Event organizer and co-operator of the TRU Band Room, ShelleyVan, used to be a blogger with a reach of over 7M and a social media influencer on platforms such as Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. She used to have a corporate marketing job where she worked on building social campaigns and monitoring KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). She took this experience and used it to promote and host over 365 events in the past year in Decentraland.
When I asked her about her time in Web2, she told me, “I hated social media marketing because of the algorithms. It took away the humanity of it. It becomes inorganic when you are trying to spread organic awareness.” That all was about to change after June 2021, when she jumped into Decentraland to check out Zed Run. “When I found Decentraland I was like, ‘Ohmigosh, you’re a person here.’ There are no algorithms.”
When ShelleyVan saw Decentraland for the first time, it reminded her of a game she used to play as a ten-year-old. “It was called WorldsAway. It was a side-scrolling metaverse and it was a social platform. People from all over the world would talk to each other.”
It would be another three months before happenstance brought her into contact with The Rocking Uniquehorns (TRU) NFT project. Florian, one of the Uniquehorns founders, reached out to ShelleyVan through her Etsy store. The very next morning she and her partner Dhino were on a Zoom call with the TRU creators in Switzerland. Their digital marketing agency, Songbird Collective, joined the team that same day to begin promoting the TRU NFT project.
The TRU creators decided they needed to build something in Decentraland right away. “To their credit,” explained ShelleyVan, “they just do stuff.” JudasJudas designed the venue, and on October 31, 2021, Ash Orphan had his first concert in the TRU Band Room. “The place was filled,” said ShelleyVan. She had a feeling that the TRU Band Room “was gonna be something cool.”
By the next event on November 4th, “Chase the River” performed and the TRU Band Room had Proof of Attendance Protocol tokens or POAPs for attendees. “Those were like concert ticket stubs,” said Shelley. “It was a 24-hour turnaround.” she noted, explaining the short amount of time it took “the guys” to incorporate the POAP dispenser on the build. These would eventually be replaced by a proprietary attendance token airdrop system called, the TRU SHOAP.
Putting on a show at the TRU Band Room is more than scheduling acts and having them perform. “We want to avoid a one way show. It becomes just as much about the audience as it does about the artist,” said ShelleyVan as she described how she onboards talent to perform in Decentraland. “When I onboard a musician, I get to know their work. I get to know their personality. Everybody is different and their engagement with DCL will be unique.”
As an example, she described the workflow of a typical show put on by Mr. Swe. He does not have the technical capacity to be in Decentraland during his live sets. ShelleyVan and her team create a custom media stream for him behind the scenes. “We’re feeding him names of people coming into the room so he can do shout-outs. I’m sending him screenshots of chats so he can respond to people.” She explained, “Even though Mr. Swe can’t see the room, we work very hard to show him the room.”
We talked about the difference between going to see a live show in real life and a virtual show. “You’re never going to replace live shows,” she said. “Rather than see no live music during the pandemic this was an awesome way to get your fix.”
She conceded that there are elements of a live performance that can only be experienced by going to an in-person live show. “It’s not worth comparing. I still go to live shows but I love going to virtual concerts. You’re not going to get a global audience” at a live show. Even though she may be on her couch in her pajamas, “I do feel like I’m at an event. People from all over the world are coming to this place at this time to see this live performance. The musicians are live and I can talk to them. I can tell them, ‘Turn up your mic.’ Or I can say, ‘Whoa, that was awesome.’ There’s real-time, direct artist-to-audience engagement. You don’t always get that at a live show.”
She told me about other benefits of virtual shows. “For musicians, it is a way to balance their lifestyle. I’ve talked to many musicians who say, ‘I am exhausted from touring.’ They’ll spend nine months out of the year on the road. That’s a lot of stress on a human being.” With virtual shows, “they can tour half that amount and still do real life stuff. But when they offset that with virtual concerts, they can reach a global audience and potentially establish many new income streams–all without the need for a label.”
When I asked her if there was any part of running the TRU Band Room that she hated, her immediate reply was, “I truly do not hate any of it.” She went on to say that there are parts of the job that become tedious. She estimated that 50% of her time is spent managing communications from multiple media channels such as Instagram, Twitter, and Discord DMs. To date she has trained over 100 performers.
For ShelleyVan, what she enjoys most are the connections she can make in the virtual space of Decentraland. “It’s the part of this job I am obsessed with. I love it so much. It’s always unique. It’s beautiful.”
Who: ShelleyVan
What: Event Organizer at TRU Band Room
Where: 27,-118
