NFTs first emerged back in 2014 with several others following over the next few years. But these early NFTs didn’t come anywhere close to the widespread popularity of the later launches and remained relatively unknown except to people who had an extensive understanding of crypto and blockchain technology. It wasn’t until 2017 that NFTs became more mainstream for the typical consumer. A key development in the increased popularity was when NFT collections began launching on the Ethereum blockchain. The previous blockchains had made trading and transferring ownership of NFTs difficult. The interest in NFTs continued to steadily increase into 2021 when one sale was too big to ignore. The artist Beeple became the first to sell an NFT through a major traditional auction house. The Christie’s auction for his “Everydays: The First 5000 Days” closed at over $69 million, and suddenly the mainstream was no longer ignoring NFTs.
Fast forward to today, and research from dappGambl (via Watcher Guru) found that out of 73,257 NFT collections, 69,795 NFTs have a market cap of zero Ether. But NFTs are still showing signs of life and interest from businesses and consumers. High-value brands, including the Premier League, Louis Vuitton and McDonald’s, announced plans for NFTs in 2023. I believe there remains a future in NFTs—and with it, there is an opportunity to evolve.
What The Future Entails
NFTs go beyond mere collectibles. Their unique digital certificates can prove ownership of real or virtual items, like art, music or even your car. Stored on a blockchain, they’re like one-of-a-kind digital keys that can make buying, selling and trading more efficient and secure and reduce the possibility of counterfeits or fraud. Smart contracts, self-executing agreements on the blockchain, could be used to automate certain aspects of ownership transfer, like property taxes or inheritance processes.
Other potential uses of NFTs that I see include providing secure and verifiable digital identities for individuals who lack traditional forms of identification, such as the unbanked or undocumented. Users could choose what information to embed within the NFT, potentially offering greater control over personal data than centralized databases.
The facilitation of novel asset-sharing models and marketplaces for previously illiquid assets like art or intellectual property also falls under the realm of possibility of NFTs. They can represent ownership of fractionalized assets, allowing for micro-investments in real estate, art pieces or other valuable items that have historically only been available to more wealthy individuals.
