Thread by @CroissantEth

NFTs are blowing up, and I believe what we have seen is only just the beginning.

These unique digital tokens have a wide range of use cases, but there are a lot of big things people aren’t talking about...

I’ll list some food for thought below... 🥐

Digital Art

One of the most popular examples of NFTs is digital art

Any creation can be tokenized by creators with NFTs, integrating & building a new level of connection between communities

These are configurable with many different programmable parameters on smart contracts

Tickets

This topic has big use cases for $ETH as a whole

Tickets can easily be made for events, with benefits exceeding that of current systems

For example, the Dallas Mavericks have discussed using NFTs as tickets to collect more revenue from royalties

Jewelry

As soon as a diamond leaves the Jewelry store, it loses nearly half of its value

This is largely because they aren’t a very liquid asset, & don’t have any form of verifiable authenticity even slightly comparable to NFTs

The applications of NFTs here are obvious...

Sports

NFTs in sports have grown significantly thanks to the creation of projects like NBA Top Shot and Chiliz

NBA Top Shot allows for fans to trade and own officially-licensed video highlights

Chiliz takes it a step further with some tokens offering exclusive content for fans

Creator Tokens

Any creator can make independent economies with unique control over their interactions and experiences with users

Content creators are usually subject to standards maintained by a 3rd party who take a portion of earnings, making these tokens even more attractive

ENS

The Ethereum Name Service uses NFTs in a way that is similar to the way website domains work

They can be registered, sold, or used to prove unique domain rights to a given .eth name

Additionally, you can receive $ETH to your ENS (i.e nft.eth) instead of a wallet address

Licenses

NFTs can be created to digitally represent agreements between two parties

The content represented on the NFT can then be commercialized on the wider market by the owner of the token

This allows for an unmatched level of freedom & value for the new type of asset class

Real Estate

NFTs appear to be a great solution for real estate

Real estate is often limited to only those who can afford such investments, & there is a lack of liquidity

However, NFTs could introduce fractionalized tokens, changing everything for the market as we know it today

Digital Real Estate

Digital land, unlimited by physical space like land today, can be tokenized and used to build entire economies that are owned by the players

When VR technology becomes more popular, virtual land could eventually evolve to a trillion dollar marketplace

Music

A problem all too common within the music industry is record labels and larger corporations taking up all of artists profits

NFTs offer a direct platform for creators to sell their work directly to their fans, while making it a whole lot more profitable!

Gaming/Esports

This is a use case I think we will begin to see more of in a matter of weeks

$GME appears to be working on an NFT platform that is integrated with games

Social tokens, in-game currencies, in-game items, donations, & more are likely to be represented here as NFTs

Supply Chain

There is a ton of friction in the supply chain industry due to some difficulties in accounting

Utilizing NFTs, suppliers can easily monitor their inventory levels, avoid third party fees, reduce errors in data optimization, & spot mistakes in order forms!

Metaverse

NFTs on $ETH will power a universe beyond our own

This will be propelled by virtual reality technology created by some of the largest companies in the world

We’re talking about matters of augmented reality, virtual ad space, tokenized in-app purchases, & much more...

Memberships

NFTs can even monetize access while avoiding third party apps

Just define the amount, duration, & price of your content, & you can integrate an NFT that works on any website!

The content can only be viewed when one is connected with an $ETH wallet holding the NFT

Intellectual Property

Intellectual property, much like open source development, had previously been hard to sustain because it was intangible

With NFTs, we are given verification & digital representation to this entire asset class that was not possible before

Decentralized Identity

NFTs have great potential for verifiable and probable scarcity on a public ledger

When combined with decentralized identity protocols, the authenticity of NFTs will be indisputable

This will also make the general public feel a lot more secure using them

Exclusive Content

NFTs are almost like a giant platform of an evolved Patreon, but without the middleman

They connect communities with each other better than ever before, and this is evident in their insane growth

Truly exclusive content tools are at the tip of creators’ hands

Fractional Ownership

Similar to the fractionalized real estate ownership concept mentioned earlier, NFTs can be created to represent a handful of different assets.

This opens up investment opportunities that were almost unimaginable for the vast majority of people

Disintermediation

A common pattern seen in the largest companies existing today is their unique ability to connect consumers with creators more directly

This increases many things for profits, interactions, and general user experience

Patents

The field of patents, maintained by records at patent offices, are limited in many ways

You can’t have fractional ownership of, or even publicly trade patents

Quite obviously, NFTs could play a large role here in what would be a greater ledger of decentralized records

Tokenization

Anything that can be represented as a stream of value can be turned into instantly transact-able assets easily with NFTs

They will not only create entirely new asset classes, but also entirely new creator economies

The extent to which this can be used is unlimited

Royalties

NFTs have programmable parameters at fullest advantage to users

Lots of companies miss out on a large portion of secondary sales made by scalpers

However, if these items (such as tickets, games, or shares) were NFTs, they could capture fees from secondary markets

Marriage (yes, seriously)

Coinbase employees chose to get married not in the traditional way, but instead on $ETH with use of NFTs

This example is obviously a bit speculative, but I included it to show just how much they can be used for

Marriage NFT:
etherscan.io/token/0x961cf9…

All these use cases of NFTs are the primary reasons why I believe we may never get another shot at a form of digital authenticity like this again

We are watching the transition to the Web3 economy, owned by the users

TLDR? NFTs are far more than just digital art. Enjoy! 🥐