Popular NBA player Stephen Curry, popular rapper Eminem, Paris Hilton, Mark Cuban... The list of celebrities who are promoted to NFT (non-fungible tokens) seems to increase every hour.
NFT is no longer uncommon. In particular, NFTs for artworks and collectibles have become mainstream at an alarming rate, beyond the scope of any cryptocurrency. The reason is clear. NFTs (especially NFTs for art and collectibles) are interesting, visible, culturally relevant and easy to understand. Not like blockchain.
NFT can solve real-world problems. A few months ago, Daryl Morey, the head of basketball operations for the Philadelphia 76ers of the NBA, told me:
"It was difficult to move from Houston to Philadelphia. I had to move 10,000 comics, art on the wall, and everything. The numbers were not needed. Absolutely great. This is the beginning of a very big trend."
Many people, including myself, have greatly underestimated "community" or social views.
Buying an NFT like "Boring Ape Yacht Club", "Cryptopunk" or "Women's World" shows that you understand NFTs and that you are a member of a special club.
"Ownership is talking about some basic things about identity. It's talking about interest," said Maria Shen of Electric Capital, a venture capital firm focused on blockchain.
What's next?
Only a year ago, the NFT of artworks and collectibles was mainly about "potential." Except for those involved in cryptocurrency, I didn't take it seriously.
Which categories are likely to break through at a stage similar to the situation at the time? What is the NFT recommended by NFL star Tom Brady in 2022? What is the disruptive NFT that Ariana Grande will promote in 2023? What will happen next in this intense story?
I spoke with NFT stakeholders (including investors and entrepreneurs) to get tips on future NFTs. Some may be obvious, some may be impractical, and some may even seem ridiculous.
But in general, NFTs have the potential to change content consumption, how to spend and make money, how to prove identity, how to participate in events, fashion, and even where and how to spend money...
The possibilities are huge. But let's start with the story of the cute character.
Games As many as 2 million people play Axie Infinity’s cute characters every day, worth $3 billion.
Devin Finzer, CEO of NFT market giant OpenSea said: "This game is really exciting. Millions of people have already bought digital goods in the game."
The reason why NFT games are still not popular is that “the development and development cycle of games is slightly longer than simple art and collection projects. They are a bit behind,” Finzer said. He believes that great results will be achieved within one or two years.
Jamie Burke, CEO of Outliter Ventures, a British blockchain venture capital firm, is encouraged by a study that "users spend five times as long on blockchain games as traditional games." But according to Burke, many people "sneered at the results of the investigation." Aksi appeared there.
"It's clear now." Burke said that Axie is just the beginning of a greater prosperity. The next ten years, this game will be "very huge."
Fashion Luxury brands are entering the NFT. For example, Dolce & Gabbana's first NFT series "Collezione Genesi" won the bid for approximately 5.65 million U.S. dollars (approximately 640 million yen).
The collaboration between “The Bored Ape Yacht Club” and the streetwear brand “The Millions” “sold out in a few hours,” said Shen of Electric Capital.
"In 18 years, I haven't seen anything happen on our website. It's just a surprise," said Bobby Hundreds, co-founder of The Millions.
Fashion NFT has just begun. Shen believes that NFT will create new ways to monetize and invest in fashion. For example, sports shoes.
Now you need physical space to invest in popular sports shoes. However, if a new investment method using NFT is implemented, investment will become easier.
"Investment products such as the hot-selling sports shoe index will also become possible," for example. Instead of investing in a pair of sports shoes, you may also invest in an index of 100 popular sports shoes.
This can be said to be a combination of DeFi (decentralized finance) and NFT.
DeFi (Decentralized Finance) NFT Suppose you forget to pay and spend all your money on the popular NFT "cryptopunk". But no problem. Using NFTfi (NFT Finance), you will be able to borrow money with cryptopunk as collateral.
"NFT creates new asset behaviors," said Andrew Steinwold of NFT investment company Sfermion.
In addition, NFT may become a financial asset, through diversification to increase liquidity, and become similar to securities, which will soon arouse the interest of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Burke of Outliter Ventures believes that innovation will advance rapidly, and a secondary market or "derivatives" market is expected.
For example, you cannot trade items in the popular game "Fortnete" right now. However, when the item is converted to NFT and can be traded in the external secondary market (secondary market), it will create a new mechanism for the flow of funds in the game. It is a mechanism to realize the integration of NFT and DeFi.
Activities and Tickets Consider a hypothesis. There is a live performance by popular rapper Drake. Tickets are NFT, the following 6 types are possible.
The art of your favorite designer is drawn.
This will be a souvenir, and maybe one day it will be very valuable, just like the Beatles concert stub.
You can enjoy light meals and drinks at the venue.
Using smart contracts, real-time income is automatically allocated to Drake 40%, DJ 10%, lighting staff 2%, and security staff 1%. No intermediary is needed, so there is almost no charge.
VIP tickets can enter the backstage, and digital goods will be prioritized in the future.
Not only can you participate in live performances, but you can also become one of the organizers. NFT is like a living stock, you can get some profit.
Such a future is not far away. "I'm excited about using NFT in the real world," said Carolin Wend, co-founder of NFT platform Mintbase.
