The CryptoSmiles Series: Justin Campbell
This Q&A series celebrates those visionaries who were the first in the world to buy a Smile Maker at CryptoSmiles.Store and demonstrate their commitment to the future of crypto payments and mass scale adoption.
We first met Justin Campbell back in February 2018, when he saw intimate.io in this Sydney Morning Herald article. Since then, he’s been a fabulous friend and tireless supporter of our project. A sharp libertarian, Justin has written about his political philosophies for a range of publications including Quillette and Penthouse Australia. Dipping into his stash of ITM, Justin purchased two Smile Makers vibrators to surprise his wife for Valentines Day!
Everyone has a story re: how they fell ‘down the rabbit hole’.
What’s yours?
I’m passionate about free speech and the power of technology to democratise the media. I’m also a big believer in the cloud and centralised platforms. The convenience and user experience of those platforms are fantastic. I love Google and Facebook. I buy my books on Amazon. And YouTube has expanded my mind by connecting me with thinkers and ideas that I wouldn’t have otherwise encountered. But, centralised platforms aren’t the right tool for every situation.
Unfortunately, in the last couple years we’ve seen major centralised platforms become censors. We’ve seen this with the social media platforms like Facebook and YouTube, but we’ve also seen the payment gateways act as censors. YouTube wants cool creative types like Casey Neistat and advertiser friendly videos of cats using skateboards. They don’t want their platform used for political commentary or anything that’s not advertiser friendly.
When YouTube’s adpocalypse de-monetised all the controversial creators I thought, Ok, cool. No problem. Fair enough. People don’t want their brand associated with right-wing political commentary or people producing adult content. That’s fine. No one has a right to be sponsored and receive income for creating content. But when a year later Patreon and the payment gateways started using their market power to act as a censor, I decided the only solution was a decentralised solution. This was different. This was the payment gateways acting as a barrier between buyer and seller. In my mind that’s not their role. However, judging by the enormous pressure on Facebook and similar companies to act as as censor this isn’t going to change. We need another solution.
There’s one industry that has been dealing with these issues for decades: the adult industry. The adult industry is partially responsible for the victory of VHS over Betamax and of the initial popularity of the internet — at least they were one of the first to commercialise it. So when I heard about intimate.io I was keen to get involved and help how I could.
What myth would you like to dispel about crypto?
That it’s only for neckbeards and shady characters.
I think crypto and de-centralised technologies has enormous potential to make the internet more democratic.
What do you wish you could buy with crypto that you can’t now?
I’d really love to see a crypto Patreon emerge. I really love supporting my favourite creators. I want creators to be able to make a proper living out of their work. As a failed creator myself I know and respect how hard it is to create high quality content.
I also want to be able to pay for individual articles, videos and podcasts without having to sign up to some expensive monthly subscription. For the same reason I’d love to be able to purchase high quality adult content. It’s become harder and harder for creators to produce high quality content. Micropayments can change that. I’d love to be able to rent an Erika Lust film with intimate.io tokens.
Favourite crypto / blockchain project? Why?
intimate.io of course. Because it stops my credit card company censoring what I watch.
What makes you smile?
My cat, Ebony.
Why did you choose to support the launch of CryptoSmiles.Store?
Being a crypto newb I was worried that the crypto would be too complicated for people to understand. I’ve seen from my experience working in SAAS how important user experience can be. User experience and payment gateways matter. Jeff Bezos is the world’s richest man because of One-Click.
That’s why when intimate.io and Smile Makers released their beta payment gateway I wanted to be one of the first to try it out. I even made a video of myself using it to buy a vibrator.
I was relieved to see that buying something online using my laptop was easy. All I had to do was use my Trust Wallet to scan a QR code and my payment was made. It was as easy as using a credit card.
Smile Makers are designing the next model to add to their collection. If you were a Smile Maker, what would you be named and why?
I’d make a wand and call it the DJ because it makes you feel those sweet, sweet beats.
