#32: 🧑💻Digital Identity & Intangible Value 🌐
Your Character In The Game Of Life 🎲
The metaverse is estimated to be worth $5 trillion by 2030 🤯.
The Creator Economy (as of 2022) was estimated at over $100 billion.
Clearly, there is value in the intangible (non-physical), the digital.
However, most people think that they do not have value to share online.
They believe that whatever they have to say, others have already said it.
“Why should I bother?”This is the wrong way to look at digital value on the Internet.
Regardless of how many people may be sharing similar information (value) as you online, your own story and experiences create unique perspectives from which you can connect with others.
There are billions of users of the Internet. You do not need (or want) all of them to look at your story.
You only need a relative small percentage of them to resonate with your story, your true fans.
You want people who truly find your story valuable, not people who click subscribe and then never read or watch your story.
"But I don't know what to say"Determining what to say is a journey of experimentation, of trial and error. Of building self-awareness of your own story.
Rather than assuming that others have already said what you would want to say, why don’t you start thinking of how you would want to say it and say it anyways?
Instead of sitting on the side-lines, overthinking every aspect of your story, start thinking about the identity behind the message, the character of your story.
Your personal brand.
Your digital identity.
Your player in the game of life.
Are you ready, player?
Recalibrating Recap
Welcome to Recalibrating! My name is Callum (@_wanderloots)
Join me each week as I learn to better life in every way possible, reflecting and recalibrating along the way to keep from getting too lost.
Thanks for sharing the journey with me ✨
Last week, we touched on the future of value and why you should start thinking long-term when it comes to generating value over the course of your life. Artificial intelligence is changing everything we ever thought we knew about the generation of value (in both the Creator Economy and the Knowledge Economy).
We are in the midst of a fundamental shift of our societal perception of value and the entities that create it (both human and now, non-human).
Are you ready to ride this coming wave 👀?
This week, I am doing something a little different. The last few entries have been on the longer side and I recognize that not everyone has had a chance to read them.
Before I move too far into the digital realm of the creator economy, artificial intelligence, blockchain, and the metaverse, I wanted to make sure that you have enough context to truly grasp the depth of this value system.
These topics can be complicated on a technical level, but also on a philosophical "what is value? 🤷♂️" level.
To that end, I have created a dedicated video that goes in-depth on the concepts of digital identity, personal brands, and the creator economy.
In this video, I touch on the importance of developing your story and its hero.
The main character.
Your player in the game of life.
Digital Identity & Personal Brand 🎟️ Your Ticket To The Creator Economy 🎨📚
Welcome to the Creator Economy! One of the fastest growing and most lucrative industries, all it takes to play the game is to create your character (digital identity) and connect to the Internet.
The creator economy is not just reserved for artists, but also for knowledge workers - people who think for a living. Anyone who generates intangible (not physical) value can connect and play the game.
The Creator Economy and Metaverse (read: NOT Facebook's metaverse, even though they rebranded as Meta) are estimated to be worth $5 Trillion by 2030. Only 6 years away 🤯
This prediction is by McKinsey, the full report can be found here.
Every person in the world has the ability to build their own digital identity and generate value online by sharing story, knowledge, or art.
In this video, I talk about:
why you should care about digital identities;
what a digital identity is and how it relates to personal brands; and
how to start building your digital identity (personal brand) so that it has value.
I will continue to write about the topics discussed in the video above. However, I hope that this video gives you a glimpse at the bigger picture of what I have been writing about for the last 30+ weeks.
As my Recalibrating subscribers, you understand more than anyone else in the world what it is that I am trying to build with my digital identity and story. Accordingly, I value your feedback more than you can possibly know.
If you watch the video (or even a chapter of it, it's split into chapters), I would absolutely love to hear your feedback ✨. Please consider leaving a comment on YouTube or Substack, or send me an email with your thoughts.
The more feedback I get on the topics that interest you, what you like and what you don't like, the more I can Recalibrate the Story I am telling to maximize the value you receive.
Thank you 😊 🙏
Now, I'll share more about how the concept of digital identity connects to the topics of the last few weeks.
Words, Voice, & Story
I know that many of you subscribe to Recalibrating because you enjoy reading (I'm with you, I love it), but sometimes I think it can be valuable to hear the voice of one's story.
Voice is the original method of human communication (aside from perhaps art). Humans have evolved over the millennia to value the words spoken by others.
The spoken word conveys nuance and emotion that, however much authors try, cannot be included in the written word.
It is only in relatively recent times that the masses got access to reading (in the 1400's with the invention of the printing press, see Innovation Overload). Just because they had access does not mean that they had the capability of literacy.
Instead, criers went from town to town spreading messages, the church read the bible to the public, and friends and family sat around fires at night, telling stories (which is why my paywalled content is in a group that I refer to as my Digital Campfire).
Accordingly, we have an emotional connection to hearing story told by others. We have an even deeper emotional connection to stories told by the person who experienced it.
Over the course of our lives, we gain wisdom from the experiences we have undergone.
We then pass this wisdom on to future generations through story.
Over hundreds and thousands of years, some of these stories fall into the realm of legend, the land of myth.
But myth does not have to be something ancient.
Myth can be modern.
Myth & Digital Identity
Myth arises from legend, legend arises from story, and stories are created by people sharing their experiences with others. Sharing wisdom.
