It’s no secret that the world of fine art and collectibles has been massively disrupted by technologies stemming from the innovation of Bitcoin.
Non-fungible tokens, colloquially known as “NFTs,” are a relatively new technology that has taken the art world by storm, generating millions of dollars in sales across platforms like Nifty Gateway, Async, SuperRare, MakersPlace, KnownOrigin, Rarible; the list grows. Projects like NBA Top Shot and CryptoPunks are leveraging this technology to create digitally-scarce art and collectibles worth thousands of U.S. dollars apiece!
There have been large sums of value discovered in the realm of digital art and collectibles in the past few months alone. Advancement is rapid in this nascent space, and I imagine we haven’t seen the top yet, but where will it all “end up”?
The First NFTs Were Right Here On Bitcoin (And They’re Coming Back)
Maybe we should look at where it all started. That’s right, the one blockchain to rule them all: Bitcoin. NFTs started in 2015 on BTC with counterparty token (XCP) and rare pepes. While today we are seeing a thriving ETH-based NFT space, many Bitcoiners and Bitcoin artists are ready for a BTC NFT resurrection.
I personally see the value in NFTs for their immutability, uniqueness, scarceness and permanence. You don’t need to do anything to keep up the condition of a digital art piece the same way you would with a painting or print. But if the value of an NFT is directly tied to its permanent residence on a perpetually-secure blockchain, then there’s a clear case to be made for why BTC is the best chain for hashing digital art and tokenized collectibles. Whatever additional layers of protocol it takes to make the perfect platform and marketplace, it’s clearly the BTC chain that you want the data pegged
