Yes, it's from VICE so :LIB: warning, but some key bits I found fun to read:
"It did not really hit me that I was in a special sort of hell until I was walking aimlessly through Austin for SXSW and came across a venue with a few inflated geodesic domes. There were large 3D anthropomorphic rabbits plastered everywhere, which I gathered were somehow related to crypto though it wasn't clear how. Large screens inside and outside of the domes streamed a panel where a member of Linkin Park crafted a song that would be minted as an NFT as a discussion about the liberatory potential of the metaverse carried on. And somewhere, a loud voice rang out a cultish mantra: “This is changing the future. This is FLUF House. This is the Hume Collective, so remember why you are here. Remember the power that you have. The power of this community, and when it gets hard, remember you are not alone.”
With a few adjustments, this could read like it was guided by the ghost of Hunter S. Thompson. :hst-pissed:
"Above us, a woman in a trance stood on a platform and plucked on harp strings that spanned the length of the venue with such vigor that a few people I talked to and eavesdropped on debated whether she was actually playing or a recording was doing the work."
This part summarizes it all nicely, techbro attempts to be quirky with drug assistance aside.
"Most of the hype around crypto, NFTs, web3, and metaverse is being generated, after all, by already wealthy participants eager to bring fresh blood to the casino."
“There I was— surrounded by a pack of animals rearing and strutting like peacocks on speed. Someone asked me if I was in “FT”, I told them that was a shit stuffed shirt rag, I wrote for playboy. They looked at me with eyes like a teenage boy seeing his first breasts—but uglier. ‘they’re minting now?’ Desperate to get away from whatever possessed this man I grunted ‘and basil too’ and hightailed it out of there.”
“Little did I know the next 7 hours would see me consummate a lagomorph, have my net worth fluctuate by more than I’ve ever made in my life, and shoot down a drone. This is Hunter, with more to follow.”
I read that with the appropriate voice, something between the genuine article, Bill Murray, and Johnny Depp. :hst-pissed: