• NFT hype died down
• New projects from Sony and Amazon
• Is the market niche?
In 2021, NFTs, non-exchangeable, digital certificates on a blockchain, were among the hopefuls in the crypto market. Investors found numerous possible applications, NFT collections from Bored Ape Yacht Club or CryptoPunk rose in value at breakneck speed. But the hype has since died down: The trading volume has plummeted and even the large company Meta, which focuses on the digital-analogue mixed world Metaverse, in which NFTs were said to have great potential as a possible central building block, has its NFT ambitions on Facebook and Instagram recently shut down.
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Sony files another NFT patent
But those who are said to be dead live longer: The Japanese tech giant Sony has not yet shelved the NFT market and has recently increased its efforts in this segment. After the company filed a patent back in 2022 called “Tracking Unique In-Game Digital Assets Using Tokens on a Distributed Ledger,” which suggests it should allow fans to track in-game objects owned by eSports players and influencers, the Playstation manufacturer has continued to work on its NFT concept, as a renewed, recent patent application shows. Under the name “NFT Framework for transferring and using Digital Assets between game platforms”, the Japanese have developed an NFT system that is intended to enable the transfer of non-fungible tokens both between different games and between different gaming platforms. In particular, the fact that Sony is thinking cross-platform here could make many observers sit up and take notice, because within the scope of the patent application, not only Sony’s own platforms such as PlayStation 4 and Playstation 5, but also “game consoles from Microsoft or Nintendo or another manufacturer, virtual reality (VR) headsets, augmented reality (AR) headsets, portable televisions (e.g. smart TVs, internet-enabled televisions), portable computers such as laptops and tablets, and other mobile devices, including smartphones, and additional examples”.
Among the NFTs that can be traded and/or transferred across platforms, Sony envisions “a character or a weapon or other game item” among other things.
Amazon to launch NFT marketplace?
The Internet giant Amazon is apparently also about to enter the NFT sector on a large scale. Unlike Sony, however, the US company does not appear to be concentrating on issuing or creating NFTs, but instead has ambitions to create an NFT marketplace. Corresponding speculation had already been circulating at the beginning of the year, for example Blockworks had reported that Amazon was pursuing corresponding goals:
SCOOP: Amazon is coming to Web3, according to multiple sources.
How long could they stay on the sidelines, as millions of consumers see the value of NFTs?
Exclusive from @michael_bodley https://t.co/cK0sQZUqgJ
– Blockworks (@Blockworks_) January 26, 2023
Now the new Amazon project could start as early as April, as “The Big Whale” reports. According to the portal, the world leader in e-commerce wants to launch its NFT platform on April 24 after months of development and some delays. The name of the project is said to be “Amazon Digital Marketplace”, customers can access it through the Amazon website. Initially, however, the platform should only be aimed at US customers, and the marketplace should be rolled out gradually to the rest of the world. The start of “Amazon Digital Marketplace” was originally planned for earlier, but the turbulence surrounding the collapse of the crypto exchange FTX caused delays, The Big Whale continued.
Sony and Amazon address the mass market
The ambitions of Sony and Amazon could help the NFT segment out of the niche and into the mass market. Because the two tech giants have a large customer base, blockchain and NFT concepts are therefore made accessible to a broad public in this way. So far, NFTs have largely been a niche market, and the concept has not yet been mass-adopted.
It remains to be seen how promising the respective advances of the IT giants will be. Amazon may have a better chance of success, because Sony will first have to refute prejudices that the electronics group is facing, especially from gaming customers. Many gamers consider NFTs in games to be cheating, crypto gaming is one of the most controversial topics in the gaming market. Electronic Arts and Ubisoft had also announced in the past that they wanted to develop NFT games and had encountered great resistance in their own communities.
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