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Jul 18, 2026 · ryangtanaka

Tezcon 2026 Wrap-Up (And What's Coming Next)

OBJKT #88236410000 editionsAll rights reserved (no licence stated)

By ryangtanaka

Tezcon 2026 is a wrap! Thanks to all the people who came to the event (Twitter profiles), many of them flying in from all over the country:

@FendelMarc @red_alark @hello_carmello @TunaKuna4 @_TransparentArt @Juniper_Paisley @flexasaurusrex @B_DWIL @StrokeDriven @normalistoxic @YinYangYoeshi @TezosGaming @DopeAZMama @mightymoss @BillKnightsart @sistersageherbs

and the folks who were supporting us from online:

@malsheep56 @_joesimon @AuRo404 @DarkWheelNFT @romainti @MoeinKhatteSiah @tezosartnetwork @danielchideraa @MagicallyViral @firelorrdArt @liapsart @ManikVisuals @HashSosaHash @spike_0124 @webidente

This is the third year we've done Tezcon but this year the atmosphere felt different - maybe it's the theme of "Beyond Enshittification" that brought that side out of the participants but there was a sense of urgency and realism to the event that you seldom see at a crypto "conference".

Songs of hope (and songs of cope), the acknowledgement of the darkness in the world (but trying not to be consumed by it), and of course, the Voices of Iran project, which was an ideal expression of both the technological and organizational power that the blockchain provides when used in the right way. Either way, our marketing was successful in attracting the kinds of people we were looking for: realists, but also resilient and gritty enough to still remain optimistic.

What's Next?

I've been telling people that Tezcon this year wasn't an ending or a punctuation, but a new beginning - the shift in the markets has prompted a lot of questions and new ideas about what and how the Tezos community might respond to what's unfolding in the near future. While most of the world is going through a period of unraveling and self-destruction (i.e. enshittification), Tezos itself is in a period of "great consolidation".

TEIA has added these features in the last year - all of which are blockchain-based systems and fully decentralized:

Coming Soon

  • On-Chain/Hybrid Calendar System (Integrates both Web2 and Web3 calendars to keep the community informed.) [In beta: https://preview.teia.art/calendar]
  • TEIA's minting contract v2 (Better financial sustainability, added functionality for better integration with traditional art systems physical works "phygital", improved usability for collab contracts, better integrations with bakers and DeFi) [Discuss here - https://teia.art/inbox/channels/34]
  • Collections/Collaborations System for Projects of Multiple Works (Update to TEIA’s Collaborations Contract) [ETA: Late-July]
  • Curations System for Storing Lists of Works (Albums, Playlists, Collections System With Curations Rewards and Referral Fees, Advanced Royalties System that aligns incentives between artists and curators on-chain, even in curatorial projects) [ETA: Mid-August]

The common theme in all of these new features is that TEIA - the teia.art site is now transitioning its focus from an minting marketplace (although that will always be there) into a "social" site - where every user can leverage artworks (both old and new) in ways to make the experience more interactive. The "utility" behind NFTs that people have been waiting for, without the need to ever leave the transparency and immutability of the blockchain itself. (TEIA still has no logins or servers/data centers - there is no tracking, no doxxing, no data collections - only wallet syncs and public blockchain data.)

There are other sites out there that are experimenting with decentralized social systems (fediverse, threads, mastodon) but none of them have the legibility and economic power that a pure blockchain system like TEIA has, making it the only one of its kind. It is the obvious antidote to the "enshittification" happening on social media and tech projects in general, where these on-chain validations act as a quality control barrier that the industry needs so badly right now.

