Contact.xyz – Google Domains customer – (United Kingdom)
The .xyz community is home to innovative startups that have developed new services to meet the changing needs of our society. Digital talent measurement solution Questy.xyz aims to automate recruitment workflow, assess candidates’ skills, and map a complete employee development lifecycle. Learning tool Fingerspelling.xyz leverages hand recognition technology paired with machine learning to help teach American Sign Language. Brooklyn-based events startup PizzaTime.xyz helps facilitate catering and virtual experiences for remote teams. In this week’s #WebsiteWednesday, we’ll introduce you to a London-based startup designed to empower and support entertainment industry creatives to make a living: Contact.xyz.
Contact.xyz is the online home of Contact, a platform designed to help models, photographers, hair and makeup artists, and more, showcase their talents and connect with brands to book work. The London-based platform works to help furnish over 900 creatives with the tools and resources they need to thrive in the entertainment industry. Contact.xyz has helped creatives connect with major brands including Nike, Vivienne Westwood, Vogue, Balenciaga, and Burberry. Contact.xyz is backed by venture capital firms like Founders Fund and Rhino Ventures, and actress Maisie Williams. Their latest funding was raised on May 16, 2022. Reuben and his team applied the funding to expanding the platform to all of Europe.1
![Contact.xyz](https://gen.xyz/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/contactxyz-image2.png" "Contact.xyz")
The innovative platform helps creatives promote their talents and helps brands find the right artists to hire. Creatives can join Contact.xyz to begin showcasing their portfolio across different creative services. On the Creatives page, applicants can join the creative community that “celebrates the oddballs, outcasts and underdogs.” You can choose your creative discipline from four options: Model, Photographer, Hair/Makeup Artist, or Other. Next, you can create your profile. Provide your name, date of birth, pronouns, your social media handles, a short bio, and more to begin promoting yourself. Businesses and brands can visit the Book Creatives page to browse and discover creative talent using filters. They can shortlist creative talent, provide details about the job they’re hiring for, and book creatives directly. Creatives can accept or reject jobs via Contact.xyz. Once the job has been completed, the creative is paid directly by Contact.xyz. This feature helps creatives avoid the occupational challenges of chasing down a payment. The artist-focused platform is free to use for creatives seeking work, and is designed to allow the talent to brand itself independently across different verticals. Contact.xyz charges bookers a 20% booking fee, which is designed to help them save money by booking talent through the platform, rather than through an agent. Since launching in 2020, Contact.xyz boasts upwards of 2,000 projects that brands, casting directors, and world-leading photographers, have booked through the innovative platform.
CEO and co-founder Reuben Selby is also the creative director of his own eponymous fashion label. On Contact.xyz, Reuben shares his inspiration: “I deeply care about creating a safe, and inclusive space that empowers people to express themselves and their unique personalities and talents. I’m driven to help people get fairly paid for their talents, find balance and live more free and expressive lives.” We are inspired by Reuben’s forward-thinking to help creatives find work in a challenging industry. His passion and innovation make Contact.xyz a great fit in the .xyz community. You can learn more by following the platform on Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn, and by visiting Contact.xyz.
1. https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/the-contact-agency
Paragraph.xyz – GoDaddy customer – (United States)
Creator-focused web3 platforms are building their online homes on .xyz domains. Publishing platform Mirror.xyz helps writers distribute and monetize their minted work. DAO-governed Universe.xyz helps artists mint NFTs and launch community-driven NFT universes. In this week’s #BlockchainThursday, we’ll introduce you to a publishing platform aimed at helping creators publish content, grow audiences, and foster communities: Paragraph.xyz.
Paragraph.xyz is a web3-native publishing platform that helps creators publish blogs and newsletters for virtual communities. The platform aims to help creators reach their audiences on web2 while using web3 tools to create, distribute, and monetize their content. With Paragraph.xyz, you can develop a community around your newsletter by selling NFT memberships, a feature which is designed to give ownership to your readers. You can also mint special edition NFTs that grant additional features to your readers, like special content, comment privileges,and Discord access. Paragraph.xyz’s current focus is on web3-native writers, DAOs, and NFT communities, with plans to expand to traditional media in the future. On October 24, 2022, Paragraph.xyz announced that they closed a $1.7 million pre-seed funding round led by investment firm Lemniscap. The platform will use the proceeds to expedite product development and user acquisition.1
The platform’s website offers resources to demonstrate what sets the platform apart from other publishing platforms like Substack or Mirror.xyz. Web3 and web2 functionalities are listed for review and comparison. Web3 functionalities of Paragraph.xyz include gasless NFT minting and optional permanent storage on Decentralized Storage Network (DSN) Arweave. Web3 creators who move over to Paragraph.xyz can bring their own NFTs or ERC20 tokens for gating content or they can mint directly on the platform. Paragraph.xyz now integrates with web3 social networks like Farcaster.xyz, which helps discussions from those platforms to be displayed on your posts automatically. Web2 functionalities include the ability to see the email addresses of your subscribers, which can help you to keep track of your subscribers. You can also connect your Paragraph.xyz publication to Google Analytics to track audience, conversion rates, and more.
