Searching For A Save Point (Continued...): Giles Peterson connecting Neurodivergent Artists to heal Neurodivergent listeners (3.5.2022)
"Powerful Impact, BOOM! from the Cannon"
Receiving Emails, DM's, messages, comments like this used to make it all worth it.
A very intentional and methodically uncompromising approach to being an artist was definitely not a financially lucrative, sustainable or even stable path to walk for decades. That was never a deterrent nor had any noticeable influence on both my unstoppable passion nor prolific self driven consistency in creating and sharing it out into world.
This message was received on March 5th of 2022, While it's true 2016 is when I paused on releasing full length highly intentional albums, while at the same time rejecting the newly launched Spotify model, that seemed to pop up at the same time as we lost chronological feeds on social media and began having noise and user activity clog up our feeds.
It's not like I gave up, stopped sharing or fell off. It's honestly the contrary... I created and shared more music from 2017-2023 than most artists I know, I just pivoted and leaned into sharing in real time.
from 2020-on, all growth across all platforms felt like they just were hard gated and to be honest, I'm not wired to even pay attention or chase growth in terms of metrics, so even that didn't slow me down or deter me....
But shortly after pivoting to blockchain as an artist in early 2021, I'd say closer to time of joining Catalog Works, Sound, etc, I got an influx of new followers (on twitter) of all the artists, collectors in that space.
Everyone seemed to cheer me on when I they saw someone collected my work, or when they saw me collect others work, but from the beginning, my sole purpose for even touching this technology was completely different than those around me, I was very inspired and hopeful at the time due to how not only these platforms, but founders, collectors, artists sold it's use case for artists.. Basically and transparent departure from the loss of control and purposely broken design of what social media had become, with a huge emphasis as being the counter / cure for the hellscape of devaluing creatives work that Spotify and TikTok algorithms created.
I really believed that everyone around me all believed in this technology and how game changing it would be for repairing what big tech was leaning heavy towards.
from 2021 to 2025, methodically documenting on chain consumed all my available attention and energy... this pivot was very much frowned upon by both my long term respected music peers as well as existing fanbase, but I thought as long as never compromise and lead by example that in the future i'd be able to repair those perceptions once artists had a safe , reliable and meaningful place on the internet to share and connect.
Somehow the entire narrative collapsed along with all the platforms I both created and collected / supported artists on.....
at the same time, social media is in it's most toxic and broken state, the new narrative for those who were super pro blockchain as a means to re-value and appreciate artists seem to have shifted that same excitement and conviction to A.I. yet another technology highly rejected by nearly every creative and fan outside of the "tech forward / blockchain" community.
a half decade of focus and sacrifice building a connecting story about intention, persistence, integrity, documented impact across time and how important preservation and archiving culture is, more now than ever before with a touch a human vulnerability and transparency.
Not only did it all evaporate, but it seems any and everyone's once shared admiration for it's purpose and execution evaporated alone with it.
So as of August 1st, 2026... I'm re-doing all the work I was doing before it was lost, which ironically forces me to sort through decades upon decades of documented output and proof of real impact, during times in life before all of the internet was a gamified casino of pvp attention.
but it's hard to find the importance in telling this story because I can hardly reach the audience and respected peers I built over decades prior to pivoting to blockchain, there's no new growth and I still can't even understand the concept of virality or trying to grow metrics especially in places that show you the data that they aren't even letting you reach your existing audience....
I'm watching everyone from outside connecting and engaging and encouraging each other, and all I can think is... I guess who I am, what i stand for, how i think, my documented impact, or my selfless actions aren't any special or even respectable...
cus in the big 2026 I seem to have no friends and no benefits.
- Dutchyyy Vs The Algorithms
<3
