You must have heard quite a bit about NFTs – Non-Fungible Tokens. You may also have seen headlines going around the social media about people spending millions of dollars on digital collectibles that range from sports cars to shoes. The reason the NFT market is growing quickly is because the space is no longer limited to art, and in order to earn money with nft all types of items are being sold as tradable assets.
It goes way beyond what we used to see with the trade of online game items – these days you are able to trade real stuff and keep control over your property through Ethereum smart contracts – each item has its own unique ID, which is called ERC721 token.
NFTs are a new type of digital asset. Ownership is recorded on the blockchain — a digital ledger that can be used to record any transaction as long as the Internet connection is available. Just like it works with Bitcoin and other cryptos.
Each NFT is unique and belongs exclusively to its owner. Think of them more in terms of collectibles rather than traditional assets. You typically purchase one for yourself or another person rather than share ownership with others. Owning an NFT is also an investment opportunity, since many people will want to own these items later on, either due to scarcity or higher demand.
You might wonder what constitutes an NFT. It is basically any virtual asset that has the real-world value, and you can buy it with various currencies – for example NBA Top Shot lets people use credit cards to purchase their assets. At the same time there are platforms allowing only cryptocurrency.
At the same time, should you be interested in selling your own digital artwork, I’m going to give you two examples of how this can be done. One – where someone buys an artist’s work for thousands of dollars; another is when they sell something worth just $5 – but this time only made out of paper cutouts instead of pixels.
Where to buy NFTs
So you want to start your own virtual collection of NFTs. There are a few places where the items can be purchased, OpenSea being one of the most well-known marketplaces for digital art and other collectibles, not just limited to cryptocollectables. It’s set up in a similar way to an online gallery and mostly functions as an auction house – potential buyers submit their bids on the items of interest. At the same time some listings let you “buy now” instead at a set price.
Before you can get started, your money needs to be placed into a digital wallet. To be able to spend it, make sure that the app is set on Ether and then buy tokens at an exchange rate (if necessary). Once you have the Ether ready in your account, you are ready for action.
Just think about how many available games are out there. Every time I walk into an arcade or video game store I feel excited – once inside I will have fun playing one way or another. The same idea applies to NFTs, and platforms like OpenSea in particular – trading is being made fun.