Founder Colin Armstrong is a former Engineering Manager at Google and Software Engineer at Coinbase. He originally developed the platform under the name Papyrus, then rebranded and upgraded the domain from Papyrus.dev to the more apt and topical Paragraph.xyz. As Colin explained to us,
“For web3 startups, xyz is an obvious TLD domain name choice. It’s forward-thinking, it symbolizes decentralization, and it’s easily recognizable as web3 by a growing global audience.”
We are proud to have creator-focused platforms like Paragraph.xyz defining the .xyz community. You can learn more by joining the Discord, following the platform on Twitter @paragraph_xyz, and by visiting Paragraph.xyz.
1. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/paragraph-raises-1-7m-pre-seed-funding-to-take-on-legacy-online-publishing-giants-301657341.html
Capital.xyz – Namecheap customer – (United States)
Forward-thinking businesses have been embracing .xyz domains and upgrading to domain names that signal innovation and expansion. The parent company of popular services such as Cash App and Square credit card reader rebranded to Block.xyz to indicate their growth. Investment firm Dragonfly upgraded to Dragonfly.xyz to signal a global presence and deep technical expertise. Collectible trading card platform Alt upgraded to Alt.xyz as they expanded their alternative assets platform to include options for buying, selling, storing, and borrowing against valuable trading cards. In this week’s #WebsiteWednesday, we’ll introduce you to a newly rebranded financial technology company with a focus on expanded banking services: Capital.xyz.
Capital.xyz is the online home of newly named fintech company Capital (previously Party Round). Before rebranding to the more memorable Capital.xyz, Party Round provided solutions for founders, with a focus on an automated fundraising tool. CEO Jordi Hays explained in the press that their rebrand was tied to the company’s expanding vision to support other startups. Party Round reflected a product for fundraising and bringing together investors, but it limited the vision he and co-founder Sarah Chase had for the company. Capital.xyz’s expanded platform will still help startups raise money, but will offer additional features that allow those startups to use their capital immediately.1 As stated simply on their Twitter bio, Capital.xyz aims to help you “raise, hold, spend, and send funds – all in one place.”
The new platform offers benefits for startups as well as investors. Companies can sign up for an account on Capital.xyz to begin fundraising. Capital.xyz can issue a virtual Visa debit card once the companies begin raising capital so they can start using the funds they just received. Startups can also connect the Capital.xyz app to other fintech services like HR platform Gusto. This can help companies to raise money directly through Capital.xyz and then hold, spend, and send cash through it. Potential investors are able to do some angel investing in early-stage companies within Capital.xyz’s network and track that investment. The platform also added an NFT associated with the funding round. Investors can choose whether they wish to display the NFT on Twitter as evidence of their investment. Capital.xyz provides a full set of resources for founders and investors on their Support page, including how to start a fundraising round and how to invest using wire transfer.
We are always happy to have growing, innovative businesses like Capital.xyz in the .xyz community of forward-thinkers, and we look forward to seeing their continued growth. You can learn more by following them on Twitter and LinkedIn, and by visiting Capital.xyz.
1. https://techcrunch.com/2022/10/04/party-rounds-rebrand-is-banking-on-founder-bank-accounts/
XYZ hopes you and your loved ones have a happy and healthy Thanksgiving. As you prepare for the festive holiday season and the approaching new year, it’s a perfect time to give thought to developing your online presence or launching that new idea. This year’s Quarterly series has delivered great tips on the fundamentals of website design, including choosing the ideal domain name, SEO strategy, and designing an impactful website. Now is a great time to put those tips to use.
