by Santi & Ray

Non-fungible tokens, or better known as NFT’s, are crashing the market right now. Let’s figure out why. In the year 2012, the first official Non-fungible tokens or more commonly referred to as NFT’s were first made. These tokens are so valuable because they’re tokenized drawings. 

So what are the origins of NFTs? NFTs are tokenized drawings that stockholders can purchase for various prices typically ranging from $1-$900, and even sometimes being worth a lot more. However these drawings are specific, see for many years art has been around and has been purchased. Art has been considered a thing ever since the year 30,000 BP and has been part of the market for not too much shorter. However with the internet on the rise and duplicating drawings being more common and easy, certain drawings and pieces of art lose their value as replicas look the same and that most original art pieces are stored away in art museums. With the internet you can buy these NFTs and purchase the drawings and have ownership of them meaning you can sell and purchase. However with all this being said we take a dive into why they all of a sudden have become popular despite art being existent for much longer.

With that being said we ask why are NFTs all of a sudden blowing up in popularity? The big reason why NFTs have blown up so suddenly is because of 2 things with the first being “CryptoKitties” and the second being human natural collecting instinct. So firstly what’re CryptoKitties? Originally CryptoKitties started out as a Canadian developed video game where you would earn money and buy kitties. However as time went on they then made the feature to spend real time money and make actual investments from within the game to buy these kittens at fluctuating prices.

 This was such a hit that they then created their own market called Ethereum’s underlying blockchain network. This was such a hit that other digital artists decided they would make their own drawings and sell them on the market in mid 2021 which then led to NFTs blowing up in popularity and popularity to the point where it is at now. Now the second reason I pointed out is human natural collecting instinct. Research has shown that humans have a natural instinct to buy more than they need for example, sneaker heads won’t own only 1 pair of shoes, and designer fashion models won’t have only 1 of 2 outfits, they’ll have multiple ones making them feel the urge and instinct to own more than they need.

 Another psychological comparison is food. Typically we (humans) only eat 3 meals a day and have a small meal throughout varying parts of the day, however when we make purchases we try to get as much as we need until we’re satisfied with the amount. The only difference is once you’ve eaten your food you have none left meaning you need to go back whereas wearing a pair of shoes once won’t take its toll on them.

In conclusion, NFTs have blown up in the past year or so for many different reasons. These can include having the feeling of owning something expensive, popularity, and even just collecting something and having ownership of it. With more and more people on the internet every single day, NFTs will continue to contribute to our daily spending and what we do on the internet with our money.