In the year After its amazing run in 2021, almost everyone knows what Nephrible Tokens (NFTs) are. Although many people don’t know that NFTs constantly get new input functions and use cases.
This article highlights the role of an interesting feature: unlockable content in NFTs. We’ll explain the benefits and use cases and show you how to add openers to your NFT collection.
What is an NFT?
Traditionally, NFTs are defined as unique cryptographic digital assets on the blockchain that can be bought and sold online. They can be anything, including digital images, songs, videos, in-game items, real estate, or your personal genome.
In particular, NFTs offer artists advantages such as decentralization, ownership and management, ease of transfer and trading, rarity and scarcity. More importantly, NFTs will build an entirely new creator economy, where creators can earn royalties from secondary sales by establishing smart contracts without any third-party mediation.
However, despite the obvious benefits of NFTs for artists and society itself, many people are still convinced that they are a temporary fad. NFT skeptics keep repeating, over and over again, that such muddled digital NFT art on the blockchain has, in fact, very little to do with real art.
To be sure, most NFTs exist as various immovable objects on the blockchain to be bought and sold on online marketplaces. And since there’s no middleman, they can be anything, including low-quality content.
However, the public should not forget that the NFT phenomenon encompasses digital art and contemporary overpriced collections because the underlying technology allows creators to do more than individual JPEGs or GIFs.
NFTs enable dozens of use cases. For example, by their very nature, NFTs represent unique tokens that can be “owned” by users, meaning that any NFT can be used as a token, certificate, or key. The spectrum of innovative ways to use this “access control” mechanism to provide value to people is limited only by the creators’ imaginations. This is exactly where the concept of unlockable content comes into play.
NFTs have a huge amount of creativity that artists can use to diversify their practice. Unlockable content is one element that can add real-world value to NFTs outside of digital tokens and bring innovation to it, thereby enhancing the trading experience. Essentially, unlockable content is a key to special things and services that can only be accessed with an NFT wallet. After the purchase, it will be shown to the NFT buyer.
Although unlockable content can be anything but unique, the unlockables often offer links to high-quality NFT files or opportunities to purchase a physical copy, along with shipping details or artist contacts. In addition, unlockable content is a valuable tool to add value to your NFT collection and a great way to generate traction on the secondary market.
For artists, unlockable content is an opportunity to honor and celebrate NFTs collectors by providing an original object with real-world value. In this way, unlockables will result in increased rarity and demand for NFTs.
There are a wide range of ways to use unlockable content in NFTs, and the examples are practically endless. It can be anything from high quality versions of digital images and additional video content to access to private communities or certifications.
For example, musicians can use NFTs with open content to send physical copies of their records or distribute tickets to give fans access to their shows. What’s more, artists can add exclusive behind-the-scenes content to lucky collectors who purchase their NFT pieces.
Although unlockable content opens up a lot of mobile new ideas, the NFT marketplaces it supports can be counted on one hand. This is mainly because NFT marketplaces have two major problems.
First of all, there is the problem of storage. NFT platforms do not offer on-chain storage as it can incur huge costs. Therefore, NFTs are usually stored in centralized file systems such as IPFS, Arweave or others.
Then, if unlockable content isn’t properly stored on-chain, it becomes very platform-specific. This limits the possibilities of creating custom unlockable content and adding it to NFT collections. However, there are a few NFT platforms that have open source content for NFTs on their platforms – OpenSea, Solsea, Rarible and Mintable.
Generally, for artists, when creating NFTs, the option to add unlockable content is available on NFT Marketplaces. In other words, artists can attach objects that can be opened while creating or editing. So, how do you add unlockable content to your NFT collection?
There is not much difference between adding openable content in OpenSea, Solsea or any other platform that supports this. The program is roughly the same. They are limited to plain text content. NFT platforms offer a large text space to add whatever artists choose, such as a history of the work, a message of appreciation or a certificate of authenticity.
The content upload settings that can be opened are limited to the text format, meaning that NFT creators cannot upload any file they want in the form of images or videos. Alternatively, you can easily add links to important files hosted on other storage solutions of your choice, which should organize themselves. Therefore, it is the responsibility of the authors to ensure that the unlockable content lasts for a long time.
Related: How to Create an NFT: A Guide to Creating an Unbreakable Token
2021 was a pivotal year for NFTs, a year of foundation and adoption. Now, in 2022, it’s time to think about multiplying use cases and solidifying NFT’s position as a digital phenomenon. And unlockable content features are becoming one of the important steps in this direction.
Expanding the functionality of NFTs, the content that can be unlocked for NFTs is a limitless field of creativity for artists – simply scale it up. Its importance is difficult to overestimate. Additionally, non-lockable objects add utility to NFTs. With hidden unlockable content that only NFT owners can see, for fans and followers, buying NFTs is becoming an interactive experience with an element of surprise on a new layer of engagement. In this sense, Unlocked has the potential to flourish in the crypto industry and benefit artists and their communities.