The XYZ Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales are your chance to score the perfect domain to build your online presence. Check out this year’s great offers:
| Term | Sale | |
| .xyz | 1 year | as low as $0.99/1st yr |
| Monster, .Quest, .Christmas, .LOL, .Pics, .Mom | 1 year | as low as $1.50/1st yr |
| Beauty, .Hair, .Skin, .Makeup | 1 year | as low as $1.50/1st yr |
| .Homes, .Autos, .Motorcycles, .Boats, .Yachts | 1 year | as low as $1.50/1st yr |
| .College, .Baby, .Rent | 1 year | as low as $5/1st yr |
Take advantage of these special deals at one of our featured registrar partners:
Find even more registrars below!
As you jump in to choose the ideal domain name (for up to 95% less than standard retail price!), find inspiration from the many innovative and forward-thinking members of the XYZ community:
Consider getting a jump on your holiday gift list by getting members of your family their own .xyz and .Christmas domains. Your website is your own piece of the internet, and giving the gift of a XYZ domain helps your loved ones share their creativity, passion, and innovation with the world. You can find even more festive .Christmas inspiration on our .Christmas blog post.
With so many unique domain extensions on sale, you’re sure to find some for yourself and everyone on your list.
Consider making your mark on a specific industry by making use of our .Homes, .Autos, .Motorcycles, .Boats, and .Yachts domains.
The XYZ Black Friday Cyber Monday sales can help you finally launch that skincare line, promote your status as a beauty influencer, or build your online portfolio to become your region’s go-to makeup artist.
Don’t wait to get the look. Choose your memorable domain name today.
You can connect with any passion on a deeper level by sharing it with a global audience on your new XYZ website. These Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals are available now. Score your ideal domain names before someone else does at one of our featured registrar partners below!
MichaelHo.xyz – Network Solutions customer – (Japan)
The .xyz community is home to talented visual creatives using .xyz domains to develop their portfolios and showcase their artwork. Illustrator Leighton Gray uses LeightonGray.xyz to display her assortment of artwork and creative endeavors. Visual effects (VFX) designer Yue Jia uses Realtime.xyz to share his VFX designs. Programmer Rosenbloomboom.xyz showcases their Unity3D, C++, JavaScript, and Ionic-based gaming projects. In this week’s #WebsiteWednesday, we’ll introduce you to a contemporary artist who shares his artwork using a “FirstNameLastName.xyz” domain: MichaelHo.xyz.
MichaelHo.xyz is the personal website of Michael Rikio Ming Hee Ho. Born in Hawaii, Michael is a Cantonese, Japanese American contemporary artist currently based in Tokyo. He specializes in creating art that is aimed to encourage dialogue about today’s society. Michael graduated summa cum laude with a BA in Fine Arts from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) in 2018. At the end of that year, he moved to Tokyo and began showing work in Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Los Angeles. Michael is represented by Tokyo International Gallery and is a member of the collaborative art space Shinokubo UGO.1 In 2022, Michael was selected as one of “30 Artists under 35” by leading art magazine ARTnews Japan.2
Michael’s Selected Artwork, CV, and Bio are easy to explore with a simple and informative website design. Visitors can easily navigate to each page, which can help make Michael’s information easy to find. Michael features a slideshow of his unique, text-based artwork on his homepage. For a more detailed experience, click on the Selected Artwork link to see each art piece with a full description, such as a work titled Good Enough. This work is made of enamel, acrylic, ink transfers, spray paint and resin on canvas and stands over 4 feet tall. It is a black and white oblong structure that has been spray painted with the words “GOOD ENOUGH” in bright orange. Another piece is titled Hyperinflation, and stands nearly 5 feet tall. Made of the same materials, the artwork reads “HIGH MARKET VOLATILITY AND HYPERINFLATION ARE A PART OF THE WORK” in stenciled black spray paint on top of a colorful background. With Michael’s inclusion of his CV page, potential collaborators, galleries, and clients can gain a full understanding of Michael’s talent, background, and experience, which can help them make the choice to work with him.
Using a FirstNameLastName.xyz domain like MichaelHo.xyz for your personal website can be beneficial, because MIchael is not limited by any third-party platform constraints. He can use his website as the online hub of his artwork, and maintain complete control over how he presents his creations. We are excited to have Michael and his artwork in the .xyz community of innovative artists and creatives. You can learn more about Michael and see more of his artwork by following him on Instagram and by visiting MichaelHo.xyz.
1. https://www.tokyoartbeat.com/en/venues/-/DD7ED46A
2. https://artnewsjapan.com/30artists_u35/article/12
