Unless you've been living under a rock, by now you surely must have heard of cryptocurrencies. These have taken the world by storm. But the latest craze making overnight millionaires is in the world of NFTs. Take an artist most of us had never heard of named Beeple. He recently sold an NFT for over $69 million dollars, to become one of the most valuable artists in the world. So if you are wondering what an NFT is, how it all works, and what Amazon might have to do with any of it, we'll do our best to break it down into some easy to digest chunks. Amazon is already rumoured to be working on its own cryptocurrency. But can you buy and sell NFTs through Amazon?
What is an NFT?
First, it helps to understand exactly what an NFT is. NFT stands for Non-Fungible Token. This is a unit of data proving ownership of a digital asset, such as a picture, a video or audio file. It works on the same principle as other blockchain technologies such as Ethereum and Bitcoin. the blockchain proves ownership of the item because of the uniquely identifiable set of characters linked to that particular item. Non-fungible means that the item is unique. Whereas a Bitcoin can be swapped for another Bitcoin that is essentially identical, an NFT is more like an original artwork. While anyone can buy a poster of a Monet for example, only one person can own an original version of Water Lilies. The NFT proves who the original belongs to; the equivalent of provenance.
Almost anything can be sold as an NFT: A photo of your cat. William Shatner trading cards. Clips from a basketball game. It is certainly a booming market; NFT buyers grew by 66% in 2020, with the combined value of transactions growing from $63 million to around $250 million.
So with all that in mind, have Amazon got on board with this new technology?
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Can I buy or sell NFTs on Amazon?
With such an enormous rate of growth, what online marketplace wouldn't want a slice of the pie? eBay has already made an announcement to confirm that they will be opening up their market to NFT assets. But what about Amazon?
Well, at the moment, NFTs are not available to buy and sell on Amazon. As far as we can ascertain, it doesn't look as though there are plans for Amazon to adopt them anytime soon either. Whereas eBay have made a very clear public announcement, Amazon have remained completely silent. Of course, this does not mean that NFTs won't become available in the future. But for right now, you'll need to look for a dedicated NFT marketplace if you want to buy and sell digital artwork There are plenty out there to choose from, so make sure you do your research, check how much it will cost, and that it's going to work for you.
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