginning of 10 years that I spent at university, actually,

work at the same time.

After a decade working in corporate, I realized that maybe something else is

calling me.

I decided to start a content agency.

And as that evolved, I started to work with artists.

And I felt a lot of reflection around this world.

I was like, there's something rich there.

I started to have this urge to know more about who I was.

And then I got this opportunity to go onto this board for a charity where I

up in Glendale, GI.

And a lot of the protocols that the charity had were Māori.

That's where I met Bill.

Luke came onto the board of Te Waipuna Porowai.

I would describe him as one of those people who still waters Monday.

Bill started to show me things at my own pace.

It became my safe space where I could learn about what Māoridom meant to me.

The more I got to know Luke, I recognised that he had the skills of a

the ability to see things before they occur or to be able to say that's where

the issue is.

I've seen brilliant Māori leaders and he was someone younger that had that

ability to think like that.

It was around the same time that Luke also discovered the world of crypto.

My first experience with Bitcoin was in 2018.

I had heard that it was this asset that you could invest in. It's just so cool,

but it's also quite unregulated.

I was trying to work out for myself what's going on. I need to learn about

industry. I need to make as many mistakes.

as I possibly can so that I can learn faster.

I managed to lose a lot of my crypto trading because I didn't know what I was

doing. I had an allocation of money that I put into some digital assets and I

got it really wrong. And so now they're worth nothing.

Great! I just actually have to laugh at how bad I did.

But it was almost like that was my training.

While Luke knew crypto was a world he wanted to keep on exploring, it took a

backseat when whānau called.

COVID came.

My brother had been quite unwell.

He passed away.

I was very shocked.

My brother's wishes were that I was to run the tangi.

Bill came and helped to give that grounding of protocols and it was such a

living curve for me.

My brother had a plan.

It's time for you to really accept te ao Māori.

But I was fearful to actually understand who I am. And as I started to unpack

who I was, I started to have this deep urge to connect.

The most pressing question that people ask all the time is, who am I?

In Te Ao Māori, your knowledge of your own whakapapa is your ticket and pathway

to your connections to everything in Te Ao Māori.

And so knowing who I am, where I belong, where I come from, it allows you to

connect with others.

I just had this calling, and so we jumped in a car.

Every two or three months, we'll drive somewhere, and we'll talk about the

history of the land.

There's a saying.

And that's what he needs you to do.

Let those winds blow in your face.

To my soul.

I realised there was a piece of me that was never actually acknowledged.

Over there is Taurere Taurere, famous for where they beach the canoes, being a

river that goes directly out of the sea. Luke started to grow. I saw

the growth in him and his own knowledge

of his identity.

I started wanting to draw.

I wanted to try different things like carving.

I went from being an observer to wanting to be more than that.

I was also trying to find my place in crypto. Do I buy crypto? Do

I create crypto stuff?

Andy creates crypto stuff.

The local coffee shop where I live, that's where I started to meet Paul.

He'd probably not want to be known as this, but I call him OG.

He definitely has been around longer than most.

I first heard of Bitcoin in 2011.

Being in Europe at that time, it was actually incredibly easy to buy Bitcoin.

I was shocked when I moved back to New Zealand and it was so hard here.

Being that there was nobody really outside of techies or forums, there was

nobody talking about Bitcoin in a commercial sense or in a business sense.

I'll try to consult with businesses and banks so they can understand Bitcoin and

cryptocurrencies.

Paul is considered one of the pioneers of crypto in Aotearoa, and with a career

immersed in the blockchain industry, that chance meeting with Luke then

new door.

With us both being tangata whenua, it was just a really nice connection, and

had the answers that I'd been searching for. And that's where I saw the spark.

I actually realised that my place in crypto was building things.

We actually found we both share the same iwi, the Ngapuhi, and it was a great

place for us to start. The protocols from a te ao Māori perspective, the

protocols from a technology perspective, the same principles of integrity and

trust.

After I realised where our respective experiences could combine, I said, let's

try a few projects.

I really had this deep feeling in me to create something Māori. But I also was,

like, really tempted.

NFTs were such a radical idea.

I was very hesitant at first.

what really opened my mind is the communities that were behind them people

who are purchasing nfts are so different than people purchasing client art see

the young people having fun nfts are opening a door for a younger demographic

to start to love art i had seen some maori

appropriation happening in space you can't squash all of the cultural

appropriation but what you can do is produce a genuine authentic article so

can drown out the scammy projects by having something that is true to

cultures when we were looking at creating an nft project we started with

we were looking at the concepts and something just didn't feel right it

have the flow and it started to feel forced so we just stopped

And we said, fine, then we won't do it.

And if you look at Māoridom, the birds are the ones that weave change before

create something.

That's when the next format started to show itself with the Heitiki.

And I thought, really?

Is this really what wants to start to come to life?

Was it such a velocity that I couldn't say no, it was just meant to be?

It really started to feel like I was on a rollercoaster with them.

We decided that we wanted to bring Te Ao Māori into the Metaverse.

