Musician and entrepreneur Nasir Jones, best known as Nas, talks with CoinDesk about his business interests in bitcoin space and the overall potential of bitcoin.
Hip-hop rapper and a founder of the venture capital firm Queensbridge Venture Partners, Nas, full name Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones, has invested in ride sharing startup Lyft, mobile laundry service Washio and e-commerce platform Fancy, forging connections with tenured VCs in the process. His new relationships with Andreessen Horowitz’s Ben Horowitz and Chris Dixon, resulted in his interest in the digital currency industry.
Dixon and Horowitz, both highly support the digital currency movement, and so does Jones now, pointing out to the bitcoin’s potential. The singer has already invested in Coinbase.
Jones said that bitcoin could be one of history’s notable investment opportunities:
“[Bitcoin] will evolve into an industry as big, if not bigger, than the Internet. My man Ben Horowitz really opened my eyes to that point. This isn’t of the Internet age, bitcoin is its own age.”
Even though there is a big number of bitcoin enthusiast, many people still consider bitcoin as an unsafe investment, adding.
“Obviously challenges will arise from a security and privacy perspective, but the Internet was the same way 20 years ago.”
Jones mentioned that he and his team have been buying bitcoin for more than a year, using Coinbase wallets to store digital currency. Though his firm hasn’t spent any of its bitcoins yet, he said that it might happen soon:
“[We’re] holding onto it for now, but [we’re] looking forward to making transactions in the near future.”
Jones also indicated he is still looking at the digital currency space and willing to identify trends and potential opportunities.
Furthermore, he specifies that he may invest in projects aimed on bringing bitcoin to people with no or little access to banking services.
“[I] would love to see how it affects people who don’t use credit cards or don’t have bank accounts,” he said. “[Bitcoin] could be a big opportunity for those folks.”
Jones is also rumored to be working on his next album, the follow-up to 2012′s number one hit ‘Life is Good’. In his comments, he suggested the marketing campaign for this album could include bitcoin.
Earlier this year, 50 Cent was one of the first popular artists to embrace bitcoin, as he partnered merchant processor BitPay for his latest album ‘Animal Ambition’.
Jones didn’t say anything specific about making the same move to his future musical releases. However, during his interview with Coindesk he suggested that his next album’s marketing campaign could include bitcoin. He concluded:
“We are exploring this now: to be continued.”
Konstantin has always been at the forefront of the global virtual currency scene since first discovering cryptocurrencies the same year that Satoshi Nakomoto created bitcoin in 2009. Konstantin is the owner of a number of small businesses in trucking and mobile development, and co-founded CoinSpeaker in 2014. He graduated from Belarusian State University in 2009 with a degree in Mathematics and Mechanics. You can contact Konstantin via [email protected]
