As the understanding of the potential and value that NFT can provide becomes more and more extensive, more and more big brands, major investors and venture capital companies are paying attention to and participating in it.
Original Title: “Reviewing 2021: List of Popular Projects in the NFT Ecological Layout”
Written by: NFT Labs
Blockchain is the latest product of the digital age. It has experienced rapid development and many changes in the past few years: from the budding in 2017, the smart contract in 2018, the change in 2019, to DeFi in 2020, and in 2021, NFT is undoubtedly the hottest topic in this field.
2021: The first year of NFT development
NFT first appeared in 2015, the first batch of projects started in 2017, and will usher in rapid growth in 2021. In the first half of 2021, the total market value of NFTs is 2.5 billion US dollars. In July alone, sales soared to $1.5 billion. However, in the second half of 2021, the NFT track gradually became calm. According to nftgo.io data, it can be seen that the number of traders has gradually declined in the past three months.
(Data source: nftgo.io)
Application scenarios of NFT
The initial main application scenario of NFT is virtual collection. Since each NFT is unique and irreplaceable, the use of NFT to encode artworks is in line with the scarcity characteristics of artworks, which makes them very valuable to collectors, artists, and other sellers.
The new NFT project is not only the future of merchandise sales, but also provides musicians with a new way to protect copyright in the era of streaming media and digital content sharing, and creates new economic profit methods for game developers. Although NFT was originally used in art collections, due to its uniqueness and value, NFT has developed into a way for some people to show their wealth and identity by owning NFT. In the future, NFT may also be widely used in the DeFi field, gradually expanding from art investment to a wider range of rare collectibles, real estate, loan collateral and other fields.
The original function of NFT: art collection
Rarible
Founded in 2020, Rarible is a platform for contacting buyers and sellers of digital collections. It allows digital artists and creators to issue and sell custom assets that represent their digital product ownership. It supports digital art, music, domain names, and DeFi insurance. Within the transaction, and allows users to conduct direct transactions without an intermediary.
Currently, Rarible has launched RARI. Rarible hopes to build a decentralized autonomous organization in a virtual community through RARI, where users can use RARI to vote on the platform, creative proposals and artworks.
Rarible is also integrating NFT with DeFi and will cooperate with Yearn Finance and Nexus Mutual in September 2020.
Expansion of NFT investment: land investment projects
Land economy is one of the most unique ways to invest in NFT. Decentraland and The Sandbox are currently the two most powerful virtual reality ecosystems for buying and selling land. In these platforms, users can monetize the land by developing real estate, and even build functional places on the land, such as amusement parks, museums, and galleries, to further monetize their land.
Decentraland
Decentraland, originally created in 2015, was launched in the beta version for the first time in 2017, and has gradually become one of the most powerful land trading platforms in the meta universe during the booming wave of NFT in 2020.
Decentraland is a virtual reality world powered by blockchain that enables users to create content and applications, and provides users with multiple digital collectibles such as packages, wearables, names, and heritage. Users can own digital land, including different structures and unique building sets. In addition, users can purchase virtual land in Decentraland, connect to the wallet through a web browser to set an avatar, create a representative of a virtual identity, participate in governance and trade rare digital collectibles.
The Sandbox
Founded in 2011, The Sandbox is a decentralized gaming platform where players can create and own their own game world and profit from virtual real estate created by themselves. In The Sandbox, digital real estate is called LAND. Players can purchase it and add games and assets freely. Multiple LANDs are combined to form ESTATE.
The Sandbox also created SAND, which users can get through playing games, or through purchase and creation.
Although both are virtual real estate projects, their functions are slightly different. Decentraland only uses the ERC-721 standard, while The Sandbox plans to cooperate with Enjin to support and implement the ERC-1155 standard in the game, which makes The Sandbox more compatible. In addition, there are also differences in user activity between the two.
(Data source: NFTGO.io)
From the data point of view, the total market value of the two is the same. The Sandbox provides more NFT options, and the overall transaction trend. There are more buyers than sellers, indicating that a steady stream of newcomers have entered the user base, and this part of people is more than selling assets. people. From the perspective of 30-day liquidity, The Sandbox has better liquidity performance and faster asset flow.
Decentraland (Data source: NFTGO.io)
The Sandbox (Data source: NFTGO.io)
According to the above two Traders charts (the trend chart of the number of buyers and sellers), you can intuitively see the trend of the number of traders. Both of them have relatively large trading volume volatility within 30 days. It can be seen that two projects are still in the early stage. The user volume is not large enough, there is room for growth, and the transaction volume is also susceptible to other factors and activities.
NFT community: continuation and development
CryptoPunks
CryptoPunks was established in 2017. Each punk is generated by an algorithm. The total number of punks is 10,000. Among them, human punk is the most common type, while other types of punk are more expensive due to their scarcity. For example, zombie punk has There are 88 ape punks, and there are only 9 alien punks.
At the beginning of the release of CryptoPunks, anyone with an Ethereum wallet could claim it for free, but due to the total limit, 10,000 punks were quickly claimed. After that, if people want to get punk, they can only get it through purchase. Each punk has a different background and different appearance characteristics, and the owners of rare punks can obtain profits through auctions.