TEIA Events (Global)

Between the teia.cafe team (me and Jorion), TEIA core team, and community organizer MaliciousSheep we have raised $30K USD for the purposes of putting on events around the world under the TEIA/Tezos name:

May 23, 2026 - Swift Evo's presentation or Teia and Tezos at g0v Summit in Taiwan
(https://x.com/TeiaCommunity/status/2062766704132800970)

June 1, 2026 - Malicious Sheep's 4th Annual #TezosPride minting event, Curation and Juried Honourariums

June 5, 2026 - NFC Lisbon Cycles Curation in association with ArtOnTezos

July 13, 2026 - Paraxeno's #Art4LifeTez minting event and Blood Donation Awareness Campaign

June 17, 2026 - Genieve Dawkins' #MidsummerParty2026 minting event and Exhibition

June 19, 2026 - Erika Lamothe's #VoicesOfIran Zine and Presentation at TezCon 2026

June 23, 2026 - Malicious Sheep's 3rd Annual #CINDTezos minting event, Curation and Juried Honourariums

June 25, 2026 - Psychofuturist's #BYOBxTeia Exhibition and Community Event in Mexico City

July 14, 2026 - Ting Song's Workshop in Beijing integrating Teia Art with Physical Jewelry (https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/research/ai-art-gallery/artists/ting-song/)

So Tezcon and @normalistoxic's Voices of Iran is one of many events happening in the world, all at once. What's amazing is that TEIA has managed to organize and fund all of these events through our DAO - every event had to be reviewed, approved, and voted on by the community is a decentralized way:

https://teia.art/wiki/multisig-features-core-team-and-moderators

The Tezos Scene in Seattle is Growing (Local)

After putting on events for 3+ years in Seattle, local membership of the Seattle Tezos group has been steadily growing - we've had many random encounters with people who remember Hic et Nunc, TEIA, and objkt from the earlier days - and surprised to hear that the community is still alive and continuing to push the needle like it did back in the earlier days of the NFT movement.

But we seem to have reached a critical mass of Tezos people who have decided to plant their roots in the Seattle / Pacific Northwest area, locally. Some of them include @FendelMarc, @red_alark, @TunaKuna4, @_TransparentArt, @flexasaurusrex, @B_DWIL, @normalistoxic, @mightymoss, @BillKnightsart, @ryangtanaka, @sistersageherbs, @NftSizzle

The consensus is that Tezcon must continue - we have already set a date for next year: June 12, 2027 in Georgetown's "Art Attack" Art Walk week.

https://georgetownseattle.org/art-attack/

(This is the link for the current year but gives an idea what it looks like. 10,000+ participants and the biggest event we've planned so far.)

Unlike the saturated art-tech scenes of Los Angeles and New York, Seattle offers a rare and undervalued advantage: a deep bench of both artistic and technical talent, which still remains largely untapped. The city's longstanding support for music and performance arts, combined with its proximity to global tech leaders like Microsoft, Google, Adobe, and Cisco, creates a talent pool that is unusually fluent in both creative expression and digital infrastructure...seems like the perfect place for Tezos to hold its ground, no?

But to activate this potential all the way, we agreed that we need to hold smaller, regular meetings to help us build up towards that big event next year. Currently in planning, but will let people know once it goes through. (And we'll put it on TEIA's new calendar system when it launches, too!)

We're also in talks with local nonprofits and businesses to create partnership and sponsorship opportunities to help make next year's event bigger than before. Working with local talent will give us both the opportunity and feedback needed to take TEIA’s initiatives to the next level.

Currently 65+ members in the local Seattle area:
https://www.meetup.com/tezos-seattle/

Fendel and Ryan are also on the board of this 501c3 music non-profit, which has paid for the music performers this year:

https://sustainablemusicnw.org

The overall idea is to gradually on-board people into the Tezos ecosystem over time by targeting interested parties one by one. The markets themselves having slowed down, the opportunity for a “contrarian” project like TEIA to stand out is the best that it’s ever been.