In most stories, a hero is faced with a dilemma or challenge that causes them to leave the world they knew and travel into the world they don't know.
The Hero's Journey
(I talk more about the Hero's Journey in my sub-series on Story mapped to Level 3 of Maslow's Hierarchy: Connection and True Community)
From the known to the unknown.
In the unknown, they face trials, meet friends, make enemies, and come to learn something about themselves and the world that transforms them.
They take this knowledge of the formerly-unknown and bring it back to the land of the known, sharing this information and knowledge with the people who stayed behind.
The journey of the hero, their experience, becomes chronologically recorded in a story.
The story is then passed from person to person. The more people that hear the story, the more people that believe it, the more mythical the hero becomes.
Myth is merely a set of shared beliefs. Enough people believe in the story behind the myth that the myth becomes real. The myth turns into value.
In a sense, this is how digital identity and personal branding work.
A digital identity (e.g., Callum @_wanderloots) shares story after story. Over time, these stories get passed by word of mouth from person to person (or by algorithmic display in web2) and more and more people come to know the name Callum & Wanderloots.
My digital identity is a projection of my IRL (in real life) identity, sharing the story I wish others to know.
The wisdom I have gained over the course of my experience.
Known Players vs Unknown Players
The more your online character shares story, the more potential you have to generate value over time.
People need to trust the person sharing story, otherwise the value is tainted with suspicion of the unknown.
Only by sharing story consistently online can the player earn the trust of their readers, viewers, or listeners. Consistently appearing before an audience (you 👋 ) allows the player to become known. To become accepted as part of their ordinary world.
However, with the advent of fake news, misinformation, and disinformation, it is becoming more and more difficult to trust what you see online.
Deep fakes can be created en masse with no way to discern their authenticity. I wrote about this issue in law school with my final (and in my opinion, best ever) paper.
Artificial Intelligence has made this issue impossible for humans to solve, which I touch on in the #29 Battle for Generative AI, #30 Impossible AI Training, and #31 Long-Term Value Creation.
We must use better technology and judgment when deciding the truth of what we see online.
We need to begin building trust in a verifiable way with the audiences of the Internet.
Blockchain & Trustless Digital Identities
Blockchain is a complicated topic that I will dedicate a full future entry to, but I want to keep bringing it up so you can begin to understand the issue that led to the invention of blockchain in the first place.
It is an important one.
Most people do not understand or care about blockchain, which is fair to the extent that it is currently very technical to understand.
However, the metaverse and the Internet as a whole are going to be run on blockchain (unless some new technology is invented, but I can't see that happening in the near future).
Blockchain effectively allows for the linking of identity across the Internet.
Your identity is not tied to an account (web2 style), but to a wallet that holds your identity (an oversimplification, but that's the gist).
This wallet holds a key that enables you to access assets connected to blocks in the blockchain so you can buy, sell, or move them.
In order to get access to the asset, you must sign a new transaction block using your private key (that no one else has access to, if you're careful).
The address of your wallet (kind of like an email or username) can be used to "sign in" (connect to) any platform in web3 (the blockchain-based Internet).
In contrast, in web2, you must create a new account for every platform, keeping them all separate.
Instagram, Reddit, Facebook, YouTube, Google, Apple, Pinterest, Twitter (X), Substack, Goodreads, TikTok, Threads, Flipboard, etc. (notice anything about the URLs?)
While you can try to link your digital identity across these platforms by using the same username, it is only the myth of that username that connects the accounts.
With blockchain, you are able to create what is called a self-sovereign identity that is used across platforms. The identity is linked not on the trust of the audience, but by blockchain.
Trustless.
Future-Proofing & Looking Ahead
The future of value is digital. The value of intangible assets has gone up 430% in the last 50 years and will continue rising as more and more companies digitize and join the Internet economy.
Your digital identity can be used as a character that builds experience to generate the myth of your personal brand. Your ticket to enter the Creator Economy and the Metaverse.
I discuss this topic in much more depth in the video I shared above. Please consider watching it and leaving a comment on YouTube so that I know if you are interested in this format or if you have any suggestions on how I can improve (recalibrate) the message 🧭
Next week
I hope you like this format of including a video with my newsletter. I'm trying to find a way to balance both so that I can continue sharing my message in a way that is natural and authentic to me (an important requirement for avoiding burnout).
Next, I'll continue with the concept of blockchain and how you can start building a self-sovereign identity that transcends any one platform..
If you are interested in further reading on this topic, I have an Intro To web3: FAQ and a series on How I Got Into NFTs and made my first sale to Synyster Gates 🤯
Stay tuned ✨
P.S. If you are interested in learning how I build my digital mind (second brain) to help me process information and identify patterns to solve my problems, please consider upgrading your subscription to paid. Your support means more than you know 😌 ✨
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Book of the week: Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement With Everyday Life
Finding Flow has been perhaps the most influential book I have ever read. It completely changed the way I look at the concepts of work, happiness, and engaging with life.
Photo of the week: Flow
One of my favourite photos of all time, people say this "makes my brain feel good".
Callum that was a fantastic video - like such high quality editing and videography! I, like you, am quite bullish on the idea of individual brands and identities proliferating over the next few years. It's a sign of individuals gaining more sovereignty, and that's a good thing.
Do you think there is a conflict between the rise of potentially anonymous, untraceable cryptographic identities, and the "personal brands" that people are also making?