10KTF IRL Events And Why They Are Great For Community-Building

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Hi frens, Meby here. I have wanted to talk about this topic for a while since it is one of my favorite things happening in the space and NFT communities: IRL events. I don’t think anything can substitute for a great night out with friends (or frens). You know, “more apparatus does not equal more immersion” (cit. Degen Figge). Since we started this amazing 10KTF journey one year ago, we have been able to experience two official IRL events. I will briefly talk about them for the people that didn’t have the chance to participate.

The first event was on March 31st, 2022, in the district of Little Tokyo in downtown LA. It was magical. For the first time, we stepped into the original 10KTF shop IRL. The scenography was perfect. We had custom drinks (s/o to the OG Fashioned), mankinis, kagamis, prototypes of 10KTF items, the Back Alley, and a huge map of New Tokyo with alpha all over it (iykyk).

The second event was on June 23rd in Brooklyn. It was more spacious than the first event, and instead of stepping into the small 10KTF shop, we went through the portal and entered New Tokyo. We experienced walking on the city streets, making graffiti with Beeple, getting the first merch in collaboration with Puma, and watching the teaser for Act 2: The Kaiju Problem.

I have amazing memories from those nights. I got to meet people that I hadn’t met before–people I had the pleasure to connect with on discord many months before. I met Atareh in LA and DiamondHandz in NY. It was actually at the end of the event in NY that we decided to create something together that became ‘The DAM Show’.

So, as I said, these events are awesome, but unfortunately it feels like they are just not enough. Local communities ask for more, and not everyone has the ability to travel to NY or LA. I am not new to organizing local meetups–I periodically do it for the WoW NYC community, and I recently helped the Renga community as well.

We have a great group of Grailed in NYC, and we have been waiting to meet up again since we came back from our summer vacations. While we were on the verge of organizing a small gathering between us (s/o to AlfAlpha, Wisdom, Buggsy), an idea hit me: “We should organize something bigger; let’s make it so legendary that people will travel for this.”

And just like that, the party planning started. There were two main reasons to throw a massive party:

  1. Wagmi-san’s birthday and the end of Season 1
  2. The DAM birthday

Here is how I planned it and how it went:
1) START A THREAD ON DISCORD: If you want to start a community meetup in your location, start with creating a thread on discord and tag as many people from your area as possible. Once they are in, they will help you get the word out to even more locals.

2) DECIDE LOCATION AND DATE: Once you have an idea of how many people will join the event, decide the location and date. Brainstorming together is the best way–create a message with different dates and let people vote. For our party, we went for a Japanese-themed location (JAPAS NY, a famous karaoke spot).

3) CREATE A GUEST LIST: If your party has more than 10-15 people, I recommend creating a guest list to keep track of how many people will make it. This way, you can adjust your reservation accordingly.

4) BOOK: Call and book the location. Make sure you ask when the deadline is (if any) to modify your reservation. I usually get most cancellations in the 48 hours before the event, with an average of 10-15% of the total participants.

Flyer credit to @bobmajon

We had a blast in NYC. We got to celebrate Wagmi-san’s birthday and the DAM Birthday. Here are some pictures of the evening and a video of our videocall to DiamondHandz.

With love,
Mebynetta

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