Addressing the NFT Dilemma
The global recognition and adoption of blockchain technology have absolutely transformed how we do business, interact, and handle finances. With the recent rise of NFTs, the innovation made possible with blockchain tech has now revolutionized how humanity creates.
Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) are recent examples of how disruptive and impactful blockchain technology can be. Even though NFTs have just been around for a few short years, these unique bits of data on the blockchain now serve as a source of empowerment for creative minds around the world.
While NFTs have had an overall profound impact on the worlds of art, music, and gaming already, there is still a ways to go before the technology we use to mint, buy, sell, or launch is perfected. The overall state of the NFT space is steadily improving each day, but there is no denying that there are several issues detracting from the NFT and blockchain spaces.
These drawbacks have made it difficult for people with the best intentions to make most of NFTs and other parts of blockchain technology.
Here are a few of the major issues holding back the NFT space:
High Barrier to Entry
Part of blockchain’s appeal is that anyone can use it, and it’s accessible to everyone. That being said, the actual minting process for NFTs is a bit complicated for most casual users, and talented artists routinely struggle to create their own projects on blockchain due to a lack of technical experience with smart contracts. Minting NFTs also requires a wallet on the chain you are using, the native currency for that chain to pay transaction fees, and of course, an NFT marketplace.
Those hoping to put their imagination to the test and build a blockchain-based video game or virtual world are also limited by the complexities of smart contracts regardless of whether they are on BSC or Ethereum. That means learning a career’s worth of skills in a short time frame or spending a small fortune on developers if you want to build out a gaming project.
Ethereum is Expensive and Inefficient
Speaking of gas fees and entry barriers, the Ethereum network is notorious for its sky-high gas fees and crippling inefficiencies, especially in the NFT and gaming spaces. Whether you’re minting an NFT, putting artwork up for sale, or simply sending it from one wallet to another, lots of Ether is needed sometimes in the range of hundreds of dollars per transaction.
Unfortunately, Ethereum is home to most NFTs, including some of the space’s most well-known collections like Cryptopunks and Bored Ape Yacht Club. Despite the astronomical fees, affluent NFT investors are constantly on the hunt for the next big NFT collection on Ethereum. Blockchain games also require lots of miniature interactions with the network, making high gas fees fundamentally incompatible with a decentralized blockchain gaming experience.
While gas fees continue to climb, more and more projects and creators are migrating over to other chains like Wax, Tezos, Solana, and Cardano.
Oversaturated with Copycats and Knock-Offs
Amidst the recent NFT fervor, we’ve seen people spending millions of dollars daily on NFT artwork, with trading volume reaching over $10 billion in Q3 of 2021 alone. Despite this impressive milestone, most still find it challenging to make money in the NFT space because the market is overwhelmed and oversaturated with uninspired ideas, similar collections, and knock-off games.
In order to stand out amongst the crowd of shameless copycats, you have to bring something new to the table like unique token utility mechanisms, gamification, decentralized finance applications, or even a metaverse to tie things together supported by captivating lore.
As mentioned before, most creative minds in the space (and most people for that matter) lack the skills or abilities to build out these NFT utilities, blockchain-based games, or DeFi functions. Only a fraction of the creative genius interested in entering the NFT space can realize its vision, while truly groundbreaking original projects are in short supply.
Lack of Access to Funding and Launchpads
Ideas are a dime a dozen. When it comes to NFTs, thinking up a million dollars idea is not the problem. The issue is executing that vision. You have to be skilled as an artist or developer or cough up a fortune to a team of people who can make that dream a possibility.
Let’s say you have the talent to create an original idea, design the artwork, incorporate compelling gamification mechanisms, and incorporate actual utility. In order to make this a reality, you still need a launchpad to debut your work, a marketplace to display it in, and not to mention financial backers that will support you every step of the way. These barriers of entry limit the number of innovators building and creating in the space, a true tragedy in the grand scheme of things.
Neglecting the Metaverse Potential
While people are just now waking up to the possibilities of NFTs, the potential of the metaverse remains largely untapped. Imagine a virtual or augmented reality network one can tether themselves to for virtually any reason, whether it’s socializing, interacting, transacting, playing, performing, or working. This alternate reality allows us to experience the internet in real-time while forging our own alter-egos on-chain.
Even Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has called for the building of more maximalist apps to fit into this future iteration of the internet. Unlike many companies, Facebook understands the potential of the metaverse and is willing to stake the future of the social platform on that belief.
While few of us will have the opportunity to create a multi-billion dollar company, we entrepreneurs need to realize that the landscape is changing. Just as we saw major corporations left behind after failing to embrace the incoming internet era, so too will we see the same for ones that fail to adopt blockchain technology and, more specifically, the concept of the metaverse. Brands will increasingly need to stay ahead of the metaverse curve to remain competitive, making the adoption of the metaverse vital for the survival of legacy industries and businesses, and of course the creation of new ones.
The sooner people and businesses recognize this, the greater the chance they will have to survive and ideally thrive.
Final Thought
The potential in blockchain technology is limitless. We as a species have already been able to accomplish many things with it. Trading & investing, decentralized finance, and play-to-earn gaming have all had their blockchain makeovers, and now it’s time for the art world and subsequent creative spaces to experience the same.
While we are certainly trending in the right direction, there is still a lot of progress to be made, opportunities to be seized, and innovations to be discovered.
Fortunately, projects like Lovelace World are working hard to bridge the knowledge gap to make the NFT and blockchain spaces much more innovative, profitable, composable, user-friendly, easy to navigate, and accessible for all.
About Lovelace World
Lovelace empowers creators to realize the potential of the metaverse through its NFT marketplace, Play-to-Earn gaming engines, smart contracts, launchpad, and partner integrations.
Our Metaverse-as-a-Service toolkit helps creators breathe life into their NFTs, games, digital economies, and worlds across Cardano and other blockchains.
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