And we wanted to create NFTs with the Hei Tiki.

So Paul and I were working through this kind of creative process.

OK, if we really respect the protocols, who should we be talking to? And that's

where we started to connect with Bill.

My understanding of NFTs and crypto is very limited.

I went on my knowledge of Luke and his integrity and the need to be honest and

sincere about Te Ao Māori and how we do things.

He goes, well, what's your intention?

To share our culture and to let anyone around the world...

connect with it in their own way.

Do it with the right intent, do it with sincerity, do it with honesty, aroha,

and you can go there.

But aren't all the heitiki tapu?

The heitiki are considered sacred and tapu, and they have their own mauri,

its life force, and they have their own ihi, its own power, and mana being its

own prestige.

But it never said that you can't adapt it over time, as long as you keep the

fundamentals of the life force, the ehi, the fierceness, that keeps the tiki in

its form.

Bill really gave her the...

which we needed to work with them. The metaverse is like this new universe that

is being explored, and these tiki are on a mission to go and navigate the new

waters of the metaverse.

I'm not up to play with the metaverse in the full sense, but I do know Māori

have a part to play in that world.

So I think it's really important that Māori take their own art to the

because they are the authors of their own creation.

Our people have always been innovative, our people have always been navigators

by the stars, and it's a natural extension of our thinking in a

digital world.

Very much came from Luke's head. He created some very simple Tiki shapes,

but it was then a reference point for when we approached an established artist

who had experience with Tiki.

The first sketches that came back were far more intricate than I was expecting.

They almost came out to life in a 3D form. That really was the genesis.

Taitantiki was real.

So this funny edge called Karaka, and Karaka Tarawhiti was part of the wider

Tainui Waikato iwi.

The whakapapa behind Taitantiki started with Tainui.

We actually worked with multiple artists, so we had one...

coming up with a different kind of tamoko, ensuring that they had consent.

And then we had another artist just bring all the colours to life.

It was this beautiful weaving happening.

It was like we were moving up the country.

Different iwi going through, but definitely the roots were in Tainui.

So we did a thousand, there were different types, but every one of the

were individual.

You know, what is their role?

And you know there's different roles in Te Ao Māori within our tribes and our

whānau. And we came up with the hierarchy of a tribe and the roles that

do. A chief, a priest, we had a gatherer, a navigator, and really

think about what that looks like.

My personal journey into Te Ao Māori was exhilarating. I was learning quickly.

We were running on adrenaline to get things done. There was a lot of late

Our wives wondered, why are we spending so much time with someone that's not

even going to pay?

This for us has always been a passion project.

Any value or wealth that we generated from the project, we would reinvest into

creating additional things in the future.

The perception that NFTs were something that could make you a millionaire

overnight was something we just kept dispelling and just kept going, nope,

is another form of artistry and creation, culture and community that we

realise with this.

The mint date was on the 10th of October in 2021.

Thinking back to that day, yeah, I was very nervous.

We had a karakia from Bill blessing the launch.

Okay, you're going to receive this, but you're also going to get a karakia,

which is part of a blessing, which will accompany this particular taonga or this

particular tikit.

So it keeps within Te Ao Māori. I think that keeps it safe, but also something

that belongs to you. That's part of sharing our culture.

We did our mint in phases, and we called them wakau.

We had the first waka going out and it sold out and we went, oh my gosh, this

amazing. Oh, the next waka is coming.

And then it sold.

We're like, shit, this is happening.

We got, I think, to the end of the night. It was something like midnight.

did the last waka. We fully sold out.

You know, like we were kind of stunned.

Now we've got this community that we need to...

Talk to. You now have this community that has all of these expectations of

you'll do.

When you're buying an NFT, you're a shareholder in a way.

So if you buy an NFT worth $10, they would like it to be worth $100.

So you have a voice and you want to be a part of things.

It came in wave.

So there was a lot of desire to make their NFT worth more. We held our

did what we believed was right, and that value has gone through different

stages.

And so what it really took was understanding where to find the right

and actually what made us happy so we could continue to share Te Ao Māori.

We have released two phases so far. One has been the 2D version.

And then we did a 3D version.

It was quite interesting to try different mediums out because 3D moving

are being used on different marketplaces.

And we are now working with different mediums for our oral culture.

So we're definitely at that stage. We're back weaving our net, getting ready to

go fishing.

So there's a lot of hope there around what we could do and what we could

And so that's where we are right now.

With the deep connection with Te Ao Māori, with doing the work and getting

know who I am, I feel like life's just starting.

His growth has been huge, and I'm very proud of where he is at the moment. I

know there's more to do, and I know his mind is always looking to the next

challenge.

I see so much change yet to come, and we're tired and ticky.

continuing to be present in the Metaverse community and sharing Te Ao

We've explored bringing Te Ao Māori into the Metaverse, but what other work has

been created across Aotearoa that smashes the NFT stereotype?

I am a big fan of new technology. Love trying new things out and seeing how it

works. In 2018, we created Beyond with a vision of designing

accessible, fun, wow VR experiences.