NFT Community Suppose you have a luxurious NFT like Dolce & Gabbana Crown. Where is it stored? The physical crown can be stored in a safe or even displayed in a luxurious villa in the Aegean Sea. But what about digital NFT?
"Controlling the customer experience is essential for luxury brands," said Burke of Outlier Ventures. Trying to express a beautiful and exquisite crown in the current Metaverse seems to be a "very bad description" (so Dolce & Gabbana has two years to show buyers a place for NFT. It is given).
In short, Burke predicted an environment where people could gather together to talk and brag about NFT. It may be a kind of AR (augmented reality) or VR (virtual reality). Or it could be Web 3.0 or something completely different. For this, you need a good environment to experience NFT.
Shen was thinking about similar things. She envisioned a "social network for NFT owners." Only people with a specific NFT can access the network.
Meta universe "Metaverse will become a game changer for NFT in the future," said Maxime Laglasse of Nonfungible.com. Meta universe is a place to store and appreciate NFT art, a game center, Zuckerberg's new mission in life, and perhaps an evolution of our online consumption methods.
Virtual Real Estate In the 2006 movie "Superman Returns", his rival Lex Luthor said: "No one can create land."
His suggestion may be correct in Metaverse. In Decentraland , The Sandbox, Cryptovoxels, etc., land is capped. In theory, if demand surges, the value will increase.
"The future is huge," Marty, an influencer in the NFT community, said in a tweet, introducing future use cases for NFT in 2020. This tweet accurately predicts the excitement of art, collectibles and games. And Marty is also optimistic about real estate in virtual space.
"Consider Axie Infinity. With more than one million players, some of them will find the meaning of owning land (in the game)."
The profit potential of virtual real estate is dizzying. The virtual building will be built on virtual land and rented out as a virtual conference hall. When attendees want to take a break during the cocktail hour, they can rent out casino games and bet on real crypto assets. "Something crazy really happened," Marty said.
Digital Identity Self-sovereign identity (SSID) has long been considered the most promising application of blockchain technology, and NFT may be the key to open this door. Lagras to Ethernet Place Name Service (ENS), for example.
"Almost any SNS account, such as Instagram, Twitter, etc., can be linked to ENS. Because it is decentralized, you can really have an account name and show it to every community."
Lagras calls these "practical NFTs." It cannot be exchanged for money like works of art and collectibles, it is just a proof of ownership. There is also the idea of converting college diplomas into NFT. "This day is almost here," he predicted.
Affect NFT "Think about the value created by social media platforms," said Burke of Outlier Ventures. He said that at present, advertising is the only way to monetize its influence, and influencers can only get a small part of their income. So what happens if we quantify the impact and convert it to NFT?
This "influence NFT" is more than just assessing the number of followers on Twitter. "It enables digital content to assess and quantify community connections," Burke said. This will include online reputation and credibility, as well as the ability to plan and create quality content. ..
Remember in the early days of Twitter, there was a service called "Klout" that could calculate user influence? 2018 ended without grasping the demand, but the appeal of this idea can be understood.
"In theory, any form of digital value stream can be converted into assets," Burke said. He envisions that influential NFTs will be incorporated into the DeFi (decentralized finance) ecosystem, such as being used as collateral for loans.
Music "This industry definitely needs to be creatively destroyed," said Marty, who expects NFT to affect music as well as art and collectibles. It can be said that it has already started. Some artists use NFT as a means to balance monetization and interaction with fans.
Live Nation is one of the world's largest music event companies, hoping to make "moments (short videos to capture precious moments)" collections in music, such as the popular NFT trading card "NBA Top Shot". "We are learning from the NBA Top Shot," CEO Michael Rapino said in an earnings report.
Or, NFT, music, and DeFi may merge. "If we can hold Music Masters in installments, we will be able to earn income as a bonus for streaming media," said Shen of Electric Capital.
Healthcare "The impact on the healthcare industry is huge," Lagras said.
NFT can be used to keep medical information confidential, such as medical history, and to strengthen drug supply chain tracking.
Advertising
"Advertising hasn't received much attention, but website operators should be able to use NFT to sell ads," Marty said.
Fantasy Sports
Sorare is already developing an NFT game where you can use digital player cards to buy and trade virtual football teams. This move will soon be extended to other popular sports, such as American Football (NFL) and Major League Baseball (MLB).
NFT Search
NFT does not yet have a good search service. "NFTs are interesting now, but they are in a state of chaos. This is similar to what happened on the Internet in the 90s before Google," Shen said.
The last one is the most important expectation.
Everything is digital
"Many people still don't understand how big an NFT will be. NFT will apply to everything. All forms of value will appear as NFT," Sfermion Stein said. Wald said. This is a bold statement. Why can we say so much?
"We spend most of our time online," he said. This trend will accelerate in the next 20 or 30 years, and eventually "you will get a lot of digital goods." In the future, when you buy popular sneakers, you will also want NFT, if you get it, you will be able to show off it and use it in Metaverse and on-ear games.
"It may not be limited to this chair," he points to his chair on the Zoom screen, and eventually people will get wine, basketball cards, rare coins, watches, cars, and even their names. He said he wanted an NFT to handle everything. "This is what will happen in the future."