The first NFTs were issued in the spring of 2017, when Matt Hall and John Watkinson, two programmers in Brooklyn, created a set of collectible characters consisting of little pixelated heads of punk-rock-looking creatures they called CryptoPunks. Here are some NFT highlights:
- Definition – NFT stands for “non-fungible token.” In economics, a fungible asset is something that can be readily interchanged, like money. Non-fungible means it has unique properties and cannot be readily interchanged with something else. Ethereum’s ether (ETH) coin is a cryptocurrency, like bitcoin, dogecoin, or litecoin, but its blockchain stores extra information that tokenizes art, collectibles, and even real estate. Ethereum was architected to facilitate blockchain-based smart contracts, explaining why most NFTs are based on this blockchain platform.
- Charlie Bit My Finger – Origin Protocol sold the iconic viral video, “ Charlie Bit My Finger” for $760,999 to 3F Music, according to a company tweet. Dubai-based music studio 3F Music clearly has capital to invest in this emerging market, having also purchased several other high-priced NFTs, including “Overly Attached Girlfriend” ($411,000), The New York Times’ meta NFT-column ($560,000), and Disaster Girl (see image below).
- CryptoPunks – Christy’s once again reaffirmed the strength and depth of the NFT market when it auctioned a collection of 9 CryptoPunks for $16.9 million on May 11. Created by Larva Labs in 2017, CryptoPunks is one of the earliest NFT projects and consists of 10,000 small pixel-art portraits of people, zombies, aliens, and apes. Each one was algorithmically generated and features such different attributes as hairstyle or glasses — a uniqueness that made CryptoPunks valuable as collector’s items.
“Disaster Girl” — a photo taken by Zoë Roth’s father in 2005 that became a meme due to her smirking while a house burned down in the background — was sold as an NFT for 180 Ether, about $500,000, to Dubai-based 3F Music on Apr. 17, 2021.
- Virtual real estate – Toronto-based artist Krista Kim sold the first digital home, named Mars House, for 288 Ether, or $512,000, on non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace SuperRare on Mar. 22, 2021.
The “first NFT digital house in the world” sold for more than $500,000 as global interest in virtual design continues unabated.
- Beeple – The preceding three NFT sales records were topped on Mar. 11 when Christy’s auctioned an NFT of a collage of 5,000 mostly digital illustrations by Mike Winkelmann, better known as Beeple, for $69 million.
- Grimes – On Feb. 28, Canadian musician Claire Elise Boucher, known as Grimes, sold $6 million worth of artworks on Nifty Gateway.
- NyanCat – On Feb. 19, artist Chris Torres sold a version of his 10-year-old Nyan cat for $534,159 or 300 ether.
- NBA Top Shot – One of the first high-profile NFTs was a video highlight known as a “moment,” which showed a LeBron James dunk. The NFT sold for $213,000 on Feb. 6, 2021, via NBA Top Shot. NFTs certify ownership of an original asset, even though everyone can see and download the same video clip for free.
- Mainstreaming – Proving that the NFT concept is mainstreaming, fast-food chain TacoBell got in on the action offering the NFTacoBell on NFT marketplace Rarible.
Members of the voice-only social network Clubhouse know that NFTs are a hot topic these days, which is music to the ears of all artists. What we’re witnessing is a fundamentally new trend, the digitization of assets.
Ubertrend Categorization: Digital Lifestyle.
NFT Gallery (with more TK)
On Apr. 25, 2021, Nifty Gateway auctioned a Paris Hilton NFT, “Iconic Crypto Queen,” for $1.1 million. Part of Hilton’s new series called Planet Paris, the artwork was created in collaboration with designer Blake Kathryn