One of the things that we've focused on is how do we make worlds where everyone

feels like they can belong with goodness at the heart of it.

I met Sam, she was an early innovator in the VR, AR space and I had a

lot of respect for the work she'd been doing and it was kind of exciting at the

time because there were a few of us females in this space.

We've been running our Creative Tech Studio method for just over 19 years.

Tech to me is always best when it's invisible, when it's actually the story

that's doing the job and you forget that you're immersed in this experience.

Jess and I would occasionally text each other and talk about projects. And we'd

recently been briefed on an NFT range.

So kind of started thinking about, well, we're doing all of this for other

people. Why couldn't we do it for ourselves?

When she messaged me and said, have you seen what's happening in this kind of

digital avatar ownership NFT space?

Because it's fascinating.

We're like, we specialize in this. We make beautiful 3D characters all the

We just felt like there was a big opportunity.

The market for NFTs at the moment is crypto growth.

It's such a derogatory term, so I'm sorry for those people who are genuinely

this, but the market is very targeted and heavily dominated by men.

The huge egos, the let's party, drive fast cars.

I was just seeing a bunch of cowboys coming in and going, we can get rich

Female characters, people of colour, NFTs that there are in here, were valued

lower.

But it's a self -fulfilling prophecy because...

If you're white and male in the space, it's a version of you, right? So you're

not going to necessarily buy a female character.

If I wanted to change, I kind of have to be part of that change. So maybe from

the inside.

We can start to turn it into something more accessible.

If we could reduce the tech terms, if we could show that women were in this

space, if we could show people of colour in this space, you might gravitate more

towards it. So we decided to collaborate on a collection that focused on

diversity, inclusion and accessibility.

We looked at our own upbringing and we very quickly got to kind of this idea of

doing a generational range, so the 80s, 90s and the zeros, and thought, well,

there's something pretty nostalgic about that.

So we started thinking about all the things we loved collecting, because

are collectible. I collected garbage pail kits. They were one of my favourite

things.

We talked about how could we potentially bring some of that collectible card

quirkiness aspect.

They're a little repressed. They're a little bit misunderstood.

And they've gone through some hardship, you know, so they've come out of it on

the other side.

They're a little bit rebellious, but with good heart.

None of us are perfect.

When we first started looking at the art, we're like, they look too nice.

We want the quality to be great, but they all look like plastic models.

How can we change that up?

We had one of our artists come up with some ideas around these tattoo -y type

pieces of art on their vase.

That's when things started to feel really good for us and started to draw

this idea around superpowers and how we all have a superpower.

And that's not about being able to fly.

It's just about who we are as humans.

And we're all a little bit messy.

We're all a little bit unique, and that's what makes us special.

We're living in a world where gender is very fluid, and so just having a female

-male collection didn't feel quite right for us. What if we just took that out

of the picture? What if there just isn't one? And you get to decide what you

want that to be.

It was really important for us that we had a 3D character because we can do

with 3D characters. We could take them across different platforms.

So if you want to use it in a game, then you'll be able to.

There's a new audience who are really interested in having their own avatars,

their own characters, which they can bring into new worlds, whether it's for

work or play.

If we took a little refresh into that metaverse space or game space, it's your

bespoke character.

There won't be anyone else like you in that space.

And so I think that's where the beauty of NFT lies.

This idea that I have something that is wholly mine, that no one else has access

to. Now, it's less about the show -off nature and more about how I can showcase

a little bit of myself.

We hope that the audience who want to be represented by these will be people who

have good values, who want to do good things in the world, and they'll feel

proud of how they look because we think they look pretty cool.

The intention behind Little Riff Raff is not to make a whole lot of money. We

really want them to be accessible, to open up a new audience.

One of the biggest factors in creating this was actually how could we put it

back into either charity or society.

And so how can we do good from it was a real driver for us. So out of that came

up this idea of Little Riff Raff Academy, which is all about upskilling

training the next generation in the creative tech sector.

So the Little Riff Raff Academy is still a little bit work in progress, but the

idea is that it will be a platform where people can be a part of learning

sessions, mentorship, as well as real -world events, workshops.

It can feel a really daunting thing to come into an industry, be it virtual

reality or 3D creation.

How do we enable as many people as possible to be involved?

We want more women in the game sector, in coding, in creative tech, more people

of colour, people from different backgrounds.

So that's the first goal, is to see how we can level that playing field.

We really believe in what we're doing and how we can be a part of the change

this industry.

The characters we've made are really empowering. They all have a strength to

them. They all have a superpower.

And I resonate with that, and I hope that an audience will resonate with that

too.

Bitcoin absolutely consumes a lot of energy.

Mining is big news when it comes to Bitcoin.

A lot of people talk about how dirty Bitcoin is.

But what if the narrative we've been told is huge?

The mining process and Bitcoin shouldn't be feared by the public.

Could crypto actually help solve global warming? I do believe that Bitcoin

mining could revolutionize the energy industry.

Bitcoin mining is actually the number one most viable solution to solve some

our major methane issues.