Hello there! It's Lacks, your totally-not-an-art-snob art collector! I guess! Ever since @juliakponsford was teasing her upcoming art site I was interested to find out how these "NFT's" work. (And I'm going to be honest I still don't really get it) The site that Julia created is called NFTShowroom. Make sure to follow their Hive Blog account too @nftshowroom!
What is an NFT?
They are a type of Non-Fungible Token. An example of a nonfungible asset you can hold would be a concert ticket. They look identical to other tickets at first glance, but each one has different customer names, row numbers, and seat numbers. Digitally, NFTs can be used in a similar manner to create verifiable scarcity and provable ownership. You will most often hear about NFTs online when it comes to Crypto Card Games as well as the Crypto Art scene.
Why should I collect NFTs?
NFTs create a way for digital objects like artwork to be tokenized. It mitigates the duplication of such artwork and limits the ownership for the artist. This in turn creates scarcity for the artwork and thus creates value.
What's stopping me from just right clicking and saving the art instead of buying it?
Technically... Nothing. But what's stopping you from going to Staples and getting your favorite Rembrandt printed out to hang on your wall? Authenticity? Originality? Rarity? If those are checking boxes for you then you already understand why people pay for NFTs. The same goes for cards in the digital card game world. You wouldn't print off a Black Lotus Magic The Gathering card and try to pass it off as legit to your friends, or even strangers, would you?
So, now that we got that out of the way, let's take a look at my first purchases. I own 4 pieces in total that I bought via the converted HBD earned off my posts. I simply logged into the site using Keychain and set up my profile with my website, Twitter, and Instagram. Buying the NFTs is pretty simple. You need to convert some of your Liquid Hive into Swap.Hive tokens on the Hive-Engine site and use that to buy your artwork! Once you have some Swap.Hive tokens in your Hive-Engine wallet you can add the artwork to your shopping cart on https://nftshowroom.com and when done buy it just like any online checkout! Let's take a look at two of the art pieces I purchased.
Virtually Worthless(*) NFT by @richardfyates
Virtually Worthless is an attempt by the artist to flood the market with low-cost NFTs so that everyone can own at least one piece. It's a simple and clever plan to try and get people into that collecting mindset. But that isn't what made me purchase it. What made me purchase it is the little "translation" tag. "People paid money for this shit?"
It sums up what I initially thought of NFTs. I didn't get them. I didn't understand the appeal. Digital artwork seems so temporary. I don't have any saved photos from my teen years when I first got a computer. It didn't make sense to me why you would want to prove ownership until I thought about it like buying a license to use images commercially. Then it started to make sense. You can use these NFTs however you see fit if you own the commercial license.
Narloth by @kristyglas
Narloth is the first NFT I purchased, simply because I like the artwork. It reminds me of the Elites from Halo crossed with a bug of some sort, with the horns and antenna. According to the write-up, The Narloths are a species of dragons known for hoarding treasure. It is rumored that one even possesses the fabled sword in the stone of King Arthur. Amusingly, Narloth dragons also possess a somewhat weak memory and sometimes forget what they possess. Which can make it extremely difficult to find the treasures if you are a treasure hunter.
According to their post the dragon heads are a thank you to engagement on her posts. But she also wishes to spread the NFT art bug in a similar manner to Richard, by posting later editions at a lower price than the earlier editions. It's almost like the collectors who just have to have 1st edition prints are subsidizing cheap art to help other users get their first NFT's while not hurting the artist's wallet. It allows new users to grow their art collection and new artists to the site to grow their brand!
If you enjoy art and collecting artwork I recommend you check out the NFTShowroom today! The community is growing fast. I'm seeing new artists releasing artwork every day! There is some cheap art on there to get you started down the path towards being a digital art collector.
I bought myself a new laptop and have a Wacom tablet. Expect NFTs from me once whitelisting opens up to more users!
Thank you very much for the mention <3
Hope you like the latest dragon ^_^
Woah! That is really cool! Thank you very much!
Hivelander The Mannequin is there too ;-)
"Virtually Worthless NFT"... I love it!