List of basic data of CryptoPunks (data source: NFTGO.io)
NFT Collection market share (data source: NFTGO.io)
The total transaction volume is a basic indicator that can indicate the number of sales between users and the total value of exchanges. This indicator is largely affected by the growth of new players, giant whales, and pre-sales. It can be seen that the market share occupied by CryptoPunks is very large. Among the many NFT collections, the transaction volume and the number of transactions are considerable. The number of giant whales is as high as 163, showing the strong position of the old NFT. As can be seen from the figure below, even from the perspective of the 24-hour trading volume and the highest transaction price, CryptoPunks, as the old-brand leading NFT, still performs well and tops the list.
24-hour trading volume and highest transaction price (data source: NFTGO.io)
Bored Ape Yacht Club
Bored Ape Yacht Club is similar to CryptoPunks. It is an NFT collection of ape avatars with more than 10,000 people. Users can freely create the characteristics of apes and have a variety of types. The project features cartoon great apes with different attributes and rarity. The cheapest great apes cost about 6 ETH. BAYC was just launched in April this year, and the 10,000 apes it provided quickly sold out within a few days, with a total price of US$24.3 million, an average of US$200 per ape. In addition to using these as digital avatars, NFT has another purpose. Every BAYC NFT holder can join a member-only secret club for life.
The BAYC project is so popular as soon as it is announced because it provides a wealth of options and diversified features. In BAYC, the characteristics of apes can be randomly generated by algorithms, so each ape has a unique background style, clothing and hat, earrings, eyes, mouth and fur, which undoubtedly meets the needs of people today to show their individuality.
Compare Bored Ape Yacht Club with CryptoPunks:
(Data source: NFTGO.io)
Comparing the two, it can be found that in addition to the overall volume, the highest price and the average price are quite different. The average price of assets is an indicator that needs to be interpreted carefully, because each project has assets of different scarcity and value, so the average price may be biased. However, for buyers who have bought a large number of NFTs, it is still an indicator to measure this type of asset. The indicator of maximum price should also be carefully considered. Every sale may have background factors that need to be understood in order to fully understand the special value placed on high-value assets, which is also an indicator that some collectors value.
Cross-border applications and integrated platforms
Flow
Flow was created by Dapper Labs, the parent company of NBA Top Shot. It is a blockchain platform designed for NFT collectibles and encrypted games. In 2017, Cryptokitties developed by Dapper caused congestion in Ethereum. In this context, Flow came into being. It is now considered the foundation of a new generation of applications, games and digital collectibles.
Flow is a blockchain that aims to expand widely to provide fast and low-cost transactions. It has developed various consumer blockchain applications, including CryptoKitties, Dapper Wallet and NBA Top Shot, and provides developers with And trading specific types of NFTs.
Flow has a rich ecosystem, including top entertainment brands, development studios and venture capital startups, and its ecological partners include global IPF brands such as Warner Music, NBA and UFC. Top developers and some world-class brands have already built on Flow and realized new experiences through top-level content. Users can purchase the process on cryptocurrency exchanges such as Kraken and Gate, or interact with Flow by purchasing artwork through NBA Top Shot or from the VIV3 NFT market.
NBA Top Shot
NBA Top Shot is one of the top NFT projects created by the NBA in cooperation with Dapper Labs mentioned above. It is built on the Flow blockchain, not on Ethereum. This is an officially licensed blockchain application launched by the National Basketball Association of the United States to trade collectibles with Dapper Labs.
In the Top Shot platform, fans can buy, sell, and trade officially-licensed numbered versions of specific video highlights, freeze the exciting moments in the stadium, and become a virtual product that can be owned and traded, and includes player statistics and Information about the transaction history of NFTs. On the NBA Top Shot platform, a limited number of NFT packages are released every week, and the price depends on their rarity. These NFTs are certified by the NBA for shooting, and the buyer has the authenticity and ownership of the exclusive moment.
In addition to the highlight moments on the court, Top Shots also contains player statistics and player history information, which is like a virtual star card, providing fans with new collection objects.
Enjin
Enjin was established in 2009 to develop a gaming network. In 2017, it launched Enjin Coin (ENJ) and began to develop a specially constructed blockchain ecosystem for NFT. In 2018, Enjin announced one of the world’s first multiverse games, and now more than 40 game developers use its platform to create games. Enjin’s products have powered more than 1,300 blockchain marketing activities, providing gamified online participation for companies such as Binance, CoinMarketCap, Kyber Network, and CoinGecko.
Enjin has developed into an ecosystem of integrated digital products for trading and game monetization. Developers can use Enjin coins to mark in-game items on the Ethereum blockchain. On March 31, Enjin launched Efinity, a next-generation NFT blockchain based on the Polkadot protocol.
Enjin is one of the most popular encrypted NFT projects, providing various digital products for game monetization and trading. According to reports, in March 2021, Enjin reached the highest market capitalization of all NFTs and has the greatest growth potential in 2021.
Summarize
As the understanding of the potential and value that NFT can provide becomes more and more extensive, more and more big brands, major investors and venture capital companies are paying attention to and participating in it. Independent blockchain game developers have also begun to successfully attract venture capital. Although the future path of NFT faces challenges, as a new and young field, there is still room for overall growth. We look forward to more new NFT projects to open up our imagination.