Consolidation of the Tezos Community (TEIA as a Community Hub)

The calendar and wiki features we have recently launched was not only a feat of technical advancement (an on-chain calendar with multisig administration/moderation functionality) but also a big step for the community as a whole. To name a few:

**The Tezos Community [TTC] (1500+ Members)
Teia (2500+ Members/Wallets)
Tezos Artist Network (3500+ Members)
Tezos Baking Community (200+ Bakers)
Tezos Developer Community (Scattered in Multiple Places, TezHacks, ZeroContractors, Discord Groups. Estimated 150-200 people.)**

The idea is for TEIA to become the “hub” for these scattered groups and provide a place for them to collaborate and intermingle with each other. We now have the infrastructure to make it happen, but going forward we will be doing many outreach efforts around the Tezos ecosystem for individuals and communities that may have been overlooked or fallen out of the loop in order to keep everyone’s activities and efforts in sync.

“Stronger Together” - motto for The Tezos Community

The Work Must Continue

Art is “Recession Proof”

Art economies are resilient even during tough economic times. Tezos is uniquely positioned to become a beacon of hope in the crypto/NFT spaces in the next few years, if its basic infrastructure can be maintained.

With the advancement and popularization of AI technologies in social/content platforms, public trust in corporate and media algorithms/feeds have degraded significantly in recent years, prompting many people to actively look for alternative platforms online. Decentralized systems have become more popular (Bluesky, fediverse integration into threads, Mastodon, etc.) but TEIA is uniquely positioned to take advantage of these trends because it goes several steps further (especially in terms of economic opportunities) in regards to its dedication to transparency and provenance for artists and collectors alike.

Tezos’ reputation as the “art chain” will pay off eventually because it has prioritized art as its “product” over other places, which treated NFTs largely as commodities rather than art assets to be maintained under existing rules. Tezos was one of the few ecosystems in Web3 that never attempted to tamper or bypass royalties and copyright/IP laws, which is part of the reason why it still maintains its trust among many artists today. As the hype cycle continues to progress, there will be a time where Tezos will become the “obvious” place for serious artists to mint their works.

The introduction of TEIA’s activity feed was a nice surprise to many of us working behind the scenes, because it has shown remarkable resiliency despite market downturns - the volume may have decreased, but the activity levels have actually shown steady growth over time. With a few additional features, this puts the ecosystem in a very good position to see explosive growth in the near future.

Open-Source Guarantees a Future for Tezos

We will largely be focusing on NFT infrastructure, networks, and community integration projects. Our contributions to TEIA’s open-source repository guarantees that the work done by community input is preserved for the long-term and compounds over time, increasing cohesion and opportunities exponentially as more contributions are made. It will also keep “core” users, artists, and builders motivated to keep the ecosystem running and evolving, especially when the forward-facing parts of the industry have slowed down.

Face-to-Face is Key for Onboarding New Users and Builders

As we approach the later stages of the Gartner Hype Cycle, many creatives and technologists are already starting to look for what the “next big thing” may be in the next waves of innovations to come. Talks around AI currently dominate most technology scenes right now, but since a few years ago the momentum has slowed down considerably, prompting many to become curious about developments happening elsewhere. Where is “elsewhere”? This is where we currently are.

We’ve had success in approaching people in the Seattle area by keeping our marketing/outreach focused towards forward-looking builders in the area. The crypto industry’s reputation is admittedly very poor right now, but showing the Tezos community’s “serious” side has gotten at least a few people to take a second look at blockchain systems as a whole. With some time (and institutional adoption becoming more commonplace), these conversations will become easier, making conversions much more likely. (And when they happen, we want people to have lots of things to do with clear benefits when they arrive on site.)

The Tezos' art scene - having been born out of the digital nativism of the pandemic era - has primarily existed in online and virtual spaces - something that still continues out to this day. But over time, its branches have started to take root in real-world places, which we are starting to get closer to cementing over time.

There's a lot going on both online and off with TEIA - keep an eye out!

#seattle#teia#text#tezcon#tezos#tezosartistnetwork#thetezoscommunity