While I certainly can't claim that DeFi doesn't have any value; I also can't claim that $UNI didn't motivate me to explore the DeFi trend and see if I can't become a Junior Chad. That said, at some point the DeFi trend is going to get stale, new protocols and new food coins will stop being created and will stop offering massive gains to some and serious burns to others. Imho, the next topic that will become a crypto buzz-word is going to be NFTs. If you've not already taken an interest in the NFT space, or simply weren't convinced that it would be better than yams or sushi; the simplest explanation is that an NFT is a provably scarce digital asset secured by cryptography. While NFT's have essentially infinite use-cases, the most valuable are definitely gaming assets and digital art. Gaming as an industry will only grow and expand as the world continues to adjust and adapt to being more and more digital. Considering that its already a 40 billion-a-year market, the potential of NFTs in the gaming space is massive. There's already a surprising number of games integrating blockchain technologies to allow players to truly own their in-game items, with some games even developing cross-compatibility of NFT assets. (eg: The Forge Hammer; if owned by a player it can be used in at least 8 different games) What's even more enticing than truly owning your loot, being able to sell it on secondary markets, and take it into other games; is the fact that blockchain-based games are replacing the all-too-familiar "pay-to-play" business model with "play-to-earn." While that may seem like a counter-intuitive decision from a business standpoint, it's actually proving to be very beneficial. There's exponentially more incentive to spend time or money on a game when presented with the oppurtunity to steadily earn back that investment, or even make a tangible profit. As an example, this article was written about a Phillipino family who are making more from playing Axie Infinity than they would be making by working a full time job.
While I could likely spend hours discussing the potential of NFT assets to completely revolutionize the gaming sector; I'm even more amazed (and far more bullish) on the benefits that blockchain, smart contracts, and NFT protocols offer to creatives.
While digital art isn't a new concept by any means, the ability to prove its authenticity and scarcity is an incredible innovation. Not only are artists, musicians, writers, etc. able to instantly prove the authenticity of their work, they're also able to monetize their creations without any third-party interference, access a global audience 24/7, and even established automated royalty payments on secondary sales of their work; forever. I'll take the oppurtunity to use myself as an example. During the first wave of #trashart hype, I ran a poll to determine whether or not I should create/publish the idea I had for a #trashart piece, which led to the creation and tokenization of "The Trash Supper". The piece was created as an edition of 10, which, after several weeks of being unnoticed (aside from a friend buying one) were all purchased by one person, and almost immediately resold at a profit, and several of the editions have changed hands multiple times. Point being, every time the one of the editions of "The Trash Supper" has been sold, regardless of me being unaware of it, I automatically earn a percentage of the purchase price in royalties.
The piece was orginally sold at a trash art price of 0.0125 eth for each edition, meaning that the edition used as a reference is providing me resale royalties with higher value than the primary sale.
As a fairly incredible coincidence; while checking twitter and collecting my thoughts for a few minutes during the writing of this article; my confidence in NFT season growing closer by the day has just been unshakeably verified due to mentions of cryptoart by several influential names in the space.
- Ari Paul of BlockTower
- 'Pomp'
- Scott Melker [The Wolf of All Streets]
If you don't have any NFT's yet, you're running out of time pretty rapidly. Despite the evidence saying cryptoart is strapping into a rocket, I'll be leaving a number of pieces priced for accessibilty on Rarible, as well as on Atomic Assets.
There seems to be an excess of platforms available to create, collect, and sell NFT's; (especially on the ETH network) but luckily there are people in the space who are looking out for the artists and other creators that are juggling eight thousand things every day trying to keep track of what's new and relevant in the space while it's moving at an unbelievable pace. One of the best examples of this is CryptoArt Net, created by Clyde Smith. It's likely you've used Linktree or something similar to manage your social media links; CryptoArt Net could be tought of (as a high level concept) for CryptoArtists. Instead of trying to keep track of all of your social media, your market links, portfolio sites, etc.; you can list all of them on your CryptoArtNet profile page. While an aggrated page for links is certainly convenient; it also offers the added benefit of functioning as a directory of artists working in the NFT space, all in one place (so long as the artist has created an account).
In fact, CryptoArtNet has a few other great features as well; a web directory for educational articles/blogs regarding cryptoart and NFTs, a regularly updated publication about the goings on in the cryptoart world (CryptoArt News) as well as a "social currency" issued by Roll, CryptoArtist Coins, also known as $CRAC. As an example of the layout and resources that are made available, you can visit my cryptoart directory page. With the #CryptoArt space being discussed by some of the most well known people in the space, new artists flocking to Rarible in droves, and highly reputable Crypto Publications creating NFT-Focused content; it likely to be great time to be a cryptoartist with a but of experinence, and definiely a good time for "traditional" and Web2 artists to enter and learn about the NFT Metaverse.
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