On episode 30 of the Zero Rights Reserved podcast, hosts Toady Hawk and Joshua Fisher from The Noun Square sit down with David Hovarth, a legend in the Lifestyle Character Brand world and creator of such cultural heavyweights as Uglydoll and Bossy Bear. In this conversation, we dig into David’s past and his development from a curious child into a creative force. We hear his story about founding Uglydoll with his now-wife and working partner Sun-Min Kim, and building that property into a globally successful character brand. We also chat about David’s 2022 Nouns proposal to put Nouns Sofubi and Plush into high end Japanese stores, and how they came back asking for more. Lastly, David talks about his new proposal to Nouns to produce more Nounish Plushes and place them in stores where they can be a trigger for new people to fall down the Nounish rabbit hole. If you enjoy this pod, please mint it and share with your friends on Warpcast and X! Timestamps: 00:00 - Plush down the rabbit hole 00:50 - ZEORPOD Intro 01:33 - First time face to face 02:30 - The David Horvath origin story: Childhood 03:15 - Favorite toys 05:31 - Favorite Collectibles now 06:31 - “Releasing a plushy” vs Plush culture in Japan 07:50 - The power of plush 09:07 - “Caught in the pursuit of awareness” 09:39 - Gary Lee is the Mr. Rogers of this generation 10:50 - “Brands cannot live on nostalgia alone.” 11:11 - Ugly Doll’s genesis 14:14 - Collaboration with Sun-Min 16:28 - “The Eames Chair of Plush” 21:00 - Taking UglyDoll to scale 23:00 - Pounding the pavement 24:36 - How was Bossy Bear similar, different? 27:31 - Misconceptions about breaking into Japan 28:00- In Japan, Lifestyle Character Brands are for everyone 29:00 - Getting people to care vs just knowing about you 30:45 - The BossyBear story 33:51 - Your tribe has to grow organically 34:52 - BossyBear compared to UglyDoll creative experiences 37:00 - 5 o’ clock somewhere
37:34 - David’s original Nouns proposal 39:25 - What is a Sofubi? 41:54 - How were the first run of Nouns plush received? 45:00 - What to expect if the current proposal passes? 46:16 - Taking CC0 ideals to shelf space 48:00 - Prop is designed to be self sufficient in the long run 50:00- Nouns at Toy and Gift Shows 51:05 - How does he answer people who ask “What is Nouns?” 54:00 - “Maybe I shouldn’t explain too much.” 57:00- Talking Snoopy 1:00:00 - “Wouldn’t it be treat if they fell down the rabbit hole?” 1:04:20 - David as a nouns OG 10:06:00 - “We know when we’re being sold.” 1:07:00 - Where to find out more — Podcast recorded by Toady Hawk, edited by Toady Hawk and Santhosh. Hosted by Toady Hawk and Joshua Fisher. Music by Toady Hawk x Suno AI. Zero Rights Reserved, please remix and reuse our content in any way you like! Produced by The Noun Square onchain media collective. Follow @ thenounsquare on Twitter for daily content about Nouns, NFTs, Ethereum and more or visit tns.wtf to learn more.