About Sean Bonner

It’s difficult to explain what Sean Bonner does exactly, though he’s often referred to as an artist, author and activist. He simply calls himself a misanthropologist. He has been credited with changing the world more than once, and uncredited more than that.

Since 2020 Sean has been immersed in the world of NFTs playing an educational and advocacy role, as well as working in various capacities directly with artists and projects which he has written about extensively. He currently heads up web3 exploration for Obey Giant and is a Venture Partner with the Japan based web3 fund gmjp. Along with DJ Muggs he co-created the virtual lofi musician 8tari, and is co-founder of the environmental open data non-profit Safecast. He’s been an Associate Professor at Japan’s Keio University where he worked with the Blockchain Research Lab and a researcher at MIT’s Center for Civic Media where he spent time with MIT’s Digital Currency Initiative.

He’s a published street photographer and releases ambient noise music under the name Delay 5000 (aka d5k). Previously he co-founded the multimedia art/music collectives Cross My Heart Hope To Die and Saturday Night Massacre as well as Coffee Common and the first hackerspace in Los Angeles. As a writer, he has contributed to BoingBoing, MAKE, Al Jazeera and authored several books. He maintains a regular newsletter and became a Shuttleworth Fellow in 2014 with whom he co-authored 50 Shades of Green: Reimagining Philanthropy.

The book Don’t Go Outside, a collection of Sean’s street photography from Tokyo was published in 2017. He’s been an Artist In Residence at the MuseumsQuartier in Vienna, a Hacker In Residence at Sparkfun in Colorado, and an Entrepreneur In Residence at The Groop in Los Angeles. A selected artist CV can be found here.

He’s spoken at events all over the world about everything from art and activism to communities and consumerism and primarily splits time between Tokyo and Vancouver.

In the 2000’s as co-founder of Bode Media Inc, Sean helped create Metblogs, the first global network of local media sites. Prior to that, Sean helped build the storied contemporary art gallery sixspace exhibiting artists such as Glen E. Friedman, Shepard Fairey, Space Invader and others. He also ran a record label releasing music by the likes of Hot Water Music, Integrity and Less Than Jake. He’s managed his own design firm and designed things at Playboy and Victory Records, where he was the Creative Director during the mid 90’s. Way before that he was a dishwasher.