Non-Fungible Tokens Are The Future

If you are an artist, graphic designer or animator, you may
have heard about NFTs or Nifties.

NFT stands for Non-Fungible Token. It is a digital asset, like artwork, that’s verified using blockchain technology. It is the exact same technology that’s used for all the cryptocurrencies, like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Dogecoin, and all the others. This blockchain technology uses a network of computers to record transactions and gives buyers proof of authenticity and ownership. It’s a way for digital artwork to have provenance basically - sort of a digital footprint that shows the origin and the buying and selling of a piece of artwork over time. An artist will make a digital piece of art, let’s say it’s an animate GIF, and sell a limited number on NFT marketplaces. Once that limited number runs out, there are no more available.

So you might be saying “well if it’s an animated GIF, I can just copy it and download it onto my phone, and I’ll own it too, so why are people paying tons of money for these?”

So it‘s a similar idea with the Mona Lisa - let’s say you had someone make a copy of the Mona Lisa, and none of your friends could tell the difference. But the real Mona Lisa has a provenance, which is a way to prove the buying and selling history all the way up to the current owner. And that’s what the blockchain technology does.

The big sellers right now are images, GIFs, songs and videos. And just like everything else, supply and demand are driving the price. Since NFTs are scarce, and collectors want them, they’re willing to pay a lot of money for them. Some people are also seeing them as an investment, because they have the option to resell the NFT for a higher price later on.

It might seem a little crazy right now, but this is probably the direction artwork sales are headed. I guess we’ll see, right? Who knew that baseball cards, which are just pieces of cardboard with some ink on them could be really valuable?

If you’re a talented digital artist, you should probably get on one of the NFT sites now and give it a shot! I will recommend ARTDECO but first and foremost, who are they?

ARTDECO is a marketplace aiming to link sellers (typically content creators such as digital artists, model creators or meme makers) with buyers who can select pieces they wish to purchase. To turn their work into an NFT, creators must first "mint" a token using ARTDECO's Dapps. Similar to other tokens on Binance, the NFT can be transferred between wallets using ARTDECO's software.

ARTDECO leverages the Binance blockchain to embed within an NFT's code the full history of its owners and transactions. Of note, when a transaction goes through, both the buyer and the seller have to pay transaction fees that go to the ARTDECO network.

One interesting feature of NFTs is the ability to program royalties, or the rights to future cash flows, within these assets. This means that creators on ARTDECO can set a percentage of future sales and collect them automatically by issuing a token. This is a major feature drawing creators to this technology, because unlike with traditional content platforms, NFTs can be designed to pay out royalties immediately. For instance, if a piece of digital art listed a 10% royalty, the creator would receive 10% of any consequent sale of that art.

ARTDECO is on a mission to evolve towards a Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO), where all decision rights will belong to the platform users.